Not A Regressor - Chapter 40

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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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I Am Not a Regressor Chapter 40
Closed-Door Training (1)
Three days had passed since I healed her eyes through the Dragon’s Eye.
—Rustle, rustle.
As usual, I woke early in the morning, finished my light dawn training, and came downstairs to find a peculiar scene unfolding before my eyes.
“Is, is this how you’re supposed to do it?”
Sizzzzzzzzle!!
“Ahhh!! What, what is this!! Why did it turn into charcoal!!”
In the cramped kitchen, Song Ha-eun stood in an apron, attempting to transmute something.
That’s right.
That wasn’t cooking—that was transmutation.
“…What are you doing?”
I gazed at the room filled with acrid smoke, my expression utterly deflated.
Flinch!
Song Ha-eun’s shoulders trembled.
“Oh, oh? Ah, it’s nothing!”
“For something that’s ‘nothing,’ the house looks like a disaster.”
Cough, cough.
I waved my hand through the thick smoke and opened the window.
I let out a hollow laugh as I looked down at the meat (or what used to be meat) sitting on the frying pan.
“When did you start cooking?”
Setting aside whether this could even be called food.
This was the first time I’d ever seen her cook.
“Ah~ well… you know, I suddenly felt like eating some meat!”
“So you transmuted charcoal?”
“It’s not charcoal, it’s not!! Ugh… this is strange. I was sure that if I did it this way, the Maillard reaction or whatever would happen….”
She scratched her head vigorously while staring at her smartphone.
“Well… anyway, here.”
She placed the blackened meat on a plate and thrust it toward me.
“Try it.”
“…You want me to eat this?”
Has this older sister lost her mind?
“If you just cut off the burnt parts, it’s fine!”
I stared at her bold declaration for a moment, then picked up a knife.
‘Well, it’s my older sister’s first attempt at cooking, so I should at least taste it.’
Besides, it would be a waste of meat.
I slowly brought the knife toward the meat.
Crack.
The meat split in half, revealing its charred, carbonized interior.
“…”
I had thrown it away.
“Hey!! What are you doing throwing that away!”
“How am I supposed to eat this now!!”
What exactly did I have to do to burn food this badly?
“Our stove’s flame was too weak, so I used a stigma to help cook it….”
“No.”
That’s why it burned, you fool.
‘She’s only just started rehabilitation training.’
Though I had supposedly removed the curse with the Dragon’s Eye, her body hadn’t fully recovered to its original state yet.
At best, I’d say she was at the level of taking her first steps.
There was no way she could properly control a stigma in that condition.
“Ugh.”
Song Ha-eun turned her head away as if she had nothing to say.
Her profile as she turned her head.
An eerie, incongruous detail that clashed entirely with her delicate features caught my eye.
“Is your eye okay?”
“Oh, this?”
She touched the area around her left eye.
Unlike her perfectly normal right eye, her left eye gleamed with a sinister yellow iris like that of a reptile.
It was also much larger compared to her right eye, and root-like blood vessels protruded around the eye socket, making it look quite grotesque.
“It looks strange, but there’s no problem with my vision at all. Actually, when I focus with my left eye, I can see things much more clearly.”
“Well, that’s a relief, I suppose.”
Every time I saw that sinister yellow iris gleaming, worry took precedence.
“…It’s not a side effect of the curse, is it?”
[Don’t worry, it’s not.]
The answer came from an unexpected place.
A soft chime sounded.
Vega appeared in the air surrounded by silver light, circling around Song Ha-eun’s body as she answered.
“If it’s not a side effect, then why did this happen?”
Song Ha-eun also asked, carefully touching the area around her right eye as if she didn’t understand why this had occurred.
[Hmm.]
Vega gazed intently at Song Ha-eun’s left eye and continued speaking.
[Rather than a side effect… it could be said that this is a kind of ‘blessing’ in a certain sense.]
“…You’re calling this a blessing?”
Song Ha-eun narrowed her eyes as if to say I was spouting nonsense.
[Your stigma… during the process of the Dragon’s stigma and curse being resolved, the dragon’s power that was generated caused an interaction, creating the ‘Dragon’s Eye’.]
“Dragon’s Eye?”
