Black Killer Whale Baby - Chapter 317

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Side Story: Act 42
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“Thank you for showing me such a wonderful place.”
Night had fallen. Father had told me not to stay out this late.
‘It won’t be me who gets scolded—it’ll be Calypso.’
I spent the late hours with Ruga. The night market’s lights shone brightly.
Even as night fell, the festival overflowed with sights to behold.
I had just returned from watching a spectacular diving performance by the goldfish Beastkin.
This leisure was possible because Tus, who had stepped away for a moment, had returned.
– Calypso, I found the way!
Tus shouted confidently that we could leave immediately, saying he had gotten lost once before but this time he was certain.
I gazed at Ruga while cradling Tus against my chest.
“I won’t forget what happened today.”
“…”
“How kind you were, how tender.”
“…It was nothing special.”
Ruga spoke quietly. Was she embarrassed? For some reason, her atmosphere felt slightly different.
I felt Tus squirming faintly against me and gazed up at the sky.
“…This place felt like a different world.”
“A different… world?”
“Yes. A peaceful world where no one was sad or fought?”
Perhaps someone would call it an ideal world.
If I had awakened here right after completing my second playthrough, I think I would have wanted to stay and live here.
I smiled softly.
“I’m taking the most precious thing from here.”
“…The most precious thing? Did I… give you something?”
“Your heart.”
Ruga’s eyes widened slightly.
“It was the most precious thing to you, after all.”
I glanced around briefly, then took everything in with my eyes and blinked.
The last thing I gazed upon was Ruba.
In the darkness, her pale cheeks were faintly tinted by the flickering lights of the distant night market.
Her flushed cheeks. Her wavering eyes.
“When my memories return, I will think only of you and give you my answer.”
“…”
“Ah, but I already confessed, didn’t I? So this might be meaningless?”
I moved my hand to signal Tus.
“Thank you for making this truly enjoyable.”
It was time to return.
A faint golden light began to spread beneath my feet.
The scattered lights around us were like fireflies in a forest shrouded in darkness.
“Thanks to you, I was able to forget about all those troublesome things.”
How could I not be anxious? Every time I found myself adrift in an unfamiliar timeline.
Yet when I opened my eyes, miraculously, you were there. Always so unchanging.
“I hope you’ll be happy with me.”
It might sound a bit strange, but you don’t mind, right?
After all, I’m going to leave anyway.
That was the moment.
My wrist was seized.
Ruga’s face before my eyes came into sharp focus. That peculiar expression I had seen countless times today.
“Noble Lady. Or rather, Calypso.”
And… a face as if he had found the answer.
“Who are you?”
My eyes widened.
* * *
“Protagonist, I want to become a teacher like Hyeong-un!”
This was when I was three years old. Back in those days when I spent my time with Lugaru, eating lunch together as a matter of routine.
While Ruga stepped away for a moment, Ruba’s eyes sparkled as he spoke.
“Hyeong-un has to learn lots of hard things. I think running around and playing is more fun!”
“How hard is it that you can see?”
“Like, like, time, history, all sorts of weird stuff!”

It was a remark I hadn’t taken seriously at the time.
“Is that so? Ruga seems like he’d make a wonderful teacher.”
And not long after, I met Illia and heard that Ruga was the Matriarch’s successor. So I forgot about it.
Until I heard something similar when he was a bit older.
“My brother wanted to become a teacher. But now that’s difficult, so… he reads about other things very diligently.”
“Is that so? What does he read about now?”
“Celestial bodies. The sky.”
Among dolphin beastkin, there are many scholars, teachers, and professors. They love both receiving instruction and imparting it.
Ruga would have made a fine teacher.
It would have suited him well.
* * *
“You’re… not the Calypso I know, are you?”
I was more shocked in that moment than I had been at any other time. Perhaps even more than when I first opened my eyes in this world and met Ruga.
More than when I received that kiss on my cheek just moments ago.
