“Terminal… you say.”
In the heavy silence that had settled over the meeting room, I sat quietly for a long time before finally speaking in a low voice.
“Who is it?”
“Ah, that is… um…”
Tiffany Astelaid, who had snapped back to her senses at my question, stammered and forgot even to keep up her usual composure.
“Did I… did I see it wrong?”
“Mm. I think you must’ve been mistaken. Haha.”
And yet, despite normally being terribly dense, she suddenly began to display an almost transcendent awareness.
But unfortunately for her, it was already too late.
“……”
Meredia, whose right hand had quietly lifted to cover the brand glowing faintly with her other hand, looked paler than ever.
And when I saw her lower lip trembling slightly, it was clear she already knew all about her curse.
“If nothing else, it’s impossible for you to misjudge something like that, Tiffany.”
“Huh?”
“You’re the kind of person who can identify most curses just at a glance.”
And above all, Tiffany misidentifying a curse was close to impossible.
In-game, her curse detection accuracy was 100 percent—unless there was a bug, her readings were never wrong.
“To the Guardian of Radiance, it might look unclear, but from my perspective, that mark could still mean a number of different curses…”
“Y-yes, indeed. There’s a saying in the Eastern Continent that even monkeys fall from trees. So, let’s not jump to conclusions…”
Though Salem and Baek yeon-hwa joined the conversation in calm voices a little late, even they couldn’t fully control their expressions.
“This is… a tragedy.”
“S-sister, that mark is…”
“…Shh.”
Before we knew it, Astrid, the Head of the Southern Branch, was looking at Meredia with pity in her eyes, and Aurora and Celeste couldn’t even meet her gaze.
“…Yes, it’s true.”
In the increasingly grim atmosphere, Meredia’s unexpectedly calm voice rang out.
“I figured it would be revealed eventually. Though I didn’t think it’d be like this.”
“The curse on me is a terminal curse. One of the worst known to exist, on par with the Curse of Midnight and the Curse of Monstrification.”
I had more or less guessed it already, but hearing it directly from Meredia made my heart ache like it was being pierced with a needle.
“The Curse of Midnight… that one was developed by the dragon lord of the Second Hero’s Party. The Curse of Monstrification is the legacy of the former evil god.”
“And the terminal curse… that one was developed only recently.”
Watching my expression beside me, Tiffany began to explain without being asked.
“Who developed that one?”
“…It’s said to be the work of the so-called ‘Great Shadow,’ the leader of the black mages.”
She looked at both me and Meredia nervously after speaking, but I didn’t have the mental capacity to feel sympathy at that moment.
“Sigh…”
Thanks to the knowledge from the original game, I’d known that Meredia carried a fatal curse.
But I thought it was something like a binding curse that caused pain or forced behavior.
Was this the reason Meredia had moved so desperately in the original work?
Whatever the case, for someone like me who’d been awaiting death from an incurable disease, this whole situation was just too cruel.
“Then…”
“You want to know how long I have left?”
Because I couldn’t bring myself to ask it outright, Meredia, who’d been quietly watching me, continued for me.
“Probably… around a year now.”
“……”
“Still… ha. Never mind.”
Just as she was about to add something, she pressed her forehead with a hand and deliberately turned away, concealing her pale expression.
“I need some air.”
And a moment later, Lady Meredia quietly walked out of the meeting room.
“Wait a second…”
“Don’t follow me.”
I had tried to follow her with a dazed expression, but her tired voice stopped me in my tracks.
“I want to be alone right now.”
With those final words, Lady Meredia disappeared from the room.
“Tiffany. About that terminal curse…”
“……”
“…Is there really no way to break it?”
After standing like a statue for what felt like forever, I finally gathered my senses and turned to Tiffany, who had been nervously observing from the side.
“In the case of the Curse of Midnight or Monstrification, there are a few known cures because they’ve existed for a long time.”
“Similarly, curses treated as incurable, like the Curse of Misfortune or Binding, had cures developed during the era of the Second Hero.”
As expected of the head of Lumen Ordo, she easily rattled off cure methods for curses even I had thought were incurable.
“I’m asking about the terminal curse.”
“…Ah, right.”
But the one piece of information I actually wanted was missing, so I reminded her, and her expression darkened further.
“The terminal curse…”
“It’s okay. Just tell me.”
“…There is no known cure or method of mitigation.”
Hearing her final answer, my own expression darkened along with hers.
“If we researched it, couldn’t we develop a cure?”
After all, this is the holy ground of white magic—Lumen Ordo.
Even if they aren’t true white mages, they’re still the foremost experts in countering and defending against black magic.
Just like there were hidden cures for other curses I thought were unhealable, maybe a cure for the terminal curse could be found with enough study.
“…We are already researching it.”
“But with just one year… it’s impossible.”
That’s what I thought, but the hesitant answer from Aurora and Celeste behind me shattered my hope once again.
“The curses used by the leader of the black mages are structurally different from traditional black magic…”
“At least another three years of research would be necessary.”
