Chapter 444

The seed vault on Dainhar was just as she remembered it. Light-emitting diode lights illuminated the corridors. Elsia’s footsteps pattered behind her, but she ignored them, pretending not to hear.
“It was definitely right here.
I didn’t stop once during the entire run. I had visited the first parallel world before, so my body remembered the way, and it took me less than five minutes to reach my destination. The yellow and black striped iron gate stood silent. I’m embarrassed to admit, the password was a little confusing this time.
What were the last two. 4? 7?
“I don’t know.”
I hesitated for three seconds, then swung the knife. A long diagonal line cut through the door. Two cracked steel plates collapsed, revealing a vast space. The room was littered with machinery and wires, giving the impression of entering the guts of a giant beast.
A single column of blue light stood in the center of it all.
“——!”
My gaze naturally fixed on the pillar. Inside the pillar, filled with a preservative fluid, floated a naked man, his back to the entrance, so you had to go deeper to see his face. His back was to the entrance, so I had to go deeper to see his face.
I turned to face him and cursed.
“Eat, fuck.”
Obviously, I wasn’t swearing because I was offended.
I swiped my hand across my face and looked back up at the man.
Dozens of life-support rods were connected to his body. The festering wound in the center of his chest was obviously inflicted by an ungrateful elderly bastard. His silvery-white hair, identical to his sister’s, stood on end.
No doubt it was Cain, my father.
“Well, at least you’re still breathing, huh?”
I laughed out loud. I hadn’t seen him in a long time.
It was the first time he had seen Cain since his death in the original world from Abel’s blow, and even in the last two parallel worlds, he had been dead.
With each inhale and exhale, white water vapor formed and dissipated on the glass surface.
I put my hand on the glass tube and giggled.
“Hey, look.”
But something was wrong. The sleeping thing was the same as the world, but it looked worse. Its hollow chest was inflating and deflating very slowly, like a whale’s lungs. It wasn’t hard to see why.
“He’s getting worse. He’s looking pretty dire.
From the beginning, my father was dying. The glass coffin in front of him and the countless bundles of bamboo were just life-sustaining treatment to fulfill his wish to see me before he died. There was only one special medicine in the world that could cure him.
Just then, a shrill cry rang out from behind Cain.
“Stop!”
I lowered my gaze. Through the clear glass, I could see Elsia leaning against the doorway, catching her breath. The contrast between her silver hair and flushed face was stark.
“Whew! HAH! Finally caught it…!”
“Elsia.”
“Who the hell are you! Why are you here, and how the hell did you get my password—!”
He must have been running pretty hard. A smile spread across her face. I’d been so focused on my father that I hadn’t noticed her, and she was almost equally as familiar, someone I hadn’t seen in a long time.
Out of nowhere, a drop of thick liquid dripped onto the instep of my foot.
“Growl—.”
“What is it?”
I looked up at the sound of boiling water.
A huge wolf’s head poked through the ceiling, as if it could swallow a bull in one bite. It was translucent, so I knew it wasn’t a real wolf, but a spirit. The fur on the nape of its neck stood on end, waiting for Elsia to tell it it was safe to eat.
“What gap did he summon this in?”
I put my hands on my hips and gasped. His gleaming fangs were quite fierce.
Now it wasn’t just the wolf spirit. Cain’s room was soon filled with spirits large and small. Flaming snails, bats hanging upside down and glaring at me, shark fins circling the floor–before I knew it, I was surrounded.
Running a hand through her sweaty hair, Elsia extended her index finger.
“Don’t change the subject. Before you answer, step away from the glass casket now, and if you do anything even remotely suspicious—”
“Let’s do that.”
I did as she asked. I took three steps backward with my arms raised.
Elsia was taken aback by his unexpected demeanor.
“What—.”
“I’m not the enemy, I didn’t mean to scare you, but that’s what happened.”
“You freaked me out—? Wait. You’re the one who spilled the flesh?!”
“For now. I’m sorry if I scared you too much.”
I nodded. I radiated life, scared to get near the seed vault.
It was more of a spinal cord reflex, partly because he was nervous he’d run right into Akasha, and partly because his stomach was so fucking twisted as a side effect of the continuous spatial travel. The organs in his damn stomach were still tap dancing. This is the kind of day I miss Lucky Stripper.
Elsia’s face paled.
“What nonsense–I’ve never felt that kind of energy from Abel.”
“Of course, I’m stronger than that asshole, so I’m sure he’s doing something right now.”
“Do you even know who Abel is?”
“I don’t know why, you’re the asshole who stabbed my brother, but other than that, I know you’re fine. Whoa–I was worried something had happened, thank God.”
I breathed a sigh of relief.
Knowing that Cain was alive and well gave me some much-needed peace of mind.
Elsia was now looking at me like I was some kind of great demon that had crawled up from the abyss.
“—Who the hell are you?”
“This is his son.”
He jerked toward the glass tube. Elsia’s face hardened.
“What?”
“His name is Ronan. I’m sure he’s mentioned him once or twice, but didn’t you hear him?”
“Ronan. Ronan?”
In an instant, all the spirits stopped moving. Even the wolf spirit’s muzzle, which had been creeping closer, stopped in midair. I still held my arms in a raised position.
“No way.”
Elsia approached slowly. Her steps were cautious, like someone walking on a half-melted river. She stopped three paces away, her gaze alternating between my father’s and my face. Her ruby-colored eyes grew slightly larger with each repeated glance.
It was the end of the thirty-third iteration.
“—Oh my God.”
Elsia clamped her mouth shut. Her large eyes filled with water.
