94
Chapter 94
Splash!!!
"Gasp!!!"
Splashing water everywhere, Parang suddenly sat up in the water tank.
"Gasp...... Gasp......."
Like waking up from a long nightmare, she breathed heavily.
Her companions, who had been waiting for her to wake up beside her, approached and surrounded Parang to ask if she was okay, but she couldn't answer.
"Ughhh......."
Her head hurt like it was going to split open.
The living Alice, the kraken's tentacles, the severed shapes, Atlantis, and countless other sights.
With so much information hammered into her brain all at once, she literally fainted. It was a headache bad enough to make her lose herself and almost collapse again.
Looking at the clock, it hadn't even been thirty minutes since she fell asleep.
Parang tried to explain what she had seen to her companions around her, but felt her words completely blocked without realizing it.
She couldn't figure out where or what to start explaining to them.
Thus, she barely managed to open her trembling mouth to say just one thing.
"......See for yourselves. I, I'm going to rest a bit."
The sounds coming from around her felt muffled, like she was hearing them underwater.
She lay back down in the water tank as if collapsing and closed her eyes.
She tried to organize the thoughts in her head, but it wasn't easy.
Perhaps it was because she was too dizzy and tired. The more she tried to think, the more they disappeared like a fading fog instead of getting organized.
Eventually, along with her hazy mind, her ritual sank down, deep down below.
#
"......Looks like she fell asleep."
"Yeah. Probably."
Outside of Parang's ritual, the members of Oceanus gathered around the water tank she lay in, anxiously checking on her condition.
Since she entered the memory contained within the artifact, her condition was so poor that one couldn't even jokingly call it good.
All the color had drained from her face, her hands and feet trembled, and her limbs and face were so stiff, as if turned to stone, that she showed no signs of moving.
With Parang looking like this, it was only natural that blaming gazes fell upon the one who had kicked the door open out of nowhere and forced her to enter the memory. That is, toward Bertea.
Ironically, however, the most flustered person among those surrounding Parang was also her, Bertea.
"I-I didn't know this would happen. There was definitely no problem when I saw it. I only did it because the memory inside was the most important information for Parang. Sure, shoving the artifact at her out of nowhere was wrong, but I didn't have any other intentions! I swear!"
Her urgently delivered words seemed to be accepted for the time being.
The 'memory inside the artifact' that Bertea described was truly something Parang needed to know before anyone else among them.
Besides, when the rest of Oceanus checked the memory, they hadn't shown any abnormal symptoms like Parang did.
Well, what happened had already happened, and taking into account that Bertea also experienced considerable confusion after seeing the memory, it was decided that they wouldn't hold her responsible as long as Parang woke up safely.
They decided to sit around the water tank and wait for a while to talk about what they had experienced and keep an eye on Parang's condition.
Everyone cast worried glances at Parang, who slept peacefully like a being disconnected from the world.
"Just like the last dive, it seems like Parang is the only one taking heavy mental damage again."
"Yeah. It could just be a simple mental issue......."
"That's impossible."
If anything, Parang's mentality was on the stronger side, definitely not the weak side.
"Well, maybe she wasn't feeling well. Considering everything Parang has been up to lately, it makes sense."
This wasn't exactly a satisfying deduction either, but it was at least partially true.
Lately, Parang's life had been so incredibly busy with this and that.
However, Parang also had good stamina, and she had never once shown signs of exhaustion while actually handling all those grueling schedules.
"If it's not that either, then there's really only one explanation left."
Elvira said, resting her chin on her hand.
Right. If there was one thing that made Parang different from everyone gathered here, it was just one thing.
"The Kraken."
Because she was the only person directly connected to a transcendent being.
"Could it be that Parang really is......."
"Hey. We agreed not to talk about that."
After that, a suffocating silence hung over the group.
In fact, there was a point they had wondered about ever since they first saw Parang.
Almost all hunters could 'perfectly' control their skills with just a little effort.
To them, a status window was literally like a third arm.
Excluding special cases where a penalty made it impossible, it was possible to freely adjust and utilize all elements of that skill. Just like bending or swinging an arm.
Of course, just as delicate tasks like sewing or playing an instrument require a lot of training, tuning all those elements and utilizing them in the right place during combat was another story.
Anyway, that's how it was.
However, Parang's Kraken was far removed from such a concept.
Right from the moment she pulled it out, it would smash an area-of-effect mental attack into enemies and allies alike.
In a world where one could create fire that wasn't hot to specific people, it was absurd that she couldn't control a mere mental attack.
It was far too ironic.
If she couldn't control it, it naturally led to the thought that it might not be a skill.
If it wasn't a skill, it meant it was an 'inherent trait' of the entity known as Yoo Parang itself.
In the end, it even led to the question of whether Parang was truly human.
