Take Up the Cross – Chapter 121: [Authentic Fiction] Meets Another Untruth Made Real

Under twilight skies, Neesiette’s crimes were spoken with something approaching pride.

As if it were simply necessary, even.

(I will understand why you did this…!)

That look of wonder she gave to another is the central crime.

(Then punish you.)

“… A-Adris…! Bro…! Lil bro, what are you doing!?”

The devil’s ultimatum disguised as an appeal was not spontaneous, suffusing the scene in its entirety like smoke for his illusions and infusing that which he gave artful life to lull his obsession into compliance.

Age, cultivation, and intellect most heinous set that stage and its exhibits well in advance. Prior study aids in such traps, drilling to the core of the target for impact and then folding in the pierced flesh to cover the wounds. Because so many targets were laid bare by Adris’ own, it’s easy to follow the trail in unwilling fellowship with another conman.

The shared pursuits, ending in one side facing the prospect of inferiority to the other.

Where he’d acknowledged his, and curiously benefited.

(I’ll remember that approach, in your memory. And…)

The townsfolk which prostrated themselves, in deference to a Neesiette that secretly longs to be found useful and worshiped.

Golems which stood for what she could create with the manse owner’s services, grand pieces worthy of her continued investment.

Perhaps most alluring, a pupil who respected her. This Kol “made better”, the culmination of joining hands to train a recalcitrant offender, struck a chord on the instrument made by the moon.

(Such pure calculations were made. I thought too little of that thing.)

Never again.

The danger is now experienced firsthand, the cure for this gray cancer made obvious.

Cold details are easy to handle when your touch is also freezing. When your heart is fierce, but quiet, filled only with a pure need. A virtuoso can entice another to be stolen where this amateur only sought to beg a willing surrender.

(Why that one failed is probably obvious in retrospect.)

Sifting these details lines them up perfectly, no need for petty externalities. They will save his mind from dwelling on what might have been lost, but wasn’t, and now stands only to gain.

(They’ve been in contact more often than I thought. Whenever they talked of craft or lore, it was a conversation none could ever intrude upon.)

That Neesiette was perfectly met on the elevated stage of equals, despite not being treated as one. A conman in purple and green had danced with her in his hands, saying all the correct words and leading in the final steps toward the heart of what Neesiette desires and abhors. All while she floated in that fabricated memory.

(She wants elegance despite being ascetic? She drank it up when he poured it into her cup. She also “despises” his overbearing assessments of that peculiar way she regards herself, her duties, and the world, but isn’t that just a lie, too!?)

Neesiette had been stripped naked for a moment by the devil’s cutting truths. Adris had to share glimpses of her truest fears and hopes that struggled to hide within an emotionless, constrained self.

(I need to claim that inroad.)

She’d never asked for an apology. When a woman doesn’t demand one for overstepping boundaries…

(… Kill him.)

“Ugh, calm down, please!?”

Just as that creature spoke, Neesiette faced the empirical with absolute belief that required silence.

And it had nearly unbalanced her enough for the close to steal her.

(I need… want confirmation.)

This blurry figure on the bed that refuses to be near him is the perfect option for testing this. Regardless of her refusals of love and talk of being an ageless lover that will bury others, this beautiful specimen that reeks of carnage also understands the heart.

Despite not being born with a working one, herself.

“L-Lycia…!”

“Y-Yes~!?”

“When a… when a girl looks at a man like… like…”

When he must describe the feelings or the face, the heart that feels cannot deliver words. It prevents feeling them, no matter how the world around him appears to swirl in his erratic mood.

(Stop tripping over yourself and be clear!)

Suddenly, when he looks for a description he perfectly recalls the very face she showed.

Eyes, widening. Filling with fascination. Mouth parting only minutely. Head and neck, losing tension as wonder overtook all else…

(Words don’t work, so show that face. The face I’ve seen more than once…)

Within the Castillo, for a brief moment when trapped alone in the study room with Neesiette’s introductions.

Adris had studied that reaction very briefly before returning it.

“Ugh!? Stop it! Men don’t ever look like that, ever!” Lycia’s disgust proves he gets it right. “Cease! Quiiit! You’re not a maiden! But, also, stop getting angry, too!?”

“Lycia: what does it mean!?”

“That’s… hah…” A quick head shake and a scratch of her cheek reveals Lycia Vehrose’s bewilderment, but also fighting suspicion. “It’s an easy question, but don’t go wild after the answer.”

(The answer is…)

“It’s the look of a girl who’s wondering… if she’s finally found what she loves.”

(Of course it is, or her equivalent thoughts.)

A fist slamming on the floor demonstrates how fine Adris is with that information.

So hard at first, the impact changes to miraculously soft.

(BURN EVERYTHING YOU LOVE, RIGHT TO THE GROUND WITH YOU INSIDE IT! I DON’T CARE IF THIS SHIT ISN’T FLAMMABLE! I’LL FIGURE OUT HOW TO SET IT…!)

“Shi-shit, Adris…!”

(… Right, there’s also the second face.)

“And, this second one, Lycia…?” Cool in his head, his voice turns equally cold. “Watch closely.”

“Mm-hmm!”

The second face was the dissatisfying, niggling doubt that overtook everything else.

A look that spells out that the artifice of the illusory moment, one where anyone might agree to what you demanded of them by begging, breaks.

“… Huh, that’s the face of someone who didn’t…”

(She passed up that moment.)

Adris cannot understand why, given what he knows.

Perhaps nobody will be enough. To match this godlike being called “Luna” that Adris will likely never meet might simply be too far to leap, falling into a bottomless pit called inadequacy.

(Or… his appeal was simply the wrong one.)

If it were Adris, Neesiette would never fall into his own flow even for an instant.

She would systematically tear down his viewpoints and march over his emotions in her own implacably subdued style. A brutal little tyrant that sees all other living creatures as misbegotten children to be relearned, Neesiette is always exact without a shred of uncertainty and expects the same in return. Only when caught off guard with indisputable logic or the deepest emotions that she can’t comprehend does she give in.

(However, that bastard received something unique.)

