I slumped back in the rickety chair of my cramped rental room in the small town of Elderwood, letting the weight of everything settle in for a moment.
The faded walls and rough wooden furniture did nothing to calm my nerves.
Soon, it would all be over.
I was barely scraping by as it was, and soon, I wouldn't even have the money to pay for this humble room or afford the little food I'd been surviving on.
I'd already started making plans to fully leave the academy, to cut ties with that place altogether.
But as I sat there, reflecting on it all, a strange feeling overcame me.
I'd actually done it.
I'd done the unthinkable—I'd killed the main characters.
The ones who were meant to guide the story, to shape this world.
My pulse surged as I thought about it.
In a strange way, it felt good—satisfying, even.
I'd subverted the script, changed the fate of this world in ways no one could have predicted.
And yet, as the adrenaline settled, a new thought gnawed at me.
I hadn't been sent back, not yet.
The world around me hadn't shifted or cracked open to deliver me home.
What would become of this place now?
The irony of it all hit me as I chuckled bitterly to myself.
Here I was, a mere extra, someone with no lasting impact, and yet I'd managed to alter the very core of the story.
But now, the only ones left were Ariana and Draven, Ariana who was hardly even integral to the plot.
Draven, once the esteemed guard of the Bluerose House, had likely been exiled, thrown out in disgrace for failing to protect Amy.
In all likelihood, he'd be grasping at straws, trying to claw his way back to the academy.
Knowing him, he'd probably seek a scholarship, try to carve out a path for himself to study again, to regain even a fraction of what he'd lost.
Ariana, on the other hand, was even less important.
A minor main characer and support character in every sense of the word.
I could erase her, and the plot would barely shift.
Yet the choices I'd made created five potential outcomes, each one with a storm of repercussions.
I leaned back, analyzing the possibilities one by one, weighing what would come of this broken storyline.
[Route 1: Bluerose House's Retribution]
The Bluerose House wouldn't simply let the death of their daughter slide.
But what would an outcast like me do back at the academy?
I hadn't thought this through.
I'd been too blinded by my goal to eliminate the main cast, neglecting the fundamentals of survival here.
Strengthening my abilities was all well and good, but I was penniless and low on influence.
Money and reputation should have been my priority from the start.
Foolishly, I'd focused on my mission and forgotten the basics.
With a frustrated sigh, I summoned the system window, hoping there'd be some kind of option to make quick money or find an opening to earn a place for myself.
Suddenly the window glitched, the familiar interface flickering with static.
A nervous sweat beaded on my brow.
The screen glowed, then turned an unsettling shade of red, illuminating the room with an ominous hue.
Suddenly, a warning message flashed across the screen in bold letters.
[Warning: Key figures necessary for the story have fallen below required threshold!]
[System error!]
[World destabilizing!]
My heart skipped a beat as the world around me began to distort, lines of code materializing before my eyes.
I reached out instinctively, as if to steady myself, but the air crackled with chaotic energy, disintegrating into specks like some digital virus.
The walls, the furniture, even the floor began to dissolve, fragmenting into particles, all of it disintegrating before my eyes.
The ground gave way beneath me, and I plummeted into an endless, inky void.
My surroundings were nothing but blackness, the suffocating darkness pressing in from every side as my mind spun with panic.
This couldn't be happening.
I clawed at the void, desperate for some kind of hold, something to steady me, but there was nothing but emptiness, a vast abyss stretching out in all directions.
My pulse hammered in my ears as I struggled, spiraling downward.
Then, the system flickered again, the red screen flashing within the void like a cruel beacon.
[Searching for alternative routes...]
A pause, as if the system itself was weighing its options.
The red light intensified, casting my face in a harsh glow as it displayed the final message.
[Redirecting...]
[Original Novel Route taken!]
And then, just as suddenly, everything vanished into darkness.