Chapter 311 |
What She Wished For (4)
During his stay in Sealed City.
After long deliberation, Najin reached a single conclusion. It was a conclusion about this Star's Tomb, built from Yuel's past, and a conclusion about the Carnival King.
It was not that the Carnival King chose not to intervene.
That demon could not intervene.
While he stayed in Sealed City, Najin tore through the city like a hound hunting rats, searching for traces of the Carnival King. Even if he was constrained by an ordinary human body, Najin's essence was still infinitely close to a Transcendent.
A being like that spent years investigating a single city.
And still, no trace of the Carnival King appeared.
At that point, Najin came to a conclusion. There was no target in this city for the Carnival King to take root in. In other words, the Carnival King could not intervene in what happened inside Sealed City.
Even she, when intervening in someone's story and trying to twist it, would assign herself "a certain role" in that first attempt.
Just as, in Don Quixote's story, the Star of Mirth claimed the role of "Lady Dulcinea."
After taking a specific role, she seeped in from the smallest point and warped the story, like dye dissolving into water. Her approach was careful, secretive, and drawn out over long years.
But none of that existed in Yuel's story.
There was no trace of the Carnival King in Sealed City.
So the point where the Carnival King contacted Yuel in the past was not inside Sealed City.
He had roughly guessed that already.
Because he had clues. Najin recalled the conversation he had with Yuel before entering Star's Tomb.
"Yes, only the memory of facing the true body of the Star of Forgetting at the end of the dream is clear. I cannot remember the other scenes. I only feel a vague fear."
A sense of incongruity.
Why was only the final part in focus?
If the Carnival King had intervened from Sealed City onward, she would not have stopped at merely drawing in the Star of Forgetting. She could have touched Yuel's mind and turned her into a complete monster.
A perfect baleful star could truly have been born.
The Carnival King would never miss that kind of chance. But she did not touch that point. Yuel did not become a monster, and she was not all that different from her usual self.
"My past self was afraid. Afraid of what, terrified of what, and I ended up questioning that."
She only stirred Yuel's emotions at the very last moment and gave her a push from behind. Why? The answer was simple. She had no choice.
She could not touch the larger framework of the story.
Because in Yuel's past, the Carnival King did not play a major role. In this story, her original role was probably no more than an observer.
But one thing was certain.
At this point in the past, the Carnival King definitely existed. It was not hard to guess when she was present, and at what point she would reach out to Yuel.
There were not many eyewitness accounts of the Carnival King.
But in most cases where records clearly stated she had appeared.
She appeared alongside a certain Constellation.
The Star of Forgetting.
Where the Star of Forgetting appeared, the Carnival King came with it.
* * *
The Carnival King opened her eyes.
At this point in the past, at this very moment, she existed here. Because she had to uphold a contract with a certain star.
The moment that star moved.
The Carnival King had to move with it. She spread the darkness she took pride in, covered witnesses' sight with paint, and hid that star's true body. That was the contract between her and that star.
In return, the Carnival King could borrow that star's Authority. It was a contract with no loss and all gain.
This moment was no different.
The Carnival King moved after the suddenly moving star. And there, she witnessed the moment the Star of Omniscience tried to complete a baleful star. She also witnessed the moment that completed baleful star collapsed immediately.
On that day, at that moment, she had been here.
Inside her past self's body, the Carnival King looked down at the ground. She could see it. A baleful star trying to rise while twisting the laws of the world, and she could hear the wish that baleful star made.
Rumble.
Then, as if answering that wish, a star began to move.
Ah.
The Carnival King lamented. It would have been nice if she could make that baleful star her own. But she had only a few points where she could intervene in this story.
Even if this was a reenactment of the past.
Touching the Constellations appearing here was too great a burden. It was difficult to significantly distort a story involving two stars, the Star of Omniscience and the Star of Forgetting.
Just one step.
Abandon the role that had originally been hers in that past, "hide the true body of the Star of Forgetting," and make her, who was trying to discard her past without regret, feel regret instead. Use that regret to spark curiosity.
A small move, but a fatal one.
With just this, she could shatter the imperial army. And unlike what she expected, that man jumped into this Star's Tomb to block that move.
The Carnival King's eyes narrowed.
She sneered at the being who had stepped onto the stage as if he would rewrite the story she had barely touched, the script she had laid out, in his own way.
Do it. Go ahead.
Do you realize? This is no different from giving me one more chance. Should I make those emotions run wild this time and ruin your plan entirely? Touching a story once, then touching it again, is far too easy.
The Carnival King moved her hand.
