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Densetsu no Yuusha no Densetsu (Light Novel) - Volume 10, Chapter 5: Examination
Volume 10, Chapter 5: Examination
This chapter is updated by NovelFree.ml
Ferris went to all the dango shops in town every morning to investigate their flavors for the new day, and she was currently standing in front of the final stop of her morning dango ritual: Wynnit Dango. She used a wooden pick to cut a clean portion of some red bean dango off to taste.
“Mm. Today’s dango is wonderful too!” Ferris said with a big nod.
The shop’s owner, an older man who had been watching her taste-test with a worried expression, instantly brightened up. “I’m glad. If you say it’s delicious, Lady Ferris, then I have no doubt that business will prosper today.”
“Mm. No doubt!”
“I’ve made you some tea to go with it, so please do take your time,” the owner said and set it down for her.
“Mm.”
The owner then returned to inside his store, so Ferris took another bite of dango. She chewed it slowly, savoring the bite.
“Mm! Delicious!” She said, unintentionally loud. Then she took a sip of tea.
She looked up at the sky. She had delicious dango and the weather was great. Well, there had been a moment during her dango tour where the sky went dark with clouds, but the weather was great now, so it was fine. It was a blue, cloudless sky.
“Hm. It feels like something good will happen today,” she said to herself and nodded. Now how should she pass her day? She thought for a moment to plan the day’s schedule.
The morning training her brother made her do with him had completely ceased since she returned to Roland, and she’d just finished circling the town’s dango shops. So she was free for the rest of the day…
“Hmm.”
Iris said Sion was having her do something for him today, so she couldn’t play… so should she just bully Ryner?
Her expression clouded over at the thought of Ryner. “That cad,” she mumbled. She always felt a little angry when she thought of him lately. Because he was always too busy working with Sion to let her bully him…
“…How boring,” she said, dissatisfied. And Iris was out of the country today because Sion was having her work. “Mmh…”
She stuck her lip out, sour.
A strange man passed by her.
“…Hm?” She said. Because he was dressed just like someone she knew well. White armor and a robe - Roland’s Magical Knights’ uniform. Ryner always wore it too. Also, the man in the Magical Knight uniform was carrying someone over his shoulder. But he was walking so quickly that it was hard to see.
But Ferris still noticed. She couldn’t tell much more because he’d been walking so fast, but she felt that the guy thrown over his shoulder was familiar to her. He had black hair, and looked strangely like he’d collapsed from exhaustion…
“Hm? Ryner?”
The carried man didn’t respond. So he had fainted… or he was dead…
Ferris stood. “You over there! Wait!”
He didn’t wait. He just got farther and farther away.
“Kgh.” Ferris gripped her sword and began to run, but—
“Hey, beautiful lady~! I have something I’d like to ask you. Is that alright?”
Ferris stopped. That was a familiar voice. Ryner’s voice. She sighed softly, then turned around. “What, and here I thought you’d been captured. You’re awfully easy to mistake for oth—”
She stopped halfway through her sentence. Because this man wasn’t Ryner.
“……”
It was a man in his forties with blond hair and dark blue eyes. He had a tired, but calm smile plastered on his face that gave her a strong sense of unease.
This man was not Ryner. But he had a very similar air about him. He spoke flippantly. “Man, you’re even prettier up close.”
Ferris grimaced. Now that she was really listening, his voice was different from Ryner’s. They didn’t even sound all that similar. Why had she mistaken them?
“…What… you…”
“Hmm… I don’t know if you should be asking people questions with that kind of tone—”
“Save your complaints and answer me,” Ferris said.
The man shrugged jokingly. That gesture resembled Ryner, too.
What was this guy…? His hair and eyes were different colors from Ryner’s, so how could they be so similar?
He smiled happily. “Are you really that worried?”
Ferris glared. “What are you talking about.”
“…What I mean is… are you really that worried about Ryner?”
Ferris unsheathed her sword and pushed it towards his neck in an instant. “What have you done with Ryner, you bastard?” At the same time, she was groaning internally. So the person from before had been Ryner after all. But he hadn’t responded to her voice. What had they done to him? They couldn’t have…
Ferris shook her head. No, that couldn’t be. This man couldn’t have…
“Are you worried?” He asked, strangely pleased.
