Several hours had passed since Subaru was chained to the wall and his one-sided conversation with Petelgeuse was severed, leaving him abandoned.
Heat drained from his body into the cold floor. Lying there, Subaru found his body wouldn't obey him. His consciousness was clouded — a consequence of having lost his stamina, then his body heat, and now running a fever.
Gasping out ragged, painful breaths, drool trailing from the corner of his mouth — that was Subaru. Yet there was no one in this place who would tend to such a wretched Subaru, let alone so much as acknowledge his existence.
"I must move all the remaining fingers on my left hand, desu. Clearing the road was handled with just my right hand alone, but if it proves unmanageable, we may need to move the schedule up and consider blocking the road, desu ne."
At one end of the cavern's great hall, Subaru wasted away. In stark contrast, at the center of the hall, Petelgeuse stood clapping his hands and barking instructions in that high-pitched voice, brimming with inexhaustible energy.
His appearance could only be described as a skeleton wearing a human's skin, yet his voice, his gaze, every movement — all of it overflowed with vitality.
His behavior was perfectly befitting the word "diligence" that he repeated over and over, and it was clear this was deliberate. That someone like him would profess the title of "Sloth" was laughable — but there was no one here capable of laughing at it.
One after another, cloaked shadows appeared before Petelgeuse, who remained seated at the center of the cavern. Not one of them made so much as a ripple in the air; they delivered whispered reports to Petelgeuse, received his instructions, and then dissolved back into the darkness like shadows returning whence they came.
Only Petelgeuse remained stationary. Because they came and went in succession, Subaru could not distinguish among them — but if each one was truly a different person, the number easily exceeded twenty.
The group of black-cloaked figures, appearing as though growing from the shadows themselves — their image stirred something in his mind, as if connected to some half-formed memory.
"Oh, ah, now that I think of it, I was here all along, desu! So, desu ka, have you perhaps developed the desire to talk, desu!?"
Once the last shadow vanished and the two were alone again, Petelgeuse moved. He unceremoniously approached Subaru and looked down at his fever-reddened face.
"Does it hurt, desu? Is it painful, desu? Are you sad, desu? Are you angry, desu? If you are a fellow sufferer, I would not hesitate to offer my heartfelt sympathy — but is that what you desire, desu!?"
"————"
"Oh, how cold-hearted, desu!"
To the madman looming close, Subaru responded only by turning his face away in silence.
Seeing this, Petelgeuse gleefully slapped his knee, leaned back, and tilted his head.
"But you see, you're giving a much more convincing reaction now, desu! With just one more push, just a little more wobble — I think I'll understand you, desu yo!"
"————"
"What is it you need, desu ka ne? What should I bring you, desu ka ne? What must I do to make your heart tremble and repay the love you are owed — what should I do! That's right… DESU!"
Petelgeuse worked himself up, shouting with an expression of rapture, leaving Subaru behind entirely.
Then — just as he was about to retreat once more into his own world, soaking in ecstasy and spewing his ravings as he had before — an interruption came without warning.
"Oh my, oh my?"
Petelgeuse turned around. Before him, black shadows rose one after another from the ground.
Black-clad figures that looked as though they had simply sprouted from the shadows themselves—more than ten in number. They knelt where they stood and gazed up at Petelgeuse in silence.
At the sight of them, Petelgeuse tilted his hips, his neck, his eyes, "What is it, I wonder?"
"......"
"What's this? The left hand's cordon has been broken through? Single-handedly? How wonderful! Outnumbered, wounded, and yet they cling on desperately... And yet how incompetent and slothful my fingers have been! Could it be that he slipped right past them?"
"......"
"He didn't slip past? He didn't go outside to seek help, but instead slipped inward? In that wretched state! Toward us, with numbers uncertain! Ah, that is—that is that is that is that is that is that is that is that is—how deeply loving and diligent he is!!"
Clapping his hands, his face and eyes shining with radiance, Petelgeuse spun toward Subaru with a bouncing motion. Then he crouched down to meet Subaru's gaze, and with a childlike smile, "You should be delighted! That you are thought of with such feeling! A diligent one risks his very life for you! Ah, my brain, my brain, brain, brain is trembling!"
Spitting in his excitement and splattering Subaru's face, Petelgeuse rose to his feet and bustled between the kneeling shadows, "So the girl is coming? Ah, so that's why you came back. That is good! Very good indeed! I must, must, must, must, must, must welcome her! I must greet her with my own hands!"
