The Knight Who Broke Off Our Engagement and Told Me to Never Show My Face Again Still Clings to Me Today, Even Though I Was Possessed and Turned Into a Villainess for Ten Years - 67 - One Second Before the World Ends 3

Rufus restrained Mabel while I started searching the room again.

“Where… where is it…”

With trembling hands, I desperately searched inside shelves, behind them, under the bed—everywhere I could think of.

I had already searched every possible place last night. After looking so thoroughly and still not finding it, I felt crushed by panic and fear, thinking there’s no way I could find it now.

“Norman must be fighting. Let’s believe in him.”

“Rufus…”

“Instead of searching at random, you should stop and think calmly. It’s going to be okay.”

Rufus gently stroked my back and spoke to me in a soft voice.

I stopped my frantic searching, taking several deep breaths, just as he said.

“…Thank you. I’m sorry.”

Thanks to Rufus, I felt a little calmer, and my mind started working again. I closed my eyes softly and thought carefully.

── If I were Mabel, I would never let something so important out of my sight.

Considering everything she’s done, she wouldn’t trust anyone. If she lost the magic tool, she would lose everything she built up until now.

But when we checked earlier, there was no sign of Mabel hiding the magic tool on her. We searched the room thoroughly, and there weren’t many places to hide something in the first place.

Why was Mabel so confident?

“Rufus, where do you think is a place where something could never be found?”

“Only somewhere you can’t reach or somewhere invisible, I guess… but I doubt there’s such a convenient hiding place inside this mansion.”

“…A place you can’t reach, a place you can’t see…”

Yes, unless it’s something like that, careful Mabel wouldn’t have been so sure of herself.

‘Lady Eliza always used to say, “The most precious things must be kept closest to you.”’

Suddenly, Matilda’s words came back to me.

“…No way.”

It felt like the dots in my mind were connecting into a line. I lifted my head with a jolt.

I stood up, went to the desk, and opened the drawer. I pulled out the small dagger I had found a few days ago.

Then I walked over to Mabel, who was still tied up, and lifted the hem of her dress.

“Rufus, hold Mabel down! Please!”

Rufus looked confused but nodded right away and pinned Mabel down to the floor.

“What the hell? That hurts! You bastards!”

Mabel struggled desperately, but with my body and Rufus’s strength, she couldn’t win.

“──I knew it. It’s here.”

When I lifted her skirt all the way to her thigh, I saw a thin piece of cloth I recognized.

I ripped it off by force. There was a scar just like the one I had seen on Eliza’s body. My guess was right.

“Ugh… stop it! Let me go!”

Mabel must have realized I’d figured it out. The composure she had until now vanished, and she started to fight back wildly.

I drew the dagger from its sheath. My heart was pounding painfully, but I aimed the sharp blade at Mabel—at my own body.

“Sadie? What are you…?”

Rufus gasped. And then—I plunged the knife down onto the scar on my thigh.

“Gaaaaah! Nooooo! It hurts! It hurts it hurts it hurts! Aaaaaah!”

The sickening feeling of cutting into flesh made me want to throw up, but I gritted my teeth, pushed the knife deeper.

When I pulled the knife out, without hesitating, I pushed my fingers into the bleeding wound.

Soon I felt something hard at my fingertips. I pinched it with two fingers and yanked it out in one pull. Mabel’s screams echoed through the whole room.

“This is…”

In my hand was a bl00d-soaked golden rod—the magic tool that had brought us so much suffering for years.

──Mabel had been hiding the magic tool inside her own body.

Even after taking my body, if the doctor was cooperating with her, this would have been possible. No one would ever suspect such a thing, and of course, we could have searched forever without finding it.

“…No way.”

Rufus stared in disbelief at the bl00d-covered magic tool.

“Gaaah… aaah… it huuurts…! You b1tch… I’ll never forgive you…!”

Mabel, unable to endure the pain, thrashed around, clutching her bleeding leg desperately.

Thinking about how this injury and pain would soon come back to me made me terrified.

Even so, losing my precious friends—losing our future—was far more frightening.

“Give it back! Give it back! That’s mine…!”

Even in agony, Mabel stretched out her hand toward me, desperately trying to take it back.

That alone convinced me this magic tool was the real thing.

Norman’s condition was critical. We had no time to waste. I needed to take back my body right away.

“Rufus, I’m going to switch back to my real body now.”

“…Yeah. Right after that, let’s treat your wound immediately.”

Rufus looked pained. He was clearly worried about the injury my body had suffered.

“…………”

The magic tool already had my own bl00d on it since it had been inside Mabel (in my body). All I had to do was stab it into this body.

──Honestly, I was scared.

Using this magic tool—the very thing that had ruined my life and everyone else’s—on myself… Of course I was scared.

But still, with this, everything should be solved. Norman would be saved too.

As I gripped the magic tool tightly—

“Sadie! Norman is really… it’s really almost…!”

The door burst open, and Neil came in, tears in his eyes.

When he saw me covered in bl00d, he fell silent, but he quickly realized what I held in my hand.

“No way… Sadie, hurry! The doctor arrived, but Norman’s seriously at his limit!”

“I understand!”

Just as I was about to stab the magic tool into the palm of my hand—I froze.

“──Eh?”

The knife I had stabbed into Mabel’s stomach earlier was now pierced straight through the heart of my own body.

I stared in shock. Mabel, her mouth dripping with bl00d, grinned at me.

Now that the magic tool was in our hands, Mabel knew she had lost everything. She would surely be sentenced to death.

So instead—she chose to die while still in my body.

“Damn it! Stop this! Neil, get the doctor—!”

Rufus’s voice rang through the room. Neil nodded and immediately ran off.

“………!”

If I returned to my real body, I might die.

But there was no time left to hesitate.

“Hey, Rufus…”

I held the magic tool tightly and stepped back a few steps—far enough that Rufus, who was holding Mabel down, couldn’t stop me.

“Rufus… I really love you.”

The moment I said that, Rufus’s eyes opened wide.

I was glad I could at least say this before the end. Even in this moment, a natural smile came to my lips.

“Sadie! Stop! Please!”

Rufus shouted desperately and reached out for me.

“…I’m sorry.”

──Please, let this be the end of it all.

Praying with all my heart, before his hand could reach me—I stabbed the tip of the magic tool into my own palm.