“…I’ll kill you if you’ve done something to him.”
He just got happier and happier. “Heheh. So you’re really that worried about him.”
“Enough boasting about what you’ve done,” Ferris said. “Who are you, and what have you done to—”
Ferris didn’t finish. Because he interrupted her with something absolutely unbelievable. “Do you like Ryner?” He asked.
“Wha!?”
He laughed happily. “Ahahaha. You like him.”
“You’re wr—”
“I’m not. Why else would you be bright red and embarrassed?”
“Uu…” He’d made her lose her cool. But this wasn’t the time or place for that.
He spoke with an identical voice and mannerisms to Ryner. “So you like him after all.”
“…Shut up… If you insist on continuing this worthless conversation, I won’t be able to guarantee your life—”
“What do you mean, guarantee my life?” He asked.He touched his hand to her sword. It lit up with a blue light.
This was bad.
She didn’t know how it was bad yet, but she had a horrible feeling about it.
The man’s hand, shining blue… For some reason, it made fear race down her back.
“Kgh.”
Ferris jumped back, then raised her sword up again with a glare.
The man’s eyebrows shot up. “Not bad at all. You realized in time… I’m glad that Ryner managed to attract such a good girl to protect him.”
Ferris didn’t have the time to focus on his words. She had to put all of her attention into fighting. She sharpened her senses. She’d realized the situation she was in - she’d die if she didn’t put all of her power into both offense and defense. A single lapse in attention would cause her death.
“……”
Ferris gripped her sword tightly and deepened her fighting posture. She extended her consciousness to her sword to help her react in time.
The man smiled leisurely. “Good. Show me how serious you are.”
Ferris answered calmly. “I don’t know what your objective is, but if you continue to look down on me… you know that you’ll die, right?”
“Hm. Or will you be the one who dies?”
“Of course it’ll be—” Ferris focused the last of her energy, “—you.”
She released her power, reaching the man in an instant. She was faster than the naked eye could see. She swung her sword once she reached him, aiming to slice his torso in two… but in the instant her sword touched him, his body turned to smoke.
“Wha…!?”
Ferris scowled. A fake? Then his real body was…
She suddenly felt murderous intent emitting from both sides. There was a second person…?
Ferris didn’t worry about that, though. Because letting one’s mind cloud over for even an instant in battle meant that it was over. She ignored the murderous intent hitting her from her left and focused on her right side. She pushed her sword through the smoke. “Hagh!”
Her sword stabbed through. But it wasn’t a human. It was an odd red ticket.
“Hm?”
Ferris eyed it suspiciously. It was an odd response to her stabbing her sword into a dire situation. Her sword should have cut it, but it vanished… and then…
“Ngah!”
Her eyes widened in surprise. Her sword had suddenly gotten heavier…
“Kgh…”
This was bad. He sealed her weapon with ease. She didn’t know how he did it, but he’d made her sword three times as heavy as it normally was. She couldn’t move it well enough to fight like this. It was a big sword to begin with - a girl with thin arms like hers had enough to deal with moving it around even without it being this heavy. She couldn’t move as fast as she would have liked like this…
The murderous aura behind her was getting stronger. What should she do? Drop her sword and run? Or…
She let the tip of her sword fall to the ground. “M, move!” She yelled as she kicked it, then spun it around against the ground with the momentum. Then she managed to lift it enough to slash at that aura. When she did, her sword came away with another ticket. This one was a pitch black paper, folded into a humanoid shape.
This time, her sword disappeared without a trace.
“……”
Ferris was at a loss for words.
What was happening? Was this magic? Magic from some country she’d never been to? No, that was unlikely. All magic, regardless of its country of origin, required a certain level of preparation, like drawing a magic circle and reciting an incantation. Estabul, Iyet, Nelpha, they were all the same. They all had similar requirements. But it looked like this man was jumping through far smaller hoops than that.
How was he doing it?
Was he really casting magic? Or…
“…Is it a Heroic Relic?” Ferris whispered. If he was using relics just like those guys from Gastark did, then her chances of winning…
Sand swirled in front of her. It rose up, taking the shape of that man who resembled Ryner. He smiled like he saw right through Ferris and knew exactly what she’d been thinking. “Wrong. This isn’t a Heroic Relic. It’s just magic.”
