The Monster Lady and the Holy Knight - Chapter 40

For He said to him, “Come out of the man, you unclean spirit!” And He asked him, “What is your name?” The demon answered, “My name is Legion, for we are many.”

—Evangelium secundum Marcum 5:8-9

***

Visions are different from dreams. They can appear at any time, often at night simply because that feels natural. But today, the vision was far too vivid for a mere dream.

Step. Veronica stood in front of a city alight with flying embers. The city had already crumbled to ruins. Rats with long, sparse fur skittered by her feet, preying on corpses. These rats and the Bahamut were close companions. One consumed the body, the other devoured the head—making it clear that these monstrous creatures, sharing their spoils, had no reason to be enemies.

Veronica, used to witnessing gruesome feasts, did not pay them much attention. What first struck her as strange was the absence of snow on the ground.

Instead of snow, unfamiliar sand covered the earth. Broken yellowish walls surrounded her. Veronica soon realized she stood before a colossal structure—a giant pyramid. This must be Tanbia of the southern lands. But how? The faceless Bahamut had been in Blasen, amidst the frozen mountain range, until recently.

Veronica looked around, catching her reflection in a discarded shield on the ground. A normal Bahamut without a face stared back at her.

In other words, she wasn’t looking through the eyes of the Bahamut she had assimilated but through those of another entity.

What a strange feeling. Was this because they were all connected? Could “it” see the entire world as easily as one might view their palm?

Like a god.

The moment the thought crossed her mind, the scenery abruptly shifted. Now, she was climbing jagged cliffs formed from cooled lava. Behind her, azure waves crashed and licked hungrily at the rocks. This must be the Rom Archipelago in the east, also known as the Chain Islands. Arrows rained down from above. Eastern warriors were engaged in a fierce battle.

Next, she saw Whiteland, where snow piled higher than her height, and Ruega, a fertile land where the wind roamed freely. The attacking Bahamuts seemed devoid of any purpose—destroying, ravaging, consuming humans without apparent reason.

It was in the ruins of Aseldorf that the anomaly appeared. An unnaturally large number of Bahamuts swarmed the city, searching desperately for something. Outside the inn where Veronica had stayed. At the edge of the closing drawbridge. They searched with frantic urgency because one of them had come across what they sought in that place.

But what was it? Tell me, what is it that you’re so desperate to find?

If you tell me, I could help search too.

The head of God. The place where the vanished God hides.

A chill ran down her spine.

The moment something that wasn’t a human voice invaded her mind, Veronica awoke with a start, holding her breath.

She lay in sunlight that shattered into white fragments. Lying on a white pillow, hugging a white blanket tightly, she exhaled the breath she had held.

Her eyes were swollen and sore. Outside the window, birds chirped cheerfully. It was an astonishingly peaceful morning.

“……”

Yes. It’s alright. This is reality. This is neither a vision nor that black corridor. Everything is okay now.

Slowly catching her breath, Veronica sat up. On the wide bed, there were no signs of anyone else having slept beside her. Well, of course not. The man who looked at her with such disgust would never have stayed here overnight.

Her last memory of yesterday was of herself crying, looking up at Leon’s cold face. Fear had made her cover her eyes with her arm. She couldn’t help recalling Mecklenburg’s hands around her throat—the moment when she was pushed to the brink of death, thinking she would lose her mind.

At that moment, Mecklenburg had looked like a dark specter. His eyes, large and white, glowed in the darkness as he glared at her. It hurt. She was terrified. She hadn’t even managed to say anything to Leon—hadn’t even begun, only for it to end.

She never thought things would work out with Leon from the start. His convictions were clear even to someone like her, and her feelings had never been that deep anyway.

She didn’t want much. Just to speak her name. To say it, even if he didn’t ask.

Veronica Schwarzvald. Named after the saint, as you know. The woman who wiped away the blood of the crucified god. Like her, I wanted to share your burden.

Without realizing that she was already useless and discarded. To him, she had meant nothing.

“What now?”

Veronica muttered to herself, turning to lie on her side. At first, she couldn’t understand. Why had she worried about and waited for someone she barely knew? Liked him?

