MDL | Chapter 2.2

Once upon a time, a long, long time ago.

In a small country, there lived a miller. Though he barely made enough to get by, he was a cheerful man who never lost his smile. In his youth, he had lost his wife and three children to illness, leaving him with only one daughter.

She wasn’t a great beauty, but like her father, she had a beautiful, lively smile and was a marriageable maiden. The miller adored and was immensely proud of his only daughter. And why wouldn’t he be? There was no other maiden in the area as diligent and well-regarded as his daughter.

“My daughter is worth more than a million gold coins!”

He would often say to his neighbors.

“My daughter is the best bride in the world. She may not have skin as white as snow¹ or golden hair like the waves of a witch’s daughter², but her smiling face can wash away all sorrows.”

He would also say this:

“She’s hardworking, strong, always smiling, and sings beautifully. When she gets up at dawn to sweep the yard, humming a tune, even the birds in the sky stop flapping their wings to listen.”

As the saying goes, even a hedgehog thinks its own offspring are lovely. How much more must this father, with his only family, his one and only daughter, adore her? In a world where so many people hate and abuse their own children, his overflowing love, though excessive, could be seen as endearing.

But sometimes, boasting without humility can invite scorn.

One of his neighbors sneered and said,

“What talent does she have besides being diligent?”

Another neighbor pursed his lips and said,

“She has no money, no beauty—she’s just an ordinary marriageable maiden you’d find in any village. If she’s such a great bride, why hasn’t she found a match yet?”

Yet another neighbor nodded in agreement and chimed in,

“That’s right, that’s right. In times like these, how can someone become a good bride just by being diligent? Diligence is the bare minimum; you need a hefty dowry. Unless, of course, she’s as stunningly beautiful as the bride of the Beast Prince next door³—then she wouldn’t need a dowry or diligence.”

The miller’s face turned red with anger at the insults hurled at his daughter.

The words were harsh, but there was some truth to them. His daughter was long past the usual age for marriage, yet no one had proposed to her. Their hand-to-mouth existence was the biggest obstacle. Though his daughter was hardworking, strong, and had a beautiful smile, she had no dowry to bring. How could she marry without a single penny to her name?

Stung and flustered, the miller opened and closed his mouth silently, unable to find a retort. Frustrated, he stomped his feet and finally blurted out something utterly absurd.

“My, my daughter has an enormous dowry! It’s not that she can’t marry because of money. It’s just that there’s no worthy young man in this area to marry her!”

“Where would you get such wealth?”

“Hmph! You don’t know anything! My daughter can spin straw into gold thread!”

Hahaha. Everyone gathered there burst into laughter, incredulous.

There’s a limit to boasting. How can you spin straw into gold thread? Even a three-year-old wouldn’t believe such nonsense.

“It’s true! My daughter can spin straw into gold thread!”

Driven by stubbornness, the miller shouted loudly.

“Alright, alright. We get it. Your daughter has the amazing talent of spinning straw into gold thread!”

The people responded with a mix of teasing, mockery, and pity. It was clear that if they pressed further, a fistfight would break out.

That day, it seemed the matter would be brushed aside.

“Spin, spin, spin. The miller’s daughter spins straw into gold thread!”

“Spin, spin, spin. The sound of the spinning wheel. The mill is full of straw instead of wheat!”

“Spin, spin, spin. The sound of the spinning wheel. The mill is full of gold thread instead of wheat!”

Spin, spin, spin.

The sound of the spinning wheel.

Spin, spin, spin……

Until that song spread from the mouths of children. Of course, the children didn’t make up the song out of malice. They had overheard their parents gossiping about the miller’s boast in their bedrooms and found it amusing.

Unfortunately, the song mocking the miller spread from one street to another, and eventually, it reached the ears of the King.

“Spinning straw into gold thread? What an astonishing talent!”

The young, handsome King clapped his knee and said this, then led his entourage to the mill.

No one in the village dared to tell the King the truth—that the song was just a song, born from the miller’s boast and pride in his daughter. Who would dare tell the King such a thing? It was clear that anyone who did would risk losing their head to the terrifying swords of the soldiers.

“Oh, oh, Your Majesty!”

The miller prostrated himself on the ground, bowing his head. The young King looked down at his graying scalp and said,

“I’ve heard the rumor that your daughter can spin straw into gold thread. I’m curious if such a talent truly exists.”

