Chapter 165 - The Greatest Trace (1)

Justia quietly stroked the foreheads of Vlad and Jean as they lay on the bed.

The damp chill of cold sweat touched her fingertips.

The bed was soft, but both their faces were tightly twisted, and Vlad, among them, was intermittently writhing.

He looked as though he were having a terrible nightmare.

"..."

Justia stroked Vlad's tousled blond hair, then finally looked at the armor he was wearing.

The phrase the Northern Orthodox Church had personally written for the young squire back when it had still been San Rosino.

Even then, Vlad had climbed toward the church's highest spire for the children of the village.

And Justia had been one of the people who had watched him from closest by.

"Let us begin."

"But Lady Justia..."

Justia nodded as if she had steeled herself while looking at Vlad in pain.

The priest beside her opened his mouth with worry as he looked at her, but now there was nothing to be done.

Even if she sank into deep darkness, she had no choice but to believe that He would descend with her.

"I will go in. Please prepare."

"... Understood."

The room had been full of priests until just a short while ago, but now only a few who followed Justia remained.

Yet those who had stayed until the end began to recite their prayers with all their might, determined to complete what they had to do.

-He knows when I sit and when I rise, and from far away He will reveal His thoughts for me.

Listening to the quiet prayer spreading beside her ears, Justia gently closed her eyes.

Through their clasped hands, Justia slowly sank into Jean's dream.

Though she could not become a shining star like Gunther, she chose to descend closer herself and become a single bright signpost.

"..."

The farther she left reality and descended into the pitch-black darkness, the smaller and weaker Justia became.

But at least her platinum-blond hair, shining brighter in the dark, still did not lose its light.

And when at last she pierced through the dark clouds and descended into the world of dreams, she had already become a single free bird.

* * *

-Go out through here.

Andreas in the dream spoke while blocking the shaking door with his whole body.

His fingertips, trembling ceaselessly from the violent vibrations, were pointing at the bookcase directly in front of them.

"This isn't a door, though?"

["How many times must I tell you, you fool..."]

Looking at Vlad, whose eyes had gone round, Quijano beat his chest in frustration.

Though he had said over and over that the form visible to the physical eye held no meaning, Vlad still did not seem used to the world of dreams.

-Take out the Bible. There will be a path inside it.

The world of dreams was made of symbols and meanings.

Just as the last refuge young Jean had sought was Andreas's room, the way to escape this collapsing place would not be through a door or road visible to the eye, but through a single meaning held in the heart.

FLIP FLIP FLIP!

"... Eek!"

Vlad hurriedly pulled the Bible from the bookcase and was startled.

Because the worn Bible in his hand began turning its pages on its own, as if it were alive.

BANG BANG BANG BANG BANG!

-Read it. There will be a path inside it.

Looking at the door as it began to creak more and more, Vlad hurriedly examined the open page.

Countless verses were written there in dense letters, but one sentence in bold, as though telling him to read it, stood out clearly in Vlad's sight.

"The path... that guides the blind is the light in the darkness. And it shall be a song?"

RUMBLE...

The moment Vlad stammered out the Bible verse, the bookcase on the wall began to roll upward slowly like paper.

Vlad, startled, stepped back and saw a sight like the Milky Way floating above the clouds.

"This is..."

["That is the exit. Hurry and get out!"]

The only road by which they could escape the dream.

A single faint path lay before Vlad, like white sand scattered over a black sea.

It was as narrow and shallow as it looked, so fragile it seemed it might scatter with a single breath.

["Hurry!"]

"...!"

At Quijano's urging, Vlad hurriedly hoisted Jean onto his back and looked back one last time.

Andreas nodded as if telling him to go quickly from within Jean's dream, which was collapsing more and more.

What had protected the young acolyte's world to the very end was a single thread of teaching passed down by his teacher.

"Thank you!"

Holding Jean tight, Vlad followed Quijano and rushed toward the path Andreas had shown them.

The sky overhead was dark, but the starlight touching the tips of his feet was soft as sand on a white beach.

RUMBLE!

The moment the group escaped, Andreas's room collapsed with a roar, as if it had been forcing itself to hold out.

It was not only Andreas's room.

"The church is collapsing!"

["That is why you run!"]

The Church of Varna shattered into pieces as if a glass bottle were breaking.