It was because she had nothing left. If Leon, whom she had met in Bayern, disappeared too, she would truly be left alone. Better to be battered by waves while anchored in a harbor than to drift endlessly across a lonely sea. Flowers withered and crumbled to black in an instant amid the salt-filled air of that illusory harbor.

Had the side table not caught her eye as she lay there, she might have spent the whole day lying powerless in bed. Veronica stared blankly at the clean clothes, the quill, and the parchment.

‘Don’t leave without permission. Record every vision without exception’, was it?

Her blurry eyes gradually regained focus. Remembering the long visions she had witnessed the previous night, she finally approached the desk and picked up the quill.

She rubbed her eyes, painstakingly writing down everything she could remember. Not only because Leon had demanded it—she herself felt that she might forget everything she had seen if she didn’t write it down immediately. There was too much.

Her hurried scrawl depicted the state of each region with a historian’s level of detail. However, she chose to omit the final voice she heard. It was too unsettling. She must have misheard it. The head of God?

“There’s no way a Bahamut could speak,” Veronica muttered to herself for reassurance, placing the quill back down before heading to the bathroom.

She wanted to wash. Though only twenty years old, she already understood the truth—bad moods could be washed away with water.

Undressing, she unraveled the bandages stained with dried blood. Every movement brought pain as scabs fell off. Naturally, the memory of the previous night came rushing back. The feeling of being pressed and rubbed against the bed. The man who wouldn’t move, even when she said it hurt.

“The real monster isn’t me. It’s you.”

She lay down in the middle of the empty tub, hugging herself. It felt like a coffin.

“Was there ever a time you were sincere with me?”

No one answered her solitary question. So she answered it herself.

“…It’s alright. If you discarded me because I wasn’t needed, then all I need is to become necessary again.”

A simple problem. If she gave up, she would be left alone in the snowfield. She had to rise, no matter what.

Veronica quietly closed her eyes. How strange, she thought. Even with all this sunlight, why did it still feel like she was trapped in that black corridor?

***

“Do you understand the implications of what you said to His Majesty?”

“Hmm, I heard the source was an assimilated one, but how is an assimilator still alive?”

“Does His Holiness know about this too?”

Leon had been busy all day.

Mecklenburg was dead.

The death of the Commander of the Holy Knights was no ordinary loss. Especially since the holy sword Hennessis had not returned.

The holy sword consumed holy power. This meant that whoever wielded it could cut through Kart’s walls, which had accumulated over a thousand years of holy power. Bahamuts using human weapons was already a well-observed phenomenon. Once they learned how, they wielded them skillfully.

There were already documented instances of Bahamuts using catapults during sieges and firing bombs meant for the walls at human armies. There was no reason they couldn’t use a sword.

That was why the Pope had silenced Oscar. If this news got out, public sentiment would be the least of their concerns.

As it stood, only three people likely knew of Mecklenburg’s death: Philip, Oscar, and the Pope. The same went for the ominous prophecy.

At dawn, Leon had gone to the Imperial Palace. He reported everything he knew to the Emperor. To explain the source of his information, he mentioned the assimilator and requested her protection. The reaction was as expected—uproarious. It was the great Mecklenburg, after all.

The Council of Elders, comprised of major nobles, had been convened, and Leon had repeated his testimony multiple times, putting all his remaining honor on the line. Despite that, most refused to believe him. After all, this was Kart. The land where God had promised peace. A paradise preserved for a thousand years.

It had only been two years since the Bahamuts emerged from the sea, and until people directly felt their presence, they wouldn’t easily shake off their complacent peace. Even the uneasy citizens of Aseldorf were like frogs in a boiling pot, oblivious until it was too late. Even if ruin was at their doorstep, they would scoff, believing that tomorrow would be the same as today, just as today had been like yesterday. The world was going downhill, yet they remained blind.

To the imperial family and nobles eagerly awaiting the Spring Founding Festival, Leon’s warnings were no more than flies at their feast. Perhaps capturing a Bahamut alive and dropping it in the middle of the city would be quicker. These were his thoughts as he opened the door to the inn. Leon paused when he saw the candle still lit on the bedside table, despite the late hour.

Ah, that’s right.

He had instructed a messenger to deliver clothes and parchment to her, but he had completely forgotten her existence since then. Or rather, the very concept of someone waiting for him was unfamiliar.

“I thought you’d be asleep.”