Under the fake moon that she rejected as ugly, Neesiette was deferential and supportive. Struggling to be something she isn’t by nature, in order to complement another’s mood for an unknown reason.

(I don’t feel like I’d want that consideration?)

It appeared healthy, uniting them in an evolving play with emotional overtures, but the moment it was threatening to their relationship at present they both pushed away without hesitation or mercy.

(Until I know what it is I’m missing about Neesiette’s actions, I will not allow myself to hate her, no matter how easy and correct it would be to do so.)

The belief that [the overly loyal Neesiette would not normally do this, so the troubles go much deeper] extinguishes the bonfire of pain that was growing. Just before it can flare up to resemble the inferno born in the tomb beneath Xin.

“She would not betray us without extreme cause.”

“… Oh…?”

“Yes. I will choose not to destroy her until I understand her soul even better than that feathered old…”

(Ah, don’t give away too much.)

“… until her soul is plain to me.”

“O-Okay… good, women love people understanding their souls, so, please… help a lady out with…”

When his mood calms, so does Lycia’s in her continued, aimless pleadings.

(Neesiette… and that arrogant son of a bitch… felt so lonely, and she refused him immediately out of concern for others. Even if a veiled excuse to hide the rest, it is not untrue.)

Adris’ mystic barely slid to a stop before the moment of betrayal, wisely realizing what dangers it would bring her.

(So, there’s only really one [ABSOLUTE VILLAIN] about to be chopped.)

“Ghk!? UUUUUGH…!”

A thread of happiness at his arch-enemy being lonely sparkles before Adris’ sight.

Such a bright, sunshine grin with broad appeal to all who witness it is his response.

(And the berserk creature I’ve been tutoring is even more pissed than I am. This revenge finishes, whether I want it to or not! Especially after being hoodwinked into a full-scale war for the “soul” of her creator!)

Though that outrage the evil doll spirit feels is mostly pure fantasy and the contrived illusions of others, a naive soul is what Adris wanted in the first place. Filled out and fattened by a kobold’s fiery nature and the necessary evils conveyed by Adris’ wonderful intellect, his instrument is nearly finished.

(Looking at this logically, they all have some guilt, so I’m just gonna let Fehr go wild and take as many heads as she wants to.)

From lesser to major:

Rantil,

Ave,

Kol,

Still,

The bird bitches of this manse and their fencing lizard,

The mad bunny sage,

Orloss,

Sapphira,

Neesiette…

(And his “eminence” the fake butler, who moves on others’ possessions when it’s most convenient… for him. They all must pay their required tithe of suffering for this, so that when I deign to intercede in their salvation it will be after I am satisfied…)

The thought of sharing an intimate moment with the foolish doll collector where he laments that he couldn’t seal the evil deal he offered renews Adris’ lease on life.

(The unfinished, misplaced details that destroyed his seduction are mine to correct, too, for my own victory. I am a false god, and I swear an Oath to myself that I’m going to make sure you’re always alone, you gutless, dismissive, little pissant of a faux riche…!)

“DONE! I’M DONE…!”A voice screams this, right before Adris feels a sharp prick. “tAkInG iT!”

(GAH!?)

“HAAAH~!” Lycia’s arm whipped out without him being able to follow it, to yank out of his forearm with a victory cry while blotting his sleeve with his own blood.

(FUCK THAT HURTS!?)

Half blurry-eyed still but now waking, Adris watches his panting ghoul collapse upon the bed, barely propped up.

“Naaah… haaah.” Rasping as she moans, green star-like eyes shaking in veneration of the crimson dripping from her fingernail. “… Hehehehe, oooooooh…!”

A face sunworn and peeling is the likely source of her painful sounds, but it softens when she sniffs what awaits.

(She suffered from me freeing myself?)

“Mmm…? MMMMMM!!”

A pilfering finger disappears into her mouth, slurped by that delightfully long tongue she teases with before it can even get inside.

(C-Cold! She’s drawing out my life force like Still does!)

Adris heart plummets, strength draining from his arms along with heat.

“… Nnnaaah…!”

His vitality dances in her mouth, delicious sucking sounds sending Adris’ remaining blood pumping in sync with the eroticism inherent within a woman who arches her back in ecstasy of plunder.

“… Hah… hahahaha… tashtes… sho…!

NEVUR… NEVUR FIHND… AGIN…!”

Weathered, cracked skin slowly springs back to devoid of imperfections. Commensurate energy is stolen almost to the limit of Adris containing his own moans of pain. Collapsing to his knees to stay upright, when he has to focus he plays mental aura tricks upon himself.

(It hurts! She’s getting off so much on tasting me, though!)

“Ahhhh, SHUBLIME, NO MOONSH,

ONLY BRUE SKAIS AND…”

The intoxication makes Lycia loudly honest in a way she rarely agrees to be, that delectable body of hers twisting up with what sets her soul ablaze.

“ZHA RAY-DIANT…! SHO RONG AHGO…!”

(The stench of… a bitch is getting thick in here!)

He’d smelled it on entering, but it’s more potent when she savors his own flavor.

“… hah, and… then, how would you rate the… experience?”

“AANGH?”

Wandering eyes refocus with this intrusive question. The finger pumping into her mouth, and a hand which was pulling open her mail skirt, both stop abruptly.

She quickly sits back up, shifting her legs to a more demure pose with the annoyed glare of a woman stopped when it was just getting good.

“It… it’s very… ten out of ten… in healing…”

Lycia chokes out this response, avoiding looking at him while her body’s building release rebottles. Without an outlet, Adris knows she’ll lose restraint soon.

(Lycia has been bathed in horny harpies… she’s going to be…)

“… Nnn…” One last lick on the finger she stabbed him with settles Lycia’s mood. “I see…”

(Pliable…!)

A perfect payment for the liquid treasure she stole.

Rather than skittish, she becomes provocative by letting her legs slide off the bed to display for Adris. Black-clad skin peeks out behind the cuts that allow movement.

“Even though you’re swimming inside with bad things, you’re still… mostly human?”

(I’m pissed that this is so surprising for everyone I meet! But, it’s reassuring, too?)

“Xin’El (HUMAN), but let’s not forget the efforts I’ve put in over my adventurous life.”

