Beyond the Dream (2)
Beyond the Dream (2)
"Y-you...you...how..."
Rupes flinched and backed away. I slowly turned my head.
Her face was swollen. Blood ran from all over her body. Monica, collapsed on the floor, was trembling as she looked up at me.
There wasn't a single unharmed spot on her. The clothes she wore were torn to shreds. The spit she coughed out as she mumbled was thick with blood.
Even the name she managed to force out trembled.
"Za...hard..."
I took off my coat. I stepped past Rupes and draped it over her.
Rupes drew his sword. He asked in a frantic voice.
"H-how did you get..."
"Shut up for a second."
I raised my hand.
"My head's ringing."
BOOM!!!
"GUBBUBUBUBUB?!"
I slammed him in headfirst. I controlled my strength so I wouldn't kill him.
He has to stay alive. Right. He can't die yet.
You have to live. That way you'll feel even more pain. Isn't that right?
I need a target to take my anger out on right now.
"...L-let go of..."
For a so-called warden, he'd wrapped himself in Sacred Power, so his skull didn't crack. He thrashed and grabbed at my arm.
I slowly lifted my hand. I grabbed his finger and snapped it with a crack.
A strange sound came from Rupes's throat.
"N-ngh...ghk...ngh..."
"Hey."
I broke all five of his fingers. That wasn't enough, so I crushed his wrist.
Crunch.
With a gruesome sound, Rupes's right hand was completely ruined.
"Aaaagh!!!"
"I told you to shut your mouth."
I heard movement. People who had come running at the scream opened the door.
The ones entering weren't guards. They were their enemies. Paladins who had slaughtered the guards and were roaming the Punishment Office.
I glanced over them. I'd thought I'd taken out quite a few on my way here, but some were still left.
"You bastard!"
"Who are you!"
"Wait a moment."
BANG!
I slammed Rupes's face into the wall, deep enough to embed it.
Pebbles pattered down. After confirming that his limp body was still alive, I lightly shook out my wrist.
"...I'm not in a good mood right now. Not in the slightest."
Screams echoed throughout the Punishment Office. Through mana resonance, I heard a wretched crying sound.
It was Amar's voice. She was dying right now. To be precise, her mind was slowly collapsing, which was the same thing.
It was a sound I could hear clearly even without magical power. A sound that would make anyone feel pity.
But these bastards weren't even flinching.
"You all..."
A dagger dropped from my Pocket. Just before it hit the ground, I snatched it with both hands.
"...should know you won't die cleanly."
BANG!
The air burst. In an instant, the cold floor was shoved back with a grinding sound.
Dust billowed out belatedly. The three paladins flinched. They thrust out their swords, but they were slow.
I slipped between them. The dagger spun in my fingertips.
Slash.
"What the fu...!"
A right arm fell. A leg rolled across the floor, and the spilling blood soaked the surroundings.
I wrecked the wrist holding a sword and drove the blade into an ear. I dodged an incoming sword as if deflecting it, then grabbed a paladin's head and slammed it into the floor.
Ten seconds.
The time it took to subdue the enemies.
I tucked the dagger away with a click. The paladins I'd half-crippled collapsed to the floor. They writhed like bugs.
Their bodies were slowly regenerating through Sacred Power, but I had no intention of leaving them alone.
"Stay still."
I pressed down hard on the backs of the paladins crawling on the ground. I snapped their spines, one by one, completely.
Crunch.
"You're kicking up dust."
"Aaaagh!!"
"S-stop, stoooop!!!"
"Your Eminence!!! Your Eminence!!!"
I was sick of hearing "Your Eminence." They were so thoroughly brainwashed that the words "Archbishop Dwayne" never even left their mouths.
So from their perspective, this was as good as a predetermined future. I left the writhing half-corpses alone and walked back to Rupes. His body, embedded in the wall, flinched.
"Did you think I'd pass you by if you played dead?"
"S-stop..."
"Stop what. I haven't even started."
I pulled Rupes's face out of the wall. Then I pressed it against the floor and ground it.
Scrrrrrrrrape.
"Ngh?!"
Blood burst out. Flesh tore away from his face as it was ground against the stone fragments and cracked floor.
I pressed him down slowly, very firmly. With all the care in the world, I peeled the skin off his face.
"S-stop..."
"......"
"I-I'll...reflect...I...I..."
"......"
"Th...ugh...uhp..."
"......"
"...ah..."
Even his screams stopped. I flipped Rupes over. His eyes had stone shards driven into them, on the verge of falling out of his face. His nose and mouth had lost their shape, practically flat.
