Chapter 6
Chapter 6
The eighth memory was a trial.
Raindrops blurred his vision. The smell of damp earth mixed with a faint stench of sulfur, stinging his nose.
All he could hear was the quiet sound of rain as he ran forward, empty-headed.
He ran like that for 500 meters straight. His breathing grew ragged, and something—whether rainwater or sweat—soaked every part of his body.
“...”
Strangely, it made him calmer. He could feel that he was alive.
Bell was currently undergoing a trial.
At least it was summer.
Since long ago, Bell had always been unfazed in humid, rainy places, no matter what he experienced.
Ever since he lost his older brother in the back alleys as a child, whenever the damp scent of the sewers brushed his nose, his emotions would go still, and his actions would grow bolder than usual.
Especially when it came to killing something, or fighting someone.
Not long after, he reached the garden’s main gate. Despite his heart pounding as if it would burst, he felt no tension.
The moment he stepped inside—
“…Don’t come…”
A faint groan reached his ears from afar.
“Run away… Bell…”
He ignored the warning and kept moving forward.
Step by step, he wiped the rain from his eyes and walked on as if nothing was wrong.
“...”
He looked ahead.
The entire world was swallowed by storm clouds. Razor-sharp rain and roaring thunder tore mercilessly at the land.
Lightning flashed so violently it was hard to even keep his eyes open.
Splash.
With endless rain soaking his body, his sense of touch dulled. Still, he could tell his steps had grown heavier—water had pooled around his ankles.
The stench of rotting corpses mixed with sewer filth clouded his vision.
There was a taste of blood in his mouth. His cracked lips bled from malnutrition and festering inflammation.
The groans continued to echo in his ears.
Smell, sight, touch, taste, hearing.
The natural disaster before him devoured all five senses.
And yet, Bell kept moving forward as if it meant nothing.
Unlike his fading senses, his mind had never been clearer.
The flashing lights, the scent of revenge, the sewer stench—
Memories resurfaced. Days when death was closer than even now on the battlefield. Days in those alleys.
This place was a trial.
Splash. Splash.
Under the Pope’s guidance, this was the trial to obtain the “equipment of the Hero’s Party,” something past heroes had endured.
According to what Bell had heard, each trial was different.
Some had to break their limits and face powerful enemies.
Some had to confront the fears within their hearts.
Others had to face their inescapable past.
“...”
But for Bell, this trial was too easy.
Voices of friends long dead in the back alleys echoed in his ears, but they didn’t stir his trauma or shake his emotions.
Especially now.
As he’d said before—whenever the stench of a summer sewer filled his nose, his emotions died away completely.
No matter whose screams he heard, no matter how the rain blinded him, this was nothing more than a false world built from his memories.
Bell simply walked forward.
After a long time—
The world was still flashing.
Screams rang in his ears. Blood filled his mouth. Rotting stench filled his nose. His body was numb.
Eventually, his legs stopped moving.
And so, he collapsed to the ground.
Thud.
“...Hah.”
He had no idea how long he had been running. It felt like days without rest.
The rain still poured endlessly.
“...”
He looked around.
The very alley where they had once struggled to survive.
No matter how far he ran, he could not leave it.
“Haa…”
Bell lowered his gaze.
In the rainwater pooling beneath him, he saw—
A boy.
Under a heavy sky filled with damp clouds, a lone streetlamp cast a dim orange glow.
A boy walked beneath it.
A boy stripped of everything by the demon called anxiety. A boy who had lost the will to live.
Step by step, as he walked, the sewer stench and the metallic scent of rain clung to him.
A boy who had lost the brother who had protected him since childhood.
A boy who believed he had no future left.
He walked endlessly.
Without direction. Without a place to go.
Trying to escape the cursed back alleys that had taken his brother.
Yes.
That was Bell.
The Bell of the past—
And the Bell of just moments ago.
Perhaps this trial was showing him his present.
No matter how much he struggled, he was still nothing more than an uneducated child from the slums.
