Chapter 487: Option to Forever
"He didn’t bring his phone, his wallet, his gears, or anything he usually brought to close rifts or anything. It’s... strange," Eastiel said.
Cecilia froze. Her fingers went cold around the phone.
"What... were you guys doing when it happened? Or he just... left when literally nothing happened?" She tried to keep her voice steady, tried to calm the rising panic in her chest.
"There was nothing happening, I promise." Eastiel said earnestly. "We were talking about you, and then we decided to find name options for our baby. Oathran made us nachos for a snack and..." He sighed.
"What happened next?"
"We were talking about the meanings of our names. Mine, Arkai’s, yours... then we asked about the meaning of his name and we asked if his mother might have told him something about it, and suddenly he just... stopped speaking."
Cecilia slowly stood up from her seat. Her sisters’ voices faded into static.
"And then...?"
"And then..." Eastiel struggled, the memory clearly troubling him. "He squeezed his eyes shut and grabbed his head... and... it looked like he was in pain, but it was only for a second before... well, he stood up and pushed us away. He looked mad when he left the apartment... We really don’t understand why."
Cecilia’s eyes faltered.
Did he... remember?
How?
But she didn’t get any notification from the System. No ding. No pop-up. No cheerful announcement that a memory had been restored.
Could it be... the notification would only come out if all three of her husbands remembered?
Her hand flew to her stomach.
"When... exactly did this happen?"
"I don’t know, around eleven or midnight?" Eastiel said. Then, softer, gentler, "Cecilia, please don’t worry, alright? We’ll find him. You... you stay put. We know Oathran. It might look as if Arkai’s the most responsible, but actually Oathran is the most responsible of the three of us, I promise."
Cecilia didn’t answer.
"Nothing can hurt him either. He’s the Dragon Lord, after all."
Nothing could hurt him.
But does nothing include himself?
He didn’t... even try to find her.
He was out there somewhere, alone, and...
He was mad at her.
"I’m going home now." Her voice came out steadier than she felt. "I’ll call an Uber."
"No," Eastiel said firmly. "I’ll call my work and take a second day off. I’ll come get you. You want me to track you with the location app or are you gonna send me the address?"
His voice lifted at the end, a gentle attempt at humor, trying to pull her back from whatever edge she was teetering on.
Cecilia couldn’t reciprocate it. But she managed a small smile he couldn’t see. "I’ll send you the address."
"Great."
The line went dead. Cecilia lowered her phone and stared at the screen, her reflection pale and pinched in the dark glass.
What if... he wouldn’t forgive her? What if this was the thing that broke them? What if the trust she had built with him—
She should’ve told him. From the beginning. She should’ve told him about the pregnancy aspect of this scenario, about the cost of entering this world, about what it would mean for him specifically.
But if she had told him, he would have outright declined.
Before entering the prologue of this scenario, she had thought it would be the CEO’s baby. She didn’t even know whose baby it would’ve been, and she had entered the prologue to find out whose child she was carrying.
But after she entered and saw what this world could offer, the technology, the knowledge, the clues about rifts... maybe a way to save Oathran, she had decided they needed to enter this world no matter what.
This world was too important to skip.
Cecilia sent the address to Eastiel and fell into another daze, her thumb still hovering over the screen. She didn’t notice her sisters exchanging glances across the kitchen. She didn’t see them set down their spatulas and their stolen sausages and move toward her.
"Iris." Isla pulled her gently by the hand, guiding her to the sofa. The older sister had somehow spotted a crisis in progress. "How about you pull away from this lawsuit against Vasiliev completely? We’ll take care of it all for you?"
Ivy appeared a moment later with a plate piled high with an English-style breakfast, sausages, toast, a small bowl of baked beans, perfectly scrambled eggs, and whatever fresh vegetables had survived Isla’s thievery.
She stabbed a forkful of egg and toast and held it up to Cecilia’s mouth, no-nonsensely feeding her. "Yeah. Say aaaah."
Cecilia opened her mouth and accepted the food. The eggs were fluffy. The toast was perfectly buttered. She chewed slowly, mechanically, her mind still racing.
She did not want to meet Arzhen again.
The thought of facing him, of sitting across from him in another sterile room, of listening to his pleas and his threats and his desperate, twisted declarations, made her stomach turn.
And now, with Oathran missing, out there somewhere alone with whatever voice in his mind... this had become her top priority. Her only priority.
She wanted to get out of this world as soon as possible.
It hurt. The thought hurt like a knife between her ribs. Because this world had given her so much. Sisters. Family. A name that was hers by blood and not by charity. And this baby, this sweet egg growing inside her—
She wanted this baby.
But if she lost Oathran, nothing was worth it anymore.
She wouldn’t choose anything over him. And it might be crazy, but she wouldn’t choose even a baby over her husbands. Any of them. All of them.
It was her fault. She had known the risks. She had made the calculation. And now Oathran was paying the price.
But Oathran’s happiness that day, when she told him she was pregnant, the way his mist-grey eyes had gone wide and wet, the way he had held her like she was the most precious thing in any universe...
Why? Why couldn’t they be happy like that forever?
This world had no Key. That was the point. In this integrated reality, Oathran wasn’t carrying any burden. He could be happy. He could be free. He could be just—a man. A dragon, yes, but not a sacrifice.
So what if... what if they stayed in this world forever?
[Yes you can, Cecilia!]
Ah—
Cecilia’s breath caught in her throat.
[As long as you don’t complete the tasks, you will not return. And for you, the time in your real world will freeze forever.]
The System’s voice was gentle. Kinder than she had ever heard it. None of the usual chipper teasing, none of the panicked hiccups it had developed around the gods. Just... quiet. Earnest. Almost sad.
[We... will always admire the essence of your soul.]