“‘From across the black skies’, I hate the way your words self-explain. Just like always, even since back then, Adris, you’ve felt… ‘dangerous’ to be near.”

“It’s the mask, I know. It has the effect of—Ghk!?”

She rises again, shutting his mouth with a nail to his chin that tilts him skyward.

“No, that’s its own presence! You personally are a black cesspit that fills a little more every time I wander by!”

“Cesspit!? Cultural ignorance runs both ways, sis! On Xin, I’d be highly respected for reaching the first rung in the aura ascension track.”

“‘Ascension’? Huh!” When his words don’t win influence, Lycia’s own body language turns hotter. Hand on her hip, she leans away and waves her hand flippantly while pointing upward. “If you think you’re going up, then here on Zennia we call it ‘diving into horror’ when someone flirts endlessly with what lurks just out of sight. Hidden by little more than…”

A short cough punctuates what she hesitates to say.

“… vague obscuration.”

Both flinch when the manse creaks, settling by sheer coincidence.

Green eyes that turn stern signal an unspoken warning at this.

“Don’t overstep the topic. Don’t expand it. Don’t recognize what we both know.”

(Damn, she does know a lot! And she’s wary.)

“You wear another like a protection for your ego. Allow it to cling on for so long that it feels real.”

“Don’t be shy, he’s trying his best. Even I… can’t call that idiot kid fake anymore, sis.”

“You should always call it fake.”

An unserious comment to Lycia earns a less friendly posture that swells with chaotic energy. Claws play by jutting out on one hand, lifting ominously.

“If it ever takes over, I’ll tear that possessing wraith off myself, lil bro.”

(It would be wise. Even on Xin, “self-possessive” Techniques that degraded one’s mentality were absolute heresy.)

If aura is “truth”, and darkness is “mystery”, then the two opposing states of enlightenment must be dissimilar in many aspects. All that Adris knows of what to expect, the trials and advancements, along with their motivations and requirements, is likely useless.

Especially the hazards.

“Even your true form tastes like a Castillo monster’s threat, now, with that bestial blood so thick that I can hardly distinguish the rest riding along. Were you a hallway encounter, I’d gild you before you could talk.”

“… I’m…?”

(‘Bestial’? Then that’s why…)

Even if she doesn’t smell “fertile”, this feminine odor clinging and tickling Adris’ nose is ripe for tasting further. The sharpness of Lycia’s gaunt features is clearer than ever before, no matter how blurry she grows with the corners of Adris’ view getting pinker.

“… I’m not normal even by your standards?”

“Nobody ‘normal’ waltzes into someone’s room wearing another’s form, only to dramatically reveal with glowing red pupils and a billowing cloud of shadow clinging to his body! It still reforms briefly with every stupid thought you have!”

(Shadows?)

Calmer now after his future plans manifesting so well, Adris can take the time to examine his surroundings. Beneath his place in the room bears the most signs of his earlier anger.

(Guh, it’s like standing on wax! Just like the depression when Kol pissed me off. So, she was telling me to calm down because…)

A whipped appearance, like cream left to harden after frothing, has taken over the pseudoprosopon that reacts negatively to his powers. After his ascension his newly made reservoir overflows more often.

(My “darkness” before was inactive, but now it’s as agile as aura.)

Feeling put on the spot, Adris smiles dismissively and turns from her.

“You walk around with glowing eyes all the time, Lycia, but I don’t clobber you.”

“Hilarious. Keep yammering. You’re cramming curses and worse into yourself, ones like those boots…” The rabbit boots with matching red eyes that she points at explain much. Red eyes within his mind and the roar of a malevolent spirit often grate on his psyche when he uses them too much.

(Why were they left with me, when everything else was taken? Was it because I couldn’t be parted…?)

“… and now you’re teetering over the edge. Glaring at others more contemptuously than I do, as if it’s natural to think yourself more sinister than them.”

“Nnn!”

Adris opens his mouth to refute her, but she just chuckles.

“Huh, or is it worse? Maybe you’re already at the point of pretending to be a Beast of Conquest that gains strength from hunting the weak?”

(Everyone is so scared of the “dark” of Zennia, but I’ve survived plenty of times!)

“Aaaah, forget it! I don’t care about the ‘why’, but the ‘how’!” No longer wary of Adris, Lycia’s attractive body looms harder. Overt femininity and naked aggression are the same with how this woman uses her appeals. “Adrisssss~s, you know…”

Claws tap on his chest, flinching Adris and forcing him to give space.

“The next day is fashionably late for news…”

(She knows for sure.)

“Emotions were high, right?”

One leg crosses before the other, a swaying strut of seduction harming Adris in more ways than by instilling fear.

“Even two days after, well? We can say that’s just the way men are, right, romantically unavailable to prove a point?”

She leans over to let her bosom be nearer to his face, enjoying the way he twitches.

“If you were just playing hard to get, I’d have settled for bullying you a bit… but…?”

Narrowed eyes are full of displeasure.

A disapproving mouth turns up, cheeks firming.

“You were never going to tell me, were you?”

When Adris remains silent at the invitation to speak, she taps his lips.

“Right?”

“Ah.”

“What you forced on me, like I’m one of your marks to toy with.”

(I didn’t force you, at least not like…!)

Further silence only results in Lycia’s teeth revealing slightly.

“Can you please tell me what you’re messing with from the bad places? I saw it twist that deranged tunnel dog. I remember the ‘dream’ and recognize the quality of the unknown infesting your cross.”

(You also heard enough…)

Tales of his escape, no matter how brief, revealed the “why” of his overcoming all odds.

“It’s more than bringing others down to your level? I know for sure… these cravings I feel for knowledge, the excesses I taste when looking at exciting things like you…!

(“Exciting things”!?)

The devilish smile Lycia is wearing while regarding Adris is familiar, as is the tone. Both match the girlish face she wears.

“They began that wonderful night, the one that I chose not to eat you, little brother.”

All together, they remind Adris of that nightmare from the past.

(SHIT! Just like Kol, she’s being influenced now by…!)

“RIGHT, I WAS RIGHT! You know, don’t you!?”

