Limited Extra Time - Chapter 52

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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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—— Page 1 ——

“Have you seen my eyes in full?”

Periel Kalos lowered the flute slowly as he spoke.

I watched the golden light recede from her gaze like an ebbing tide, and my lips parted deliberately.

“Your eyes, Periel Kalos… they were truly beautiful.”

At Carina Leopold’s words, Periel Kalos caught his breath.

“Like a flower blooming and fading in the light of the sun.”

Her candid observation was the sort one rarely voiced directly to another’s face. It gave me some measure of understanding just how distant she kept herself from others.

Though Periel Kalos recognized that her words carried no profound meaning, he could not suppress the peculiar sensation that stirred within him.

“Of all the compliments I’ve ever received, that one feels the most luxurious.”

Periel Kalos spoke with a low, gentle laugh. Carina Leopold gazed up at him intently before nodding.

“So why did you suddenly stop playing the flute?”

“I thought it might be easier to move about.”

Periel Kalos opened the door wide with confidence.

As Carina Leopold hesitated with a puzzled expression, Periel Kalos seized her wrist and pulled her out of the room.

“No one will disturb us.”

At his assured words, Carina Leopold’s brow furrowed.

As she followed Periel Kalos down the Corridor, she discovered the reason without difficulty. A Maidservant, apparently a servant, lay collapsed on the floor.

“You didn’t… kill her, did you?!”

Carina Leopold’s voice trembled with shock as she spoke.

“What? No, no! Of course I simply fell asleep. I would never kill anyone, no matter the circumstances.”

“Ah….”

At Periel’s troubled expression, Carina Leopold’s face drained of all color before flushing a deep crimson.

Watching her complexion shift by the moment, Periel burst into quiet laughter.

“My, I never imagined Carina would take me for a murderer.”

“That’s not it…, it’s just that this is my first time experiencing something like this.”

I never expected I could actually put someone to sleep.

—— Page 2 ——

Despite the Manor surely being full of people, the surroundings were eerily silent. As she walked down the corridor, she gazed cautiously toward Abelia’s Room.

Periel caught her hand just as she reflexively reached for the door handle.

“You mentioned there were conditions, didn’t you?”

“Ah….”

Only then did she pull her hand away from the handle with a startled expression.

That’s right. If I open it myself, it will only create a passage back to where I came from.

Periel laughed at the sight of Carina and instead grasped the handle, pushing the door open.

“…You really are something.”

She murmured softly.

Abelia was slumped over her desk, fast asleep.

Carina gazed quietly at the sleeping Abelia, then swept her eyes across the room filled with lace, dolls, and ornaments before turning away.

Once outside Abelia’s Room, she made her way directly to the Study.

“Is there someone you wish to see?”

“Someone I wish to see?”

“Yes, everyone has fallen asleep, so you may go and visit them if you’d like.”

“No.”

Carina Leopold answered without the slightest hesitation.

There was no one she wished to see—not even anyone she had thought of in the past few months.

As I walked toward the Study, my heart thundered in my chest with an intensity that felt almost unbearable.

I knew well that this sensation stemmed from fear.

The urge to flee consumed my thoughts entirely.

Merely imagining facing him made my breathing shallow and labored.

Periel Kalos observed me quietly as my complexion drained to an ashen pallor.

I came to a halt before the Study door.

Periel Kalos smiled and turned the Study handle on my behalf, opening the door with deliberate slowness.

As the door gradually widened, I held my breath.

“Ah….”

A soft sigh escaped me upon seeing the Study fully open. It was empty.

I gazed blankly into the vacant Study before cautiously stepping inside.

There had been one occasion when I entered the Study and was severely scolded for disrupting his work—after that, I never ventured near this place again.

Each time I approached this area, that thunderous voice would seem to crash down upon me from above, crushing me beneath its weight.

“Are you alright, Carina Leopold?”

“Yes, thank you.”

Carina Leopold walked slowly toward the desk in the Study.

The rug beneath her feet was soft, and the desk itself was neat, save for a pen and a few framed portraits.

She withdrew a letter from her bosom, nestled in a pristine white envelope, and set it down at the center of the desk. It bore no wax seal—a letter that seemed, in some ways, rather perfunctory.