“Y-Your Majesty… That, my daughter…”

The miller trembled like a leaf, unable to finish his sentence. A cruel smile flickered across the King’s handsome face. At his gesture, the soldiers brought the maiden out of the mill. As he watched helplessly while his daughter was taken to the palace, the miller wept bitterly.

It was all because of his big mouth. In his frustration, he had boasted to his neighbors, and now his precious daughter was in trouble. No one dared to comfort him as he sat on the ground, crying like a child.

Meanwhile, the king took the maiden to a dark storage room in the castle where not a ray of sunlight could enter⁴…

“North?”

The girl, who had been devouring the bird stew like a possessed person, asked again.

Yes, the girl with the shotgun. Up close by the campfire, she looked older than she had from a distance. She seemed a year or two older than the wizard. Her small frame and the red riding hood she wore—something more suited for children—had made her appear younger at first glance.

When she saw the prince and his companions, she relaxed and approached, plopping down near the campfire without a word of apology. The sound of thunder rumbled from her stomach, so I offered her the leftover stew, and she began wolfing it down.

“No. You can’t go north.”

She, the girl in the red cloak, said.

“Why can’t we?”

Zig asked in a guarded tone. He hadn’t let his guard down around this woman who had suddenly appeared.

“Why…?”

The red cloak looked at Zig with a disbelieving expression.

“The road’s blocked.”

Then she went back to slurping down the stew.

“What should we do, Wizard?”

Zig whispered to the wizard.

“Hmm, I suppose we’ll have to take a detour, even if it takes more time. First, we’ll cross the Orobos River to the east of this region… um… then we’ll come across a house where a donkey, a dog, a cat, and a rooster are happily singing and playing instruments… From there, we’ll change direction…”

“A donkey? A donkey sings? Like a person⁵?”

“Ah, yes… They’re quite clever, haha. Not like the dumb horses at my place.”

The wizard glanced subtly at the prince and Sleipnir as he spoke. He hadn’t forgotten the prince’s earlier remark about trusting Sleipnir with human speech over him. The wizard was the type to hold a grudge…

“Let’s see…”

Just as the wizard was about to pull out a map from the sleeve of his old robe, the red cloak let out a satisfied “Ahh” and set down the empty stew bowl.

“You can’t go.”

“Huh?”

“You can’t go east either.”

…They had been speaking in hushed tones, but it seemed the red cloak had sharp hearing.

“Huh?”

The wizard asked again, dumbfounded. Rose, who had been watching the scene from the side, interjected impatiently.

“What do you mean we can’t go? You’re saying we can’t go north or east? Are all directions blocked? Explain it properly.”

“Wow, you guys are really…”

The red cloak looked at the prince’s group as if they were the most clueless people in the world.

“Where are you even from that you don’t know this? The lockdown order has been in place for fifteen days. By the king’s royal decree. No one is allowed to cross the border. It doesn’t matter if you’re foreigners or travelers. Thanks to that, I’m stuck in this damn country too. That’s why I’m in this mess. Damn it, I was sure that wolf had run off into this forest…”

“A lockdown order? Why?”

Zig asked.

“There’s been a kidnapping threat.”

The red cloak patted her full stomach and pulled out a long pipe, lighting it.

“Some bold fool sent a threat to the palace, saying they’d kidnap the prince who’s just a month old. It might just be a prank, but… things have been tense lately. Over in Hamelin, children were kidnapped from every household⁶. The culprit was never caught. People here suspect the one who sent the kidnapping threat might be the same infamous kidnapper from Hamelin.”

“What? There’s really someone so vile? Targeting only children?”

“Where are you guys from? How can you not know what’s going on in the world?”

“Ah, we’re from, um…”

Zig awkwardly gestured toward the Forbidden Forest. He seemed unsure whether to reveal to the woman that they had come from beyond that forest. But the sharp-witted red cloak immediately caught the direction of his gesture.

“You came through that forest?”

She looked surprised, then took a deep drag from her pipe. After a moment, she exhaled a thin stream of smoke and muttered.

“I heard no one ever returns from that forest…”

“Huh?”

“No, just talking to myself. Don’t mind me.”

The red cloak replied curtly. Zig, slightly deflated, didn’t press further.

“Wizard, what are you thinking so hard about?”

