Sister-in-law of the Heroine in a Childcare Novel - Chapter 198

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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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Chapter 198

A woman draped in ash and death. So transformed that I couldn’t believe she was the same person I’d known until now. A desolate face like a dead tree stripped of bark.
Faded blonde hair…. A body covered in scars.
A voice dripping with bitterness.
“How do you plan to persuade me? You think I’m the same as those little girls?”
“No.”
I could tell from the moment I first saw young Titania.
All of these ‘Titanias’ were me.
It wasn’t a reincarnation into the world of a book, nor an awakening of memories from a past life.
My original self had lived beyond the end of the original story. After contracting with a god, I had been able to live for a time as a beloved daughter of my parents in Korea—the price being that I would create a happy ending for a world that couldn’t have one properly. Now what confronted me were fragments of my own past, deliberately forgotten.
This Titania had never experienced being loved by parents. I could dismiss her as merely a fragment of memory, merely a fragment of another life. I could pass her by as if she were the protagonist of some other book, a stranger. And yet…
“I’ve abandoned all lingering attachments. Just because you spout some ridiculous nonsense doesn’t mean I’m going to—”
Venom seeped through every word. Knowing how hard a life that ‘Titania’ had lived, I felt no anger.
“Thank you.”
“What?”
“For not giving up on everything.”
“What kind of insane thing is that to say?”
My counterpart let out a sharp sound, as if something inside her had come undone. I met her gaze steadily.
She looked like the ‘me’ of just a moment before.
Immediately after contracting with the god Beloborg, my soul hadn’t simply flown to Korea to live again.
The world at that time was in utter chaos. The power of Chernobog was already overflowing across the continent.
To send ‘Titania’ to another world for a time and turn around a broken world, ‘Titania’ needed to plant a sword in the center of the world—a sword that was a fragment and a wedge of Beloborg’s power.
The ‘Titania’ who had nearly killed Bibi and was half-imprisoned in a tower made a contract with a god and obtained a sword. After that, she clung to the brothers and sisters of the Castrain Family. To the center of the Underground World, to the place where the Northern Barrier stood on the surface. To throw everything into the world’s center.
Because it was necessary, to turn the world around.
But the Castrain Family’s territory was already destroyed, and the Northern Barrier was nearly in ruins. Descending to the Underground World to escape the pouring flood of Magic Beasts was madness itself.
Yet that ‘Titania’ had done it. Even begging from those who despised her.
“You must have suffered terribly. You’ve worked so hard.”
I meant it sincerely, but she seemed unable to imagine hearing such words from a person she considered, by her standards, ‘an empty-headed fool with no substance.’ She continued to stammer, “Um, uh…”
“You… you insane… I thought you were thoughtless. But right now…”
“Do you want to?”
“Want to what?”
“Do you want to absorb the current me and continue what I was doing? I think you have the right to.”
“…”
It was an unexpected offer, and she fell silent.
I began to voice the thoughts I’d been pondering. Yes, unconsciously—or perhaps consciously. Each time fragments of memory resurfaced, I’d push them aside or let them slip away. But none of that mattered anymore.
I remembered young Titania lamenting that it was ‘unfair.’ Young Titania had never directly experienced the love of her Korean parents, the ones who loved only her. And if even a child’s desire was like that, what of this Titania?
Even if she were merely a fragment of memory, she had lived so fiercely. To have her give everything to a future version of herself who, in her own eyes, was a thoughtless idiot—that would be unfair.
As I descended to the Northern Region, clashing with Magic Beasts and activating the Barrier, I had lost consciousness. When this ‘other me’ awoke—only then did I remember that scene. Ah, so that’s why I must have looked so foolish, so incomprehensible to her.
It could be.
“You can hate Bibi. You can be sick of the Castrain Ducal House. But you’re going to save the world, aren’t you? Even a world that no longer matters to you, you’re going to try to save it. That’s truly remarkable. And really, you chose that path because you wanted to live, at least a little, with some dignity. That goes for me, of course, but also for you—I just think that’s how it is.”
“…”
“You won’t forgive yourself. But I don’t think I have to.”
In truth, it was circular reasoning.
All of the ‘Titanias’ were me. Right now, not having absorbed all those memories and fragments and records yet, I could speak so freely, as if to someone else: ‘Will you take this on?’ That was the end of self-pity—forgiving yourself.
