I’m Sick of the Kind Protagonist, so I Might as Well Just Die - Chapter 46

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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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#46
Crack.
The railing Leonas gripped shattered under the force of his grip. His gaze remained fixed upon the gazebo at the garden’s center. Even from such a distance, he could see with perfect clarity what Aurelia and Perenustus were doing.
“The legal owner of a toy has simply come to retrieve it—why are you angry?”
Bilateia Fernichiosa Venisike gestured toward the gazebo with a subtle jab at his pride.
Between the white columns entwined with climbing roses, a man swept his hair back gently while his lips curved upward, and a woman with flushed cheeks smiled brilliantly. The two of them appeared so naturally part of the landscape, as though they had always belonged there.
“The more I look, the more they resemble a painting—such a perfect pair.”
“….”
Instead of answering, Leonas ground his teeth audibly.
“I cannot discern which troubles you more—the husband who suddenly burst in, or the woman who carelessly wandered off and now laughs like a fool?”
Though she spoke with feigned leisure, Bilateia’s heart thundered against her ribs as though it might burst free. Leonas narrowed his eyes and glared at her as if to ask: how could she not understand?
‘The entire sequence has changed! All the knowledge I’d prepared is utterly useless now!’
Bilateia read his thoughts from the mere meeting of their gazes and twisted her lips.
Her heart raced no differently than his. Yet she continued this performance for one reason alone: she felt it—a piercing sensation like countless fingertips stabbing from all directions, a clarity of observation that was unmistakable.
‘This is maddening. What is this gaze? It must be the Ancient Gods watching. Why did that damned professor even enter here? As if intruding upon the Worlds wasn’t enough, now he’s dragging an audience along?!’
Bilateia cursed silently and viciously, then glanced sideways at Leonas. His eyes flickered once, barely perceptible. Continue naturally. The two exchanged silent agreement and resumed their performance.
“So then. How do you intend to compensate me for today’s troubles?”
“Compensate? I owe you?”
At Bilateia’s unexpected words, Leonas raised his eyebrows sharply. She nodded brazenly while lifting her chin.
“Uninvited guests have walked through my garden with such audacity—all because of you. Therefore, you owe me proper compensation.”
“Is there anything you desire from me? I alone am the one yearning.”
Leonas countered her rebuke with a pointed truth. Bilateia pouted her lips, then concealed her expression behind her fan.
‘I need to get to the Dark Space and strategize with this fool.’
‘Sigh… I cannot tell if the scene has ended or if this is merely an intermission, so I dare not speak freely.’
An ambiguous stretch of time elapsed—neither clearly the end of a scene nor a definite intermission. Just as they exchanged a glance while observing Aurelia and Perenustus, who remained absorbed in each other, everything shifted.
The fountain’s water ceased its murmur entirely.
The wind that had crossed the garden, the water droplets that had glimmered in the sunlight, even the faint humming that Perenustus had been murmuring—all froze as if suspended in amber. Someone had forcibly wound down the world’s mechanism, and a suffocating silence and oppressive pressure descended in an instant.
-I ask of the wise ones.
A voice quieter than silence itself struck both their bodies. It resonated like a vibration striking not the eardrums but the brain directly.
Leonas, startled by the tremor that echoed not from his ears but from within his skull, forced his trembling eyes to fix upon Bilateia’s face. Her gaze spoke volumes: I hear it too.
-The vermin that disturbs the god’s farm, and the lazy farmer who fails to eliminate such pests. Which of the two is the problem?
It was not a question. It was a command and an incitement. Leonas instinctively tried to lower his head, but the gods’ will forcibly fixed his gaze toward the gazebo.
-Do not avert your eyes. Look. Do you not wish to become the first disciple to surpass the Creator?
As laughter-tinged provocation reached them, both clenched their fists. It was obvious that sharp fishhooks lay hidden within that bait wrapped in curiosity and benevolence.
‘I must not take the bait. One does not make contracts with gods carelessly.’
As both carefully withheld their responses, their vision twisted violently. The garden’s landscape transformed into a torrent of massive data, and fantastic visions began pouring down like a waterfall.