Before he can pull away, her hand clenches tightly over his growing member.

“Nngh!?”

“Why am I suddenly a singular genius, little brother, when I’ve only ever been stunningly brilliant before now!? You crammed nasty things into me too that night at the garden, didn’t you!?”

Through his suit, that grip painfully controls the rest.

But, not without gifting some motivation, too.

“… and I don’t mean just your cute cock, Adris.”

At his obedient stillness, she starts to stroke the tip gently.

“What did you gain that we didn’t… touch on?”

“… From… from you I learned about Modi. And, in the Castillo I took that and…!”

(Took what I wanted! What I deserved!)

“It wasn’t a con, Lycia! They placed faith in me, in an Oath, and we… I, made a Modus!”

“M-Made a Modus!? Tell me everything.”

Her other arm comes to wrap around his back, allowing the ghoul to lean in. She strokes him kindly, though she’s roughly breathing in anticipation of a secret.

(She’s overwhelmed…! I’m… I’m overwhelmed, too…)

“I’m waiting…”

“Stop twisting, I’m hurrying!? A Modus is the sum of those belonging to it and their efforts, granting abilities based on them, right?”

“In basest essence, that’s true. From Devotion, stolen or earned, comes advancement with it.”

“… Then, like a true problem solver… I thought: ‘why be weak and alone, when I can be at the top of a new order’…?”

(Why not be the supreme existence of my own path, just like her?)

“Insanity must be your father, little brother, to think you can be a [paragon] (TRUEST EXEMPLAR OF A MODUS) like the Alchemaster.”

(Stop reading my mind!)

“I have plenty to be insane about, these days! [Rule in Dark], the Modus I made that I am the peak of, clearly proves it rewards you well to be loose with reason!”

“Huh, ‘everyone loves a winner’, so it’s okay if you do crazy things?”

“I think I’ve known plenty of idiots who would agree.”

Though reproachful, the light “joke” causes Lycia to grin. Loosening up her tension also brings her to almost pulling Adris to her body.

But, she then stumbles upon a question.

“Having a Modus doesn’t give you anything by itself. How did you taint me…?”

“What are you saying? The Alchemaster empowers others with her ‘greed’, at least that’s what I’ve heard.”

“… You’re too ignorant of that side of the equation. How did you impart something in me sufficient to vastly increase both my intellectual acuity and spontaneous creativity?”

The way she tenses again leads Adris to wonder if she already understands. How her questions lead in is the probing he would use with Ave.

(After all, Lycia is, first and foremost, a mad scholar… she knows something I don’t. When she talks like this, all proper and methodical, I end up losing.)

Lycia lets her forehead rest on his chest after closing her eyes.

(Ah, my heartbeat! With Lycia, even Verisimilitude won’t work now that she suspects everything I might say is false.)

“I can… impart to others things called ‘achievements’.”

“Achievements?”

“Like Modi grant Talents, except from more directed sources. I can direct [Rule in Dark] to empower people and objects that have ‘souls’. These boots, my metallic bracer, even Kol—AAAH!?”

Adris is suddenly thrust toward the ceiling, his gentle and seductive sister replaced by a growling lion!

“I knew that’s what it was!”

“It’s nothing harmful, Lycia! I can invest others with Talents—!”

“You can’t invest Talents, you monkey!”

“But I’ve given Talents. More than once, actually!”

(Why wouldn’t a Modus be able to—!?)

“Idiot! Talents derive from within, from the spiritual framework of the recipient of a Modus’ guidance!”

“Defeating others or overcoming great things… these are what I’m using! Isn’t it the same!?”

“You’re talking about that… tar you coated the tunnel dog with, correct!?”

(Yes?)

Only nodding in response, Adris watches as Lycia shakes with rage.

Before dropping him back to the floor.

“… I gave her… the memory of a creature from the First Age that we defeated.”

“Ahh, yeah, it certainly felt like it was older than I am?”

(You felt it?)

Some combination of honesty and incredulous innocence saves Adris from being brutalized further. Lycia only crosses her arms, propping up her generous tits before…

“Look, there’s little that can be said without others hearing. What you did wasn’t ‘instilling a Talent’. Within that braggart there was a nascent, wounded thing trying to revive.”

(Kol’s aura? Or… the memory of the creature that she met that gave birth to it?)

The discovery of the night that Kol’s aura awakened was that she already possessed a Technique, or its approximate, within her. When an Inner Expanse had attempted to form by her conscious impetus, this Technique attempted to take over.

“There was something within her, but it wasn’t a leftover part?”

“It would’ve recovered on its own eventually, but that corruption you let it suckle on caused it to reincarnate within my own ‘dream’! Hah!” Lycia pats Adris’ sides, looking for something. “Is this why you’re possessed by the Allip, too!?”

“Wha!?”

Again she grabs a hold of his still erect member, tugging on it.

“Did you let it suck your dick and lap up what ‘Talents’ sprayed out!?”

“… No, she was an imp changed by the other side along with me! We’re linked by circumstances, not mutual exchange.”

“Being from another world is pure ignorance if you’re consorting with imps, little brother.”

All lingering doubts seem to have fled her upon hearing Adris’ mistakes, leaving Lycia free to pace around the room.

“Defeating others grants them? Let me guess, you also receive these ‘achievements’ for actions that spectacularly terrorize or dominate potential foes?”

“I mean, few of these achievements actually hurt me or others? They mostly just bode poorly for people in the future…?” Stopping to think on the ones he’s acquired and used, and also…

An achievement relating to this blond beauty is lying in wait, kissing at his thoughts to be brought forth.

Gained by thwarting the Alchemaster and freeing her, it was half blessing and half curse with the way that it spoke glowingly of itself.

(Just the same as every other “defeat” achievement: born of overcoming a “being of darkness”, either fully or partially composed of it?)

When he thinks of her and what he gained from risking her ire, Lycia startles.

“How am I related now?”

“From your perspective, you’d be totally correct about where my ‘gifts’ come from is what I was thinking.”

“Then… those aren’t ‘achievements’, Adris.”

For once, Lycia’s knowledge comes with deliberation.