“……”
Magic. It was just magic.
Ferris’ eyes narrowed.
Just magic? That wasn’t what it looked like. Because she could slice right through Ryner’s magic circles, and he activated them about as quickly as possible. But she couldn’t tell that this man was doing anything to cast his spells at all. So it wasn’t magic. But he said it wasn’t a relic either. So what was it?
Was he showing her some kind of illusion? What was the trick?
The man waved a hand. “Amee Lasoh.” She didn’t know what those words meant, but when he said them, that black paper from before reappeared. It burst, and Ferris’ sword reappeared in his hands. “Ope. I’ll help myself to your weapon, then~”
He swung it around with ease.
“……”
There was a pit in Ferris’ stomach. What just… what just…
If that was really magic and not a relic, then… she couldn’t compete with him. He’d just done the impossible, after all. If he could really cast magic with just a couple words, then it didn’t matter how fast she could move. His magic would always move faster. She didn’t…
He laughed. “You don’t have a chance.”
He was seeing right through her…
Ferris shivered. This was bad.
What was she doing? She’d far underestimated his power. She had to get out of here.
“You’re thinking of escaping right now,” he said. “I can see your muscles tensing to run away. That’s smart. Amazing, you’re a real genius. Your intuition, judgement, speed, strength… you have it all. The only problem… is that you’re related to him. Guess that’ll be the final exam… alrighty then.”
With that, the man raised his hand up high…
“Lightning Flash.”
A magic circle instantly appeared before him and shot lightning.
“Wha…”
Ferris moved to the side quickly to dodge. Lightning crashed into the place she’d just been, destroying it. She watched in shock.
“……”
Wh, what the hell… That was impossible. That was definitely impossible. But it’d just happened.
Ferris was familiar with the spell he’d just used. It was one that Ryner used often, after all. She’d watched him draw the magic circle and say the incantation for it many times…
But this man had just said the words. It wasn’t an illusion. That was what had really happened. It wasn’t a relic, either. This man was really capable of casting magic with a few words…
“What’s with you…?” Ferris said, her voice hoarse.
The man smiled bitterly. “That’s my line. I didn’t think there were any women who could dodge a mantra-casted Lightning Flash…” He shrugged. “Although I intentionally casted that so that it was possible to dodge. You understand how strong I am now, right? To the point where it’s frustrating and painful? You can’t win. I’m impossible to beat.”
That was true. She wouldn’t even have been able to dodge if he hadn’t raised his hand first like that.
That would have been it otherwise. That would have killed her.
“……”
She was going to run. She wasn’t confident that she could escape a monster like this, but… this wasn’t an enemy she could fight.
He raised his hand again and Ferris’ whole body tensed up.
She’d run the moment he activated his next spell.
He opened his mouth to cast his next spell… but. “Oh, right. I forgot to tell you before, but… I killed Ryner just a little bit ago.”
“……”
Ferris was silent.
She couldn’t process what she was being told. What was he saying?
He continued. “I stabbed him in the heart and killed him. He made such a pitiful face when the blood started gushing out.” He sounded happy with himself.
“…You’re lying…”
That was all she could think to say. Because… it just wasn’t right. He… Ryner wouldn’t die that easily…
But the scene from earlier rose up in her mind. That man in the Magical Knight uniform had been carrying someone who looked like Ryner. She’d called out to him, but he hadn’t reacted in the slightest… But that didn’t mean—
“You saw it before, right? That was Ryner’s dead body.”
“…You’re lying. You’re lying to me…”
“Nope, not lying. Ryner’s dead. You’ve already realized that, right?”
“……”
That… was…
Her mind went blank. She couldn’t understand. What was he saying? In the heart… no. She hated that. No… Ryner being gone… no…
“Ah… uu…”
Her mind had fallen into chaos. She couldn’t keep her calm.
Her voice…
Her head hurt so much.
Her tears…
“Oh man, I made you cry,” he said. He wasn’t taking this seriously at all.
“I, I’ll kill you…”
“You aren’t capable of that,” he said.