Colossal steel warships navigated between stars, filling their retinas with the cities of a galactic civilization. The trajectory of blue propellant cutting through the pitch-black cosmos wrapped around their bodies.
“Ahhh!”
As a startled Bilateia screamed, Leonas swiftly pulled her into his embrace to shield her. The moment both squeezed their eyes shut and opened them again, the landscape had transformed into thousands of swords filling the sky, their blades severing causality itself.
Beneath the feet of warriors who charged toward one another with billowing robes, the earth fractured. The instant both flinched at the blades cascading toward them, an otherworldly cacophony erupted—magic and machinery belching pale steam, their sound assaulting their ears.
Doors between the Worlds opened and closed in chaotic succession, with no semblance of order.
-We, the Ancient Gods, have made a wager with you. To the victor, we shall grant the right to traverse any World of your choosing.
“….”
-For those of exceptional talent, this World must seem rather mundane and suffocating, would you not agree?
Leonas Hagpethar Yuletanis’s eyes shifted. The Ancient Gods did not miss that change, and they injected vivid imagery directly into his mind—not this place saturated with lace and the scent of perfume, but himself wandering through endless, dust-choked wastelands. His throat convulsed visibly.
-Would it be merely the freedom of movement? If you wish, we could elevate you to the position of administrator.
This time, Bilateia Fernichiosa Venisike’s eyes blazed with fervor. Amused by her reaction, laughter tinged the voice of the Ancient Gods.
Even as Bilateia Fernichiosa Venisike heard that laughter, she turned the words of the Ancient Gods over and over in her mind.
Administrator. The one who weaves the narrative of the Worlds directly. Not a supporting player in this theatrical production, but the very architect of the stage itself. That single word lodged itself immovably in her consciousness.
‘Do not be deceived. Bite the bait, and the hook pierces your mouth.’
And yet.
-What sweeter temptation exists than the power to mold an entire World to your whims?
As though they had read her thoughts, her vision shifted once more. The vast, undulating vistas of strange Worlds converged into a single form.
A colossal loom. She could instantly comprehend that the warp and weft ceaselessly woven by the loom constituted the narrative that shaped the Worlds. As both of them stared in rapt fascination, an enormous hand casually reduced the loom to dust.
-Weaving is laborious, yet destruction is so effortlessly accomplished.
Suddenly, her vision cleared to reveal a pair whispering in the Gazebo. The Ancient Gods placed a transparent glass cup directly over Perenustus’s form.
-When a flea leaps without knowing the height of the sky, it falls to an observer to place a cup over it and teach it the limits of its world. We wish for you to become the transparent, unbreakable cup that shall contain such fleas.
With that declaration, pale light began to coil like threads from the fingertips of both Leonas Hagpethar Yuletanis and Bilateia Fernichiosa Venisike. The tingling sensation of the light wrapped around their wrists, traveled up their elbows and shoulders, and seeped into their chests, transforming into warmth.
-Experience firsthand how intoxicating it is to reshape terrain with a mere gesture, to twist the fates of characters with your will.
Leonas Hagpethar Yuletanis gazed at the light spreading across his fingertips and clenched his fist. The sensation of light gathering in his palm was vivid and familiar. It did not feel foreign. Rather, it carried the weight of filling a space that had been empty for an eternity.
Bilateia Fernichiosa Venisike extended her hand slowly, as though entranced, wreathed in light. The slowly coalescing luminescence settled across her palm before melting away like snow. Her fingers trembled faintly.
‘Just once.’
Both of them thought the same thing simultaneously. Just once to accept this, and then I shall proceed on my own terms.
-It pleases me to see your satisfaction. We shall accept our recompense through your actions.
The suffocating pressure that had constricted their throats vanished instantly. The muffled sound of the fountain and the chirping of birds, which had grown distant and dull, returned to clarity in succession.
The ambient sounds of everyday life restored themselves. The sunset glow, the shadows cast upon the gravel path, the wind chimes swaying beneath the Gazebo’s eaves—all remained unchanged.
Only the hearts of the two figures standing upon the Terrace had soared to a place far removed from the mundane.

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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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