Chapter 42
Translator: True Detective
Chapter 42: ■■■'s Nightmare (7)
‘The Red Knight.’
The first disaster, the boss monster in charge of Pitch-black Night.
While Lanne and ■■■ were running away from the guy, I moved secretly and handled my tasks.
Was it thanks to my thorough preparation?
Everyone seemed to firmly believe in my death.
‘Well... I even brought similar clothes, a similar mask, and a lump of meat to play the role of a corpse.’
If they aren't fooled even by this, that would be scarier.
I ran around with trivial thoughts.
In this plan, speed is life.
I had to go around the entire Zone A where the barrier was cast.
Of course, I didn't do it alone; as always, our Princess lent a hand.
[ 🦇 Carmilla ]
[Viktor.]
“Princess.”
[ 🦇 Carmilla ]
[I went to the indicated spot, and as expected, there were other cadets. They must be the children trapped in Zone A with us. I knocked them all out and moved them to a safe place. Since I handled it in an instant, this lady's presence wouldn't have remained either.]
“Good work.”
All the students swept up together were moved to the edge of the barrier.
Because the plan could get tangled up if those guys acted up for no reason.
Smooth progress.
“I have just finished my business as well.”
While Carmilla was running around, I widely circled Zone A.
I found and smashed all the recording magic tools installed inside the forest.
Because it would be troublesome if the faculty members checked them later.
Since the place is full of demonic energy anyway, I can just write it off as them exploding from an overload.
“Lastly...”
The crystal ball I threw into the exam venue a few days before the practice.
I slyly collected that back.
With this, the preparations were perfect.
After finishing the work, we returned to the scene.
“Hmm.”
Whether the Red Knight had wreaked havoc, the forest was truly smashed to pieces.
The red armor stood tall, its head seemingly touching the ceiling.
In front of it, only two shabbily broken girls.
Lanne had lost consciousness, and ■■■ was also slumped on the ground.
“It seems I arrived... at just the right time.”
Messily disheveled black hair, and dead black-blue eyes.
■■■ was just quietly muttering with her lips.
As if speaking to something that didn't exist.
—Yeah...
—Do whatever you want.
Muttered words.
The scene that unfolded afterward was beyond expression.
A few seconds after her lips parted, ■■■'s nightmare was scattered into the world.
It was a terrible scenery.
If you were to visualize the word 'ruin', wouldn't it feel like this?
‘So that's it.’
■■■'s nightmare.
All sorts of monsters squirmed and crawled out.
Monstrous birds, queens, chess pieces, playing cards, rabbits...
Ominous things swarmed, and ominous fog spread.
‘Wonderland.’
The name belonging to the third of the seven ruins.
I quietly stared at the desolate landscape before my eyes.
Everything was called in by ■■■.
‘Dream.’
The girl's ability.
The authority to reverse daydreams into reality.
Wonderland was a type of nightmare parasitic under such authority.
[ 🦇 Carmilla ]
[What on earth is that...]
Carmilla muttering blankly.
It was hell.
The rushing monsters knocked down the Red Knight, violently tore its armor, and dragged out its internal organs.
The tentacle-like insides were damaged to the point where their original form was hard to find.
Soldiers running wild with madness, and queens with high-handed murderous intent.
A familiar mechanical sound rang in my ears.
*Ting—!*
[Cleared Main Quest!]
- Title: Pitch-black Night
- Content: Defeat the Boss Monster ‘The Red Knight’.
[You have stopped one of the Seven Ruins!]
- Content: Defeat the Boss Monster ‘The Red Knight’.
[You have stopped one of the Seven Ruins!]
- Special rewards are provided. Please check your inventory.
Content stating the ruin was cleared.
However, I had no leisure to open the inventory.
Because the next moment, the screen of the status window dyed pure red.
*Bbeeeeek—! Bbeeeeek—!*
[EMERGENCY QUEST GENERATED!]
[EMERGENCY QUEST GENERATED!]
[EMERGENCY QUEST GENERATED!]
[EMERGENCY QUEST GENERATED!]