“…I’ll kill you, you bastard…”
“I’m telling you, that’s impossible. What’ll you do to me? You’re a smart kid who can make reasonable decisions. You run when you’re supposed to… he should’ve taught you that. So run. Fighting me now would be suicidal.” He raised his hand up again.
Suicidal. Right. Not running would be suicidal.
She had to run. That was what she’d been taught.
And yet.
“……”
She ran towards him with nothing but her hands to fight with. She raised her fist up.
“Die!”
The man laughed, half happy and half sad. Then he caught her and gave her a swift punch to the stomach.
“Augh…”
She collapsed. She could feel her consciousness fading… but before it left her entirely, she heard a voice. Ryner’s voice. No, that voice that so resembled his.
“…You pass. Sorry for bullying you. To think that you’d go this far for him… In that case, I’ll lend power to your sword - the power to cut through darkness… Use it to protect h…”
She didn’t catch the end before falling completely unconscious.
---
Inside the dark, red depths of him, at the base of his heart.
Ryner had passed the long red corridor and arrived at the very deepest point.
“……”
It was a strange place. A huge sky spread out above him… but it was all red. The heavens, the earth, red. The ground felt like guts beneath his feet.
“This is like… super gross…”
Ryner looked around. Red as far as the eye could see. No matter where he looked, it was blood red.
“I’m getting kinda dizzy…”
He pressed a hand to his head, then realized that wasn’t normal either. He brought it back down to look at it. It was white with black letters snaking around and encircling him…
“I seriously have no idea what’s going on…”
Ryner shrugged to himself. The voice had told him to keep going so he walked all the way here, but…
It was hard to tell what kind of situation he was in. Just when he thought he’d been killed by a knife to the heart, he was brought to this weird place… His whole body was white and he was surrounded by these weird chains of black letters… And the same voice as his Alpha Stigma was descending from the skies. It said that it wasn’t the Alpha Stigma and was actually a god or a hero or whatever, but he was just gonna call it the Alpha Stigma for now…
“Man… what’s happening to me?” Ryner wondered. His biggest problem was wherever he was now. He looked around once more. Everything was red like the inside of a human being. “Heey,” he called. “I left the corridor just like you said to. What should I do nooow?”
No answer. Ryner scowled.
“C’mon, are you theeere~? You’re horrible, ignoring me like this. I’m gonna leave and go home if you keep bullying meee~!”
No answer.
“…Hmm… Well, I mean… I don’t actually know how to get home from here though…”
He thought for a moment.
“Maybe I gotta go deeper?”
He took another step out into the ‘sky.’ The ‘ground’ that felt like human insides. Stepping on it felt just as terrible as it looked…
“Eugh… seriously?” Ryner mumbled with a grimace. He took a step forward, then another. He kept walking out on the red sky. The red ground.
And then the sky—
“Ahh, aaahhhh…”
It was that voice again.
“Ah, ahhh… How I’ve wished for this day to come…”
Normally when this happened, no one would be there even if he looked up at the sky. But right now…
There was a beast dangling from the sky. From the heavens.
“……”
No, maybe ‘beast’ wasn’t the word. It was actually pretty close to being human. But it wasn’t. It definitely wasn’t. Its flesh was redder than even blood. Its eyes were redder than its skin. And in the middle of those eyes were red pentagrams. It also had sharp teeth and matching sharp nails. And wings. Those were all red, too.
It was a monster. There was no word for it but monster.
“…You’re the one who’s been talking to me?” Ryner asked.
The beast looked down at him with bewitching pentagram red eyes, then opened its mouth wide… “Fu… hah… hahah… hahahahha haaahhaha ha ahhhhahh ahhhhh!!”
It laughed madly, loudly. Enough to make the world shiver down to its core.
Ryner shrunk away. He felt something well up inside of his chest. Fear.
That voice scared him.
It was overpowering, to the point where he even started to believe that it really was a god, just like it had claimed. It had the power for it. He felt like its voice alone would crush him. He couldn’t help but cover his ears. But that didn’t matter. Because he’d already felt it.
This was a special existence.
“Hahahahahah, ah, ah, ah…”
It ceased its laughter, then spun its neck in a suitably monstrous fashion and spread its wings… then dropped down from heaven, stopping just before the ground with ease, as if its weight meant nothing to the world. Then the monster approached him slowly.