Behind the collapsing debris, the heaven-defying tree raised its roots savagely and began to roar.

RAAAAAAAH!

"Where! Where do we go!"

["Didn't that Gunther or whatever fellow tell you to follow the starlight!"]

The path that guides the blind is light and song.

But though the path beneath their feet was bright, the sky they looked up at was entirely black without a single glimmer of starlight.

["There!"]

"... Huh?"

Behind them was the roaring tree.

The road beneath them was a white sand path scattering in the wind.

The two of them lost their direction there for a moment and panicked, but soon a single light began to descend through the heavy clouds.

"A bird?"

What Gunther had told them to follow was starlight, but what Vlad saw now was a single tiny bird.

A canary breaking through the darkness with a banner of platinum-blond raised high.

"... Justia."

It looked like a bird, but the being it contained was someone familiar.

Recognizing the being flying toward him, Vlad bit down hard on his lip.

Because the sight of that little bird struggling through the darkness was exactly like the picture the Divine Maiden of the World Tree had shown him.

* * *

"You damned..."

Gunther's gaze was fixed above the fog, into empty air.

Even now, beneath his foot lay a man thrashing as he shed black tears, but the only thing that mattered to him now was the unidentified woman blocking the knights.

STAB!

When he ended the thrashing, the man went limp.

Yet to the final moment when his tears stopped, he had been desperately calling someone's name.

-My son... My son, Noah.

The name he had called so desperately was the name of the child the man had lost.

The tragedy no one would ever know came to an end with the man's movements.

"Who are you?"

"A person with no blood or tears. Did you not even pity him?"

"How absurd. Wasn't all this a tragedy you created?"

The holy knights who had reached Gunther's side hurriedly formed a square formation and began thrusting their swords toward the woman floating in the air.

"..."

They were knights who had cut down all manner of wicked beings until now, but before this unidentified woman, they could not hide their tension.

Because the form of her they saw through the world of God was a being twisted all over so horribly that they could scarcely dare put it into words.

"Still, he must have been happy at the very end. He must have realized what was truly precious."

"I will not ask twice."

The world of God, visible without closing his eyes.

Before the holy knight, who stood with both eyes wide open, there was only a wicked being that did not even tread within God's embrace.

"I, Gunther, Captain of the Second Knight Order of the Northern Orthodox Church, shall now hold you responsible for every tragedy in this place."

At some point, Gunther's thumb had been cut, and it was full of his blood.

Yet his blood drops, though gathered, did not fall, and instead were etched into the air as he slowly drew them along.

"O Saint Rosino, glorious commander of the heavenly host, who stands beside God..."

We are sinners who can do nothing even before a wicked being, so please impose upon us a cruel wound.

"Carve upon us a wound, a stigma, that can never end until we break the enemy."

"Ghhhhh!"

"Hup!"

As Gunther's blood drops completed themselves into a single technique, cruel wounds began to form on the foreheads of the holy knights around him.

The wounds, as though carved with a blade, sharpened the minds of the knights who had been shrinking back, and made the aura flowing through their swords shine even brighter.

"Knights, do not be afraid. God is always with us."

The holy knights had carved upon their foreheads as stigmata the blessing that was always with them.

Confirming the presence of God once more through the fierce pain they felt, they began to step slowly toward the fog.

"That is a technique I have not seen in a long time. The one before me must be a noble knight."

"I will burn you today and end this curse."

The world with me is the world of God.

This world I stand upon was already created by His will, so even without closing my left eye, I shall see the world whole.

"But do you know?"

Watching the holy knights gradually approach, the headless knights began to come out to meet them.

The holy knights trying to head toward the heaven-defying tree, and the headless knights trying to stop them.

"That stigmata technique."

Two groups stood on opposite sides.

Yet the wounds they bore were far too similar.

"I made that."

At Gunther's resounding order to charge, the woman's final words did not reach them, but that did not matter.

After all, once they drew close, they would see.

They would see how heartless the will of the God they followed truly was.

CLANG! CLANG CLANG!

Within the clamor of swords clashing, the stigmata of the holy knights shone.

But at the same time, there were shining wounds on the severed necks of the headless knights as well.

"Aaaaargh!"

"Captain! The stigmata are being devoured!"

The woman smiled as she watched the wounds slowly burn, feeding on God's blessing.