She lifted her head slowly and surveyed the desk’s surface. Small portraits were arranged there.

Abelia’s, Infrick’s, Ferden’s, and Mother’s.

Among the various frames displayed, there was none of her own. Carina’s expression hardened gradually.

—— Page 3 ——

“Sometimes, when I witnessed such things with my own eyes, it was terribly sorrowful.”

Periel Kalos listened quietly as Carina Leopold spoke without preamble.

“But now, I simply realize that this is all I can be.”

Having ventured beyond my sheltered world, I discovered there were many warm-hearted people.

There were those who would rush across vast distances from south to north, driven by concern for a complete stranger, and those who remained kind to me despite years of no contact.

Such people existed.

“So perhaps it is only right that I treat these people with the same measure of affection they show me.”

Why inflict unnecessary suffering upon myself?

When I thought about it, the answer was simple. The reason I suffered in this relationship was that I kept grasping at people who had wrapped themselves in thorns.

If I had never reached for those thorns in the first place, I would not have been wounded.

“Periel Kalos.”

“Yes.”

“Please don’t tell Millaiyen about my artistic affliction.”

“…Why not?”

Periel’s brow furrowed.

It was Millaiyen who had asked for help, and regardless, he was Periel’s close friend.

Deceiving him didn’t sit right with me.

“If he discovers that I’ve used him, he’ll surely come to hate me.

And he’ll feel guilty as well.”

“…”

“Once winter passes and spring arrives, I intend to assess my condition and leave Leopold Manor. I’ll part with Millaiyen cleanly, with our contract fulfilled.”

It was simply a matter of keeping my promise.

If I said it that way, perhaps Millaiyen would no longer try to stop me.

Having spent time with him, Carina Leopold had come to realize that his

nature was more straightforward than she’d expected, and she decided to exploit that quality.

“I simply don’t wish to be remembered as something unpleasant.”

“…Why do you keep assuming death as a premise?”

“People have intuition, you know.”

Carina Leopold let out a soft laugh, her expression devoid of fear.

Watching the corners of her mouth relax as if resigned to her fate, Periel

clenched his fists tightly.

“I know my body’s condition better than anyone. This…doesn’t seem like something that can be fixed.”

If it could have been fixed, many would have done so from the beginning.

It was already too late to set the painting aside. Only half a year remained.

Even if I abandoned the painting now, little would change.

Periel Kalos regarded her quietly.

Contrary to someone preparing for an end, her resolve remained unshakeable. Carina swallowed a bitter laugh as she met those grave eyes.

“…Shall we return once we’ve finished what needs to be done?”

“Yes.”

Periel Kalos offered the suggestion with eyes full of unspoken words.

As Carina Leopold nodded, he closed the Study he had left open and stepped aside with a slight twist of his body.

—— Page 4 ——

Carina Leopold grasped the handle of the Study door and carefully turned it open.

Beyond the doorway where the corridor should have been lay a Studio suffused with the scent of oil paint.

…At this point, there’s truly nothing she cannot do.

The Creators each had their own limitations, yet she seemed to possess none.

Truly capable of work as divine as a god’s.

Thank you for coming with me, Periel Kalos. Thanks to you, I was able to move about more freely.

Not at all.

Periel Kalos answered calmly, his expression devoid of warmth.

Standing there, he seemed strangely silent.

Carina Leopold, observing that grave expression, let her eyes roll thoughtfully.

Was something bothering me?

Periel Kalos, who had been tilting his head slightly to the side, slowly lifted his gaze to meet Carina Leopold’s eyes.

May I ask you something I’m curious about?

Something you’re curious about?

Yes, regarding the progression speed of the Art Affliction.

Speed? What kind of progression speed are you referring to?

As she wore a puzzled expression, Periel Kalos drew in a breath and slowly began to speak.

Miracles are not infinitely boundless.

There are always constraints, things that must not be done, and limits that cannot be crossed.

Among those who wielded miracles, there were rare cases of those afflicted with the Art Affliction, and they would surrender something as a price to transcend that ‘limit’.

Since Periel Kalos was a miracle user who had not been afflicted with the Art Affliction, he too possessed limits.

Do you perhaps know of any absolute taboos—things that must never be done when using miracles?

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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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