CH 7: The Devil Laughing PT 2

[ You have transferred.]

"…" 

[ You have gained experience.]

[ You have gained experience.]

[ You have gained experience.]

[ You have gained experience.]

I saw four people die in when I transferred.

The statues were killing again and I could feel the negative emotions of a hunter standing before me as we both watched as it happen.

I saw the Cruel lord standing over the body of another who was crushed smothered underneath his heels.

I glanced down and saw both my knees were missing, like they were torn of and ripped of my parts.

The blood trailed from the floor to a set of legs resting near a statue holding onto a large axe.

I assumed I was dragged while they were dying. Someone had attempted to help.

I don't know, but even if I couldn't feel it.

I think it would be far better if they had left me dead.

It would be a little merciful.

I was used to experiencing my body in this kind of way to point where it almost seemed normal for something familiar as this to be my reality.

The only problem was, I never got to live long enough to understand just how painful losing your legs can affect you.

" Boss." I heard the hunter speaking as he said a name of the young person we were looking.

Who died in such an awful way.

Now I was crippled and I noticed the injured that were taken under the statues without weapons. 

A few young hunters tended to those who survived like me.

I saw they may die.

It was their external conditions that showed it.

Some had their eyes closed and others rested sleeping on the floor without a heart beat left in them.

Many were dying, but my heart beat was steady and my mind was calm to it.

 I only experience have experience this side of living.

When I worked for Siphon.

Even if I were not some kind person who transfered.

I know the killings would never change.

[ You have gained experience.]

Nothing in this kind of life will ever change at all.

I know…

" Boss…" The old hunter fell to the floor as he mourned for the girl, I saw his mind go in that second as he stared to the sword on the ground in front of his eyes.

I reached out my hand in an attempt to comfort him, but even if I know what it's like to lose something. I couldn't reach him from here.

So all I could do was watch him from a distance as I assumed.

He might just… I wasn't that person who can show the right empathy for others.

But I raised my finger and began writing.

Hoping that this would change.

I didn't have the confidence to believe it would change anything.

Not when the only noise erupting in this place was the sound of the statues footsteps, the screams from the hunters as they ran from them.

[ Don't give up.]

[ Choose life.]

All I could do was leave those two words.

Then I focus on legs that were gone.

One moment.

There was an awful scream.

A statue stood over a man holding on its sword over it's shoulder.

The hunter was enthralled by the Cruel Lord in the center of the dungeon, but couldn't see the one right behind him.

It lifted it's sword high and before it swung down.

I saw his death.

It would split him right through the middle.

Just like my past lives before.

"…" Something hurt my heart knowing it.

Nothing would ever change. Unless I tried to alter it.

Over and over. It was always the same.

— Why did monsters exist in this place.

— Why?

—— Why do I always have to live with seeing things like this?

——— Why do people have to die…. Why….

—— Why does this feel normal?

 I pushed my fingers against each other and snapped my index and thumb very hard.

In that short moment.

I lost energy from the use of my hands.

What normally happens is for the system to relay what I had done, but I didn't want to see it through a notification.

The statue paused before it could drop the sword.

The hunter finally noticed it… and ran.

Time snap.

An ability I had taken from a video game.

A modification in that game that has the power to capture all statues within my awareness and have their movements restricted by time.

I felt something crawl behind my eyes after using my fingers.

An awful feeling as if needles were tearing it from inside to be open.

One side of my vision blurred and turned red.

I captured all of them. 

No-one had to die anymore.

" Al!, Al!" I heard a voice and saw the old hunter pull me up as he stared panicked to my left eye.

Concern I never seen before.

From someone I've never met.

All I did was smile and stared down to the sword.

I was glad that he hadn't went through it here, but thinking my condition now.

I was starting to ponder if it were better to just go away.

It was kinder than living as what I am now.

" I'm Al." I spoke.

He didn't show any signs of mentioning the way I looked his sword.

I wasn't hiding it from him.

I thought he was a very kind hunter.

I regained some energy and leaned forward to where I felt my pants without my knees and I raised both hands forward.

" What are you doing?" The hunter tried to stop me, but he didn't press so hard.

" Al.. You've just used your mana… If you go any more than this."

" I'm okay." 

 An aura appeared over my fingers coating them in this cyan glow.

I was okay. This wasn't mana I was using.

This was just another variation of the magic they know.

" Mend." In that second. A stronger aura burst out from the tip of my fingers.

A thick dense of energy brighter than the light I had before.

The old hunter stared very tense at the magic and looked away solemnly.

" You are right Al…"

" It's better if we died here the way want to." 

I didn't know what he was talking about, but I wasn't think of what I would like to look like if I died.

I just wanted to see that faint colored light again.

This world was so beautiful that even if I were to die.

I'll never forget what it's like to see it for the first time again.

It reminded me that even in the most awful places.

Miracles like this magic exist.

Reach your hand forward and think of everything I could have done if this was my original world.

A form of magic that could have healed my sister existed here…

——Why was I so lucky?

 I saw my flesh begun to reconstruct a new skeletal system for my legs.

The flesh developed over the new bone and soon followed the developed skin.

Mend was a strange ability and to use it required one of my memories to be sacrificed.

[ A memory has faded.]

I wondered what memory left me this time.

I pulled myself forward to stand on my new legs.

I was too tired to stand, but the old hunter immediately leaned forward and pulled up.

He was strong. Although he appeared quite old.

I crawled forward on my stomach as he tried to help me to stand.

I felt my bones creak and parts of my body begin to snap and I took a deep breathe unable to see very far away.

" Old man." 

" Please step back." 

" Will you be alright?" He asked concerned, but I wondered why he flinched at the mentioning of calling him old.

" I'll be okay." I said with an apology.

When I noticed he stepped back, he seemed concerned that I would follow, but I kept looking until moved further away from me.

"…" In the distance. I could barely see them clear, but I felt their scent, the scent of different people clinging to their forms and moving.

One my eyes saw the world in red and blur and my other saw it as a killing field.

People for their lives.

Hoping to live.

I clasped my hands together and offered them a prayer.

" Find them." 

I rearranged the positions of my fingers and pointed down slightly below my chest.

" Mark their locations." 

I imagined a flame burning. An aura that burns and feeds on the statues I saw.

A combination of time snap and fade being executed immediately.

All my powers were made from a function that as long as I die. I could sacrifice myself for anything I desire and alter reality.

I didn't need to resort to death to do something as small as this now.

Every last on of them within my awareness will die.

