Gambit (3)
“…Abraxas.”
Repeating the familiar name, I forced my collapsing body to steady itself and stood on both legs. Abraxas was a word from the novel Demian, the name of a god. If An Yuho—the girl who loved literature—had chosen it, the name fit perfectly.
[Yes, my name is Abraxas (ΑΒΡΑΞΑΣ). The final ark forged by a promise.]
The translucent status window covered the false scripture’s letters and the surrounding scenery, as if driving out a false god.
“Right. I wondered why a promise I never made suddenly appeared. And there were quite a few cryptic lines in between.”
Looking back, fragments hinting that this game’s genre was actually Cthulhu mythos—cosmic horror—had been scattered everywhere. The original game’s community had often speculated that the genre might be Cthulhu mythos.
In the original’s first chapter, a Blood Knight had appeared alongside a red moon, the very symbol of lunacy and madness in the West. After barely defeating it, a tentacle-like shadow presumed to belong to Cthulhu passed over the moon and nearly reversed the tide.
Iä! Iä! Cthulhu fhtagn!
“□■! □■! □■□■□■□■ □■□■□■!”
Even the Blood Knight’s words, once filtered and matched by character count, were mostly sentences related to the Cthulhu mythos. And R’lyeh was the dark parody of Atlantis from Lovecraft’s novel The Call of Cthulhu—the very place where Cthulhu slumbered from the beginning. It was strange that I hadn’t realized it sooner. Among the books An Yuho had lent me was clearly a Lovecraft novel like At the Mountains of Madness. She had once said that among people who loved words down to the last letter, no one disliked the Cthulhu mythos.
“This is why I hate cosmic horror. In modern works, Chekhov’s gun gets ignored like a dog and just pops out, shattering plausibility.”
I spat the blood pooled on the floor and barely opened my mouth. Part of my body had turned into flowers, but I could still move well enough. Three solid reasons why this game’s genre was Cthulhu passed through my mind.
First, why Demian—who knew the future—had suddenly changed his attitude unlike the original and even handed over the Holy Sword. Second, why the status window had deliberately filtered its own name to five characters and blocked Demian’s ability copy. Third, why An Yuho had appeared in my nightmare, begged me to end this tiresome infinity, and forced me to experience withering into flowers.
“Ignorance is the most effective means against infinity. If I had known the future earlier… I might have gone mad from forbidden knowledge.”
A countermeasure against Cthulhu, an Outer God from beyond the stars, wasn’t entirely unreasonable.
‘The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its contents. We live on a placid island of ignorance in the midst of black seas of infinity, and it was not meant that we should voyage far.’
That passage was also from The Call of Cthulhu. In the end, to defeat a giant human from an ant’s perspective, one had to overcome fear.
“Demian, is the future you spoke of really just this? A future where everyone dies helplessly, struggling without being able to do anything?”
And the answer might be closer than I thought. The Hero who had wagered the Holy Sword on a bet with me, claiming it wasn’t a gamble but a choice for the future.
“…It’s similar. Among countless futures, Shade is the only hope I’ve seen.”
“Yeah. Not bad. At least you’ve got an eye for people.”
Demian spoke as if he had believed in me even in this situation. Anxiety and relief coexisted on his face. No matter how much one knew the future, actually experiencing it was different.
──Click.
Recalling what An Yuho and Demian had said about infinity and ignorance, I pulled a potion from my waist. A pain-relief potion mixed with medical narcotics that would numb pain for several hours. In one of Lovecraft’s short stories, the protagonist had taken drugs to reach the depths of R’lyeh, so it should be fine.
Gulp.
Along with a bitter taste that numbed the tip of my tongue, I no longer felt pain even when moving my body.
“You’re not going mad. You’re far too sane. It’s unpleasant how you don’t praise the Great One and even have pure reason gleaming in your eyes.”
“…If believing in a god after seeing a book bound in human skin makes you sane, then I’m the crazy one.”
“What a shame. Even though I wrote it myself. Isn’t the handwriting truly beautiful and elegant? Even if it can’t compare to the real thing from R’lyeh.”
Now I could identify the human-skin scripture the Cardinal had taken out. The R’lyeh Text. It was the grimoire that appeared in the novels of August Derleth, the writer who, alongside Lovecraft, shaped the Cthulhu mythos.
“You tried to resurrect the First Saint using Cthulhu’s power? I can guess where that disgusting squid-head is aiming.”
I immediately drew the Holy Sword Einherjar and spoke. The blade, imbued with the power to banish evil and bring light to the world, trembled before the Cardinal’s neck. Einherjar. The same name as the warriors Odin gathered in preparation for Ragnarök in Norse mythology. Names were the easiest element to hide foreshadowing in, so literature often borrowed them. A sword meant to prevent the end of the world—quite fitting for the current situation. There seemed to be no more effective weapon for beheading a believer of a false god.
“Disgusting, you say. It is merely pure love for the First Saint. I simply… wish for her to be reborn in this world. I desire nothing else.”
“You crazy bastard. Are you even human after saying that? You’ve laid hands on hundreds of women, and you call it pure love?”