Captain Gunther was a shining star, but the woman floating in the air was someone who had once shone even brighter than him.

Though now, she had gone cold.

* * *

"Huff, huff..."

He thought they had run far, but the white sand path still did not end.

'Damn it, damn it!'

The weight of Jean on his back and his footsteps exhausted from the endless path were both heavy, but the impatience worse than either was burning Vlad up.

'I have to hurry! Hurry!'

The canary grew visibly more exhausted as time passed.

The little bird, whose color looked just like Justia's hair, continued to light the group's path even now, without stopping its labored wingbeats.

The sight of Justia growing more and more exhausted, and Vlad looking at her with a worried expression, looked more like the picture the Divine Maiden of the World Tree had drawn with every passing moment.

["There! I see it!"]

"...!"

As if to soothe Vlad's anxious heart, a faint shape began to appear up ahead.

Golden waves shining like an aurora, announcing the end of the darkness.

Justia's arduous guidance had finally led Vlad to the boundary of the world, and if they could reach the place visible just ahead, they would surely wake from their deep sleep.

-...!

But in that instant, the little bird began to stagger.

"Justia!"

With feathers bursting apart as if it had suffered some great blow, the tiny canary slowly began to melt into the darkness.

"No!"

Vlad reached out to catch her as she fell lower and lower toward the ground, but all he grasped were tiny scraps of feathers.

Even those slowly melted and disappeared, leaving Vlad deeply shaken.

THUMP!

"What in the world is..."

["Run! Vlad! You must not stop!"]

The sound of a heartbeat began to thunder in time with that ominous disappearance.

But even after seeing Justia's symbol vanish so emptily, Vlad could not stop.

["The path has been cut off! Now you must find your own way!"]

"...!"

Vlad looked back and saw the heaven-defying tree striding toward them from the distant end of the darkness.

"Damn it!"

When Justia had been with them, the thing had not even been visible in the distance, yet the moment she vanished, it had chased them all the way to just behind them.

["It is right on us! Close your right eye!"]

With my closed left eye, I see my world.

With my open right eye, I see the real world.

But this time, the reverse.

"Hup!"

Walking or running no longer had any meaning.

This was the world of dreams, and what they touched were only symbols.

'Justia!'

THUMP!

Listening to the sound of his heart beating harder and harder, Vlad closed his right eye.

Shifting Jean from his back to his front, Vlad quietly focused his mind and began leading himself and the young acolyte toward the boundary of the world.

["...!"]

A chilling presence had come right up behind them.

And before it came the ringing of someone's sword being swung.

The tip of the root that had finally crawled all the way there was feeling along the nape of Vlad's neck, but Vlad could already see the real world with his closed right eye.

Because she had guided Vlad right to the threshold of reality.

"... Ghh."

And so, at last, he reached his world.

Barely lifting his eyelids, Vlad saw platinum-blond hair filling his entire field of vision.

"Justia...?"

What he felt the moment he returned to reality was not someone's welcome, but only the sharp, fishy smell that pierced his nose.

THUMP! THUMP!

And all he could feel was the heartbeat that had begun to race beyond control.

"Gaaaaaah..."

Vlad forced his stiffened throat to squeeze out a groan that was like a sob.

Justia had collapsed as though covering Vlad.

Bright red blood was still flowing down her back, yet Vlad's trembling hands could not even catch Justia as she slowly slid toward the floor.

"You have awakened, young dragon."

"Hhhhhh..."

Through the focus that only now came together, there was a white-haired man leaning against the window.

At the tip of his sword hung a clear drop of blood that had just begun to flow.

"You bastard..."

"But you will fall asleep again soon."

The voice he heard was terribly familiar, but the two hands of the man gripping the sword radiated an unbearable fear.

Yet though everything they possessed was pushing against each other, the hearts beating face-to-face were so alike they seemed to share the same blood.

"Aaaaaaah!"

Justia finally slid down beneath the bed.

Unable even to catch her, Vlad howled in helpless rage and fear.

"I swear I'll kill you! You son of a bitch!"

"... So you truly are a dragon."

Watching the young dragon flail before him, the greatest Dragon Slayer smiled.

The heart that began beating whenever Vlad struggled slowly started to warm his body.

It was a very old heart that could beat only before a dragon.