Chapter 2Do-Over

After a near-fatal car accident, I was bound to a Transmigration System.

The world I entered was a novel, a classic romance about a neglectful hero who has to grovel to win back the woman he wronged. The hero, Damian Thorne, and the heroine, Willow Hayes, had a torturous love story that, after countless trials, ended in reconciliation.

And Tim Stan was the devoted second male lead, the one who watched over her from afar and never married.

The conflict between Tim and Damian exploded midway through the story. Damian was in the groveling phase of his character arc, clumsily trying to win Willow back. At the same time, Willow had become aware of the unspoken love her adoptive brother, Tim, held for her, and she was trapped in a painful state of guilt and indecision.

The System told me my mission was to earn 100% of Tim’s affection.

So, in the tenth year of my mission, when Tim set off a city’s worth of fireworks for me, got down on one knee in front of both Willow and Damian, and asked me to marry him…

When I heard the System’s voice announce, [Congratulations, Host. Mission complete.]…

I wept with joy. I chose to tell Tim everything—about the System, about the fact that his world was a book. And I chose to stay, to live out a new life with him, free from the novel’s plot.

I had no one in my original world. As long as I could live, it didn’t matter where. Besides, somewhere along the way, I had truly fallen in love with him.

I still remembered his trembling hands as he held out the ring, the frantic beating of his heart, the love that filled his eyes under the cascading fireworks.

But it was all a lie.

Tim had deceived everyone, including the System, all to free his precious girl from her guilt so she could run into another man’s arms.

Now, seven years later, the novel’s plot had concluded. Willow discovered that Damian had cheated on her, that her happily-ever-after was a sham. She fell into a deep depression and jumped from a building.

Her white dress had blossomed into a crimson flower in the wind.

Only then did Tim finally feel regret. And in his desperation to go back and save her, he tore open the bloody, horrifying truth.

How laughable.

From beginning to end, Willow was his only destination.