She places a finger to her blood-red lips, tapping as if indicating a need for secrecy.

“I’m not sure who fooled you in your self-tutoring of this world, but what you’ve become would be loosely classified by the Works as a [Penumbra] (HALF-SHADOWED BEING). You’re hoarding vestiges of dark things you slay.”

“Penumbra? Is that what…?”

When his eyes rove over her figure, Lycia nods coquettishly as if he’s just appropriately noticed her worth.

“The undead are instantly classified as one by our natures. ‘What should not be, what cannot be, and what must not be’. All fit into this, and we’re the first. [Umbra] classifies the second.”

“And how did I…?”

(It was the Veil…)

“You’re a ‘human who’s briefly wandered outside of the definition’. A twilight resident by choice or accident, forever changed by what you learned from peeking, most likely.”

“Then where does this power I use derive from?”

(What fills the black cross’ reservoir, if not my Modus?)

Lycia’s face grows troubled, her eyes turning toward thin shadows that once leaped at her.

“A simple definition would be: ‘when others wish that they’d never met you, or that you’d never existed in the first place’.”

Fear.

Dread.

Obsession.

Pure mysteriousness of the Beyond.

(An “achievement” can certainly be called one, to solidify the nebulousness that makes up Zennia’s unseen foundations into easily usable form. Things born of it would obviously grow stronger by absorbing more, just like aura users acquire Techniques. Ah, we’re…)

“Yeah, I suppose I am one, Lycia.

One of these creatures you all seem to… fear.”

A naked admission sounds like moans from all corners.

Aggressive and cruel,

conspiratorial and indifferent to remaining hidden.

Briefly both are surrounded by these presences that can’t be. Turning to catch sight of those who intrude on a private discussion, neither discover a soul.

“I hate that…!”

“I’ll agree, that never feels fine.”

When the room is, of course, revealed to still be empty instead of full of the shambling lookers that both felt crowding them enough to warrant peeking under the bed to be sure, Lycia wriggles her fingers and hangs closer to Adris as if to steal some heat.

(“You would’ve used evil things without limit or safety if you understood then how seductively potent they were”.)

Rantil only identified the “how” and “why” using “achievements” had functioned with intent to steer clear of risks. Adris doesn’t even have to open her book to confirm this would be her excuse.

(I only know how dangerous “darkness” is after being ruined by it many times. Before that, I would’ve played with it like a neophyte mixer just discovering fire powder…)

“Savoring the bad things you collect… offered like candy that you dole out to ignorant kids who please you!”

“UGH!?”

Lycia’s sultry manner flits away entirely when the strange phenomenon doesn’t reoccur, anger surfacing anew when he admits to everything.

“Who or what did you stuff into me!? I’m already perfect enough, so what else could I need, huh!?” The corner of her mouth pulls up into a sneering smile.

No matter how Lycia tries to regain elegance by calming, she has the Alchemaster’s same “tics” when frenzied.

(The ego matches, too!)

“… The… ‘thankful to me for being allowed to escape from its confinements to visit woe, the Alchemaster’s ire—GACK!? STOP, SQUEEZING!”

“You put who into me!?”

Teeth flash, like she’s going to chomp his neck, if only she could remove her strangling hand from it.

“You’re grafting malevolent impressions of nightmares onto me and you pick the Origin of Greed, the pinnacle of Zennian horrors, for me!?”

Lycia doesn’t balk even when the shadows stretch with the words she chooses.

“… The Alchemaster… is… like us…!?”

“No, she’s worse! She’s an [Eclīpsis] (EVIL FORCE)! The epitome of ‘what must not be allowed to exist’!”

Lycia’s other hand on his cock yanks hard!

“AND YOU STUFFED HER INTO ME!?”

“OUCH! That… isn’t wrong!? That these achievements also… influence others personalities is…!”

“You knew, you little shit, and you did it anyway!?”

“WROOONG!” Adris’ body snaps forward, following his member as she leads it. “AFTER! I found out… after! I swear to you on your life, Goddess Lycia!”

Only that saves Adris from getting his neck chewed into by the ghoul that collapses into him. His cock mercifully escapes further harm with a few jerking tugs.

“Why… did you do this? Did you think you could make me better?”

“No! I… had no choice! To… save others with the cross… always costs me!”

(If I didn’t do it, I would’ve just been committing suicide.)

“Kobolds ended my life when I answered their pathetic cries for me to free them! If you say I did it with the power of something other than a Modus, then that makes the power mine, still, so…!”

“If you freed them with what you draw from being part-other, then of course you almost died. You’re burning out the oil for half of your existence! It’s not even something that should normally be possible?”

On his stomach, Lycia draws a circle with a sharp finger.

“What warped Talent lets you siphon off what normal Zennians avoid noticing…?”

“The Alchemaster can’t do this?”

“No, even she can’t just take the ‘existence’ of an Umbra and bestow it. How can you…?”

(That’s… an excellent question. I’d assumed it was my Modus and the cross.)

If a Modus cannot bestow a Talent, only draw it from within, then the means must be native to himself.

(Why can I pass along darkness to others? My aura conditioning? I’m… missing something.)

“Lycia, I wanted to be honest from the start. But, I also won’t apologize for trying to survive, then, by omitting it!”

“Huh, at least you’re not a mindless fool. I’d have beaten you senseless, and enjoyed every delicious kick.”

(Evil hypocrite!)

She finally releases his neck, long after slackening her grip.

“But, I’m still not forgiving you for passing up on explaining later. You owed me one, of your own free will!”

“I’ve never had to owe one! If a lie poisons one village’s deep spring, there’s always ten more ahead on the great chain of islands!

Ah?”

But in her tight embrace that follows his excuse, and especially a week into a new life, that abandonment no longer works.

(And I was toting along the most poisoned reservoir named “Serras”… lessons I always learn too late to matter.)

“… Whatever. I knew there’d be complications with you.”

Soft hair brushes over his suit, a cheek rubbing against his young chest. While still filled with frenzied energy, Lycia seems more content to do this than to thrash him.

“That one and I aren’t impossibly dissimilar. One more source of obsession won’t matter.”

