Ch.125Last of Us (7)

Something is wrong.

A feeling of exhaustion spread through every part of my true form. As if trapped in an unstoppable causality, Saphaul’s world turned pitch black.

The brightness itself was similar to imaginary space, but the atmosphere was completely different. At least when wandering in empty space, I felt comfort if anything, not this unpleasantness.

This place is, how should I put it.

An extremely uncomfortable place.

The other foreign gods who were with me have all disappeared. I don’t know where they went. I tried walking toward the real space that existed just seconds ago, but only repetitive structures like crystal lattices awaited Saphaul.

Mirror.

Mirror.

Mirror.

And, mirror.

“…What is this?”

Prisms covering all directions diffusely reflected my true form.

It’s a wave.

Here, Saphaul existed not as a physical entity but as a wave.

And along the highly reflective mirrors, that form swayed back and forth, making me feel like I would lose my mind from the dizzying movement.

“…!”

Yes, continuously.

Back and forth back and forth back and forth.

“I, I need to get out of here…”

Back and forth back and forth back and forth.

“Exit! Where is the exit!”

Back and forth back and forth back and forth.

Saphaul screamed.

[What you see here is called Free Spectral Range, or FSR for short. The sharp protruding parts represent the dwelling points of each foreign god. The peaks would be proportional to each foreign god’s rank.]

Back and forth back and forth back and forth.

[There are nine peaks, so nine foreign gods are trapped. This pattern can be recognized even with classical measuring equipment like an oscilloscope. If we use equipment that converts gravitational signals to electrical signals, we can also view 4D positions through Tomography.]

Back and forth back and forth back and forth.

[Since Saphaul is the highest-ranked foreign god here, it should be at this peak. Can we communicate if we send an electromagnetic pulse here?]

Back and forth back and forth back and forth.

[Knock knock, are you there?]

Back and forth back and forth back and forth.

[In this low-energy domain, gravity and electromagnetic force aren’t unified, so we can’t go that far. Reception might be possible, but two-way communication would be difficult.]

Back and forth back and forth back and forth.

[Then let’s move this to the discussion section and write the paper.]

[Hooray! Finally!]

“Aaaaaaaargh———!!”

I feel like I’m going insane. My thoughts are being bleached. The space is narrow. It’s dark. This place is completely mad. The constant repetition of the same pattern is boring, frustrating, and infuriating—

Feeling so powerless, like I’ve become less than an insect. Even if I try to count time, I don’t know when it is now; even if I try to gauge space, I don’t know where this is, with no information available—

That’s why I said we should kill Eidel Rheinland first. I said that level of sacrifice was nothing. Back then, at the Holy Spirit Chamber, if just one more had cooperated, it wouldn’t have come to this, no, if these—

If they hadn’t betrayed me, if only that had worked, I could have killed her. I wouldn’t have been trapped in this resonator, why, why end up in such an absurd situation—

That’s why we should follow survival of the fittest. The strong ruling is absolute truth. Therefore, it’s only right that you follow the words of me, the strongest—

And.

Back and forth back and forth back and forth.

“……”

I realized it was meaningless complaining.

My breathing becomes rapid. Though I have no organ equivalent to lungs, I can’t breathe. My heart trembles. Though I have no organ equivalent to a heart, it feels like cardiac arrest is imminent.

I can’t even hear the voices of other foreign gods.

It was unmistakable.

I’m trapped in a resonator.

To protect myself from the true destruction that ‘the End’ would bring, I created companions. Forming groups is a characteristic of the weak. But among them, Saphaul was the strongest. I believed I was the strongest.

I painfully realize I was wrong.

If steel is a weapon,

Then wisdom is also a weapon.

If Saphaul had 10 units of steel and 1 unit of wisdom,

Cartesia had 1 unit of steel and 100 units of wisdom.

I was defeated by an unseen power difference. Recalling the ‘fishy smile’ Cartesia showed just before releasing her manifestation, Saphaul shouted violently.

“Cartesia! Yes! You won, you bitch! You made the better bet! So, I’ll do anything, just get me out of this fucking space!”

Back and forth back and forth back and forth.

“I’m going insane! How many times has it been! Where is Azrael? Typhus? Kedel, Pacoton, Naiyura! Falcu! Sicamon! Orewalt!”

Gradually collapsing.

Myself panicking, myself getting angry, myself shouting. Yet, unable to receive any support or confirm spacetime.

In this unprecedented helplessness, an unknown chill spreads.

It was the eerie emotion that the girl he had been tormenting, and countless other inferior creatures he had killed, had harbored until their final moments.

The name of that emotion was.

Fear.

“Eidel Rheinland———!!”

Futile, fear.

“Just kill me instead———!!”

The fear that he could never escape even if a black hole’s lifetime ended,

A fear worse than death.

***

My head hurts, and though the constellations say they’re fine, they never stop crying. It feels like all kinds of screams are scratching my entire body, and there’s a mountain of incidents to prevent. Why was I born with this constitution?

I’m tired now. Just end it here. Please, kill me.

