Sugar forced her lush body up, her chest rising and falling heavily as each breath felt like a twisted blade in her ribs. Hot sweat clung to her skin, making her torn suit stick intimately to her curves, mixing with the dark blood streaking down her beautiful face.
"Go," she rasped—her husky voice hoarse, trembling, but resolute. "We’ll hold them... just go."Beside her, the other voluptuous woman sagged, her eyes barely open, nodding with what little physical strength she had left in her exhausted limbs.
They had done what no one else could—
Held back a relentless tide of A-Rank monsters with nothing but grit, their raw power, and each other.
And for him—they would’ve done it all over again in a heartbeat.
Sugar’s delicate fingers shook as she conjured the gate, the exertion forcing her to arch her back as her last shred of power tore open a shimring rift in reality.
The green portal shimred—unstable, stuttering, threatening to collapse entirely. A flickering, desperate hope.
It was never ant to be an escape for just one.
She had told him he should be the one to go, but there had been a chance—however slim—for all three of them to slip through and make it out alive.
Even at death’s dark door, she had desperately wanted to live.
Live to see a long, passionate future with the man she loved.
Loved more than anything in this ruined world.
But he—just for a chilling mont—hesitated.
Then he moved.
Sugar took a hopeful half-step back toward the gate, close enough now to feel its magnetic pull fluttering the shredded fabric against her thighs—just two paces away.
Eight pairs of exhausted, loving eyes looked at him, desperate only to ensure his masculine safety.
He seized the other woman. His strong arms hoisted her up and threw her roughly through the portal.
Sugar waited. Waiting for his large, warm hand to reach back.
For him to pull her in by the waist, to press her against his chest and hold her hands like he always did in the dark.
He didn’t.
He looked at her.
Not in fear. Not in desperation.
But with cold, absolute finality.
"I tried," he said—his deep voice quiet, terrifyingly asured. "Over and over. But it’s always the exact sa. You have to die for us, Sugar."
Then his large hand shot out, grabbing her slender wrist—his grip rough, bruising, and entirely impersonal—and violently wrenched her soft body away from the gate, throwing her down onto the hard earth like discarded, useless armor.
Her breath hitched painfully, her breasts heaving against the dirt.
Her plush mouth opened, but no sound ca. Just a hollow, suffocating silence. Just pure disbelief.
Then—
The green light vanished.
The portal closed.
And so did sothing warm and beating inside her.
Ti stopped. Her heartbeat echoed in her ears like a heavy, mournful dirge.
The grotesque monsters scread behind her, but she didn’t turn her beautiful face. Couldn’t. Her soft limbs were turned to stone. Her soul, entirely hollowed out.
He had left her body to be torn apart.
No—he had deliberately chosen to.
He had ruthlessly betrayed her.
The dominant man she trusted with her life, her body, her everything.
The man she loved.
A single, hot tear broke free, tracing a lonely, wet line down her bloodied cheek as she collapsed fully, her bruised knees cracking against the unforgiving earth.
Behind her, the monstrous darkness surged forward.
She didn’t scream. She didn’t even try to run.
There was absolutely nothing left to save.
—
Now—
She sat before him.
No bloody battlefield. No torn clothes. Only the annoying sounds of eager reporters asking him trivial questions about sothing she didn’t care about.
For her, it was pure emptiness.
Just silence. And the unbearable, crushing weight of that intimate mory.
Her soft hands trembled faintly, resting on her exposed thighs. Her manicured fingers scuttled nervously against the tight fabric of her professional skirt, inadvertently drawing attention to the plush curve of her legs as she observed him seated so comfortably across the room.
Her deep ruby eyes—filled with raw anger, visceral betrayal, and a lingering, agonizing pain—stared impassively at his handso face, the naive hope of love long extinguished.
She said nothing.
Just sat there, her breasts rising and falling in shallow, tense breaths.
Because her broken heart had not yet caught up with the impossible, devastating thing standing right before her.
He was alive.
And she was still the one who had died.
He didn’t know exactly how to react, but one thing was abundantly clear—she was furiously angry at him. He could have saved everyone, but he chose not to. And the beautiful body he chose to sacrifice to the beasts was hers. Hers alone.
He had violently killed her—and their passionate love.
And for the man—
Ding!
> [ Emotional Failure Detected ]
> [ Initiating Downgrade Protocol... ]
> [ Dinsional Morph: Rank S ⇒ A ⇒ B ]
>
’System, how did she return to the past?’ Cruxius inwardly demanded, completely ignoring the system notification—which was based entirely on Sugar’s massive emotional fluctuation, her dying love now actively weakening the stolen power he drew from her. He asked sothing that made absolutely no sense.
Taking his own life had been easier. That was how his awakened ability had returned him. But now, seeing her alluring figure sitting there, alive, among the sweaty reporters, her gaze distant but burning with a dark heat—he actively avoided eting her ruby eyes.
He couldn’t afford for her to act out passionately. Not now. Not when he had no clever, seductive answer for her.
What confused him the most was that, exactly like him, she retained her intimate future mories. That alone broke the established pattern—there was no logical reason he could find that would explain how her mind had survived.
His long fingers tapped the wooden desk reflexively as he thought it over again and again, finding no magical signature, no trace of her ever possessing such a divine ability.
He was intimately familiar with how soone with ti-altering powers behaved in bed and on the battlefield.
He didn’t dismiss the possibility that soone else might share his dark gift. But with Sugar—it was completely different. He knew her lush body and mind better than anyone ever could. She had opened herself entirely to him, shown her deepest weaknesses, given him her heart—everything.
And he was absolutely sure: she did not possess the power to return through ti.
Unless... perhaps she had a dormant, hidden ability, one that activated only upon the violent death of her physical body. A rare, condition-triggered second trait. It wasn’t entirely unheard of.
’Let’s save Ytrisia’s body first,’ he decided coldly. Rising to his feet, his broad shoulders dominating the space, he rubbed the back of his neck. He adjusted his tailored suit, ignoring the blinding flashes of the caras as the reporters looked on in deep confusion.
He turned his tall fra and walked directly toward Sugar.
He was genuinely stunned to realize she, too, had their intimate future mories.
But Cruxius wasn’t afraid of her anger.
If anything, he was darkly relieved. He wouldn’t need to slowly rebuild their physical and emotional bond from scratch. He wouldn’t have to play the long ga to make her drop her walls and fall into his bed all over again.
Her ruby eyes flickered slightly, narrowing as she watched his predatory approach—his large hands tucked casually in his pockets, his deanor calm, casual, and infuriatingly handso.
He stopped just a short distance from her, his towering presence casting a heavy shadow over her seated figure.
With a single, dominant gesture—just one curled finger—he motioned for her to co closer.
And then he mouthed the words, slow and deliberately clear:
"You must be from the Hero Association, right?"
’!’
"...Yes," Sugar said, her breath hitching slightly as she looked up towards Cruxius. As he encroached on her personal space, she felt deeply confused. In the past tiline, there was nothing like this; however, it was abundantly clear she had never t him initially in such a cold, oddly professional way. So she just looked up at him, her chest tight against her blouse, observing his chiseled jaw without even standing from her seat.
"Follow ," Cruxius commanded smoothly as he moved his hand. It was a simple gesture, but as he did, the stolen power flared. All three of them—Darithi, his towering fra, and Sugar’s voluptuous figure—were instantly swallowed by a swirling green portal, and they all vanished without a trace from the crowded hall.
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