“I, am…….”
My body does not obey.
Now, what meaning would there be even if I pick up the sword?
Still, why.
I gritted my teeth and reached out to grasp the sword rolling on the ground.
The saint merely looked down at me with a smiling face.
However, those eyes were not smiling.
With a crunch, I ground my teeth as my golden eyes glared fiercely at the saint.
“……I won’t run away.”
The saint swallowed a dry chuckle at my wicked reply.
Even that was only for a moment.
The laughter, which had merely been a faint smile, began to grow louder and louder. Eventually, it became a colossal reverberation that echoed through the mountains and rivers.
“Puhu, ahaha. Hahahahaha!”
As the saint looked up at the sky and burst into laughter for some time.
Once again, those sky-colored eyes were slowly descending.
A gaze that wrapped around me as if to bind me, having somehow managed to lift my body.
Their eyes glistened with delight and madness.
As if they had encountered a pleasant plaything after a long time.
“……Let there be salvation to those who seek.”
Hearing that prayer, I let out a scream as if in desperation and hit the ground.
“Emmanuel……!”
With a bang, my skull shattered and I died instantly.
Thus, I died dozens, hundreds of times.
At first, my head was smashed to pieces and I died instantly. But even that, once I passed dozens of times, my means of death became increasingly diverse.
Sometimes, a morning star would crush my upper body.
It was common for my heart to be pierced by a sword or to be torn in half from crown to groin.
I truly experienced countless deaths.
At some point, the memories of a certain man began to float before my retina.
It was a war-torn recollection. Scars from a battlefield.
“It’s an ambush. It seems someone has leaked our retreat plan.”
A young messenger, drenched in cold sweat, came to me and spoke.
“We must evacuate those who can escape first!”
“What about the remaining forces?”
“All we can hope for is that as many as possible survive…….”
I thought, covering my face with my hand.
Oh God, are you watching?
Your grand plan is being fulfilled on this land. Your children are suffering, evil reigns, and in the end, they are trying to uproot even the last remaining hope.
But, my resentment was brief. As always, I arrived at the most rational conclusion.
“……We shall flee. Prioritize evacuating those forces that can aid our full strength.”
It was the correct judgment.
I had no doubt this was the best course of action.
If only my beloved had not said to me.
“I will stay behind.”
At that moment, the world froze.
“I will hold the front line here.”
That voice was the last.
With a hazy mind, I thought.
I would not bend.
I resolved that I would not crumble.
But it was not just my body that was wearing down. My mind was increasingly approaching its limit.
Before long, the sun that had been hanging high began to set, and at twilight.
With each resurrection, the time it took for me to regain my senses grew longer. Now, it seemed I could barely regain consciousness after losing myself for quite some time.
No, even after regaining my mind, my thoughts felt submerged in water, hazy.
Would it end like this?
Like everyone who had clung to their stubbornness.
“……It’s not long now.”
It was the saint’s bland statement.
Though the voice reached my ears, my mind did not have the capacity to interpret its meaning.
I merely raised my body.
Even that I had forgotten why.
It was as if by instinct.
At that moment, I heard a desperate cry from somewhere.
“……Stop, please stop!”
Crying and wailing, the lady saint was rushing toward me. Her face, drenched in tears, was truly pitiful.
The saint’s gaze flicked briefly toward behind me.
The lady saint ran and fell, pleading right there.
“P-Please… Please stop, saint! If I die, won’t that be enough? Can’t it all end with just me!”
Though she was not in her right mind, I wished for the lady saint not to be saddened.
So I smiled faintly to reassure her.
With a bang, I lost my life again.
Already the hundreds.
The boundary between life and death was blurring.
The lady saint seemed as if she might go insane.
No, it was no exaggeration to say she was already insane.
She realized for the first time in her life.
The notion that blood tears flow was not a metaphor or an exaggeration. The burst blood vessels, too engorged, shone with a crimson dew, dripping tears of blood.
No one parted their lips.
