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Everything turned dark...some noises were coming, whisperings and gasping. In that darkness, there was no one but those ringing voices and soulless mumblings. I stared straight at the only source of flickering golden light, running towards it for my life.

The light grew brighter and brighter as I ran towards it more and more, my breathing short as I sprinted towards the ray of hope. I could not feel the ground where I ran. Footsteps strangely muffled and eyes etched towards the light from an unknown source.

I reached the end of the oblivion and the light led me to the outlet...I squinted my eyes, waiting for it to adjust.

'Oh God Lord, a spawn of Devil has taken birth!' A woman called out. These were the same whisperings that I heard in that swallowing darkness. She was calling out to another nun who was working as the midwife.

The building looked old and in a dilapidated condition. From looking outside the huge window I guessed it was nighttime of a cold winter month.

The healthy screams of the child were unheard and the happiness needed to celebrate childbirth seemed to be nothing but a dream.

'He ate his mother in the womb…that is why she died.' the orthodox nun spoke again, she was old and had a severe expression that was reflected in her cold grey eyes. Her wrinkled brows were convoluted by just looking at the baby.

'Look at his black hair and those lilac eyes …he really is a devil!' another one whispered outside the maternity ward. She was more scared and horrified being disgusted like the old nun.

**Black hair? Lilac eyes?**

*Is he ?*

'You guessed it right descendant …this is that time.' A voice sounded behind me.

I jumped up from shock to see Cronus levitating in the air. With a smirk plastered on his face.

'Wah…Where are we? why am I here?' I asked.

'You ask the obvious look down first.' He pointed his sharp limbs towards me.

My clothes….my clothes were exactly the ones worn by those midwives. Long black kaftan and iron shoes made my feet heavy however unlike them who had their heads shaved I wore a veil that covered my head like ones in training to become a nun would wear.

'What…Why are we here?' I asked again.

'To kill Advisor Declan of course. Or more precisely the infant who would be advisor Declan.' He smiled as if he was testing me.

'This place….'

'This is the chapel where Declan was born and without haste abandoned when he was claimed to be a demonic child. You surely have read it in that storybook of yours.' He said this as he handed over a dagger to me. It was an old relic with rubies encrusted on the golden hilt. This was specifically used by the Demon of time to make a dent in history without changing the course of the future. The Demon of time knows loopholes when a part of history cannot be changed even by killing the pivot of it all. The result would be the same even if the hero of the whole story dies.

'Take this and kill its existence. Nothing else can stop your doom.' The demon spoke in a persuasive tone, telling me to commit the greatest sin of killing an infant.

'No…no…I cannot.' I stammered and spoke in a distressed tone. I was not going to kill an infant fresh out of his mother's womb. Even those superstitious midwives did not commit such an act.

'Why?.' he tilted his head and asked. The shine of madness in his eyes had mellowed down.

'Fuck! No way in hell I would kill a baby.' I said again more to myself than to Cronus.

'Haha...haha…. haha' Cronus laughed, his shoulders trembling. He looked…amused.

'You little hypocrite!"

"I am not a hypocrite ! I just have morality !" I roared, my voice breaking.

"Hmmm?...but you have killed someone before. In extreme cold blood and anger. ' He said again.

"What is that comparison supposed to mean!.. This and that are different !" I shouted at him. We were invisible in view of others thus talking in such loud noises was no problem.

He stopped laughing and faced me seriously...

'Listen up Aria Bellhouse…. Time is cryptic…you can only do this to save yourself. Time would not allow otherwise. Everything else would lead to the same conclusion if you left that child.' He pointed towards the swaddled crying baby.

What he said was true. I cannot do anything to save myself except kill that child.

However, this would be a sin.

But most of all be it an infant or a full-grown man…. I cannot kill anyone, not after that!

'I won't kill him. I cannot kill anyone…' I sighed and let my true intentions flow.

'Tch…. you are weak.' Cronus said irritated at my words.

'Well, that is how I was raised…I don't want to steal others' happiness just so that I can be happy.' I smiled and let out a helpless laugh.

'Hmmm…. Let us see what you have to know.'

