ALL NOVEL Chapter 1
## Prologue
Just as light brings shadow, there existed a god who desired peace for the world and another who sought its ruin. For convenience, let us call them the God of Fortune and the God of Misfortune.
In the vast continent of Armenia, where the mighty Bahamur Empire reigned, these two deities made a wager. The stakes? The very survival of the continent itself.
Isn’t the scale too grand for a mere bet? Not quite. While the continent of Armenia was large, there were plenty of other continents and worlds to take its place.
The rules of the bet were simple. If the chosen soul were to harm a person *directly*, the God of Misfortune would claim victory. Conversely, if the soul managed to avoid *directly* harming anyone, the God of Fortune would win.
The soul chosen by these two gods was born as the illegitimate daughter of a renowned marquis family in the Bahamur Empire. Rejected by her father, she returned to the marquis’ household after her mother died, enduring all manner of coldness and humiliation. Despite this, she grew into a beautiful woman, only to meet her end at the young age of twenty-four.
Cause of death: drowning. As she prepared to throw herself into a river in an attempt to end her own life, she spotted a child drowning. After saving the child, she succumbed to exhaustion and died.
Her unexpected death left both the God of Fortune and the God of Misfortune perplexed. They turned to the God of Judgment for a ruling.
The God of Judgment, too, was troubled. It was not an easy matter to decide, especially with the fate of an entire continent hanging in the balance. He proposed a simple solution:
“Wasn’t the premise of the wager ambiguous from the start? Why not ask the other gods? Ask them if ‘a person’ includes oneself and where to draw the line on ‘direct harm.’ It might also be worth asking their opinion on the outcome of the bet.”
The gods were scattered far and wide, and it took quite some time to gather their opinions. In the end, the verdict was a tie.
The God of Judgment declared, “In this case, a draw seems appropriate.”
But neither god had started the wager with the intention of ending it in a draw. So, they decided to turn back her time and make the bet again, with slightly altered conditions.
If the woman lived until the age of 70 and died of natural causes, the God of Fortune would win. If she died before then, the God of Misfortune would be victorious.
Before turning back time, the God of Fortune offered to grant the woman one wish in exchange for her earlier good deed. When the god asked her what she desired, her soul replied:
“I wish for the people who hurt me to understand the pain and sorrow I felt.”
“Do you want them to suffer?”
“Not exactly. I just want them to share my feelings, if only for a moment.”
“You… are a kind yet cruel destroyer. Very well, I will grant your wish.”
In exchange for granting her wish, the God of Misfortune imposed a simple condition: the woman would return to the past, keeping all her painful memories and her desire to die.
Thus, the woman who had shown kindness before her death forgot her conversation with the gods. However, the memories of her final moments were slightly distorted as she was sent back to her past.