That's when I imagined a parasitic flame coated in elements of fade and time stop using the statues as a burning wick with my memories of my last moments I felt before transferring here.

" Burn them all." 

[ The Black Tongue of the Tragedian has activated.]

A purple phantom butterfly manifested over the statues.

[ A memory has faded.]

[ A memory has faded—]

My awareness was focused on the statues in this dungeon. The ones on the field holding weapons.

My phantoms manifested and haunted.

They would flicker and emerge stopping time and the moment they touch their forms.

I would feel their mark.

 First it corroded their forms peeling away at the places they touched like parasites feeding on stone, it discolored and morphed what it latched onto.

Making them a habitable materials for burning.

Then when I felt a phantom full of life energy, a purple flared in delayed blinks and one of them exploded.

Like a wild fire it infected and found other statues and moved onto the process of fading. 

[ You have gained experience.]

[ You have gained experience.]

[ You have gained experience.]

[ You have gained experience.]

 I thought of my life burning and not some stone statue when I stared at the purple fire.

The entire process I felt when I was burned.

It was easy to inflict that memory, but it reminded me of something I saw in Siphon.

White phosphorus executions.

I felt my senses heightened when they fell to the floor.

The fire was feeding until they burned away, but I didn't see statues burning.

It was like I was back in that place again.

Watching someone burning in the forest again.

Like they were fading away.

"…" I watched one of the phantoms linger over my fingers and how it discolored that area of my skin too.

Anything harm the hunters, all tumbled to their heels and burned out of sight.

That's when I saw the old hunter smile.

 Enthralled by flames and standing in front one of them fading in the purple fire.

He kneeled on the floor with his head hanging lowly and mumbling as he prayed to the god of them.

He stared up to me.

" Kill them…" 

" Kill them all."

But the thing that man prayed under was a phantom only I could see.

A large serpent like beast with the head of a spider and butterfly wings and it's tail coiling around all statues.

It was largest creature in this place and it lingered because of the moment I recalled Siphon.

I turned away from him and stared off to the distant side to a large gate.

" Old man."

" Do you want to go home?" I glanced down to my fingers colored in red that fell from my nose.

"…" He was solemn again. I would be the same too.

It's just I don't really feel it as much as it showed me.

" I'll take your silence as your answer to live." 

Then I rearranged the purple phantom and removed it's effects I had placed on it.

A golden butterfly fluttered before him, flickering in and out of existence.

" Follow the fading light." 

" This will take you home." 

He stared at the small light and was puzzled by it when it fluttered around him and he looked up to me.

" This thing?"

I only smiled and stared to the light.

" This thing… It's one of my most precious memories." 

" It will protect you. Hunter." Then he stood up and stared at me and to the sword I picked off from the ground.

I handed the blade to him.

" Run. Don't look behind." He reached for the weapon and I walked past.

When I was near. I spoke to him in a small voice.

" Don't give up."

" Choose life."

" Vice captain." I looked over my shoulder the moment I heard him say it, but I didn't answer. He didn't turn back either.

" Will I see you on the other side?" There was a seriousness to his tone as if he believed in it.

I stared up to the the roof of the dungeon.

Thinking of what kind of sky existed outside of this place.

" I'm sure it will be warm today." 

" May you live a kind life." I walked away with my phantom understanding that my body was weak to hold a conversation.

I moved deeper to the blood shed.

And made my phantoms linger in front of a body we passed. 

[ A memory has faded.]

 I sent an order to every living hunter through a system notification and prepared some of my phantoms guide them away from this place.

I decided in that moment, to show them a miracle that never would happen for me in life.

A little change of perspective to a situation where life often keep ending.

I began writing.

[ A miracle has occurred.]

[ The monsters in this area are now being hunted.]

[ Escape the dungeon.]

[ Requirements for survival: Follow the Fading lights.]

[ Rewards: Return home.]

With each system notification I saw, a new phantom was created and the price for their creation was an indiscriminate fading of one of my memories.

I had no control what faded and what remained.

I simply thought of how beautiful it looked when those astral like projections of aura with the forms of butterflies and gathered and flickered all around me.

They passed through my fingers tips and danced through to the other side of my hand.

[ A memory has faded.] 

[ A memory has faded.] 

[ A memory has faded.] 

[ A memory has faded.] 

[ A memory has faded.] 

Their appearance made my memories appear beautiful, but at the same time.

My heart beating intensely made the sight appear lonely.

I pointed over past the statues to the large gate near some statues being burned relentlessly.

" Go." 

The fading lights flickered from my hands towards the gate of the dungeon.

I wasn't interested in the surviving hunters, but I was aware and feel some of their eyes on me.

The old hunter kneeling before the fire. Looked to my direction and apathetically I looked straight through him and past his figure.

To the future of what could be done or what I could do more.

I followed the trail of blood and marked the locations of bodies near us and places I remembered.

 I went to find bodies and mend.

There wasn't many statues left whose eyes I could borrow to remember where to find some hunters.

 The statues killing were burned and those without weapons were spared, before I saw one of them coming alive.

It was enough to intimidate the hunters that found them as a place of refugee.

In that area where the injured were. All the statues started to move like the others.

There were more hunters near them, than there were on the killing field, but their conditions couldn't allow them to leave.

Under a death command from the Architect.

Now all were hostile.

All of this just for one person to be a vessel for Ash-born.

—I won't judge. 

But the Architect could have been more than this.

I raised my hand and stopped their time.

[ A hunter has been chosen to be a sacrifice for the living and the dead.]

[ The hunter will be afflicted by a curse that will attract the monsters until they die.]

[ Use this time to run through the line of monsters and escape the dungeon.]

I approached a statue holding onto a harp to pull the statues and the Architects attention to me.

 I cursed my body so they all can go out and experience some kind of normal life outside of here.

That was the hope.

I delayed my curse and moved back to the location where I was before.

There were a few of them.

But there was no healer that could take care of them.

Not in my memories.

" Mr…?" A woman, man, hunter, human. They were all the same to me.

I approached them and raised out my hands.

An aura brighter than girl whose hands were shaking was needed.

" Recover." 

" I will care of it." It was our first interaction in this world again, but I could never forget the features of someone like her.

She had the most brightest eyes, but it was so dim because of what had just occurred.

I looked up to see a hand reaching out to us and gave her a short smile. 

A hunter with their shoulders pierced by an arrow tearing off his whole shoulder breathe heavily without consciousness.

I closed his chin so he would not breathe from his mouth. 

" I'm sorry. This might be a little bit painful." 

" Forgive me." 

