A flawless person.

Reg watched as Medicine’s burst of toxic mist was easily brushed aside by Aya, and the last flicker of hope in his heart was extinguished. Facing the absolute difference in speed and power, he couldn’t even manage a complete plea for mercy.

The playful look on Shameimaru Aya’s face was instantly replaced by a purer, more undeniable dominance. She didn’t even make any noticeably large movements; her wings gave an imperceptible shudder, and her figure turned into a blurry afterimage.

“Ugh!” No way! I just trained with Sister Yuuka! Why do I still have no room to resist against this Youkai?

The sharp pain came swiftly and accurately, like being savagely clamped by a massive, invisible iron vice. First, a dull snapping sound came from his right shoulder, followed immediately by his left. Reg couldn’t even clearly see the movement; he just felt both arms instantly lose all sensation and flop down limply. His bones seemed to have been crushed into powder. The searing agony exploded belatedly, blackening his vision and nearly suffocating him.

“No… stop it!” Medicine’s sharp, tearful cry was piercing.

Aya paid no heed. Her movements were too fast for the eye to catch.

There were two more dull, teeth-grinding impacts, this time landing on the back of Reg’s knees and calves.

“Crack!”

“Crack!”

The clear sound of breaking bones was eerily loud in the mountain wind.

“Aah!!!”

This time, Reg finally let out an inarticulate, heart-wrenching shriek. The crushing pain from his four limbs instantly engulfed all his consciousness like a tsunami. He collapsed forward like a broken puppet whose strings had been cut, hitting the cold, hard dirt with a heavy thud. Mud and broken grass smeared his face, but couldn’t alleviate the bone-deep, reason-destroying pain surging from his whole body.

His vision shook violently and blurred. He could only see Shameimaru Aya’s delicate leather boots stop in front of him and hear her slightly displeased snort.

“Tch, so noisy. It’s better to be quiet for an interview, you know. Don’t worry, these injuries will heal quickly if Eirin looks at them; it won’t affect the experience.”

Despair instantly filled Reg’s chest, even overriding the pain in his limbs. This wasn’t the pain of the death cycle, but a deeper, more humiliating despair. Losing the ability to resist, about to be forcibly taken away, and facing an unknown fate of being ‘interviewed’ like an object. This terrified and suffocated him more than simple physical destruction.

“Enough! Stop it, what is wrong with you?” He futilely tried to curl up, to protect himself, but his fractured limbs wouldn’t obey. Each weak struggle brought a new round of tearing agony. His body regenerated, only to be broken again at an even faster rate.

Sweat and tears stained his face. His throat could only manage broken, rasping sounds. Medicine’s heartbroken cries and wing-flapping sounded like they were coming from far away. He hadn’t even had time to fully hear the sound of the Tengu’s flight before his arms and legs were brutally decimated dozens of times within seconds.

“Such strong recovery ability. It seems that Yuuka fellow was behind it. But even with her scent on you, you’re still Reg. I’m willing to forgive you.” Shameimaru Aya bent down and easily hoisted him onto her shoulder like a broken sack of rags. The broken bones in his arms and legs were pulled by the rough motion, bringing a surge of excruciating pain every few seconds that almost made Reg faint.

His vision was completely dyed crimson. Consciousness bobbed and tore in the surging tide of agony and despair.

“Go seek refuge with Yuuka; this large area is no longer safe.” Shameimaru Aya, carrying the unconscious Reg like a sack of rags, ignored Medicine’s heart-wrenching cries and the futile attempts of her toxic mist to reach them. The Tengu’s speed was like a gale, and they instantly vanished into the clouds and mist of Youkai Mountain, leaving behind the tilted mobile workshop and the small, desperately weeping doll.

When Reg recovered a sliver of consciousness amidst the boundless pain and coldness, he found himself in a completely unfamiliar bedroom. The air was filled with a very cozy atmosphere—Shameimaru Aya’s room.

He tried to move, but the pain in his limbs was even worse than before—a crushing, bone-deep agony. Aya had been extremely heavy-handed; his shoulder and leg bones were clearly utterly shattered. Moreover, iron chains were restricting his movement.

He angrily tried to bite the chains, but found them incredibly solid. Then he changed his mind, wanting to bite off his own arm. But he was tied to the bed, his body a helpless mess, unable to even slightly curl up. Each weak breath tugged at the pain throughout his body, and his vision was blurry.

The door opened.

Reg lay face-up on the exquisite bed, his broken body secured by rough ropes. Each weak breath pulled at his fractured shoulders and legs, bringing a dizzying haze that threatened to make him pass out. In the dimness, only a tiny oil lamp flickered in the corner, casting twisted shadows on the wall, like silent mockery. It seemed the lamp was kept especially small to prevent him from kicking it over to commit suicide, and the oil inside looked like it needed constant refilling.

