Limited Extra Time - Chapter 179

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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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A Doomed Extra’s Time

A long romance fantasy novel by Ja Eun

A Doomed Extra’s Time

Special Side Story 4

“I was planning to leave once Seren came of age and established himself securely.”

But now, even that has become impossible.

Since she said it, Millaiyen has no choice but to honor it. Her words are law, after all. He can only live faithfully.

“You’re mine, aren’t you? And I’m yours. You said so yourself, Carina Leopold.”

His murmured voice held no strength.

That.

Time and again, unbidden, the thought of leaving crossed his mind.

The child grew stronger and taller with each passing day, yet Millaiyen could not shake the feeling that he remained frozen in that moment, in that world where she once was.

After composing himself, he slowly lowered his gaze to the next sentence.

[Millaiyen, I said this—

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don’t be disheartened. Of course, if you truly did that, I would be disappointed and might even cry. …Well, not just a little—quite a lot, actually.]

Millaiyen’s pupils constricted sharply. He hurried his gaze to the next sentence.

[Of course, I truly do wish for your happiness. If you continue to suffer and grieve because of me,

it would be terribly difficult for me. Oh, there’s hardly any white space left on the paper. This always happens.]

Millaiyen, surely you’re not upset that I only left a miracle for Seren?]

Millaiyen shook his head reflexively. He had felt regret before, perhaps, but never resentment. …probably.

[I don’t know how long has passed since I died by the time you’re reading this letter, but you did well, Millaiyen. You endured so much. I’m proud of you. Thank you for coming all this way to read this. It must have been lonely and difficult, wasn’t it? You probably had to hold back in front of Seren, pretending everything was fine. I’m sorry for burdening you alone with this weight.]

Millaiyen’s breath caught. She had pierced through the part he had deliberately ignored,

wounding him deeply. His pupils trembled faintly. He closed his eyelids slowly, then turned his gaze to the next line.

[There’s a small gap beneath the bed in our room. If you put your fingers in the gap and open it, I’ve prepared a gift inside. It’s in place of all the birthday gifts that have accumulated. I was happy that you, the only light in my world, became Seren’s father, and I was blessed to be your wife. Always

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you don’t need to be a strong father. Sometimes come to me and share your weakness too. Millaiyen, I love you.]

The letter, which had filled an entire page of the diary, came to an end.

Millaiyen stared at the final sentence for a long time before quickly rising to his feet.

He lay down beneath the bed where Seren slept soundly, oblivious to the world, and reached out his hand to feel along the floor.

The bed was quite large, so the small hole wasn’t easy to find.

As he slowly moved his fingertips, gauging Carina Leopold’s arm length,

something suddenly caught on his fingertips.

When he inserted his finger and pulled gently, the floor opened. As he reached his hand into the shallow cavity, he felt soft fabric.

He carefully withdrew the object.

It was a small cloth pouch. Something solid was inside, and when he took it out, it was a rough stone.

“What is this?”

As he furrowed his brow, he heard rustling and shifting sounds from behind.

“Dad…?”

“Seren, why aren’t you sleeping more? Did I make too much noise?”

“No. Is that Mom?”

Seren shook her head at Millaiyen’s question and clambered down from the Bed, asking curiously.

She gazed quietly at the stone he held in his hand, then shook her head.

“It’s a gift Mom gave to Dad. I’m not sure what it’s used for, though….”

It must have held some significance, yet at first glance it appeared to be nothing more than an ordinary stone.

Seren’s eyes sparkled with curiosity as she snatched the stone from his hand.

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Mana flowed from the child’s fingertips and soon seeped into the stone.

In that instant, the stone began to emit a brilliant blue light.

-Ah, Millaiyen?

At the same moment, that familiar voice—one he had yearned for countless times—reached his ears, and Millaiyen froze.

“Carina….”

-Is this recording correctly?

-Yes, it’s recording. Humans are truly remarkable. The way you struggle so desperately to leave traces of yourselves behind.

Ajidahaka and Carina Leopold were conversing.

She had not returned to life. This was undoubtedly one of many recordings she had carefully prepared from that time when she contemplated death.

“Mom! Mom! Ajidahaka!”

-Yes, it’s Mom. How have you been, Seren?

“Yes! How is your journey going, Mom?”

Seren’s eyes sparkled brilliantly as she asked eagerly, bouncing on her feet with such unbridled excitement that she nearly tumbled headfirst into the stone.

Millaiyen caught the teetering child and settled her onto his lap.

-Yes, Mother is traveling well. I miss our Seren so very much.

He narrowed his eyes slightly.

‘Has he prepared responses based on the tone of voice and content being expressed?’

Considering that Ajidahaka was a Dragon, perhaps such a feat was not particularly difficult.

And I could imagine how much thought Carina Leopold must have devoted to anticipating all of this.

“I miss Mother too. Where is Mother traveling?”

“Mother is….”

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After conversing gently with the small stone for some time, Seren soon yawned and rubbed her eyes.

“Seren, if you’re tired, let’s get you to sleep.”

Millaiyen adjusted the drowsy child, who was nodding off, and rose from his seat as he spoke.

“Mmm, but Mother….”

-You can see Mother again next time, Seren.

At Carina Leopold’s words, the child nodded with half-closed eyes.

