Chapter Sixty-Four: Recognizing Hell (Part One)
“Go.”
I waved my hand at the Sword Demon and continued on my way, “Let’s see what’s going on.”
Whether I remembered or not, this silent fortress had some serious issues, and I was curious about what the Church was up to inside. Why was the Sword Demon all mixed up in her memories? Where had all the missing knights and refugees gone? And what about those poor women who had been tormented—where were they now, and how were they doing?
I figured I could find out everything soon enough.
Just wait and see…
Then, decide what to do next.
With the bright sun above, I marched across the lush grass, smelling the refreshing scent of nature as I headed towards the castle. Before long, I could hear the Sword Demon following behind.
“You look… a little angry.”
She said in a calm tone, as if she had just shaken off her earlier panic and tossed those worries aside. I didn’t turn around to check her face, but it sure sounded like it.
“Do I?”
I couldn’t help but pout.
She had never shown much expression anyway… Why now?
“…Intuition.”
Ah…
Here we go again with the nonsense.
d*mn your intuition…
“Are you scared?”
I didn’t feel like dealing with her, so I changed the topic.
“Scared.”
The Sword Demon answered without hesitation, yet her footsteps drew closer as she quickened her pace to catch up with me. “I don’t like this confusion…”
“Scared but still following me?”
I noticed she had aligned herself beside me on the right but had deliberately slowed down, so I glanced over. I couldn’t read her expression, but it seemed like her body was tense. She had her arms folded across her chest, clutching her sword tightly, with her right hand lightly resting on the hilt, ready to draw at a moment’s notice.
“Are you luring me into a trap so you can escape?”
I probed casually, observing her while speeding up. The female swordsman matched my pace again, but when I paused for a moment, I didn’t hear her offer any defense.
She fell silent again…
Shouldn’t she say something at a time like this? Even a flimsy excuse to ease my suspicions would do—show a little sincerity, why don’t you?
“Tsk…”
I clicked my tongue in annoyance.
Boring…
Fine, no more teasing her.
“Sword Demon.”
I called out, “You said you couldn’t remember. Was it coming back here that triggered something? Didn’t you realize anything during the time after leaving this silent fortress?”
A chilly breeze brushed my face, not cold but enough to scatter my hair a bit. I pushed a few strands out of my eyes with my pinky and heard the swordsman’s slow words beside me.
“No…”
It sounded like she was thinking as she spoke, her voice sporadic and confused. “Coming back here, seeing the castle and the camp… some things resurfaced. Before that, I don’t know why, but it seemed like I hadn’t actively thought about anything concrete related to this silent fortress… I had impressions of some fragments, but how the whole thing happened, I… I can’t really remember…”
I couldn’t help but interrupt, “Because you were too lazy to think?”
“I don’t know…”
The swordsman pondered for a long time but finally shook her head lightly. “In any case, I never thought about it. Just that it felt dangerous here, and I needed to stay far away.”
“……”
So instead of amnesia, it sounded more like some kind of ‘memory interference’?
[Those guards from the royal city that were taken away—I asked them later… and guess what? Since they returned, they literally don’t remember anything about the valley.]
Suddenly, Rect’s words replayed in my mind.
[It’s terrifying. I don’t know how the Church did it, but those who came into contact with people escaping the valley, then got taken by the Church, came back as if parts of their memories had been erased by some kind of power. They don’t even remember having been there, or anyone who came out of the valley, or anything that was said. They have no clue at all.]
[It’s like suddenly there’s a blank spot in their lives…]
Rabeli Valley…
The landslide… the place where Iliush first appeared…
The Abyss…
Illness.
And—
[None of us will hurt you… you just need to sleep well… When you wake up, the world will return to how it was, and you won’t remember what happened tonight. I won’t let you have any bad memories…]
In the hazy dark of that nightmarish night, Angel’s nightmarish voice once again surfaced vividly in my mind.
[Little Black Charcoal, be a good girl and sleep, and let me take you home…]
Memories…
Erased by Angel and company through some unknown means, even now, after merging the power of the Deity, there are still many things I can’t recall from those days after going missing, leaving the Valen Empire, and finally being reborn as a monster from the Abyss Mud…
Those important memories I lost during those two years.
And what kind of power allowed them to deceive and control me, to play with me as they wished…
Or what kind of thing was it?
…The answer may be right here.
Perhaps…
“What’s wrong with you?”
The Sword Demon’s casual question pulled me back from my flashback.
I exhaled sharply, calming the turbulent emotions within, and turned to her. “Do you know if the Church has something that can erase or alter people’s memories?”
After the question slipped out, the swordsman’s expression clearly froze: “Does it…?”
She sounded uncertain.
But just that reaction didn’t earn my full trust.
“On the night they captured me in Woodward Forest, you were with Angel and the others, right? Do you know what they were doing there?”
“I do.” She blinked, not grasping the meaning behind my question.
“And how much do you know about them—those guys in black cloaks?”
“……”
The female swordsman lowered her head and thought for a moment. “They are a very secretive group within the Church, called The Choir of Saints. Their job seems similar to mine, doing some cleanup work…”
“What else?” I pressed on.
“That’s all I know.” She shook her head. “Our assignments that night were different… I don’t know about the others; I was only responsible for combat… And I got there a bit earlier than them. I blocked that heretic for you before you even stepped into that tree.”
…?
That happened?
…Oh.
Seems like it really did…
Just when I was about to charge into the Dragon Land, my Moon Step was stopped by that old heretic. At that time, a Thunder Light did indeed hit him out of the way for me…
That was the Sword Demon?
I didn’t see her clearly back then…
“I’m not with them.” Sensing my lingering doubts, the Sword Demon emphasized again, and beyond that, she had nothing more to add.
“…Okay.”
I nodded and fell silent.
Not like I could pull out any more information from her…
Before long, we passed through the grassland and followed a narrow path leading to the castle’s north side. I found my mind wandering aimlessly and, when I realized it, I looked up to see countless tattered tents and rudimentary shelters made of dirt and wood just under a kilometer away.
“…Wait!”
Suddenly, I came to a stop.