Unlike usual, an urgent notification flashed by.
I dusted my sleeves and quietly gripped my scythe.
[Emergency Quest]
- Title: WelcomeToWonderland.
- Content: Stop the Nightmarization of ‘■■■ (Project Alice-02)’ currently running wild.
- Penalty upon failure: Reign of the Ruin ‘Black Queen’
- Reward: WelcomeToWonderlandAndRevereTheHeartRedWhiteBlackQueensWhoReignOverTheWorld.
- Content: Stop the Nightmarization of ‘■■■ (Project Alice-02)’ currently running wild.
- Penalty upon failure: Reign of the Ruin ‘Black Queen’
- Reward: WelcomeToWonderlandAndRevereTheHeartRedWhiteBlackQueensWhoReignOverTheWorld.
[Time Limit: ???]
The letters on the status window twist weirdly.
Leaving the blinking red light behind, I took light steps toward the girl.
‘Yeah.’
I've been waiting for this.
This moment when the nightmare escapes from inside ■■■.
‘Let's see what you can do.’
The corners of my mouth inside the mask twist automatically.
From now on, I intended to completely smash the girl's nightmare.
***
“......”
■■■ was sitting blankly.
It was because of a boy who appeared in front of her just as she was about to be swallowed by the nightmare.
“Fufu.”
A scenery no different from hell.
However, even in such a scene, the clown was smiling.
It wasn't clearly visible hidden by the mask, but she was certain he was definitely smiling thinly.
“......How.”
■■■ muttering, absent-minded.
Only words like that leaked out.
Because the entire situation was full of questions.
Even the swarming nightmares were momentarily pushed back by agitation.
‘How.’
She had clearly even confirmed his corpse, so how is he alive?
With the nightmare spread like this, how is he perfectly fine?
How did he evaporate the White Queen just now?
How did he appear as if he had been waiting?
What does he want to do about this situation?
How.
How.
How.
“......”
Maybe because everything was mixed up haphazardly, her voice didn't come out.
Her vocal cords, unable to form a single sentence, only trembled rapidly.
Something she couldn't understand.
Maybe it had been like that from the beginning.
From that day the girl watched the boy beyond her dreams.
‘Unknown.’
The boy's existence had always been unknown to the girl.
■■■ even forgot to continue her questions.
Looking up at the mask, her surroundings were quiet.
As if bewitched by something, a world sinking into a lukewarm silence.
“Well.”
The clown did not answer.
He only tilted his head playfully.
“Is there really a need to know?”
Do you really want to know.
The boy looking down with such eyes.
■■■ remained frozen, unable to nod her head.
“Well... shall we have a detailed conversation later. I think putting out the urgent fire first is the right thing to do.”
A hand lightly stroking the girl's head.
*Flutter—.*
Soon, he covers ■■■, whose appearance is a mess, with something.
What he took out from his robe was the school uniform coat he usually wore.
“Please wait a moment.”
The clown delivers a refreshing request.
Then, gripping his scythe, he slyly turns his head.
Behind the clown's back, a horde of nightmares was swarming.
“My my... so many.”
A faint soliloquy.
“I caught one queen, so I just need to catch the remaining two...”
The minimum requirement to calm the situation.
Instantly kill the queens commanding the nightmare.
The clown briefly takes quick steps in place.
“Princess.”
[ 🦇 Carmilla ]
[Why do you call. This lady's loyal confidant.]
A girl who had been standing next to the clown since some time ago.
Flowing silver hair, and flashing red eyes between them.
The clown speaks to her casually.
“I will leave Miss Lanne and Miss ■■■ to you. Please protect the two of them so they don't get hurt.”
[ 🦇 Carmilla ]
[What do you intend to do?]
“I need to step out for a moment. Because I have to knock a few down.”
[ 🦇 Carmilla ]
[Be careful. They are things scattering bizarre energy.]
“There is no need to worry. Because it will end in an instant.”
The next moment.
The clown's figure flickers and leaps through space.
Only sparks remain behind him like an afterimage.