Song Ha-eun tilted her head and held up a mirror to see her left eye.
The yellow iris reminiscent of a reptile and the vertically slit pupil.
Certainly, if a dragon is a reptile, then a dragon is a reptile, so I could attach the splendid name ‘Dragon’s Eye’ to it.
“…For something like that, it’s barely any different from my normal eye?”
When I focused with my left eye, there was a slight improvement in clarity, but that was all.
In everyday life, apart from its grotesque appearance, my left eye functioned no differently than my normal right eye.
[You are still unaccustomed to wielding the power of the Dragon’s Eye. Once your stigma returns to its original state, you will be able to fully harness its power.]
“Hmm.”
I recalled the stigma carved above my left chest.
The stigma of the Dragon’s Zodiac.
While it wasn’t one of the Zodiac Twelve Palaces stigmas, it was a stigma of comparable power.
‘Though its recognition is pathetically low.’
There were only a handful of Awakeners bearing the Dragon’s Zodiac stigma.
At most, there were four or five in South Korea, and fewer than twenty worldwide.
Moreover, none of them had demonstrated exceptional achievements.
‘The lack of recognition is understandable.’
I would never have known that the Dragon’s Zodiac stigma was as formidable as the Zodiac Twelve Palaces stigmas if I didn’t possess it myself.
“Well, it looks like I need to focus on rehabilitation training first.”
“There’s no need to push yourself too hard.”
“Hehehehe! No need to push yourself, you brat.”
I grinned and gently pinched Oh Jin’s cheek.
“You need to recover quickly so you can let your big sister support you. You know me—I can’t live with debts unpaid.”
“You’re not planning to keep making food like you did earlier, are you?”
“Just trust your big sister.”
“Damn it.”
Why are you like this to me, big sister?
“Oh right. Speaking of which, a package arrived earlier. Did you order it?”
“Yeah. That’s what I ordered.”
I tore open the small box placed in the corner of the room.
“Here, this is for you, big sister.”
“Huh? What is it now?”
Ha-eun’s expression turned bewildered, clearly not expecting the item to be for her.
I handed her what I’d taken from the box.
“…An eye patch?”
“You can’t just walk around with that eye. People will stare.”
“I suppose you’re right.”
She put on the black eye patch I’d given her over her left eye.
Though called an eye patch, it was quite large, completely concealing her entire left eye area where blood vessels protruded like tree roots.
“Um, how does it look?”
Ha-eun asked carefully after putting on the patch.
“Like a failed youth in their thirties who’s never experienced love, escaping reality by indulging in otaku culture and belatedly developing a second-year syndrome.”
“I’m thinking of making something called mint chocolate tempura for dinner tonight.”
“It really suits you perfectly, big sister.”
Our sister looks so beautiful even wearing an eye patch.
“Hehe. Right? It suits me, doesn’t it?”
Ha-eun giggled softly as she adjusted the eye patch.
But joking aside, her natural beauty was so striking that the eye patch actually looked quite fitting on her.
Even if it did give off a slightly theatrical vibe.
“Does it feel uncomfortable?”
“No. It’s a bit inconvenient since I can’t see from one side, but it’s nothing I can’t handle.”
Fair enough.
For someone who couldn’t see from either eye just recently, this was hardly a burden.
“But are you really okay? You spent all the money you’d saved up.”
Ha-eun asked in a slightly subdued voice.
“Money can always be earned again. There’s nothing urgent anymore.”
“Ahem. Oh, I see?”
Ha-eun coughed awkwardly and her face flushed red.
At his words—”there’s nothing urgent anymore”—an irrepressible wave of happiness washed over her.
It was like her entire body was being tickled by soft feathers.
It was hard to suppress the corners of her mouth from rising.
“Wh-who foolishly called the immediate purchase price? If you’d just done a normal auction, you could’ve gotten it much cheaper.”
To suppress the ticklish sensation, she poked Oh Jin’s ribs with her elbow.
“What if someone else called the immediate purchase price first?”
If that happened, the auction would end immediately and the Dragon Eye would fall into someone else’s hands.
With only one item coming up for auction once a year, if she missed this opportunity, Ha-eun would have to spend that entire time trapped in darkness again.
