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Chapter 1
“It’s gone! Where did it go?”
I hid myself between some large rocks and listened carefully to the people’s voices.
“Should we report it to the Magic Tower?”
“No! If we do that, we won’t be able to keep it all to ourselves! Stop thinking about other things and go over there to look for it.”
The woman’s words made the man snap irritably.
I curled my body up and held the egg tightly against my chest.
The thing those people were after was this.
A dragon egg.
There was only one black dragon egg in the entire Empire, and it was beautifully surrounded by an elaborate golden frame.
Even complete outsiders could tell that it looked incredibly expensive.
I had deliberately let it show a little while walking through the alley, and just as expected, they had smelled money and started following me.
“Kai, you know what? I think we might really escape this time.”
I whispered softly to the egg in my arms.
Kai and I had been subjects of biological experiments in a secret research facility.
Our days were filled with pain, and we had promised each other that we would escape together.
But escaping in one attempt was impossible.
During the process, I lost my life.
By some miracle, I went back in time and repeated the cycle of escape and death over and over again.
I know it’s probably a foolish hope.
And yet, the reason I was more desperate than ever this time was simple.
In all the lives I had repeated 500 times, I had never gotten this far in my escape.
So I absolutely could not give up.
I had to use every card available to me and escape this place no matter what.
As always, I said the same thing to Kai.
“Let’s escape and be happy. You and me.”
As if responding to my whisper, a small tapping sound came from inside the egg.
Then cracks began to appear across its surface.
“……Gasp.”
It’s already starting to hatch?
I was startled and carefully tucked the egg back into my arms.
I had expected it to hatch around this time, but the timing was terrible.
A dragon egg was something that might or might not hatch even when it was given intensive care in the best possible environment.
For it to hatch in a place this terrible was extremely dangerous.
There was nothing I could do about it, even though I was panicking.
I was being chased right now, after all.
I looked around and checked for any signs of people.
The distance seemed fairly large, but if two adults chased me, it was just close enough that they could catch me.
That was exactly what I needed.
I hid the egg beneath my clothes, slipped out from between the rocks, and quickly ran into the forest.
I ran for who knew how long.
Just when I was once again so out of breath that my lungs felt like they were about to burst—
“Stop right there!”
The voice of the woman from earlier came from behind me.
I stuck my tongue out at them mockingly and turned around to run again.
“You little brat! Just you wait until I catch you!”
The angry shouts of the two people rang out from behind me.
Yes, shout even louder until your throats hurt. Make sure those people farther away can hear you too.
The plan was perfect.
Thirty seconds of running at full speed in this direction.
If I put even one foot in the wrong place, it’s all over.
It had only happened in my previous life, but I remembered it vividly.
A shiver ran through me.
When I remembered that meaningless death from before, goosebumps spread all over my body.
I won’t make the same mistake ever again.
Three seconds.
Two seconds.
One……
Now!
“Please, save me!”
I spotted a narrow passage where only two people could barely walk side by side.
I threw myself into it and shouted as loudly as I could.
And just as I had expected, the people I had been looking for were there.
Was it my 350th regression?
That was when I learned that these people passed through this exact place at this exact time.
“U-Ugh! What the hell? You! State your identity immediately…… Huh? You’re just a child?”
A man wearing a mage’s robe was startled when I suddenly appeared and raised his staff.
But soon, looking embarrassed, he lowered it again.
There were three knights accompanying the mage.
All three wore badges symbolizing the Magic Tower on the left side of their chests.
Just as I remembered.
I trembled as much as possible and put on a frightened expression before pleading with them.
“P-Please save me. Please……”
Just as the knight standing at the front was about to kneel down and speak to me—
“Hey, you! Stop right there! Right now…… Gasp.”
The two people chasing me came out of the forest behind me.
The moment they saw the Magic Tower patrol, they froze.
Then they immediately turned around and ran back into the forest.
The knight who had been looking into my eyes let out a quiet sigh and said,
“Go catch them.”
“Captain. We’ve caught them.”
“Good. You two, investigate their identities. I’ll handle the child.”
