Humanity's Terminus (2)
Hwagongsa System Control Branch.
The assembly hall where the Siok selection contest had been held lay a ruin from the battle's aftermath.
Noise from outside pressed through the hole Son Yujeong had made with the Mortasinger.
'Is that Heukseung?'
There must have been a reason they hadn't entered the facility, but the outside didn't look safe either.
Lete spoke.
"Yahweh, give up your stubbornness. This is the last time we'll treat you as our most honored guest."
As reality's mana amplified, the agents' power had grown beyond imagining.
Even administrators' hidden codes were still built on mana.
"My mind won't change. Tell me how to purify the Flesh Brain—the central computation device."
It was the device that calculated the karma of the aborted fetuses that comprised the Otherworld.
"That's impossible…"
Lete sighed, then opened her eyes wide.
"How many times must I say it!"
When purifying flames blazed from her, the two directors trembled.
"In that case, there will be no compromise."
"...Fine."
The doors of the assembly hall opened as a vast number of demons sealed the entrance completely.
"From today on, this place will be the demons' sanctuary. Yahweh, this will be your grave." As time passed, demonic power would only grow stronger—and one day it would be insurmountable.
'There must be a way.'
What was Lete hiding?
Control Room.
Etella stared at the brain—an expanse of fetuses packed together like a city-sized cliff.
'Poor children.'
There was no refuge for Limbo.
They had been removed simply for existing, unable to do anything else.
Yet the reason they suffered in hell was only their clutching at life.
'They must want to live.'
But what would living like that accomplish?
There was only one way to purify the Flesh Brain: for them to give up life of their own accord.
'Can I do it?'
They were writhing so desperately to stay alive.
"Ugh—"
A pain flared in her lower belly and Etella bent over, wincing.
'They're afraid.'
Though still as small as seeds, they fought desperately to avoid becoming Limbo.
'I'm sorry.'
My children.
'Mom must ease their resentment. That's why I came here.'
Through Master Rafael's sacrifice for Shagal, Etella had learned love.
'I can do it.'
Now she was a mother, and another life grew inside her...
'I can soothe Limbo's resentment.' If she could purify the Otherworld, life for humans might improve.
Etella took a step forward.
"Ughhh—"
A groan escaped when she saw the yawning precipice with flames licking its edge.
She did not fear death.
Bound here by the Taeguk's chain, she could not die even if she wished it.
'How much will those children—those before them—resent me?'
To become the godmother of aborted children, to take on all their pain and vanish with them.
'I can do it. No—I must do it.'
If everything had a reason, then carrying Shagal's child must be fate.
'Shagal.'
Though linked by the Taeguk chain, Shagal did not answer Etella's feelings.
What came through the chain instead was Shagal's endless, half-mad rage.
'You're pitiable too.'
If the divine Law hadn't adjusted him, he might have been a good friend.
'Family isn't meaningless.'
The Law stamps reality like a print.
"But..."
I want a family.
'Humans can form a family. Throwing your heart into uncertainty—that's what the heart is.'
Shagal could have been a good man.
'I'll carry that thought with me.'
As she took another step, a fierce pain throbbed from the womb that held the fetus.
"Ugh—!"
A small life does not want to die.
"I'm sorry."
Tears fell from Etella's eyes.
Having learned love, she could not help but ache for the life within her.
"I won't let you live here."
Extinction was imminent.
A pain far greater than the ache in her belly shredded her chest, but her will did not break.
"Let us go."
There was no other way.
Shagal howled like a serpent.
"Kiiiii!"
Killing everything in sight, he saw nothing.
"Kukku. Kukkukku."
Already blind, he raged on.
Lost time, a life that might have been happy, the resentment of being mocked by God and killing a benefactor.
"What did I do so wrong!"
Lock human emotion in a pressure cooker and infuse it with rage—this was the result.
As his purposeless killing continued, enemy resistance intensified.
'He suddenly got stronger.'
One rank? No—he seemed to have surpassed two, and wounds began to stack across Shagal's body.
In his frenzy he felt no pain, but eventually his strength drained and he collapsed.
When he came to, his body was so battered there were scarcely any uninjured places.
"Agh, this lunatic."
Agents walked past their comrades' corpses and approached him.
Shagal gritted his teeth.
'My body won't move.'
As if he'd forgotten how to exert himself, his muscles would not obey.
"Hey, hey."
An agent shoved him with a boot and Shagal toppled onto his side.
"You, do you even know where you are? You won't die anyway, right? We'll teach you what hell is."
"Ku, kukku."
Sprawled out, Shagal convulsed with an unbearable itch.
"Heh, you laughing? Fine. Laugh your fill. We'll cut your face off and bury it deep underground. After a hundred million years in darkness, maybe you'll learn your sin."
"Yeah… that sounds good."
Would a hundred million years underground ease the resentment in his chest?
'Could I forget it all?'
Maybe this was the best.
'I can't torment that woman anymore now.'
He knew the past.
'Heh, good. Step away from trash like me forever. Yes, be buried forever…'
Then it happened.
