Before I was reincarnated, I was a King.

I believed I would never be loved in my entire life, and that was indeed the case.

Because at the final moment of my assassination, even the last loyal subjects who remained by my side betrayed me.

At the edge of death, I met Hwanung. In a calm voice, he told me something unbelievable.

He said there was someone who chose death with me because they loved me. And he asked. Would I like to be reincarnated with them, to meet my lover and the one who loved me once again?

I let out a hollow laugh. Someone loved me? It was an absurd, laughable, and pitiful story. But that's why I became curious. I wanted to know what kind of madman could have loved a person like me.

And so, I opened my eyes again. The place I was reincarnated into was an era where a strange civilization had blossomed.

I attended the same school as Hwanung and wandered in search of 'that connection.'

Hwanung spoke with a voice full of conviction.

"Your destiny is within this school. Your lover, and your connection."

He handed me a plain-looking stopwatch. He said it was a signpost that would react when a reincarnated connection drew near.

But no matter how much time passed, the stopwatch remained silent.

Expectation eventually turned into disappointment. Before I knew it, I became an adult, went to college like everyone else, served in the military, and became soaked in the mundane life.

Just as the memory of the miracle was fading, Hwanung spoke up out of the blue.

"Shall we visit our old school for the first time in a while?"

It was a casual suggestion. The high school I revisited without much feeling was just a familiar, dry space.

...But it was then.

The stopwatch in my pocket began to vibrate violently as if it were broken.

Instinctively, I ran, following that vibration. Gasping for breath, the place I arrived at was in front of the infirmary.

When I opened the door, I saw a man with an unfamiliar face. Instead of the school nurse I used to know, there was a strange man who seemed to have been newly appointed.

Before a flash of joy could even pass, the stopwatch glowed coldly and illuminated his 'past.'

The fragments of memory headed toward that day when the rebels stormed in to execute me.

The reason why they couldn't kill me, the King, instantly on that day unfolded before my eyes.

He was wandering the palace wearing my clothes.

A person I didn't remember. No, a lowly being whose very existence I had forgotten.

He met death in my place.

Thanks to him, I gained two more years of life.

During those miserable years of flight when everyone betrayed me and turned their backs, I cursed the world, thinking no one had protected me.

But that person alone had been protecting me until the very end.

With that brilliant sacrifice of giving up your life.

Though I eventually met my death at the end of the two years you bought for me, my lonely path had not actually been walked alone.

Excuse me, could I get your number?