episode_0040

The Tomb of Heroes, the Mausoleum.

Right there, Aria unwound the black bandages covering her eyes, just as she usually did.

I silently swallowed. In that state, I finally faced her two exposed eyes.

They were colorless eyes.

Two abysses of endless, dark black, as if one could be sucked in just by looking.

Two abysses that seemed on the verge of tumbling down.

“Ah…”

Those very eyes, facing this way, extended an arm. Leaving behind the ecstasy nested within their lightless darkness.

“I can see.”

Aria reached out a trembling hand towards me. In that state, she carefully stroked my cheek as if savoring it, engraving my reflection into her two eyes.

“This is the Leader-nim I serve…”

Like a blind person who had lived their whole life without seeing the light of the world, finally opening their eyes and facing it.

“I can see it. Your face.”

She was entranced by an ecstasy like seeing my face for the first time. Her cheeks and ears flushed without reservation, colored with shyness.

“The image of the Leader-nim I must be loyal to and serve, I can see it with these eyes…”

“…”

She didn’t just stop at seeing; she was meticulously verifying what she saw with her hands.

Stroking, caressing, connecting skin to skin with her fingertips, she was seeing my form.

Each time, I felt her fingertips trembling.

“Ah, this peerlessly imposing figure, I wish I could engrave it with a blade into my eyes…”

Why?

Why did she suddenly untie the bandages covering her eyes? I couldn’t understand.

I simply watched her actions in silence. Aria was just looking. At my form.

Those eyes, which had been covered by black bandages and unable to see anything until now, were now gazing intently, almost piercing through, in their newfound freedom.

And each time her gaze reached me, her touch followed in succession.

Aria stroked my cheek, chin, and hair as if caressing them, gazing at me and falling into ecstasy.

That appearance was one of her many faces that I couldn’t understand or know.

“…”

So I remained silent. Because I didn’t want to disturb the emotion she was feeling now. Knowing that this was Aria’s indulgence shown before me, I simply kept silent.

“Why did you untie the bandages?”

At the end of my silence, I asked.

“…Hehe, Leader-nim is mischievous.”

Mischievous. I couldn’t understand Aria’s intention as she said that and chuckled.

“These two eyes exist solely to see you.”

Aria said, unconcerned.

“And also so that I don’t see anything that stands in Leader-nim’s way.”

After speaking, she turned her head away.

Thus, I couldn’t see Aria’s eyes as they faced forward. I even wondered what difference untying a single bandage made.

Then, tears flowed.

Tears streaming down Aria’s cheek.

They were blood-colored tears.

But just as I thought blood tears had fallen, the tears weren’t visible. The tears that should have fallen vanished as if by a lie.

I remained silent.

At the end of my silence, I moved my steps towards the Mausoleum spread out before me.

With the sensation of walking on the transparent glass of a space station, amidst the curtain of stars and galaxies shining from all directions.

To obtain the clue, the answer, that would be waiting for me beyond.

In that place where it wouldn’t be strange to fall endlessly towards the bottom of the universe, there was nonetheless an invisible path under my feet with every step I took.

Treading that invisible path, I moved forward.

With Aria, who, as always, kept by my side, but unlike always, had her black bandages undone.

We walked upon the stars.

Unable to even anticipate what lay ahead, we simply followed the path laid out before us.

Even knowing that this place was, to anyone, a ‘trap’ aimed at me.

After thinking, I let out a hollow laugh. A trap, how exactly? Me, who is here?

Against ‘Rain Grey’ and Aria of the Black Sword guarding him, against the 《Black Serpent》 there, what could possibly be done that could truly be called a ‘trap’? How?

I couldn’t know. Nor was it my concern.

So I just walked.

And the end of that walk arrived faster than I expected.

Because beyond where we stood, the endlessly sprawling world twisted its scenery and revealed its form before us.

“…”

I said nothing. I couldn’t.

The Tomb of Heroes. Even the words about being able to weave threads around those who remember them.