But, well. With a nature this simple, this foolish, this gullible, I could say such things.
Because not a single ‘Titania’ I had known, observed, and experienced until now was the kind of person who deserved such words.
“You worked hard.”
Broken in this world for never receiving even a handful of the love she wanted, but magnificent nonetheless for having thought to escape that form of existence.
I gave myself a round of applause.
The ‘Titania’ looked at me as if I were an incomprehensible being, then laughed.
“You’re really strange, ‘me.'”
“Am I?”
“I hated it—the way people said I looked ‘like someone raised with love.'”
“…”
“Bibi, who grew up without a trace of hardship. The Castrain Family who loved such a Bibi. Raymond. I think I hated them terribly. As if asking myself: why couldn’t I see things the way they do? Well, it was obvious, I suppose. A childish tantrum. And after realizing that, and then after that again… I don’t know. By now I was just so tired and fed up that I wanted to end everything and disappear.”
“But you wanted to?”
“You’re still an infuriating idiot…”
The ‘Titania’ laughed as if crying. A strange expression, like a broken laugh stitched together with tears. Her mouth twisted into what should have been a crescent moon but was only a shattered shadow.
“The fact that a ‘Titania’ like you—such a fool—can remain in this world, that seems strange and somehow… good.”
“Is that so?”
“…Haha. I’ve worked myself to death, and you just get to walk off with the experience. Suddenly strong and satisfied, are you?”
“Ha. You don’t mean that.”
“That’s right. I’m going to be at peace now.”
The ‘Titania’ grinned mischievously. The smile seemed more like mine than hers.
“Keep fighting, ‘me.'”
Probably the kind of encouragement she had never given to herself even once. I laughed softly.
In the depths of my heart, at the cliff’s edge where waves crashed, a very small gravestone appeared.
The sensation of something dying completely, being crushed and mixed together, lingered.
[[[Contractor Titania, trace replay of prior records is complete. Proceed to the next phase?]]]
“Is there any way to stop?”
[[If you halt at this stage, you will not acquire Administrator authority over the Northern Barrier.]]
“Then I have to continue.”
[[Proceeding to the next phase will permanently make ■■■ unrecoverable. Are you certain?]]
“Yes.”
The Virtual Barrier Ritual.
An ornate Divine Temple emerged before my eyes. Those presumed to be awakened with the power of gods held their positions. A figure presumed to be Saint Gloriana drove a blade into her own heart.
Not a drop of blood remained as the sword disappeared into her body. The emperor standing beside Gloriana scattered his blood onto the Sacred Relic with an unusually solemn expression. Those waiting poured their power one by one into the Sacred Relic. The relic, stained with countless hues, began to glow…
A barrier like a weaving of hundreds of thousands of threads of light spread across the void, expanding endlessly.
The spectacle before my eyes was merely an example image.
When the vision ended, I let my blood fall onto the large, imposing stone before me and concentrated.
Young Titania, the slightly older girl Titania, the Titania who rolled through the world to its bitter end—all of them placed their hands over mine inside me.
So I had no need for other companions.
Of course, there would be side effects.
-Contractor.
The sword called to me quietly.
A guide, sharing fate with the God’s Contractor of Light.
Remembering how the other ‘Titania’ had lived hard, burned through, and how this sword had kept secrets it was supposedly not yet time for me to know, I could only laugh emptily.
I didn’t hate it. This creature was like the final gentleness the God of Light had granted me.
“You know, since I ‘awakened,’ I’ve never once said my real name. My mother’s name. My father’s name. Not to anyone else—not even to you, though you’d think you’d be worth remembering. Isn’t that strange? Even though you know odd turns of phrase, common knowledge like air conditioning. Even though you use emoticons and all that to make me feel at home.”
-…Contractor.
“Think about it. I was originally the God of Light’s Contractor. A soul of this place. And yet I came here with memories of another world. I understand that it would be hard for those traces to last long. So if fragments of my previous life are awakened, if I become a complete Titania like this, if I end things this way—then I lose it forever. Don’t I? A name is proof of existence. The fact that I’m someone’s daughter, someone’s child—that’s irrecoverable, isn’t it?”
-…
“Wow, a truly fraudulent contract.”
-Titania.
“Like a midsummer night’s dream…”
Light gathered in the emptiness, embracing the whole world. Like fireflies on a summer night. Like hope.

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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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