"......"
"Yes! I shall do just that! Rally all the fingers of the left hand and escort him to the entrance! If he collapses along the way, so be it—if he arrives without collapsing, then I shall greet him myself! Ah, ah, ahhhhhh, how wonderful it is!!"
Petelgeuse's face bursting with elation. His words—his meaning—didn't reach Subaru.
Still, Subaru twisted his body and opened his mouth, his expression still feverish. A mouth that could produce nothing but groans, yet guided by some inexplicable sensation welling up from within.
But— "——!"
His mouth—as though something invisible had clamped over it—would not produce a sound.
It was different from the sensation of one's throat closing from fear or any other emotion. It was clearer than that—a distinct sensation of physical obstruction, as though something were physically sealing his mouth shut.
Overwhelmed by the sensation of an invisible palm pressed against his lips, Subaru's eyes flew wide open. Petelgeuse, looking back up at him, cackled with a dry, rattling laugh, "Well now, no need to rush... We have plenty of time."
Cackle, cackle—Petelgeuse's parched laughter echoed through the cavern.
That sound, that unpleasant reverberation pounding in his ears—even after the sensation of obstruction faded from his mouth, Subaru could not weave together a single word. He simply sat there, not grinning foolishly, not shedding tears, just repeating ragged breaths and staring fixedly as time passed.
——The change came in less than an hour after that.
The black-clad figures continued to kneel in silence, just as before. Petelgeuse paced wordlessly among them in zigzag patterns, and only the sound of his footsteps and Subaru's harsh breathing stirred the air of the great hall.
The first to raise their head was the black figure kneeling at the spot closest to the passage leading to the hall.
As if following that person's movement, the zealots lifted their heads one after another. Their gazes were uniformly directed toward the cave entrance, and Petelgeuse, noticing their movement, turned to look as well—his lips curving into a grin so wide it seemed the corners of his mouth might split open.
"It seems they've arrived, desu."
The gleeful whisper was swallowed up by the deafening roar that echoed through the chamber.
A tremendous mass was shattered with bomb-like force, and the sound of destruction violently shook the cave's frigid air. The chain of impacts traveled through the hard ground, reaching even the rolling Subaru, and everyone present could feel that the entrance had been thrown open by a violent assault.
A shadow swayed upright, drawing a cross from within its robes and holding it at the ready.
There was simply no other way to describe it—the cave was far too cramped for more than ten people to scramble around in. The hall itself had some size to it, but at most it was equivalent to two school classrooms.
There was not enough room to fly about, dash around, or accomplish anything. And that was actually a favorable condition for the intruder, who was outnumbered.
After all, her prey was— "—I found you."
It was visible even from a distance: a roaring iron ball swept aside the lunging black figures all at once, smashing them against the wall and painting it red.
The iron ball that had easily claimed three lives with its first strike was a lethal weapon that would tear the very soul from anyone it struck directly—there was no choice but to avoid it, but even that was difficult within the narrow confines of the cave.
The iron ball struck the ground, shattering the rock face, and its blood-and-flesh-caked spikes were dragged along with a heavy sound. The girl who stepped forward had dyed her blue hair a deep, dark crimson, yet her eyes—still refusing to lose their light—scanned the hall until they found the collapsed boy.
Her lips trembled as she drew in a soft breath, filled with tender emotion— "Thank goodness, Subaru-kun—"
The girl who called out Subaru's name and let her shoulders slump in relief—
Her appearance was too ghastly for words, making it vividly clear she had fought her way through an absolute hell.
There was not a single place on her entire body that wasn't soaked in blood. Her blue hair had been stained a deep, dark crimson, and her scorched apron dress had lost every last trace of white. Her torn, shredded skirt revealed legs covered in countless lacerations, and above all else, her left arm was missing from the elbow down.
Blood dripping from her cracked forehead covered her left eye, and Rem—smiling faintly—was wreathed in the scent of blood and death, having pushed a body far beyond what mere grievous wounds could describe to get this far.
"Ahh—what a magnificent thing this is, desu!"
And before her ghastly, devastating state, Petelgeuse raised a cry of acclaim.
He had forgotten the fact that his own companions had been slaughtered before his very eyes by her—if anything, he used it as further fuel to whip himself into a frenzy, merrily, delightedly stepping in place— "A girl! A single girl! So terribly wounded, and yet she presses forward, desu! For what sake, you ask? For this young man's sake, desu! You too, who would go this far to rescue a boy doted upon by the
"Spare me the sermon, Witch Cultist..."
