Chapter 57
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 57
Chapter Title: My Child Who Poured Everything to Awaken Me
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My child who poured everything to wake me up.
The fake Esira gave no answer.
The words weren't finished yet, so I had to hear the rest of the story anyway.
"...What on earth was the reason for creating you?"
It was a question tossed out, meaning to hear the answer first before passing judgment.
But the reply that came back utterly shattered my expectations.
"At first, it was to help people."
"...What?"
For a moment, words failed me.
I wondered if I'd misheard.
Asrania helping people.
It was the polar opposite of the setting I knew.
'Talk sense.'
What kind of being was Asrania in this modern age?
Uncontrollable even within Exim.
The madwoman who would cut down allies without batting an eye if things went south—that was Asrania.
No wonder Marigold had been so shocked.
"That's laughable."
Someone unfamiliar with the lore might have bought it.
She was worlds away from a righteous protagonist like the Commander. Unless it was a character befitting a final boss.
"No matter how convincing the illusion you show, the essence doesn't change. I'm a monster. I always have been, and I still am."
"No. Not from the start."
"Then?"
"Because Esira died to a human."
I didn't so much as blink.
It was a story I'd never heard before, but conviction hit before surprise.
The current Esira's existence meant the past Esira had met her end somehow.
The only surprise was that it had been murder at human hands.
It felt like a setting that fit this grim game's worldview all too chillingly well.
"This world must have suffered greatly. People dying to monsters, vanishing, murdered by others."
"......"
"That's when Mom appeared in the world. Mixed in with those monsters pouring from the rifts."
She drew a clear line. It wasn't hard to grasp.
"In the end, I wasn't human."
She smiled radiantly, nodding as if it were the most obvious thing.
"Closer to our side than to humans."
The child continued, voice trembling with tears.
"You might not believe it, but back then, Mom was called a saintess."
I stared blankly at the lab table.
Black fragments wriggling in the glass dish.
At least it didn't match "saintess."
"So."
I forced myself to stay calm.
"How did a saintess who tried to save people turn into a monster?"
"Mom was too perfect. That was the problem."
The child gazed sadly at Asrania's retreating back.
"Blood Cell isn't something humans can handle. Accepting it destroys the body from the inside out. No one but Mom could withstand its power."
Indeed, Blood Cell would rampage and kill any ordinary human who touched it.
In the original game, even Stella had lusted after Blood Cell, only to go berserk and devolve into the mindless final boss.
It was power enough to be called cursed.
"They reached for immortality's power. Even willing to rip open Mom's belly to steal the Blood Cell."
"...Too bad."
I replied flatly.
Ripping open her belly for power.
No memory of it, but the image formed in my mind. How far humans, steeped in terror and greed, could fall.
"That's when Esira died."
"...To humans?"
"Yeah. While standing up for Mom."
The child added bitterly.
"She got swept up trying to hold back the mob."
"I see."
There was nothing more to say.
"That's when Mom made her resolve."
The child reached out tentatively. Her delicate hand touched my chest.
The spot where my heart beat. Warmth seeped into where the Blood Cell was embedded.
"The shield that protected humans shattered that day."
The child's eyes bored into mine.
"Now, she'll judge them. She vowed to become an unbreakable blade."
"The Blade of Judgment, huh."
Now every piece clicked into place.
Why Asrania's power far surpassed human limits. Why she was so numb to others' suffering. Why she grew stronger the more she bathed in blood.
'Because that's how she was designed from the beginning.'
Abandoning the role of protector, becoming a monster that slays humans.
Not to safeguard, but born solely to eradicate.
I looked down at the child whose hand rested on my chest.
"What's the takeaway from this pathetic glimpse of the past? You want me to turn vengeful spirit and go on a rampage now?"
"First off, one correction. Mom didn't crave revenge. She wanted fairness."
"Fairness?"
"Yeah. Killers get killed. Just enforcing the natural order."
As the child pulled her hand away, the cabin's scenery dissolved like black-and-white static.
"Now you get it? Who I am, what you made me from."
"Yeah. To hunt humans, I crafted you."
"Mom made a monster to fight humans. A true monster, leagues beyond any that's appeared so far."
I fell silent.
My mind grew tangled.
Was all this true?
Or a fabrication by the Abyss, trying to consume me?
No clear conclusion.
One thing was certain.
The red stone pulsing in my chest was reacting fiercely.
"Sorry. For making you agonize like this."
Fake Esira.
No—the Abyss stepped closer.
"I get it. Mom has no memories. I know it's hard to accept right now."
The child hugged my silent form gently.
"But I'm always on Mom's side. Just remember that one thing."
The child's outline blurred. Like molting skin, her form faded away bit by bit. A glimpse of black, viscous essence seeped forth.
Ssshh.
Even as she vanished, she clung to me till the end.
No longer resembling Esira. Dozens of tentacles wrapped around my body—gently, tenderly soft.
It should've been horrifying, but oddly, there was no revulsion.
The black tentacle tips brushed lightly against my left chest, over my heart.
"......"
It tickled.
Like a child patting my chest, whispering not to cry. Strangely endearing.
The Blood Cell clutched in my hand throbbed hotly.
Intense red light leaked between my fingers.
The red gem in my palm and the black Abyss enveloping me linked in a single pulse. It flowed through my veins, illuminating the depths of my mind.
'...Warm.'
The Abyss, which I'd imagined cold, was surprisingly warm.
Like floating in amniotic fluid. Like returning to the safest embrace.
To protect someone. To never be hurt again, she'd armored herself in thorns.
It burned with desperate heat. Pure protective instinct.
I closed my eyes and accepted the Abyss's warmth.
How much time passed?
The black tentacles around me gradually thinned, then scattered into the distance.
The lingering warmth and the red glow that had veiled my vision faded away together.
"......"
I opened my eyes to an empty void, alone.
No trace of the Abyss in Esira's form, nor the tentacles.
Only the red gem remained on my palm, pulsing faintly.
The Blood Cell responded to my touch like a living thing. Even as a stone, I could feel it faintly squirming.
Yet it no longer felt ominous or repulsive. Touching the Blood Cell now, it seemed like a peacefully sleeping creature.
I gazed at the Blood Cell for a moment, then let out a soft chuckle.
"Looks like you poured out all your strength, huh."
The Blood Cell flickered red once, as if nodding "Yeah."
"...At the end, you squeezed everything to restore my memories?"
I muttered bitterly.
Maintaining that massive illusion must have been overwhelming on its own.
Borrowing Esira's form couldn't have been easy either.
And yet, right up to the last...
To persuade me—no, to help me understand, it had burned through its own body.
The Blood Cell lay still for a long while.
Then, just moments later.
A faint vibration hummed across my palm.
An affirmative reply.
"...Ha."
I closed my eyes, then slowly opened them.
Before me stretched endless darkness.
Yet I no longer feared it.
"We're such fools."
I gripped the Blood Cell tight and stepped into the dark.
Thud.
The instant my foot hit, black shadow bloomed from it.
Thud.
The shadow coiled around my ankle, climbed my calf. It enveloped my clothes. The fabric dissolved into black smoke, replaced by new attire.
Gorgeous.
The garb Asrania had worn back then, in the past the Abyss had shown.
Discarding the days as a human.
Returning to that era.
This was my destiny.
I gazed at my altered sleeves, stroking the red gem in my hand.
"You did well."
My child who poured everything to wake me up.
"You rest a bit now too."
I pressed a light kiss to the Blood Cell, then clenched my fist.
Turning my back on the darkness, I walked steadily toward the path back to reality.