EP.217 The Traces Left by the Catastrophe (4)
Red Palace.
The lair of the Braver.
If one penetrates through numerous illusion spells, barriers, and hundreds of sorcery to reach the deepest part… there lies a hell created by humans.
Faced with hell, the Saint groans.
“I can’t purify this.”
The First Saint, Gleria.
Having purified the swamp formed from centuries of filth, she now realizes her impotence before a hell made by mere humans.
“They’re already ruined, their souls twisted… They can no longer be part of the cycle. They are beings that have strayed from Providence.”
Gleria bites her lip.
Her tightly bitten lip begins to bleed.
“It’s a terrible thing.”
“They cannot be saved. Forever bound here, they will remain. To save them… you must kill the being that binds their souls together.”
Who is that being?
Such questions were unnecessary. Humanity has come to know that being. The land of death that was swept away points to its name.
“…Demon Lord.”
The calamity that was born.
The one who uttered that name is Ganikalt. Ganikalt tightly grips the hilt of the Holy Sword. He glares at the devastation before him.
“I’ve wondered how many humans were needed to create that being, born from resentment and malice.”
The answer stands before him.
Ganikalt slowly lifts the Holy Sword.
The First Hero swings his sword to slash at the hell laid out before him. However, nothing is cut. Not even a touch.
A sword that cuts through everything.
A swordsman with a technique that cleaves all.
Even with Ganikalt’s sword, the hell before him cannot be sliced. It has strayed from Providence. Ganikalt cannot cut what is beyond any law.
“…At least, let’s confine it.”
The Grand Magus groans as he stands before hell.
Separating this place from the human realm with hundreds of barriers is the best they can do for now.
“When we vanquish the Demon Lord in the future… we shall return here to rescue them. We’re not giving up, so don’t make that pained expression, Gleria.”
“But…”
“We have no means at present. We cannot find a way to save them, nor can we even eliminate their existence.”
Thus, the Grand Magus pats the Saint’s shoulder.
“Let’s finish everything and return.”
“Yes, I will definitely…”
As they promise while facing hell, the sorcerer of the dragon finally speaks.
“So.”
Belial glances at one side of the Red Palace.
There lies a human dying with a sword stuck in his heart. Looking at this human, Belial continues.
“You’re the one who planned this, aren’t you?”
The master of the Red Palace.
The Braver who had been lurking in the deepest part of the royal palace.
The sorcerer who created hell.
“Of course. I’m the only one who can call myself the master here. Did you really ask that? Sorcerer of the dragon.”
Even while dying, he still laughs.
He lets out a mad laugh directed at the heroes looking down at him. Cordi frowns at the dreadful laughter.
“What were you thinking while doing this?”
The elf, unable to understand human madness, asks.
“Did you hate your sister, the one who is to be the next king of this nation, that much? Could you not forgive her? Did you have to drag her below the ground to do this?”
She cannot comprehend the motivation.
Despite the incomprehension, she asks, only to receive an even more perplexing answer.
“Not at all. I love my sister, esteemed Grand Magus Cardi.”
The Braver bursts into laughter.
“I wished for her to shine all the more because I love her. A fellow sorcerer like you should understand, right? Because I loved her…”
He spreads his arms wide.
“I merely wished for her to become an eternal being. So, how did it seem to you?”
The twisted laugh of a human echoes.
The Braver smiles at the hero who faces the Demon Lord. A grotesquely distorted smile.
“Isn’t it truly beautiful?”
Gleria’s expression twists. Creak, Belial grinds his teeth. Ganikalt, with wide-open eyes, stares at the Braver.
“Ganikalt.”
Then, the Grand Magus points at the Braver.
“Cut him down. It seems there’s no value in further conversation.”
“Without you saying, that was already my intention.”
Ganikalt swings his sword.
Starlight burns the Braver. Until the moment his flesh and soul become a handful of ash, the Braver does not stop smiling.