She stepped between Subaru and Petelgeuse—the latter cackling so hard foam formed at the corners of his mouth. Rem fixed him with a cold, unyielding stare as he performed his mad antics— "You are insolent fools, causing unrest in the domain without the permission of Lord Roswaal, the Margrave of the Mathers domain. On behalf of the absent master, Rem will pass judgment."
"Are you going to do that looking so beat-up, so beat-up, beat-up, beat-up, beat-up? Stop talking like you can do things you clearly can't. Besides, you only came here to bring back this boy. Spare me the fine-sounding, decorative words."
Squatting down, Petelgeuse grabbed Subaru's head, forcing it upward.
While gleefully clutching his hair, Petelgeuse bobbed the unwilling Subaru's head up and down.
"...Don't touch him."
"What did you say?"
"I said, don't you touch him!!"
Rem's body jerked with rage, her wounded frame pushed to its limits as she launched into the air.
As if to chase after her, the dark figure that had been standing on the ground also leaped upward. Two shadows hurtled toward Rem. The black-clad figure wielding a cross-shaped blade that seemed to melt into darkness pursued her straight-leaping form.
"————!"
The brandished blade aimed to skewer Rem's torso from below. However, against the low attack, she swung her left arm—the arm missing everything from the elbow down—to pivot her body, narrowly avoiding the blade as it grazed her mid-air.
"Raaaaah!"
She swung her right arm, and the iron ball linked to its movement smashed the face of one of the black-clad figures. At the same time, her fist, clenched tight around the handle, struck the other's head directly, caving in the skull and knocking them down.
As the two corpses fell, Rem's body landed in the center of the hall. It was the very heart of the gathered fanatics, and everyone thought it a fatal misjudgment.
Indeed, the fanatics leveled their blades and charged en masse at the girl who had landed on her knees.
The number of blades thrusting toward her exceeded the fingers on both her hands, and if they struck, a fatal blow was inevitable. But— "——El, Huma!!"
In response to Rem's scream, which sounded like she was coughing up blood, one of the corpses that had fallen beside her sprang up. No, the blood that had been spilling abundantly from the corpse had its form altered by Mana interference.
The spear of fresh blood, thrusting upward from the ground, skewered the black-clad figure who had charged in carelessly. The frozen blood spear was brittle; the moment it impaled, it snapped at the base and lost its shape, but— "——Aah!"
It bought Rem more than enough time to blow the heads off the fanatics who had frozen in their tracks.
Blood, brain matter, fragments of skull scattered, and steam rose in the cavern's cold air. Every time Rem swung her arm, producing death, new corpses were created, and a mountain was built.
The number of black-clad figures in the hall was roughly fifteen. Most had already lost their lives to Rem's assault, and the remaining few seemed incapable of stopping her rage.
Rem's superiority was unquestionable. Wounded, missing an arm, yet still, her strength utterly overwhelmed the black-clad figures.
And yet, why?
"Ahh, ah, ah..."
Pressing his hands to his face, Petelgeuse lets out heated breaths as he watches the followers sunk into depravity.
The sight of him—trembling not with grief, not with fear, not with anxiety, but driven by pure, unadulterated excitement—only amplified the unease all the more, until it became almost palpable.
Beside Petelgeuse, Subaru watches Rem fight as she rampages.
The meaning, the reason behind the scene, the image of her fighting—all of it seeps deep into his brain.
He doesn't understand. He doesn't want to understand. He isn't even trying to understand.
And yet something is reaching him. An impulse surging up from deep within his chest at the sight of her—bleeding, wounded, and still continuing to fight.
Perhaps if he gave voice to that unease. Perhaps he had to.
But if he did, he might lose himself. He would have to agonize over what was right and what was wrong, and why things had to turn out this way.
So afraid of that, so desperate to spare himself, Subaru— "My brain... trembles."
As the words left his lips, Petelgeuse rose to his feet.
Swaying the hem of his black vestments, Petelgeuse steps forward with leisurely composure. Unlike the followers, he holds nothing in his hands. If anything, the way he sways his loosely open hands and advances in such a relaxed manner contains not a trace of fighting spirit.
A body built of nothing but bone and flesh, bearing mannerisms utterly divorced from any notion of strength.
Rem notices his approach. After striking down yet another black shadow, she leaps—hanging inverted from the ceiling, glaring down at Petelgeuse as he passes below.
