The Girl I Once Loved

Thanks to the potion that healed my wound, there was no scar left on my forearm. After the treatment, I immediately left the infirmary with Luna and returned to the clubroom. It was late, so no one was in the clubroom.

Looking at the clock on the wall, it was late, close to dormitory curfew. But Luna didn’t seem to want to go back. She had a face full of questions, but she didn’t ask anything, just stayed by my side, seeing the troubled look on my face as I sat on the sofa, deep in thought.

Thanks to Luna’s consideration, I was able to fully concentrate on the problem. Why did I write the word ‘Roelly’ on my forearm? No matter how much I thought about it, nothing flashed in my mind.

If I were to dissect the word and guess, it might be related to Roel. But I can’t be sure because of the one word that follows. I felt a frustrating stuffiness in one corner of my chest because of the unsolved question. I sighed and swept my face once.

The reason I punched the wall might simply be because I couldn’t bear the sudden anger. Or it could be that I was desperately struggling in pain to avoid losing something.

There’s no clear evidence that I, not someone else, carved the word into my forearm. I can’t rule out the possibility that someone manipulated me, who had lost my memory, to do it.

To solve the question, I felt the need to sort things out one by one. First of all, I had to prove that I was the one who made the wound on my forearm. The wound was made with a sharp object. There are few and clear types of objects that can cause that kind of wound.

I have a space warehouse that I can open anywhere. If I really carved the letters on my forearm myself, the evidence would be left there. I raised my hand and opened the space warehouse. As expected, my prediction was correct. I took out the purple dagger I received from Estelle.

Luna, who was by my side, seemed surprised by the bloody dagger and flinched. I silently stroked the surface of the blood-stained dagger with my fingertips.

Just like how warm food stays the same even after time passes when put in the space warehouse, the blood on the dagger didn’t harden and had a sticky texture, smearing on my fingertips. This confirmed that I was the one who carved the word Roelly. Even if someone manipulated my memory and forcibly carved the letters, they wouldn’t have been able to put the dagger in the space warehouse.

“Luna, do you happen to know the word Roelly?”

Luna, who had been blankly staring at the blood-stained dagger, snapped out of it at my question and shook her head slightly.

“It’s the first time I’ve heard it. But….”

Seeing Luna pursing her lips as if hesitating about something, I reached out and took Luna’s hand. Luna, who tilted her head slightly and looked at our clasped hands, said in a hesitant voice.

“If you don’t have Ross’s memories… could it be related to Ellie?”

“Ellie?”

I frowned without realizing it and asked back. Even when I retraced my memories, nothing came to mind with the word Ellie. To be honest, the word Ellie itself, which I uttered, felt as foreign as if it were a foreign language I was hearing for the first time.

As I tilted my head with a puzzled look, Luna’s hand, which was interlocked with mine, tightened. Luna said with a determined look on her face.

“She’s Ross’s childhood friend. Ellie, the top student in the first year and the top student in the magic department.”

I stared at Luna, wondering if she was joking. There’s no way Ross, with his gloomy and inferiority-complex-filled life, would have a friend. If there was such a person, I would want to praise them as a kind person with a lot of compassion.

“A childhood friend for me? Are you kidding me right now….”

At that moment, an intense sense of discomfort swept through my body. My whole body froze as if struck by lightning. It felt like the signals my brain was sending were all messed up. Thanks to that, my heart started to race.

“I, I don’t know anyone like that…! My only friends are the Messiah club members.”

Breaking through the shell of oblivion, I felt as if intense emotions were pressing down on my whole body. I felt nauseous. It was similar to the feeling of bugs crawling on my skin.

I tried to suppress those emotions somehow out of an instinctive sense of rejection. But Luna, as if telling me not to do that, held my hand tightly and said in a gentle voice.

“Ellie is the person Ross once liked.”

Luna’s words became a heavy hammer, shattering the firmly sealed shell of oblivion. The flowing memories painfully rummaged through my brain. As the fragmented memories returned to their places, I groaned, bending over in pain as if my brain was burning.

Roelly.

I remembered. It was the affectionate nickname that fans used to call Roel and Ellie together.

[Restriction has been activated.]

The restriction that had been placed was activated because I remembered Ellie. It felt like one side of my lung was crushed as if I had climbed a high mountain, making it difficult to even breathe. But my mind was spinning rapidly, demonstrating its ability. The recovered puzzle pieces began to fit in all sorts of places.

I slowly raised my head and looked at Luna. Just doing that made me feel like the racing emotions were calming down. It seems Luna has the ability to provide psychological stability just by being by my side.

I had a strong urge to quickly combine the clues that came to mind, but more than that, I was grateful for Luna’s kindness in reminding me of Ellie, whom I didn’t get along with, for my sake.

