In the north, there lives a beauty, unmatched and peerless.
With a single glance, she topples a city; with a second, she topples a nation.
Are you not aware of such world-toppling beauties? Such women are impossible to find again.
For some reason, these verses surfaced in Allen’s mind.
After experiencing a death cycle so long it numbed his soul, he thought he had long since shed any positive feelings for Livia.
Yet, when that familiar, radiant figure appeared before him, Allen’s gaze was irresistibly drawn to her—
Livia von Stern. The Feng Aotian who had killed him the most times, the heroine he could never avoid nor escape, his lifelong nemesis, his eternal nightmare.
But… she was indeed breathtakingly beautiful.
Not only Allen thought so; all the people around them, even Marianne and Hugo, were utterly entranced.
The once-boisterous cheers abruptly died down, as if a hand had seized the crowd by their throats.
They had all heard the rumors of Livia’s peerless beauty, but none imagined that this girl’s allure could reach such nation-toppling heights. Any attempt to describe her seemed almost sacrilegious.
This was the underlying logic of the otome game world—Livia was the absolute protagonist, the very core of the 《Starlit Romance》world.
That’s why Allen felt that, for her to become his fiancée, was as if the Flag of Death had been planted on his grave.
The world’s malice would be concentrated upon him!
To claim the protagonist? How could a villain like him even dare?
However, Livia seemed… somehow unhappy.
In fact, she was different from any state Allen had seen in past cycles.
Deep within those stunning blue eyes, there was a shadow of melancholy that refused to dissipate.
To the crowd, her sorrow was that of a kind soul grieving for the lives lost in war—even if they were enemies.
What compassion, what a merciful Divine!
But to Allen, her state looked more like utter exhaustion, body and soul.
Much like… he himself not long ago.
What on earth had happened to her?
As Allen pondered Livia’s abnormality, her gaze seemed to lock onto his, sharp and unerring amid the sea of faces.
She smiled at him—a heart-stopping, soul-shaking smile.
That smile nearly stopped Allen’s heart.
So beautiful… I… I really like her. I really like Livia. I want… I want her to truly become my wife.
But in the very next instant, Allen snapped awake!
No!
This sudden surge of infinite tenderness, threatening to drown his reason, this urge to forgive all her past violence, to fall hopelessly in love with her—this was absolutely abnormal!
Allen understood better than anyone,
You are terrifying, terrifying!
Each character twisted and writhed, as if written in congealed blood, radiating a suffocating aura of death.
For the first time, the sense of death and pure horror became physically oppressive, making his eyeballs throb with pain, as if about to burst.
Allen mustered all his willpower to suppress the fear, and, inch by inch, stiffly turned his head, only to see a girl in a pure white dress standing beside him.
She was not Marianne, nor anyone he knew.
Her skin was so pale as to be almost translucent, her pupils deep and strange, her hair color unique, a non-human fragrance of youthful purity emanating from her.
Since his contact with the “Observer,” Allen understood: these unspeakable beings often appeared in the form most easily understood by his subconscious.
And this girl—Allen recognized her.
She was Saya from the classic galgame 《Song of Saya》.
This realization made Allen’s rationality scream alarms—
She was actually some kind of terrifying, evil existence!
“In your eyes, what do I look like?”
“Saya” smiled at him, her expression pure and flawless, yet enough to make one’s skin crawl.
Allen knew it was pointless to hide, so he braced himself and answered, “…a green-haired girl in a white dress.”
“Eh, really? I thought you’d see me as a slug or something ugly.” “Saya” genuinely seemed delighted. “Your master is pleased!”
That word, “master,” struck Allen like lightning!
Where did he get a master?
Of all the cycles, the only one even loosely fitting a master-disciple relationship was that person in the Crimson Spiral Cult, the one who guided him to become an Abyss Walker…
“Star Listener”!?
“Shit! It’s you! Why are you, you anti-human maniac, here?! Weren’t you supposed to be strictly monitored by the Church’s special forces?!”
Allen was truly scared out of his wits. He had, after all, killed this lunatic with his own hands! Had this thing kept its memory to seek revenge?
Damn! I’m dead for sure!
At the start of the game, this guy’s power far surpassed even endgame Livia, the original work’s most terrifying final BOSS.
Livia only beat him because he had already soloed the Church headquarters and the Judgement Court before, drastically weakening his stats.
How could he appear before the plot even began? Shouldn’t he still be sleeping somewhere?!
“My dear disciple still remembers his master, how touching.”
“Saya”—or rather, the “Star Listener”—smiled at Allen, eyes full of a disturbing, reunion joy.
“The Mobility Force the Church uses to guard against me has been recalled to their base. My true body is still very quiet, though.”
Having been jumped by an Observer once, Allen’s San Value had improved considerably.
Faced with the sudden appearance of the “Star Listener,” he instead felt a sort of resignation, even recovering some long-lost sense of humor.
“So… you’ve ascended? Fully abandoned your human form?” Allen instantly guessed the truth.
The “Star Listener” nodded in approval. “Actually, I found I was always on the wrong path, until I accidentally… discovered you.”
