The Fate of an Insignificant Character’s Death

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[Quest -1: Accept Death (try to avoid if possible).]
[Important Info: Dungeon name where you are crushed by a slime: Dustbone Corridor.]

Compared to all the other quests, this one was simpler, easier to read, yet more shocking to the three women than anything before it.

“D-Death?! What is this? W-Why would Young Master… write ‘accept death’ on this page?”

Eir’s gaze fixated on the word “death.” Her wolf ears, as if sensing a monumental threat, shot straight up.

—Death? What death? Young Master is facing death?
—Death… means never, ever seeing Young Master again? Never hearing his voice?

The word had always been distant to her. But now, laid bare before her, Will’s playful lessons about death seemed to rush towards fulfillment.

“Crushed… crushed by a slime… This description, Eir knows this description, very well!”

Her eyes widened, staring at the line. It triggered memories of mornings when she’d enter Will’s room and find him with a slime perched on his head. Eir had always assumed it was just another one of Will’s eccentricities. But she’d forgotten one crucial thing: Will was always about efficiency and results, never doing anything useless.

“Accept… avoid… try…”

Leah murmured the keywords, brokenly.

“Damn it! Why didn’t I realize this before this page—!”

She slammed her fist on the table, then ran a hand through her hair, trying to calm herself.

Will wasn’t just a precocious student. He seemed to possess a prophetic insight, and this Quest System journal laid out a series of “sequels” he had orchestrated. Leah, who had once seen him as merely a “gifted student,” now replayed every one of his actions at the academy.

It all pointed to one thing—something she should have discovered much earlier…

Death.

The true, literal disappearance from this world.

For her, it was a distant, terrifying word. For a “witch” whose life stretched for centuries… death was still so far away.

“No, why… why didn’t I realize it when he kept talking about it? This death, he must have meant…”

“Fate?”

Treya finished Leah’s sentence. She appeared calmer than the other two, but her fists were clenched. Her eyes scanned the Quest System page—illuminated by Eir’s light, and faintly by the moonlight from outside.

The book, to her, was “colored”—perhaps because of its intimate connection to Will.

But…

If… Will died…

Wouldn’t that mean she would lose even that color?

“If it’s fate… Eir, when did he first mention that word?”

More anxious than usual, she threw the new question at Eir.

“When he was very, very young. Eir isn’t even sure the exact time… but this book, he… he wrote it when he was ten years old.”

“Earlier than I thought…”

“Why ask this? Could it be…?”

As Eir answered, her jumbled thoughts suddenly clicked into place.

“You mean… the ‘fate’ Young Master mentioned… could it… could it be…?”

Eir’s voice, naturally high-pitched as a demi-beastkin, gradually deepened.

“…He already knew, years ago, that he would die in Dustbone Corridor?”

“Exactly! After reading his Quest System like a diary, even the dullest person would understand!”

Leah looked up, biting her lip, tears welling in her eyes.

“Will—your Young Master, your ‘fiancé,’ and my good student… he knew from the very beginning when, where, and how he would die!”

“This book… is his… defiance. No, his ‘acceptance’ of fate’s declaration.”

Treya ignored Leah’s outburst, her finger turning the page.

After this page, she saw content for the first time that Eir and Leah had long since witnessed.

The densely-written page of “Heroine.”

Seeing this for the first time, Treya’s pupils dilated slightly. The purple left by the demon in her eyes was gently touched by the moonlight, making it appear slightly dimmer.

The one who taught her about “desire”… did he also have a “desire” he couldn’t give up?

Yet, even after reading this “chapter” he wrote for himself, the three found themselves no closer to that “answer”—

Where was Will now?

The mysteries surrounding him only deepened, the clouds of doubt growing thicker.

It was harder than ever to guess his thoughts.

They had once believed that with their “love,” with their extraordinary “contact” with Will, even if they weren’t the ones who understood him best, they were certainly the ones who could control him best.

But now…

If his “existence” was founded upon such a known, impending “death”—

Everything he had done seemed to be turned on its head.

“If… if Young Master accepted his death and wrote these quests, then what was his true purpose…?”