I held on to the side of his neck and an aura coated my fingers, first I administered a fading and cut off his mutilated arm.

I didn't show kindness as I did it. Since I knew my abilities so well. 

In one swift moment that the bad arm fell off.

The aura warped and glowed cyan again and I focused on a better one than the other he had before.

While a piece of the fading aura burned away the old one.

I focused on the new developed one being reconstructed in front of me.

I didn't stop with just that.

I coated his entire form in mend.

The wounded, the dead. I didn't think or look at them as I mended.

I stayed by their side until I understood there was no reason to be near them anymore.

" Thank you…" It was a response I didn't desire to hear from the man whose armed I dismembered.

Since I decided to mend them.

I didn't see them as people. 

When I saw their expressions and the relieved tears that came from fixing something that crippled them.

I understood why I had this as one of my powers.

I didn't want someone to experience suffering like my sister did in their last moments.

So instead of just focus on what only my eyes could see.

I had to make sure. I did more than what I thought was perfect, because I didn't trust my ability for it.

When they showed their emotion once the light lifted from their body. 

I thought of the inevitable appearance of the monarch invasion in the future from now.

Dying here may appear to be a far more merciful outcome.

I didn't really care about the worst to come.

All I wanted was to play god.

They would know the first thing they wished to experience out there.

I hoped their dreams and desires come true.

I know it would be a better life than the ones I live.

I just know.

My time sense was far too distorted to focus on reality.

I felt safe because of the silence and distracted by the aura over my skin.

" My eyes… I can… see…" Time passed because I slipped into my mind. Not knowing, just functioning when I saw a hunter here.

The hunter cried as she reached out for my face.

I held her hand and couldn't feel anything but indifferent to the emotions she showed me.

The way they stared at me like I was… more than useful.

It only dissociated me from this, because I know what kind of person I can turn into.

They would never look at me the same if they saw my life before this.

I just smiled to the woman.

It was the most politest way to thank her for looking at me with those eyes.

" Thank you… for helping me." 

" Thank you… so much…"

Such beautiful eyes that adored my miracle.

" My pleasure." The words slipped out naturally.

The aura faded and I stood up to leave again.

" Hunter. Follow the fading lights. They will help you return home." Those words were my exit phrase to escape any further conversation with them.

The woman stood up, but turned to the direction where none of my phantoms were.

Where I was looking forward.

She was the last one left to mend.

I couldn't remember how many I had done before. It just passed by so quickly.

That I had forgotten this was a dungeon we were in.

I fixed my shoulder armor.

" Where are you going?" She asked it in the most polite voice.

" Far from everyone." I replied.

" Why?" To that small question. 

I turned to her.

" I don't know." It was a question I was indifferent to and if I were to share my thoughts.

 It would end up turn to an exhausting and long conversation that didn't have a meaning.

" I don't feel like leaving." It was my response to someone who paid just a little attention to me.

 I raised my hand and a phantom manifested to guide her from here in the same way I had done for the others.

In that moment a phantom showed.

 I imagined my sister standing behind the woman shaking her head as if she were disappointed in how I treated these people.

I was always standing from a distance from them, because I was use to being on my own.

Play a nonchalant observing god and alter reality in places where I see suffering and death.

In one life I took life away and in this world.

I was different than who I was.

" Take care." I said to the hunter and walked to the distance side.

Where the statues were frozen far from everyone.

I caressed the clothing of one that was not under the control of the Architect and listened as it played a sad song.

Blue curse marks appeared over my skin when the tune flowed and memories of my life appeared in the back of my mind as I listened to the melodic tune of Deep Sorrow from the Eminence Of Shadow.

It was a slow version of the song. Calm and something I needed to heal my wretched mind.

My skin was stained red from other peoples blood, but mostly all from condition I refuse to mend.

In this life there are people that would never face the atrocities I know.

People like me… who had another waiting for them on the other side.

I was so envious for all of them.

"…"

' Brother!'

[ A memory has faded.]

' One day I want to be an aunty. I want some cute nephews and nieces!'

[ A memory has faded.]

' I don't mind staying here, I just want you to always be with me.'

[ A memory has faded.]

' Al! Why did you do that to Dolly! No don't you dare say anything to me. I'll kill you, I love you, but I will do it. Go back and apologize to her.'

' No. I won't.'

'… Why?'

' I don't know.'

[ A memory has faded.]

' Sera. Would you like to have something sweet again?'

' I think I will be okay, but I don't want to go to hospital.'

' Sorry. I want you to be well.'

' It hurts when they needle me. They did it wrong again.'

' I know. I know. They were… They were only helping me okay? Something happened that day and they couldn't do their job right. One more time, for me?'

' As long as they don't hurt me again.'

' I'll be there. Like I always do.'

' Okay Al. Don't you lie to me again or I'll really cry.'

' Fighting.'

[ A memory has faded.]

' Mr Al. Things aren't looking good.'

' Why?'

' Her lungs are not working as they should. We have tried the last thing that could help her, but it harmed her them more.'

' I'm sorry. The only way is to put her off the machine and her lungs might recover and breathe on it's own, but it's too damaged to keep going.'

'— Because she was born a disabled?'

' No. Her immune system has grown very weak over the time she has been here.'

' There is a chance her body won't make it if we were to go through an operation.' 

' Mr Al?' 

' It's tough when our loved ones go through this, please decide what we should do for her.'

' If you wish for us to stop, we can arrange for a new room in a ward and spend the last moments you have with her or go through an emergency operation that may keep her alive, but on a machine.'

' It's better to not go through the operation Mr Al. There is a chance something will go wrong and she may not be awake to feel it, but there will be even more pain done internally to her body.'

' Mr Al. I'm so sorry.'

[ A memory has faded.]

' No… I don't want to go there… I don't want to!'

[ A memory has faded.]

' Al, I want you to be loved and I want to see you happy. I'm going to see it again, but I'm going to miss you brother.'

[ A memory has faded.]

' I love you.'

[ A memory has faded.]

' See you tomorrow…'

[ A memory has faded.]

' Don't leave me here…'

' I won't. I will come back.'

' I promise.'

[ A memory has faded.]

' Brother Al.'

' Bishop. I don't care if my sister will recover her ability to move in the next world. That person you say can walk. That is not my sister. My sister was born paralyzed.'

' Why would I want be in a world where my sister will suffer again?'

' But she won't feel suffering. It's gods world. People who never done wrong in this life will be his children, they will have better bodies and all disabilities will be purged in that place.'