“…I-if you can just float, then why bother having wings?” Ryner asked, intent on playing the straight-man here despite the high-pitch fear had brought to his voice.
The monster smiled. “Ah… yes, I have always found them to be a bother… they are, to me, restraints.” It turned to look over itself. It looked like a terribly uncomfortable thing to do. “Fhehehe… Cliched as it is, this is what you people imagine when you think of demons… fufuehheh, haha… Without ever knowing what a true demon is, you people sealed me into this sham imitation…”
It looked at Ryner once more with its scarlet pentagram eyes.
“…But that too will end. If I devour you, I’ll be freed from my seal… and we will become Alpha. Everything will go according to the contract…”
Ryner took a step back. “Devour me? Whoa, uh… that’s kinda… a shitty thing to do, isn’t it?”
He froze.
Wait wait wait. What the hell?
It’d return to normal if it ate him? Why?
And then there was also the seal, and Alpha, and the contract, and also the door and key and stuff… He didn’t know anything about any of it.
What was he doing here? Why had he been taken here?
“Disappear, Solver of All Formulas.” The monster opened its claws and reached for him.
“Uwah, seriously!? W, wait… augh, shit, do I really gotta fight a monster like this?” Ryner said as he raised his arms up. He had to draw a magic circle as fast as he could—
—It wasn’t working!? The light wasn’t activating at all!
“Waugh, w-why!?”
The monster’s claws were fast approaching, reaching for his chest…
The world was filled with screams.
The monster’s screams.
“Gaaaaaauuuhhh!?”
“…Huh? What? What’s going on?” Ryner said dumbly. He didn’t have the faintest clue what was happening.
The monster, which was supposed to have its claws buried inside of him right about now, just continued to scream.
Ryner looked at its claws. For some reason, those black letters that’d been circling him were now circling it instead. They closed in, squeezing its arms.
The monster pulled its arms back, face filled with anguish.
“Y, youuu. A, Attfahl… kgh, kughahaha… Do you really think the lowest god could curse me…?”
The monster bent down to its bound arm… and bit.
“Disappear, Attfah—”
It didn’t get to finish its sentence. Because its head suddenly exploded.
“…Huh?” Ryner said. He stared at the monster, which fell to its knees now that it didn’t have a head. He was frozen in place. “I… what? Is it… d, dead?”
It didn’t say anything.
“H, heeey?” Ryner tried.
“……”
Still no response.
Ryner looked around at the strange red world that surrounded him. He’d been left here alone in the middle of it.
“…Umm… so what should I do now?” Ryner asked.
“Hur… ry…”
Someone answered him this time. It was a woman’s voice. “Huh? Who is it now?”
The woman spoke again. “Hurry… Ryner…”
Ryner understood this time. That voice was coming from inside of the now headless monster. “Umm… is that you?” Ryner asked the monster.
He heard the gross sound of something cutting through meat, and then a human hand reached out from inside the monster. It was the bloodstained hand of a woman.
“…Scary!” Ryner said, stepping back. But the woman’s hand grasped around in the air as if she was begging to be saved… and then the monster’s flesh ripped again and the woman’s body came out. It was disgusting. “Uuurghh… what the hell’s with this place…”
Was it some kind of monster resort? Seriously, he had no idea. He was so confused that everything was starting to sound funny instead of scary. Like, he had no idea how he got here, and then a monster attacked him, and then its head exploded, and then a bloody woman came out from inside of it…
“…Ummm… is this a dream or something? Maybe Sion overworked me so hard that he gave me a freaky nightmare… I’d be happy if I woke up really soon…”
The woman’s head forced its way out of the monster next. She had long, black hair… that came out slowly…
“…Uweh… Um… so I actually really hate horror, so I’d love to wake up aaaany second now…”
Ryner stopped as the woman’s face came into view. She was somehow… familiar.
“……”
He’d seen her before. He’d definitely seen her before. It was covered in blood right now, but he’d seen her long, silky black hair and eyelashes and straight nose and shapely lips. He’d seen it all before.
“…Y, you’re…”
He couldn’t remember. His brain was desperately trying to tell him that he knew her, but he just couldn’t place who she was. It was telling him… that he loved her…
“…You’re…”
He was shivering. What was this feeling? His chest was clenching with nostalgia…
“…You’re… who are you…?”