But he was still alive. I slowly lifted him up. I saw his hand twitch. The hand that had hung limp, playing dead, suddenly moved and grabbed my arm.
There was strength in that hand. He strained as if trying to break my arm.
A surprise attack. It must have been his last desperate move.
But it was a bad one. You stupid bastard.
Whoosh.
Sacred Flame blazed up. His left hand, the only part of him still intact, was dyed by the flames. His throat seemed ruined; his mouth moved, but no sound came out.
Slowly. Very slowly.
The Sacred Flame gnawed at Rupes's body. Like bugs devouring a corpse, it spread inward, slowly.
Rupes's body kept twitching through that slow agony. So he could feel it better, I focused my healing solely on his brain.
Vicious pain. After ten minutes of gasping, Rupes finally let his head droop. I dropped him, no longer moving, with a thud.
Trash bastard...
He touched what he shouldn't have touched.
I stomped on the corpse, its skin all burned away and nothing but ash remaining, and finished erasing it.
I immediately placed my hand on Monica's face.
[Using Healing (A).]
Her ruined face slowly returned. Monica, who had been gasping for breath, flinched her shoulders.
"Za, Zaha..."
"Shh. Stay still. This is just first aid."
Healing isn't all-powerful. It drains not only Sacred Power but also the stamina of the person being healed. Monica couldn't even hold herself up properly, as if she'd taken some kind of drug, so she needed to stabilize first.
"H-how..."
"I came looking for you."
She coughed, hacking. She looked up at me sideways.
"Why...why..."
"If I didn't come looking for you, who would?"
I muttered curtly. My anger still hadn't subsided. I was so furious I couldn't stand it.
Why the hell am I this angry? What for?
I stood up. Before saving Amar, I could see what needed to be done.
I'll kill every last one of these damn paladins. I'll make the bastards who pulled this arrogant shit pay the price.
"Rest here, Monica."
"D-danger...you don't even know what's out..."
"It's fine."
I put the dagger back into my Pocket. The ring on my hand hummed. Mistelten, whispering death, transformed into a black sword and settled into my hand with a smack.
"I'll take care of everything."
Before leaving, I drove Mistelten into the chests of the paladins groaning in pain. As the black sword bored into their chests, the paladins gagged and moaned.
Small roots sprouted. Mistelten's vicious erosion was, in another form, a poison. It pushed physical abilities to the limit, but combined with my "Venom Production," it could create a deadly poison rivaling S-rank.
A Hidden Piece I'd discovered by chance in the game. I pulled Mistelten out of their bodies. Air hissed out of their punctured lungs.
They would slowly die from the deadly poison. Mistelten's erosion would prevent them from even using Sacred Power.
There was no way for them to survive.
Once pierced, they would only suffer until death.
"Who knows? If you pray hard enough, maybe you'll survive. Go on, try praying."
I stepped over them. I left to find other prey.
"Though there's no god left to listen now."
. . .
Paladin Order Commander Pablos raised his head. The First Punishment Office.
He had even brought covert troops to clean the place out thoroughly. In terms of numbers alone, the people who had attacked the city of Filamon were greater, but in quality, this side was a cut above.
This was the main force, Dwayne's special unit led personally by Paladin Order Commander Pablos.
But what was this?
He had brought only the elite of the elite...so what the hell was this situation?
"Squad 1?"
"Contact lost."
"Squad 2?"
"Contact lost."
A mechanical voice replied. Pablos gripped his sword hilt.
There was something inside the Punishment Office. Something he didn't know about. They had surely killed most of the guards...
Who else was there besides that group?
Pablos frowned. He considered the possibility that Director Veronica had returned, but soon shook his head.
There was no way she was back already. It wasn't a force that could be subdued in half a day, and she would certainly stay in the city of Filamon for at least two days to prevent additional casualties.
The moment Director Veronica returned would be right after everything was already over.
Pablos scowled. He glanced at Amar, who was twisting her body.
"...How long until complete rampage?"
"A little over ten hours."
"Has Amar's mental state stabilized?"
"Not yet. She's still at the threshold of the dream. She hasn't entered full sleep. We're completely sealing her consciousness through Sacred Power...but it looks like it will take some time."
The paladins moved busily. They drew out Sacred Power with all their strength to stabilize the spell eroding Amar's mind.
Pablos rubbed his brow hard. He organized his thoughts and reached a conclusion.