Shagal, finally finding reason, felt Etella through the Taeguk chain.
The moment he understood what she planned, every cell in his body convulsed.
'What is this?'
Could it really be true?
Even if the Taeguk chain could not lie, it felt unreal.
'No.'
Shagal didn't know what he felt for Etella.
He had only lived swept up in a storm of violent emotions, vaguely hating something.
"Don't."
He would never see her again.
That single thought cleared the storm-clouded fog from his mind.
"Don't."
He wasn't in his right mind before.
"Kukku! Look at his face. He's terrified, huh? Well, scared is natural."
Indeed, Shagal's face had drained of color and his lips trembled.
'My baby. The child in my womb.'
Unlike a worthless father, this child would grow happily under a truly good mother…
"Ugh! Ughhh!"
Shagal squeezed his eyes shut and sobbed. The manager's voice reached his ears.
- Remaining purification time: an astronomical figure—87 hae, 2,875 gyeong, 3,241 jo... (the display lists near-ten-billion-hour magnitudes).
The agents watching Shagal's wailing pointed and laughed.
"Too shameful to keep to yourself? Cut his throat and hang it on the wall for now. Wonder when he'll be buried… ugh."
The agent with a throwing blade in his neck suddenly sprouted dozens of holes across his body at once.
"Get away."
Shagal bared the whites of his eyes and charged; the others scrambled into combat stances.
"This bastard—where did he get this strength?—" Before the sentence finished, a rain of thrown blades flew from every direction, shredding their bodies like buckshot.
"Clear the way!"
As Shagal sprinted back toward where Etella stood, his muscles began to tear and slip.
'I beg you—'
He prayed he could make the timing.
Etella had steeled herself.
"I'm sorry."
Though Shagal felt Etella's emotion through the chain, her resolve did not waver.
Their relationship was a tangled knot—trying to untangle it would only make matters worse.
'This is the only way.'
Their time had been reset; the child in the womb was not the fruit of love.
"For the greater good."
Tears streamed down Etella's cheeks as she stepped off the cliff.
Shagal seized the chain.
"Wait!"
He hauled on it with everything he had, but in the Taeguk's bind there can be no precedence.
At that moment, Shagal's eyes widened.
"A—ah—"
Like a lightning strike, his whole body shook; both knees went weak and slammed to the ground.
"Uaaah!"
- Remaining purification time: the system recalculated—an enormous amount of time had been purified in an instant. The readout dropped by roughly one hundred billion hours.
Almost 130 billion hours had been purified.
"Why! Why! Why!"
If only, among the countless moments that tormented her, there had been one instant of tenderness.
'You idiot!'
No—if he hadn't rampaged before they parted, if he had stayed by her side even at the end—
"No! That's a lie!"
He could have kept Etella.
"Uaaah!"
He could have been happy.
"Chain, chain."
He groped for the only hope—the chain—but Etella's feeling did not reach him.
"Why, why?"
Inside the main system that governed karma, every program had gone dead.
Shagal hauled himself up and sprinted down the corridor in a panic.
'It's not too late! It can't be too late!'
- Remaining purification time...
An emergency message blared through the assembly hall.
- Warning! Core data in the control room is being disturbed! Please address immediately!
Lete lifted her head.
"What?"
If the central computation device failed, the Otherworld's karma would all be reset.
"That's impossible. Those who carry karma can't access the Flesh Brain. Even if you destroy its form, the Law remains; core data shouldn't be disturbed."
- Romi Etella. Limbo.
Lete bristled.
"Stop spouting nonsense! That woman's karma—"
Then realization struck.
"Ah."
Limbo, of course.
What karma could lie upon a life sleeping in the womb, knowing nothing?
"Etella… Teacher." Hearing the message, Shirone finally solved a riddle he hadn't been able to untangle.
'Shagal's child—'
The circumstances fit.
'If the computation system disappears, calculating karma becomes impossible. We can obtain the true sound.'
All that remained was how to break through, since almost all the facility's forces had gathered there.
"Abandon your lingering hopes, Yahweh. We're getting stronger even now. You cannot leave here."
"You knew from the start? The method to annihilate the Flesh Brain, to destroy the aborted fetuses."
"...I didn't lie. If I'd known Etella was pregnant, my answer would have been different."
If asked, she would have killed her before she could answer.
"Die."
As Lete ignited her purifying flame, a sharp wind sounded from the thirteenth floor.
"Huh?"
A line split the scenery, and bodies of demons caught in that line began to ignite.
"Ge—Gehenna...! Uaaah!"
As the demons turned to flame and were drawn into the great sword, Rian standing outside the door came into view.
"Sorry, Shirone."
Kurung, kurung, kurung...
The outer wall—still jammed—creaked as stone rubbed against stone and reengaged.
"They all fled, Siok."
"Haha."
Because of the clash between Habitz and Wizard, variables had appeared in the Otherworld as well.
'This is really driving me mad.'
Lete scowled.
'That thing was still there.'
No matter how strong the demons had become, they would draw in all of Gehenna's black mana.