*Pajik—.*
[ 💧 Alice ]
[[♥♥♥♥♥]]
[ 💧 Alice ]
[[◆◆◆◆◆◆]]
The nightmares looking around as if flustered by that.
Where the boy who disappeared like that reappeared was high in the air.
‘Jabberwock.’
The shadow that had been flying in the sky all along.
A monstrous bird with a body as massive as the Red Knight.
From above its head, the boy drives down his scythe just like that.
“First, this side.”
*Pu-uk—!*
The blade digging deeply into the crown of the head.
Ignoring even its signature tough leather, it enters smoothly as if piercing tofu.
At the same time, starting from the point where the scythe struck, the monstrous bird's form melts down.
[ 💧 Alice ]
[[Kki-e-e-e-ek—!]]
The Jabberwock struggles to shake the clown off, but he merely mutters calmly.
“Initiate. Thorns.”
*Peo-eo-eok—!*
Dozens of thorns explode from the tip of the blade.
The monstrous bird's head burst without even leaving a silhouette.
The Jabberwock falling after losing its strength like that.
*Pajik—.*
The clown's body flickers once again.
This time, the boy appeared among the playing card soldiers.
Before the soldiers even noticed, he was already swinging his scythe.
“Heueup...!”
*Chwaaaaak—!*
The blade scratching cleanly in all directions.
Immediately after, the playing cards touched by the scythe melt down.
The clown does not hesitate, dashing between the fading things.
*Chwaaak—!*
*Chwaak—!*
Every time the scythe is swung, the cards are swept away like falling autumn leaves.
After cutting through the forest of playing cards like that, what comes into view is the Queen of Hearts.
[ 💧 Alice ]
[[♥♥♥♥♥]]
An appearance closer to a mannequin than a human.
On a face without eyes, nose, or mouth, only a heart is drawn.
Whether it was backing away, it was putting the soldiers forward like a shield.
However.
“Where are you going.”
*Chwaak—.*
A wall shattering to pieces just from a light swing.
The clown had already approached right in front of the queen's nose.
The corners of the mouth torn to beneath the ears.
At the same time, a dark red curve is drawn in the air.
“Did you really think you could escape?”
*Seugeok—!*
The Queen of Hearts is murdered without even a chance to resist.
A main axis of the nightmare.
One of the three queens.
However, it was a neck that was sliced too vainly.
The cleanly severed head flies, and the torso sprawls on the floor.
“Phew... so tiring.”
Unlike such lines, the boy nonchalantly dusts his sleeves.
At his feet lay countless sliced soldiers.
The clown's mask only smirked.
“Then... now there's only one left?”
The Red Queen.
The boy speaking while looking at the last remaining queen.
“......”
■■■ was blankly watching that sight.
For her, it was an unbelievable scenery.
‘It makes no sense...’
A nightmare she thought she could never resist.
Thus, a life she always had to spend as if running away.
The solitude where she cried silently alone, rotting her insides, yet unable to hope for help.
—As you live.
—You might meet someone who will save you someday, right?
And yet, a contradiction where on one hand, she hoped for salvation.
The foolishness of wishing for someone to catch her.
Because she wanted the sadness and pain to end.
—■■■.
—You will definitely be able to become happy.
The girl who wanted to be happy at the end, just as someone had said.
■■■, ■■■.
The child who shouldn't have been born.
Even so, if she yearned for something...
—For example?
—A prince on a white horse coming to save you.
The girl held her breath.
Vitality sparkled in her pupils that had been smudged black.
Resignation peeled away from her eyes, and tears welled up softly.
Over the flowing tears of blood, a transparent substance mixed and diluted them.
“Ah...”
Crying that gradually added to the moment.
She unconsciously clutched what was draped over her shoulders tightly.
The coat the boy covered her with, the fabric imbued with his warmth.
‘......The person Unnie, talked about.’
A prince on a white horse.
The person who would save the girl.
■■■ thought while looking at that back.
‘Maybe.’
Even in this terrible life, light might shine.
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