When she shows her face again, Lycia’s red gaunt cheeks are almost burning.

“Don’t play hero for me, little brother.” A voice too firm grows softer, more needy.

“Not with stakes like using these ‘vestiges’. Remember our conversation and who will live longer, and please… stop using these things you think are gifts.”

A sister returns to him at the worst possible moment with a kiss to his cheek. The lingering sort that torments before she pulls back.

The smile she shows is appreciative.

“Last time, promise me?”

Kind, and inviting.

“I punished that fake kid in place of you, sort of an amusing turn of events, so next time you’ll be getting three plus as many as you deserve added on.” Where he passed up on seeking forgiveness, she grows encouraging. “You don’t need that bad stuff, anyway, right? You have those four girls to carry you, yeah~?”

(That’s awful!)

That painful thought burns through his calm, distorting his features and leaving Lycia gawking.

“I cannot rely upon just them! That’s been proved numerous times!”

(Here, outside, and surely in the future!)

His left hand closes, longing for the cross it normally carries.

“I need… more!”

“… Why?”

Growling is below Adris, but the mood can’t be brought back to easygoing even if she seems to want it that way. Havoc was born with Adris’ vengeance, and he needs a release for it.

“If you need more, then, then big sis can make more tools? You like…”

Lycia casts her gaze toward the floor and bites her lip.

“You like my tools, so surely I can make something more reliable than the ‘gifts’ you’re getting?”

“I love your tools. It’s why I requested you to make some!”

“Are they not useful enough?”

(Why are you so disturbed!?)

“This has nothing to do with how useful you are, sis!” When she just clings harder, Adris struggles to push her away. “This is about me! If I hadn’t gained…!”

(Authentic Fiction, no matter how convoluted it’s becoming, is like having the authority of an ascended being!)

“If I hadn’t obtained a new Talent sufficient enough to draw you here, we wouldn’t be speaking.”

“Oh? Huh, right, how did you bring me here?”

Lycia’s face is only inches from Adris’, soft and inviting. As if her cheek is bare without his hand to touch it.

“I… can’t tell you right now, but I will!”

“Tch, always waiting!”

“It’s because it would interfere with how it works, and for no other reason. Believe that!”

(The moment I speak the “truth”, something in the plot unfolding will break, just like “Fehl” did.)

“I believe in its usefulness, no matter how your mind-razed associates in the Wondrous Works classify it as hazardous.”

“I can give you something way more—!”

Lycia reaches to her twin thigh panels, trying to draw something until her eyes widen upon a hand grabbing her wrist.

“It was born purely of me, of a… revelation and a question I had. It’s from no one else.”

With all his strength, Adris rejects the thought of grabbing something in place of her hand.

“I will not trade this… not even for more love from you.”

(No matter how much I’d love something you personally use…)

“Gonna turn me down, huh?” When his conviction remains firm, Lycia’s tone turns acidic.

“What part of you…!? No, what am I turning down?”

Letting go suddenly, Adris’ lack of continued contact causes Lycia’s lips to firm and her face to puff up.

“Haaah… and so, you taste something a little stronger than big sis, then immediately try to knock off a Pillar with it, huhhhhh~?”

Plopping back upon the bed and swinging her feet like a kid, Lycia stares at her hanging cavalier hat while scratching at the roses on her breastcoat.

“Knock… who? You think I’m here to invade because I’m…?”

“Adris, you’re not a good boy~.” Lycia huffs at his incredulity, patting her thighs and fidgeting more aggressively. “You get a new toy, think ‘AH, SURELY THIS WILL MAKE ME HANDSOME’! Try to impress those girls with it so maybe you can release some tension? Find some nice shiny treasures for yourself… all while thinking…”

Lycia takes up a cocky stance, a manly sort of arm sweep ending in a clenching of her hand.

“‘Everything that is happening is all according to my flawless intellect, and nothing terrible can happen because I am so amazingly awesome,’ probably said with the purest confidence of a man who knows how to sweet talk a hungry bear into sharing a meal~?”

When she sneers with him as her focus, Adris can imagine who she is pretending to be very easily.

“… buuuuut, I guess you found out you weren’t as big-brained as you thought, huh? Adris~?”

(You think… that… I’m to blame…?)

“This… this isn’t my fault, Lycia.”

(Even with Neesiette’s letter, how could she be so foolish as to trust Kol to…?)

“For once… I’m not exaggerating, this isn’t my fault. There isn’t a ‘plot’!”

Rolling her eyes at his pleading, Lycia yawns into her hand.

“Please, listen—!”

“Haah, haah, yeah, I’m listening! I see you struggle, but it’s not manly to blame others for bringing it upon yourself~.” The hand he offers is batted at playfully, but also with contempt when she pushes him lightly away from her. “Still whined about the sort of trouble you consider to be ‘frivolities’. Playing tricks, running cons, it’s a little late to suggest you learned about this place and didn’t think it would be an easy trove to—?”

(This is a trap sprung by others on ME!)

“THIS ISN’T MY FAULT!”

Lycia’s face is calm, but nothing about her body is when Adris discovers that his hands are planted on her bosom, squeezing with unnatural fierceness.

Pushing on them as if to plant her back on the bed.

(I’m… sorry! Anger and something else makes me feel, with you, like…!)

“It’s more like…”

“What’s going on, then?”

“Like… the grand tales told in the theaters in the cities… they talk about wandering Xin’Reh who throw away pride for strangers? Villages saved from evil aura users by a mercenary who fights for no coin, and then dies with a smile on his face and is buried beside their own dead…”

“Oh, an [errant knight]’s tale? We have those dubious fables here on Zennia…”

Lycia’s gentle smile betrays what she thinks about this shared cultural ideal.

(They’re all such pathetically deceptive charades, performed by actors who scoff at their roles and for nobles that chitter at the very thought of generous sacrifice! All the proceeds go to creating even more fabulous lies to tell to stroke the egos of pompous, evil merchants.)

“No soldier of fortune would ever be willing to die for a chance at being buried in dusty, lifeless dirt.”

This is what the nobles say; but, the peasants and slaves that witness these plays dream differently.

