Valley of Death (2): The World Is Fair
The world is fair. Fools who find pleasure in violence will soon have their own flesh ripped apart, screaming in agony. Those who claim to purely enjoy testing who is stronger? Those captivated by their own skill as it nears its peak? Bullshit. They are all either liars or madmen. Unless one is a masochistic pervert, there is no way something as ugly as combat could ever be enjoyable. If he acknowledged that, everything Nathan had built on his journey until now would collapse into a foul pile of garbage. After all, the only thing he had learned or done his entire life was violence.
That was why the comfort of this darkness felt especially profound. There was nothing worth returning to in the world’s exhausting chaos. In the end, it would always be one or the other. Hurt someone, or be hurt yourself. That was how it had always been.
Damn it. What a life.
Multiple layers of shadow looked down at Nathan and offered comfort. Nathan was sinking, yet the entity was rising in the opposite direction.
For some reason, a powerful premonition gripped him. Even if he vanished from the world, that existence would accomplish everything using Nathan’s body. Nathan felt reassured. Nathan sank. When the shadow swallowed Nathan, the shadow would rise. Now the shadow would replace him. As it should be.
In the murky space the floor stretched down forever, with only a single exit high above, drilled like a mailbox. If the shadow passed through that exit, Nathan would belong to the shadow. It didn’t matter. Because Nathan was descending. Nathan, who had been falling endlessly, saw the bottom of the bottomless pit drawing near and sensed what it meant. If he submerged himself there, he could forget everything and find peace. His father, Aspen, the worthless fighting… and even that son of a bitch who funded the kidnapping arena, helped push Nathan into this demonic lair, and was now trying to kill his own sibling…
I’m going to crush that bastard before I go.
Nathan rose, and the shadow sank back down… The surge of boiling blood pressure jolted him awake.
The knight felt the icy floor against his cheek and opened his eyes. Blood sprayed from his mouth, drawing dotted lines across the cement.
“Keheup. If there’s a dream worse than this, I don’t want to know it.”
It was unbearably cold. Nathan shivered as he examined the left side of his body. Thick ice coated his entire armor, locking it in place. With trembling hands he loosened the straps on his arm and chest plates. A savage pain crushed his chest. Nathan could only pray it was muscle pain from having his body heat stolen. If his heart had actually stopped once, it would be genuinely terrifying.
Lately the frequency of his life flashing before his eyes had increased sharply. No doubt days of living like a dog had much to do with it, yet it didn’t feel like the only reason.
The usual thing I see when I lose my grip on sanity is Father beating me under the pretense of teaching me. Yet now it’s changed into something even more grotesque.
It felt as if he had glimpsed something like the threshold of the afterlife. As if he had been greeted by an existence with multiple people living inside a single body, the kind of thing that only appeared in dreams… Nathan shook his head inwardly. Andau Peres had been right. This was no way to live. If he survived and made it back, he would return the medicine kit and flee to the countryside. He would hole up in a monastery somewhere and spend a long time recuperating. Of course, to do any of that he first had to survive.
Nathan rose, sat cross-legged, wiped the blood from his nose, and forced his eyes open. In the distance a colossal monster was stroking Nilly’s ice coffin. It looked nothing like an Eleim, not even like a living thing. Having shed its coat, its back sprouted a tangled mess of fur. The bones of its protruding snout were horribly crushed. It resembled the grotesquely rotted corpse of a giant white bear.
“Crazy bastards keep throwing their lives away for you, and I still can’t figure out why. At this point your misfortune has to be demonic possession, Nilly.”
The creature vomited up a long bone handle from its throat and gripped it. The moment its hand closed around the shaft, a massive axe blade of ice bloomed at the end. The monster raised the bizarre weapon above its head and began hammering Nilly’s frozen sanctuary.
“I didn’t want to make your death meaningless. I believed it was only proper not to spill the blood of kin in vain. I was going to display your death so your dismissive siblings would learn you had been a formidable opponent.”
Boom. Boom. Each impact rang out like iron forging, flinging off huge shards of ice. How long until that axe reached Nilly?
“But never mind all that now. The method no longer matters. Because of you, countless talents have lost their lives. You must feel that weight on your own chest. I will personally end your sinful existence!”