Rose sidled up to the wizard and whispered.

For a while now, ever since the red cloak mentioned the lockdown order, the wizard had been silent, staring intently at the campfire with a grim expression.

“Huh? What did you say?”

“…I asked what you’re thinking. You’ve been quiet for a while.”

“Ah.”

The wizard chuckled briefly and shook his head.

“I need to keep my mouth shut sometimes too. Being the mood-setter for the group is exhausting. You don’t like it when I talk too much, do you, Rose? You said two days ago that a chatterbox like me has no charm, remember?”

The fact that Zig, who had been almost as talkative as the wizard, had suddenly become a silent knight since that day… let’s keep that between us.

Rose pouted, annoyed that the wizard was dodging her question with nonsense.

“If you don’t want to answer, just say so. Stop rambling.”

“You’re as sharp as ever! A perfect match for our prince a hundred years from now.”

“Enough with that nonsense.”

She clicked her tongue and turned away. Despite having experienced the rifts, monsters, and the world’s anomalies firsthand, Rose seemed to have no faith in twisted timelines or collapsing destinies. Even after the wizard had spent a long time explaining it on the first day of their journey.

‘Written destinies? So we’re living according to someone else’s plan? My words, actions, choices, decisions, will, life, and death… all of it has a predetermined answer? That’s really unsettling.’

Rose had been furious.

But no matter how unsettling it was… what could she do? Even if the princess, who remembered nothing but her name, was angry, what could she do?

The wizard just laughed and sank back into thought.

He had reassured himself that the rifts hadn’t spread yet, but it seemed that wasn’t the case. The story here had already twisted.

You all know this story, don’t you?

You’ve probably heard it at least once when you were young.

The tale of the miller’s daughter who spun straw into gold, the greedy king, and the nameless fairy. The fairy demanded the girl’s firstborn child in exchange for spinning gold. Years later, the girl gave birth to a lovely child, and the fairy came to collect the debt. But when the mother begged with tears, the fairy gave her three days to guess its name, promising to forgive the debt if she succeeded.

Yes, three days.

A lockdown order shouldn’t last more than three days. Extending it to fifteen days was unlike any fairy. You all know, right? Fairies in stories are heartless creatures who set impossibly strict conditions for humans… Huh? Too discriminatory? Well, what can I do… Take it up with the old writers who established these tropes.

“Uh… so… does that mean no one can leave this country until the kidnapper is caught?”

Zig asked the red cloak. The red cloak exhaled a long stream of smoke in response.

“What if we go to the palace and explain our situation? If His Majesty permits it, I, Knight Zig, will go and meet the king of this country at dawn.”

Zig spoke with the resolute tone of someone heading to war. But the prince simply stood up without a word.

“Uh, Your Highness? Where… are you going?”

“No need to follow me.”

The prince answered dismissively and walked toward the riverbank, loosely holding the reins of the three horses. Watching the prince’s retreating figure, the wizard quickly stood up to follow.

“He said not to follow, Wizard.”

“That was directed at Zig!”

After snapping back, the wizard ran off, waving his arms and calling, “Your Highness! Your Highness!”

The prince’s Sleipnir, Rose’s Fafnir, and Zig’s Húinir—the three horses stood at a distance, drinking water or wetting their manes. The prince brushed Sleipnir’s mane and coat with a stiff-bristled brush. Sleipnir, enjoying the rare grooming, shook his handsome muzzle and acted like a playful kitten.

Sensing the wizard’s approach, the prince asked:

“You looked troubled. Has something unusual happened?”

His voice was low, so the others couldn’t hear.

“…Something like me?”

When the prince paused his brushing, Sleipnir pawed the ground and whined softly.

“There’s no anomaly like you in this world, Your Highness. You’ve returned to your twenty-seventh birthday countless times, haven’t you?”

To be precise, it was the realization of the infinite regression that made him special. But to the characters in the story, those two things likely felt no different.

The wizard grinned broadly. The prince did not smile.

“I must be the most vile of them all.”

“You’re special.”

Well, of course, he’s the protagonist. He has to be special.

…Though it might have been better if he were a little less special.

The prince resumed brushing. The wizard, feeling awkward, clasped his hands behind his back and paced around, pretending to be busy.

It was a peaceful night. The campfire burned on one side of the campsite, the stars shone brightly in the sky, and the three handsome horses drank from the river.