“Why didn’t such a man come to my village? I would not be here, I would not have lost everything…”

(They begged for the play to be real, despairing that it never could be.)

“Still pleaded with me to save Neesiette, Lycia. I’ll admit… that I briefly wondered what I could extort from her by agreeing…”

“… You wanna be a star of the play, instead? Did you fall for that girl already~?”

“No! But, like with you, I wanted to gain something real, so I, for the first time… just agreed, without planning.”

(It was supposed to be genuine, but it’s only genuinely been a nightmare!)

A rung on his ascension path hardly makes up for what he’s lost mentally. Sacrificed of his spirit to hold on to the idea of making these four who were avoiding him, his.

“All I came here for was Neesiette! And when I get here, I challenge the gauntlet to discover she’s playing pretend at being a regent!”

“… Hah, so it’s just some strange decision one of you made, that my new friend dove head first into it and dragged my little brother along to drown?”

Something is lost in his words, because Lycia doesn’t grasp how deeply he feels this disappointment.

“Sorry, little bro, but you five are honestly all so tiring. It’s not worth risking your… soul and adorable self for this mess~!”

Arms draw around Adris, stifling his perpetual rage.

“Just leave those four to sort it out. Let’s escape together~?”

Beautiful lips purse, blowing at him before Lycia winks.

“Let’s grab something pretty on our way out since we’re here, maybe one of those fine page harpies, then I’ll take you for a bite to eat and maybe…”

Her thick breath tickles his ear.

“Maybe a dessert… of big sister~?”

“Who says I want to escape?”

“… A-Adris…!? Are you really saying whatever plot you’re cooking up is worth more than a date with me!?” Lycia plops to the floor chasing him, smothering Adris with more of her cloying affection.

(I’ll forget this justified anger if I agree…!)

“I tried to do the right thing, Lycia, and I was punished for it! Punished worse than if I’d just done the wrong thing and planned a proper, greedy invasion that left Neesiette time to be hurt.”

“Adris, you’ve only been gone for a day and you’ve got that doll servant clinging to your side like she wants to make love to you~. Haha…!”

Lycia’s laugh strikes hard.

All he can feel is need for her touch and the horror of succumbing to it, that he might lose the motivation to punish, but she laughs at him for it.

“How bad could it have been? More like, why would you call me here for something as pointless as this seems!?

(… Pointless…?)

“Hey, Adris, big sis is a bit angry again, why’d you march me up the hill if you—!?”

“BECAUSE THE ONLY WOMAN WHO HAS EVER SAVED ME, JUST BECAUSE IT WAS ME, OUT OF SOMETHING LIKE LOVE, IS WHO… THEY MADE ME MURDER WITH MY OWN WORDS!”

Adris’ fury is concisely let out.

If there’s one motivation that guides the rest, it’s simply this one.

That he can stare down into Lycia’s eyes, with her below him and butt on the floor in shock of his scream, is a new experience.

An expression of amazement slowly changes as he closely watches.

He can’t not watch, as it’s in his essential nature to be aware of all details.

From fear, to confusion, to…

In a very motherly way, Lycia’s arms draw back up to hug her. Then, edge out as if she wishes to wrap around the boy who is shaking in front of her, shivering like he’s about to collapse.

Hesitating to close on him.

“I fought for their sakes, and they left me at the mercy of an enemy! While they went off and fucking played!?”

(… She… she’s looking only at me.)

“Only one of them has an excuse, I trust her…! The rest cared so little for me that I was an afterthought. They were intentionally avoiding me before today! Not even bothering to learn my ways or talk about simple things, because they were frightened of me!”

Lycia Vehrose the scholar is long gone.

Naked pain reaches a Lycia that Adris has only met briefly.

“To place so much faith in trying to meet them as honestly as possible, then be punished for it!? Do you… understand how that feels, Lycia!?

(OF COURSE SHE DOES!)

When he was thrown to be eaten in the Castillo, this Lycia had shown kindness.

“… You had a lot happen today, huh, little brother?”

Soft as a pillow, she coos at him while extending a hand. An angel, no matter how much undeath claims her, can’t help but reach out towards need.

“But…”

Almost to him, she pulls it back slightly.

(“Indecision?”)

“Why… did this new Talent you called upon for help… choose me?”

(I don’t know, I didn’t command it to. I don’t command it, it just does what it wants.)

But that’s not an answer that will draw her to him as a weapon against the real enemy.

(Lycia is very… genuine! Pain motivates, especially the pain others feel that she recognizes she’s shared!)

Somber in his reply, Adris also instinctively screws on a face of suffering. Turning away at just the right time.

“… you’re the only other person who’s ever saved me, just because it was me. A ‘shooting star that helps a falling one’.”

Her slit pupils contract. The only tell she gives, a pretty face blank otherwise.

Enough to touch her maternal instinct, these words still need more.

“Also, you’re the first person I’ve… ever felt like trying to…”

(We both received the same spiritual wound.)

“… after hearing what Rantil said in that ‘dream’…”

“I remember the words.”

A darkness innate to Lycia’s loss clouds her face. Hides the pain.

“… well, I decided that if I don’t know how to love, then I wanted that day for it to be… you that taught me?”

“… ah…?”

The most exquisite femme fatal Adris can claim the pleasure of meeting, one that exudes a sex appeal that could enslave him to her and her to him, and still have plenty left over to enthrall the entirety of Petripolis, tilts her head and grins bashfully with a troubled quality to it.

Then, she twitches. Her pupils are widening, doubt fading.

With the booming sound of a…

(UGH!?)

Adris’ hand clamps over his chest, because it feels like his heart stops.

Yet, there’s clearly a beat of one in his ears.

“Ha… hahaha…”

Lycia’s laughter has a girlish quality to it when he confesses.

Unable to think of a reply, she instead hides her expression with both hands while trying to stand up.

(Shit…! The heartbeats! They’re coming from…)

Thumping.

Twice, thrice, and then increasing in regularity.

Each one accompanies the gonging of a bell.

(Fuck… is she resonating with me like an aura Technique!?)

With each beat and ring of a bell, the black lines upon Lycia thread out more. Then jump to snare onto Adris, sucking like leeches.

