Chapter 444

In the dream, a faint halo of light enveloped the space.

I was looking down as if I were a soul drifting in the void.

Where my gaze fell was a place that remained etched in my memory with clarity.

It was the workshop where the Blue Girl’s final breath had lingered, and where her intact body was discovered.

The workshop I faced in the dream looked no different from when I first discovered it.

As if time had stopped, or as if someone had wanted to preserve this moment forever, everything was left exactly where it had been.

It was as neat as the room of someone on the verge of death, yet there was an indescribable loneliness that seeped into the air.

On the bed, the Blue Girl was slowly but surely approaching death.

Beside her was a white goby.

With its small body, the white goby had struggled to move her onto the bed, and now it wore a face full of panic and despair.

The white goby was continuously pouring a potion filled with healing power into her lips.

Though it was a product of alchemy so powerful it could be called a miracle, it was of no use at all.

The Blue Girl’s death had not been caused by simple physical injury or illness.

Through eyes that could now vaguely see the soul, I watched as the Blue Girl’s soul scattered like mist.

It was the kind of death I had witnessed before.

A way of dying caused by a “contract,” one that even premium objects could not avoid.

Just like how the Lamp Man disappeared without leaving a trace, unable to join the Mini Grim Reapers in the dream garden, it was an irreversible, eternal disappearance.

‘!!!’

As I watched this scene, I was quite shocked.

The Blue Girl’s death was entirely different from what I had imagined.

It was not just the death of her body, but the complete annihilation of her soul.

This fact raised even more questions.

“If that’s the case, the Blue Girl won’t be able to reincarnate, will she?”

“Her soul has completely disappeared, so how could the terms of the contract with the Lamp Man be established?”

“Does that mean the condition for the contract wasn’t my reincarnation of the Blue Girl?”

As these thoughts continued to pile up, the Blue Girl’s life was slipping away, grain by grain, like sand in an hourglass.

The white goby, in desperation, seemed ready to pour all the potions from the workshop, but as the Blue Girl weakly shook her head to stop it, it sat down beside her, tears welling up in its eyes.

The Blue Girl, her sight seemingly gone, blankly gazed at the ceiling with unfocused eyes and mumbled:

“It would have been nice if we could meet…”

“If I could have lived just a little longer… If we could have met…”

Her faint voice echoed through the air.

“Just like the grim ending of a contract’s grimoire… to think we couldn’t meet, just a few years apart…”

“If only we could have met, or at least had the chance to watch from afar. If only I could have relived those memories…”

Her words grew weaker and weaker.

Though she spoke as if regretful, her expression seemed strangely relieved.

Now, even blinking seemed difficult for her.

Her soul had already become so faint.

The Blue Girl gathered the last of her strength and looked toward the white goby that had moved her onto the bed.

And with a final breath, she whispered:

“I’m sorry…”

But the words that should have followed, words of encouragement, never became sound.

‘And take care. I believe you’ll do well.’

That final message, never reaching the white goby, was lost as the Blue Girl froze, like a doll with its energy drained.

Upon waking from the dream, I found myself dozing off in the chair beside the Blue Girl’s bed.

‘Maybe because I fell asleep near the Blue Girl, I had another painful dream. If I’m not the Blue Girl’s reincarnation, what am I?’

After thinking about it for about ten seconds, I pushed the memory of the Blue Girl’s dream to the back of my mind.

It wouldn’t do any good sitting here and pondering things I didn’t know!

Then, before I fell asleep again, I began to retrace what I had been doing earlier.

‘Right, I came out of the dream garden and was doing a new ability test…’

The test I conducted on the Mini Flower Grim Reaper’s Halo was a resounding success.

As I had expected, the Mini Flower Grim Reaper used the Time Halo far better than I did.

With the Halo, the Mini Flower Grim Reaper was able to reverse time much more effectively than the budding Grim Reaper.

Moreover, it showed many fragmented possibilities for the future, giving it a faint future prediction ability!

Mini Grim Reapers might be dumber than me, but they sure excel at this…

However, the object restored by the reversal of time turned out to be a trampoline, which burned up and disappeared, so I just made it into a trampoline again.