“Then… there’s no way?”
“……”
“Really?”
But rather than resentment toward them, a question I couldn’t understand took precedence in my mind.
“Then how was I able to weaken Lady Meredia’s curse?”
“What?”
At the moment I brought up that question, Tiffany’s uncovered eye widened in shock.
“I’ve definitely weakened the curse that appeared on the back of Lady Meredia’s hand.”
“……!”
“Maybe I’m the key to breaking her curse? If we research in that direction…”
Gaining strength again from her reaction, I began sharing my thoughts with as much composure as I could muster.
But then—
“There’s something we need to address first.”
It was the elder council chairman, Salem, who had quietly listened to everything so far and suddenly joined the conversation.
“Right now, your power is a mix of white magic and the power of dominion.”
“Yes, you mentioned that before, and I’m aware.”
“The problem is that we don’t know which of the two was responsible for weakening Lady Meredia’s curse.”
“And what’s the issue with that?”
Tilting my head as I quietly listened, I asked him with a puzzled look, and his expression became visibly more conflicted.
“If it was your pure white magic that weakened the curse, we would do everything we could to help you.”
“Well, thank you—”
“But if it was the power of dominion that weakened the curse… then we can’t help you.”
The moment he said that, I stopped mid-sentence and shut my mouth tightly.
“Rather, we would have to do everything in our power to stop you.”
Salem’s tone was heavy, but the resolve in his eyes was unmistakable.
“!.”
“…Yeah.”
“So should I understand this as Lumen Ordo’s official stance?”
Biting my lower lip to maintain my composure, I asked Tiffany beside me, but even her response was no different.
“You know what it means to use the power of dominion, right?”
“……”
“If you’re not careful, you could become a demon king…”
Honestly, I’ve always been passive and sensitive to how others perceive me.
“So what exactly is the problem with that?”
That’s why, even as I lashed out with my own mouth, I could hardly believe I was actually getting angry.
—Goooo…
But the moment I unconsciously raised my voice, a chilling energy filled the room—so intense even I could feel it.
“…Are you declaring yourself our enemy?”
“If you don’t try to stop me from curing Meredia, then that won’t happen.”
Salem, sharp-eyed among the council members who had instantly gone on alert, questioned me, and I forced myself to stay calm as I replied.
“W-Whitney, maybe think again—”
“Let’s end the discussion here today.”
Tiffany, beside me and visibly distressed, tried to grab my hand with a trembling voice, but I couldn’t take her hand.
“I’ll be seeing you again soon.”
Because I had to go tell Lady Meredia, who must be outside alone, that I would be with her.
“Sir Whitney. You know we’re being very lenient with you, right?”
Just as I began walking toward the door Meredia had gone through, the cold voice of Astrid, the head of the southern branch, echoed behind me.
“…Originally, Lady Meredia was also marked for elimination. And that was the case until you became a hero.”
Knowing how kind-hearted they were, I understood this wasn’t just empty talk.
“And what happened just now—you do understand that you can’t ignore your share of the responsibility, right?”
But even if it meant standing against Lumen Ordo—
There are things I simply cannot give up.
“I’ll take any responsibility I can.”
“Whitney…”
“But I won’t give up on Lady Meredia.”
Having made that clear, I quietly turned the doorknob and stepped out of the meeting room.
“Could it be…?”
“……”
“Do you like Lady Meredia more than me?”
Then, Tiffany’s tearful voice called out faintly behind me.
But without being able to give her an answer, the door shut tightly.
***
Meanwhile, at that moment—out in the front yard of Lumen Ordo’s headquarters.
“……”
Lady Meredia, who had come up the steps alone from the basement, squinted and frowned against the sudden sunlight.
“Hey, I told you to move that quickly!”
“Geez, what a mess this is…”
“If I’d known it’d turn out like this, I wouldn’t have stayed up all night decorating…”
The maids of Lumen Ordo were hurriedly tearing down and removing all the wreaths and flower arrangements that had been set up inside the castle under Tiffany Astelaid’s direct instructions.
“Didn’t expect the girl with such little charm to already have someone eyeing her.”
Watching all of this quietly, Meredia moved on with a cold smile.
“…Sorry to be such a nuisance, dying as I am.”
Her voice, filled with bitter self-deprecation, trembled far more than usual.
“Up until now, all I ever thought about was giving everything up.”
“……?”
The maids who had been busy working looked at her blankly as she walked alone through the garden.
But she paid them no mind and quickened her steps.
“I forgot that I, too, could be discarded at any moment.”
Not even knowing where she was going, just walking wherever her feet took her, she somehow looked terribly small and lost.
“Who said they’d discard you?”
“……!”
“What a dangerous thing to say.”
Until a familiar, gently amused voice spoke from right behind her.
“As if anyone would let go of something so precious.”
At Whitney’s soft whisper, as he held her arm and gently stopped her, Meredia—though perfectly capable of shaking him off—stood frozen in place, unable to move.
Cliche Novel 
man i feel bad for teffny
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