I Was Just Having Fun With The Time Limit - Chapter 168

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

Suddenly, a poem I had loved in my childhood came to mind.
Before I called his name,
he was merely a gesture, nothing more.
When I called his name,
he came to me and became a flower.
That was how Arun appeared to me.
It felt as though I had poured the water of life into a wilting flower that had lost its vitality.
‘His face has… changed so much.’
How much time had truly passed?
I felt Arun’s hand gripping mine tightly.
That hand was as large as my biological father’s hand that I remembered.
It felt like I was holding the hand of an adult.
“Isabel…”
I heard ragged breathing.
Arun seemed to have forgotten all language.
He simply repeated my name—Isabel, Isabel, Isabel—over and over, tears streaming down his face.
‘Ah… this does seem like a touching moment of reunion.’
I wondered if I should really be like this.
‘He’s really handsome.’
The boy I remembered was nowhere to be found; instead, I saw a complete man.
The boy’s appearance had been beautiful too, but it was nothing compared to now.
I wasn’t sure if it was appropriate for this situation, but I genuinely wanted to ask.
‘Are you even human?’
No, he was a dragon.
In any case, this didn’t match the situation, and someone might call me thoughtless, but this was something you had to experience to understand.
My jaw simply dropped, and I could see nothing but his beauty—a phenomenon I was experiencing for the first time myself.
“Isabel!”
The male lead Arun from the novel, who valued dignity and composure, pulled me into a tight embrace.
Though his arms were wide and strong, strangely, Arun felt like a young child to me.
Without thinking, I raised my hands and patted Arun’s back.
Arun cried, his body trembling as though he had become a young child.
As some time passed, Arun seemed to regain his composure.
“…Thank you for coming back.”
“Thank me? I should be thanking you more.”
I explained to him what had happened while I was unconscious.
“It felt like someone kept pulling me into a dark, deep place. But then I heard a voice. For such a long time, every single day, a voice that never gave up on me guided me toward the light.”
“…”
“I think that voice was you, Arun.”
Without that voice, I would have sunk deep into unconsciousness and never awakened again.
“How much time has passed?”
“Seven years.”
It would have been a lie to say I wasn’t shocked.
That meant I only had three years left.
“I see.”
But I didn’t let it show on my face.
If I revealed my sorrow here, Arun would crumble.
‘In the novel, I was portrayed as a protagonist with an unwavering spirit, stronger and more resilient than anyone.’
So why did I become so small before him?
Perhaps it was because I carried Beolkkot’s consciousness within me.
Had my mental maturity failed to keep pace with my physical growth?
Arun gently caressed my cheek.
‘Huh?’
His fingertips felt as though they were tipped with feathers.
A delicate tickling sensation that began at my cheek spread through every corner of my body.
“It’s real.”
“What, what is?”
“You really woke up.”
Arun pulled at his own cheek with his other hand, stretching it out.
It extended like supple dough, bouncy and elastic.
Should I bite that? No, that’s not it.
“It hurts. This isn’t a dream.”
Arun laughed brightly.
His eyes were still bloodshot, yet his smile was the warmest and most radiant I’d ever seen.
It was like sunlight itself, enough to make me happy too.
Arun rose to his feet.
Then he leaned down and placed a gentle kiss on my forehead.
“I don’t want to be apart from you for even a single second.”
Ah, but.
Did he have feathers on his lips too?
A tickling sensation that began at my forehead rippled down my throat and reached my chest.
My chest tingled strangely.
“But I can’t keep this joyful news to myself alone.”
“….”
What was this feeling?
I found myself drawn to Arun’s lips.
His lips were unusually crimson and warm.
Beneath his lips, I could see his Adam’s apple, like an apple seed.
The Arun in my memories was still a boy, and he didn’t have such an Adam’s apple.
His features had definitely become sharper and more defined than before.
Below his Adam’s apple were shoulders far broader than I remembered.
“I’ll go inform them that you’ve awakened.”
Arun rose to his feet.
I thought there couldn’t possibly be anyone in this world with proportions as perfect as my biological father’s—no, even better than his.
When did he grow so tall?
I found myself captivated, gazing at Arun’s retreating figure as though under a spell.
I was experiencing firsthand that the novel’s phrase “so many fell lovesick merely from watching him” was no exaggeration whatsoever.
“Ah, but I don’t want to leave.”
Arun approached me again and took my hand.
“Just thirty more seconds, then I’ll go.”
For reasons I couldn’t explain, his hand felt impossibly warm.
I startled and pulled my hand away.
Words materialized above Arun’s head.
[?]
[Did I hurt her?]
“S-sorry. Your hand felt so warm.”
Arun brought his own hand to his cheek, checking its temperature.
In truth, my explanation made no sense.
