Book 2: Chapter 515
Even a cursed fate has an end.
The life of hunger, which she was unable to do anything about on her own, came to an end. It took a very long time for that to happen. She was only released at the moment when the universe came to an end, long enough for her to even give up on giving up.
But freedom was just the beginning of a different hell.
A grey desert.
A sky embroidered with various colours.
A desolate world where not even a trace of life could be felt.
“──.”
All of a sudden.
She realised her role.
It was her first time feeling this way.
Knowledge that she hadn’t known before flowed into her head. Each and every truth that she came to know was so shocking, she…
“…kukuku.”
Let out a laugh.
How could she not.
After all, she found out why she had suffered so much.
“Don’t go looking for God.”
She heard a dry voice.
It was a person with bleached hair that sharply contrasted his brown skin.
“Under no circumstances, regardless of how hard it is, won’t go looking for God. We.”(*: The ‘we’ should start the sentence)
The way he spoke was more unique than anything she had ever experienced before, but it was not enough to distort the intent behind his words.
More importantly, she knew who this being was.
“We?”
That’s why it was even more disgusting.
“Don’t act like we’re the same. Do you even know what hunger is?”
The Knights are not all the same.
They don’t have the same pain.
So don’t try to build a sense of kinship with me, you bastards who don’t know hunger.
“I don’t know. However, I know. Other things.”
“Like what?”
“Why we became like this.”
“…”
“There is. Outside. Beings born from hundreds of millions of overlapping miracles. Beings who live long lives without experiencing a single failure. Beings who took away the blessings we were meant to have, like the two sides of a coin, light and dark.”
“…”
This was something that surpassed the knowledge that she received.
She asked.
“Who are they?”
“Rulers.”
After a brief reply, he continued.
“Every being is born with their own purpose. According to that person’s determined classification system, we are born losers. And Rulers are born Absolutes, beings who acquire everything from the very beginning.”
“Who is that person?”
“God.”
“…”
That day.
From the day she first learned about God and the Rulers, she hated them so much. But more than that, she was jealous.
For a while, she was overcome by a sense of inferiority and defeat, and she struggled with pain once more.
No one knew what was happening inside of her.
Because she didn’t want to show any signs of weakness, she laughed.
* * *
The past was something she didn’t want any piece of to be discovered by anyone.
No matter how precious a person is, even if they were closer than a family member, the things that someone didn’t want to reveal were even more precious.
In Pale’s case, her past, which was dotted with hunger, was that thing.
‘Sorry.’
Lukas apologised first.
She wanted to conceal her origin, but Lukas had peeked at her memories without permission. It was an act deserving of criticism.
‘I see.’
However, because of that, Lukas was able to grasp Pale’s nature.
He also learned of her blind hatred towards the Rulers.
“Ahahaha…! Ahahahaha…!”
Pale burst into laughter, but she wasn’t laughing at all.
She seemed crazy, but she was calmer than ever before.
Lukas could see it now.
…In that case, then,
At this point, there was something that he could say to her.
Even if it can’t change anything, even if it is pointless.
[Lightning God, if we continue like this, we can win this battle.]
That was actually the case.
Although one arm had been cut off, the Lightning God displayed such an amazing fighting sense that he couldn’t even be regarded as a one armed person.
It didn’t stop at sending Pale’s helmet flying. While minimising the damage he took, he was consistently destroying Pale’s armour.
Still concentrating on the fight with Pale, the Lightning God responded.
“Why did you add a useless thing like [if we continue like this]?”
[Because I need to do something crazy that will probably lower our chances of winning.]
If someone else had heard such bullshit, their bodies would probably have paused, even if just for a moment.
Of course, the Lightning God would not make such a silly mistake, but the absurdity he felt was no less.
“Can you not understand the situation? I have the advantage. I finally managed to build momentum to put pressure on the Blue Knight. Do you understand? If we don’t continue this momentum, there will not be a second time. .”
The Lightning God looked at her.
Even though her helmet was hit away and half of her armour was smashed, she didn’t look like a being who was at a disadvantage at all.
“If the initiative is passed to the Blue Knight again, that will be the moment of certain defeat. As I said, that guy is still growing even now.”
[Everything you said is right.]
“Then…”
[However.]
It was at that moment.
The Lightning God experienced the unpleasant experience of his body moving without his control. It opened its mouth and spoke.
“Just this time, follow my insistence.”
Immediately after those words were uttered, the Lightning God’s eyes widened slightly in surprise, before narrowing again.
“Did you grow again? I can’t believe you managed to regain control of your body while looking at the past, present and future.”
“Just the tongue and lips.”(TL: And jaw?)
“What are you trying to do?”
“I told you. I’m about to do something crazy that will lower our chances of winning.”
“…prick, aren’t you ‘watching’ right now?”
He was talking about the authority of omniscience.
Lukas smiled bitterly.
“Not yet. I’m doing it at the same time. However, I’m gradually reaching my limit. You should know too, right? The longer this pointless conversation goes on, the more our chances of winning decrease.”
If someone were to see this scene, they would probably burst into laughter.
It would look like one person was asking and answering his own question, as if he were playing two roles.
“You dare to threaten the Lightning God?”
“I’m saying think rationally. I will tell you, I have no intention of giving up on this craziness.”
“This is turning me off more and more.”
“…you, know a word like that?”
But the only spectator there, Pale, was not interested in their conversation.
She was still smiling, but the smile on her face was not because of the unfunny jokes by the beings in front of her.
“Ha. Right. Just do whatever you want.”
Saying that, the Lightning God focused on the fight once again.
Lukas only regained control of his tongue. But that was enough for now.
“Pale.”
He called the name of the woman with blue hair.
There was no response.
“Pale.”