—
“There’s something you need to understand here, and it’s two things.”
Cardi lifts his hand.
“One is the origin of the Shadow.”
He raises his index finger.
“And the other is understanding the Shadow.”
With that finger raised, he pointed at my heart.
“To be precise, it means to understand the ‘curse’ that is gnawing at your heart.”
“…Curse?”
“Yes. Have you ever thought it strange? Why does the Shadow cast curses on humans? Why does it gnaw at the flesh of a sorcerer like you?”
“That’s…”
I couldn’t offer a substantial reply.
I’ve only ever thought that since it is the Demon Lord, an existence that has strayed from Providence, anything must be possible.
“I’ve tried finding a way to solve the curse…”
Why can the Demon Lord cast curses?
I’ve never considered that aspect. As I fell into silence, Cardi spoke.
“It’s not just because the Demon Lord is an evil being, or a being of chaos, that such a thing is possible. Understand the origin of the Shadow. Then, naturally, it will come to you.”
As he said that, Cardi took off a bracelet and handed it to me.
It was a bracelet with the symbol of the Ashen Tower engraved on it.
“It’s a magical tool that allows you to enter the barrier. It will also protect you from those things.”
I bit my lip tightly while holding the bracelet.
“…The Demon Lord was born in Arcadia.”
All circumstances pointed to that fact.
The altar suspected to have created the Demon Lord stretched long beyond the barrier. The one who created the calamity must, contextually, be the master of this Red Palace.
“If so…”
Countless conjectures filled my mind.
However, there was no way to know right now.
“Haah…”
I took a long breath.
Through the heavy atmosphere, my breath escaped.
Then, Cardi asked me a question.
“What do you plan to do?”
Will I do it, or not?
He asks like that.
Click.
I silently slid the bracelet onto my wrist in response. In the end, there was only one path for me to choose.
“I have to confront it, after all.”
That’s the only answer.
“…I must.”
I looked towards the other side of the barrier.
I breathed in deeply as I took in the hell that unfolded there.
The forgotten history that remains nowhere.
A path leading to a history that should have been forgotten lies before me. Beyond that, reminiscent of hell, lies the answer. The answer I have been searching for all along.
“The origin of the Demon Lord.”
The origin of the Shadow.
“How did an unknown being that gnawed at me and humans’ history for centuries come into existence?”
The truth that is recorded nowhere.
Thump.
I took a step forward to reach it.
The barrier rippled, enveloping my body. The gleaming wave of Ashen light flickered in front of me, causing me to close my eyes momentarily.
Blink.
When I opened my eyes again, what welcomed me was the hell created by humans. Standing before hell, I slowly pulled off my gloves.
—
Once a corridor of the royal castle, now a corridor made up of human corpses is nothing less than a Phantom Territory. Raniel steadied her breath and squinted her eyes.
What she sees are numerous corpses.
Even Raniel, who has seen everything from the battlefield, is horrified enough to instinctively step back. There was a nauseating spectacle that cannot be expressed in words.
Crushed and ruined forms.
Yet, they are still alive.
『■■, ■. ■■■■■■■■.』
They mutter incomprehensible sounds as they claw at the ground. Despite everything being crushed, their black hands remain intact. Human hands are scraping the floor.
The floor, worn away for centuries, is deeply hollowed out.
Raniel gazes at it. She looks at the procession of humans who have strayed from Providence, unable to die or live. She listens to their groans.
But it sounds just like noise.
That sound seems to hold no meaning.
Yet, she can understand that it is a groan.
Though they have strayed from Providence, these once humans continuously groan in unending pain. It is a lamentation, a wail from someone.
‘Suffering.’
Raniel does not turn away from it all.
‘It inflicts constant pain.’
Amidst the incomprehensible, she starts to find something she can understand, calmly surveying her surroundings with an endlessly cold gaze.
Scrape, scrape.
The sound of the floor being dragged.