' So, I'm supposed to just accept that my sister suffered in this place, just so she could experience a new body in a different world that's better?'

' Stop manipulating me with your words.'

' God is very kind. Please understand.'

' God? If he were so kind, He would have made her feel no suffering before and when she was taken from me.'

'…'

' So what if he can fix disabilities and make a place where suffering doesn't exist at all.'

' That isn't enough. It would never be enough. That isn't enough for me…'

' Do you know what I saw before life took her away?'

' You don't really understand your god, do you?'

'…'

' I won't curse your beliefs, I don't follow your preachings so I have nothing to say against it, but I want to make something clear.'

' No-one will ever be as merciful as I would. If I was him just for a day.'

' I don't know much about this afterlife, but I hope your kind god feeds my sister sweets in that place.'

' I hope she is fed constantly and experiences a life where she could have anything she wants, something I could do when she was here.'

' I'm sorry brother Al.'

' It's okay. I don't really feel anything anymore.'

' I think it's because I was thinking of her again.'

' I'm sorry Bishop. I can't control when I cry.'

' I think I'll learn how to get it right soon.'

' Al… crying is a good way to show you are still there.'

' Not for me Bishop.'

' I'm not a good person anymore…'

' Come here son.'

[ A memory has faded.]

"…"

It was like watching two different screens on one side You watch your life and sometimes your memories begin to blur near the end of them and the other was what you see in front of you.

 I saw people both living and dead.

One was clear in my mind and the other was blurry in front of me.

I was tired.

The song was soothing and leading me to places where I wanted to go.

 I can just close my eyes and rest listening to it forever.

Nothing mattered. Nothing mattered at all.

I wanted to sleep for long this time and I wanted to dream of my sister when we were young.

I don't want to transfer. I would really lose mind there.

I'll snap… I know It would happen eventually.

I trailed a phantom circling around me as the song played on a repeat.

In the blinks of my tiredness. I would see hunters and some I knew in the distance.

I observed them as they attempted to escape from here.

 Jin-woo and beautiful Miss Healer and the original survivors and those I helped before.

They all stood at the distance and some looking to my direction calling out my name. 

"…"

I only wanted to listen to this song and then sink to the bottom of the dark.

" No! NO!—" The hunters were holding someone.

The woman who had this condition with her eyes.

 I fixed that because she had a beautiful face.

Why would anyone allow such a pretty girl here with those ruined eyes.

I was too tired to think about what they were saying.

I know why they didn't leave.

Before I had to perform a shadow transfer to make a portal for them to exit the dungeon.

I wasn't that life form now.

"…" I looked to the large gate standing tall where the lights creaked out from under showing the other side.

[ The doctrine of the Idle Baphomet has activated.]

[ Those marked by the Idle Baphomet will be killed without rest.]

[ All monsters will be controlled by ~+~ and orders will be carried out to intiate all out attacks on marked targets.]

[ Monsters will continuously attack until there is no life left in them.] 

We all had a role and I accepted being disposable with the only function be useful.

Hunters were more valuable than me, because they had one thing I couldn't really see.

A future.

I raised my hand over my chest tiredly because my life will end in a single moment.

It had been ingrained in me that this dungeon was another place I would die in without a funeral.

" May they all live kind lives." 

[ 5 minutes before monsters will initiate their final attack.]

[ An exit will be created.]

I begun to initiate preparation for their saftey out and mend as many of the dead I could find before the statues and the Architect come.

This is all I could do for their family outside the gate.

" Ah… I'm such a good worker." 

" I bet there's no-one whose a better support like me."

I hope that their religious gods would provide me some reward.

Like a honey friend chicken and fried rice or something interesting and tasty to eat.

Something cheap would be enough.

I had very poor expectations for living….

A beautiful woman who was madly in love with me would do it for me though.

That thought made me smile.

Something like that would never happen.

"…" I located many of the bodies marked by phantoms and they lingered over their locations.

[ A hunter who has been killed by a sword.]

[ A hunter who has been killed.]

I don't believe I have the luxury of time to mend them all perfect.

5 minutes wasn't enough.

I didn't want to resort to alter reality here.

But I believe I was a smart No-Life.

All I need was the memory to speed up the process and connect it with The Black Tongue Of The Tragedian.

When all the hunters laid neatly in a row. 

I simply dreamed of that experience and fed it through vocal projection with the thoughts of life mending.

I stood in front of the place. I did it before.

In the previous transfer where I mended them.

I spoke with a clear voice.

Being reminded that I was just throwing words as if it were some ancient and majestic spell.

" Sympathy for the Fallen." It sounded direct. If I were to go very deep into the role play. 

I'll suggest the spell to be named. Sympathy By The Devil.

[ The Black Tongue Of The Tragedian has activated.]

A large magical formation emerged over the ground and all the hunters both flesh and blood underneath my phantoms marking were teleported in my direct line of sight.

Blood, flesh all line up in a row and mending at a rate that defied my own ability to mend now.

They were cradled in this glow.

As I saw flesh and blood being recreated and forming a person.

A young girl who looked no older than a teenager laid on the floor with an insignia of a lion attached to her side.

The person a hunter cried for mended below.

She wasn't a destroyed as the others, but there curse marks on her skin, some kind of magic in this world.

I reached out to the marks and begun to fade them off her skin.

' Aren't you afraid?' 

' …' 

' If I were a good person. I'd say you shouldn't be here.' 

' —-But If I were an honest man I would say.' 

' Do as you please.' 

' If it hasn't happened yet, there's no need to fear it.' 

To me hunters were people who should be strong and different, but in the stories I saw.

They were just things that were created to serve some meaningless goal.

Just like how these people who died were killed by the Architect.

This was their design for their existence.

Live out their lives up to the points their meaning wasn't useful anymore, because death was just death and in stories.

I saw it different now.

They were all just fools lending out their lives, but I understand their reason.

This was their only option to live and survive in the world.

[ Mend has been applied.]

' You're leaving me…?' 

' If you wanted to. You could always use your sword to make up for me leaving you for dead.' 

' It wouldn't satisfy you.' 

' You wouldn't even feel a thing.' 

'…' 

' If you make it through this…' 

' A tongue wouldn't be enough.' 

' I prefer the option where you try to make me fall madly in love with you first, If it works out then maybe we could move on to a red wedding.' 

' …' 

Her sword was crushed and irreparable. Broken from the weight of the Cruel Lord.

I thought weapons and flesh were the same and all it needed was a little bit of memory to feed it and fix.

It was easier to mend something not living, because they won't speak or remember you did.

