“Don’t tell me… you still haven’t received proper guiding?”
“Aaaaah—!!”
Before I could think any further, I was thrown into the realm of black magic, and the iron-barred door slammed shut behind me.
“It’s okay, Jade!”
“You can do it!”
I can’t!
I wanted to shout back immediately, but maybe because my energy points weren’t fully released, my voice wouldn’t come out.
“Jade.”
My protagonist, Adrian, gently tilted my chin up.
Unlike his smiling lips, his beautiful violet eyes weren’t smiling at all.
“Do your best.”
“…!”
That’s when I finally remembered what I’d done just before passing out.
A full-body tackle. Also known as forced guiding.
It wasn’t intentional, but I’d ended up screwing over the vengeful protagonist of this regression story.
‘B-But still, I couldn’t just die, right?!’
However, the cost of surviving turned out to be earning Adrian’s grudge.
In fact, I had practically exposed the secret he wanted to keep hidden at all costs.
‘Of course, Adrian managed to escape the crisis by pinning everything on me…’
As expected of my cunning, revenge-driven protagonist—he never lets anyone else manipulate him.
But there was still one problem left for Adrian.
‘That I, a mere extra, know his secret.’
Otherwise, there’d be no reason for me to attempt a guiding via full-body tackle.
‘To protect his secret, Adrian can’t just leave me alone…’
That’s when it hit me.
Out of the frying pan and into the fire—just as I barely escaped death from Harris’s rampage, I was now facing revenge from the protagonist!
“A-Adrian…”
I barely managed to move my lips to speak, but—
“Well then, we’ll be off.”
Before I could even desperately plead, Adrian turned away with a breezy smile.
“W-Wait a minute—!”
I reached my hand through the bars, but they all vanished in an instant.
“…”
What the hell is going on?
As if it weren’t enough that I ended up in this world through the infamous posthumous possession route—a fate reserved only for hardcore webnovel fans—I had to be reborn as a slave no one listens to?
‘This is a scam!’
Sure, I might’ve once joked about “wanting to experience reincarnation” or “waiting for the truck to hit me,” but that didn’t mean I wanted to possess some nameless extra number 123 who gets brutally murdered by her favorite character!
‘Of course, I wanted to wake up as a noble lady with wealth, power, beauty, and good health—pampered by maids and attendants!’
But instead, I was reborn as the slave doing the pampering—not even just any slave, but one being accused of being a fake Guide and about to be killed.
Isn’t this possession difficulty setting a bit too extreme?
“…Cough.”
That’s when I heard a small cough.
Harris Godwin.
My favorite character—whom I’d admired and cheered for in the novel.
He was half-lying on a bed fixed against the stone wall, illuminated dimly by a worn-out lamp on a rickety table.
His black hair hung loosely, casting deep shadows across the side of his face turned away from the light. His high nose bridge and long lashes shimmered faintly.
Sunken eyes, the shadow under them adding a decadent air. And most striking of all—his crimson eyes glowed vividly even in the backlight, like blood.
‘Wow… it feels like my eyes are being purified.’
I instantly felt dazed. So this is what people mean by visual healing…
Cough, cough!
…No, wait! I rushed over to him in a panic.
“H-Harris… sir! Are you alright?”
Cough, cough, hack!
Clearly not.
Harris’s body curled forward with each violent cough, and crimson droplets spilled between the fingers covering his mouth.
Bright red blood dripped onto the tattered blanket.
‘H-How could this happen…’
My heart ached.
Harris was the sole heir of the prestigious Duke Godwin family—he was the Duke’s own son.
He should’ve been staying in the finest bedroom in the castle, attended by the most capable servants.
He was someone who deserved the best of everything here.
And yet, the only one by his side in his suffering was… me. A slave, mistaken for a Guide.
‘My situation is miserable, sure, but Harris’s life is just as tragic…’
As I was swallowing a sigh, our eyes met—his crimson eyes like red gemstones.
“…You.”
Shadows under his eyes, dry and cracked lips.
He looked every bit the image of a terminally ill patient, but somehow, when paired with his face, even that frailty became a sort of tragic beauty.
“Uh, hello?”
Caught in his gaze, I instinctively greeted him.
“Um, are you feeling okay? You were coughing really badly just now and even vomiting blood…”
I reflexively reached toward Harris’s back—to gently pat it. Just like the nurses and my family used to do for me when I was throwing up.
‘It always felt like it helped, somehow.’
So it was a completely subconscious act. No deeper intent.
Smack!
But before I could even touch him, my hand was smacked away.
“…?”
Not by Harris’s hand, but by the dark, smoky aura swirling around him.
Startled, I looked up…
“Are you crazy?”
What met my gaze were hostile crimson eyes and a sharp, cold voice.
Pain and heat bloomed on the back of my hand shortly after.
‘…Ah, right. Harris hates being touched.’
I’d been so starstruck by meeting my favorite character that I’d forgotten even the most basic settings. I scolded myself briefly.
