Chapter 75

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It would be a lie to say he felt no shiver at entering an abyss untouched by even a speck of sunlight.

But was that shiver fear? Or anticipation? And if anticipation, what was he anticipating?

Rather than sling his sword over one shoulder as usual, Ricard carried it in one hand as he followed Lemania, ready to draw at any moment. Deep inside the Rose Garden theater was a passage leading to the catacombs. Honestly, he had expected as much.

Ricard and Ice followed Lemania down the dark passage connecting to the catacombs. The click of her heels echoed through the ever-deepening darkness ahead. The farther they went, the darker it grew, until, by the time they reached a descending staircase, he could no longer see his own hands.

When utter darkness swallowed Ricard and Ice and brought them to a halt, eyes gleamed within it like those of wild beasts. But unlike the green eyeshine of other animals, these were red. Dozens of pairs glowed high and low, near and far—a sight chilling enough to make an ordinary person faint.

Ricard was not afraid, merely concerned. His senses remained razor-sharp in the darkness, but these numbers posed a problem. Could he win with his back to a wall? Leaving this narrow passage would be dangerous. Such thoughts flashed through his mind.

Perhaps smelling his unease, Lemania snapped her fingers up ahead. Torches mounted along the walls flared to life on their own. They revealed a vast space with a high ceiling, its walls riddled with honeycomb-like openings. A coffin rested in each one.

Some vampires had gone to sleep in their coffins now that morning had come, but others were still awake. A few had bright red blood smeared around their mouths. In one corner lay the unrecognizable remains of someone tortured to death. The cool air peculiar to underground chambers enveloped Ricard and Ice. It was not cold, yet its chill seemed to seep into their hearts.

Ricard boldly surveyed the vampires, but something felt wrong. Their eyes were utterly empty and lifeless. They showed no hostility toward humans, not even the slightest curiosity or desire to devour them. And yet, during the performance, they had laughed so gleefully and relished deceiving the humans.

"They're husks. They merely imitate pleasure."

Lemania spoke as she headed into the passage leading into the catacombs proper. She spoke of the other vampires with contempt, utterly unconcerned whether they could hear.

Looking at those hollow vampires, Ricard felt he was seeing their true faces. They could easily obtain appetizing prey if they wished, and they were well versed in every manner of perverse pleasure. Yet all that awaited them at the end was emptiness. Eventually, they would begin turning into ghouls—creatures stripped of intelligence and driven by endless hunger.

Ironically, Lehmann, who had chosen starvation and a long death, had attained a higher order of intellect, while those who pursued pleasure were ultimately left with nothing. And they told humans to live in pursuit of desire? It sounded like the words of someone drowning who wanted to drag others down too. The vampires had deceived even themselves.

Once they entered the catacombs proper, human skulls covered every wall. How many deaths lay here? The sheer number was overwhelming. At a fork in the path stood a great central pillar, itself built entirely of piled skulls. Lemania led Ricard and Ice past it, deeper and deeper into the abyss.

They began to see vampires in the process of becoming ghouls, and eventually hunched ghouls wandering the catacombs. Their eyes flashed with madness at the sight of Ricard and Ice, but cowed by Lemania, they dared not attack. Still, they followed at a distance. Before long, they filled the passage, blocking the way back completely.

Fortunately, they eventually reached a junction with paths branching to either side. A boy sat there, surrounded by melted candles and the light of dozens of flames. Thin and bare-chested, he sat cross-legged with both arms dangling limply, his head bent low and tilted slightly to one side. He appeared unconscious. Or perhaps he was asleep.

At the sight of him, Ricard momentarily forgot every danger and anxiety and stared in wonder. He could feel an indescribably holy presence.

"My father, my lover, my son, my god. Armand."

Lemania knelt and bent forward to kiss the fingertips of the boy's limp hand. It was an act of utter worship.

Ice was just as bewildered. He had expected a tremendous monster, or someone resembling Lehmann. Instead, a thin boy sat there, looking as though he might die at any moment. More than that, seeing Armand made his heart pound because the boy reminded him of his dead younger sibling. They did not look alike, yet the two seemed to overlap.

"Are you all right?"

Ricard caught hold of Ice as his breathing grew increasingly ragged. Ice barely managed a nod.

"Y-yeah..."

Ricard signaled with his eyes that they should take the left path if anything went wrong. Just then, Lemania spoke from beside Armand, where she lay almost prostrate, gazing up at him.