They had lost some troops. He didn't know what was out there. But the plan was already as good as complete.
There was nothing to fear.
The First Punishment Office would fall, and Cardinal Dwayne would stand atop it. That was the natural order.
Once the Holy Art was completed, no one would be able to return Amar's body to its original state. When that moment came, Pablos only needed to gather his paladins and escape the prison.
Only a tiny amount of time remained until the large-scale spell was complete.
No matter what was out there, nothing would change.
Everything would go according to plan.
"...Heh heh heh."
A low laugh rang out. A wolf Beastfolk sitting blankly inside the bars, staring this way, spoke.
"You touched the wrong thing. You went and touched someone you shouldn't have. You stupid fools."
"Do you want to die right now? Sinner?"
"The sinner seems closer to your side than mine."
A Lizardfolk who had been quietly observing the situation from inside the cell rose to his feet.
"Run before our brother returns. That is your only way out."
"...Brother?"
"Brother. A human sturdier and stronger than any warrior of the grasslands. I saw him for the first time. It has only been a month since I met him. But..."
"He's strong!"
A voice that suddenly cut in moved inside the cell. A black-haired woman clinging to the bars grinned.
"You know, you guys are the bad guys, right? People who killed a bunch of guards and came all the way in here. Why don't you just let me blow you up and die by my hands? Amar is a monster Zahard cares about. When he gets here, you're all going to die...wouldn't it be better to just get blown to death by me instead?"
"Zahard, you say?"
He had heard the name. A paladin who had contributed to the salvation of Paramer. A rookie who had only just joined the Inquisition Office.
He was someone Cardinal Dwayne had specifically warned them to be careful of. But Pablos didn't believe that information.
He was surely just someone born from coincidence piled on coincidence. Pablos figured people who had reached a high realm like himself didn't need to pay much attention to him.
But...was that not the case?
"...What do you mean by that?"
"What do I mean?"
The voice crawled out from between the bars. A serpent's tongue flicked out of her mouth and swayed.
"Just die now. If you don't want to end up more miserable."
Ting.
Pablos staggered. He seized his momentarily derailed mind and raised his head.
A mental attack?!
Pablos clutched his head. He snarled and struck the bars.
"Shut your mouth, capital sinner. I don't know who you are, but if you move that tongue one more time, I'll tear you apart alive."
"...There's a suggestion on you far stronger than me. Whoever did it, they clearly did a thorough job, didn't they?"
The woman leaning against the wall spoke as if whispering.
"But that ends now too. The difference in power will be overwhelming."
"I told you to shut—"
"He's coming."
The woman raised her head. Pablos heard it.
Footsteps piercing through the silence. The Lizardfolk muttered.
"Quiet footsteps. How frightening. I don't even know how angry he is...but these are footsteps I've never heard before."
The wolf Beastfolk swallowed dryly.
"...The guy's angry, huh. I don't even want to imagine that. He's someone who only ever played around even when sparring with me. If someone like that gets serious..."
"Everything's going to burst. Boom."
The black-haired woman took a step back from the bars.
"I haven't done anything wrong. I don't want to get scolded by Zahard, so I'll stay back."
"I concur."
"Same here."
"Facing him...I don't even want to imagine it."
The capital sinners each backed away from the bars. They hid themselves in the darkness. Pablos understood even less.
Just what was this Zahard, that even these capital sinners were afraid of him?
"What are you...afraid of?"
These people were the worst of the worst, who had once caused immense damage. Weren't they managed separately because their threat level was so high?
"It is not fear."
The Lizardfolk, a step away from the bars, muttered.
"A story you do not know. We 'respect' him."
The steady footsteps grew louder. They stopped in front of the door, and then the sound of something dropping was heard.
"......"
The door opened. Something rolled inside.
A subordinate's head. A face Pablos knew.
A foot that entered a beat later crushed that head. A man covered in blood walked through the door.
"...There's a lot of you."
A black sword hung at an angle. Pablos flinched in surprise without realizing it.
How strange. The glare flowing down through his blood-smeared face was eerily vicious.
A predator.
The kind that must never be touched.
A man who would skin alive anyone who invaded his territory and hang them up.
"Let's reduce the numbers first. Makes it easier to talk."
Zahard...
So that was Zahard.
Pablos hurriedly drew his sword without realizing it. Even though his capabilities had risen further than before as payment for his contract with Dwayne, he couldn't stop the goosebumps.
What is this?
There's something.
That man who had slaughtered paladins until his original priest robes were dyed red definitely had...
Definitely had something!