One hour after the battle.
I was lying in my room in the Silver Diamond Inn, where Catherine raised his staff high, chanting its healing spell to heal the hypnotic spell, from which it corrupted my mind little by little. I was reverted back to the real world, and the image of my past parents slowly faded until it diminished.
I couldn't open my eyes easily, like I've been paralyzed on the neck down, the hypnotic spell spreads through my mind like a virus. Like it eats away my thoughts until I'll become a mindless monster.
"Catherine, what's her status?" Elias said from a distance
"She is not doing well. Her condition has only worsened for a few hours. Her brain was corrupted with hypnotic magic, one wrong move and she'd never known the Eirene I know of…"
Catherine can perform high-level healing to heal huge and deep wounds quickly and easily, but from curses and hypnotic magic is more advanced and complicated. Catherine healed me for more than an hour straight without taking a single break, I can hear them accurately, as her groans echoed through the room, I can tell that she is low at her mana.
"Catherine, stop this!" Elias shouted
Elias approached at Catherine, who was busy healing my body from the hypnotic spell,
"But, Eirene, what about her?" Catherine grunted
"You're pushing yourself too hard. Keep continuing this and you're dead, your mana meter is beyond zero, Catherine!" Elias replied
"No! No! No! There is another way to save her, I wouldn't let it happen, ever!"
"Sorry, but it was the only way around. There was no option to save Eirene."
After Catherine deactivated her staff, the warm sensation of healing magic suddenly vanished. As they all lost hope on me, Elias muttered through my body.
"Little sister, I know you can fight this. I've seen full potential in you, Eirene. So please, use all your might to repel the spell!"
As Elias muttered in my unconscious body, I could hear it clearly, my big brother's pleas for help. Regular healing magic doesn't break the hypnotic spell itself, instead, I need to fight it.
The world went hazy as the spell erupted in ecstasy. As I fell into the familiar black, I could help but feel there was something strange about my blood curse, about Alistair, even in his death.
When I came in, I stood in a space of pure white. I only remembered that I had been here once before. I tried to remember then, but I couldn't seem to grasp it. The world was just as far as I could see.
As I tried to sort through my memories, a girl suddenly appeared before me. The girl has silky black hair, dressed in white with a face filled with layered makeup, identity white to the world around her. It was as though she was part of it.
She looked at me, and she sighed.
"Greeting Eirene Rynd, I told you not to be so reckless… I'm about to hit my limit."
The girl pointed to the ground at her feet, and underneath, I faintly made out of a darkness. In that darkness lay a countless number of creatures, deformed, wounded, groaning in malice and hatred. I knew instinctively that this darkness was a place of overwhelming fear, a part of the hypnotic spell.
And in that moment, I remembered. I had seen this place in my dream, I remembered the girl too.
"You're… Roxanne Albatross."
"That's right, I'm glad we finally have a chance to properly talk. I'm Roxanne, I'm your past life."
That girl that I talked to was my past identity, Roxanne Albatross, her soul was in my mind. Like every detail of my body was in hers, wearing the same layered makeup, the same silky black hair and it's 5 '2 height of mine. When I look into my past self, I can tell that both of us are different.
"Eirene, thank you." Roxanne thanks me
I tilted my head, confused…
"Thank me?"
Roxanne said, looking at me sincerely…
"I wanted to thank you for killing me."
"Killing you?"
"Yes, because of your heroic behavior, I'm glad you lived a new life in this world. I'm glad you saved Marcel from that accident, and especially, I'm glad you killed me!"
I had no words. I didn't have any idea how to reply. That traumatic experience had haunted me ever since I left it. I had been uncertain whether I had really done the right thing by ending her life, my past life, monstrous as it had become. I wasn't sure of anything anymore, only that I wanted to protect Marcel. Was it okay to be glad that I killed myself?
"Don't look like that, I'm happy, honestly. I'm happy things ended as they did." Roxanne said
"But I… I just … I can't say I'm happy that it happened." I replied
"A bit stubborn, aren't you? Even having heard what I think. Although, given what I've witnessed of you and your actions from here. I can't say I didn't see that coming."