"Your blood."

Ricard glanced back. Ghouls swarmed in the passage, blocking it completely. One wrong move and they might descend on him. Ahead, meanwhile, stood Armand and Lemania. Still, a promise was a promise. Prepared to draw his sword at the first sign of trouble, he took out his dagger, rolled up his left sleeve, and cut his forearm.

Blood immediately welled up and began to drip. The ghouls behind him grew restless. A scent of blood spread through the air, difficult for humans to detect but unmistakable to these unholy things. Lemania gazed desperately up at Armand's bowed head. Please, please, open your eyes.

But even at the scent of the purest blood, Armand kept his head bowed and his eyes closed. Had Ricard won the wager, then? Lemania had said he could kill or spare Armand as he pleased if her father showed no reaction. And killing him would complete the commission.

Then a single tear rolled down Armand's cheek. Lemania's eyes widened as she lay gazing up at him. It was the first reaction he had shown in the decades since she had abducted him.

Slowly, his lips parted, and he spoke. His voice was like the ringing of a glass bell, or a single drop falling into a still pond.

"It wasn't your fault, Ice."

Was this what hearing the voice of God would be like? The words themselves seemed imbued with divine power. Ice was so startled he could scarcely breathe, while Ricard's eyes widened. What was going on?

Armand slowly opened his eyes and lifted his head to look at Ice. His eyes were not the vivid red peculiar to vampires, but an exceptionally clear blue-green. He rose, approached Ice, and took his arm in a delicate hand.

"Let's go. It's dangerous here."

Without warning, he took Ice by the hand and led him down the right-hand path. Ricard had no idea what was happening, and Lemania was equally bewildered.

"Father!" she cried.

Armand looked back at her as he led Ice away.

"You have no chances left, Lemania. You die here."

Ricard did not know what that meant, but it seemed to strike Lemania like a thunderbolt. She froze on her knees. With a mental shrug of To hell with it, Ricard followed Armand and Ice. Glancing back as he went, he saw Lemania still staring after them in utter devastation. His instincts warned him that something had gone wrong, and he drew his sword.

"Hey, do you know the way out?" he asked Armand.

"Yes. If it's still the same as before."

"How long ago was 'before'?"

"Hmm... Six hundred years or so? I'm not sure. I've lost my sense of time."

Trusting him to lead the way seemed like a bad idea, but Ricard did not know the way either. Meanwhile, Ice looked completely dazed. Armand's voice had shaken his deep-rooted guilt to its foundations.

"Snap out of it, Ice. Snap out of it. I said snap out of it."

Ricard grabbed his shoulders and shook him hard.

"H-huh?"

"Get a grip. I think something's gone wrong. Let's focus on getting out. The sun's up outside, so we should be safe once we're out."

"Riki's right. Let's get out first," said Armand.

Ricard tilted his head.

"How do you know my name?"

"I saw you in a dream."

"What, you have prophetic dreams?"

"Yes."

Armand answered as though it were perfectly ordinary. Apparently, living long enough with one's mind intact granted special abilities. The catch, if there was one, was having to starve for six hundred years.

"What?"

"But I get confused about whether they're past events or future ones. One thing is certain, though, Riki. In the end, you must confront your past self. Only then can you move forward."

"..."

"You will confront him. Don't worry too much. Pain nourishes the soul's growth. You can do it. No, that's not right. You've already done it. What will happen happens, which is the same as its having already happened. The future and the past are one and the same."

What was he talking about? By now, Ricard was too dumbfounded to speak. Yet whether that prophecy was right or wrong, listening to his voice truly was mesmerizing. But it was the very opposite of sinister. It was closer to something sacred, as though it instilled the strength to hope.

Just then, a ghoul suddenly lunged at them from ahead, jaws gaping. Ricard reflexively raised his sword and drove it into the creature's mouth.

"Kyaaagh!"

He shoved it away with his foot and pulled the blade free, coated in blood. As he hurriedly wiped it on his clothes, he heard a clamoring behind them. It sounded as though the horde that had been following earlier was coming after them.

"Hey, can't you use magic or something? This is looking bad."

"Sorry. I've starved too long. I have no strength."

He might have the gift of foresight, but he seemed to have lost the formidable power of a vampire.

"Want to drink my blood?"