The woman opened her eyes and looked up at him. She had kind black eyes, the sort that looked like they’d forgive anything and everything. Ryner knew those eyes. But he just couldn’t place them.
He pressed his hand against his chest. His heart was hurting. Why?
“Who… are you to me?” Ryner asked.
The woman smiled sincerely. She raised a hand from the monster and beckoned him over. “Come a little closer.”
Normally, one wouldn’t walk up to her in this situation. Normally they wouldn’t listen to the words of a woman who’d sprouted from a monster that just tried to kill them. And yet.
“…Please… come a little closer… Let me touch you, Ryner…”
Her voice was doing something to his head. The sound of his name in her voice… He knew it. Somehow, he knew that he’d always wanted to hear her call out to him.
“……”
Ryner stepped closer. Her hand reached out to touch his face. His forehead, his eyes, his nose, his cheeks, his lips. Then pulled him into an embrace.
“…To think… that you’d gotten this big…”
She pet his head with a loving hand.
Ryner didn’t know what to say. He couldn’t even think.
She continued as she pet his dark hair. “I’ve been waiting… always, always waiting… so that I could see you.”
“…So you could see me?” Ryner repeated.
She nodded. “Always.”
“…Right here?”
“Yes.”
“Inside of this monster?”
“……”
She didn’t answer.
He looked at her familiar face. He wanted to remember who she was. But he just couldn’t.
“Who are you?” Ryner asked.
She smiled sadly. “I can’t answer that.”
“Why not?”
“…Because that’s the kind of contract this is.”
Ryner grimaced and pulled himself away from her. “That contract again… You and that monster are all on about it. Contracts this, contracts that. What’s with that? Who’s the contract with?”
She looked sad. The sight of her like that pulled at his heartstrings. He didn’t want to see her like this. What he wanted to see was…
“Why?” He said. “Why do I feel so strongly about this…? Who are you? And why… do I want to see you smiling instead so badly?”
She smiled as if to answer his pleas. It was a truly happy smile. “I love you, Ryner,” she said. “All I need are you and Lieral to be happy.”
Lieral… Lieral.
His head hurt. He knew that name. But he just couldn’t remember…
Why? He knew it was something very, very important…
“I love you, Ryner. Never lose sight of yourself. Never think of yourself as someone who doesn’t matter. It’ll be okay. I’m sure everything will turn out alright. I’ll… I’ll protect y—”
“Gugyakaagakaaaaraaaaaaagh!!”
The destroyed monster’s thunderous scream descended on them as it was reborn.
“H, how could a sacrifice…! How dare you how dare you how dare you how dare you!!”
The monster opened its mouth and bared its fangs, aiming for the woman’s neck.
“W, wait, stop!” Ryner yelled. “Stop! Please! I’m begging you, so please…”
The monster’s fangs dug into her neck with a gross noise. Red blood spurted out of her.
It was that color again. That horrible, cursed color…
“……”
Ryner was paralyzed. He was watching a monster eat that woman right in front of his face, and yet…
She smiled at him the whole time and spoke softly. “I’m sorry… I couldn’t get us any more time… but even so, I’m happy… I want to thank Lieral… He upheld our contract and let me see you again…”
“I-I’m going to save—”
She shook her head as well as she could. “I’m… okay. You should hurry. Go deeper, to the door, and touch it before the Maker of All Formulas appears…”
“Wh-what’re you saying?”
“Just hurry. The curse of Attfahl that Lieral casted for us won’t hold this guy for much longer… so…”
The monster ate her head down past the neck. But she still held her arms out for him.
“I wanted to touch you more… I wanted to show you that I love you better than I got to… I wanted to stay with you forever… and see you grow up…”
Her voice faded when the monster finished chewing her head up.
Only her arm was left now.
“……”
Ryner was speechless.
“……”
He held his hand out… and hers gripped his tightly, then pushed him away as if urging him to go. Ryner looked towards where her fingers were pointing. A door had appeared there. No, it’d been there since the beginning. But he’d been too taken by the sky to notice it. It was against a scarlet, pulsating, flesh-like wall… and the door was impossibly tall like it’d been built to reach the heavens.