Her bent knees蓄 explosive force, and the body launched in the very next instant—her arms—would shatter Petelgeuse's slender frame to pieces.
But—and yet—why.
Why is such a dreadful premonition tearing at his heart— "—Mnh."
A hoarse voice barely scrapes its way out from the depths of his throat.
It is a meaningless fragment of a word, carrying not a shred of what he wants to convey. And yet, gasping for breath, raising his face, pushing wide open those formerly emotionless eyes— "...Rem."
In a feeble voice like a wisp of a whisper, he speaks that name for the first time in who knows how long.
"—Ah."
That voice, a voice that seemed as though it might vanish at any moment—did it reach her alone?
A faint trace of gentle emotion settled upon the face of the girl hanging upside down in midair, drenched in blood.
Her lips loosened ever so slightly, her eyes fixed upon Subaru and trembling with rapture— —yet countless crosses pinned her through like a pincushion, driving her body down into the earth.
※※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ Seeing the blood spreading from Rem's fallen body, Subaru had lost his voice.
Groans of agony, cries of pain chaining together, and the sound of something sharp plunging into flesh repeated endlessly, one after another.
It was the sound of the crosses' blades piercing Rem's crumpled body over and over and over again.
Blades that had freed themselves hovered in the air of their own accord, searching for skin not yet riddled with holes, and drove themselves in once more. The ownerless blades numbered eight, and they stabbed into Rem's body, withdrew, and stabbed into a different spot—again and again without end.
"The Authority of 'Sloth'—the Unseen Hand, this."
Muttered Petelgeuse, looking down at Rem as blood gushed from her.
He raised both hands in front of his face, waved them, then thrust them forward to show that they were empty— "To make the unreachable reachable. To accomplish something while one's body cannot move. To toil diligently while one is steeped in sloth—ah, the slothfulness of mine own being makes my brain tremble with the thought, this!"
All at once the crosses were driven free—and all at once they plunged back into her body.
Rem's body, no longer even capable of letting out a groan, lay face-down against the ground, without the slightest twitch.
Subaru stared at Rem's final moments, dumbstruck, without a voice.
Eyes wide, breathing forgotten, his consciousness was beginning to fade as he faced the unbearable reality of the blue-haired girl's end in the darkness.
But— "Running away is not permitted, this."
Petelgeuse seized a fistful of his bangs and yanked his face upward, cutting off any hope of escape.
As Subaru grimaced in pain and shock, Petelgeuse brought his face close, his bulging gray eyes darting about wildly— "Look. Look at it. Keep looking, this. The girl is dead, this. She died in devotion to love, this. She pressed on through her wounds, fought, defied her terror, charged forward—and in the end accomplished nothing, this."
"Uuh, ah..."
"Look, this. Burn it into your mind, this. The result—of what you did, this."
"—Ah?"
Petelgeuse yanked Subaru's face forward by force, refusing to let his eyes drift from Rem sinking in the sea of blood. He pinned the struggling Subaru to the ground with one hand, clamped his face in place with both, and breathed fetid air onto him.
"Thiss is the result of your actions! You did nothing— you were 'Sloth'! That is why the girl died! You are the one who killed her!"
"……You're the one who—"
"With my hands! With my fingers! With my body! You did it, you did it, you did it, you did it, you did it, you did it, did, did, did…killed her!!"
*Rip*—the sound of something being torn clean off.
Right before his eyes, in the center of Subaru's vision, Rem's body jerked violently.
Her left arm had been ripped away from the shoulder. The severed limb was flung aside like garbage and rolled across the cold cave floor, scraping along the stone.
"Rip, squelch, snap."
"……You—"
Each time Petelgeuse mouthed those cheap little sound effects, Rem's body was destroyed anew. An ear was torn away, the right ankle was twisted off, and the embedded blade shuddered as it widened the wound.
Rem was being ravaged.
Her dignity, right before his eyes, was being violated—easily, joyfully, with impunity.
That scene—*that* sight, so horrifying he could not even bring himself to look away— "——PETELGEUSEEEEE!!"
It was enough to wrench Subaru back to his senses, Subaru, who had been terrified of looking at reality.
He lunged for the throat at his side, straining to sink his teeth into it. But the shackles held him back, and he fell just short. He pitched forward, slamming his face into the ground from sheer momentum. Petelgeuse looked down at him and grinned with amusement.