“The moment you stabbed me in the back, I realized we might all just be actors dancing in ‘Their’ Script. And you’re the only free variable.”
“That’s a nice line… But where’s my freedom?” Allen relaxed a little. Since the other party was willing to chat, he might as well fish for information.
“I’ve died in every possible way! No way out at all! Especially that ‘girl in love’ you mentioned earlier—she’s killed me how many times now? Who will she fall for this time?”
“She will fall for you. Irrevocably.”
The “Star Listener” spoke with a Script-reader’s certainty, delivering this prophecy.
Fall for me? It’s not even April Fools in this world, what a joke!
As Allen chewed over these words, a flash of inspiration hit him. “You know who’s behind me, don’t you?”
“Yes.”
“And you know who’s behind her?”
“Of course.”
“So… you realized those ‘Evil Gods’ really will destroy humanity, so you switched sides?”
“No, perhaps ‘They’ have no such intention. But from another perspective, if all humans become what I am now, that’s a kind of destruction too.”
“You’re surprisingly self-aware.”
Allen didn’t want to look at this girl who radiated death, silently thinking.
“She’ll fall in love with me… That’s ‘Their’ Script, right?”
“Yes.”
“Can Livia… break free from this control?”
“That’s why I’ve come to you.”
In this frozen world, the “Star Listener” walked to Livia’s horse, quietly studying her breathtaking, melancholy face, and shook their head.
“They can’t be allowed to keep influencing her. She’s fallen deep enough. So I need you to create an opportunity. I’ll try to temporarily cut off ‘Their’ direct influence on her.”
“And then?”
“Your plan must proceed faster. That’s the time I can buy you.”
“Did you change gender again or what? Even you, enemy of humanity, want to save humanity?”
“There’s more than one way to save humanity. Sometimes you save your country by taking a roundabout path.”
The “Star Listener” smiled enigmatically.
“Fair enough.” Allen frowned, suddenly overwhelmed by weakness and dizziness, as if his life was rapidly draining away. “We can’t keep talking, can we? I’ll go mad or die outright?”
“Correct. The price of understanding… is annihilation.”
“Alright, you’re the Outer God now. I’ll keep moving with my plan. I’m not interested in your motives anyway. My goal is to save humanity—however that gets done doesn’t matter to me. By the way, I’ll be heading to the Church to tell them about you soon.”
“Of course. I’ll be brief.”
The “Star Listener” came back and quickly gave several key pieces of information:
“First, you must stay by her side—it stabilizes her mental state.”
“Second, if something happens and you two can’t stay together, you must immediately prepare to kill her.”
“Third, Markbearers are not invincible. The key is faith and willpower. Go to the Church for the Black Sword. That weapon is your answer. Also ask if they still have any Saint’s Relic. Weapons or bullets made from those can suppress Bloodlines from the marks.”
“Fourth, you will die. That’s already written in the Script. Prepare for sacrifice. And this is your last cycle. Or rather… humanity’s last cycle.”
“Wait!” Allen fought through blinding headache and nausea. “I get that I’ll die, but this so-called cycle… is it really a cycle?”
Allen stared intently at the “Star Listener.”
In a world with unspeakable beings, knowledge was a curse.
By now, They knew so much of the world’s truth, They had surely gone beyond Allen’s comprehension.
“…My dear disciple,” Their voice echoed strangely, ethereal, “you are humanity’s last hope for redemption. Because of that, I can’t tell you more.”
“One last question…” Allen’s consciousness was blurring. He gathered his remaining strength to ask, “Can the Script… be rewritten?”
“It can. But please, do your utmost.”
“You are the only free one, because ‘They’ can’t see through you. Remember that.”
The “Star Listener” finished, then walked to Marianne, extended a finger, and traced a complex, sinister symbol in the air before her brow. It glimmered faintly, then vanished.
“This is my last gift. You have already altered her fate line—she can serve you better now. She now possesses a true ‘Brand of Shadow.’ Its power is perfect concealment in shadow, ideal for the future you planned for her. Even the Church cannot sense this Bloodline.”
Allen was stunned!
Creating a Bloodline out of nothing?! Even able to evade the Church’s detection?!
“Star Listener”… You really did ascend, didn’t you?! Just how did you do it?!
As if seeing through Allen’s shock and confusion, the “Star Listener” left one last, meaningful remark: “You’re not the only one to achieve transcendence through endless nightmares…”
Before the words faded, Allen was violently dragged back to reality!
Color and sound returned in an instant, the stillness of the world vanishing completely.
The “Star Listener” was gone, as if They had never appeared.
The Capital was still bustling, the world unchanged.
The only change was that Allen now knew—damn it, the Script had already begun without reservation!
A wave of weakness hit him, and Allen staggered, nearly collapsing.
Quick as lightning, Marianne stepped forward and caught him.
This sudden commotion drew Livia’s gaze.
She saw Allen—saw those bottomless black eyes that seemed to pierce everything.
Allen looked up, clearly seeing a flicker of surprise and indescribable complexity flash in Livia’s blue eyes.
In that instant, it was as if they saw through all the cycles of eternity.
The mischievous gods’ “romantic comedy” for the “protagonist” had begun.