CHAPTER 40: LISTEN HARDER

[After taking you away, Lilith — while surprised at your transformation — helped heal you, and Selena questioned you about what had happened.]

[You didn’t reply immediately. Instead, you took your time gathering your thoughts before you told them everything honestly, and both of them calmed down slightly, attributing the earlier situation to bad luck.]

[You didn’t say anything further after that and simply returned home with Lilith.]

[There, once you entered your room, your calm facade vanished. And with a furious expression, you started breaking everything around you.]

[Only when almost nothing remained intact did you begin to calm down slightly — and finally stop.]

[Afterward, you moved to your desk and took out a hidden notebook.]

[Opening it, you stopped on one of the front pages, where two words were written in red: Listen harder.]

[You stared at those words for a long time before flipping to the last few pages, where a single word stood out — strength.]

[You remained like that for hours, eyes locked on that word, thoughts churning inside your head, before finally shoving everything aside and beginning your training in Blood Scripture.]

[The next day arrived. But you didn’t go to the university. Instead, you stayed inside your room and continued training.]

[You kept training like that until nightfall, when Lilith, clearly walking on edge, quietly came to your room. She mentioned how you hadn’t left the room all day, hadn’t gone to class, hadn’t even eaten — and with concern in her voice, she asked if you were okay.]

[At that, you simply smiled... and stated that you were dropping out of university.]

[Lilith’s mood was visibly elated at the news, though she tried not to show it. Then she insisted you don’t skip your meal — and you didn’t refuse, knowing you couldn’t keep going like this forever. And so, time passed.]

[One week later, Selena visited you at your house. She first asked about your sudden decision to drop out of university, but you told her it simply didn’t hold any meaning for you anymore.]

[She frowned but, still didn’t comment on that, and instead changed the topic to your recent transformation.]

[You didn’t explain right away. Instead, you told her that you would share everything later. While she wasn’t satisfied with that answer, she chose not to press further.]

[One month passed. With your strength, mastering the early parts of the Blood Scripture came easily. And you were finally able to measure your progress more precisely in the first stage — Vital Purification. You had reached 91%, and not much remained before advancing to the next stage.]

[With renewed vigor, you continued your training.]

[Another month passed. But, your progress had barely moved — only 1%.]

[Assaulted by a strange sense of urgency, after some thought, you decided to take more drastic measures.]

[You met with both Selena and Lilith, explaining to them the Blood Refinement Path — and how you could accelerate your progress by using better nutrients. You asked if they could help provide those.]

[Both gave the same answer, that it was possible, and promised to bring you the nutrients you needed as soon as they could.]

[One month later, Selena won the race. She brought you a type of fruit you had never seen before — brimming with nutrients.]

[A few days later, Lilith arrived as well, bringing a special kind of meat that could be used in meals and would offer significant support to your training.]

’With competition, everything really is different!’

Noel thought, raising an eyebrow.

In the last simulation, Lilith had taken two whole months to bring that kind of meat. But this time, just one.

The difference was clear.

And then there was Selena.

Noel couldn’t help but wonder... why did it have to be fruit?

Why that, specifically?

Because it made him think — about the Merrow family, and their Wood Law.

And he couldn’t help but link things together.

The thought came to him so naturally, that he already started suspecting this simulation might be short once again.

Shaking his head, Noel pushed the thought aside and focused on another thing.

It seemed like Serah had vanished entirely from the simulation.

So... did his interaction with her really determine the nature of their relationship to this extent?

He tapped the desk with his fingers, thinking.

Just earlier, she had been too forward with him. Too close. Too intimate.

And so, even though he didn’t get her number in the simulation, it still felt impossible that they wouldn’t cross paths again — not even three months later.

And yet, that’s exactly what was happening in the simulation.

Further more, it seems that she had left a shadow in him — one that pushed him into a restless urgency, as he chased after strength with even greater desperation.

Noel’s thoughts spiraled in all directions.

But in the end, he simply continued reading the flowing text.

[With this kind of food, your training speed accelerated — reaching more than double what it had been before — and you finally returned to fully devoting yourself to your training.]

[Two months later, your progress in the Vital Purification stage reached 95%. The next stage seemed closer than ever.]

[But you were not satisfied. You could feel something was wrong in your body — and unless you solved it, you couldn’t even dream of reaching the next stage.]

[That realization made you even more desperate in your training.]

’Come again?’

’Even my body has a problem now?’

Noel sighed as he read the content of the simulation.

He closed his eyes briefly, searching through his memories for clues — anything that might help him understand what was going wrong.

And then... he remembered.

Something he had read back in the first premium simulation.

Selena had explained his condition to him, and one line, in particular, came back vividly:

"The problem wasn’t only your injured soul, or the bloodline that had already been taken from you."

That was what she had said.

Noel found himself stopping on the word bloodline.

At the time, he hadn’t paid much attention to it.

His focus had been on the soul — on how healing it could be a problem in itself. That had consumed all of his thoughts then.

But now...

Now, seeing that even the Blood Refinement Path — the one thing he had clawed toward after everything — was possibly closed off to him...

He couldn’t help but clench his hand, frustration boiling inside him.

And once again, he found himself asking the same question that haunted him relentlessly:

What the hell happened to him... before he lost his memories?