In the minimal time zone, in the even more compressed period of time.
In the midst of the fierce battle, Lukas called her name once more.
There was still no answer.
Pale just continued to swing her sword with a faint smile.
‘Maybe she doesn’t want to listen.’
But it was Lukas’ fault for causing this disagreement.
That was why he had more to say.
“You are wrong.”
“─haht.”
This time, there was a reaction.
Pale’s eyes flashed with cynicism, and the power behind her sword slash increased.
The Lightning God clicked his tongue. Depending on their emotional up and downs, they become stronger or weaker. This rule should only apply to the weak. As expected, the Four Knights were beings that deviated from providence in many ways.
The momentum of the fight intensified.
However, this was only the beginning. From now on, Lukas would stir up Pale’s heart even more wildly and violently. Most of the responsibility for handling the aftermath would fall on the Lightning God.
Feeling a little sorry for him, Lukas continued.
“Now I know your principles of conduct.”
He thought of an event that occurred in a certain timeline.
At that time, Lukas had gone to a place called the Dump Site. And it was none other than Pale who guided him there.
The corpses of ‘many Lukases’,
He had no choice but to eat them in order to become stronger. Pale must have been able to see through that goal.
So Lukas ate them.
He committed a sin by eating everything without leaving anything behind.
Pale, who realised this fact when they later reunited, was even more happy.
He wasn’t sure why at first, but now he knew.
At that moment, Pale had felt a faint sense of kinship. She also got the slightly addictive pleasure gained from the feeling of immorality when corrupting someone.
…She must have felt a kind of love as well.
A twisted affection directed only at those who had committed the same sin.
She couldn’t just love those that bore the same scars. The quality had to be much worse.
Without such a person, Pale had to create one.
So she guided Lukas to the Dump Site.
And she encouraged Butterfly to eat her parent.
“You can’t do that.”
Lukas murmured again.
“That method is wrong.”
“What’s wrong with it?”
Pale replied in a low voice.
It was the first time that conversation had been established since she went out of control.
“Just because you’re walking through hell, you shouldn’t entice others to walk with you. The presence of someone else walking beside you might cause the pain to fade for a while. However… your surroundings are still hell. Nothing changes.”
“Change? I don’t want to change.”
“No. You do want to change. You long to change your environment. You are lonelier than anyone I know, which is why you can’t stand being alone.”
The power of Pale’s blade doubled.
A lightning-clad arm blocked the attack, but the Lightning God’s body sank into the ground.
He was shedding blood. It was only then that the Lightning God realise what Lukas meant by ‘ something crazy that will probably lower our chances of winning’.
Continuing this conversation which was stimulating Pale was basically a shortcut to defeat.
“Please look at me, understand my wounds, and the cries I let out every time I cough up blood.”
Lukas slowly recalled the past.
“It was like that the first time we met. Sorry. I didn’t notice.”
He’d thought she was an incomprehensible monster.
Even after that, he kept her in check, being careful.
It was the same even in this life, in this life where he could confidently say that he was the closest to Pale.
Even after coming to the Three Thousand Worlds, he treated Pale like a dangerous element. Although he didn’t express it directly, he had always regarded her as an uncontrollable monster.
He was more wary of Pale than of Diablo or the Demon King, who were his original targets, or the Rulers, who were hiding their ulterior motives.
…He shouldn’t have.
“…”
Pale’s eyes shook.
It was a different attitude from before. At some point, the smile had disappeared from her face. Her tightly pressed lips seemed to be forcibly blocking her bursting voice.
“It’s not too late.”
“…”
“I’ll help. I’ll teach you how to live a better life.”
Of course, Lukas didn’t know enough about life to brag. However, there was no right way to live. There was just one truth.
Life was essentially pain.
And in Pale’s case, she didn’t even know what her pain was. That made it the most painful and saddest pain in the world.
“…and how to kill an inferiority complex, control jealousy, and overcome a sense of defeat.”
There is no one that isn’t at least a little ugly.
Everyone has some amount of evil in their hearts. There is no human who is perfectly good from head to toe.
Lukas now knew that too.
“I learned that because of you.”
“…”
“I learned a lot after I ate so many ‘mes’ in the Dump Site.”
Pale didn’t understand what he was saying.
Pale, who had been looking at him for a while, turned her gaze away.
Lukas wanted to reach out to her, but he couldn’t.
His body was still under the control of the Lightning God. As mentioned before, Lukas only had control over the lips and tongue.
Now he had reached his limit.
Lukas returned control, which he had temporarily regained, to the Lightning God.
He turned his eyes away from the the battle between the Lightning God, and the Blue Knight, the two absolute beings,
And looked at the future.
Hopefully, this conversation wouldn’t have been for nothing.
He hoped something had changed.
Wishing desperately, he looked.
Looked at the futures which were more numerous than the stars.
“──.”
Lukas blinked.
More than hundreds of millions of possibilities.
In the blink of an eye, most of the futures began to disappear rapidly. It was similar to the Milky Way rapidly disappearing from the black sky. Or like a city filled with lights suffering a power outage. In this way, ‘possibilities’ began to disappear one by one.
He had kept it from the Lightning God, but Lukas hadn’t found a ‘future where he reconciled with Pale’. He couldn’t find it.
This meant that this possibility didn’t exist from the start.
However… Nevertheless, he still hoped something would change.
Although he really hated the word, he hoped that a miracle would happen.
But judging from the result, Lukas’ actions were foolish.
Most of the possibilities disappeared from his sight.
Among the pitch black futures, only one possibility had not lost its colour.
“…”
Seeing that future, Lukas resigned himself.
The sight of a corpse laying grimly on the ground in a miserable state.
A future that had already been fixed, a future that could not be changed.
Soon,
Lukas Trowman would die.