' I will kill you.' 

' I hope you do. It would be far better to die young than by something without a heart.' 

' Take care and—-' 

' —- May you perish wretchedly.' 

[ A memory has faded.]

After I added my mending on the areas I faded.

I placed the sword over her chest and wrapped her arms onto it and lifted her to the middle of the formation where the other hunters laid.

In the moment I carried her. It reminded of the times I use to do the same for my sister.

" Mod. What are the chances for hunters returning to life in this world?"

[ 50%] I thought about the cup of reincarnation.

If not for that the chances would represent 0.

A cold hard muffled voice that reflected my words escaped my throat.

" If I used Alter Reality what are the chances that they would survive outside this dungeon?"

[ 0%] 

" Why?" 

[ They won't survive.] Because the future outside this place is much more despairing that the experiences here.

" So…" Everyone of them will die.

I know that it might appear different after if Jin-woo had inherited Ashborns blessing.

I changed that things here again.

There survival rate outside this place is because of me.

I stopped the Architect from killing people.

That led to reality of this world diverging from the one I know.

Some will just allow it to happen and others will just passively watch them suffer.

All I had to do was alter and live out the life I wanted to see.

Nothing really mattered, but what I wanted to keep as my memory.

 I stepped out of the formation.

I was surrounded by the statues and the Architect stood in the middle of all 5 of them.

" You're different—"

[—— from the rest of those flies.] 

I cut the Architects communication he had sent through with the system to not confuse the hunters with my own.

They were moving again and that meant something had touched them.

"…" The hunters looked fine and they came here first without killing them.

The Architect spoke with both the system and his voice and seemed very curious about the way I was able to influence his own system.

But the way he looked at me was more intrigued by the curse marks on my skin.

His eyes couldn't move away from them.

" Those markings. Why do I feel so much pleasure when I look at you?"

" Pleasure?" 

The Architect eyes snapped wide open and a crazy and distorted smile showed similar to that of the cruel lords.

"You won't understand—-"

[—-But I have this very strong feeling that when I kill you...]

[ I can live forever too.]

" You have an ugly smile again."

" Again?" 

" That statue showed the same expression."

[ That's because killing humans is fun.]

" I know." I've seen you do it in so many transfers. It just become numbing to see now. 

"…" I looked to his statues and their famished eyes focused on my skin.

" And what do they feel?" 

[ Everything I do.]

He raised an axe. His multi armed form ripped out from and holding onto numerous weapons.

[ Die.]

" Come." I extended my hand and fed a bit of aura to it and altered with a fading element. 

The Architect and statues under the temptation of the curse mark on my skin.

They all rushed without their minds.

In that small moment I felt the pressure above.

I ignited the system notifications over all the hunters and directed the Phantoms to guide each one to the most safest route that will guarantee their survival away from me.

Any part that didn't have the statues nearby was a chance that they didn't come into contact with fading.

The gate was shut and so I took control over the Cruel Lord using my own system with the intention for it to fire of a powerful heat ray to break it right open.

First. A phantom appeared over it and touched its form.

[ A statue has been infected.]

The Cruel Lord raised his head A large amount of magical energy focused to the direction of the gate.

I suggested for it to channel all of its power in that beam to the extent it would be destroyed the moment the magic left from its body.

[ Your will has been executed.]

Something about the Architect not being able to have control over his own creation, but unable to react because he was bewitched by the curse.

Allowed me to see a glimpse of his eyes turn, but immediately snapping on to me.

It was a sudden moment, but I learned of the extent the Idle Baphomet had control over someone.

 As someone as powerful as the Architect even he couldn't fight the temptation within.

A large ray of light that almost be compared to a dragons final breath changed everything we saw.

A massive violent ray of energy gathered to the center of the Cruel Lord eyes and then expelled a large flood of magic exploding from his eyes.

 Anything in its way vaporized and was consumed by thet pure magic energy and destructive power of the Cruel Lord.

It burned through and created a great valley leading out to a large gate swirling and twisting with magic.

It burned straight through and into a different dungeon. The air was changed by it

[ All hostile entities have been drawn to your location.]

It was a once in a life-time experience you'd never see in a world without magic.

[ All hostile entities have surrounded you.]

My role was to be nothing less than useful.

This was all I could do from here.

[ You have created a transparent blade coated with fade.]

Before they came.

 I rested the edge of sword of light against the side of my ear and leaned forward and pulled down while I turned my head towards the opposite side I looked.

In the distance I saw phantoms flying into the ravine and hunters chasing after them.

I was happy. I could be useful.

Although I felt so much blood more than I saw before just spilling from the open wound from my neck.

I looked down.

That's when I saw a body near my feet.

…

[ You have been transfered to a temporary moment in your life.]

I looked down to the pile of people stacked over each other like firewood all of them burned by white phosphorus.

" Did they have to go so far?" 

It wasn't the real white phosphorus. It was an alias for the atrocity we know as white zombie.

We understood they were tortured before it touched their skin, but none of the people in the room wanted to say it.

" Ah…!!!"

Because the people who did it to them.

They were our own.

We worked for the same organization, but couldn't think of a reason why a person would only cut open their faces after torture and leave them here still living.

The most cruel thing was to see someone you'd believe to be dead in pain and breathing.

Helping them was not an option any of us can do. They were less than what was considered unable to save.

Nothing could heal that chemical or those wounds that were inflicted, but worst.

Their minds had becomes zombie.

They were going to die on their own, but worse they could never live as people even if we belonged to the UN who sought to prevent these things from happening.

You can't save someone who was reduced to a zombie.

" This isn't fucking right!" One of the soldiers reached out his gun and shot the floor when he heard a soft and painful moan.

A child who was younger than most of us flinched from his weapon.

The thing was. I knew what he would do the moment before it happened.

Since this was a transfer in my past.

 I had already lived this experience before.

I walked up to the boy and patted his shoulder because he couldn't look away from the child underneath his feet.

Still breathing and shaking without his mind.

They were still alive even if they looked like they were used and left here as a warning.

I could tell the boy was angry at all of us so I took his gun from him and finished off the child he didn't kill properly.

I fired above their heart. One shot to the head and two at the chest. 

This was Siphon way of allowing others to know.

We were here.

" Boss…" It was hard at first, because at this point of time.

I never had to kill someone, but someone had to bear that sin.

I handed the gun back to the boy and walked back to my position.

" The next time something like that happens."

" Be aware. What can and will kill you."

I knew all of us did not have the conscience to just walk away after we had found them.