Raniel looks down at the ground. There is a reason the hands are endlessly scraping the ground. They want to erase the letters engraved on the floor.
Letters etched in filth.
Though she cannot read them, Raniel realizes it is part of a circuit. In part, she conjures the image of the circuit filling this place.
As expected.
The circuit exists to inflict pain on the traces of humans who can neither live nor die here. But why inflict pain on them?
“Reason.”
What is that reason?
What can be gained from inflicting endless pain? The answer echoes in Raniel’s ears.
『■■ ■■■ ■■■.』
『■■, ■ ■■■, ■■■■.』
Groans.
‘Sounds soaked in pain.’
Then Raniel recalls.
What they seek to create is the Shadow that stands opposite the star. What is the Shadow yearning for?
‘I wish to draw down the star.’
Thus, the Shadow hates the stars.
It resents everything related to the stars.
That is the trait of the Shadow.
『■■, ■. ■■■■■■■■.』
Listening closely to the groans, Raniel thinks.
If one listens carefully, it almost resembles the prayers of believers. The believers of the Deloheim Church pray to the stars to borrow their divinity. Sometimes, the star would answer their earnest prayers.
“The stars are beings that respond to wishes.”
Once, the Saint, Sara, said that.
“They answer our questions when we pray, wish, and earnestly desire. That’s why they are beings of wishes.”
Raniel views the stars as items for trade.
However, not all do.
Since ancient times, they have been expressed as god-like beings, and the stars are described as entities that respond to human aspirations.
‘Can a wish be a form of currency?’
Suddenly, Raniel considers this thought.
Can a human’s earnest desires become currency for trade? It didn’t seem impossible.
‘Stars and Shadows are opposites yet similar.’
If the star is a being that responds to human wishes.
Then the Shadow, too, must possess such traits.
‘Wishes.’
Desires, prayers.
『■■, ■. ■■■■■■■■.』
Raniel gazes at the floor.
The hands clawing at the ground and the sounds ringing in her ears seem to curse something. They resemble the actions of resenting and hating.
Resentment and hatred.
The pain inflicted to extract such feelings.
What do you call the language left behind from resenting and hating something? There’s no need to look far. Raniel opened her mouth and muttered.
“Curse.”
The essence of the Shadow.
“A platform for creating curses.”
That is the identity of this place.
Raniel feels the curse dwelling in her heart. Though suppressed to its limits now, the curse that was once uncontained clawed at Raniel’s entire body.
Crack, crackle.
The scene unfolding before her is the same as that. Essentially the same. Raniel comes to understand the essence of the curse embedded in her soul.
‘I wish with resentment.’
Gains the power to lead something to destruction by using hatred as currency. That is the essence of the curse. At that moment, Raniel understands the essence of the Shadow as well.
“Human’s screams.”
She pronounces it.
“The intense emotions of pain, resentment, and hatred that arise from humans.”
The wishes arising from that.
‘What does the object of those wishes mean?’
The curse dwelling in her body naturally resents Raniel herself. And the Shadow, formed by the accumulation of curses, always resents one thing.
“The stars.”
It hates the stars.
“How?”
What remains is the question.
What lies before her is an unfathomable number of human corpses. So many hands, countless. Do they all detest the stars even as they die?
While suffering endless pain.
While being used as materials to create the Shadow.
And still, they hate the stars.
‘Why?’
That reason remains unknown. Lacking knowledge, Raniel walks. She senses she is only a step away from the truth.
A path paved by those who were once human.
She walks down that path, going toward where their origins point. And at the end, Raniel meets something.
At the end of the path lies a throne.
“Oh, you’re faster than I expected.”
The shadow seated on the throne.
“Welcome to my palace, Ashen Mage.”
The shadow smiled.
Raniel asked the shadow’s name.
The shadow answers her question.
“First Prince, Izak.”
Or perhaps.
“The First Light. The Nameless One.”
