Wow! This is Exorcism! (2)
Beyond the heavy iron door of the underground chapel, a grotesque metallic screech leaked out, like the throat of a beast being scraped raw.
"Kehihihihi, hahahahaha!"
A damp, sticky malice stabbed into their lungs. On the marble floor, unidentified black liquid slithered like snakes. Aaagh! Shadows of humans with mouths gaping in agony rose and crumbled repeatedly from the walls and ceiling corners.
"Kehihi... Is that all you've got? For dogs of God, your barks are far too feeble!"
Amid the vibrating stench of acrid sulfur and fishy blood, a man bound tightly in thick silver chains twisted his body at an unnatural angle. Black smoke billowed from his torn lips. His inverted eyes gleamed with only the whites visible, chilling to the bone.
"Where's that incompetent god you serve? Curled up in some corner taking a nap, I suppose?"
The exorcist priests sprinkled holy water with trembling hands and desperately chanted prayers, but the demon only mocked them further by conjuring eerie hallucinations.
"Come out of Earl Spencer's body at once!"
"Reveal your true name, fragment of the filthy abyss!"
"My true name? Kehahaha! You think your shallow eardrums and souls can survive hearing my real name?!"
The priests' faces drained white at the demon's savage mockery. Despite days and nights of grueling ritual, the demon wearing the earl's skin remained unmoved.
Plip, plop.
Suddenly, sticky liquid poured from the ceiling.
"...?"
The priests flinched and looked up, only for the ceiling to erupt in a horrifying downpour of dark red blood droplets.
From the pooling blood on the floor, swarms of tens of thousands of sewer rats surged up with gruesome shrieks.
"Eek! O Light, what in the world...!"
The old high priest recoiled in horror.
"Don't falter! It's all illusions crafted by the demon!"
The priests squeezed their eyes shut and gripped their holy power. The earl's husk still wore a grotesque sneer.
"Useless! Without my true name, I'll nest in this flesh and devour you eternally!"
Despair darkened the priests' faces at the demon's taunt.
And outside that horrific storm-ravaged chamber, in the cold corridor leading to the underground chapel, the priests' fierce shouts echoed.
"We must send in the Saintess! At this rate, the earl's soul will be utterly destroyed!"
"Nonsense! You want to shove a barely awakened ten-year-old girl into that hellish pit? We're talking about at least a high-ranking demon with a granted title!"
"Then what about the earl dying in there? If that monster breaks the seal here... countless people could suffer gruesome deaths! We can't afford to choose methods now!"
And beyond the firmly shut door, Elia waited alone for the decision.
'In... in there...'
Elia turned her head toward the darkness lurking at the corridor's end, the underground chapel. The intense malice prickling her skin was far beyond what a mere ten-year-old could endure. Clasping her pale hands tightly, she trembled like an aspen leaf. Just the bloody stench and killing intent seeping from beyond the iron door made her heart feel like it would burst.
'I'm scared...'
Her terrified heart pounded wildly.
'Do I really have to go into that horrible place?'
But what crushed Elia more cruelly than the malice was the brutal weight of responsibility on her slender shoulders.
'Can... can I really save that person?'
If I fail. If that person inside dies because my power isn't enough. As overwhelming terror and despair engulfed Elia for the first time in her life—
"Scared?"
A voice cool as ice and alluring pierced the trembling Elia's ear.
Roën, eldest daughter of the Lancaster Duke's house, stood there with her chilling red eyes glinting. Her gaze looking down at Elia, arms crossed, held no sympathy or warmth.
"How long are you going to stand there shaking like a pathetic fool?"
"L-Lady... I-I..."
"While you're throwing a tantrum and trembling here, the man inside is having his soul torn to shreds. Can't you hear? Those horrific screams?"
Roën's sharp sneer echoed down the corridor.
"...I'm scared. I've never seen anything like that before..."
"Scared? You think that's an excuse?"
Roën roughly grabbed Elia's slender wrist.
"Kyaa! R-Roën!"
Ignoring Elia's short scream, Roën dragged her like a rag doll to the chapel door's gap. Her pale, eerie fingers gripped Elia's cheeks hard, twisting them.
"Look closely."
Roën forced Elia's gaze into the chamber beyond the door.
"U-Ugh...!"
The hellish tableau brutally ravaged Elia's vision. As Elia tried to squeeze her eyes shut, Roën's sharp whisper coiled into her ear.
"Look properly. Don't avert your eyes!"
Only then did Roën release her cheeks with a flick. As Elia collapsed to the floor, gasping ragged breaths, Roën stepped closer. Her slender finger poked Elia's chest. Poke, poke.
"Your weakness and incompetence are killing that man."
"N-No... I'm just..."
"Having that world-saving power yet cowering like a coward. Utterly useless."
Inside Roën, Memories of her previous life’s crushing defeat swirled in blood-red.
