Prologue: Ah...
[...... Ah.]
In the dark underground basement, blood trickled down a woman's nape.
She was being devoured.
By a girl far smaller than herself, her living flesh torn away bite by bite.
Yet the woman smiled.
She carefully embraced the girl who was eating her, her face soft with a gentle smile.
[...... You have to run, Flora. You understand, right?]
The woman's body crumbled.
Her head snapped back, her legs gave out.
Even the arms that had wrapped around the girl until the very end fell limply to the floor.
The girl slowly emerged from the shadows.
Her dull, unfocused eyes, blood streaming down her chin.
Even with her sister's corpse right before her, the girl smiled.
Vulgarly. Base. Undignified.
The girl's eyes turned toward the screen.
She grinned, a chilling smile.
"So damn pitiful."
I muttered without thinking, staring at the screen.
That was the name of the female character who'd just died on screen.
And she was the older sister of that girl from moments ago.
But why did she let her little sister eat her alive?
Just look at that girl's title: Mad Vampire.
That's right—madness.
Flora Alberich wasn't sane.
Flora had been born without a soul.
A hollow shell driven only by a vampire's instincts, obsessed with devouring every living thing in sight.
That's why her parents had confined her to the underground basement.
Why had Carsella approached Flora so defenselessly?
Because that scene was a hidden route.
Defeat Carsella in battle after the 99th turn.
Satisfy that condition, and you get this hidden cutscene.
Once the cutscene ends, Flora appears as the hidden boss.
The hero—that is, the player.
The battle with the hero dragged on too long, pushing all the way to the room where Flora was sealed.
Carsella loved her little sister.
Even if Flora no longer recognized her, even if she'd gone mad, Carsella loved her fiercely simply because she was her only family.
Terrified that Flora would be slain by the hero, Carsella lost her reason.
She approached Flora completely unprotected.
And then it played out just like we'd seen.
Devoured by a little sister who didn't even recognize her, smiling as she urged her to flee—that was her end.
...Well, being the boss and all, she gets taken down by the hero in the end anyway.
Eden's Crusade.
That's the name of the game.
And I'd been playing it for six whole years already.
The reason? Simple: to uncover Carsella's hidden route.
Eden's Crusade boasted insane volume and freedom.
Even after six years, new stories and routes were still being discovered.
There was every chance a hidden route existed.
Of course, I still hadn't found it.
That's why I was still glued to this game.
Today, I planned to try a new method.
You can't reach Flora's sealed basement through normal means.
The only way in is via the hidden boss fight—but that route always kills off Carsella for good.
But what if there was a way to enter the basement?
"Not the normal way, obviously."
I'd force my way in using a map-clipping glitch.
"Wow, what pervy bastards at the devs."
The underground basement I bulldozed into.
There sat the model of Flora Alberich, bound in iron chains.
I approached, and sure enough—there was even an animation of her lunging to bite the player, only to jerk back against the chains.
Thump.
My heart pounded.
Too detailed for mere dummy data.
...There might be something here.
Not this glitch, but a proper, legitimate route into the basement.
And maybe it connected to Carsella's hidden route.
"Whoa..."
A sigh of awe and exhaustion escaped me at once.
The first real lead in six years.
I swallowed hard and approached Flora.
Anything—anything. Even the tiniest hint.
With trembling hands, I attempted to interact with her.
In that instant.
The monitor screen went pitch black.