DRMB Chapter 5

The prologue of the game begins like this.

「In the beginning, there arose those who gained transcendental power through the overflowing love of God.

People worshipped these superior beings, calling them Transcendent Ones. However, as time passed, the Transcendent Ones, confident in their power, became arrogant. They saw those without such power as uncivilized beings and committed cruel acts without hesitation.

Saddened by this, God punished them to restrict their actions, and the Transcendent Ones were afflicted with the uncontrollable agony of madness.

As a result, countless Transcendent Ones, unable to withstand the madness, eventually perished after going berserk, and the number of Transcendent Ones dwindled rapidly, leaving only five survivors in the Empire.

They were still revered as superior beings, but at the same time, people feared for their madness and potential for outbursts.

Then one day, an oracle is delivered, revealing the existence of a cure that can soothe the Transcendent Ones’ madness.」

The “cure” mentioned here was the owner of the body she now inhabited, Ipersha.

‘The first one to find her is Phelix Obern.’

Phelix Obern, the lord of the underworld, through whose hands all illegal activities in the Empire flowed.

While searching for the cure after the oracle is delivered, he discovers Ipersha by chance in a red-light district alley within his territory.

At first, he’s unsure, seeing Ipersha, an orphan dressed in rags, barely surviving by wandering the slums. But the moment his hand lightly touches her, the madness that tormented him subsides, however slightly, for the first time.

‘After that, without asking her consent, he drags her to his mansion, confines her to a room, and imprisons her.’

That was the common episode of the game, shown before choosing a capture target’s route.
After this event, a branching point arrives where you can choose a capture target, and customized episodes begin to unfold based on your choice.

‘However, it takes a while before you can freely choose a capture target.’

Ipersha recalled the early stages of starting the game.

She remembered that all but the top names out of the five were unavailable for selection.
The four options, grayed out, only became available after reaching a certain point.

’Anyway, I know the first encounter episodes with the male leads like the back of my hand. I repeated that part endlessly. So, I’m certain.’

Whenever a bad ending occurred, she had to restart the game from the very beginning. All the accumulated favorability points and saved files from previous playthroughs were mercilessly reset. Because of that, she had unintentionally become an expert only on the first encounter episodes overnight.

‘Should I be thankful that skipping the boringly long common episodes wasn’t reset?’

She inwardly swallowed the urge to cry at the thought of her gameplay history when the capture target she had only attempted once right before falling asleep came to mind.

However, snapping back to reality at the maid’s stare, Ipersha reminded herself that dealing with the current situation was the priority.

‘He’s not someone I can meet right away anyway.’

Pushing her worries aside, Ipersha asked the maid,

“What’s your name?”

In the game, the maid before her was a mere extra. An extra whose role was to lead Ipersha to Phelix.

But she remembered. That it was just a part of the fragment that lay beneath the surface.
In one of the countless dead endings she’d seen in Phelix’s route, she had died at the hands of this very maid.

‘Who would have guessed that an extra who appears only once would be Phelix’s shadow?’

Shed, Obern’s shadow group, acted as his limbs, engaging in assassinations, espionage, and other illegal activities.

The maid is a character who specializes in assassination and surveillance.

‘I didn’t want to know either.’

Ipersha recalled the bad ending where she had died unjustly and swallowed back her tears once again.

She was trying to display a friendliness she didn’t possess to prevent such an incident from happening again.

She wasn’t sure if it would be effective since the maid wasn’t someone who’s easily moved by emotions…but still, wouldn’t it be better to leave a slightly good impression? First impressions were the most important, after all.

…Although it seemed like several days had already passed since Ipersha had been brought to the Duke’s mansion.

“…My name is Jenna.”

Fortunately, it wasn’t a wasted effort as the maid revealed her name. Ipersha deliberately interpreted this in a positive light and asked,

“Okay, Jenna. What day is it today?”

“It’s the Ides¹, the middle of the moon, when the full moon rises.”

What a complicated way to say the 15th.

Ipersha swallowed the words that rose to her throat and smiled.

Without the previous explanation and her experience playing the game, she would have been completely lost.

‘If it’s the full moon, then it’s the first episode.’

Even after bringing her to the Duke’s mansion, Phelix leaves Ipersha alone for several days

He doesn’t mind if, out of fear, Ipersha refuses not only food but even a sip of water, and he readily withdraws if she refuses his summons at night, as she does now.

But on the night of the full moon… 

He doesn’t overlook Ipersha’s refusal as he had before. He comes to her directly and forces himself on her.

’Whatever the reason, it’s better to go to him myself than to be forced.’

She wanted to make this damned game to proceed as smoothly as possible. While it might have been acceptable in the game, now that she had to experience it firsthand, she desperately wanted to avoid the game’s dark aspects.

This game, true to its genre as a 19+ romance simulation, tended to resolve everything physically.

The way Ipersha was used as a cure for the male leads was also through ‘contact,’ and, faithful to its concept as a dark, 19+ game, that contact was always achieved through intimate physical relations.

‘I can’t avoid that, so I have to steer things in the least problematic direction possible.’’

Especially in Phelix’s case.

Having made up her mind, Ipersha rose from her seat.

“Let’s go.”

“I’ll guide you.”

As if waiting for those words, Jenna stepped aside and stood next to the open door.

As Ipersha walked towards the door, she unconsciously glanced back at the mirror again.

Long wavy black hair that cascaded down her back, green eyes like the lush greenery of summer.
Ipersha’s exceptionally beautiful appearance was reflected in the mirror.

As if she had become accustomed to it, it didn’t feel as unfamiliar as it had at first.

“……”

If the countless failures, as the man had said, were the cornerstone of this success, and if the system had chosen her for this very reason, perhaps this playthrough would be a little different.

So, let’s think of it as another restart, like the countless ones I had done all night. 

Only this time, with a hefty reward.

[A life where you don’t have to do anything and can enjoy everything you want. A life where you don’t have to give up on what you want to do.]

Repeating those words to herself, she took a deep breath and crossed the doorway.

─── ⋆⋅☼⋅⋆ ───

Jenna led her to a door and then left first.

While she was grateful to have a moment to compose herself before entering the room, she also felt uneasy, wondering if Jenna was watching her from somewhere out of sight.

However, the most important thing right now was the encounter with Phelix, her first capture target, so Ipersha decided to focus on that alone.

She stared at the large door before her.

‘Can I deceive Phelix Obern?’

Following Jenna, she had been pondering for a long time how to minimize the dark aspects of the first episode with Phelix.

True to his reputation as the lord of the underworld, Phelix was ruthless and didn’t hesitate to commit cold-blooded acts.

This was especially apparent when he had something he desired.

He was even more unscrupulous in his methods when it came to obtaining what he wanted. The only thing that mattered to him was that his desired object ultimately ended up in his hands. His philosophy was that it didn’t matter if it was broken or damaged, as long as it was within his grasp.

Naturally, this was no exception for Ipersha.

‘To Phelix, Ipersha isn’t a person, but merely an object, a cure.’

She had already experienced this in countless dead endings.

When she refused and resisted Phelix’s coercive actions, her whole body was immediately shackled, confined to a bed for days on end, and deprived of even a proper sip of water.

However, this was the least of it.