Like that count had once said—would becoming a noble really change anything?
His current self was built from short but intense fragments of childhood.
Unless the past changed, he couldn’t change either.
“...”
No. He wouldn’t change.
He had run to survive.
Struggled not to die.
And that hadn’t changed.
Only his surroundings had.
He had more to protect now.
More people who believed in him.
Like Ricardo had said—believing in himself was what mattered most.
He wouldn’t change. The past couldn’t be changed because it was already the past.
A flower that bloomed in a swamp would not hide its origin.
It would wear it proudly.
Its scars would become experience.
Even if he became a noble one day and gained everything—
He would never forget.
Because he knew pain, he knew joy.
Because he had survived through the kindness of others, he knew how to give.
Because he knew how to give, even the same coin held greater value.
Because he understood the emptiness of death, he understood the value of life.
Three years ago, when he fled this place—
There were still people trapped here.
Slums. Back alleys. Streets.
Bell thought about Ricardo’s words—“duty.”
Maybe this was what it meant.
He would become a mentor for those from the slums.
He would succeed.
Kill the Demon King. Survive. Become a noble.
And prove it.
That someone like him could succeed.
That even without status, effort could achieve dreams.
He would become the spark—
So that others could live chasing their goals.
The rain poured endlessly.
“...”
At last, Bell realized.
This alley he had spent his life trying to escape—
Was not something he needed to leave behind.
He looked up at the sky.
Dark clouds still covered everything. Lightning still tore through the heavens.
But—
Between them,
Through a small gap in the thick clouds—
He saw it.
A massive moon.
“...Ugh.”
Bell groaned as he woke.
His mind was hazy, like he was still dreaming.
He looked around.
“...?”
Everything was white.
Endless white stretched in all directions, making it impossible to tell where he was—or if this place even existed.
Depth itself felt gone.
As if he had stepped into a two-dimensional world.
“...”
Bell felt betrayed by the Pope.
He had said that once the trial was overcome, one would lose consciousness and awaken in reality with the Hero’s equipment in hand.
But Bell had clearly blacked out after seeing the moon.
So where was this?
After looking around for a while, Bell simply closed his eyes.
There was nothing here anyway.
Just as he considered going back to sleep—
“Nice to meet you, my apostle.”
“...”
A voice brushed past his ears.
Bell opened his eyes.
Before him stood a tall woman with long black hair and black eyes, looking down at him.
He froze.
“…The God of Death…?”
“Yes. That is correct, my apostle.”
Her calm confirmation sharpened his gaze.
“…Did you make me?”
“No.”
“…Then did you decide my fate?”
“Not that either. Even we gods cannot easily defy fate. However—”
She continued,
“I have experienced your life alongside you, in the first person. That is why I chose you as my apostle.”
“...”
Bell fell silent.
The God of Death gave a faint, bitter smile.
“Time is short, so I will get to the point.”
“This generation’s Demon King and the Seven Deadly Sin executives are unusually powerful. To prevent destruction, we gathered what little divine power we had to strengthen your Hero’s Party.”
“Even so, there were limits.”
“We tried to make you as strong as possible… but our power was lacking.”
“So we placed constraints on each apostle.”
She gripped his shoulder.
“Remember this. Each member of the Hero’s Party stands at the opposite end of fate from one of the Demon King’s executives.”
“If one does not kill the other, both will eventually collapse under the weight of their destiny.”
“If you fail to kill them, both sides will perish. The Demon God has likely told the Seven Sins the same.”
She clicked her tongue softly, then delivered the final blow.
“The one standing opposite your fate…”
“…is the Sin of Wrath.”
“The Demon King, Satan.”
She bowed her head slightly.
“I am truly sorry. This was… half-forced.”
“If you arrive in purgatory, I will personally see that you are treated well.”
After hearing everything, Bell spoke quietly.
“…You’ve got to be kidding me.”
It was the first time in his life—
That Bell swore.