~Chapter 2~

“Doctor! Hurry! Patient 1605 is regaining consciousness!”
A sharp voice rang out, followed by the urgent squeak of shoes on linoleum.

Through the mist that clouded her senses, a chaotic scene swam into view. The sting of antiseptic hit first. Then the shrill beep of machinery.

It felt both familiar and alien, a dissonant hum that sank deep into her bones.

A wave of terror surged.
This was a world she had never thought she’d see again. A world that felt like a bad joke.
A world she had long abandoned.

She had been certain she’d found happiness at the end of that long, winding path. Certain that the rest of her days would be spent smiling, safe and cherished. But just as she placed a ring upon the hand of the man she loved… the world ripped her away.

As if someone sneered, “You don’t deserve this,” and hurled her off a cliff.

“Miss? Miss Kim Ji‑young! Do you hear me?”

That name crashed over her like a wave. Kim Ji‑young.
A name she hadn’t heard in five long years. A name she thought she had buried forever.
But the desperate voice refused to be ignored.

Reality sank its teeth into her. This was no dream.
She was back.
Back in the world she had escaped.

Back to being Kim Ji‑young.

A faint memory surfaced: a dark alley. The screech of tires. The sickening thud of a dump truck. The smell of alcohol hanging in the midnight air.
A hit‑and‑run. An accident that had torn her from one world and thrown her into another.

She had believed her old body was gone, lost forever.
That was the rule of such stories, wasn’t it? The original body dies when the soul finds a new vessel.
That was the way it worked in every novel she’d ever read.

Except…
Here she was. Breathing. Weak, broken, and alive.
Everyone called it a miracle. A patient in a long coma suddenly waking. An impossible recovery from the edge of death.

But for Kim Ji‑young, this ‘miracle’ was nothing short of a curse.

The medical staff exchanged hopeful glances. An older woman in the bed beside her smiled, brushing away a tear. “Look at that! You came back to us. You have to eat well, dear, build up your strength…”

To them, she was a fighter. A beacon of resilience.
To herself? She felt like a prisoner thrown into a body that refused to walk anymore.

A year of immobility had left her legs wasted, one with a slight drag. The doctors warned recovery would be long, if it came at all.

It felt like the universe whispering, “This is your punishment. This is what you deserve.”

A wave of nausea rose as memories bubbled forth. Khalid’s hand in hers. The warmth in those crimson eyes as he promised forever. The sound of the bells, the sacred vows on the tip of her tongue.

It hadn’t been a dream.
She refused to accept that it was.

Through clenched teeth and shaking hands, she scooped a bite of bland hospital rice and forced herself to swallow.
“Good girl,” the old woman praised beside her. “You have to eat well, build strength for rehab.”

Each bite felt like swallowing sand.
Each bite was a reminder of the one thought burning within her:
I have to get back.
Back to him.
Back to that world.
Back to Khalid.

Even if it meant clawing herself up from this bed, piece by piece.

Meanwhile, within the sprawling estate of House Arfin, silence pressed down like a storm about to break.

Rivie Arfin, the jewel of the Empire, the holy beacon of the Church, lay motionless upon crisp sheets. The room that had been a sun‑drenched haven for five long years was now a tomb.

“What happened?” The Duchess sank into a chair, voice shaking. “Why would she collapse like this? She was fine this morning…”

“Are you sure this isn’t some plot?” she pressed, desperation rising. “What if someone tried to poison her?”

“Her Highness was with her every moment,” came the reply, firm but soft. “He wouldn’t have allowed it.”

“Then why?” The Duchess buried her pale face in shaking hands. “Why, when she was so strong? Why now?”

The Duke stood grave and silent, swallowing the ache rising in his chest. He refused to voice the suspicion burning in his thoughts. The holy energy within Rivie had drained suddenly, violently — an impossibility unless she had done it herself.

But why? Why would the daughter who had worked so hard to rewrite herself for five long years suddenly risk everything? What reason could she possibly have? What had taken so much holy energy from her?

The High Priest had offered only one answer:

“She has expended a massive amount of holy energy in an instant. An unprecedented event. It is as if it was ripped from her body. The only thing we can do is wait for it to replenish.”

A reason that refused to make sense.

“Will she be alright?” asked the Duchess faintly.

“As long as her holy energy returns, she will open her eyes,” the High Priest had promised.

The words felt fragile.

The Duchess rose, leaning heavily upon a servant’s arm, whispering a prayer that refused to form fully. The Duke remained by the bed, silent. The air felt so still it was suffocating.

Then the door creaked open, and Crown Prince Khalid Nomen Epherenia entered, every inch of him poised and commanding.

“Has she woken?” he asked, voice deep, tight.

The holy blessings may have been Rivie’s, but Khalid possessed a holy strength of another kind — a strength that spoke of honor, steel, and immortality. The Empire called him the ‘Sword of the Gods,’ and no blade had ever bested him. Yet one person had defeated him. Not with weapons, but with a quiet heart and a shy smile.

Rivie Arfin.
The woman who had reshaped herself, reshaping him in the process.

“Not yet,” replied the Duke quietly.

Khalid sank into the chair beside the bed. The silence pressed down harder.

“Then I’ll wait.”
He drew a long breath and fixed crimson eyes upon the woman he refused to lose.

“Rest as long as you must,” he said softly. “But come back to me, Rivie. Come back to the one who swore eternity to you.”

A faint sound emerged from the bed. A whisper of breath. A quiver of lashes.
“Mm…”

Khalid surged to the edge of the bed. “Rivie!” he called, voice shaking.

Through the veil of twilight that held her, Rivie Arfin — Kim Ji‑young — began to stir.