In the original storyline, August had fallen for the First Saint’s portrait and expressed twisted desire for someone already dead. He was the kind of man who, unable to call it pure love, reached for not only nuns who had sworn chastity to the goddess but also married women with children and widows, as long as they were beautiful and young. He was a criminal who enjoyed bribes and even human trafficking without hesitation, all to satisfy his endless greed and hunger.
“In the first place, no one would think of resurrecting and raping the woman who was the First Hero’s childhood friend and lover.”
Even in the original, August’s reason for trying to resurrect the First Saint had never been her heart—it was her body and appearance, described as the reincarnation of the goddess. He had pushed the plan forward out of the desire to possess the real thing, even if it meant violating a woman who had already died and become a mummy. Thanks to that perverse obsession, it was fortunate he had never touched Raybi, the half-baked fake Saint candidate.
“It doesn’t matter anymore, does it? Even the one once called the noblest Hero, □■□■, has had his name erased, leaving only traces of his existence.”
──Tap.
Even as blood droplets fell from his neck where the Holy Sword touched, August spoke boastfully, grinding his wisdom teeth.
“Ah. My apologies. You wouldn’t know the truth. I momentarily forgot that preaching enlightenment to the ignorant is pointless.”
“The truth? I think I know that too. You’re just a bunch of lunatics worshiping a monster with its head blown off by a steamship.”
This was exactly why August had obediently guided me underground despite my provocation. In cosmic horror, those who faced or learned of Cthulhu usually went mad or became fanatics. He had brought the Hero and his companions to R’lyeh, planning to lure or drive them all insane, which was why he had shown a friendly attitude.
“How amusing. Heretic. There’s no way the Great Old One would die to something so trivial.”
August merely laughed off my words. More precisely, the original text of The Call of Cthulhu simply called it a “squid-head,” yet he denied that even a lightweight trading ship could have blown its head off.
“Compared to Him, we are merely ants. Whether the gods above play whatever game they wish, we can only watch like ants. In that situation, what difference would coveting one more woman make?”
“Sophistry. An insult.”
“Hahahaha…! As expected, it doesn’t work on you. I knew a false prophet like you would appear someday. The Antichrist has always existed—”
──Slash!
I swung the Holy Sword, unwilling to hear any more of August’s sickening nonsense. Even as his neck was severed, Cardinal August laughed like a madman. His head rolled across the floor and stopped. Then—
“Hahahahaha!! Hahahaha!! Did you think I would die just because you cut off my head like a human? I am not a mere pawn like you! I am an apostle favored by Him!”
August’s head, already separated from his neck, continued speaking and laughing toward me and the others.
“…Is that thing even human?”
“It might be related to the Demon King…. Hiiiiiik…!!!”
“Maybe it was a corpse from the start. Or perhaps it used some kind of sorcery…”
Everyone except Demian and me trembled or even collapsed at the grotesque sight.
“Everyone! The time of the Rapture has come! Let us judge those who defile and trample this eternal paradise!”
──Rumble rumble rumble.
“A heretic’s iron mace! Despair to those who would topple the cornerstone of ruin!”
Cardinal August’s severed head merged with the flowers and soared into the sky. It took the shape of a dragon’s head and plummeted toward the ground.
“Get down!!”
I shouted the moment I saw the shadow looming overhead, but its target was elsewhere. And then—
Crunch.
The massive dragon formed of flowers precisely swallowed only Raybi, the Saint among us, and descended deeper underground.
“Ph'nglui Mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh Wgah'nagl Fhtagn!!”
From the hole left by the Cardinal, from deep within the strata, an eerie chant echoed.
“Tekeli-li!”
“Tekeli-li!!”
Then, colorful roses bloomed on the necks of the Holy Knights surrounding us, and their heads fell off one after another. The Holy Knights, bearing beautiful yet horrifying colors—red, blue, black, orange—pointed their swords at us and charged as if to kill us immediately. If the status window hadn’t blocked it, I probably would have transformed the same way.
“We’ll handle things here, so please rescue Raybi, who’s been taken hostage. Right now, you’re the only one who can do it, Shade.”
At that moment, the Hero who knew the future immediately drew his iron sword and prepared to fight alongside his companions.
“Even if the First Saint is resurrected, she won’t be happy at all, so hurry. Go and smash that color from outer space to pieces.”
“Raybi… she’s not dead yet?”
“No. At least not right now. So there’s no time to hesitate. If we clean up here first, it’ll be too late.”
Demian spoke firmly, as if entrusting everything to me.
“I’m leaving the rear to you. I’m counting on you.”
──Tap!
Without hesitation, I nodded and leaped into the strata below where the Cardinal had disappeared. Even though my extremities were mutating into flowers and blood tears streamed from my eyes, the drug’s effects made it bearable. Besides, I understood the meaning of “color from outer space” better than anyone. There was no choice but to try.
‘A meteorite. Perhaps the reason the Holy Kingdom of Elysium emits light isn’t the First Saint’s remains, but a meteorite.’
Not sacred light that shines on its own, but a new star fallen from the sky that shines. In memories that rose more vividly than before, I finally cast off the safety mechanisms of oblivion and ignorance. Now was the time to face this world’s ugly truth.