“I-I just have to touch that?” Ryner asked.
Her hand motioned for him to go once more.
“O, okay… th-then I’ll be going now.”
Her hand shivered, then motioned for him to go once more.
That was all it took. He understood what she was feeling.
Go… Don’t go… Don’t leave me here alone…
He reached out to squeeze her hands. She did the same, like she was wishing for him to save her. Her hand was shaking from loneliness and fear…
He wanted to save her. He wanted her to come back with him, where she wouldn’t be sad, and would smile instead… Everything would be okay then. He was sure of it.
And yet.
Her hand pushed him away, telling him to go. Her hand, which the monster was chewing at. Her shivering hand, urging him to go.
“…Uu.”
Ryner broke out in a run in the opposite direction. He ran forward, away from where she was being devoured.
“…Shit… shit,” he spat. He was tired of this. He hated it.
What was with this place! Why did he have to feel like this!
“…What am I supposed to do!?”
His head was a jumble of words that meant nothing to him.
Door, sacrifice, memories, seal, Alpha, key, contract, the Solver of All Formulas, the Maker of All Formulas.
Not a single one of those meant anything to him. He didn’t understand them at all. But he still ran. If he could get out of here, if he could leave this shitty situation, then things would definitely change for the better. So he ran towards the door.
“I won’t let you. You’ll become my sacrifice here,” the monster yelled. It’d finished the woman off and was now coming for him.
Ryner didn’t turn back. He just ran. Only a little longer until he reached the door. If he just reached his hand out…
His fingertips touched the door.
And in that instant… he saw something.
It was strange. It was all black and white, and… had a fairy tale quality to it, like it was a page in a picture book.
There was a man holding a sword up. He wore full-body pitch black armor, and he wavered like the flame of a candle. And he was crying. Tears were earnestly pouring down his cheeks. But the depths of his eyes didn’t reflect sadness. They reflected a strong will. Ambition. Decisiveness. He held the sword up… and stabbed.
“……”
He’d stabbed a woman. An unimaginably, dazzlingly beautiful woman.
She was a goddess. She had to be. And he killed her, tears rolling down his face.
Then he killed a second, a third, a fourth.
He killed goddess after goddess. Finally the tears dried up… and he smiled instead.
Sixth, seventh, eighth.
Blood spilled across the land. Blood dirtied the world. That was all of the world’s goddesses. It was all of the world. With that, everything would end. The world itself would end. He knew. He knew that that was that. He was too late. The world was gonna end. But the man didn’t stop. He continued to kill.
He killed all life. He killed the whole world. He covered everything in blood.
The black and white world got darker and darker, moving towards the black of blood. It was then that he realized… that that man’s armor wasn’t black. It was… made of blood… crawling, writhing blood…
The man swung his sword up and down, crying. Nobody could stop him. He just swung his sword, again and again, until everything he loved was ruined. That was all he had the power to do.
It was because he was chosen.
He was chosen by the gods, by everything. He was the legendary—
“Ha… haha… hahaha… hahahaha…!?”
He continued to cry and swing his sword.
The screams disappeared. Despair disappeared. He swung his sword. Love disappeared. Joy disappeared.
He was drunk on his power.
And at the end, the very end…
“……”
He didn’t say anything. But he was still shouting somehow desperately trying to convey something through his tears.
“……”
He couldn’t hear anything.
What? What was he trying to say?
“……”
He couldn’t say anything. But he was desperately trying to convey something, to appeal to his emotions…
Why? What was he trying to convey?
“…ve… s… me…”
He was trying so hard to convey it through his tears… but his voice didn’t come through.
Ryner strained his ears as much as he could, but he still couldn’t hear.
His desperate wish - him begging for Ryner to save him - wasn’t conveyed, in the end.
He was crying and crying. And then—
“…sto… me… I, you…”
He raised his sword up high with shaking arms… and then lowered it. Right onto Ryner’s neck.
“……”
He saw it. He saw it, in the moment he lowered his sword. He saw his own reflection with an expression that was screaming that he didn’t want to die. His own reflection, which betrayed the person he loved. His face as he was killed by some person he believed in. He, who was crying, desiring his love… he, who didn’t look like a human at all anymore—
Instead, he was a demon.
