The Villainous Noble Who Kept Rewinding After Death: The Story Somehow Changed When I Committed Suicide

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The Villainous Noble Who Kept Rewinding After Death: The Story Somehow Changed When I Committed Suicide

Chapter 115: To Be Together

~side Shuvina~

After Lewis and Fiera headed towards the Hydra, Shuvina stood ready with her bow, facing the monster-like Ryan.

“Ryan… No, it’s just Ryan now. You’re no longer royalty, so there’s no need for titles, right?”

Shuvina cautiously tried to engage Ryan in conversation to gauge how much reason he had left.

“Shuvina… Shuvina…”

“Ryan. What’s happened to you? If you still have any reason left, answer me!”

“Shuvina… My Shuvina!!!”

However, Ryan had lost all reason and was merely a monster driven by his own desires.

As a result, he didn’t respond to Shuvina’s calls and lunged at her like a beast.

“Eek!!”

Even with the keen eye of an archer, Shuvina managed to barely catch a glimpse of his speed, just evading his charge by rolling on the ground.

(What speed! It’s not as fast as Eir or Fiera, but I can barely track it.)

After rolling on the ground, Shuvina quickly got to her feet, notching an arrow in her silver bow to shoot at Ryan.

“Graaawww!!!”

“Gotcha!”

The arrow Shuvina shot flew straight and pierced Ryan’s left arm, eliciting a scream of pain from him.

(He may be big, but he feels pain, at least.)

Ryan looked like he was covered in tough skin, yet since the arrow had penetrated, Shuvina concluded there was still a chance of victory.

“Shuvina!! Shuvina!!!”

“How disgusting.”

Seeing Ryan in this state, seeking her out purely out of desire, Shuvina couldn’t help but mutter with disgust.

With appropriate distance established, she continued to evade Ryan’s charge and claw attacks while striking back with her arrows, taking a moment to further distance herself.

(I’ve dealt some damage, so he’s moving slower than before.)

Ryan was bleeding from various wounds, and due to significant blood loss and the arrow embedded in his leg, his movements had slowed.

“If this keeps up, I might actually win!”

“Graaawww!!!”

“…Huh? W-what are you doing?”

Just as Shuvina planned to carefully finish off Ryan, he suddenly gouged out the area where the arrow had pierced, even ripping off his own arm, chewing and eating it.

Then, as he began eating the severed limbs, his body pulsed slightly, and the color of his skin changed from purple to a darker hue.

Suddenly, the arm that should have vanished began to sprout from the wound, and even the flesh he had gouged out started regenerating.

“No way, is he healing? Ugh! I won’t let that happen!!”

While Ryan was busy regenerating his arm and wounds, Shuvina immediately fired another arrow at him, but unlike before, the arrow bounced off as if it had hit metal.

“W-what?! Has his skin become even tougher?!”

As Shuvina feared, Ryan had gained resistance against attacks by eating his own flesh, instinctively finding the best way to protect himself from harm.

“Not yet! If I cloak it in fighting spirit!”

Quickly assessing the situation, Shuvina coated her arrow with fighting spirit and aimed it at Ryan’s head.

“He dodged?! Where did he go?!”

However, her arrow was easily dodged by the now fully healed Ryan, merely sending a nearby tree flying without causing him any harm.

“Graaawww!!!”

“Uh-oh!!”

Then, out of nowhere, Ryan appeared right next to Shuvina and mercilessly swung his sharp claws down at her.

“Gah!?”

Thankfully, Ryan’s downward swing was blocked by Dōna’s thick tree, just barely missing Shuvina.

“Dōna, thanks!”

Quickly distancing herself from Ryan, Shuvina thanked Dōna while keeping her eyes fixed on Ryan.

(This is bad. Not only has his defense increased, but all his basic abilities have too. It was already hard enough to barely track his speed, but if he’s even faster now…)

If she used fighting spirit to enhance her vision, she might still be able to track his movements, but being a backline combatant, her body and mind struggled to keep up, making her unsure if she could avoid attacks even if she saw them coming.

(I have to think. Eir once said that I should always think, even during battle. As a backline fighter, I need to do even more of that.)

It had been some time since she became part of Lewis’s group, and during that time, Shuvina had asked him how she could best contribute as a backline fighter.

“First and foremost, you must never stop thinking during combat. I’m always figuring out what to do when I fight, and Fiera surely does the same. In battles, those who abandon thinking die first.”

He had added that as a backline fighter, she should view things from a broader perspective.

“There’s no enemy out there completely immune to damage. If physical attacks don’t work, use magic. If magic fails, then go for the mental angle and thoroughly probe for weaknesses.”

“Fortunately, in our party, we have Fiera, who specializes in physical attacks, me as an all-rounder, and you with spirit magic and backline capabilities. So just do what you can.”