Roxanne said this with a slight smile, as though she knew all about me already. As though we're friends or some sort. I felt a bit like she'd invaded my privacy. Her speaking so openly about my past self. It's like I've seen a ghost out of thin air, and that ghost was my past self.
"Anyway, aren't there more important things you want to ask me about?"
Roxanne said, gesturing to the world of white surrounding us.
"Oh. Yeah. What is this place?" I asked politely
"Well, I suppose you can think of it as a spiritual plane where your blood curse deposits the blood of those it devourers. I used my power to create this quiet part."
I gave a confused look on my face, it seemed that this place was my innate domain. I tilted my head at Roxanne.
"Hmmm…"
"You don't get it do you? I can see the confusion written all over your face! You're going to think to yourself thinking so hard. Well, just so you know, the whole reason your Blood Curse controlled an urge for blood was because I created a space for you. Now do you get it?"
"Woah…"
"The gods didn't give you the blood curse. I gave that ability to you, the gods gave you that useless appraisal skill of yours. Thank me in advance."
When I thought back, it was true that ever since I acquired my first evolution, my blood curse had been oddly quiet. Even though I'd worked diligently to control hunger through training, something about the suddenness of the change had struck me as strange. Now, I finally had an explanation.
Also, the gods gave me a human skill: Blood Curse and Inspect. As Roxanne's information gathered through me. She lended me a Blood Curse, a skill that increases my stats permanently just by drinking blood. It was a good start for being reincarnated in this world. Now that I know that, I thanked my old self from that gift of hers.
"Thanks Roxanne, but why have you done all of this?" I asked
"I already told you. I'm grateful you killed me. This is my way of saying thanks. You sacrificed yourself just to save one of the people you love from that singular van accident."
Roxanne stared sadly at the world she'd created, her clear white eyes turning into a bright red, just as they had been stained when I'd first seen her. As that crimson leaked in, her world began to tear apart at its edges.
"Now Eirene, I will spare your life from now. The hypnotic spell is saved. If you do, my power can help you. You will become something other than what you are now. It's inevitable."
No matter what it cost me, I knew that I couldn't stop. I had to ask Roxanne how to get out of this plane, back into the world. But as I began to do so, the white ground split around my feet, and holes opened into the darkness below.
"Whoa!"
Just as I was about to fall into the dark pit, crowded with the howling souls of the damned, a hand reached out and grabbed me. It belonged to a man I'd never seen before. He was tall, a bit handsome, and he looked older than me. He spotted a striking head of black hair and a set of tattoos.
"Jeez, I wondered why you weren't replying. You've just been hanging out here, huh? You know there's only so much I can do on my own, right?"
The man said with an arrogant air as he hoisted me back up.
"Wait, I know that voice. You're… Plasma?!" I said, still disoriented from Roxanne.
"The one and only! This is my temporal form. But don't go thanking me as your saviour just yet… thank Roxanne, she is your past life, remember?"
Plasma gestured to Roxanne, and a flash of annoyance crossed his face. I wondered whether he and Roxanne knew each other, he didn't look like he wanted to be here much longer.
Still, I'd only ever know Plasma as an AI assistant. It was refreshing to see him in a form with visible expressions, and I took a moment to study him.
"Hey, didn't anyone ever tell you it's rude to stare?" Plasma said, crossing his arms.
"Wait, Plasma, did you…did you used to be a human…?" I said, shocked
"Does that even matter right now? C'mon. Let's go. Roxy, we're running out of time."
He was right. And it looked like Plasma knew how to get me out of here.
"Plasma, I need your help."
"Of course you do. That's the whole reason I'm down here."
Then I turned it into Roxanne, and said my final message before leaving.
"Thanks Roxanne, without you, I've never been in this hellhole."
Roxanner remained silent, but after a moment, she nodded.
Plasma reached out a hand, and I grasped it with my own. The two of us were wrapped in light, and…
"Eirene, she's awake…"