Footsteps approached, light but carrying an undeniable sense of oppression. The door slid open silently, and Shameimaru Aya’s figure blocked the faint light seeping through the gap. The satisfied smile on her face was no longer her usual professional journalistic expression, but a look of profound fulfillment.

She held a bowl emitting the faint scent of rice porridge.

“Reg-kun…” Her voice was soft, like a lover’s whisper, completely unlike the perpetrator of this tragedy. “Are you hungry? Come, eat something. Porridge handmade by your Aya.”

She sat on the edge of the bed, ignoring the fear and disgust churning in Reg’s eyes. She scooped up a spoonful of warm porridge, gently blew on it, and offered it to his lips.

“Go away…” Reg was furious.

“Good boy, open up.” Aya’s hand was steady, her voice hypnotic and seductive. “You need nutrition to get better, to heal quickly, so you can stay with me forever.” Her red eyes gleamed strangely in the dim light, her gaze wrapped around Reg’s face, filled with a spine-chilling focus and possessiveness, as if admiring a carefully captured and irreplaceable collector’s item.

Wait? Reg seemed to detect another thought? Love? Love, still love? What the hell is this? Why would she commit such a terrifying act in the name of love?

When Reg stubbornly kept his mouth shut, the gentle smile didn’t change. She placed the food in her own mouth, then forcibly pressed her lips to Reg’s, forcing him to open up and pushing the porridge inside.

“Cough, cough…” The warm liquid went down the wrong way, triggering a chest-ripping cough that tugged at his broken bones and caused his vision to blacken from the pain.

“Oh dear, how clumsy of me.” Shameimaru Aya’s voice remained gentle. She meticulously wiped away the porridge residue and choked tears from the corner of his mouth with a plain white handkerchief, her movements as careful as cleaning the most precious porcelain. Her fingertips sliding across his skin sent shivers down his spine.

“The wind outside is very pleasant today…” she began, speaking to herself as she wiped. “The clouds are low, like balls of cotton candy. When I flew over the forest, I saw a newborn little bunny, very cute and fluffy… what a pity I couldn’t bring you to see it. Because of the disaster!”

Her tone was full of regret, as if Reg being confined here with broken limbs was just a trivial, temporary inconvenience.

“Me… Medicine…” Reg struggled to squeeze out the words, his eyes holding the last shred of his attachment.

Aya’s wiping hand paused. The gentle smile instantly froze, and the calm in her eyes was replaced by a cold darkness. The air in the room seemed to solidify.

“That bothersome little thing? I’m sorry, she must have escaped, fled to a safe place. After all, even a Tsukumogami has the same survival instincts as a human.” Her voice dropped, yet it seemed she was worried about Reg’s mental state.

“Don’t worry about her, Reg-kun. She doesn’t belong here. She only takes away your attention… and all of you must be mine. Only when we together can I possess the power to protect everything.”

She leaned in extremely close, so close that Reg could see his own miserable, distorted reflection in her eyes. “This place is safe, very, very hidden. No one will find you, no one will disturb us. You don’t have to worry about that annoying bad luck anymore, you don’t have to fear death… because I will protect you and keep you by my side forever and ever. All you need to do is look at me, and feel my love for you.”

The word “love” left her mouth with a sickening stickiness. This was no longer the reporter’s fervor for sensational gossip, but a thoroughly twisted, pathological possession. She stroked Reg’s bound, immobile wrist, her gaze not one of lust, but the perverse satisfaction of a child confirming ownership of their most cherished toy.

Yes, that’s the emotion. This heavy love, condensed into a terrifying look as if viewing a pet. It’s an extreme form of madness.

Possessiveness, frantic possessiveness.

“You just need to get used to this place, get used to… me.” Her voice returned to that particularly gentle tone. “We will be together always, Reg-kun. This is our destiny, written by my own hand. Our eternal, exclusive interview. We will survive the fate of destruction and welcome the ending of Adam and Eve.”

“So please endure this for a while. Don’t think about escaping. I will use my power to suppress your pain as much as possible. The Youkai power remaining on you will suppress your ability to move.”

Reg stared at Shameimaru Aya. The crushing pain in his limbs still tore at him, but deeper was a despair spreading from every bound joint, every inch of restrained skin. He couldn’t feel the warmth of the porridge, only the giant, invisible net named Shameimaru Aya, which was tightening around him, cutting into his flesh and suffocating his soul.

His world, the meaning of his struggle for survival, the faint light he wanted to protect… all were being crushed and stripped away piece by piece in this secret stone room, amidst these whispers of pathological love, leaving only boundless darkness and a cage from which there was no escape.

Aya’s fingers still lingered on his cheek. That gentle action was like the cruelest torture. Reg closed his eyes, no longer resisting the forced swallowing, and blocking out those terrifying red eyes.