A peaceful night, incongruous with a world hurtling toward its end.

As the prince vigorously rubbed Sleipnir’s back, he suddenly grimaced. A low groan escaped through his clenched teeth.

“Your Highness?”

The wizard rushed over.

“Are you hurt? But…”

In the five days they had been traveling together, the prince had never shown such discomfort.

The wizard tried to support the prince, but the prince shook his head and refused help. What could be wrong with the prince? Where did it hurt? The wizard didn’t miss how the prince clutched the lower part of his back with his right hand.

“I suddenly felt dizzy. I’m fine now.”

A lie. It was a lie.

“Will you give me some space?”

The prince straightened his back with effort as he spoke.

“I want to wash up.”

It was a visible lie, but the wizard didn’t want to press him. What did the truth matter, anyway? Right?

“Can you manage alone, Your Highness? If you need help bathing, just say the word.”

“Are you offering to be my servant?”

“I wouldn’t mind.”

“I appreciate the offer, but no need.”

Haha, the wizard laughed, though his eyes were filled with concern.

“I know the truth, Your Highness. You don’t like having attendants during your baths.”

Thinking the wizard was spouting nonsense again, the prince shook his head.

“What do you know?”

Normally, the wizard would have retorted, but today he didn’t. Instead, he carefully stepped back, as if reassuring a trapped animal, raising his hands to face level. Then, about twenty paces away, he suddenly turned and ran back toward the campsite.

Once the wizard was completely out of sight, the prince let out the groan he had been holding back. It was a long, low, and painful sound, like that of an animal deeply wounded. Beads of cold sweat formed at his temples and streamed down the sides of his face. Sleipnir, as if resonating with his master’s pain, lifted his head and let out a mournful cry.

…Do you remember, everyone?

In the last part of the story, the prince’s cursed sword had cut through and absorbed the rift-born monster into its blade.

When the cursed sword devoured the otherworldly monster and shone brilliantly, the prince had felt an intense pain in his lower back, between his shoulder blades.

The pain tormenting the prince now was the same as that pain.

As if burned by fire…

As if his flesh were being seared by a hot iron…

That kind of pain.

But there was no wound. It had already been five days since the pain first struck. If there had been a wound, the prince’s body wouldn’t have remained unscathed over those five days. There would have been bleeding, pus, or infection.

A pain without a physical cause.

Who could he tell?

The prince instinctively knew. This, too, might be another anomaly affecting the world. This pain and the endless cycle of memories that only he possessed.

“…Come to think of it, I never asked.”

Burying his face in Sleipnir’s thick mane, the prince muttered.

When they reached Omphalos and he plunged the cursed sword into it, sealing the world’s rifts and restoring everything to normal… what would happen to him?

Would he forget?

The fact that he had lived through countless repetitions of his life?

And would he once again be dragged back into that endless cycle?

That…

The prince thought it was absurd. A written destiny? A life with a predetermined answer from birth to death? A life of following a set path like a puppet, all while deluding oneself into thinking there’s free will or choice, and suffering because of it?

As Rose had said, it was “really unsettling.”

Then would it be better to let the world collapse?

To tear irreparable rifts into this world and push it into eternal uncertainty.

Would that be better?

The moment that thought crossed his mind, the pain, which had momentarily subsided, surged back. It seeped deeper beneath his skin, into his bones. Feeling as if a dull blade were slicing through his bones and tendons, the prince gripped Sleipnir’s mane tightly.

Enduring pain so intense he couldn’t even scream, he peeled off his sweat-soaked clothes, layer by layer. His cloak, tunic, shirt, pants, and even the thin undergarments beneath—until he stood completely naked. Moonlight and starlight cascaded over the prince’s finely sculpted body, as if mocking him. The prince bore the light with dignity as he slowly waded into the river. The cold water against his skin strangely seemed to dull the pain a little.

Sleipnir followed the prince into the river, worried as his master ventured deeper, up to his waist. When Sleipnir approached, the prince wrapped an arm around the loyal animal’s neck and whispered something tender, meant only for its ears.

Leaning half his weight on Sleipnir, the prince turned his head to one side. He wanted to check his reflection in the water. Only after craning his neck painfully toward his collarbone could he barely glimpse the rippling surface.

Reflected in the water, the prince’s back…

…

…

…

There was nothing.