Curious But Cautious Forgiveness

Jean hesitated, stuttering, "I... I... N— U—hm. W-Well, they're all different, but..." Several more warnings popped up. "...one was a city ruled by a massive leviathan, and everyone in the city..." He shivered. "... was a part of something f*cking horrible. Murders happened in the streets, rape happened in every house, children were traded away as sex toys, violence was regular and open, greed was expected, there was no trust, love was always betrayed, and... and so, so much more. It was horrible; I—I hate it. I hate everybody in it. It should be destroyed absolutely. There was no saving it."

Jean continued describing it for some time after with increasing... fear? anger? fanaticism? He didn't know what he felt. The sight of the city had been so revolting that tears appeared in his eyes as Jean's monologue finally halted, though his tears never fell.

"It sounds like you're right," M said, only vaguely recognizing his description from an ancient book, though parts of it didn't fit. "A city like that deserves to be wiped off the map," he said, his stomach stirring in revulsion and disgust at a few of his descriptions. "Righteous fire must only be used when necessary, but I'd be more than happy to use it to eradicate that city and its people. Were there any others?"

A warning popped up: 'He's probing for more information! Don't give it or he may find what he's looking for!'

Jean sniffed, "Y-Yeah, the second was... It was actually better. It was grisly and harrowing but much better than the city. It showed me pain I can't even describe, but any amount of physical pain is better than that."

"I'd think so, too, depending on a few things, but continue."

"It was an entire plain of human remains. It was scorching hot, like the center of a furnace; no, it was even hotter than any fire I know. But there was also a sharp wind stronger than a hurricane blowing the pieces of bone around until they splintered unto shards that eviscerated everything there and eroded the skeletons beneath into nothing. But at least your pain would be quick there."

"Better than a slow destruction, yeah. Were there any more, or was it just one a night?"

A final warning zipped into Jean's view, 'Yes! It was only one a night! Take the way out! He's offering it to you on a silver platter! Take it, now!'

"Uh... N-No, there was one more, the one that I just woke up from. The other two were from the day prior. This was the most recent, but this one was worse than the other two by far. Concerning wrath, there could be no world with a purer concentration of it that that."

M muttered, "It was wrath, then," before asking, "Can you describe it to me? It must be something incredible for you to say that."

"It was madness. Human-like things were all over the place in all kinds of sizes. There were some larger than skyscrapers, and even the smallest was bigger than the two of us. The entire plain was made of bodies, not just bones, but bodies, and each one was still alive and grasping at our heels to kill us as I and every other one of the creatures did nothing but make war against one another."

Jean continued, still shaken despite being awake now and having time to process it in the void, "I killed everything I could however I could, and everything else did the same. Nothing would stop us, not even health, physics, or death. Every time one of us lost something, it would regenerate. I lost my head and my chest, and they both reappeared from nothing."

Trembling, Jean said, "The muscles felt like snakes as they intertwined themselves with the bones and attached themselves violently. Fire burned us alive, but I couldn't notice the heat. Everything was red, and the sky was oblivion itself, black, beige, scarlet, purple, raining blood and bodies. I only returned when I couldn't do anything more. A behemoth with a leg larger than my body stepped on me and buried me under so much gore I couldn't do anything. Tons and tons of remains were on top of me."

"I was right. That does sound like something special. I don't recognize your descriptions exactly, but I may be able to dig something up with enough research." M was lying again to make sure Jean didn't run off. Neither knew the other's intentions, and he had to play it safe for the sake of the great good.

He recognized the domain as soon as Jean mentioned wrath. Every region of the abyss, as it was called by some, contained three hells, each corresponding to the past, present, or future, and the region's domain was the seat of its power and the most powerful hell in the region. M didn't know all this, of course, as only an extremely select few on this world did, but he knew some. He knew nothing about the diamond, as Jean didn't mention it, but he knew that he might be able to find something about the hells with Jean's help. So, he decided to forgive him for his unconscious outburst.

"Did you see anything else, Jean? Anything that could help, even if you think it might not. Hopefully, I can get rid of these nightmares of yours." M said this with every intent of making it come to pass if he could but moderately low expectations of actually being able to do so. He was just gathering information now.

All the warnings vanished, and a blue chat screen zipped open with a message that read, 'Well, now that you've gone and said it all, just tell him the truth, will you? That's about it, isn't it? There's nothing left to tell, is there?'

Jean let out a breath before pausing a moment to think. "Fhew... Uh... Kind of. At the end of my sleep, I enter a void of some kind. Nothing's there, not even my body. I can't go anywhere at all. I can't tell if time passes at all, so I don't know how long I spend there, but it seems like every time I realize something important, I wake up. Like when I realized the names of these hells and how much better the second was than the first."

"You know the names? What were they? You should've told me that earlier."

In frustration, Potestas sent another message, 'Stop jeopardizing yourself! Everything you give him could be something that sets him off! What are you doing to us!? Why?!'

"The name of the city was iniquity. It was wrath's breeding ground. The plain of bones was called pain and desolation. It is the end of wrath. The third hell was just wrath. It was eternal... And I guess it still is, actually. Because it's eternal, it can never not be eternal, depending on what it means to be eternal in this context."

"That's a fair assessment. Are you sure about the names, though? Are they the names given to them or are you just guessing?"

Jean stayed quiet for a moment because even he didn't know. The line between Potestas' information and his thoughts was growing thinner. In reality, he was not the one to come up with these names. Sins, past, present, and future, are all eternal, and so is every aspect of them, including their names. "...I don't know."

Another chat from Potestas read, 'Pretend you might have more information later! If he thinks we've outlived our usefulness, he might kill us to rid himself of responsibility or a loose end! We need more information to know what to do, so you have to play it safe! We talked about this!'

Finally heeding his advice because it no longer required lying, Jean said, "I don't think this is the end of my dreams, though."

"What makes you say that?"

"A diamond was revealed to me in the void. It has 21 faces, and I think each of the hells are only one face of the diamond."

M's heart beat faster and harder and his breathing quickened. This was vital information to him that he could share with those he needed to. That number, 21, gave them crucial information. It told him that there were seven regions of the abyss.

Jean continued, "I don't know how much of it I'll have to go through, maybe all of it, but this isn't the end as far as I can tell."

M cleared his throat to make sure his excitement wasn't too apparent. "Alright, thank you. This is extremely useful. I should be able to make better progress with this."

"Better progress? You've been researching this kind of thing already?"

Deciding to come clean, M winced and said, "Well... Yeah, I've been researching a topic regarding the hells for a very long time. It's very important to me, but I still know little about them. They're an incredibly elusive subject. Even now, I don't know anything about these dreams of yours, but I do intend to find out. I have more research at a university relatively close to here, and I'm going to try to reach it as soon as I can to get more information."

"Can I come with you?"

M promptly responded, "No. I don't know how to say this, but... They're hunting you, Jean."