When he came to, the first thing Subaru noticed was the unbearable agony coursing through his body.
The pain was especially severe from the neck up, radiating across his face. His left cheek, around his right eye, his back teeth and front teeth, his left ear—the list of aching wounds went on and on.
Probing his mouth with his tongue, Subaru registered that he was missing two back teeth, one front tooth, and a canine. Then he opened his eyes and took in his surroundings, understanding that his right eye was swollen shut.
"Hhh…aa…"
The blood pooling in his mouth and the jarring gaps where his teeth should have been coalesced into a mangled voice.
Each breath sent a cold sting through the nerves of his remaining teeth. Even breathing through his nose was out of the question—dried blood blocked that passage too. Gasping, he spat out the blood filling his mouth.
"Could it be… I didn't die?"
Dragging his wrecked body along, Subaru was forced to confront the reality that he had somehow survived that hopeless, near-death situation.
Propping himself up on half his vision, he took in the dim corridor where he lay sprawled. There was no sign of anyone. He replayed the exchange just before he'd lost consciousness.
"Elza…"
She was gone.
At the very least, she wasn't anywhere within his field of view.
She was a woman whose trade was lurking in darkness. It was possible she was right there in his line of sight using some technique to evade detection—but there was no reason for her to do so.
Elza was gone. She had left. And she had done so without killing him.
"What was the point of that… no, more than that…"
Every time he moved his mouth, it bled, and he irritably spat it out before shaking his head. He tried moving his limbs one by one, taking stock of what hurt and what was completely non-functional, when he noticed something.
—That cradled in his arms, there was a faintly breathing, warm presence.
"…
The beloved girl with blue hair. The girl who kept sleeping, who kept Subaru going.
Rem was quietly keeping time with a pulse in Subaru's arms. Shallow, rhythmic breathing, skin that was unmistakably warm with blood flowing through it—the rhythm of life, proof that it continued.
"————"
Without thinking, he tightened the arms holding her, overcome with emotion.
He took advantage of the fact she wouldn't react, embracing her small body greedily, drinking in its warmth. As if trying to feel through her skin the proof that she was alive.
"Why… why did she leave without killing either of me or Rem…"
Holding Rem's body, Subaru muttered over the inexplicability of Elza's actions.
She had killed Petra, killed Frederica, and even caused
It was true that just before losing consciousness, Subaru had done something like begging for Rem's life. Elza's response could have been interpreted as agreement, but could she really have honored it so faithfully?
There was no way to understand the thought process of the "Bowel Hunter," a person with a completely fractured psyche. But maybe the reason Rem survived really was something as simple as that.
"Then… why did I…?"
He had been sure he would die.
At the very least, Elza had swung her knife at Subaru with clear intent to harm. Every shattered bone, every cut in his skin and muscle screamed that truth to him through pain.
And yet—what was the reason Elza had let Subaru live?
"For now, let's just…"
Shaking his head—it was pointless to try to figure it out—Subaru forced his battered body to lift Rem into his arms.
Holding Rem's light frame against his chest, he looked toward the far end of the corridor, where Frederica's corpse still lay abandoned, and decided what had to be done.
—First, he had to see to the burial of Frederica and Petra.
"If I've already written this world off as one that's ending, then none of this really means anything…"
A self-deprecating murmur escaped his lips—sentimental, irrational, and wretchedly vain.
Subaru had already decided to reset this world by paying for it with his own death.
He had lost too much. He had gained things as well, but not a single one of those gains had allowed him to protect what mattered. He had lost as much as before, if not more. He no longer had the courage to live on in this world where he had lost so much.
If his own life could be the price to reclaim it all, there was nothing to hesitate over.
This world was one that was going to end.
Petra's death, Frederica's death, Beatrice's death—all of it could be redone.
The promise he made to Petra, the apology he owed Frederica for doubting her, the answer he owed to Beatrice's sorrow—all of it could be delivered in the next world.
If he could accept it all that cleanly, then mourning the dead truly served no purpose.
Sentiment left behind in a world destined to vanish—if only Subaru himself could endure it, it would fade from every memory and leave nothing behind.
—If he could accept it that completely, then
"But resolve, determination, ability… honestly, no matter how far I go, I'm never enough. Why am I so damn weak? Hey, Rem."
No answer came from the girl in his arms.
The only place Subaru could vomit up his weakness, the only place he could show how frail he was, was here—in front of this sleeping girl. Only here.
※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ —It was only a few minutes after Subaru had resolved to bury Petra and the others at the manor that he found it.
"What the hell is this?"
The sight of the object sitting before him drew a dumbfounded sound from his throat.
But no one could blame him for that reaction. The object before Subaru's eyes was so thoroughly baffling that he couldn't even begin to guess what it was.
A lump of meat with a pinkish hue—that was probably the closest description.
It was roughly spherical but misshapen, like a mud ball a child had made. That alone would have conveyed enough strangeness, but there was something else that left Subaru even more bewildered.
"It's huge…"
Purely and simply, the lump of meat was far too enormous.
