Chapter 04
991 Words
Ada Williams
I brought my hand to my mouth.
My chest ached. It truly ached.
As if that loss were my own, as if I had actually buried those people myself.
As if I had spent nights alone in this house, waiting to hear footsteps that would never return.
It was too real.
Tears continued to stream down silently as I stared at my distorted reflection in the water.
No. This couldn't be normal.
No dream felt like this. No hallucination could make my heart ache like this.
I took several deep breaths until I regained some semblance of control. Then, I slowly turned my eyes back to the floating window.
*Ada Williams*
"Is that my real name?" I frowned, bewildered.
Peasant of White Hill.
Parents killed in a wagon accident.
My throat went dry.
The pieces slowly began to fall into place. And the more they fit together... the worse it got.
"..."
That... that name, White Hill, was familiar. I had seen it somewhere before...
That was when it suddenly hit me.
THE GAME?!
Was I inside the game?
The question was so absurd that my brain almost rejected it instantly.
It was impossible, literally impossible.
But then... What else could explain all this?
The house. Those memories. The messages that seemed to come from some kind of system. And that name... White Hill.
My heart slowly sank.
"Oh, come on..."
So that was it? I had been thrown into that piece-of-trash fantasy romance?
And worse...
Not even as the protagonist. Not even as the villain, or someone important. I was a random extra who probably died some miserable death.
"I couldn't even end up as someone rich..."
I rubbed my face nervously. This had to be an insane dream.
A fever. Maybe a coma. Anything.
'Breathe, Ada... just breathe,' I thought, trying not to freak out.
On top of that, why the hell was my name the same as in reality?
I tried to calm down.
Okay.
Assuming... ASSUMING this was real.
How do I get back? How do I get out of here?
I had a job. Documents. Bills to pay.
Damn it, I literally still needed to finish those reviews for Mr. James.
I stopped dead in my tracks, realizing what I was thinking about.
I almost let out a nervous laugh.
My life had gone to hell, and I was still worrying about insurance reports.
I walked slowly back to the bedroom where I'd woken up. I sat down; the bed was just as hard as before.
I started staring into space.
Okay. I needed to think.
If this really was *The Saint and the Dragon*... then that weird panel probably functioned as some kind of system.
Except it was a broken system. Because the only thing appearing over and over was:
**MAIN ROUTE ERROR**
And right below it:
**LOADING ALTERNATE ROUTES...**
It kept flashing slowly, giving me chills.
But then another block of text appeared, and it was the one that genuinely terrified me.
**Main Objective: SAVE WHITE HILL**
My stomach turned to ice because I knew exactly what that meant. White Hill was the first city destroyed in the war.
I closed my eyes, trying to pull details from my memory.
In the game...
After the Winter Festival, the conflict between the kingdoms escalated drastically. The cursed dragon ends up falling into a wartime trap, being taken hostage, tortured, and humiliated. Only then is he saved by the protagonist, the Saint, who demands the Church release him, but they refuse.
The dragon vanishes, manages to escape, and then, the m******e begins.
An White Hill... White Hill was one of the first cities destroyed.
I vaguely remembered the description.
Houses burning. Bodies in the streets. The army breaching the walls. The economic collapse caused by the destruction of the agricultural region.
It directly affected the Kingdom of El Linor—the Saint's kingdom. The dragon destroys half the world just to force the Church to hand the Saint over to him.
My throat slowly went dry.
Because... because apparently, I was living in this godforsaken city.
"Oh... shit."
So that was it? I had to stop it? OUT OF NOWHERE?
And worse...
I didn't even know who this fictional Ada was. What connection did she have to the plot? Did she even pop up at some point? Was she already destined to die?
I had no clue. Because I hadn't finished the damn game.
"Damn it..."
I pressed my fingers against my forehead. All I knew were a few major events up until almost the halfway mark of the story. That was it.
I let out a slow sigh.
I... couldn't die here, in this godforsaken city, in a war. No way in hell. Just thinking about being stuck here in the middle of that nightmare when everything goes down...
My heart raced.
I tried to look on the bright side.
"Okay... it looks like the war is still a long way off, which means I entered the game before it even starts, or something like that."
And maybe... saving White Hill was the condition to go back home.
The thought struck me almost instantly. If this was some kind of system... some kind of route or mission... then maybe completing the objective would send me back.
Right? That had to be it!
I was already getting my hopes up when reality hit me.
How the hell was I supposed to save an entire city?
I was in the body of a peasant girl. No power, no money, no influence. I didn't even know how to use a wood-burning stove.
I slowly got up from the bed. My head was still spinning.
I needed to find out everything I could about this world. About this character. About this damn broken system.
And fast, because at some point...
The war will happen, and I definitely don't want to be around to see it in person.
- Writer
