The world shatters and reassembles itself.
Everything stops, then all creation rewinds as if being played backward.
In this reversed reality, only Yulice moves normally, the sole exception.
She looked around with a bewildered expression.
It didn't take long to grasp the situation.
After all, it was quite intuitive.
'Time...'
[Searching for Save Point!]
[Opening Player Log!]
'It's going back.'
One day, two days.
Time rewinds. Her poisoned self, her self surrounded by insects—both quickly vanish.
The rewinding time soon reaches her fierce battle with the Insect King.
Her seemingly endless week disappeared in the blink of an eye.
The miracle didn't stop there.
The Hero impaled by the Insect King's thorns vanishes, and the party members surrounded by insects blur like fading illusions.
[Accessing log...]
The rapidly rewinding time eventually formed into distinct scenes, showing fragments of the past.
The Hero being ignored by party members.
The Hero bleeding, poisoned by venomous insects.
The Hero coughing constantly after being cut by the Minotaur, and more...
The scenes pass by like snippets of film played in sequence.
Watching this, Yulice realized one common thread.
Each of these scenes.
'They're all rewinding around the Hero...'
Indeed.
Every scene focused on Luke.
She merely observed like a floating ghost, watching it all unfold.
She silently asked him:
'Hero, is this your doing?'
The one responsible for this phenomenon.
Having studied the history of Heroes since childhood, she instinctively understood.
Throughout history, every Hero possessed one or two abilities granted by the Goddess.
These abilities were comparable to divine miracles in their magnificence.
Yulice believed this spectacle was a divine power activated by the Hero. Nothing else could explain such a phenomenon.
She quietly continued her reasoning while watching the scenes unfold.
Soon, the scenes began showing aspects of the Hero she'd never witnessed before.
The Hero deliberately letting insects bite him to build poison resistance.
The Hero practicing swordsmanship alone late at night while everyone slept.
The Hero hiding alone after being scolded, making a tearful face...
The Hero she hadn't seen was incredibly hardworking and deeply human.
"This is tough..."
His smiling face, which had seemed impenetrable to even the harshest words, easily crumbled when no one was watching.
"Haah... this is so frustrating."
When conflicts arose and arguments broke out, he would retreat to a corner and voice his complaints alone.
"We're not far from the Insect King now... I need to improve my skills before then."
Yet through it all... he never once set down his sword.
Angry, sad, exhausted, yet still striving for the future.
There wasn't a single instance of him conspiring with the Demon King's army or scheming as she had suspected.
"..."
The Saintess felt an ache in her chest watching these scenes.
It was guilt, plain and simple.
The Saintess, who should have defended the innocent above all others, had instead plunged an innocent man into misery.
Yulice frowned whenever she saw herself badmouthing or tormenting the Hero.
Seeing herself from a third-person perspective, she appeared so spiteful it was hard to watch.
With self-loathing on her face, she muttered:
"I'm truly despicable..."
Of course, she had her excuses.
The "Fragment of Sin" on his body was undeniable evidence of evil. She had hated him based on that evidence.
While this didn't erase what she'd done... she couldn't deny she'd had justification.
She still didn't understand why the Fragment of Sin clung to him, or why she felt such discomfort whenever she saw him.
But as more time passed, she couldn't help but realize.
[Accessing the earliest log!]
The scene shifted to show the Hero in an even earlier past.
It was a back alley in an Imperial city.
Garbage bags were piled like mountains, with cigarette butts and broken bottle shards littering the ground.
A vagrant in tattered clothes sat in the alleyway.
Within seconds, the Saintess recognized who this vagrant was.
'Ah.'
The Hero, before he became the Hero.
Despite the bruises on his face and the hood covering his head, she recognized him immediately.
After all, she couldn't mistake the black hair and red eyes she'd seen for half a year.
He was staring at the night sky with contemplative, troubled eyes.
"...If I'm not there, they'll die."
After a long, vacant stare, he finally spoke.
"No, they'd be lucky if death was all they suffered."
One by one, he mentioned the deaths of each party member.
Each death was horrific, enough to instill terror in anyone hearing about them.