With this, I felt my vision darken.

**

This time it was a street that I could not recognize at all. With the lively atmosphere and busy shops, it looked like a marketplace that remotely resembled Araka's street however the dialect said otherwise.

'Where is this now?' I asked Cronus who was levitating in front of me.

'Just wait and watch Descendant.' He said in a cool tone.

The place was filled with people to the brim, sweat-mating with seafood on the roadside, who had lived a privileged life could not bear the smell of it, causing me to pinch my nose to prevent myself from gagging.

Cronus looked back at me, snorting at my gesture. He too knew that the young lady of County cannot bear to be in such a place. It made me embarrassed but that was the truth anyway.

I was looking at my surroundings when a girl ran past pushing me in the process.

'What the….' I exclaimed looking at the child.

'Descendent who is she now?' Cronus came up and whispered in my ear.

Lisbeth!!

'This is the time when the soul of that little body was adjusting to her underprivileged surroundings. Lisbeth Morton's soul disappeared and an alien soul took her place. If I am not wrong was she the heroine you mentioned?' the demon said again.

'What do you want to show me?' I asked

'You can kill her you know. That child was stealing apples from there…' Cronus pointed towards the man who was running behind Lisbeth. He was shouting on top of his lungs with a stick in one hand.

'Right now, a carriage accident would fail to take place…look there.'

As Lisbeth was running on the cobblestone pathway of the market, a very fast carriage was moving in the opposite direction. I heard that commoners dying by coming under carriages were a very common occurrence from my servants.

'Lisbeth would survive this accident, right?'

Cronus nodded with a smile stuck on his lips …. there was a catch to it.

'But that could be changed…' he said

The time stopped…I could see the running Lisbeth and the angry expression of the apple seller turn into stone. The neighing horse of the carriage stopped on its track just before he could crush into Lisbeth. The whole marketplace turned quiet, the hustle-bustle turned into a pin drop silence and the only sound that came was from Cronus's footstep towards the stone crowd and my anxious breath.

'Aria Bellhouse…this man would play the savior.' He touched the shoulder of a huge man in knight's uniform. He had red hair and bushy beard. Exactly looking the age my father would be when I turned five.

'I remember him…' I vaguely remember the book pointing towards the man who adopted Lisbeth when she was struggling as a beggar after waking up into a body of a five-year-old child. Lisbeth who was a teenager in her world was calm and intelligent. She belonged to a rich family but when she transmigrated her status completely changed. Struggling to live another day she almost met with a carriage accident when a knight saved her and offered to take her in.

'So, this was that time….' I mumbled.

'Why not stop that knight…make a small talk to him or ask some directions. Keep him busy so that the carriage would run over the protagonist. And when everything is done you could end the conversation by saying 'poor child…died so young.' while knowing exactly who lead it happen.' Cronus said it once again. He was urging me to kill someone. His persuasive tone filled with honey and dripping with lies of reason.

'Cronus, I told you before I would not kill anyone…I asked you to turn back time not to kill someone by going into the past.' I spoke.

Looking at the pink-haired frail girl with a desperate look on her face. Her cheeks were sunken and her eyes rimmed with dark circles. I could not help but pity her instead. That is not what the heroine would deserve. I am determined not to kill someone even if all I want is to survive.

'What if I say no?' Cronus asked as he once again made the time flow. Lisbeth was caught in the accident but that knight saved her. She thankfully got away with a minor scratch.

'You are my contracted demon …those shackles are evidence of it.' I said part of me was probably assuring myself of that fact.

'Why should I be saving you? When you are nothing but a cloud of dust on the fate of the world? You cannot kill someone and neither have any hatred towards your enemies. Do you really think so that I would save you such a weak person?' He spoke.

'But…I am the only one…. the only one who could free you…' I felt anxious at his words. 'Don't make a deal with the Devil' that was a saying my mother used to say. I don't know why my mind recalled that quote now.

'You are the starting point of saving this country, killing you would only benefit me…And this shackle? He snorted.

'…. they came off the moment I crossed time barriers with you.'

The golden shackles that seemed to have loosened from his wrists now fell on the ground with a thud.