I Reject the villain’s ending.

Episode 58.

I picked up a pen for the first time in a long time.

I dismissed Iros and Mei and sat at my thinly dusted desk, muttering to myself as I scribbled away.

‘To summarise, ‘Mad Saint’ isn’t just a novel, it’s the ‘past’ that happened, and God turned back time.’

That means the crown prince and I, the two of us, have regressed.

‘The difference is that the crown prince has all his memories after his death, and I know what happened in the past because of the book The Crazy Saint.’

This raised a question.

‘Then why did I not regress with all my memories, but live as Kim So-won, die, and come back?’

I remembered my conversation with the crown prince.

‘I said no, because you’d be the same person if you went back in time, and you’d never change.

‘God said he’d sort it out, and he did.

‘What in the world did God do that made you laugh as you killed me, and then you went on to do poverty relief and save the poisoned imperial family?

‘Did God reincarnate me as Kim So-won to change my role in Crazy Saint?’

It all clicked when I thought about it.

She was born as an ordinary girl in Korea, loved by her family to the fullest, taught to love and give love, and learned Korean archery like a spell.

She injured her hand and had to give up her dreams, but she also learned to bounce back.

‘If I kept my memories of living as Sierra, I wouldn’t have changed anything even if I was reincarnated, but I lived as Kim So-won without knowing anything.’

I grew up to be a normal person. An honest citizen with an ordinary mindset, a Confucian girl.

‘Isn’t it God’s plan that I read The Crazy Saint?’

I have to kill her and return her to this world.

He had to make sure I knew the past in some form because I needed to know what was going to happen so I could change things.

That was the novel.

‘So I needed a third person to see what I’d done, to see what I’d done, to get me back on track in this world…….’

I got goosebumps.

‘It’s complicated, but it’s the best way to change Sierra from a crazy saint to a crazy saint, and who the hell was God to draw such a big picture……?’

I rubbed my goosebumps and shook my head.

‘I’m not sure if what I’m thinking is right, but I know what I need to do.’

I need to go to the crown prince, apologize, and tell him everything I haven’t heard.

‘I told you I’m the pendulum that keeps this world in balance, right?’

No one had ever told me such an important thing. Not even God.

Maybe I should have a face-to-face with God after nine years of being a saint.

With a bang, I opened the door and Mei popped out as if she had been waiting for me.

‘Sister, where are you going?’

‘I’m going to the waiting room.’

‘Then I’ll follow you!’

‘Sure. Where’s Pink?’

‘The Guardian has gone to the archives. She said she’s looking for something.’

‘Really?’

I thought she was going to cry and stay by my side all day like May did, but she must have realized before I did that I was okay now.

That’s why we’re apart like this.

The only person who knows me better than I do is Iros.

I felt both sorry and grateful.

I didn’t know what I would do without him.

Mei and I walked for a long time before reaching the waiting room. Still ashen white, the high prayer hall was eerie.

No one visits the Great Prayer Hall unless there is an event, and the silence that descends upon it is eerie.

‘I don’t remember it being this dreary last time……. Am I mistaken?’

‘I don’t know.’

As Mei said, it seems to be getting worse and worse. I wonder if this is what a dying space looks like.

I was taught that this is where the god’s power is strongest.

‘Is there something wrong with the gods?

As time passes, the fullness of the divine power in the temple seems to diminish ever so slightly.

‘Ah. Now that you mention it, what did I hear at the last installation ceremony? I think it was something along the lines of, ‘I’m asking for someone.’

‘What? Why are you telling me that now!’

‘Huh. I thought I was hallucinating.’

Mei jerked her head back, startled by my momentum.

‘What did you say? Try to remember. Maybe it’ll give me an important clue.’

‘A clue? Now, wait a minute. I mean-’

– The kid was…gone. Remember……. Please-

‘It’s a faint voice, but she said that.’

‘That child, remember, please…….’

If The voice that Mei heard belonged to the Lord, then the child is most likely me.

I tried to parse the stuttered words.

‘The child is the pendulum that keeps the world in balance. Remember that, please?’

Was he trying to tell me that I was important to the balance of this world and that I should protect it no matter what?

Because if I die, this world, this place he loves, will be destroyed?

Biting my lip hard, I walked up to the dusty altar and knelt in front of the god’s statue.

I clasped my hands together and squinted my eyes. I cried so hard earlier, that my swollen eyes wouldn’t open.

‘Damn it. I can’t see.’

Still, I had no problem praying, so let’s move on.

I closed my eyes and felt the faint holiness that filled the Great Prayer Hall as I had the first time I had been in the temple in a very long time.