Paint sloshed. Her Authority shone. The moment that paint, which erased, corrected, and distorted the sentences of the story, tried to invade the stage.
Sssshhhhk!
Something split the air.
Thud.
It grazed past the Carnival King's side.
It pierced the paint she had raised in an instant.
"..."
The Carnival King's eyes narrowed. As if someone had precisely identified where she was hidden, the spearhead that tore through the paint was embedded right beside her.
It was a spear she knew as well.
Lance of the Crossed Star.
The symbol of those detestable Golden Horn Knights.
Pressing a hand to her throbbing heart, the Carnival King's eyes narrowed further.
Tap.
Then she heard footsteps.
"So you were here after all."
When she turned and looked, that man was walking toward her. His hand held nothing, but only for an instant.
Clench.
The moment he grabbed empty air, starlight flooded out. Even the stage, expanded for the arrival of Transcendents, struggled to endure. The holy sword that made even Star's Tomb creak was drawn by his hand.
"Carnival King."
Excalibur.
And the human holding Excalibur.
"Ah."
The Carnival King smiled.
"It's you again."
The two of them, two beings from the future who should never have existed in this story, looked at each other. Their gazes crossed.
"Are you trying to interfere with me again?"
"Do I need words?"
Excalibur was aimed at the Carnival King.
The Carnival King's paint sloshed and pooled on the floor.
"This is earlier than I expected. I wanted to avoid meeting you if possible. Even if we did not rush to meet like this, weren't we going to meet soon anyway?"
"Really? What a coincidence. I wanted to meet you one second sooner."
"Oh my. Is this a confession?"
A detestable smile. Words she did not mean.
They both laughed at each other.
At this point, the Carnival King had nine stars. As those nine stars rose behind her, Najin kicked off the ground.
Excalibur flashed.
The Star Sword engraved with The Star of Dawn shone.
As he charged toward the Carnival King, Najin thought to himself. He was not the protagonist of this stage. And for the stage where the protagonist could shine, a supporting role would sometimes throw himself in willingly. Najin hurled himself toward the flooding paint.
To buy time.
And to stick it to that damned demon.
2.
Outside, revealed as Sealed City collapsed.
It was a ruin stretching beyond the horizon. Yuel opened her eyes in the middle of those ruins and turned her gaze. Countless cities were buried here.
It was also a vast sprawl of experimental grounds.
Cities that had existed even before Sealed City. And countless experiments that must have been attempted before Sealed City as well. The traces of those experiments remained here intact. To Yuel, it looked like one giant graveyard.
"Ugh..."
Yuel staggered. She felt disoriented.
Her body would not move the way she wanted.
Her head hurt.
Breathing was difficult.
Her eyes throbbed.
Her mind was a mess.
It felt like a giant wave was pounding her body. Every time a wave crashed, she felt she would be swept away and dragged under. Her vision shook, and ringing filled her ears.
She had skipped the designated stages and stepped straight into Transcendence. And she had done it through an abnormal method. The human mind was not built to endure Transcendence in the first place. A gap had formed between the soul and mind that had been half-forced into Ascension.
And her star was a black-red baleful star.
A baleful star that polluted the mind, twisted the soul, and dyed everything black-red. There was no way a human mind could endure a baleful star.
The moment she let go like this.
The moment she was swept away by the wave.
She would become a beast. Transcendence was eroding Yuel's mind by the second. She did not have much time. So Yuel tried to immediately do what she had already resolved to do.
But then.
Splash.
Something covered Yuel's sight. Paint stained in every color wrapped around her body. The moment she was stained by that paint, all sorts of voices echoed in her ears.
"Is that really what you want?"
"Aren't you afraid?"
"You are going to lose yourself. That is no different from death. Why do you have to do this?"
A sweet voice melted her eardrums. Countless illusions spread before her eyes. They were happy futures she had imagined once.
A future with that man.
A future where ordinary days continued forever.
Or a future where she might be able to do the math she loved again.
Simple dreams passed before her eyes.
Dreams she had to give up.
The voice whispered in Yuel's ear. Isn't your willpower strong? If you endured for so many years in Sealed City, can't you resist this madness too? Is there really any need to make this choice? Won't you regret it?
Thoughts she had already gone through again and again.
The moment those voices became a giant wave and tried to sweep her away together with the baleful star.
Clench.
Someone.
"You told me not to let go."
Grabbed Yuel's hand. In that wave rushing in to sweep her away, he became an anchor and held her in place.
Then, yank.
He pulled her out of the paint.
"What am I supposed to do if you are the one who lets go?"