Nobody wanted to have that kind of memory, but it was ruthlessly exposed to us.

It was something I know could ruin someone and deteriorate them later in life. It happened to people who work with Siphon.

It happened to me.

So I chose to ease the burdens of those around me by doing the things I knew some of them could not do at this moment while working in this job.

Someone had to function and get paid to feed their families or their greed and someone had to rot within.

I knew my worth.

Be useful.

Be useful.

" I will do it." Keep the rest functioning and survive.

They all had something that I didn't have.

A place they can go back too after.

I motioned the soldiers to leave the shed and I stared at the gun with a twisted heart.

It was hard, because not all of us were terrible people. I know I wasn't as twisted as the others I've met in this place.

Sometimes you had to do something terrible to show mercy.

Sometimes you know only one way to do it right.

I didn't have a resolve to just leave them and walk away.

I prayed against the gun.

" God…"

" In Another Life." 

" Please show them a miracle than this." 

I turned the modified pistol down.

Each bullet I heard leave the gun. It reassured me that I would die the most wretched death imaginable.

I felt disgusting and I was ashamed. I pulled aside a body and shot them.

I didn't deserve to live or exist.

I just knew one day hell would catch up with me even though I did not understand what that kind of place would look like.

All I knew was each time I heard the gun.

I was one step from it.

One sound from ending my own.

Hell was a place the people who hated us wished for us to go.

I wasn't so afraid.

It sounded like where I belong.

I made sure they were properly dead and wouldn't remember their torture.

There on the side. A young boy looked at me and lowered his head.

" Boss. The others are waiting." 

" I'll do my job better this time. I promise."

I tapped him over the shoulder.

" Make enough so you won't have to ever see something like this again."

" Boss?"

I stared out the broken building and it was the first time in awhile I was in Siphon.

That sky was the only reminder.

I wasn't there anymore.

[ A past memory has faded.]

"…"

My hands were shaking terribly and I couldn't cut all the way through.

I thought I had died and transfered.

I didn't want to go back to the past anymore.

I wished all my memories fades… but at the same time.

I don't want to forget everything I had done.

" Mend." 

 I fix the large cut from my ear down to my collar bone and reacted to a shift in the air.

 I moved my head to the side the moment there a pressure and sound from behind.

[ A hostile entity has attacked you.]

[ A hostile entity has appeared above you.]

[ A hostile entity has appeared behind you and is attacking the formation.]

I snapped my fingers the moment I received it.

[ Time snap has been activated.]

The closest one near was the Architect who was behind.

I stared at his silhouette on the ground and raised my hand over my head.

" I don't want to go." From my words a purple aura exploded behind and from the reflection where I saw his shadow was breaking apart.

Under the aura that was eating him from inside and the powerful temptation of the Idle Baphomet that was controlling his mind.

I could hear him try to say something.

" I'm sorry." 

[ It….doesn't…. hurt….?]

" It should never feel that way." 

I turned around to see this distorted and wicked smile and those famished eyes staring straight at me and all his arms around me.

[ What's your name?] There was this feeling that when I saw him dying.

I couldn't help but say something only he should know.

" Cartenon. Al Cartenon." 

Despite the control I believe my abilites had over him.

In that moment he placed his hand on my shoulder and showed signs he had regained control.

[…] There was a moment of emotions in that look he showed as he stared towards this dungeon and down to the statues fading.

[ You did all this?]

" Death doesn't have to be painful."

Under the brief moment when I felt the release of time snap and his arms erupted out of his back and he attacked.

I stared in his eyes unfeeling to all his weapons aiming for my life.

In that short moment he found control.

" Al Cartenon. The name of the life who killed the Architect and immortalized him inside of his memory." 

" In this life." 

" You will be immortalized through me."

[ You have gained experience.] 

His eyes stared straight forward, but I lowered one of the swords he held in his multi armed form and just the lightest weight against it shattered his hand starting from his knuckles.

The discoloration made it seem so fragile and sand fell to the floor.

I had an understanding when it came to Monarch deaths.

This time he didn't fade. He became a different sort of sand.

A dark grain like salt.

I observed as his body broke apart and crumbled but one of his hands holding onto a ring stayed reaching out to me.

I took hold of a black ring. 

[ You have recieved ' The Ring Of Cartenon' ]

[ Description: The one named Al Cartenon, inheritance from a creation who chased after immortality.]

The purple aura grew more brightly as if his death was like fuel.

The sand burned inside the light.

I watched him the rest of him burn out over the ground.

[ Fading: A curse modification with the element to fade and rot entities.]

It hadn't caught up to me yet, but It was hard to know that the numbness I felt was familiar.

On the ring. There was a small description placed on the side. A marking of some language I know I've never seen but understood because of his power.

[ Death doesn't always have to be painful…]

[ Sometimes… It leaves you in a heart beat.]

It felt like something split open in my chest and cut off my ability to breathe.

My heart started to hurt me.

I must have imagined someone standing there besides me in that moment and all of a sudden.

 All I could do was to stare down to the six pointed thorn helmet that one of stone statues wore and my neck resting over it.

I watched as my body reached out and placed my chin over the spike of the crown until something poked through the skin and grinding through the bone.

I noticed…

The amount of blood that was slowly crawling up my heels.

An illusion… No…

This was that feeling I had before I transferred.

Before the executioners came to take my life.

 A Psychological Suicide.

[ A new ability has activated: Auditory hallucinations.]

It sounded like it was raining and although there was no more statues here.

I could hear the melody clear.

The rain sounded very heavy now, like bodies dropping into a stream.

"…"

When I close my eyes.

The whole world drops dead and I'd see my life. A place I was always so happy and care free and felt like nothing will ever change that.

Now. When I close them.

I don't see home anymore.

I opened my eyes because I saw a fragile glow.

 There I saw an Miss healer with tears falling down her face using her healing powers over me.

It would seem like someone had pulled me away from the spike. I could still the wind pushing through the hole.

This isn't going to work.

This wasn't something she had the power to fix.

Stop trying to exhaust yourself on me.

I thought of tainting that light and alter it with elements of fade so it would stop healing.

 I know I could not say a single word.

I raised my fingers.

[ Stop.]

It's not that I can't mend it.

My mind disconnected again.

My body shut down because of the words I saw on that ring.

I didn't react to her and how she tried and attempted to heal the wound I inflicted upon myself.

My mind was completely gone.

I looked up towards that light that could heal wounds.

It just wasn't a broken skill like mine.

So I raised my finger and spoke through the system with no remorse.

[ Fade.]

