My Husband Hid His Regression, So I Hid Mine Too Chapter 5

His body was growing lighter.

Breathing became easier, as if by a miracle.

At the same time, the frail body in his arms was growing colder by the second.

“…Hey. Stop this. Right now.”

He tried to pull her hand away, but her fingertips were already as cold as ice.

“I said stop it, Odely!”

“No.”

But Odely only shook her head desperately, clinging weakly to him.

“If not now… I’ll never get another chance.”

“Don’t! I never wanted this!”

Ludville shouted, the veins in his neck standing out.

His furious cry didn’t last long.

Before long, it turned into a desperate plea.

“Please… stop. I’m begging you…”

But it was already too late.

A faint smile touched Odely’s lips before she slowly collapsed in his arms.

“It’s okay now.”

Before he could even tell her that nothing was okay—

“If you keep going… you’ll find a way out. …So you have to live.”

Gathering the last of her strength, Odely raised her trembling hand and pointed somewhere ahead.

“Live. That’s my final wish.”

The gentle curve of her smile never faded.

Not until her final breath.

For someone who had confidently insisted she would outlive him,

Odely died all too easily.

She hadn’t even reached the average lifespan of a Purifier.

Now that Odely was dead, another Purifier would soon be born.

House Cardel would no doubt click their tongues and complain that they would have to raise the newborn from the beginning.

In the end, nothing had changed.

The Purifier’s fate, unchanged for centuries,

had merely arrived a little sooner.

It had always been that way.

It always would be.

That should have been the end of the story.

But…

There was one person.

Just one, who refused to accept that fate.

“You said you’d live longer than me…”

His cracked, bloodstained lips trembled.

Ludville’s fingertips slowly brushed across Odely’s cheek as she lay sleeping peacefully in his arms.

“…You lied.”

“Odely.”

“Please…

Answer me…”

His shoulders shook.

It didn’t take long before his ragged breathing broke into sobs.

The moment the first cry escaped him, he completely fell apart, weeping uncontrollably.

After years of living as an experimental subject, Ludville remained painfully thin even as an adult, little more than skin and bone.

He looked nothing like the man Odely remembered.

But his eyes…

His eyes were alive.

Even in the darkness, they burned brightly.

“I don’t care if it’s God… or the devil… anyone. It doesn’t have to be a miracle. A contract, a curse… anything. Just please… one more time…”

Hot tears ran down Ludville’s face and fell from his lips.

He prayed with every ounce of his being.

“Take everything. My name… my memories… my soul. Just please… save her…”

At that moment, the empty air rippled.

As though time itself had stopped,

the space twisted, and a radiant gemstone appeared.

It was a blue crystal, small enough to fit in the palm of a hand.

It pulsed faintly, beating like a living heart.

“This is…”

One of House Cardel’s many sacred relics.

For centuries, while claiming to be descendants of the Dragon,

House Cardel had secretly collected countless holy relics and stored them beneath their estate.

One of those relics had suddenly appeared before Ludville.

Then, the scene changed.

The floor was soaked with blood.

Ludville lay motionless, his entire body drenched in crimson.

The blue gemstone was still clutched tightly in his hand.

Surrounding him stood the silver-armored knights of House Cardel.

Someone shouted through gritted teeth.

“That insane experiment actually dared to steal one of our family’s sacred relics!”

The knight standing at the front drew his sword.

Then drove it straight toward Ludville’s heart.

Odely instinctively rushed forward.

But then—

The gemstone blazed with brilliant light,

erupting in a flash of blue.

The overwhelming radiance swallowed Ludville whole.

Like a blazing star.

Beautiful.

And merciless.

Then…

Everything disappeared.

The blood.

The pain.

Even the sword piercing his chest.

Within the silent darkness, time began to flow backward for the very first time.

The pool of blood spread across the floor flowed back into his body.

The knights surrounding him withdrew their swords and stepped backward.

Everything rewound,

like the turning of a great clock.

When he opened his eyes again, Ludville had returned to ten years earlier.

The very day he had been sold at the slave market

and dragged into House Cardel’s underground laboratory.

…The Gem of Regression.

It was the gemstone set into the ring Ludville always wore.

No one knew what had triggered it.

The only thing that was certain

was that the gem had responded to Ludville’s desperate prayer as he knelt before Odely’s body.

He had been chosen.

And with that, he gained the power to turn back time.

“This… isn’t possible.”

The first time he experienced regression,

Ludville refused to believe it was real.

“…I can undo everything.”

Then, hope found him.

“I can save you.”

Ludville smiled in pure joy.

“We can live together.”

This time, he escaped with Odely.

But he was nothing more than a powerless slave.

Before they could even leave House Cardel’s territory,

they were captured.

He was executed on the spot, and Odely was dragged back underground.

Time rewound once again.

The gemstone had become slightly smaller than before.

I need more power.

This time, Ludville chose to escape House Cardel first.

Serving an old retired knight, he held a sword for the first time in his life.

The boy who could barely lift a blade without stumbling eventually surpassed others his own age through relentless effort.

But it still wasn’t enough to become a true knight.

So Ludville devoted that entire lifetime to mastering the sword.

He trained until he died of old age.

The moment he died, time turned back once more.

The gemstone had grown even smaller.

In the next life, he became a knight of House Cardel.

When the opportunity came, he fled with Odely.

They hid aboard a merchant ship, escaped to another country, and built a small cabin together in a quiet rural village.

“Odely.”

Ludville took out a pair of newly purchased silver rings from his pocket.

“I can’t give you anything expensive… or make any grand promises…”

They were the finest rings he could afford after spending every coin he had saved.

With trembling hands, he slipped the smaller ring onto Odely’s finger, then placed the larger one on his own.

“This is my promise… that I’ll stay by your side forever.”

Slowly, he pressed a kiss against the ring on her finger.

Looking at her with the face of someone hopelessly in love,

he whispered,

“…I love you, Odely.”

There wasn’t a trace of pretense in his confession.

Only pure, unreserved love.

As though this moment would never come again, Ludville held her with all the love he possessed.

But Odely’s body had already been ruined beyond saving after years of exploitation.

She died at twenty-nine.

Ludville despaired.

But it was all right.

He still had countless chances left.

…I have to find a way to heal her.

Ludville traveled across the Empire, searching for any medicine that could cure Odely.

But there was only so much information a low-born knight could obtain.

I need power.

Time turned back once more.

The gemstone became smaller again.

He enlisted as a child soldier.

He threw himself recklessly onto the battlefield.

Ironically, he was killed almost immediately by an enemy’s sword.

Time rewound again.

The stench of countless battlefields.

The screams swallowed by flames.

The names of comrades who fell beneath his blade.

He died, again and again.

He failed, again and again.

He earned enough merit to become a baron.

Then a count.

Then a duke.

Compared to the thousands of achievements he had accumulated,

becoming a Grand Duke was almost insignificant.

He saved nations.

He conquered enemy kingdoms renowned for their advanced medicine.

He learned magic, hoping to create a miracle.

He even became the ruler of the underworld, resorting to every forbidden art imaginable.

But none of it was enough.

No matter what he did, he could never save her.