Once she was laid upon the bed and the blanket drawn over her, Seren drifted swiftly into slumber.

Millaiyen gazed at the stone emanating its soft blue luminescence for a long moment before slowly opening his mouth.

“…Carina Leopold.”

His voice cracked at the end.

His voice flowed out heavy as stone, as though crushed beneath a boulder. Even muffled and faint, the magic bound to the stone understood it perfectly.

-Yes, Millaiyen.

“…Carina Leopold.”

-Yes.

“Carina Leopold, Carina Leopold.”

-Mm, Millaiyen.

The response had changed. Millaiyen’s pupils dilated wide.

Millaiyen’s face contorted as though he might weep.

It was a voice he had drawn and redrawn countless times in his dreams. The very voice he had desperately struggled to hold onto in his fading memories, refusing to let it slip away.

It was a voice.

“I missed you. I missed you so much. I missed you so terribly.”

Millaiyen clenched his teeth.

Words that had always drifted aimlessly through his mind, with no one to hear them, finally spilled from his lips.

The moment he had someone to tell, they began pouring out uncontrollably.

-Yes, me too. I missed you. Have you been well?

“Yes…. No, I haven’t been well…. Without

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you, I feel like I’m dying.”

At Millaiyen’s words, the stone fell silent for a moment. A faint sound of laughter seemed to echo from the stone, but that was all.

-I missed you too. I hope you’ve been happy and well.

Carina Leopold still envelops me in her warmth with that tender, gentle voice of hers.

A voice uniquely hers—one that could never be heard in the cold, harsh, and combative Northern Territory.

It was a voice.

“…Yes.”

Millaiyen responds like a child, then slowly lifts his hand to press firmly against his eye sockets.

Despite having long since crossed thirty, it feels as though I’ve returned to those days—back when I knew only curiosity and how to charge straight ahead.

“Are you happy? How are things there?”

-It’s good here. A wonderful place to live.

Dragon is here too. And Ajidahaka became a god. Did you know? He’s been so kind to me that I see you and Seren every single day.

Millaiyen laughs awkwardly.

Her considerate imagination—as if telling me not to worry about her—draws a genuine smile from my lips.

It might actually be true. Ajidahaka was a Dragon, and he held considerable favor toward her.

Perhaps he really did become a god.

“Well, I’m grateful for that. Seren is doing well. Growing so fast it’s almost troublesome. Day by day, he becomes someone I don’t quite know, and that feels both strange and a little frightening.”

Children grow in leaps and bounds overnight.

Unlike those days when I knew everything about him from start to finish, he now has friends I don’t know and secrets he keeps.

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Living with two powers—divine and magical—Seren has gradually stopped showing signs of struggle.

Whether the hardship has truly vanished or he’s simply grown strong enough to bear it alone, I cannot say.

….

No response came from the stone.

‘It seems she didn’t anticipate this far.’

Everything up until now had aligned far too perfectly, in a way that made my skin crawl.

It felt as though I were truly conversing with Carina Leopold herself.

“Am I doing well? Carina Leopold?”

-Yes, you’re walking forward properly. Because you’re Millaiyen, you’re doing well right now.

At the sound of Carina Leopold’s voice, Millaiyen slowly leaned his back against the chair’s rest. Merely hearing her voice lifted his spirits.

“Even though you died, the world continued on without a hitch. As if nothing had happened, the sun rose and night fell and morning came again. I hated that so much. The fact that even if my world disappeared, the world wouldn’t change.”

Millaiyen spoke.

“I hated that you were my entire world.”

It was only natural, yet it was unbearably painful. A world that continued on perfectly fine without her—I couldn’t accept it.

“I used to love the daytime, but now I prefer the night. Because I feel you a little closer, and I remember you a little more vividly.”

The blue light began to flicker gradually. It was clear that her gift would soon come to an end.

“The light in the stone is fading, so you’ll be leaving soon. I know I won’t be able to hear your voice again, yet I can remain so composed—is it because I’ve grown accustomed to this situation by now, or has my affection for you dulled that much? Either way, it terrifies me.”

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I was afraid of myself growing accustomed to her absence, and I feared the self that was becoming used to it. Though my complaints would go unanswered by the stone, which had already recorded its message.

There was one thing he knew would certainly receive an answer. Words he wanted to hear again countless times, words he would never tire of hearing for the rest of his life.

“I love you, Carina Leopold.”

He had naturally expected an answer to come

back. An answer of love. Those words he had anticipated would whisper back to him countless times.

But the stone remained silent.

“….”

“Carina Leopold?”

It was when I called out in bewilderment.

-…You’re doing well. When Seren was ill, you didn’t sleep and nursed her by your side. When Seren wanted to do something, you let her do it freely, and when she did something wrong, you scolded her strictly.

Even when it was hard, you endured it. You even quit smoking for Seren.

The voice coming from the stone was clear and distinct. And it was strange.

All of it was what Millaiyen had done after she died. Perhaps it was something I could have anticipated. But it was far too clear and detailed for that to be the case.

-That we can part ways without tears, with composure, means we’ve grown. While promising to meet again someday.

“…Carina Leopold, you.”

My voice trembled at the end.

This was absolutely not the kind of thing she could have anticipated. And it wasn’t something I could answer so naturally.

It felt as though… I was conversing with the real Carina Leopold standing right before 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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