In the past, Oceanus had decided to stop thinking about it whenever that question crossed their minds.
Because they saw the very act of throwing out insulting questions about whether their precious friend was a human or not as wrong.
And that conclusion hadn't changed, at least not yet.
"Let's drop those shitty questions and talk about Alice."
"Right....... Where should we begin."
And so, their conversation took a sharp turn, beginning to move forward with a slight rattle.
#
Step, step.
Parang walked forward through a space filled with nothing but pitch blackness.
Parang didn't know where this was, how she was able to walk, or why she was walking.
She had been walking for some time now, and she simply continued to walk.
Step, step.
As if echoing within a Cave, the entire space was filled with Parang's footsteps.
A moment later, Parang came to a halt.
In front of her was a Throne.
A Throne made of something black and sticky.
The Mucus that formed the Throne swelled and burst, gurgled as if something was crawling inside, and dripped limply onto the Floor.
And on that Throne sat Parang herself.
It was her, looking exactly like her but somehow seeming melancholy.
Wearing an elegant Dress completely in black, she sat haughtily and aloof, her legs crossed, her chin resting on her hand, and her eyes closed.
For some reason, Parang couldn't say a single word in front of her.
The Parang on the Throne had opened her eyes at some point and was meeting her gaze.
Those eyes were endlessly black, filthy, and entirely hideous.
Looking into those eyes, Parang felt 'fear'.
As if noticing this, the Parang sitting on the Throne bared her Teeth and let out a loud laugh.
It was the laugh of a beast that had found its prey.
Before she knew it, Parang realized she had reached the very front of the Throne.
She had no idea when she had moved her legs.
Still maintaining that unsettling smile, the Parang on the Throne reached out, grabbed Parang's chin, and pulled her closer.
Staring into those empty eyes, Parang was so terrified that she wanted to run away right then and there, but she couldn't.
The black-eyed Parang spoke.
"You think you can defeat me. How foolish of you."
Parang couldn't quite understand what she meant.
"Pfft, bwahaha......."
However, paying no mind to Parang's confusion, the dark Parang simply continued speaking without changing her expression.
"How amusing. You seem to think you're a Human."
The moment she heard those words, it was as if Parang's blocked mouth had opened, and she could finally make a sound.
"Mmph!!! Mmmph!! Mmmmmph!!!"
But the words only lingered in her tightly shut mouth before fading away. She herself didn't even know what she wanted to say.
"Ahahahaha!! Kyahahaha!!!!"
Watching her, the black Parang laughed like a maniac, and the sound of that laughter was both incredibly clear and terribly gruesome, as if it were being hammered directly into Parang's brain.
"Kyahahahahahaha.........."
Just like that, Parang's Ritual faded away.
Splash!!
"Ugh, ahhh......."
Just when she thought her Ritual had completely faded away, Parang's eyes opened.
Feeling refreshed after waking up, Parang's brain quickly started turning, and she soon understood what had just happened.
'A dream.......'
It was the most ridiculous dream she ever had. What on earth was that dream.......
'How long have I been sleeping.......'
Rising from the Water Tank and looking around, the room was pitch black.
Looking at the Clock on the wall, it was ten at night.
She had slept through half the day.
Around the Water Tank she woke up in, she saw the members of Oceanus sleeping in various positions.
Xiao was sleeping sitting up, leaning against the Water Tank, Russell was sprawled out on the Floor, and Diego was leaning back in a chair.......
Everyone was surrounding Parang.
'Don't tell me, they waited until I woke up.......'
Her heart suddenly welled up with emotion.
No matter what anyone says, they really are great friends.
The moment she got out of the Water Tank to cover them with a Blanket, she heard Bertea's voice from the side.
"Are you feeling a bit better?"
Unable to hide the fatigue written all over her face, she spoke in a sluggish voice.
"Bertea, did you guys perhaps......."
"Yeah. You looked like you were in really bad shape. We all waited together and ended up falling asleep."
Unable to think of anything fitting to say, Parang fell into Silence for a moment before barely squeezing out a word.
"......Thank you."
"No, well, there's nothing to thank me for....... If someone else was in your position, you would have done the same."
Bertea said, looking around at the Oceanus members sleeping here and there.
"We just did what we had to do. As for the memory, well. You have something important tomorrow, right? Let's talk after that's done. I'm going to get some sleep now, too. I'm so tired......."
It was a bit early to go to sleep, but Parang couldn't bring herself to complain.
"And, I'm sorry for just randomly bringing out the Artifact earlier. I should have thought more carefully......."
With those final words, Bertea dropped her head and fell asleep, letting out soft breathing sounds.
"Don't tell me......."
Were you staying awake until the very end just to say that, Parang couldn't bring herself to ask.
It was a quiet night.