I heard it all.

After hearing it, at the same time, I reached the place of the ‘heroes’ I had searched so long for.

As if this place were the answer that would resolve all the doubts presented before me until now.

Once again, the landscape we stood on twisted.

With the distortion, she appeared.

“You’ve arrived, Sir Rain.”

She was there. As if she had been waiting for me to come from the very beginning.

Therefore, I silently frowned.

“Leader of the 《Black Serpent》.”

The Girl Who Carries the Sun, Nike Pendragon II.

“Countless individuals have reached this place, only to regret their foolishness and vanish.”

She said.

“Were you, too, one of the foolish prey drawn here by the utterly absurd notion of being able to ‘string threads’ to a hero?”

“…”

I didn’t answer.

The silence wasn’t long.

“Who are you?”

Simply because I could know.

She was someone I had never directly conversed with or known, yet at this moment, seeing her form before me, I could understand.

The one before me was certainly not the Queen of the Bretona Empire, the so-called ‘Girl Who Carries the Sun’.

She was different. So clearly that even a fool could tell.

“Hehe, you say interesting things.”

“Is it amusing?”

I retorted. There was no subordinate to hold their weight by my side like that time. No, there shouldn’t have been.

“Please, it would be wise to choose your words carefully.”

Except for her, who, unlike usual, had her dark black bandages undone.

“Because Leader-nim doesn’t particularly enjoy humor.”

“Ah, good. I don’t like jokes either.”

How those words would be received, I couldn’t know. But nothing would change.

“The Girl Who Carries the Sun—you’re talking about that child who lives alongside the innocence of the people of the world, aren’t you?”

“Yes.”

The girl before me who said that spoke with a voice that was literally amused, as if discussing ‘someone else’s business’.

“You speak as if it’s someone else’s business.”

“Just because the outward appearance is similar doesn’t mean the essence is.”

“—.”

There, in the starry world where galaxies unfolded in all directions, the girl who greeted us spoke.

Bearing an appearance no different from the former Queen of the Empire, Nike II.

Yet unreservedly revealing an incomparably complex demeanor that could never be imagined from the ‘real Nike II’.

“Who are you?”

Thus, I asked again.

“It’s not a difficult answer.”

She replied.

“I am the Goddess of Victory (Nike).”

Hearing that answer, I understood.

“And at the same time, I am the goddess who blesses ‘that child’ who shares my name.”

Now, the one before me was not the Queen of the Bretona Empire that Dalgui spoke of.

At least, not the queen I knew.

Rather, the appearance Dalgui remembered might be the one currently before my eyes.

Either way, it made no difference. That was nothing more than ‘something’ with the exact same form as her.

My intuition screamed as much.

“Did you say goddess?”

“—That’s right.”

She continued speaking.

“Mr. Rain, who remains a blemish on my life and this world.”

Again, it was a statement I couldn’t comprehend.

Therefore, I remained silent. Because there was nothing else to say.

For evil, silence is a virtue. Nothing was different from before.

I knew the one good thing about being a villain. And the countless contradictions and evil deeds I had committed until now, relying on that one ‘good thing’.

“You speak as if you know about me.”

“I know more than others, certainly.”

She, the girl claiming to be the Goddess of Victory, laughed there.

“At least, I know that you came all the way here to find answers.”

“…”

“Has the scenery of this place become the answer for you?”

Leaving behind the endlessly stretching scenery of stars and galaxies.

Before those words, I couldn’t laugh.

“Well.”

I didn’t laugh.

But at the same time, I realized.

That I hadn’t laughed at any point until now.

“Because I haven’t heard the answer yet.”

I said, unconcerned. And there was no time for those words to finish.

The entire area, the world, spread out before me, twisted and crumpled as if by a lie. Unilaterally, as if crumpling a sheet of paper.

*Crunch, crunch!*

So as not to see what blocked my path—.

And at the same time, when I realized I hadn’t properly understood the meaning.

It was already too late.