Without a trace of fear, Ricard offered the forearm he had cut earlier. Even Armand seemed taken aback by his audacity. He gave a helpless chuckle and shook his head. Drink blood now, after centuries of starvation?

The sounds of pursuit continued behind them. Ricard abruptly began striking the skulls and bones stacked along the wall with his sword, sending them tumbling down to form a makeshift obstacle.

"Go ahead. I'll follow the sound of your footsteps."

Ice hesitated, but Armand tugged at his arm.

"Don't worry. Riki lives much longer than you do."

Ricard kept swinging his sword, building a barrier of bones. The ghouls' eerie cries and pounding footsteps drew closer. Then, suddenly, they were upon him, jaws wide like rabid fucking dogs, snapping at anything they could reach. He calmly retreated, swinging his blade to sever heads or split them open. A single missed stroke would leave a small opening, and he would die, overwhelmed as though swept away by a wave.

But he never missed. Moreover, the ghouls tripped over the skull barrier and one another, quickly choking off their own assault. In moments, ghouls and their corpses piled up to the ceiling. Seizing his chance, Ricard turned and ran toward the distant footsteps of Ice and Armand.

Then the torches lighting the catacombs suddenly went out. Darkness swallowed him in an instant. However extraordinary his senses, he could not detect inanimate objects. He pressed a hand to the wall and made his way forward, but Ice and Armand were pulling farther ahead. He felt increasingly isolated. He was not afraid, but he could not stop his heart from racing or his breathing from growing ragged.

Then it happened.

"Since it's come to this, I'll settle for drinking your blood."

It was Lemania's voice. She attacked from straight ahead. Though he could see nothing, Ricard ducked, precisely evaded her strike, and counterattacked.

SWISH! WHOOSH!

Their attacks crossed almost simultaneously. Lemania recoiled in surprise, never having imagined that Ricard could strike back. He stared into the pitch-black darkness, every sense on edge. Watching him from within it, Lemania tilted her head. He clearly couldn't see her.

To test him, she attacked again with an inhuman movement. Flipping upside down, she sprang up until her feet touched the ceiling and tried to slice his throat with her nails. But the instant she moved, his eyes tracked her precisely. What?

CLANG!

Lemania was no ordinary vampire either, and she blocked his counterattack with her nails in the nick of time. He had nearly cut off her head. What was going on? Bewildered, she stood well back and studied him again. He was unquestionably blind in the darkness. His staring eyes were completely unfocused. She could not understand it.

"Of course. My brother wouldn't have sent just anyone."

She invoked her power and summoned the ghouls. The sound of their frenzied charge surged toward him.

Startled, Ricard immediately fled. But unable to see anything, he could only move so fast. All the while, Lemania harried him with irritating little feints, not true attacks but strikes meant to slow him down.

"Where are you going, little boy? Come to big sister!"

She shouted and cackled. Ricard struck back by sound, but between escaping and counterattacking, he had too much to handle. Wounds accumulated on his arms and legs. Protecting his vital points was all he could manage.

"Oh, my! You look so delicious!"

Lemania kept calling out mockingly. Abandoned even by her father, she seemed to have lost her mind and decided to enjoy herself now that everything had gone wrong. Ricard could feel his composure beginning to crumble.

Then Armand's shout rang out from somewhere in the catacombs.

"Riki! Drink the holy oil!"

Ricard pulled Ilya's Holy Oil from inside his clothes. He doubted drinking this stuff would solve anything, but with no other options, he uncorked it and drank.

Thick oil filled his mouth. The scent of olives burst across his senses as it slid down his throat. But it merely tasted greasy. Nothing changed. Of course... This stuff was just superstition... The thought was interrupted by a sudden sensation of wind blowing inside his body.

That wind instantly filled him from head to toe. It whirled wildly through his heart, liver, lungs, blood vessels, muscles—everything—without any steady rhythm. This was something on an entirely different plane from Mana Drive. It almost felt familiar, yet not quite. Strange and familiar at once, but not unpleasant.

Was it longing for lost days of innocence? Homesickness? Had Veszprim made it home safely? What had happened to his brothers on the battlefield? And Chaldebert? Questions rose unbidden in his mind. His previous life and his present one mingled until he could scarcely tell them apart. Which was real?

In that instant, the wind within him became a raging fire. For one brief moment, Ricard felt the agony of his brain burning away, and then he lost consciousness.