Crazy bastard. Nathan clicked his tongue inwardly. The creature’s heart was every bit as hideous as its appearance. This grotesque form had to be Mornid’s true self.
What kind of elf is that? A demon, maybe.
The crooked thorns piercing its back, the faint whiff of sulfur. The longer he looked, the more the possibility that it really was a demon gained weight. After all, doppelgangers and children of the stars were already strolling openly through the heavens. Even if someone had received the Abyss’s blessing and become a demon, it would hardly be surprising anymore. Still, a demon was a dangerous entity that even three or four lion-winged warriors attacking together would struggle to bring down.
Damn. I only heard it was strong. If I’d known it looked like this I might have thought twice before charging in.
Then again, even if he had known, he probably would have charged anyway. Nathan stood with a groan. A grip that froze anything it touched. It was hard to tell how much of his frozen body had been damaged. He could only pray his internal organs were still intact. He would need time to figure out how to kill the monster.
“Ah, shit. I just want to live a little easier. The world refuses to cooperate.”
Nathan cursed himself as he limped toward the creature.
“Stubborn. Too damn stubborn. Let’s stop this already, seriously.”
“Relax. I used to be a famous archer back in my prime.”
“I once killed an enemy general by hitting his nipple from three hundred meters away.”
“Only three hundred meters? In Cydia you have to hit a squirrel at that range before you’re allowed to taste the meat.”
“Were the squirrels in your village smaller than nipples, you country bumpkin from the kingdom?”
“Enough, enough! If you don’t want to end up on a wanted poster, fix your masks properly. We’re getting out soon!”
Benny’s plan had been simple.
First, approach the abandoned building using the boat loaded in the rear of the vehicle. Hidden inside thick fog, they might avoid having their identities exposed.
Second, provide sniper support. The uncooperative patients who built priestly bows in the backyard only to break them would restrain the northern prince trying to kill Nathan from a distance. The fog would not interfere with sniping. Wearing the mana-welding goggles Benny had made herself, the prince whose body overflowed with mana would stand out as clearly as if it were broad daylight.
It would have been ideal to use weapons she had crafted personally, but the risk of being traced was too high. Artisans capable of working metal at that level were rare in the slums. She had to be content with attaching red iron that absorbed mana to the priestly arrowheads.
Third, once the job was done, destroy the goggles and the boat, then scatter along the pre-secured escape routes. Chasing someone through a slum that resembled a maze was nearly impossible. Or rather, they could only hope it was impossible. Since the strategy had been improvised, there were countless ways it could go wrong and leave a trail. From the beginning, sticking their noses into the Protector Lord war waged by the northern madmen had been an insane idea.
Benny prayed. She prayed that her late decision to change her mind and help Nathan would not turn out to be the worst choice of her life.
Yet Benny never got the chance to choose.
“No. Don’t even dream of it.”
The scenery changed right in front of their speeding vehicle. Benny’s eyes widened. Ramkaf let out a shrill scream and slammed on the brakes. Benny, nearly thrown into the front seat, gritted her teeth and looked around. The place they had reached after cutting through the flooded currents was…
“The place you should be is right here.”
In front of the Graveyard House clinic. Behind them a pitch-black dimensional gate stood open. The waterlogged road beyond the gate vomited torrents of water onto the hospital’s front yard.
Benny, who had returned futilely to her starting point, gripped the vehicle’s railing and hung her head. From beyond the dimensional gate, Santra, owner of the Great Arena, stepped out. The sight of her walking lightly across the water was grotesque.
“Foolish Mornid. A few strange rumors, a gang’s threats, a lake created by collapsing the dam. He must have thought that would be enough. That no one would dare approach his little palace.”
At Santra’s gesture the dimensional gate closed.
“Deliberately wounding that bear’s pride would only earn you an uncomfortable strong enemy. At the very least he won’t be able to play at running a hospital anymore. Don’t you regret everything you’ve built up until now, Benny?”
“It was a decision I made after careful consideration.”
The twisted plan churned her stomach. Nathan might already be dead. With wet hair clinging to her face, Benny clenched her fists tightly.