It was certainly not only due to the overwhelming inertia of the saint. For hours now, a man oscillating between life and death had been etched onto their retinas.
Hundreds, or perhaps thousands?
Blood and brain fluid splattered through the void. Without even a final cry, thick blood stains were scattered across the ground. As the lifeless body twisted, it fell with a thud.
Falling, collapsing, yet continuing to die like this.
It stood up. It was getting back up.
It was an incomprehensible scene.
A tragedy born from the saint’s miracle and the man’s fierce obsession.
Thousands of pairs of eyes stared, entranced, at the battle between the two.
No one spoke, no one at all.
Except for the screaming lady saint.
“No, no… Please, please stop! Someone, anyone stop them… Huh? By any means, no matter what… Please!”
The crescendo of her cries turned into a sobbing suffused with despair.
It had already surpassed hundreds.
The beloved man was being killed. Is there any woman in this world who could witness this in her right mind?
Moreover, that man had stepped into the battlefield to save the lady saint.
The lady saint’s jaw trembled, and her teeth clattered. Her mind, pushed to its limit, was close to collapsing at any moment.
What must be done? Any means, any method.
As the lady saint’s eyes caught the figure of the holy knight, who appeared to be absent-minded, they were originally the ones meant to bind her here.
There was no time to deliberate.
“Ugh?!”
The lady saint violently rose and staggered forward. Once more, her hands were bound behind her, leaving her in an unstable stance. Yet that desperate rush was difficult to grasp quickly.
Or perhaps it was the atmosphere. There was a certain determination felt in the lady saint’s dash.
The will to save her beloved man.
That made the holy knight hesitate for a moment, their gaze seeking an answer from the pope.
Did they need to restrain her again?
The pope made a bitter expression before shaking his head.
After all, the situation had been overwhelmingly maintained by the saint. Even with the lady saint intervening, it would not alter anything.
The saint was not at a level where she could not control the lady saint.
Moreover, the pope felt somewhat overwhelmed by that young knight’s presence.
He had never seen anything like it.
A legendary warrior who had protected the City of Siendel for hundreds of years. The name ‘saint’ stood as a towering wall, a mountain that no one could conquer.
Yet a single man stood before it, wielding a sword.
Compared to the looming cliff, his armor was nothing more than a toothpick. But if he were to fall and rise again.
Wouldn’t you want to witness it?
What might be the end of it all.
Thus, the lady saint rushed forward, now before the saint.
But she could not go any further.
Though her desire to advance burned fiercely, the fallen body showed no signs of rising again. Merely the saint’s gaze flicked over her once.
The lady saint’s legs had hardened, no longer able to move.
As if they had become lead in an instant.
Yet the lady saint pleaded.
Please, stop; can’t it all end with just me?
The man she loved looked nothing but worried for the lady saint. A vague smile formed at the corners of his lips.
With a bang, his head exploded, showering blood like a fruit.
“Ah, aaah… Aaaaah!”
Even if her hands had not been bound, the lady saint would have covered her mouth with both hands to scream.
The sound that escaped her without a cover drenched the blood-soaked ground. The lady saint trembled as if she were having a seizure, burying her head into the earth.
“Ah, no… Please! Saint, forgive me… Was it because I spoke disrespectfully to you? I apologize… I will never, never act so arrogantly again. Please, please let it be only our I-an…….”
Thud, thud.
The sound of her head striking the ground echoed through the desolate mountains and fields.
The earth was darkened with the dried blood, and the twilight sky cast a shadow upon the ground.
The shadows painted the twilight as their gaze turned.
Toward another shadow on its knees, pleading.
“Lost lamb, there is no need to apologize. Hold onto your questions endlessly and deny the existence of the Lord. This too is faith.”
“Then why!”
It was a cry soaked in tears.
The saint, without any words, gazed down at the lady saint. There was no visible disturbance in his sky-colored eyes.
Covered in dirt, the lady saint raised her voice in anguish.
