The crystal chandelier hanging from the mansion's ceiling swayed slightly from the aftershocks of the struggle, casting multi-colored yet cold beams of light over a chaotic scene reeking of death. In the confined space of the room, the scent of natural oak blended with expensive wax candles—a fragrance that usually represented upper-class luxury—was now violently torn apart by another grotesque mixture. The pungent stench of fresh blood seeping from the dead man's lips mingled with the sharp, acrid scent, akin to almonds, of the pristine white Potassium Cyanide powder scattered across the polished wooden floor. Kyouya's thin-framed glasses lay bare in a corner, the empty frame bent awkwardly to one side, exposing the completely foiled suicide trap.
At Itsuki's feet lay the corpse of Kyouya Manabi, motionless and pitifully contorted. The man who once arrogantly believed he could calculate every probability in the world was now just a worthless empty shell, permanently erased from the reincarnation game. His eyes glared widely, his dilated pupils reflecting the chandelier, harboring utter shock, hatred, and absolute despair. Around his Adam's apple, dark purple bruises clearly imprinted the shape of Itsuki's five fingers—a cruel testament to a decisive, crushing grip. His body cooled rapidly under the night breeze, the dark red blood from his nose and mouth congealing into a thick, dark streak on the oak floor.
But Itsuki's triumph was short-lived. The very moment Kyouya's last breath of vitality completely dissipated, an inorganic, eerily mechanical sound echoed straight into the depths of Itsuki's brain.
[Appropriation successful.]
[Synchronizing the pain and most recent death...]
"Gah...!"
A choked, hoarse gasp shot out of Itsuki's throat. His glowing red eyes shrank into two tiny pinpricks, and immediately, the tall physique of the Mikage family's bastard son collapsed onto the wooden floor. The pain struck so fiercely that he had no time to prepare. It was no ordinary physical pain, but a brutal biological backlash—the mandatory price of the Assimilation mechanism when a mortal dares to take the life of a Time Breaker.
Itsuki could clearly feel his larynx being crushed by an invisible, giant hand. His trachea flattened, completely sealing off the flow of oxygen. His chest heaved frantically, his diaphragm spasming violently as he tried to inhale a single breath of air, but the only response was emptiness and a hellish burning from two lungs gradually shriveling from suffocation.
Itsuki's hands instinctively flew up, his fingernails clawing frantically at his own throat, leaving long, bloody scratches. A buzzing roar, like high-voltage current, rang inside his eardrums, completely severing him from the sounds of reality. The blood vessels on his forehead and neck bulged, stretching pale and blue as if about to burst. His vision blurred, swallowed by a blood-colored mist, while sparkling spots continuously danced across his retinas due to severe cerebral hypoxia. He was experiencing the exact sensation of suffocation, agony, and helplessness that he had bestowed upon his victim mere seconds ago.
"Young Master...!"
The black-clad subordinate hiding in the dark corner watched the scene in horror. He stepped forward in a panic, his trembling hands reaching out to support his master.
"Get out... Get lost...!"
Itsuki gritted his teeth, broken, deep growls mixed with blood escaping from between them, carrying a cruel authority. He swung his arm, violently swatting away the subordinate's approach. His bloodshot eyes pinned the man down like a wounded predator ready to tear apart anyone who dared touch its pride. The solitary and extreme nature, forged from years of being humiliated by his clan as "mud-blood trash," did not allow him to show weakness. He wanted to swallow this pain whole, by himself.
Itsuki gripped the edge of the oak table tightly, his fingernails bending and bleeding. He stared at the puddle of white cyanide powder on the floor. In the midst of the suffocating agony where it felt like his brain would explode, the corners of Itsuki's lips suddenly tore open, forming a twisted, wildly arrogant smile. He laughed at his own terrifyingly lucid presence of mind earlier. Had he been one step slower, allowing Kyouya to touch the poison-laced glasses frame and successfully commit suicide, the game would have ended in the worst-case scenario. A Time Breaker killing himself would immediately trigger the regression mechanism, the Assimilation process would be nullified, and Itsuki would remain permanently trapped in the lowly status of an ordinary human.
This brutal suffocation, though tearing his chest apart, was the ultimate proof that he had won. He had single-handedly nailed his prey to reality, crushing the only escape route to force the system to hand over its power.
Just as the suffocation showed signs of easing, another, more brutal aftershock instantly struck. This time, no mystical force was trying to seize his body; instead, a terrifying torrent of information was transmitted straight into Itsuki's brain.
Kyouya had only gone through a mere three time loops, but that was more than enough to accumulate a massive amount of mental toxicity. Itsuki's consciousness was dragged into a dark void, where the deep psychological scar from Kyouya's Original Loop detonated like a pressure bomb.
In his delirium, Itsuki found himself no longer in the luxurious room. His sense of smell was flooded with the stench of collapsed earth and rock, damp concrete, and the suffocating atmosphere of an underground construction site caved in deep beneath the earth. His brain forced him to fully recreate Kyouya's agony on that fateful afternoon. Both hands burned, the flesh chafed to bleeding as he desperately clung to the pressure release lever continuously for three excruciatingly long minutes to give his subordinate, Tanaka, a chance to survive. His chest spasmed violently, his lungs aching as if about to burst from lack of oxygen, but that physical torment was completely overshadowed by the cruel jolt of betrayal.