I wonder if the future where it was restored into a trampoline wasn’t seen?

Hehe.

Now, I was testing the new ability I had gained after handling the contract’s grimoire.

‘Mom! I did it!’

Still a little dazed from the dream, I was slapping my cheeks to wake up when one of the Golden Grim Reapers approached me with a bright smile.

The Golden Grim Reaper held a spear piercing the white goby in one hand and a contract made of stone-shaped cookies in the other.

When I checked the contract, there was a check mark next to it.

<White Goby Hunt (1/1)>

<Reward: Mom’s Praise and Star Candy>

‘Well done.’

I passed on my encouragement and patted it, giving the Golden Grim Reaper a piece of star candy. The Grim Reaper smiled happily.

At the same time, the contract burned and disappeared with the termination.

Nom nom.

The Golden Grim Reaper then sat next to me, slowly munching on the star candy.

‘This ability is somewhat useful, though not too useful.’

After acquiring the contract’s grimoire, I gained the ability to make contracts with my subordinates.

Perhaps, depending on the situation, it could be a pretty useful ability, but since my subordinates were Mini Grim Reapers, it was completely useless.

Well, Mini Grim Reapers would eagerly carry out any orders you gave them.

But it might be useful when giving tasks to the “busy” Orange Crown Grim Reaper, who loves to complain.

I turned my gaze to the bed where the Blue Girl was lying quietly.

Not dead, but as if she were just sleeping.

‘Hmm’

I still needed to test the Blue Girl’s alchemical abilities, but I didn’t feel like it.

Her alchemical powers were incredibly strong, far beyond what I had seen in the dream of the Purple Moon, but…

Entering would be uncomfortable, hungry, frustrating, and painful, so I was reluctant to go in.

Plus, my slight rebelliousness made me not want to go in.

Kyu…

Looking down, the Goby Grim Reaper was clinging to my feet with a sad expression.

As soon as I returned from the dream garden, it had been clinging to me, begging for possession of the Blue Girl.

No matter how much I tried to shake it off, it was stronger than me, so it wouldn’t budge.

‘How annoying…’

I thought, ‘Maybe if I made a hybrid, it would forget about begging me and go out to play?’ but I shook my head, pushing that dreadful thought away.

If it still clung to me even as a hybrid, that would be a nightmare.

The Mini Grim Reaper Garden, Marshmallow Plains, and the Blue Girl’s grave after the Gray Grim Reaper left.

There, the leaden doll and the Saintess Doll, having escaped the Sehee Institute, were seated.

The Saintess Doll, surrounded by Mini Grim Reapers, was busily writing something in a book.

[Hello.]

The Saintess Doll was writing Hangul in awkward handwriting on the practice sheet.

Next to the Saintess Doll were several leaden dolls, but only one of them moved its hand to gently stroke the Mini Grim Reapers.

‘The other leaden dolls don’t move, but this one does.’

The first time the Saintess Doll saw the moving leaden doll, she had thought it was the Gray Grim Reaper, and she was quite startled.

It looked exactly the same, but there was something divine about its presence.

However, upon closer inspection, it felt too weak compared to the real Gray Grim Reaper, so the Saintess Doll decided that it was just a moving leaden doll.

She took out a green Jade Plate from inside her clothing.

It was a lost holy relic of the sect that she had obtained from Junior 2 as a wish.

‘I hope everyone in the sect is doing well.’

The Saintess Doll gazed at the Jade Plate with a slightly nostalgic look, silently speaking to it.

Though it was highly unlikely the sect members would hear, she hoped her thoughts would reach them through the relic.

Whenever she missed them, the Saintess Doll would pray toward the Jade Plate.

Tap tap.

Suddenly, feeling a sensation poking her shoulder, she turned her head to see a leaden doll staring at her with yellow glowing eyes.

[Jade Plate…]

And a faint psychic wave reached the Saintess Doll.

[Do you want this Jade Plate?]

It was the first time a leaden doll spoke to her, so the Saintess Doll blinked, surprised.

The leaden doll slowly nodded its head.

In its golden eyes, a small yearning was visible.