A World Where Death Had Vanished
I closed my eyes and focused, sharpening my senses toward places beyond sight and sound. Worlds on the brink of destruction share common omens. Chaos arising to devour the world piece by piece.
From my experience as a reaper who had watched countless worlds collapse, the signs were unmistakable when a world began to crumble: fissures splitting the earth, structures twisting wildly, living beings warped into grotesque shapes. Anything changed by chaos would vanish as though it had never existed in the first place. Or, more precisely, it became one with the chaos. Once it grew large enough, that chaos would swallow the entire world.
Yet no matter how keenly I stretched my senses, I could detect no trace of chaos. Instead, the air was thick with negative energy. …What on earth is going on?
Negative energy certainly harmed a world, but it wasn’t a force that directly shattered reality like chaos. Of course, because it corrupted souls into evil spirits, it was far more horrifying to reapers like me than chaos could ever be…. Still, the negative energy seemed unable to spread beyond a certain boundary. In other words, this world appeared unstable yet was strangely, stubbornly solid.
The bizarre contradiction made me frown without thinking. Wait, maybe my senses have simply grown dull. I was confident in my detection abilities, but right now I couldn’t be certain. There was always the chance that my senses weren’t as sharp in this world as they were elsewhere.
Asking someone who has lived here a long time would be best.
I turned my gaze to the Saint and spoke carefully.
“Saint, is there perhaps some problem with this world?”
At my question, her pupils trembled violently. In an instant, her face turned paler than the snow piled around us, like someone whose hidden secret had just been exposed. Her voice shook as she murmured.
“…How did you know?”
Just as I thought. There was definitely something wrong with this world, and it was serious enough to make the Saint tremble from head to toe. A world that defies the laws of the universe couldn’t possibly be without problems….
I tried to ask her again, but before I could open my mouth, she grabbed me with a trembling hand.
“It’s because of me.”
“…Pardon?”
Her knees buckled and she collapsed to the floor. Then she bowed her head as if pressing her forehead to the ground. Startled, I hurried to help her up, but she wouldn’t budge.
“Saint?!”
“I cursed them. So please, kill me quickly!”
She clutched at my trouser leg as she spoke. …Wait, this felt strangely familiar. Is this what people call déjà vu?
The suddenness left me dazed for a moment before I snapped back to my senses. No, this is exactly what happened earlier!
A sense of foreboding, born from two experiences, flashed through me. Worried she might hand me a weapon again, I quickly hid my hands behind my back.
“Please… just kill me. …I want to die. I have to die.”
I let out a sigh as I looked down at her. The way she hung her head against the floor looked utterly pitiful. I pulled my hidden hand back out and gently patted her back.
“Saint, didn’t I tell you earlier? You mustn’t speak of dying so lightly. Life is precious and important. You should cherish and value it.”
But she only shook her head weakly.
“…No. That’s not true at all.”
Her hollow murmur sounded emptier than anything I had ever heard. Clear tears slid down her cheeks.
“…Something like my life… it isn’t precious in the slightest.”
Her small shoulders trembled pitifully. Tears fell to the floor, leaving countless droplets behind.
“I… I need to disappear from this world as soon as possible.”
“Saint.”
“Only if I disappear, if I die, can everyone become happy…. I shouldn’t be alive….”
“Don’t say such ridiculous things!”
My shout echoed through the corridor. For the briefest moment, focus returned to the Saint’s previously cloudy eyes. I knew I couldn’t let that moment slip away. I quickly grabbed her shoulders.
“I understand. People like that… the kind of person you’re talking about—I know them better than anyone!”
“…How could you?”
Her voice still sounded empty, yet it was different from before. A faint trace of doubt had crept in. If I didn’t answer that doubt, it felt like she would shatter completely. I closed my eyes and spoke clearly.
“I have no choice but to know.”
“…Why?”
“…Because.”
I didn’t want to say it. I didn’t want to drag the memory out. But….
I bit my lip hard before slowly opening my mouth.
“…It’s because I’ve been erasing people like that all this time. Without leaving even a trace behind.”
