“Don’t kill the marquis, keep him alive!”

That man is my enemy from my past life. Erica had no intention of letting him go peacefully.

Roderick must have taken Grandma’s last advice to heart, as he had already brought Erica to a room in the area occupied by the princess faction’s army. Then he held Erica and wouldn’t let her go, continuously stroking her belly.

“How could you do such dangerous spy work while carrying a child?”

“I already started the spy work and then found out I was pregnant, so what could I do?”

“……”

“……Sorry.”

This time it was Erica’s turn to be scolded. While Roderick and Erica were having their tender reunion, outside the capital recapture operation was proceeding smoothly.

“Return to the land of the dead!”

The horde of undead that had been attacking the princess faction’s army outside the capital’s walls turned to dust and disappeared with a single gesture from Grand Mage Margareta who appeared atop the walls.

“Your leader is in our hands! If you want to live, surrender immediately like your leader!”

As soon as they showed the captured marquis as a prisoner, all the human soldiers threw down their weapons and knelt. The dwarves, who learned that their own kind had been massacred at Eberstadt and they could no longer receive the promised land of the elves, cursed the marquis and withdrew on their own.

Thus the war that had lasted four seasons finally came to an end.

* * *

Creak.

The door leading to the underground dungeon opened with a metallic sound. At that sound, the man sitting behind the iron bars flinched and raised his head. Thinking it might be an executioner coming to drag him to the execution ground, terror turned the face of the marquis, who had become nothing but skin and bones in just a few days, pale blue.

However, as soon as he realized the person who entered through the door was Erica, the terror disappeared and only rage began to burn in his eyes. The marquis just sat slumped on the floor glaring at her. Erica received the murderous gaze fully and sneered as if it were ridiculous. Then she brought up what she had come to say.

“What kind of attitude is that toward the group’s princess?”

When she spoke in modern Korean speech patterns, the marquis’s eyes widened. Erica delivered the finishing blow.

“Manager Kim.”

You never imagined it was me, did you? Only then did the marquis, realizing Erica’s identity, point at her with bloodshot eyes.

“Th-this……”

But his words seemed to be stuck and he couldn’t properly get out a single word.

“This time I won.”

There was nothing to discuss with him. She only wanted to clearly show Manager Kim who she was and that she had won in this life. Now that Erica had no remaining business with Manager Kim, all that remained for him was execution.

“Take him away.”

At Erica’s command, the executioners who had been waiting outside came in and dragged the marquis away. Erica watched without missing a moment as the enemy who had deceived and killed her in her past life was executed in a miserable state. Just before dying, the enemy left these last words like a curse:

“I’ll make you regret killing me! I’ll be reborn and take revenge!”

If he was reborn once, why couldn’t he be born twice? Even at such a plausible curse, Erica didn’t blink an eye.

‘Would God listen to your words?’

She had something to rely on.

“Grandma, there are gods and spirits in this world. What’s their relationship?”

One day when she was bored while confined in the palace, she had asked Grandma Greta.

“Gods and spirits are not different.”

That’s how she learned about the invisible forces that govern this world.

Great souls dwell in all things in the world. They are called spirits, and they are also called gods.

The most primordial spirit is the spirit of the universe. This universe gave birth to the earth, and the earth gave birth to all the spirits of this land.

“The Grand Temple worships the spirit of the universe as god. Since their holy power comes from the greatest spirit, spirit masters and mages who borrow power from spirits below it cannot overcome holy power.”

“I see.”

However, there are also spirits in the world that transcend the earth. The spirit of life, the spirit of death, and spirits of time and space, and such. These spirits were born directly from the spirit of the universe.

She had fallen asleep listening to such stories. Her last thought was ‘Then which god among them made me be reborn here?’ As if eavesdropping on the question she held in her mind, someone had come when she woke up at dawn that day.

“Do not be surprised. I am the spirit of life.”

It was the very spirit that had saved Roderick’s life when he had died at Aurelius’s hands.

“How can I see a spirit and understand your words?”

At first she had suspected it might be the marquis’s trick.

“I can speak human language too. And I can show my form to anyone if I wish.”

When Erica still didn’t believe, the spirit of life told her about saving Roderick’s life. Since the marquis couldn’t possibly know about that, the spirit before her eyes had to be the spirit of life.

“But why did you come to see me?”

“Weren’t you curious? Who brought you to this place?”

The spirit of life said it was something she, the spirit of time, and the spirit of space had done together.

“You know why we did so.”

“I have a guess.”

“It’s as you think, but I also wanted to give you, who lived a life rich in material things but poor in heart, a new opportunity. Of course, I gave your enemies the same opportunity.”

“Those two seem to have already ruined that opportunity.”

The spirit of life had smiled bitterly at Erica’s pointed words.

If those two people had repented of their past life’s mistakes and lived this life honestly and differently, the flow of the story would have changed and Erica’s role wouldn’t have been necessary. Then everyone could have lived the calm and peaceful life Erica wished for from the beginning.