Arun was currently in human form, and human body temperature hovers around 36.5 degrees Celsius.
How hot could 36.5 degrees possibly be?
“It was warm. Sorry.”
The facts seemed irrelevant to Arun.
“I’ll be more careful next time.”
“Huh?”
He definitely just said careful, right?
Arun gazed into my eyes with an enigmatic expression for a long moment.
Perhaps his expression was the same as the one I remembered.
Maybe I was simply perceiving something enigmatic in those eyes that wasn’t really there.
“Why… why do you keep looking at me like that?”
Without thinking, I averted my gaze from his.
Holding someone’s eyes for this long felt strangely uncomfortable.
“Because you’re beautiful.”
Ah. This scene.
I remembered it.
This kind of scene appeared frequently in the novel.
The next line was usually this.
「”Because this moment is precious.”」
“Because this moment is precious.”
It was a scene that often happened when I was with Ria.
The Arun in the novel would become overwhelmed with happiness merely from gazing at Aselia, not knowing what to do with himself.
He would gaze at her for a long time, basking in that happiness, and when Aselia asked why he looked at her that way, he would simply answer: because you’re beautiful, because this moment is precious.
A sudden clarity struck me like a bolt of lightning.
‘But I’m not the heroine…’
An unsettling anxiety bloomed within me—what if I were merely an unwanted variable inserted between two people destined to love each other?
* * *
Sermon dragged a bound man before me.
His crimson eyes gleamed as he smiled lightly.
“I’ve brought him, Your Majesty.”
Among the miracles I had wrought was the “Isabellic System.”
This grand revolution had enabled mana power plants to generate magical energy and distribute it across the world, allowing common people to benefit from magical civilization.
Currently operating on a trial basis in Alpea and Jirdel, the five remaining kings were already pleading desperately for the Isabellic System to be implemented in their realms.
Yet wherever profit and progress flourished, corruption and greed inevitably took root.
“He siphoned mana that should have reached the people and sold it in secret. Moreover, evidence has emerged that he attempted to steal core technologies and sell them to the Magic Federation.”
Sermon’s smile never wavered.
Upon seeing that smile, the man prostrated himself on the ground, begging desperately.
His clothes, originally white, had already turned crimson.
“P-please, spare my life.”
“What shall we do, Your Majesty?”
Sermon continued with a radiant smile.
“Given that he attempted to insult your very spirit, the gravity of his crime is certainly not light.”
“Sermon, what do you think should be done?”
Ron and Sermon were not in a typical father-and-son relationship.
In particular, Ron carried a certain debt of gratitude toward Sermon, though he struggled to know how to interact with him “properly.”
Yet over these seven years, the two had built a remarkably deep bond and sense of kinship.
“I suspect that simply killing him would be ineffective. Such creatures are like cockroaches—no matter how thoroughly we exterminate them, they continue to spawn.”
“You seem to have a good idea in mind.”
“I believe we should sever his tongue—beep—and then beep—and finally beep—so that beep—would be most fitting.”
This “beep” was Sermon’s own ingenious creation.
It was a euphemism replacing words of extreme cruelty and horror.
Sermon spoke this way because “Isabel would likely disapprove.”
Thus he independently refined his language, and remarkably, Ron understood every word.
This was one manner in which Ron and Sermon communicated.
“I see. That would serve as a warning to others as well—an excellent approach.”
“Then I shall proceed accordingly.”
Sermon drew a short blade from his robes and approached the man.
He smiled brightly and licked the blade lightly.
“There will be no forgiveness. You committed the very act I despise most. I’ll make sure you experience the most beep— and beep—.”
At that moment, Biatone burst through the door without knocking.
“Your Majesty!”
“Do not interfere. He has defiled Isabel’s name.”
“No, that’s not the issue at all!”
That kind of thing?
Ron’s expression darkened.
Biatone had grown far too powerful over these seven years, making it difficult to strike him carelessly.
If they were to fight properly, the Capital City would be blown away, so lately they hadn’t been able to spar much.
“It’s been a while since we last fought….”
“The Princess has opened her eyes…!”
Whoosh—!
A tremendous gust of wind erupted.
Crash!
The window shattered.
Ron was already gone from this place.
He had thrown himself through the window.
Biatone cried out loudly.
“What am I supposed to do when both of them just disappear like this!”
The man was clinging to Biatone’s pant leg, pleading for his life.
He begged earnestly, saying he would never make such a mistake again, that his thinking had been shallow, and that he would do anything if only his life were spared.
A voice was transmitted through magical power.
[Grant him a special pardon.]
“…Yes? Suddenly?”
[In Isabel’s name.]
No further words were heard.

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