The Outer God Needs Warmth – Chapter 4

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To the members of the pseudo-religion, the god called Cruxshibal was a merciful deity who dwelt in a dark and gloomy place, but because of that, he was a benevolent god who cared for them.

However, because its form manifested as an uncontrollable powerful explosion, the cult members built up the image of the god as a powerful avenger.

Because of this image, a man named Yasle could easily rise to become the leader of the pseudo-religion. This was because his own appearance was suitable for projecting the god they believed in.

A large man full of thoughts of revenge. He has bizarre tattoos on his face, but his speech and behavior are not violent, rather even intellectual.

Having been the leader of a religious nation, he knew well how to become the idol of people who believe in a non-existent god.

So he guided the image of the god to overlap with his own, and could easily rise to the position of leader of this cult.

Because the images were mixed like this, many people thought that the appearance of the god who descended to this world borrowing the girl’s body would resemble Yasle.

At least they thought it would show an equally powerful appearance.

But when it opened its mouth, what was this?

It speaks in a very childish tone.

The slight doubt that had arisen gradually turned into suspicion when they asked about its identity, and most became certain when it made a statement like a child throwing a tantrum.

That was not the appearance of the god they had expected. Moreover, the god who stood up from its seat went down and played by stepping on the offerings.

With an innocent smile, it steps on the corpses that are called offerings. And the naked girl who jumped around on top of the offerings only returned to her original seat after leaving her footprints on all the offerings.

From beginning to end, she had a full smile. So some thought this:

Maybe we didn’t call a god, but something else?

For example, something like a demon.

At least they were certain it wasn’t the god they wanted, but because there was a possibility it might be some tremendous being, they held their breath.

But the girl’s question was fatal.

It was also a statement that completely denied the faith they had believed in.

“How do I do it?”

With this question, more than half of the believers present decided to reject the one in front of them. And the warrior of faith, who had been placed separately out of fear that something dangerous might be summoned, fired a weapon inscribed with all sorts of curses.

Splat

With a crushing sound, the girl’s head flew off.

It didn’t hit exactly in the middle, but because the arrow was so thick, the right half of the head along with the skull was shattered and scattered on the ground.

But.

It didn’t end there.

At least the girl who was containing the god should have died and whatever was inside should have returned. If lucky, the thing that had come inside and falsely claimed to be their god should have died too.

Of course, it had no intention of falsely claiming anything.

The problem was that the thing that should have died was standing in place.

The face that was only half remaining smiled brightly as if there was no pain and stretched out its right hand towards the person who had blown off its face.

Dark purple smoke appeared along the trajectory the arrow had flown. It looked as if it had traced back the trajectory in reverse, but those with good eyes saw that a thin thread had already been connected before the thick stem reached the attacker.

In other words, there was no path of escape.

And the dark purple energy slowly got sucked into the person who had attacked. Here, a man belonging to a special group trained for combat among the cult members called warriors of faith.

In reality, he was a 16-year-old boy, still hard to call a man. He had come here because he had lost his parents, become an orphan, and been thrown onto the streets.

Because there was no one else to help him, the boy had joined this cult and grown into a faithful member while receiving education full of intentions to brainwash.

The appearance of the god taught in that education was not the one in front. It was a great appearance, like the leader over there. So the boy, thinking this summoning was a failure, fired the crossbow for the safety of that leader.

Right after that, he felt a terribly cold pain in his heart.

At the same time, his fingers stuck to the crossbow he had fired and wouldn’t move. No, it wasn’t just that they wouldn’t move, but his fingers were actually sticking to the crossbow.

And he saw dark purple smoke seeping deep into his bones. He saw it seeping under his skin, under his muscles, into his bones. And into what was inside them.

Originally it should have been under thick armor, but the boy saw it clearly.

A chill that would make his teeth chatter immediately surrounds his whole body, but he doesn’t care about that sensation.

It is down there.

What had appeared as a girl until just now.

The opposite of light.

Endless darkness.

Eternally hungry void.

The one below despair.

Words from the scriptures or expressions describing the god called Cruxshibal flashed through his mind, and he saw directly that all those expressions were far from sufficient.

All the training and education he had faithfully built up over the past days, joy and sorrow, and finally despair and anger, and hope flashed through his mind, then he watched as they slowly got sucked into the thing down there.

He could only watch in terror as his precious things were taken away.

And-

It was so cold.

It’s like falling into water with nothing in it. The sound is muffled, and all he can see is deep darkness. The warmth that was in him until just now is gone.

I have to find it. He thought that unconsciously.

The frozen body doesn’t touch emotions even as the head rolls. There are no emotions anymore. Or it’s caught up in just one emotion.

He slowly looked ahead.

A fellow warrior of faith. Surrounded by armor, but strangely he can see what’s inside. Let’s say it’s because he knows the face.

He can see everyone, from the man who was his instructor during training, to the woman whose face he had never seen. And in the middle of that, there is light.