Listening to his monologue, Yulice felt a chill run down her spine.
'How?'
How did he know their fates so precisely?
Was he just guessing? Had the Goddess told him something?
Or perhaps...
Numerous questions sprouted in her mind.
But they didn't last long, as the next scene was even more shocking.
"System."
The Hero, having steeled himself, called upon his ability.
While Yulice couldn't see the system window, she could tell he was looking at something.
Then, he began to sacrifice what was most precious to him using his power.
His Bonds.
When he offered them as payment, countless lights surrounded him. Some were achingly beautiful, others were red enough to make one shudder.
The Saintess instinctively understood. She now knew where the "Fragment of Sin" came from, and why she felt such discomfort around him.
It was all because the Hero had sacrificed his Bonds.
Through this, he became a Hero, and simultaneously, a villain.
Though he had committed no evil deeds, the world would view him as a villain from now on.
Just as she had.
'Ah...'
Yulice felt a chill run down her spine.
This emotion was... awe.
—In the Order of the Sun, there has long been a prophecy.
In the distant future, when chaos returns to the world,
A Hero stronger, nobler, and braver than anyone else will appear.
She, Saintess Yulice, had believed this prophecy was wrong. That the Goddess had chosen the wrong Hero.
She thought he was neither strong, nor noble, nor brave.
No.
She had simply been too foolish to recognize it.
He was nobler and braver than anyone.
How could anyone call a man who chose to walk into hell of his own accord anything but brave?
Who would dare say a man willing to sacrifice everything to save the world was not noble?
"..."
The Saintess watched the scene for a long time, as if entranced.
Then suddenly,
The world turned black...
[Player Log review complete!]
[Divergence point confirmed.]
[Designating Save Point.]
The Saintess regressed.
*
"Huh?!"
"Hmm, you're awake?"
"You must be tired, sleep a bit more. It'll take some time for that Hero to finish dismembering the monster anyway."
When the Saintess opened her eyes, she was inside a tent.
Her fellow party members were there, each maintaining their weapons, meditating, or resting.
Having just woken up, the Saintess felt confused.
"H-how? You all should be dead... The insects..."
It felt like she'd had a long nightmare, or perhaps a momentary vision.
Everything seemed so unreal that her experiences didn't feel like reality.
"What? Haha! Yulice, what are you saying? Are you still half-asleep?"
"...Don't joke about such things, even in jest."
"You must be tired. Rest well. Stamina is important."
"No, but you all..."
Her confusion didn't last long as she realized this wasn't a dream.
After all, no dream could be so vivid.
The sensations she'd felt were still fresh. The despair and the seemingly eternal time she'd experienced couldn't possibly be from a dream.
Thanks to this, she quickly accepted the truth.
That she had returned to the past.
*
Several days passed after her return to the past.
Some party members seemed confused by Yulice's subtly changed attitude, but after a few days, everyone seemed to adapt.
The point she returned to was just days before his body was cut in half by the Minotaur.
The exact moment when their expedition into the Demon Realm began to go wrong.
After pondering for days how to save him, the Saintess finally managed to rescue him safely.
Which brings us to now.
'Poor man...'
She looked at the Hero who had fallen asleep right on the pool of blood left by the Minotaur.
If he was suffering this much now, she couldn't even imagine how he felt when his body was cut in half.
Perhaps because the person involved was alive again, the effects of the curse had also returned.
She could tell by the unpleasant feeling she got whenever she looked at him.
"..."
But.
'It's okay.'
She now knew this feeling was fake.
She knew it was a manipulated emotion created by a curse.
Even the Fragment of Sin still rising from behind him—she knew it was the price he had paid.
If that was the case, she could overcome this unpleasant sensation.
She quietly clasped her hands as she looked at him.
'May blessings accompany your path.'
She couldn't rescue him from the hell he had chosen.
She couldn't become a great shield to prevent his suffering.
She was far too weak for that...
But... at least she could offer her support.
If not a shield, she could be an umbrella to block the rain and wind.
She would forever bless the path of one who walks toward hell.
Saintess Yulice von Yugrasia made this resolution.