“Please, I beg you, don’t do this!” Reg said fearfully.

“We’re already here. You will accompany me in an uninterrupted fate through countless lifetimes! Outside is an incomprehensible disaster, an incomprehensible disaster! Only this way can I protect you! Do you understand? I feel like there are countless thoughts in my mind! I want to possess, I want to possess everything, but I know it’s all wrong! But I have no other way!”

After Shameimaru Aya finished speaking, Reg sensed that something in him began to stir.

However, the darkness brought no relief, only a clearer realization: his life, his everything, had now completely become this pathological Tengu reporter’s exclusive, never-to-be-published “scoop.” And he was the protagonist in that report, pinned to the paper, silently lamenting.

His heart, with every breath, was dying bit by bit, shattering into dust, and sinking into the eternal coldness of this bedroom.

It hurts so much, so much! Why do these people commit such painful acts in the name of love? What’s the point of being a Transmigrator if I’m so humiliated?

Please!

Please!

Let me become strong!

The intense despair began to stretch time.

Number of times facing mental breakdown due to Shameimaru Aya: 1,248 times.

Converted time: a continuous loop of 400 years.

Shameimaru Aya seemed to have planned this all along; no amount of smooth talk could resolve it.

“I don’t want to die!!! It’s so dark!!! So disgusting!!!”

The desperate man was continuously screaming, piles of his corpses covered in the spreading smell of blood, endless suicide, endless mental agony.

[Omni-competent]: “What’s wrong? A mental breakdown? You look very sad. You must have suffered endless torture, haven’t you? You can lift your feet, feel the darkness, and quietly wait for time to end.”

[Ordinary Person]: “So disgusting, so disgusting! I can’t take it anymore! Without power, I can’t live a good life in Gensokyo at all. Being born here is simply a sin! She’s completely treating me like an RNB (Resource/Natural-Born)!”

[Omni-competent]: “Hmm, there’s no helping it. Since you entered this place, it seems to have been infected with some strange virus. This virus acts up after you turn 18. I wonder who the pathogen is?”

[Ordinary Person]: “Why, why? I just wanted… to live an ordinary life! Why is this happening to me?”

Reg couldn’t touch his own head. He stared hollowly at everything around him, muttering constantly, seeking help, but the death save locked in this loop prevented him from escaping. His consciousness began to expand into the surrounding darkness, and something in the middle seemed to be tearing.

[Omniscient and Omnipotent]: “Is a new trait about to condense? Is this the beginning of self-denial? Or… the response to salvation?”

Tch, so it’s another one of me. It hadn’t fully condensed. Since entering the ‘Rule Quirk,’ Reg had rarely split himself. His other selves were too strong.

Massive black characters began to cover the space whose underlying color could not be seen.

《Savior of the Hero Clan requests to join the group chat》 《Monster of the Nuclear-Contaminated Environment requests to join the group chat》 《World-Modifying Esper requests to join the group chat》 《Doomsday Who Loves Nature requests to join the group chat》

… Ah… these powerful people can all get lost.

《Flawless and Ignorant Hero joins the chat group》 《Changed name to Flawless Hero》

Aah! Reg clutched his head. A vast amount of sword technique memories began to pour into his mind. His experiences seemed to be continuously merging with parallel lines that didn’t overlap.

[Flawless Hero]: “I am designation 25907, Flawless, also named Reg. The thing I love to do most is chase wealth. As long as there’s money, I can even kill a god for you. And the other gentlemen? Ah! Mr. Dark Fairy Tale? Long time no see.”

[Omni-competent]: “Welcome! Long time no see! Our family is getting livelier and livelier. ‘Ordinary Person’ is currently withdrawn. Are you such a late-numbered existence?”

[Ordinary Person]: “Disgusting, please, save me! Other me!”

Reg noticed that the space seemed to be getting increasingly lively. Although he couldn’t feel what his current expression was like, his heart must be happy, right?

[Omni-competent]: “Part of the color of despair has been triggered now. It seems to be a left-over anti-collapse mechanism, preventing the host from becoming an irrational, contaminated evil god. Therefore, he can be reborn starting from infancy.”

[Ordinary Person]: “Whatever… I want to calm down here for a while…”

[Flawless Hero]: “Your memories are tragic. Then let me cut down this disaster! I will lend you my sword technique memories! My everything! Let it all turn into success!”

[Ordinary Person]: “Hey, wait, the rest isn’t necessary, is it? Are we merging personalities?”

[Flawless Hero]: “Something like that. At least you’re not completely desperate yet, right? Start a new life? After all, you’ve died so many times. This is already a dead save file, isn’t it?”

Reg seemed to be talking to himself, yet also touching something indescribable. All of this was real.