The spirits had given them the chance to choose first, but unfortunately the two people committed the same mistakes as in their past life. There is no next opportunity for those who missed their last chance.

So the marquis would never be reborn to take revenge on her.

* * *

“Victory and glory to Her Majesty the King!”

The throne had finally regained its master. Elodie, wearing a crown as big as her head and sitting on the throne, still looked like a young child far from being a dignified king, but she still greeted those who had come to celebrate her coronation with unusual dignity for a child.

“Iriel, king of the elves, meets the human king.”

Among the kings and envoys of allied and friendly nations, Iriel, king of the elves, was given the first turn to greet Elodie. It was courtesy toward the allied nation that had first sided with Elodie in this war.

Although the land of the elves had been trampled by the dwarf legions, both the trampled nature and power recovered at an amazing speed. It would soon regain its former appearance.

“I will devote my loyalty so that victory and prosperity may accompany Your Majesty’s reign.”

After the national delegations finished their greetings, it was time for domestic nobles and subjects to pay their respects. The first to pledge loyalty was Duke Pendrel. He was appointed as court minister. He would become Elodie’s excellent political backing.

“I swear to protect Your Majesty forever as I have done until today.”

Elodie’s expression became subtly strange as she looked down at the next noble pledging loyalty. It was because she was still not used to ‘Dad’ kneeling to her and treating her like an adult.

Roderick wore blue formal wear embroidered with snowflakes and wyverns in silver thread. It was the symbol of House Winterborn.

The House Winterborn margrave family that had been exterminated was restored. A few Winterborns without abilities had survived, but only Roderick and Eric had the abilities. It was natural for Roderick to become the head of the family.

Thus Roderick became Count Winterborn, but was exempted from the duty of guarding the frontier. With only two Winterborns, they couldn’t guard both the frontier and the throne. And there was one more reason why Roderick shouldn’t go to the frontier.

“From now on, this is your home. No, this was originally your home.”

It was the day Elodie first entered the royal palace.

“You don’t have to move again. Elodie will live here forever. Isn’t that good?”

However, Elodie only looked around the royal palace with an awkward expression and wasn’t happy. The royal palace was only Elodie’s home. It wasn’t Mom, Dad, and Eric’s home.

No matter how much they were ‘family’ who had cared for and protected the king from birth, since they weren’t royalty, they couldn’t live in the palace with Elodie. However, Duke Pendrel had suggested there was a way to live together even if they weren’t royalty.

“Then couldn’t the lady take the position of head maid?”

Thus Erica became the king’s head maid in her capacity as Countess Winterborn. Roderick could stay in the palace as military commander and guard captain, and Eric could stay as the king’s playmate, so the family of four could live together even if not exactly as before.

On the day Elodie officially regained her home and crown, a new oracle came down to the Grand Temple.

The wind has changed. The bitter cold wind that carried the incarnation of revenge and brought death has subsided into warm winds carrying peace and abundance, so the age of life will now arrive.

In the end, the oracle about the child who would end the war was an oracle that meant the end of the world. Fortunately, thanks to a few humans who interpreted it correctly, the oracle of destruction was not fulfilled, and the fate of this land changed.

As the oracle predicted, new sprouts began to grow the following year from lands that had been burned black by war, and baby cries and adults’ laughter began to echo in villages where funeral dirges had flowed with weeping. Of course, the vigorous cries of their newborn second child and the laughter of the family of four never ceased in Erica and Roderick’s home too.

Several years later, on the night of the last day of April, Roderick planted a young birch tree in front of the royal palace head maid’s quarters.

“I’ve achieved everything I wanted to do with you. But there’s just one thing, one wish I haven’t fulfilled yet.”

Erica recalled what Roderick had said like a prophecy the night before and picked up that birch tree without hesitation. Then she took Roderick’s hand and the two set out alone.

“Who is this!”

“Roderick?”

“And that woman is…… Erica?”

When the two people who had left the village over ten years ago appeared without a word, the entire village was turned upside down. However, the curiosity that poured down like artillery fire didn’t last very long. It was because their clothes were too shabby.

The hometown people, who only thought they had failed completely elsewhere and returned to their hometown village, would never dream of it. That Roderick and Erica were the famous Count and Countess Winterborn.

The two didn’t bother to reveal it. They had a different purpose for returning to the village.

To fulfill Roderick’s long-cherished wish of dancing with Erica in front of all the village people on the last day of the May love festival.

On the cool spring night, the two entrusted their bodies to the cheerful melody while holding hands. Smiles bloomed on the faces of the two who danced spinning around the giant birch tree, and only each other was reflected in their eyes.

It was the moment when the extreme revenge drama ended and the gentle healing romance that Erica had so desired raised its curtain.

〈Main story complete, continues in side stories〉