“Rather than risk that, I had to secure it while the chance was there.”
Money was merely a means to an end, after all.
As long as the objective could be achieved, the cost didn’t matter.
‘Though calling 10 billion won all at once was still foolish, I’ll admit.’
I hadn’t planned to call the immediate purchase price from the start.
The plan was to feel out the market and purchase the Dragon Eye as cheaply as possible.
━But.
The moment I spotted Song Ha-eun with tears streaming down her face.
Something ignited within me, and I called out 10 billion won without hesitation.
“Ah, u-uh.”
Song Ha-eun’s face turned crimson as she hung her head low.
“He, hehehe.”
She laughed like a broken machine, her shoulders trembling.
“I-I’m going out for a moment!”
Whoosh.
She fled outside as if escaping.
[….]
Vega, who had been quietly watching Ha-eun’s retreating figure, suddenly flew over toward Oh Jin.
[She truly treasures that child.]
“Hm?”
[I heard you’ve been protecting her since childhood… Is there some particular reason?]
“What? Did my sister tell you that?”
That I’ve been protecting Song Ha-eun since childhood.
Half true, half false.
“It wasn’t me protecting my sister—she protected me first. Or rather, she protected everyone at the Orphanage.”
[Hmm?]
Vega’s eyes sparkled at words she was hearing for the first time.
“Back then, she was like a leader to the children at the Orphanage.”
Oh Jin’s lips curved into a bittersweet smile.
Long-buried memories surfaced.
A girl who would charge at the Orphanage Director like an enraged beast for the children who followed her.
Song Ha-eun’s radiant form, brilliant as a jewel burning with luminous fire.
“But you know what? Despite how she looks, my sister is actually a huge crybaby.”
On nights when she’d been beaten by the Orphanage Director, she would pull her blanket over her head and cry in secret.
“So….”
[You stepped forward in her place? To repay her?]
“I suppose.”
Repayment.
Of course that was part of it.
‘But that wasn’t all there was to it.’
Oh Jin shook his head with a bitter laugh.
“I’ll tell you about that later.”
[Hmm.]
For some reason, Vega pouted slightly, pushing out her lips in a sulk.
[Ugh, ugh.]
Vega, now perched above my head, irritably tugged at my hair.
It hurt.
[…Still, I’m relieved.]
Vega, who had been pulling at my hair, now gently stroked my head with tender care as she continued.
[This is the first time I’ve seen you smile with such genuine sincerity.]
“….”
Oh Jin nodded with a faint smile.
[In your previous life, you couldn’t save Song Ha-eun?]
“That’s….”
I don’t know.
Whether I saved her in the first cycle or failed to—I have no memory of it.
‘I probably failed.’
Perhaps that’s why the me from the first cycle destroyed the world.
‘I have no idea about that either.’
I had no memories of the first regression, so there was no way to know.
Honestly, I could barely believe that I was the primary culprit behind the world’s destruction—how could I possibly know the reason?
Regardless.
“Yeah. Back then… I couldn’t protect her.”
I’d play along here.
[I knew it.]
Vega gazed down at me with a pitying expression, then gently tapped my forehead twice.
[Cheer up. You saved her this time, didn’t you? With your own strength, you’ve already rewritten the first page of destiny itself!]
“Ha ha. Yeah, you’re right.”
Of course, I wasn’t a regressor.
I didn’t possess any memories from the first cycle.
And yet, I could still change destiny.
[Ahem! But don’t forget! Song Ha-eun is merely your ‘older sister,’ nothing more!]
Why did she keep emphasizing that she was my older sister?
[Anyway! Now that we’ve broken Song Ha-eun’s curse, what’s the next plan?]
Vega hastily changed the subject.
‘The next plan, huh.’
I did have something in mind.
“Vega. Could you do me one favor?”
I needed her help for that plan.
Poof.
Vega, perched on my palm with her legs crossed, straightened her posture and answered.
[If it’s something I can do, I’ll help with anything!]
I nodded and gently wrapped my hand around her.
“A few hours a day isn’t enough.”
[Huh?]
“Twenty-four hours—I want to be with you all the time, Vega.”
[W-what did you just say?!]
The goddess’s cheeks flushed crimson in an instant.

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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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