“Really. Are you really Ronan?”
“Nice to meet you, Elsia. Oh, you must be new here.”
All spirits were summoned back. Smoke of mana dispersed in the blue light.
I smirked, noticing the animosity gone from her.
“Sure. I’m glad to see you’re alive.”
“Uh, how, did you get rid of all the inhibitions? Ronan shouldn’t be able to see the Savior—no, more than that, why? Why are you only coming now, so long after your coming-of-age ceremony? I, I–!”
“Elsia, calm down.”
I wrapped my arms around Elsia’s shoulders as she launched a barrage of questions.
Its long, white ears twitched.
“I’ll explain it to you first, and if you still have questions after all that, you can ask me then, okay?”
She looked up at me, bit her lower lip, and nodded. I told her everything. Just the information she needed. With summarizing skills honed over three parallel worlds.
No, it’s not, and I got the answer I expected.
“—— I can’t believe it, a parallel world?”
“Yeah. I’m not the Ronan of this world, and I’m sure that asshole is probably off with his criminal ex-comrades-in-arms right now, bitching about what’s wrong with him, but I’ve sent someone, so you’ll see him sooner or later. Oh, and my sister’s doing fine back home.”
It’s not some backwoods hillbilly, it’s Acalusia. Given what I did there, Adrian’s sister would have done anything to bring Ronan3 back, even if it meant committing a crime.
When I finished, I glanced over at my father.
“More than that, it didn’t look like it was in very good shape.”
“Oh—yes. He’s gotten a lot worse in the last few months.”
Elsia’s voice turned somber. She dropped her gaze.
“To tell you the truth, it’s gotten to the point where I have to prepare myself every morning when I wake up, and there have been times when my eyes are closed but I’m sure I’m hearing voices, but now I can’t be sure of that. The only thing that will make it better is—”
“It’s just the blood of the bastard.”
“Just as you said.”
Elsia sighed softly. Only Abel’s blood could heal the wound from Abel’s sword, and knowing that, I was deeply troubled.
“Hmm.”
Honestly, cutting off Abel’s limbs and draining his blood and tears wasn’t that much of a challenge for me at this point, as I was probably still lobbying for bald heads rather than absorbing the source material.
There was only one thing holding them back. Akasha.
“Why are you here?
I pulled out my mana tracker. Erzebet had attached a string to it, so I wore it around my neck like a necklace. The needle inside the mana-sensing bead spun in place.
‘He’s gone. It’s just a facade.’
I activated the Mana Tracker as soon as I arrived in the North. The Acalusian mother and daughter had done a masterful job of picking up even the slightest trace of Akasha’s mana as it scattered in the blizzard. Shortly after the detection was successful, the needle pointed unmistakably in the direction of the seed vault.
But it was only three minutes.
I was running hard, and the needle started to spin in place, disoriented. Erzebet said there were only two things that could happen.
Either Akasha has gone to another parallel world, or she has traveled too far to be pursued. In the latter case, she is beyond the reach of this star.
“What the hell—.”
I grew worried, wondering where he could be wandering if he was so badly injured.
But what if this is all a trap, and I just don’t understand it, and I’m not supposed to go to another parallel world in the first place?
All the while, Cain was dying.
I was sobbing as I frantically moved the scales in my head.
Thump-!
From beyond the wire-covered ceiling, a heavy vibration rumbled.
“What, what?!”
Elsia’s shoulders slumped in anger.
I shook my head in disbelief.
“This feeling is—.”
The shaking that seeped through my skin was familiar. The hairs on my arms and legs stood on end. My body moved before my mind. I sprinted outside, leaving Elsia behind.
“Wait, I’ll send an elemental—”
“I don’t have time for that.”
I couldn’t be careless here, not with life support. I moved to a suitably secluded room and swung my sword. Two crescent-shaped sword qi escaped, shattering the ceiling. Bright sunlight fell overhead like stage lights.
“Again.”
In the sky, seemingly as small as the palm of your hand, shimmering mana floated.
As you inhale, your thighs inflate. I lowered my stance and spread my legs. His body rose like a spring, and in an instant he was through the hole and on the ground. A gust of cold wind slapped me in the face.
Not far from the entrance to the Seed Vault, a white crack carved into the green sky above. A huge, white, human arm stuck out of the crack.
“Unable to pass. There must have been a problem forming the path.”
A voice rang out that excited me.
The low, thick bass and white forearms belonged to an unmistakable giant. His white arms, which would have been shaved bald if they had been full length, were flailing in the air as if trying to grab a hold of the air.
The reason for the sudden crack was self-evident.
“Yeah. Wherever he went, there’s bound to be a trail.”
It was proof that Akasha had traveled. To prove it, the crack was barely big enough for a werewolf to fit through. It would have been much larger if the intent had been to take out his head.
This is when it is revealed that the place Akasha was transported to was not another parallel world, but a world of giants.
“Good.”
The corners of my mouth turned up. I could only see it as good news.
My body, having reached a high point, was slowly losing speed and falling. I swung my reddened sword like a spray. The sword energy shot along the trajectory and pierced the giant’s arm.
“Get your dirty hands off me.”
『——!!!』
The arm was severed without resistance. A fountain of blue blood gushed over my head. My underwear was now soaked through, but I didn’t mind because my problem was solved.
“Oh my God, what is that—!”
Elsia’s screams echoed in the distance.
The giant’s arm, flailing, plunged into the crack.
I landed in a swallow-turn and held up a knife glistening with blood.
“Elsia, I have a great idea!”
“Yes, Naeh?”
If this plan works, he won’t have to die.
Probably.