“Santra, let me go back.”
“Benny, I have always liked you, both then and now, but my business comes first. On paper, you are my property.”
“Don’t stop me. Please.”
“I don’t know what wind has blown in to make you show such uncharacteristic stubbornness, but the answer is no. A good friend has the duty to stop a friend’s foolish choices. And…”
The veiled woman turned her gaze toward the direction of the abandoned building and smiled.
“There is something I must retrieve from inside that boy.”
Neither kidnapping, nor threats, nor execution, nor the loss of both wrists, nor even a lover’s betrayal had worked. Would the demon’s bloodline succeed where all else had failed?
“I’m growing curious. Exactly how hard must I press before the outer shell peels away?”
It wasn’t only Nathan who was sick of this. When the knight spinning a two-hander behind him appeared reflected in the ice, the monster that had been Mornid turned and growled.
“If you were lucky enough to survive, you should have run. Why hasten your own death?”
Didn’t you fund the one who kidnapped me? Isn’t the loss of my hands ultimately your fault as well? Aren’t you the villain trying to kill his own family? He could have answered that way. Instead Nathan replied with vicious curses about the other’s parents—crude insults forged on brutal battlefields and polished by Aspen. Mornid nodded.
“Yes, with that much spine it’s no wonder you destroyed my funding source in only two days. I will now grant you the death you should have met in the arena.”
The instant Mornid’s grip tore through space, Nathan suddenly vanished from the creature’s sight. To dodge the foreleg strike, he had simply released all strength and dropped to his knees. At the same time the sword tip naturally aimed for a position the monster could never have imagined. The two-hander that had been spinning upward as if to strike the chin completed one more revolution and struck…
The demon let out a silent scream. Blood dripped from the two-hander that had sliced between its legs. The corner of Nathan’s mouth rose before he could stop it. He simply couldn’t help it.
The monster roared loud enough to collapse the building and slammed its entire body against the floor. Nathan, nearly crushed, lost his sword and was thrown backward. As he struggled to rise, the monster that had retreated a distance swelled its whole body. Any normal beast would have lost its will to fight the moment its testicles were severed, but the opponent was a demon filled with rage.
Faster than expected. Too late to dodge. The charging creature’s bulk filled Nathan’s entire field of vision.
“Ah. Come on.”
Last resort. Nathan raised his arms to shield his head.
Thud.
Once more fallen into darkness, Nathan sighed. If his imagination was this vivid, it was an illness. The suspicion kept growing. Perhaps combat fatigue had driven him insane.
That same place again? This is ridiculous. Let me ask one thing. What the hell is this place anyway?
Not helpful at all. Fine. I need to go back.
Dark space. The floor stretched down forever, with only a single exit high above like a mailbox. Nathan, who had rolled down from the exit, was sinking once more. He tried to crawl back up. But the multi-layered shadow he had met before bound him tightly.
Let go. I’m going back to fight.
Nilly needs help.
Nathan sank. The shadow rose. Now the shadow would truly replace him. As it should be.
It was true. The Rune of Kelsa that could at least have helped in this situation had been severed along with his wrists. Facing a demon without any comrades’ assistance was madness. Who could blame him if he gave up?
Yes, he understood the meaning. But…
It pisses me off.
So I have to crush that bastard and only then go.
Now there were three who thought this was tiresome. Leaving the dumbfounded shadow behind, Nathan rose.
Not yet. He was still breathing. Therefore it was not over. Nothing could be called finished until it was truly finished forever… Yet the moment Nathan opened his eyes he nearly met his end.
Nathan barely rolled sideways. The demon’s axe nearly grazed his shoulder. The monster howled like a northern gale and swung its weapon. The motion of a finishing blow meant to decapitate a fallen foe. The ferocious strikes split the cement floor again and again. One could guess the power behind them. The axe’s point of impact drew closer and closer.
Nathan gritted his teeth, planted a hand on the ground to scramble away, then—
Huh.
He lost his balance and slipped. There was no sensation of ground beneath his feet. A rising dread made him look down at his hand. It was gone. His two frozen prosthetic hands had burst and been horribly severed, leaving only cables behind.
The frozen axe blade descended toward his head.