Thinking that I should express my gratitude while the gratitude remained, I said to Luna, who was looking at me with worried eyes.

“Thank you for reminding me of Ellie. I’m being shameless, but can I ask you for one more favor? Can you stay by my side until I find the answer?”

At my request, Luna nodded her head enthusiastically as if it were obvious. I will forget about Ellie again before long. That’s the nature of the ability called the Blessing of Oblivion.

But with Luna, even if I don’t remember Ellie again, I will be able to remember what kind of conversation we had. Even if I forget the process of reasoning, I can get the result.

I said in a cautious voice.

“I remembered why I carved the word Roelly on my forearm.”

Luna widened her eyes and waited for my next words. I lowered my voice and said.

“I left a warning about Roel.”

***

A few hours ago.

After talking with Rosalyn, I was foolishly thinking of running to Roel right away and confessing everything, happy that I had an unexpected collaborator.

I didn’t have any doubts. I know Roel the best in this world. What felt unfamiliar was just confusion due to the difference in time. The Roel of a few years later is also the Roel I know. A noble hero who will save the world. The most trustworthy person in this world, along with Nelson.

If Roel has regressed, he will naturally be looking for a way to save the world before the Demon King descends on this world. I thought that revealing everything and putting our heads together was the way to go for everyone.

But I kept feeling an unknown sense of discomfort. Every time I took a step, I felt a stabbing pain in my heart as if it were a warning.

In my head, I couldn’t shake the feeling that there was something that couldn’t be explained if Roel was a regressor. I didn’t have any memories or evidence, just a feeling, but it bothered me like a small thorn stuck in my finger.

I shook my head roughly and tried to take another step when a memory flashed vaguely in my mind. I don’t remember the details, but it’s a nightmare I had sometime.

A nightmare where I sold my soul to the Demon King but ended up dying at Roel’s hands.

I wondered why that came to mind. And the question met with thought and presented more questions. The one thing I strongly wanted in my dream. What was it that I thought Roel had taken from me? No matter how much I thought about it, I couldn’t remember.

To solve the question, I headed to the empty hallway and took out the setting book. And I checked the scene where Ross first appears. The setting book was full of ■■ everywhere, as if someone had painted it black.

There were also differences from my memory. Roel’s heroines in the setting book were not 4, but 5. One name was blacked out and couldn’t be seen, but Roel clearly had 5 heroines.

Why don’t I have any memory of one of the heroines? It’s like cutting the middle of a film and splicing it together skillfully. I didn’t even feel the gap in my memory until I recognized it.

Using the information about the last heroine recorded in the setting book as a clue, I headed to the magic department dormitory without any plan. I clearly have the memory of being the top student in the first year and participating in the triathlon together, but I forgot who that person was. Why did I forget that memory?

After waiting outside for a long time, I was able to find the same girl described in the setting book coming out of the dormitory alone. I don’t know what I was thinking, but I ran out and blocked the girl’s path.

Black hair grown to her shoulders, skin so transparent that you could see her veins. The girl with beautiful eyes resembling obsidian lowered her head and walked, then noticed my presence blocking her path and raised her head.

Our gazes intertwined in the air. No one opened their mouth first. We just stood in the middle of the hallway, looking at each other with observing eyes.

It wasn’t a look full of wariness or surprise at a stranger. Rather, the girl had an expression close to apathy, unable to feel any emotion. The girl, who briefly held me in her obsidian eyes, finally tried to pass me.

My lips wouldn’t move. There was something I wanted to ask, but for some reason, I felt like my tongue was swollen in my mouth. My emotions were fluctuating with anxiety. I had no choice but to let her go.

The girl brushed past me. And with the sweet scent that brushed past my nose, I felt an imbalance as if the center of my body was misaligned due to a bizarre sensation similar to distortion, and I staggered.

What is this incomprehensible sensation? I didn’t know why, but I turned my body and unconsciously muttered at the girl’s receding figure.

“…Ellie.”

The word that popped out of my mouth feels foreign. An ominous feeling that I said something I shouldn’t have is rising arbitrarily. The regret that I brought up unnecessary words came late.

But my muttering stopped the girl’s steps. The girl’s face, which turned to me, no longer had apathy. I realized for the first time that so many different emotions could be revealed on a person’s face.

Her eyes, resembling obsidian, seemed to shine beautifully like jewels thanks to the tears that filled them. The girl slowly approached me. Only then did I realize that the sweet scent I felt from her was the scent of strawberries.

The girl smiled calmly, pressing down on the corners of her mouth as if suppressing tears.

“Ross.”

At the girl’s voice calling my name, I felt a strange urge to smile at her with all my might for some reason.