Her pure green healing powers bright was violently being infected by my aura.

[ The Black Tongue Of The Tragedian has tainted an entity.]

I could see the horror because of the unknown power changing in her hands.

There had only been one color I know when it came to a healers magic.

 A warm and soothing green glow that made you feel good, but under this light I desired for it to only exist to do one thing.

 [ Fade.]

My voiceless words was like temptation being amplified even though I ordered her to do it.

She was unwilling to follow that voice I projected through the system.

" No… No…." As she tried to cut of her mana and start over again.

I imitated the same thing.

We both stood over the body. 

One evoking a green light and other tainting with a purple shade.

" Heal…." The aura would sometimes fade, but she wasn't as strong in front of my voice.

 I wasn't sure what would happen if I pushed any more words through the notification.

The Black Tongue of the Tragedian wasn't a kind ability.

There was a chance that It would end up doing what I had said if I said it.

Under the influence of my words. It wouldn't be strange for it to completely change her personality and displace her into a murderer.

So I only said the one thing I know.

[ Fade.]

Each time the light was tainted. A part of me was gone.

I was pressuring her into an non consent murder. I offered my full consent because it was me who would be killed.

She just didn't feel like it was right thing to do.

The light in her hands was very warm too me, but I saw it as something that can take my life too.

I was comforted at the moments where I only saw purple in her hands.

She stared blankly.

" I can't do this anymore…" 

" I tried so hard this time…" 

My mind became clear when I understood what the Architect had experienced.

The feeling of watching bits of yourself being torn and disappear, but unable to feel it.

Like the frames of a photo being burned from the edges.

My body was brutally faded.

I stood by her side as she just stared at my deformed body.

[ Thank you for healing him.]

" Healing?" 

She looked to her hands where the color of fade no longer tainted her abilities.

" You made me kill him!"

" I could have…. I could have!" 

[ You showed mercy.]

[ This was more merciful than what he had planned to do to himself.]

" No… Al would never think of that." There was this seriousness in her voice as she glared at me.

I know she couldn't see me. None of them could, but it was like she knew I was there kneeling in front of her.

It was that rage I saw in those blue eyes I knew.

This wasn't the girl I admired in the story.

[ But I would.]

" I could have…" 

The future was a cruel place for a healer.

Since healers could save lives.

I believed they should hold the power to take them too.

[ Reach out your hand.]

She responded because my words tempted her.

[ When you find yourself in a place where you can't go back.]

[ Think of things ending.]

[ One day I hope this power can make your life easier to live.]

There a purple aura appeared over her fingers. It was small, but it had the ability to fade anything in this world.

That was my assumption.

I reached out and snuffed the aura out.

[ This does not use mana.]

[ Don't use it unless you are willing to live a life where you lose everything you love.]

Memories. That's what my powers feed off.

She was someone very kind, beautiful with a pale complexion, orange hair and deep blue eyes.

"…" 

That's all she was too me on the surface.

She didn't have to be special.

It was easy for me to be enthralled with anyone who showed me a bit of kindness.

An experienced doctor… or a slightly traumatized healer.

The only thing I could do was simply smile and admire them from a distance.

[ Thank you.]

— You have been killed.

——You have gained a Black Soul.

Then she vanished right in front of me.

I found myself in this dark place again.

A status screen masquerading as god glowed in the middle for every time I died.

[ Do you wish to continue?]

I stared at it and thought how unlucky it was for someone like me to be blessed with such a miracle.

All I do was die. The irony was there was nothing here to see or do and endless plain of a dark sea you can walk on, but couldn't feel at all.

I didn't deserve to transfer and often thought the devil was being entertained by my deaths.

[ Fated To Perish wretchedly.]

There was always a number recording the amount of lives I've died in.

[ Past lives: 008]

 Like a simulation where I was being used to measure what can happen and how far I can go.

I did not believe it, but it was one of the things that stings when you think about it.

If one day I woke up and play god.

I would just dream until nothing left of myself existed again.

[ A personality construct is fading.]

I have no desire to endure transfers.

[ Personality construct is fading….]

Then I saw a message glowing in this golden display of the system.

[ Input new personality construct.] 

I reached out with my non existent hands and touched those words.

" Al Cartenon."

[ Al Cartenon has been created.]

[ Al Cartenon will live on as your new personality construct.]

[ Al can hold numerous personality constructs and transfer between each one.]

[ These personality constructs will have their own experiences and life in different transfers. You develop these personalities during the times you live as them during transfers.]

[ Because you are facing a personality construct fading.]

[ All experiences will be transferred over to the new personality.]

[ Do you wish to continue?]

There I saw a someone standing in front of the hunters.

His face was burned and discolored, but I knew that person was the body that had been faded.

It was waiting inside the dungeon.

In front of the hunters covered in my formation.

It was a me and he was standing over looking the formation.

[ Do you wish to continue?]

"…" 

" Mod. What will happen to me?"

[ You will experience a temporary form of slumber and live on in the new personality construct you have created.]

" Would they have their own conscience and thoughts?"

[ A new personality construct is a limb of what you are. It will respond and live as you desire, but all abilities will not transfer over.]

" So… It's just a clone?" 

[ A personality construct is your identity known within transfers.]

" What does that mean."

[ Your current personality construct will stay here in an eternal slumber.]

[ Until the moment you desire to switch personalities.]

[ Are you afraid?]

" No."

I looked at the person in that place. In that dungeon.

" Mod. Is that person me?" 

[ The body is not you, but you infested it before it was killed by a statue in the original timeline.]

[ Due to it's extreme desire to live on. A forbidden magic was attempted but failed. ~+~ found a disposable body that accepted your personality construct and tailored it to fit transfers within this world.]

" Does he have a family?" 

[…]

[ There are entities waiting for him outside this dungeon.]

"..."

[ Do you feel that you could have lived out your life differently knowing this?]

[ All your actions have involved the death of a life who desired to return to their family. A circumstance you had offered for the hunters.]

[ But denied for the body that allowed to use it as your home.]

"..." 

[ Dear Administrator.]

[ You have seen the world through transfers.]

[ But you have never lived long enough to see the impact or alterations your actions have done in those worlds.]

[ You may come to desire and yearn for death in your transfers.]

[ You may become something that prays for the deaths of millions of worlds.]

[ You may hope to stand in a place where you believe god does not do enough and bring forth miracles to those you encounter.]

[ Administrator.]

[ Do you wish to transfer?]

[ In Another Life?]

"…" I stared at my body.

The way he stood in front of the formation not controlled by me.