As he stood motionless with one hand on the wall and his head bowed, Lemania jeered.

"What are you doing? Given up on everything?"

Then Ricard raised his head. Golden flames blazed in both his eyes. Lemania felt a sudden surge of wrongness. No, not mere wrongness. It was the unmistakable terror of death.

At that very moment, the charging ghouls crashed over Ricard. They hurled themselves upon him like a wave, leaving no possibility of dodging. For a fleeting instant, Lemania felt relief. It was over. Thank goodness.

Then a sword burning with holy flame thrust out and swept away the ghouls in a single stroke.

SHLAAASH!

Blood poured down like rain, and chunks of flesh splattered to the ground. Drenched in blood, Ricard stood with his burning eyes aglow. Unlike before, his gaze pierced the darkness and fixed squarely on Lemania. Golden flames blazed along his blade.

Lemania froze, speechless. He wasn't human after all? But what in the world was this?

"Do you know whom you dare stand before?"

A voice filled with bottomless hatred and rage issued from Ricard's lips. Lemania felt as though her long-dead heart were racing.

Ricard no longer needed to react to his opponent's movements or turn their strength against them. He could simply—simply cut through everything. Lemania hurled herself away with incredible speed, but a burning sword pierced her voluptuous body from behind, then sliced upward in one stroke. Split in two, she died without so much as a scream. She merely collapsed onto the floor of the ancient tomb, a lump of rotten meat.

Ricard stood looking down at the dead Lemania. Just as the thought What is this? flickered through his mind, Ice's distant voice struck his ears.

"Riki!"

The voice passed through his ears and struck his brain. His normal awareness abruptly returned, and the golden flames in his eyes and along his blade went out.

He stood alone, bewildered, until he remembered only that he had been running away. He immediately sprang toward the voice. Before long, he saw Ice and Armand surrounded by ghouls, with iron bars behind them. Unlike six hundred years ago, the exit was blocked. Ice fought desperately to protect Armand. Ricard cut down the ghouls from behind and joined them.

"Did you drink the holy oil?!" Armand demanded without preamble.

"I think I did, but I don't remember."

"Good. Then open this."

He pointed at the iron bars. What was he talking about? Shouldn't they fight through the ghouls and hurry to find another exit?

"Hurry!"

Urged on by Armand, Ricard let go of his sword almost without thinking and pulled at the bars. He clenched his teeth and strained with all his might. Suddenly, the bars bent like taffy. His own eyes widened in surprise. Why were they bending? Was the iron weak?

Armand seized the moment, caught Ice by his clothes, and slipped through the bars. Ricard hurried after them, with the ghouls in pursuit. Then a straight shaft of sunlight fell across their path, stopping the ghouls from following any farther. Armand, however, took Ice's hand and flung himself into the light. They emerged onto the coast outside Harlen, greeted by the refreshing crash of waves.

Armand ran across the sand, holding Ice's hand. After they had run for some time, his skin began to burn and smoke. Only then did a startled Ice remember he was a vampire and grab him. Armand's arm snapped off without resistance, and he fell onto the soft sand.

"Ah, sunlight for the first time in a thousand years. I forgot. Hehehe."

Armand laughed where he lay on the beach. Ricard hurried up, stripped off his cloak, and covered him, but it was not enough.

"I-it's all right. This was meant to happen. No, it already happened."

The midday sun kept burning him. More and more of his body turned to gray dust. Ricard and Ice could do nothing to stop it.

"When you have prophetic dreams for long enough, people start to feel like old friends. Even before they're born. Silly, isn't it? Ice, your younger sibling never blamed you... So you have to be happy. I wanted so much to tell you that... Ah, aah, ngh..."

The sunlight burned Armand without respite. He closed his eyes and endured the pain, his body trembling as though in the grip of a fever.

"Riki, you've already..."

Armand tried to leave some words for Ricard as well. But the sunlight consumed him completely. The last of his skin turned gray. The mass of ash that had held the shape of a boy crumbled with a dry rustle. Ricard's and Ice's hearts sank at the sight.

A sea breeze swept through the ashes, and then a wave washed them away. On that beautiful shore, emotions beyond words enveloped Ricard and Ice. They had come to kill him. They had barely known him. What was this profound sense of loss?

For the first time, they resented the sun. Amid drifting ashes, only the futile sound of the waves remained.

End of Part 14 — The Unforgiven.