I Will Die for You, My Darling! - Chapter 32
Chapter 32
She adored him even in his beast form. Her “Big Cat.” It amused her that the nickname, once hers alone, had become a universal moniker for him. She cherished him like a pet cat. Though she had never imagined being pierced through the chest by her pet cat’s fangs.
Her mind, flooded with a torrent of thoughts, felt dizzy. “What’s the matter, Izzy? It’s almost New Year’s. Why so violent?” But the words that tumbled from her lips were the same carefree ones she’d uttered during her first death.
Even then, she had sensed her impending death. She knew it from the aura Isaac exuded. He was going to kill her, and he had chosen this moment.
Her heart pounded fiercely. The unavoidable tension one felt when facing death. Yet, there was no resentment, no fear.
Since Seia’s death, Arietta had surrendered her life to Isaac. He had repeatedly told her he would kill her “at the optimal time, in the optimal way.” He was merely exercising his right.
On this New Year’s Eve, not with a blade or a gun, but with his own body. He would capture her with his eyes and devour her with his mouth. ‘So this is your optimal time, your optimal way.’ ‘Then it’s a beautiful death.’
Arietta smiled in the face of death. Her only regret was her desire to possess him completely… She could no longer influence his life after her death.
The beast lunged. Animal instinct made Arietta recoil, but she didn’t flee. When the black tiger’s jaws opened, she silently offered herself to the sharp teeth before her.
Bones fractured, lungs punctured. Isaac’s fangs tore through flesh, burrowing deep. She couldn’t scream; her breath caught in her throat.
‘Horrible.’
Instinct overrode will. Forgetting her resolve to accept death with composure, Arietta thrashed. The realization that resistance was futile hadn’t yet reached her.
‘It hurts. It hurts. It hurts.’
Her vision blurred. She struggled with all her might, yet her fingers and toes wouldn’t budge. ‘Why do my arms and legs hurt when it’s my chest and stomach that are bitten?’
In that moment, a startling realization struck Arietta.
‘This is a dream.’
Time stopped the instant she understood.
Arietta slipped free from the suffering woman’s body. It was a bizarre sensation. She watched her own body being torn and crushed from a third-person perspective.
The falling drops of blood hung suspended in mid-air. The beast’s cruelly contracted muscles were frozen.
Arietta turned her back on her own form and gently stroked Isaac’s brow. “How did it feel, actually doing it? Horrible?” She had always wondered. After Seia’s death, Isaac, who had taken Arietta in, had made it his mantra. He would kill her most miserably, most horribly. ‘Was he satisfied?’
“If you were to remember me dying like this, over and over, would you be pleased?” Naturally, Isaac didn’t answer.
The white hand that had been stroking his brow moved to ruffle his short fur, then settled on the beast’s eyes. The pupils of his yellow eyes were dilated. The same murderous intent as always. Isaac always wore this expression when he came to her on New Year’s Eve.
The repeating time accumulated only for Arietta. With each cycle, she changed, eroded, while Isaac remained the same man from the first iteration. The countless hours Arietta spent with Isaac were simply discarded, evaporating without meaning.
Finally tearing her gaze from Isaac, Arietta looked around the room. Even in the dream, the room was rendered in meticulous detail. Probably because she had lived here for an incredibly long time.
An eternity.
She hadn’t wound the automaton’s gears in decades. The butterfly’s turquoise wings no longer held any charm. The intricate curves of the sculptures had become tedious.
Arietta knew every element of the room intimately. She had memorized every book on the shelves. From alphabet primers and children’s picture books to complex, weighty tomes.
Arietta pulled a book from the shelf. An illuminated manuscript with the title and a rose embossed in delicate gold leaf on the cover. The title: On Love.
Until the third or fourth regression, the book had been nothing more than a decorative piece on the shelf. She had first picked it up and read it after several deaths.
Now, it was her favorite book. This iteration had begun in late May, which meant Isaac would bring the book to her glass dome mansion, a gift from the Sky City nobles, within a few weeks.