‘Get a grip. The pity I feel for Harris is just one-sided attachment from my all-knowing-reader perspective.’
But from Harris’s view, I was nothing but some random slave loitering in a dungeon.
And Harris is a transcendent—someone who could easily kill me.
I reminded myself of this and quickly pulled my hand back.
“I-I just thought you might be feeling unwell and tried to comfort you…”
“…Who are you?”
“Pardon? Who am I? I’m just…”
Just a random slave #1 who got thrown in here after being mistaken as your Guide… was what I meant to say.
“Are you a Guide?”
“…Huh?”
The absurd question left me speechless.
“I knew it.”
“What??”
And the way he said it—so certain, like he’d already made up his mind.
“I thought something was off… so that’s what it was.”
Why is even Harris misunderstanding like this?!
“No, no! I’m not a Guide—”
“I don’t need one.”
“I’m just an ordinary slave—wait, what?”
“I said, I don’t need a Guide. So get lost.”
“…You don’t need a Guide?”
You’re not just any psychic, you’re an S-class transcendent, you’ll die without a Guide!
“That can’t be right!”
“Can’t be right?”
His voice was hoarse and cracked from all the coughing. His clothes were ragged, and his complexion pale.
He looked so worn down—and yet, the way his crimson eyes glared at me made it hard to meet them.
“And who the hell are you to say that?”
Guh—! A groan escaped me as his power clamped around my throat.
Black smoke-like energy bound me instantly, lifting me off the ground.
“How dare you…!”
His voice was murderous.
That’s when it finally hit me.
Possession. Favorite character. Provoking a powerful protagonist… All these unrealistic elements suddenly crashed into grim reality.
‘This world… is nothing like the one I lived in.’
A strict caste society. And I’m at the very bottom—the untouchable class of slaves.
Even worrying for someone else could be seen as “presumptuous.”
‘No, not just someone—he’s a noble.’
The highest class of this world—people as far removed from me as heaven is from earth.
The injustice of my situation, the confusion of being in a foreign world—it all welled up as tears.
But—
“…I-I was rude, Master Harris, cough.”
I wanted to live. I bit back everything and forced myself to speak.
“Please, have mercy…”
“—Kuh!”
A stifled groan. Before I could finish, Harris doubled over again. At the same time, the aura around me weakened and disappeared.
Thud! I dropped to the ground and whimpered in pain.
“Ow…”
What’s going on? I slowly lifted my head.
Harris’s clenched jaw, tightly shut eyes, and trembling eyelids… he looked like he was barely enduring immense pain.
‘Right. Psychics who can’t be properly guided become hypersensitive…’
And if they’re a transcendent, even the sound of someone breathing can drive them mad.
Approach recklessly, and you’d be torn apart by the power waves.
‘Wait, then it’s a miracle I’m still alive right now?’
“You.”
His crimson eyes—like fresh blood—locked onto me.
“Get out. Before I kill you.”
“B-But… you need treatment—”
“Didn’t you hear me? Get lost!”
His voice, full of venom, made me flinch.
A clear, undeniable rejection. Even the air felt like it was stabbing me.
‘S-So scary…’
My legs trembled instinctively, and I stepped back. I just wanted to get out of there.
If I had to classify him, Harris was closer to evil.
He didn’t mean to—but his inability to control his power endangered many people.
‘But still…’
This overwhelmingly powerful man, someone who could crush me in an instant, kept saying it.
Telling me to go. To leave him alone.
‘As if he were using every last ounce of strength to say it…’
It would’ve been easier to just throw me out with force.
‘Why?’
Was it because Harris hadn’t yet become the deranged villain he was meant to be?
Or was it simply because he was suffering too much to do anything else?
‘…It’s probably the latter.’
Why would someone like Harris care about some lowly slave he’s never seen before? Even if I were a real Guide, he’d snarl at me to get lost.
‘Yeah. It’s probably better this way.’
I was thrown here against my will because of Adrian and the other slave kids. I’ll just go back and tell them:
I’m not the Guide they were expecting. I wasn’t the one who calmed the rampage.
‘And if I just wait it out for a few days… Adrian will eventually treat Harris somehow.’
Just like in the original story of [Terminal Genius’s S-Class Regression Life].
Originally, all the slaves except Adrian died.
And one of them was me—this slave girl named “Jade.”
After the others die, Adrian despairs at the overwhelming power gap between him and Harris.
But even Harris, as powerful as he is, ends up writhing in pain due to the lack of S-class guiding.
“I will give you freedom.”
That’s when Adrian approaches him.
“Freedom from your power—freedom from that cursed ability.”
And thus begins the shackles of “guiding.”
A lowly slave saving the noble heir of a ducal family. That was my favorite arc of [TermGSL].
‘I just have to look away until then.’
I staggered to my feet. There’s nothing I can do anyway. I just have to wait it out.
That’s all.