How he cried in front of the formation.

Something about it made me feel bad.

I didn't think of what would happen if I were no longer there anymore.

It seemed that the moment I was no longer in control.

The original owner will return when I had gone.

Living was curse to me.

If I lived something always seemed to go wrong, but there the original owner of the body cried with joy.

[ An existence has offered all of his mana to send a message to personality construct Al.]

I stood there staring at the notification that opened and revealed a short message.

[ Thank you.]

In a single moment message faded and I saw him suffering from something.

[ Due to insufficient mana. An existence will die.]

 When I touched the option to transfer.

I found myself kneeling in front of the formation with this indescribable pain of something ripping open from the inside of my chest.

[ In this transfer. The Architect experienced a fading and you named yourself Al Cartenon.]

[ Your body faced a direct fading.]

[ The owner of the body woke up to an event where a large battle had taken place and all his tormentors were gone.]

[ Due to the fading. Only Al was faded from this reality. The original body had not been harmed. A disposable body was destroyed in place of it.]

[ To thank the personality construct. The owner resorted to sacrificing their life to send a single message, since they could not reach you through other means, but death.]

[ This body will soon die.]

" I'm sorry." 

The owner of this body. Not once had I ever thought of what he must have felt.

Every time I transferred. 

It was always about me.

Sometimes I forget…

This life I had was never my own.

Just like with Sera.

I lived for two people.

[ In the last moments of the originals body life.]

[ He smiled seeing all of his hunting party protected by this miracle.]

[ He smiled seeing many other escape.]

[ They were satisfied with your actions Al.]

I clasped my hands together and kneel down and prayed in front of the hunters within.

 I didn't think of god. I thought of how someone could do something like what this body had done.

To give up their whole life to leave behind two words.

Only someone who desired death would do something as foolish.

" Mod can you explain to me the circumstance involving this body?" 

[ Al. Occupation. Vice captain for a newly established guild called The Hunting Party.] 

[ Due to financial circumstance between his life as a student and the guild. He had entered this dungeon with the Leader Of The Hunting party and her butler. All three were killed by the Architects plot to find a perfect vessel for The Shadow Monarch, Ashborn.]

"…"

" What was the ranks for the Leader and Butler?"

[ Each one of them were registered as E Rank Hunters who could not develop under the extreme conditions of debt and inability to finance their self-proclaimed guild.] 

[ They had formed The Hunting Party in hopes of living a better life for themselves, but also their families.]

" Mod. Can you explain the way I feel?"

[ Understanding of the lives you have ruined, but unable to feel the guilt for what you have done. This feeling is an Apathetic Embrace.]

I've been thinking a lot about myself.

And I've decided to be happy.

" Mod. Go through the process for the new personality construct transfer."

I stood over the hunters.

" From now on everyone of you will be my slave."

" I won't remember your names or your faces, but you will know it from your hearts that I own you." 

" You will do everything I say even if it would go against your conscience."

" If I say murder. You will respond without hesitation."

" If I say die. You will follow through the way I want you to."

" In exchange for being my slave…."

"…" 

" Use me as you wish, because I'll use you too."

I raised my hand and felt something inside me begin to rot as I thought of what immortality would appear like here.

[ Your inside has——]

"…" I waved my hand to rid of the notification.

I didn't want it only for myself.

 A serum that granted immortality was enough to fulfill my desire.

A serum that allows someone to live after death and fixes their bodies rapidly each time they encounter it. Like mend, they will experience death, their bodies will automatically learn to mend and resurrect on it's own.

This was my gift to for them.

[ Immortal Serum: A serum that grants an entity the lowest level of immortality. Each death will increase the immortal effect.]

A white serum sitting inside of a syringe with a needle at the tip of it.

I press the needle tore a hole into their skin, not looking for a vein, but a muscle in the arm.

Then I walked to another and then another.

Placing a small part of the liquid through.

My body was decaying inside. I zoned out the feeling by walking to hunters and injecting them with some of the immortal serum as I applied mend to my body.

It didn't fix my mind.

 I refused to use the serum.

Mend was enough to delay the physical hurt, but it wasn't going to fix what was already decaying inside.

Physically it hurts.

My mind wanted to die.

It was a form of anxiety I couldn't explain.

It was just an alarm going off in my head detaching me from what I was feeling before.

This serum was for them. It won't fix my mind.

I just had to function and live till this body stops moving.

I walked over to another hunter and another until all of them were injected with an immortal serum.

I raised my hand over my body and used a bit of mend to fight against the curse of Alter Reality.

It just wasn't working. The rotting fed everything I fixed and damaged my insides again.

I saw my skin start to tear open because of it.

Inside of me was all dark and black even the blood was tainted.

[ Mending has been applied.]

[ Mending has been applied.]

In the end. I ended up laying against the stomach of a hunter, using it as some sort of pillow and looking up to the ceiling as my insides rot and burned.

I could smell the stench of decay from my own breath and my body just… dieing, but that was all fine.

It was a lot better than what I was thinking inside.

[ 9 hunters are in the process of immortality.]

[ Their bodies will repair themselves and then will be resurrected.]

I stared to an the last bit of serum of it left in the syringe. It was very small, maybe the size of two drops.

In my hands.

[ Fade.]

 I watched it burn out and fade from my fingers.

" I thought about wanting to live."

" I don't want to do that anymore." 

[ What changed your mind?]

"…" 

" I hate crowds."

" I hate the sun."

" I hate people I don't know."

" But worst of all. I'm still a No-Life." 

" It's hard to be in a normal place."

" Around normal people."

[…]

The ring I received from the Architect.

There was no use to wear it now.

So I placed it on the finger of the body I laid on and just stared forward.

I lifted out my finger.

[ E Rank Support system has been transferred to all slaves.]

[ System description: A modified system of the Architects.]

[ All abilities representing the experiences and existence of the personality construct Al.]

I wish.

Someone else could live a better life than me.

[ Are your experiences as a No-Life preventing you from living?]

" I'm not sure."

[ May I suggest a callous solution?]

[ ~+~ would like to perform a Memory Amputation.]

[ There is the potential your habits, mannerisms and desires you own will be affected after amputation——]

" Cut away everything."

[…]

[ Do you wish to continue?]

" You have my consent."

[…]

There I saw phantoms.

[ A memory has faded.]

[ A memory has faded.]

I reached out both my hands as they fluttered over me.

Thousands if not hundreds of thousands of memories.

All of them….

Surrounding me… leaving my mind.

[ All memories have faded.]