The moment the words left me, cold air sank deep into my lungs. It felt as if frozen senses were painfully waking up. A bitter smile rose unbidden. Yes. That was what I had done before I was assigned to guide souls to the underworld.
Eradicating “transgressors” who defied the laws of the universe and threatened its order. It was the fate engraved in me from the day I opened my eyes as a reaper. A being created solely to preserve cosmic order. One who had cast aside emotion, thought, and hesitation, repeating only endless battles to maintain that order. That was who I was.
Though I had been demoted for being unqualified in many ways, the instinct to hunt down transgressors still remained vivid inside me. There was no way someone like me could fail to recognize a person who “needed to disappear from the world.” The moment I found them, my instincts would have already prepared me to erase them.
I lowered my head slightly and smiled bitterly. I slowly withdrew my hands from the Saint’s shoulders and said,
“…If you had been that kind of person, I would have drawn my weapon the instant I saw you. And I would have erased you without hesitation.”
“Ah….”
Her lips trembled faintly. The emotion that flickered through her eyes was neither fear nor relief. For some reason, the sight made a corner of my chest feel heavy. I lifted my head and added quietly,
“So please don’t say things like that. You are not that kind of person. As a reaper, I can promise you that. …So stop hating yourself.”
The Saint neither agreed nor disagreed. She simply kept crying, tears flowing endlessly. This time I didn’t touch her. No, it felt like I shouldn’t touch her anymore. Honestly, I didn’t have the courage. The fear that I might confirm she was afraid of me weighed heavily on my heart.
I simply stood beside her in silence. That was all I could do right now. I watched over her from a short distance, the way one might wait for someone about to die. Just as the familiar quiet began to swallow my heart, the Saint suddenly grasped my hand tightly.
“…Saint?”
I flinched and stepped back, but the faint trembling I felt at her fingertips stopped me. She looked up at me. Within her anxiously shaking eyes, there was a strangely steady sincerity. In a voice that sounded on the verge of breaking into sobs, she asked,
“…Then will you look at me? …At my sins.”
“Sins?”
I asked reflexively. She let out a small breath and nodded slowly. The gesture looked like a ritual in which she would confess her sins and judge herself. But that wasn’t within my authority. I was not qualified to judge her sins or to bear their weight.
I answered firmly.
“I’m sorry, but I am not a god who passes judgment or renders verdicts on sin.”
“…That’s not it. I’m not asking you to judge me. Just… after you see my sins, if you could still tell me….”
She swallowed a sob and continued.
“If you could tell me that I’m still someone allowed to live….”
“Saint….”
“…Please.”
I could feel her desperately trying to cling to hope amid deep despair. If I preached about cherishing life, isn’t it my role to help her feel that way?
I took a short breath and answered calmly.
“Very well.”
“…Thank you.”
Still holding my hand, she urgently pulled me along. We stopped before a large door at the end of the corridor.
“…What is this place?”
“A place that contains all my sins.”
The Saint gripped the door handle and hesitated for a long time. I could see her fingertips trembling faintly. Then, as if she had made up her mind, she turned to me. Her eyes were a mixture of sorrow, guilt, and somewhere beneath it all, a desperate hope.
“…Come inside with me.”
She slowly opened the door. And I finally understood the unpleasant yet familiar smell that clung to her body.
It was the stench of death.
The sight that unfolded before me was horrific. Countless people lay on tightly packed beds, breathing faintly. Most of them were gruesomely mutilated. Some were missing limbs, others had parts of their skulls blown away with brains exposed. There were those whose innards had spilled out and were rotting where they lay. They were the lucky ones—at least they still retained some semblance of human form.
Many others were reduced to pulp beyond recognition, or reduced to only lower bodies, or only the upper torso without a head. But the most terrible thing was….
They were all moving as if they were alive.
Grotesquely twitching flesh and faintly rising chests. The horrible noises filling the ward were impossible to distinguish as breathing or moaning. I covered my mouth and muttered.
“…What is this?”
“This is my sin.”
The Saint’s voice was calm, but the tears streaming down her cheeks never stopped.
“I made it so these people cannot die, just as you see.”
“…….”
“Even after seeing this, do you still think I deserve to live?”
She lowered her head, as if even asking the question was itself a sin.