(She’s stealing away something!)

All of the flowing energies converge on her chest cavity, where an unbeating heart starts to contract and circulate dead blood with a perfect rhythm copied from his.

“Ahhh… ahahahaha!”

Without physical assistance, Lycia manages a hovering rise in defiance of gravity to step forward lightly.

One hand drops, allowing part of her face to peek into view.

“Big Sis was… trying not to get too attached, you know~…”

Green eyes are shining, far brighter than the thing called “the sun”.

The room is bathed in them.

Even soulless matter freezes at its command.

(Ah, paralyzation…? Can’t… can’t move…!)

He’d instinctively attempted to kick back.

Every time before this one, the full radiance of Lycia’s [Heart-Taking Eyes] has completely failed to afflict him thanks to the black cross’ gift.

“Even when you try to go straight, to be nice, play by their rules, sit at their table and share a nice talk, they still won’t let you enjoy life like you’re one of them… huh!?”

But the blackness forming words indicates why that dynamic collapses now.

“Big sis gets that. Sorry, so sorry, I get it… it really is painful, right? No matter how hard you try… you get…”

(F-Fuck…!)

At Lycia’s feet, the ground becomes fetid.

Slick.

Grimy.

Strewn with bubbling patches.

“You get pulled down, Adris!?”

Even though she should fall into it, this

DEATHLY MIRE

that bubbles to existence and expands like a cancerous growth refuses to allow her feet to dip in.

Only the skeletal hands clad with rotting meat are allowed to breach its surface, grasping forward toward the boy sinking into the heartbeats.

The heartbeats that pound in Adris’ ears as Lycia inexorably nears, languid as if floating in water, are contested by the sound of turning gears screeching to a halt.

Grinding in place.

Then, they clank as if something shifts!

Hungry hands pull Adris downward into the thick muck, forcing the Ghoul to bend forward for a better view.

(She overcame Authentic Fiction!?)

Cries of the watchers sound out, the rush of combat sweeping through Adris to answer them.

The metallic screechings begin rapid revolutions down a new track with his life now on the line.

Steamy smoke erupts from Lycia to fill the room!

With vision stolen away, Adris can only anticipate the very worst will be revealed once it clears.

“Big sis… doesn’t like taking care of others… but, lil bro is different…”

A claw lightly trails along his frozen face, scratching loose some drips of red.

(Not overcame… replaced!? Lycia is finally revealing her place as a “Great Tribulation” in this stupid plot by making herself the…!)

His tormentor’s breasts hang loose, but it’s finally her face he stares at through the thinning cloud. Upon her cheshire smiling countenance a phrase is drawn next to [Living Dead] to expose the deepest secret.

[Kindest predator, whose fullest love must always murder her beloved prey.]

All of the warnings he felt when pursuing her now make sense, for her predatory figure that’s limited only by her human design when calm now slowly elongates and pops into her state of unrestrained hunger.

(Just like Rantil had a second, more complicated contradiction, so does Lycia!? FUCK, that’s why she was shying away, it’s because if she loves me like a man she’ll have to kill me to complete her “darkness”!)

An instinctive prohibition must’ve been heeded by Lycia all her unnatural life to keep from succumbing to this mania.

(Nobody can refuse an obsession and retain sanity!?)

Sharpened teeth offer no willingness to harm, but it makes no difference what she wants now that she’s not isolated and has something to “care for”.

“IF IT’S YOU, WITH HOW YOU KEEP BEGGING FOR MORE TROUBLE… I GUESS…

THAT… I’LL HAVE TO KEEP SAVING YOU, ANYWAY, RIGHT…?”

(I caused this by letting her take over my Talent!)

Lycia seems finally happy with how lacking the tension is with her. And free, to keep squeezing her hand around his windpipe.

Joining in with the necrotic limbs trying to drown him.

(NGAH! Not an… invasion… instead…!)

Figures on the walls, of both parts and whole, vanish into the gloom of a swamp by plopping into it.

Only the green glow of the creature that spawned it remains.

(How did a collapse like the Chapel happen so suddenly!?)

Unlike that night, Lycia’s ‘dream’ here is simply a concave-shaped swamp that is impossible to create, with him at the center of the slide to eternal nothingness beneath the surface. A black moon hangs fixed in the white sky far above them. Only bones and broken trees jut above the rotten soup, denying that one can pull oneself out.

(… a killing ground! She calls it a ‘dream’, but it’s really a…)

His “date” for death is revealed as a pale-skinned woman with radiant green eyes and blond shining hair, bathed only with dried blood and viscera. Shadowy hands tear the slayer ensemble with its pretty gold capes into shreds. Everything erotic about her is saturated by this fresh red, freely available for the touch if one offers up one’s fingers to sate her hunger after.

(… nightmare!)

“I’LL NEVER LET YOU GET LOST, ADRIS, SO DON’T WORRY ABOUT USELESS THINGS, ABOUT HURTING OTHERS.”

Her long tongue snakes out to lick his lips, intensifying the paralysis halting his heart now.

“Big sis is here to take care of you…”

The hand she saved joins the first, squeezing harder.

“fOrEvEr, aHaHaHaHa!”

Vision dims with this crushing strangulation. Adris fights his bulging eyes closing, for he’ll die the instant they do.

Along with her laughter, the watchers that revel in Adris’ failings howl and cry along with Lycia!

The punishment for harming one of their own is at hand, and the contradictory masses agree with the verdict.

(… Shit… I’m not… afraid…! Of Lycia, of all people…!)

And it’s not as if he has to be.

Love is the reason he’s dying. So, all he has to do to not be loved is…

(“Darkness vanishes when it’s denied”, right, Lycia!?)

“You’ll… leave me… to die, too, just like… them…!”

“… huh?”

As if it never existed in the first place,

“I’ll never love only you, so you can never love only me, sis!”

the swamp of death swirls into torrents that rush toward the sky.

This onslaught is consumed by the black moon when the gears abruptly seize again.

“I WILL HAVE MY REVENGE, SO GET OUT OF ITS WAY!”

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Chapter 120         Table of Contents          Chapter 122