I’ll count exactly 600,000 seconds from now. When I finish counting, I’ll definitely end it.

One, two, three.

Ten thousand, ten thousand and one, ten thousand and two.

Five hundred and ninety thousand and one, five hundred and ninety thousand and two, five hundred and ninety thousand and three.

Five hundred and ninety-nine thousand nine hundred and ninety-one. Five hundred and ninety-nine thousand nine hundred and ninety-two, five hundred and ninety-nine thousand nine hundred and ninety-three…

Five hundred and ninety-nine thousand nine hundred and ninety-nine.

Six hundred, thousand…

“……”

I opened my eyes abruptly.

My mind is strangely quiet. The usual giggling noise is gone, and I can’t hear the scratching sound anymore.

It’s like waking up from a terrible nightmare.

“Are you awake?”

I turned my head at the sound.

A beautiful woman with blonde hair and blue eyes.

She sipped coffee from a mug and smiled freshly. She looks to be in her mid-30s at most, but there’s a sense of more years of experience.

“Your name is Ireh Hazlen, right? How are you feeling now?”

“You are……”

“Oh right, I forgot to introduce myself. Callis Stranov, associate professor of physics at Iryuel Academy.”

She added a meaningful afterthought, ‘With this research, I’m about to receive tenure and be promoted to full professor soon, hehehe,’ but that wasn’t what Ireh was concerned about.

Callis Stranov.

Professor Stranov.

Someone who was neutral in some iterations, caused minor troubles in others, and was even a puppet of foreign gods in yet others.

Ireh’s body stiffened.

Friend or foe?

…It’s cursed that I reflexively think this way. Ireh sighed quietly.

“How’s your physical condition?”

She asked again.

“Well, I, um……”

“Try moving your body. You know best how you feel.”

Ireh nodded. She got up and tried walking. She also tried swinging her arms or taking a shooting stance, and lifted one leg to test how long she could maintain balance.

She’s fine.

“I’m, okay……”

“The doctor says there’s no problem with coordination or anything like that. But I asked just to be sure.”

Growl.

“Are you hungry?”

“…Yes.”

Come to think of it, I’ve rarely eaten satisfyingly. Whenever I ate nutritious food, the Darwin-type foreign gods would take it all away. So Ireh’s staple food was calorie bars.

“Let’s see. Since the cafeteria isn’t open now… delivery would be good. Is there anything you particularly want to eat?”

“…Then, chicken stew.”

The delivery arrived quickly.

Ireh glanced at Stranov, then picked up a spoon, scooped some stew, blew on it, and ate.

“……”

“What’s wrong? Doesn’t it taste good?”

“No, that’s not it……”

It doesn’t taste like what I ate at the Northern Holy Spirit Chamber.

“There was something I ate before. It was rice cooked thinly and boiled together……”

“You mean rice stew? People in the eastern region eat it sometimes.”

Ireh nodded and continued eating earnestly. For now, she just wanted to fill her stomach with anything.

Suddenly checking the TV, she saw interesting news streaming one after another.

Creation of a crater with a radius of 2km in the Toba planetary system in the north.

Evaporation of the Foreign God Biology Research Institute that was there.

Complete burning of nearby forests.

Reports of high-grade monster appearances and foreign god sightings.

Hearings on allegations of biological experiments surrounding the institute.

Good news that the limb reattachment surgery of Sagittarius among the 12 zodiac houses was successful.

Circuit breakers triggered twelve times in a single day for stocks related to biology research institutes.

And.

The story that Professor Stranov’s research team developed the world’s first quantum gravity resonator capable of trapping foreign gods, and achieved positive results in its test operation.

[— ‘God of Patience and Integrity’ smiles at you.]

[— You have received a donation of 5000 coins.]

Coins.

A representative currency that foreign gods used to intercept completely without Ireh getting any share when constellations donated.

This time, those coins were properly placed in Ireh’s status window.

It was what she should have received from the beginning.

“It’s late at night, so let’s rest well before moving. There are people we need to meet.”

Ireh sat on the bed that Stranov provided.

She offered a handkerchief.

“Take it. You need it, right?”

“……”

After Professor Stranov left, Ireh lay on the bed and curled up like a shrimp.

Ah.

The foreign gods are really all gone.

Now, there will be no more time repetitions.

This will truly be my last journey.

Salty drops fell one by one onto the soft pillow. Whether for better or worse, the sobbing wouldn’t stop. Her shoulders shook uncontrollably.

600,000 seconds.

Someone had promised that if she endured just that long, she would find peace.

In her sinking consciousness, there was someone who carried her on his back and ran to the academy research lab when she was about to be used as an intermediate host for foreign gods and then discarded.

Eidel Rheinland.

No, someone wearing his skin.

A lifelong benefactor.

And, debts of gratitude must always be repaid.

***

The next day, when Ireh arrived at the hospital with Professor Stranov, she saw Eidel lying in a hospital bed with IV drips hanging all around him.

“…W-what happened to him?”

“Well……”

He hadn’t woken up for two days, they said.

“He collapsed while writing a paper.”