He knows that this is what he had until just now, and what has now been taken away by the thing down there.

So what should he do?

Let’s take it.

He slowly raised the crossbow that had now completely become one with his hand. So as not to notice that he was trying to attack, he very slowly aimed at the person on the opposite side.

We need to get away from the thing down there. That is too cold. It’s just scary to look at. It’s like a lakeside on a moonless night that you can never come out of once you fall in.

What’s needed is warmth.

And that’s in front.

He doesn’t have a second arrow. Even if he did, he would need a special tool to reload it. Because human strength can’t pull this bowstring.

But the bowstring of the crossbow slowly rises back. And a dark purple arrow rises from under the crossbow.

The question of why this is possible flashed through his mind for a very brief moment, but the expectation that he could steal light from the person in front was too great.

Give me your light!

Twang!

A powerful dark purple arrow, incomparable to the crossbow he had just fired, pierced straight through the person in front.

And at the same time, a total of 7 crossbow bolts pierced the boy’s body.

This was because while the boy was aiming at the person on the opposite side, there were several people aiming crossbows at the boy whose demeanor seemed strange.

But although he should have fallen to the ground with holes pierced through him, he’s floating in the air like an awkwardly broken polygon character in a game. There’s not even a part connecting the legs and body.

It’s physically impossible, but it’s maintaining its form.

And dark purple mist replaced those broken parts.

Then the sense of crisis rose among the people around, but soon dispersed.

Because the body came back down to the ground and was covered by a tar-like viscosity different from the dark purple.

It’s the curse on the arrows.

This is originally a curse to remove transcendent beings like gods. Of course, in terms of pantheon, it’s not for major related gods like Zeus or Athena, Thor or Odin, but a type of curse for dealing with minor Japanese gods.

It was a technique that the person called Yasle had brought from his previous religion and modified.

That technique was enough to kill what had been the boy.

Although he can no longer think because his head has flown off, the boy was very happy. Because he no longer had to be cold.

As consciousness slowly faded away, the cold disappeared, so he disappeared thinking it was warm.

Like someone who had thrown themselves into cold water in a bath and hurriedly came out, the boy’s soul left his body.

But the incident didn’t end there.

The girl on the opposite side of the boy, also a special type of warrior of faith, transformed in exactly the same way as the boy.

Of course, she was killed before she could attack again.

In the midst of all this, there was one who was the happiest.

It’s spinning round and round around the stone chair. The thing wearing the girl’s skin, whose face had been half blown off, has returned to normal and is smiling brightly.

Because the warmth it just got from the light was warm.

The difference in the light was like the difference between sashimi eaten locally and soggy sashimi bought from a large supermarket. It has much more warmth than the light that fell into its mouth from her sudden death.

It was already happy enough with that, but the light of the person the boy attacked also rolled into its mouth.

Oh my!

The light is being duplicated!

It saw a way to fulfill its desire for auto-hunting.

It immediately guessed that this is what happens when it blows itself into someone shining with light while in this girl’s form.

Its head was spinning wildly in front of the most important thing. In a way, you could say its head was doing its job.

Predicting the next step to eat prey.

The thing in the girl’s form, which had been hopping around happily, soon stopped moving and approached Yasle.

“I’m not Cruxshibal.”

Yasle realized that the fact he had been guessing had become reality.

Just that the most interesting thing is that both sides are wrong.

If plus is reality, it had been bursting endlessly unhappy people while living in a world that could be called minus. At least that phenomenon existed.

In all worlds where there is light, there was a phenomenon like a single law.

And in one world, the story created by processing that reality is the god called Cruxshibal.

Yasle called correctly.

Even though it was mismatched like that.

It said this to Yasle.

“What I can do, I just showed you. So I’ll ask again.”

With purple hair and eyes shining purple, the girl looked straight at Yasle and asked this.

“What do you want to do with this?”

Yasle thought it was like the whisper of a demon from an old scripture. But he didn’t care whether the being in front of him was Cruxshibal or something else.

What really mattered was that it was someone who could help with his revenge.

Yasle answered.

“Revenge.”

At those words, the girl smiled brightly. This meant she had gotten a chance to stay and obtain warmth.

The girl held out her hand.

“I am.”

But she stopped there for a moment. After opening and closing her mouth a few times, the girl soon made an unpleasant face and shook her head. Because her own name wouldn’t come out. She knew the letters in her head and could read them, but strangely, the name wouldn’t come out.

So she decided to say the girl’s name.

“Rebecca. Rebecca Rolfe.”

Yasle knows that this is the name the girl’s body had. So he answered like this.

“Hieronymus. That is my name.”

If it’s a fake name, let’s go with a fake name. He said not his real name Yasle, but the name he’s currently using in this cult.

The girl and the man shook hands. And with that, a contract was established.

Although it can’t be called a contract since it’s nothing but lies from beginning to end.

Still, a contract is a contract.

On this day. One pseudo-religion obtained their god.