“Heroine? It has to be the heroine! So, is it Shuna, the one who took him?”

“I don’t think so. At least, not when he wrote this book,” Treya refuted Leah. “Eir once told us that his correspondence with that woman began much later than this book’s writing.”

“Oh… right. Young Master wrote this book before he received Mr. S’s first letter.”

“So, that idiot… he… he knew about his death, yet… why did he do all this…?”

“The answer, perhaps, lies in…”

Treya casually flipped through the Quest System, turning to the very beginning, the first page, titled “Maid Eir Chapter,” the one Eir had so fiercely guarded.

“…Our own chapters.”

“…”

A brief silence fell.

But this time, their “silence” wasn’t passive.

Leah, the most direct, unreserved, and flamboyant of the three, wiped away her tears first, then lunged for the Quest System.

She flipped through it, finding the beginning and end of the “Witch Leah Chapter.”

“Leah—what are you doing?! Don’t mess with… with Young Master’s writing.”

“I’m taking my part. I don’t want others reading my chapter either, but… taking my own part shouldn’t be a problem, right?”

Leah tore out her section of the loose-leaf book, folded the thick stack of over fifty pages, and slipped it into her ring. Then, she turned and walked towards the door.

“…Where are you going?” Treya asked coldly.

“…I don’t care anymore. I’m going to Dustbone Corridor—I don’t know where it is, or where Will is, but as long as… as long as I destroy Dustbone Corridor, he won’t die there—right?!”

“Right!” Eir stood up, her ears rigid, the light in her hand swaying. “As long as… as long as it doesn’t exist, Young Master won’t die there.”

Then, Eir lowered her head, her gloved hand flipping open her own chapter, gathering every page and stashing them away.

“Are you planning to leave tonight?”

“What? Do you have a better idea?”

“Do you even know where Dustbone Corridor is?”

“…”

Eir and Leah fell silent.

“Even if we don’t, we can just check the Adventurer’s Guild map.”

“The Guild is closed.”

“Then we’ll break in!”

“Leah… you say that like… you do it all the time…”

A peculiar smile flickered across Treya’s face. She walked past them, naturally taking her own section of the book.

“Were you just mocking me?!”

“I know where it is. It’s a coincidence… Rest up, pack your things. We meet at 5 AM.”

“If you knew, why didn’t you—”

Leah was cut off as Treya raised a finger to her lips, silencing her.

“Take my carriage. If we use the royal roads instead of the usual routes…”

Treya glanced out the window. By the moonlight, it was well past midnight.

“…We’ll be there by tomorrow afternoon.”

For some reason.

Even though they had only learned five minutes ago that the countdown to Will’s death hung over his head—

All three felt an inexplicable urgency.

Even the outwardly calm Treya sensed a restless anxiety within her.

A strange sense of crisis settled over their hearts.

***

Dustbone Corridor, 5 AM—

[Quest -1: Accept Death (try to avoid if possible).]

For some reason…

At 5 AM, before the sun had even risen, as Will looked up at the massive dungeon gate, standing in its encompassing shadow, this quest floated unbidden into his mind.

He tightened his grip on his Tai Chi Staff, then touched his three key “external” upgrades—Leah’s ring, Treya’s ear-piercing, and Eir’s collar—confirming their perfect condition.

“Accept death? Perhaps my current appearance makes it seem like I’ve accepted death?”

It wasn’t the first quest he’d written.

But this quest had been etched into his mind before every other.

The entire Quest System—the one designed to make all the “loser heroines go dark”—had been built upon this premise.

Based on a future where he was guaranteed to die.

When he first wrote that quest, his death—and Dustbone Corridor’s very existence—were years away.

But now, all choices lay before him.

“But in my current state, I absolutely refuse to accept it.”

“Because I want to live here now.”

“To live here as the Will loved by everyone.”

He took a deep breath.

And looked back.

Yesterday’s dying sun, today painted the distant sea with dawn’s glow. Everything was as it always was, yet to fully awaken.

Touching his chest, feeling his heartbeat, he pushed open the gates of Dustbone Corridor.

“Come on. This is what I must face, and what I can change…”

“The fate of an insignificant character’s death.”

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