"Ah, you finally called me by my name! How delightful!"
"I'll kill you, I'll kill you…kill you, kill you, I will kill you, I'll absolutely kill you! I'll kill you! I'll kill you! Kill you, kill you…die, let me kill you, die, die, DIE!"
"To hate someone in order to stay alive! Ah, how beautifully twisted! Myself and all my fingers alike—our diligent labor was well worth the effort!"
"I'll kill you, I'll fucking kill you. Rem—you killed her! Kill, kill, kill! Ahh! Kill! I'll kill you! Die, damn you! Damn you, ahhh, DIE!"
He spat, he cursed, he screamed with all the fury and hatred in his being.
The shackled arms creaked and groaned; the irons biting into his legs drank the blood that welled up and gleamed dully.
Let my arms be torn off. Let my legs be torn off.
If he could shatter these shackles right here, right now, and kill the man in front of him, then that was all that mattered. He hated him—hated him, hated him beyond all endurance. He deserved to die. He must not be allowed to live.
This man had to die—right here, in this very instant, without fail.
"This place has gotten rather dirty as well. Shall we be saying goodbye, then?"
He slapped his knees, and Petelgeuse abruptly cut off his mad laughter, letting out a breath.
Paying no mind to Subaru, whose body shook violently with emotion, he beckoned the surviving believers and gathered them together— "We shall be abandoning this place! It's faster than cleaning up. The trial is scheduled for the day after tomorrow, and the location will be around where the right index finger is lurking. You who remain are to carry out your duties as the left hand. However, when all five fingers gather, we divide the numbers equally—is that understood?"
"Die! Go ahead and die! Die, die, diiiiie!"
Rapidly issuing his instructions, Petelgeuse clapped his hands. At that signal, the believers dissolved into shadows, returning to the dim darkness of the cavern.
And so, through the cavern whose number of survivors had been drastically reduced, Petelgeuse walked at a leisurely pace.
His tall boot heels echoed through the cavern, and at that receding sound, Subaru hurled blood-speckled screams— "Wait, you bastard! I'll kill you! I'll kill you! Die right there! Die now! Hurry up and die! Die! Die! Diiiie!!"
"Oh my, I nearly forgot."
He stopped, and with a carefree air, Petelgeuse turned around.
At Subaru, who glared up at him from below with all the hatred in his heart, Petelgeuse gave a single nod and— "I truly do not understand your position. So I thought we might judge based on whether the Gospel is brought to you or not."
Raising a finger, Petelgeuse tilted his head ninety degrees and grinned grimly— "If you are left behind with your hands and feet bound, all that awaits you is death. However, if by some chance the Gospel were to be brought to you in this place, you would be saved."
"————"
"If you are saved, then you are a fellow believer. If not, then you are nothing more than a passerby. So, how does that sound?"
As though declaring it a brilliant idea, Petelgeuse laughed cheerfully and, this time for certain, turned his back on Subaru. At the receding figure, Subaru continued to hurl curses—through words, through sheer will, pouring out every last drop of hatred in his desire to kill Petelgeuse.
Feeling none of their effects in his stride, Petelgeuse headed for the exit.
And halfway there, he stopped beside Rem's mutilated corpse and— "Ah yes, that's right, that's right. You tried very hard."
Murmuring those words, he straightened his spine before Rem's corpse and made a motion as though drawing a cross— "You gave your life for love, you fought with everything you had. And yet you fell short, you broke, love was left with nowhere to go, and your wish drifted through the void, unfulfilled."
His tone, which had seemed almost like praise, suddenly shifted—his words now spoke of the futility of her actions amounting to nothing, and hunching forward, Petelgeuse let a sneer spread across his lips— "Ah, you... you were 'Sloth.'"
In the most despicable manner imaginable, he degraded the very existence of a single young girl named Rem.
"——!!!"
Roaring, screaming—it echoed through the cave.
A rage that choked the throat, a fury beyond words, a grief that could draw tears of blood—all of it forced
Hearing it, Petelgeuse grinned as though receiving the highest praise.
Heh-heh, heh-heh.
His steps did not halt.
There was no stopping his advance, let alone putting an end to him.
Heh-heh, heh-heh—the laughter echoed on and on, endlessly.
Heh-heh, heh-heh.
Heh-heh, heh-heh.
——Heh-heh, heh-heh, heh-heh-heh-heh-heh-heh-heh-heh-heh-heh-heh-heh-heh.