'I can't let her run away weakly here.'
If she did? She'd be tamed by the crown prince or the Northern Archduke's care, only to crumble helplessly before the true apocalypse ahead.
She must face hell. That was the heavy yoke a savior, a Saintess, had to bear.
Roën's harsh words mercilessly shredded Elia's heart.
"If you're scared, quit. Stay here quietly."
"I... no..."
"But remember—fleeing leaves people behind unrescued."
Thick tears finally fell from Elia's large green eyes. But strength soon surged into her trembling little hands, as if blood rushed through them.
'Lady Roën is right.'
A person was dying inside right now. She couldn't run. The angel from the orphanage, the priests, the grand bishop—they all said she was chosen.
Elia roughly wiped her wet eyes with her worn sleeve. Then, with shaking hands, she gripped the heavy doorknob of the chapel door.
Clunk.
Elia opened the heavy iron door and stepped her unsteady foot into the hellish darkness. Roën watched her frail back.
'Yes, that's the spirit.'
Don't break. Don't run. Or else... we'll all die in the horrific future to come.
As the firmly shut iron door opened and she stepped into the thick darkness, a blood-and-pitch-black asura field seemed to swallow the frail girl whole.
"...I'll do it. I'll help."
Her childish voice, trembling faintly, dropped heavily into the chapel's maw-like interior.
"Saintess! Withdraw at once!"
"No! Someone still too untrained to fully wield holy power, how could...!"
Despite the priests' desperate pleas, Elia steadied her aspen-trembling legs and walked into hell's heart.
Beneath her feet, illusory rat swarms scratched eerily. Starved fly swarms buzzed in thick black clouds through the air. Living sticky black liquids screamed as they dripped from the worn walls and ceiling.
In the midst of that horrific swamp, a clanking noise rang out. The monster, bound in thick iron chains and twisted, snapped its neck grotesquely.
"Kehahaha! And who are you? A milk-scented little girl boldly crawling in on her own!"
As the girl took a cautious step forward—
Pure silver-white radiance erupted from her tiny feet like a fierce wave. Wherever the light touched, the filth-choked marble floor purified, regaining its original cold white texture.
"Ooh, O Light... Saintess!"
"Gaaah! What is this revolting light?!"
Elia clasped her trembling hands before her chest and murmured prayers with blue lips.
"O Light in the heavens... Warmth that envelops all creation..."
A dazzling, warm holy power barrier expanded roundly around the girl. The surging black liquids and malice shattered like waves against a breakwater and faded.
"Abyssal evil spirit... Release the earl's body and withdraw at once. I command you in the name of sacred heavenly light!"
An overwhelming torrent of light, worlds apart from the old priests' prayers. Unbelievable from a child just past ten, a massive holy radiance poured like a waterfall, slamming into the demon's husk.
"Ssssk! Gaaah! You damned girl...!"
Even in the gruesome pain of his flesh charring like embers, the demon forcibly twisted his torn lips into a savage sneer.
"Kekeke... Heh! Not bad for light's scraps—you burn hot. But a ten-year-old girl's shallow holy power can't drive me back to the abyss!"
The demon's inverted whites flooded red with bloodshot veins.
"Without my true name, I'm immortal in this flesh! I'll devour eternally until this fine earl's husk rots to pus!"
The black malice, crushed by light, began swelling fiercely again.
"Oh no...!"
"Still not enough!"
The priests' hopeful faces paled once more. The demon's massively condensed aura slowly strangled and pressed Elia's frail radiance.
I skipped along the chapel corridor. Wondering where Elia and Roën had gone, I found everyone clustered at the end.
That creepy rattling carriage from earlier brought some uncle possessed by a demon, right?
"Whoa, it's super noisy down there."
I poked my head through the gap in the slightly open basement door.
The floating blue windows in the air were excited too, weird letters dancing like crazy.
'Chocolate syrup?'
Looking at the black stuff on the floor, it really did kinda look like chocolate syrup. Thinking of food means the tart from earlier's already digested, huh.
Peeking inside, it was super exciting.
"Waaah!"
The uncle called the earl was levitating mid-air, chained up thick. And our Elia was glowing white like a lightbulb from her body.
'Whoaaa! This is like that movie from my past life!'
Exorcism. Elia's a Saintess, so she's using holy power to drive out the demon, probably.
I stood on tiptoes, holding my breath, watching super excitedly. Every time the earl uncle belched thick black smoke from his mouth like a chimney, I wanted to clap like crazy.
Plus, the black shadows on the walls turned into faces, mouths gaping wide. Just like 3D ghost house projections at an amusement park—totally fun.
The blue chat windows flickered like crazy. I giggled reading the texts.
Right then—
My eyes met dead-on with the levitating chained-up earl's!
"Gasp!"
Did he catch me watching?