He Took My Love 99 Times. The 100th Time, He Lost Me Forever. Chapter 09

He Took My Love 99 Times. The 100th Time, He Lost Me Forever. Chapter 09

On the day of the final divorce hearing, Dante actually applied for a reverse transaction.

He wanted to transfer all of his love for me to me, to repair my memory index.

The researcher laid out the consequences:

“After receiving it, Ms. Vale may recover some factual memories at most. There is no

guarantee she will feel love again.”

“Mr. Castellano will permanently lose all feelings for her, and all related memories.”

“I’m willing.”

Dante answered quickly.

The terminal identified his 8.7 percent of Affection, and the confirmation page popped up:

[This transaction cannot be reversed.]

[Once confirmed, you will permanently forget Annalise Vale.]

A sixty-second countdown began.

He placed his hand on the Confirm button and did not press it.

Fifty-nine seconds.

Forty.

Twenty.

Cold sweat beaded at his hairline. His fingers trembled.

I suddenly remembered what the researcher had once told me.

At the ninety-ninth transaction, Dante had hesitated for a minute too.

Then he pressed down, and wiped out ten years of me.

Now the same warning had landed on him, and he couldn’t even spare his 8.7 percent.

With three seconds left, he snatched his hand back.

Transaction canceled.

Dante explained, scrambling:

“It’s not that I’m unwilling. It’s just that if I forget you, there will be no one left to help you

recover.”

“Mm.”

“You believe me?”

“No.”

The last trace of hope fell away from his face.

The Marriage Arbiter read out the final findings the Exchange had submitted.

The ninety-eight subsequent transactions exceeded the original authorization.

From the sixty-third transaction onward, my cognitive assessments had fallen below the legal

threshold, and thirty-seven of those transactions were completed after I had lost the capacity

to judge.

All were void.

Dante was ordered to return the marital assets he had appropriated and to pay damages for

emotional harm.

Serena, as the actual beneficiary, bore joint liability.

The Exchange’s compensation for negligence and its review failures would be handled in a

separate case.

The marriage was dissolved with immediate effect, on the ground of the permanent loss of its

emotional foundation.

Dante rushed up to me.

“I don’t consent! She just forgot. She loved me so much!”

He fumbled out his phone and showed the Arbiter photo after photo, from age eighteen through the marriage.

“Look, she’s standing next to me in every single picture!”

“She wrote me hundreds of letters!”

“When she was sick, she wanted only me there!”

“How can a love like that just stop existing?”

The Arbiter asked only one question:

“Where did that love go?”

Dante stood holding his phone, frozen.

No one had stolen it. It had not vanished by accident.

MIDNIO

He had divided it into ninety-nine pieces with his own hands and given them to someone else.

The Arbiter looked at him.

“Mr. Castellano, you cannot use a person you have already consumed to hold the present Ms.

Vale hostage.”

The electronic seal came down.

The silver Oath Halo on my wrist, the mark of marriage, flickered twice and went dark for

good.

Dante stared at my wrist as if he finally understood that something had truly ended.

“Nina.”

He said it very softly.

“Could you ask me who I am again, the way you did that night?”

I looked at him.

“Mr. Castellano, the respondent in my file.”

“I know your name.”

A little light flared in his eyes.

I calmly finished the second half of the sentence:

“But from today on, you and I have nothing to do with each other.”

Tears finally fell from Dante’s eyes.