Chapter 1

"Captain Ashby lost her memory. She insists the clinic caretaker, Dylan Foster, is her husband and refuses to come with us. But we've already contacted the army's top neurosurgeons. We can schedule her treatments as early as next week to help her remember you."

The conversation was identical to the one from my previous life when I first found Eleanor Ashby.

Only this time, the ecstatic joy and bitter resentment were gone, replaced by total serenity.

I shook my head, declining the offer, and did two things afterward.

First, I submitted a long-term deployment request to the medical corps, volunteering for the war-torn regions of Irvia.

Second, I took the approved deployment papers and went to call off the engagement, returning a ring polished from a bullet casing.

It was the engagement ring Eleanor had made at the border years ago. She hadn't even had the chance to slip it onto my finger.

Eleanor's mother, Rosalie Quinn, clutched my hands, refusing to let go, her tears soaking her collar.

"You can't call off the engagement. Eleanor went through hell and back with you for ten years. The date has been set for ages. If you walk away now, she'll never marry anyone else for the rest of her life…"

I didn't say a word. I simply unlocked my phone and played a video.

In the video, Eleanor was picking flowers in the clinic's courtyard, and Dylan was gently wiping the sweat from her brow.

As they looked at each other and smiled, the tenderness and chemistry between them were impossible to hide.

"The situation in Irvia is pure chaos. There's no guarantee I'll even make it back alive," I said. "Instead of forcing her to marry someone like me, who could kick the bucket tomorrow, it's better to let her be with the man she loves now. I don't want to hold her back anymore."

In my previous life, after Eleanor fell off the cliff, I spent two years searching for her, only to find out she had been rescued by Dylan, a caretaker at a village clinic, and that they had been playing house at the foot of the mountain ever since.

Regardless of Eleanor's wishes, I forced her to undergo memory retrieval therapy.

The day she remembered everything, Dylan drowned himself in the river right in front of her, and from that moment on, a seed of bitter resentment was planted between us.

The high school sweethearts who had once promised to guard the borders together turned into toxic exes who couldn't stand the sight of each other.

That was until we were trapped during an earthquake rescue mission. She forced me into the only escape route, leaving herself behind.

As her voice gradually faded into the rubble, her final words to me were, "We're even now. I owe you nothing."

I knew she had done all that just to make amends for forgetting me and falling for someone else, not because she still loved me.

Tamping down the bitterness welling up in my chest, I uttered softly, "There's no going back for Eleanor and me."

In this life, I would never repeat that mistake.

Leaving the Ashby residence, I headed to the village clinic to find Dylan.

The moment Dylan caught sight of me, he panicked and hurriedly ushered Eleanor away to sort some freshly dried herbs.

He scrambled to defend himself. "I didn't hide Eleanor here for two years on purpose!"

"The special forces need a star soldier like her," I said flatly. "Whether you kept her trapped here for your own sake, you know the answer."

Realizing he couldn't play dumb anymore, Dylan clenched his fists tightly. Throwing caution to the wind, he grew visibly emotional.

"Callum, I know the deal! You're the only one she's ever cared about! The second she gets her memory back, she'll drop me like a hot potato and run right back to her former unit with you!

"But when the medical team came to the clinic for that volunteer drive, and I first saw her, I fell head over heels. I waited for so many years, never daring to hope I could even get close to her. I finally got this one shot…

"I just wanted her to be my wife for a few days. Just a few days…"

By the time he finished, he was practically choking back tears.

I listened quietly, but my gaze drifted past him, landing on Eleanor behind him. Her brows were knitted tight as she stared me down, her eyes cold as ice, dripping with suspicion and hostility.

The partner who used to have my back in the field now looked at me like I was an enemy.

I couldn't quite describe the emotions in my chest.

I only knew that since I had a second chance at life, I didn't intend to selfishly drag Eleanor back to her old life anymore.

A faint smile touched my lips as I looked at Dylan. "You don't have to be afraid. I'm not here to break you two up. I'm just here to take you both back to the Ashbys."