A female knight who had been called the captain walked toward me.
Just like before, she knelt down and brought her eyes to my level.
I swallowed nervously and looked at her.
Liliana Joren, Captain of the Second Knights Order of the Magic Tower.
She was someone I absolutely needed for my plan, so I had to make a good impression.
“Child. Where did you get that?”
Liliana pointed at Kai, who was hidden beneath my clothes.
“It’s mine.”
“Those people said you stole it, and that’s why they chased you.”
I hugged the egg tightly and spoke with teary eyes.
“I didn’t steal it. That lady and that man misunderstood.”
I held the egg with one arm and pointed at the people who had chased me with the other.
The man and woman, who were tightly bound with ropes, shouted at me with confused expressions.
“There’s no way someone dressed like you could be carrying something that expensive!”
I pretended to tremble in fear and shouted at them.
“You didn’t even give me a chance to talk! You made scary faces first and chased me!”
“What……? So what? Do you have any proof that you didn’t steal it?”
“Do you have any proof that I did?”
“Damn it! Hey, come here. You’re just a kid, but you sure don’t know when to shut up!”
The man approached me threateningly, fuming with anger.
Liliana stopped him and said firmly,
“What do you think you’re doing to a child? The shouting we heard from the forest earlier was quite threatening as well.”
“T-That was because that kid mocked us first……”
“How narrow-minded must you be to not even show a child some mercy?”
“That child isn’t just a child, Captain! She’s a thief!”
“I don’t have time to waste talking to you. Take them away.”
The Magic Tower knights dragged the man and woman away.
Their voices, protesting about how unfair everything was, gradually faded into the distance.
I swallowed my laughter toward them and looked at Liliana.
Just as I had investigated beforehand, it was obvious that she had a particular weakness for children.
I heard she lost her young daughter several years ago.
That must have been why she left her position as a knight of an ordinary count’s family and joined the Magic Tower, which dealt with public security and criminal investigations.
“Tell me the truth, and I won’t scold you.”
“……”
“Even if you’re hiding it, you must realize that makes it look like you have something to hide, right?”
You seem like a clever little one, after all.
At Liliana’s words, I deliberately avoided her gaze.
Then, pretending to be nervous under her watchful eyes, I fidgeted with my hands.
I put on my most pitiful expression and spoke like a miserable little child.
“I…… You really, really won’t scold me?”
Liliana’s eyes widened.
She was clearly shaken emotionally.
I heard that the daughter she lost was around my age.
Did seeing me remind her of that child?
“Yes.”
At Liliana’s answer, I slowly pulled out the egg I had hidden beneath my clothes.
As expected, her eyes widened dramatically, and her face filled with shock.
“You…… How do you have a dragon egg?”
This is impossible.
At the captain’s mutter, I deliberately twisted my expression.
I had practiced making myself look like I was about to cry countless times, so it should look quite real.
“I-I just felt sorry for this egg because it doesn’t have a mommy or daddy…… I just wanted to help it, that’s all……”
“……”
“I don’t have a mommy or daddy either…… So I thought I could understand how it feels.”
“Wait, child.”
Liliana called out to me, but she didn’t say anything else.
She simply rubbed her forehead and let out a deep sigh.
Of course this is giving her a headache. A dragon egg doesn’t just casually appear somewhere like this.
Dragons lived on another continent in the first place, so it was extremely difficult to even encounter one.
“Child. Even if this isn’t your fault…… I don’t think I can help you.”
After thinking for a long while, Liliana spoke in a hoarse voice and gently patted my head.
“I’ll have to…… take you to the Master of the Magic Tower. This isn’t a problem I can solve myself.”
“The Master of the Magic Tower?”
“He’s a very, very important person. He may look cold, but he’s actually kind. So don’t be too afraid when you meet him.”
It wasn’t as though I genuinely didn’t know who the Master of the Magic Tower was.
But there was no reason for me to explain anything, so I simply nodded.
Just as planned.
However, the Master of the Magic Tower wouldn’t be easy to deal with.
The real beginning would start the moment I met him.