Tanaka's static, cold voice through the walkie-talkie from the surface echoed straight into Itsuki's eardrums, every vicious word piercing his heart: "Hey Kyouya, people often say if you love someone, love them to the end... So just consider this your final act of love for me, and stay down there forever."
The walkie-talkie clicked off. The last backup oxygen supply was cut. Itsuki clearly felt the exhaustion, the despair, and the sensation of his knees buckling onto the freezing concrete floor in the darkness. A hoarse, bitter scoff at blind faith echoed in his mind, dragging along the consequences of the two subsequent loops—where Kyouya completely discarded morality, turning into a paranoid, selfish man who only relied on cold probability numbers because he believed "trust is the most idiotic variable."
All that extreme, melancholic, and panicked thinking in the face of death flooded through his neurons, frantically infecting and attempting to blacken Itsuki's ego. It forced Itsuki to view the world through the paranoid and fearful eyes of a defeated man.
"Bastard... I am not a coward like you!"
Itsuki roared hoarsely, streaks of fresh blood seeping from the corners of his eyes and his teeth due to the overwhelming mental pressure. His solitary, arrogant nature, along with the ruthless will to survive of a bastard humiliated as "mud-blood trash," pulled him back from the abyss of madness. He did not entrust his life to any variable, and he certainly would not allow the depressive emotions of a fallen loser to guide him. Through a ruthless effort of rationality, Itsuki swiftly broke free from Kyouya's dark memories.
As the fresh streak of blood at the corner of his mouth gradually dried, the worldview in Itsuki's eyes completely collapsed to make way for a new reality. The eerie silence of the room was broken by a bizarre light. When Itsuki blinked, his pupils no longer retained their original glowing red hue but began to emit a faint light, trailing behind tens of thousands of characters, algorithms, and numbers flashing continuously at breakneck speed.
The power of The Probabilist—The Calculator of the Future—had officially been activated.
Itsuki stood up straight, his chest still heaving. He raised his hand in front of his face. Instantly, a slender stream of blue numbers appeared on his fingertips, constantly changing with every slightest movement. To test the power he had just usurped, Itsuki looked at a half-finished glass of red wine on the desk. He nudged it slightly with his finger, sending the glass into a free fall toward the granite floor.
A tenth of a second before it hit the ground, Itsuki's vision froze time in his mind. A blue trajectory line was traced in the air, accompanied by a single, invariable number:
Glass shattering: 100%.
Crash!
The sound of glass shattering into pieces happened exactly as predicted. Just as the knowledge Kyouya left behind dictated: events operating purely according to the laws of nature, without the interference of human emotion, will always yield a single, absolutely precise result. The essence of this world was nothing but a series of logical equations.
He immediately glanced at the bodyguard next to him, and a blue line of text appeared: Probability of this bodyguard betraying him: 0.1%.
However, the complexity of the calculating vision only truly revealed itself when Itsuki directed his thoughts toward another variable: His own survival in the coming minutes.
Kyouya was dead, and the sudden disappearance of a Time Breaker would undoubtedly turn this place into a focal point for other hunters. The moment Itsuki hypothesized leaving the mansion, the vision in his eyes immediately exploded violently. The blue streams of numbers no longer ran in a straight line; they began to branch out, split, and multiply into a tightly woven, complex network.
Leaving through the back door: Safety rate 90%Leaving via the West balcony: Safety rate 70%Staying to defend the room: Safety rate 60%
The numbers constantly danced, fluctuating erratically with every heartbeat and intention of Itsuki. He realized that the moment a sentient factor was involved—whether it was his own behavior or the reactions of pursuers—the probability equation would instantly branch into multiple different outcomes. Hesitation or spontaneous decisions could turn those numbers upside down.
But what sent a chill down Itsuki's spine was the fatal flaw hidden within this divine power. A warning from the very nature of the ability etched into his cognition: If the input information of the event is inaccurate, the calculated outcome will be completely skewed.
Itsuki chuckled softly, a smile tinged with cruelty and supreme lucidity. He understood why Kyouya had died. His predecessor had been too arrogant, relying on an evenly balanced 50% without foreseeing that the input data had been manipulated beforehand. The math wasn't wrong, but the user of the math was too naive, trusting in surface-level data.
"Kyouya died due to blind faith in numbers..." Itsuki whispered, his glowing red eyes shining in the dark. "As for me, I will force the numbers to submit to my reality."
He walked over to the nightstand, where a photograph of the Mikage family was placed.
"Starting with you, my beloved family."
He coldly crushed the picture frame. Ignoring his bleeding hand, Itsuki calmly left the mansion through the back door, leaving an order for his subordinate to dispose of the body and burn the mansion down to erase all evidence. He got into a car and drove away, leaving behind a mansion engulfed in roaring flames.