I could feel the thin, long lines of countless branches. The divine forces are tangled and seemingly free, leading to one place.

At the end of it, he was there.

‘The Lord Viata.

The golden god, aloof, yet kind.

‘Answer me, anything is good.

Answer me why I was reincarnated as So-won Kim and returned to the Sierra, and why the current is different from the past.

There are still so many pieces of the puzzle I don’t know.

The moment I reached the end of that divine power……!

‘Survive.’

‘……!’

Survive? From what? From whom?

‘I will help you…….’

‘Help me with what? Why are you talking, God!’

With those words, the dialogue with God was over.

He didn’t pat me on the head or nag me like he did when I first came to the temple to pray.

He didn’t even say goodbye when we parted.

I called out to him again and again, but he didn’t answer.

Finally, I gave up and lifted my head to look at the statue in despair.

‘Is this the end? What the hell is going on?’

The god’s power seemed to be slipping away.

The harder he concentrated, the more so.

‘It’s not just me, this world is acting strangely.’

An uneasiness swallowed him whole.

‘Something is very wrong.’

By the time I realized, the clock had stopped ticking.

* * *

Sierra left the waiting room and went to the crown prince’s palace.

The crown prince, sitting idly in his office looking at papers since Sierra’s visit in the morning, burst through the door, his eyes widening at Sierra’s surprise.

A bang!

‘His Highness the Crown Prince!’

‘What’s this……?’

The door creaked under Sierra’s force.

The shattered door and the doorknob lay limp in Sierra’s grasp.

Sierra looked down at it and flung it back.

‘Sorry, I’m a little overpowered.’

‘One hit and you’ll be on your way to the goal. Have you come to accept my invitation?’

The crown prince, regaining his composure, put down his quill and stood up, and Sierra nodded sheepishly as he approached.

‘Yes. You told me to come to you this time, that your door was always open.’

‘I did, and I didn’t mean it, so I’ll charge you for the broken door.’

‘Don’t put it on me, put it on the door of the Deputy Diego.’

‘Why?’

‘Because I think he’s in cahoots with the people who want to kill me.’

‘……?’

The crown prince tilted his head in confusion for a moment, then, having roughly grasped what was going on, he slid down onto the couch and sat down.

‘The fact that you’ve come to me alone means you want to finish the story, right?’

‘Yes. But before I do, I need to go to…….’

‘……?’

Sierra swept to her feet and knelt in front of him.

The crown prince jumped to his feet in surprise.

‘What the hell is this?’

‘I apologize, before I regressed, I took you to…….’

His throat tightened.

Sierra swallowed hard, her eyes fluttering shut and open.

‘For what I did to you, for killing you. For using your emotions, for hurting you, for killing the people you cared about.’

‘…….’

‘I’m sorry for everything, I’m so sorry, and I’m even more sorry that I don’t have those memories.’

The crown prince’s face contorted painfully.

‘Ha……. You know, you have a knack for going behind people’s backs.’

Sierra knew how the crown prince must be feeling right now.

He hadn’t expected her to apologize so readily. He hadn’t expected her to apologize so readily, much less to say she was sorry she couldn’t remember.

Sierra knelt and bowed her head to the Crown Prince.

He didn’t tell her to get up, and Sierra didn’t intend for her apology to end there.

Her sin was great, and what she had done to this man was so cruel that it would take her a lifetime to atone for it.

Playing with a man’s mind and killing the people he cared about was too much.

‘I’m so sorry. I wish I was alive to live by your side. For ruining everything and taking everything away from you.’

A stream of blond hair grazed Sierra’s cheek and fell to the floor, the crown prince’s faintly trembling voice falling overhead.

‘…You make me want to hate and not let myself hate, you make me want to forgive and not forgive.’

The crown prince clenched his fists so tightly that his nails dug into his palms and dripped blood.

‘But I will not forgive you.’

‘I don’t think I can be forgiven.’

‘I’ll never forgive you.’

‘I’ll apologize again and again and again until your heart is free.’

Looking down at the crown of Sierra’s head, the crown prince let a single tear fall, unseen by her. It was the first tear he had shed since his regression.

Swallowing hard, the crown prince cleared his throat and spoke.

‘But I accept your apology, for it belongs to the family I failed to protect because I died a fool.’

He clutched his aching heart and repeated, ‘I’m sorry.

‘I can’t go back now, no matter how much I wish I could, because the people I was supposed to protect are still here.’

Alone, as a ghost, the Crown Prince watched his loved ones die at the hands of the Sierra he loved and betrayed.

A hot tear hangs on the edge of his chin and drips onto his shoe.

For the first time in a long time, the crown prince felt like a weight had been lifted from his shoulders.