“I thought something was off from the very beginning.”
Ruga spoke calmly.
For a fleeting instant, I recalled the Ruga of the main timeline, who had always quietly assisted from my side.
That child who, as the castle’s head retainer, resolved all matters with composure and steadiness.
“When you first appeared, an anomaly was detected in the sky.”
I listened to Ruga’s explanation in silence. Depending on what I did, it would affect the relationship between Calypso and Ruga in this place.
I couldn’t answer hastily.
‘Is he angry?’
Ruga was certainly calm. Not angry, yet not entirely serene either—his expression was somewhere in between.
But if what Ruba mentioned about celestial bodies and the sky was true, it seemed to be about constellations.
‘When I arrived in this timeline, wasn’t it daytime?’
“There was a field of study I once wanted to pursue because I dreamed of becoming a teacher. Later, I didn’t abandon it because I wanted to become a scholar.”
“….”
“There are countless universes in this world, Calypso.”
“….”
“And sometimes, with incredibly slim odds, on days when universes overlap, the sun disappears for a moment.”
Ruga said gently that he never thought he’d witness it in his lifetime.
‘Since I know nothing, I can’t even tell what’s true and what isn’t.’
Perhaps Ruga was relying on intuition, throwing out a theory to see what would happen.
When he heard that his beloved had suddenly lost her memory, wasn’t he unusually composed then as well?
Perhaps he harbored suspicions all along.
‘Have I met too many cunning people?’
I sighed inwardly and looked at Ruga.
Eyes as transparent as water.
The moment I saw those clear eyes, all my tangled thoughts vanished like they’d been washed away.
I see now—I don’t want to deceive this child. I don’t want to betray him.
“Yes.”
I nodded readily, breaking into a wry smile.
Perhaps this Calypso’s expression when she smiled was different from mine.
“I appreciate the explanation, but I’m afraid I didn’t fully understand it.”
“….”
“I know you studied hard and that’s why you became a Teacher. You really worked so diligently for it, didn’t you?”
“…How did you—”
“How do I know? I know you well. Just as you said.”
I tapped my chest lightly.
“I’m Calypso too.”
I thought I’d truly experienced every conceivable thing. My daughter suddenly fell into my third playthrough.
And now I’d tumbled into a timeline where everyone seemed peaceful and there were no conflicts.
Yet despite all this.
“I’m glad I met you. Because of you, I realized what I’d been missing.”
Here, I could indulge in something, however briefly.
My peaceful adolescence.
Something I could never have dreamed of in the main timeline.
I laughed playfully.
“I don’t think there’s ever been a moment in my life quite so fresh and peaceful as this.”
There was love, but that love was always like a rushing current, or a waterfall. Like a flower blooming amid urgent circumstances.
“Thank you. I had a wonderful experience because of you.”
“…Are you really Calypso too?”
“That’s what they say? Don’t worry, I’ll be leaving soon. Your Calypso will open her eyes right after I’m gone.”
I glanced up at the sky.
If Ruga was right, would the same thing happen in the sky when I disappear?
“I should go now.”
“Where are you going?”
“To where the Ruga I know is.”
Indeed, the world rewards those who live long. Who would have thought I’d hear about time from Ruga, not Ekion?
“And everything I said was sincere. Though I wasn’t the one confessing, I was happy to hear your feelings. The way someone could care for me like that.”
“….”
“No matter how many times I hear it, it always brings joy.”
I extended my hand, offering a handshake.
“I think the me in this place must have been happy because of you.”
The time for parting had come.
Ruga slowly reached out and took my hand. I thought it was merely a handshake, but—
“…!”
The distance between us closed abruptly. I blinked.
Ruga asked in an innocent yet composed voice.
“Did the me there not confess?”
It was as natural as the moon setting and the sun rising for this child—his tone carried the certainty of something inevitable.
“Or perhaps you couldn’t bring yourself to say you love me?”
As if the me in that place found it just as natural to care for me.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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