Shuvina hadn’t forgotten Lewis’s surprisingly solid advice and maintained her distance while observing Ryan.

(First, I need to see if attacks imbued with fighting spirit can connect. There’s no time to waste, or if he gains more resistance, my defeat will be guaranteed.)

Calmly assessing the current situation and possible futures, Shuvina deployed detection magic around her using wind magic.

(With this, it should be easier to track his movements. Now, can I hit him with an arrow? I have no choice but to try!)

“Dōna. If I can’t track his movements, I’m counting on you then.”

Dōna nodded at Shuvina’s command, ready to protect her while remaining alert to their surroundings.

Just as Shuvina prepared to fire at a moment’s notice, Ryan vanished in an instant, appearing behind her and ready to snap at her.

However, thanks to the detection magic that just barely tracked Ryan’s movement and Dōna’s vigilance to protect her, Ryan’s attack was once again thwarted.

“Go!!”

In that moment of vulnerability, Shuvina infused her arrow with fighting spirit and shot it at Ryan’s head, but he detected it like a beast and dodged.

“This isn’t working either. I really need to take out his legs first!”

Rather than aiming for a fatal strike right away, Shuvina resolved to remove his mobility first without rushing.

She issued another command to Dōna, focusing her attention back on Ryan.

From then on, Shuvina concentrated on dodging Ryan’s attacks while waiting for Dōna to create an opening.

“Graaawww?!”

“Now!”

As Ryan attempted to close in on her again, thick vines wrapped around his legs, halting him just slightly.

Seizing the moment, Shuvina quickly nocked two arrows, infused them with all her fighting spirit, and aimed them at Ryan’s legs.

With precise shots, the two arrows cleanly blasted Ryan’s legs off, causing him to collapse to the ground in a heap.

“This is it!”

To finish off the immobilized Ryan, Shuvina aimed for his head with her arrow, but an unexpected turn of events occurred.

“Shu…Vina. Help… me. Please help…”

Whether it was from pain or the loss of his legs, Ryan reached out to Shuvina, desperately seeking her assistance, retaining a semblance of the familiar person he used to be.

“!!”

That voice was one she knew all too well, and despite his monstrous appearance, the expression still held Ryan’s trace.

Faced with someone she had cared for since childhood, Shuvina hesitated just for a moment at the thought of killing him.

“Graaawww!!!”

Ryan used Shuvina’s moment of hesitation to transform the flesh of his wings into legs and lunged at her with force.

“T-this is bad!”

Realizing she had to evade quickly, but Ryan was already almost on top of her, and Dōna, who had just restrained Ryan moments ago, couldn’t move right away.

(I’m going to die. To die here like this…)

Caught in perfect complacency and unpreparedness. When it comes to killing, one must not let their guard down and must be resolved to ensure the kill, yet Shuvina faltered at the final moment.

(I still had so much left I wanted to do. I hadn’t told Eir how I felt yet, either. How frustrating…)

As Shuvina lamented her impending death, a barrier of light appeared before her, blocking Ryan’s attack and protecting her.

“…Huh? Is this… Eir’s light magic?”

The magic protecting her had been cast by Lewis earlier, just once, when she said she would fight Ryan, wanting to ensure her safety in case things turned dire.

There wasn’t a deep reason behind it other than anticipating such a possibility and a form of gratitude for bringing her to this country.

“Fufu. Truly, you can’t beat me.”

“Shuvina!! Help me!!”

Having been protected by Lewis filled Shuvina with resolve, and as Ryan continued approaching, she readied her bow and firmly notched an arrow.

“Unfortunately, I have someone I’ve decided to follow. For that person, I won’t hesitate to kill anymore. And besides, you can’t be saved now. Goodbye.”

The arrow infused with Shuvina’s fighting spirit flew straight into Ryan’s head, exploding it and taking off the upper half of his body as well.

Then, as the remaining lower half turned to ash and scattered into the wind, Shuvina sat there, stunned.

“Hah. I really killed someone, didn’t I? But if I hadn’t, I would’ve been the one killed, so it’s unavoidable. Plus, if I want to follow him, I’d better get used to this kind of thing.”

Despite being filled with guilt over killing someone she had been close with for so long, her feelings for Lewis had become clearer, and her desire to be by his side had only grown stronger.

“I really do like Eir, don’t I? Hehe. I should tell Fiera. And I need to convey my feelings to Mom and Dad, and to Eir too. But first…”

Saying this, Shuvina laid on the ground and gazed up at the sky through the trees, taking a deep breath.

“Let’s rest a bit first. Then we need to go defeat the Hydra.”

Indeed. She hadn’t actually defeated her main target yet, and the fight was far from over.

In fact, the real battle was just beginning, so after a brief rest, Shuvina set off towards Lewis and the others.