[Omni-competent]: “Be careful, though. The source of the yandere virus is unknown, and it’s highly likely random. This is probably the variable from us absorbing bad luck, isn’t it? Every death occurs at a different time, and every release of bad luck is different.”

《Flawless Hero Compatibility 90%》

“Damn it, I’ll take revenge! I’ll kill Shameimaru Aya for seizing control of my life and death! I’ll end my prolonged suffering!”

The now-empowered Reg ran, shattering all the chains with his sheer presence and escaping the prison. But in that moment, he seemed to see something.

A gigantic monstrous bird in the sky drifted at an extremely terrifying speed. All objects were instantly destroyed by the sudden storm. It was hard to imagine that the speed seemed to exceed the speed of light, and even the swirling vortex seemed to tear space itself. Everything was being annihilated. A mysterious rectangle descended from the sky, and a fierce rear gate began to resist everything. A massive amount of unknown rules began to erode the underlying code.

This place was already destroyed.

“So this is what Gensokyo looks like now?”

Gensokyo had entered a disaster. When Reg tried to stop it, he realized that his save file was already fixed at that moment. His eyes saw the remains of the Tsukumogami, Medicine, and countless empty, floating souls.

So everything outside was a disaster?

All of this made him suffer so much. Thus, he spontaneously buried this experience.

《Acquired Flawless Forging Protection》 《Acquired Flawless Object Protection》 《Acquired Flawless All-Attribute Boost Protection》

…A massive amount of extreme protections began to cover his body, continuously stacking at an unobservable speed.

Reg drew his sword. The extreme Flawlessness began to perish. Light was beautiful. His presence was like a bamboo breaking, and his sword spirit severed existence. Abandoning everything is Flawlessness. Flawlessness? It means severing all connections to oneself.

《News, Extra! Extra!》 《It is said that a Tengu with great ancient power has acquired unimaginable strength. She has established great achievements and holds the title of the Peerless Wind God.》 《The man she adored was eventually perfectly imprisoned and completely controlled under her hand.》 《Ah! Alas! She seized control of a God.》 《The Tengu has transformed into an incomprehensible existence, a God! Good heavens, reporter, how could it turn out this way?》 《Yearning! Domination! Madness!》 《There is no room for a restart.》 《What a delicious ending! Too bad it’s a bad end, not interesting enough. – commented a certain green-haired fairy.》

[Omni-competent]: “Damn green caterpillar, what are you doing?”

《Can’t I even write a news report, Reg-chan?!》

[Omni-competent]: “What bad luck, encountering such an incident. I’ll reluctantly lend you a little strength.”

《Dark Fairy Tale Compatibility 0%, Flawless Hero Compatibility 95%》

[Ordinary Person]: “There’s clearly no change! Is everything resetting? Is there any room to return?”

[Omni-competent]: “There will be. My power will save everything, change all the story’s basic elements. Sink into despair!”

[Omni-competent]: “And try to retain the memories of some people before the disaster is solved. Go ahead, follow your interests, and save this destroyed world.”

Reg snapped back to reality. He felt his memories slowly fading in the darkness, accompanied by other memories. The prolonged time compressed his memories. Even through reincarnation, it would be difficult to recover them.

As time slowly ticked, Reg gradually woke up. A large number of mountains appeared before his eyes.

“I’m alive? Am I still in another world? Wait, my vitality, my presence? They’ve all been reset to zero?” Reg suddenly realized he had become an infant. He tried to control the restless cells in his body.

He actually stood up.

Reg was a powerful hero, once capable of severing fate, named ‘Flawless Hero.’

“It’s so blurry. What happened to my memories? A defect caused by too few brain cells? Never mind, let me first check if I have the Flawless Blade.” The infant-sized Reg gently waved his hand, and a finger-sized sword aura shot out.

“Hmm, it seems I’ve returned to simplicity. I’m too weak to sense it, that’s all. This body’s talent seems a bit poor, doesn’t it? Extremely weak cell control, extremely weak recovery ability, extremely weak life expectancy index, extremely weak growth talent. What the hell kind of body is this? Reincarnated as trash?!”

[Trait Points: 380,201]

Holy cow, where did all these Trait Points come from? Reg covered his mouth. This was the most Trait Points he had ever seen in his life. In his previous life, Reg had only died at most ten times.

“It’s a shame I can’t allocate points to my skills anymore. Mr. Dark Fairy Tale? Strange, why is my group chat disconnected? I guess I’ll have to find some time to reconnect.”

[Sword Technique: 200 million]

[Automatically Acquired Protection: 5.9 billion]

Reg sorted through his vague memories. It seemed his mind had accepted strange memories and was currently in a hazy state, needing some time to organize itself.

Am I Flawless? Am I Reg?

Is my purpose for being here to change the ending?

No, wasn’t I supposed to become the strongest? To kill the Demon King?

Wait, there won’t be a Demon King here, will there?