It was tall enough to look up at, and its dense, packed solidity was obvious at a glance. The coloring and texture resembled the fresh pork or poultry you'd see at a butcher's counter. Though Subaru didn't have the courage to touch it and verify.
There were roughly twelve of these enormous lumps of meat, scattered here and there across his field of vision. They were all roughly the same size, arranged almost deliberately.
"What… is this?"
Unable to arrive at an answer, Subaru repeated the same question several times over.
Then he turned his gaze outward.
"Where did everyone in the village go?"
Standing in the center of an deserted
※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ —Subaru had come down to Arlam Village to borrow help for burying Petra and Frederica, and above all to inform Petra's family of her death.
He had steeled himself for punches. He had steeled himself for verbal abuse.
It was the same kind of sentimentality he'd felt at the manor. Here too, he could have avoided the pain—hidden Petra's death, kept it from the villagers, and reset the world.
If he'd done that, he could have buried the responsibility for Petra's death deep inside his own heart and been saved by fear of guilt alone.
But when he considered whether he could forgive himself for doing that, the answer was no.
"I suppose in the end this is just self-indulgence…"
He had planned to inform Petra's family, then carry out the burial of the two of them.
As for Beatrice—he didn't know what to do. A spirit left no corpse. That clean, almost refreshing manner of disappearing had paradoxically robbed Subaru of any real sense of her death.
Perhaps—that was it. He was indulging in a kind of wishful thinking.
Harboring these thoughts that were neither optimistic nor pessimistic, Subaru descended into Arlam Village.
He brought the sleeping Rem along with him, intending to ask someone to watch over her during the burial.
And when Subaru arrived and began searching for villagers, walking around the village, what he stumbled upon were those lumps of meat.
"…No one's here."
Setting Rem down temporarily on the eaves of a farmhouse, Subaru raced through the entire village and reached his conclusion.
Sweat running down his forehead had dissolved the dried blood, staining his face red—Subaru was a terrible sight. If any villager saw him now, a scream of horror would be the appropriate first response.
But there was no one around to scream, and Subaru sat down beside the sleeping Rem, at a total loss.
—When Elza had vanished from the manor, he hadn't been able to suppress the thought that maybe…
In the capital, Elza had immediately decided to eliminate everyone connected to the matter. What if she wasn't satisfied with just the manor and had descended on Arlam Village as well, that murderous blade in hand?
Rationalizing with various excuses, that anxiety had been part of why Subaru had come down here. But the reception awaiting him was something he'd never predicted, something beyond anything he'd imagined.
Scattered lumps of meat and missing villagers.
—Naturally, a horrible image surfaced in his mind, but Subaru instinctively ignored it.
"If nobody's here, then there's nothing for me to do. …I need to bury the two of them quickly."
Muttering something that sounded like an excuse, Subaru lifted Rem into his arms and left the village.
The motionless, enormous lumps of meat remained where they were. He felt no guilt about leaving them behind. He didn't even want to留 them in the corner of his memory.
His head was about to burst.
※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ The burial of Petra and Frederica was, surprisingly, completed without much difficulty.
He arranged the features of the dead, wiping the blood from their skin and faces with clean cloth. He felt terrible about it, but he changed their clothes. Naturally, no improper thoughts arose.
More than anything, when he threaded the sleeves of clothing onto their cold, hardened bodies, his heart was seized by a strange emotion—the desire to cry, yet the depths of his eyes growing dry.
"…Rest easy, at least."
From atop the mounds of earth he'd placed over them, Subaru murmured a prayer for their peace.
He did not know the proper rites for praying in this world. Nor did he know how the dead were sent off in his original world. All of his relatives had been alive and well—Subaru had never attended anyone's funeral, and as a typical Japanese non-religious person, he had never given those customs a second thought.
Now, he regretted that.
—Not knowing the proper words or rites to send them off burned with a quiet, piercing shame.
"Sorry to have dragged you into this too. Thanks for helping."
When Subaru reached out, the pitch-black earth dragon pressed her snout to his fingers.
Her limbs muddy from the excavated soil, she pressed close as if worried about him—
Subaru had found her in the stables, where she'd been spared the tragedy, and enlisted her help for the burial. She quickly understood Subaru's clumsy plea, and while he dug with an unfamiliar tool, repeatedly tearing the skin of his palms, she used her powerful legs to excavate the larger hole for Frederica.
Mud-caked though her legs were, the legs that could stride across the earth like the wind, the pitch-black dragon was still noble and beautiful. Subaru felt a renewed surge of gratitude for her presence.
He had dug Petra's grave himself. She was small, but even so, he had dug it wide enough that she wouldn't be cramped—tearing open his palms over and over with the unfamiliar tool.
He covered her with earth, watched until her form disappeared completely, and finally the tears he could no longer hold back traced lines down his cheeks. But he didn't bother wiping them until they dried.
He sent Frederica off the same way, fashioned a simple marker, and with that the burial was done.
Completing one task should have lifted a weight from his shoulders. Instead, the burden only grew heavier.
"…There's no point staying here."
He murmured it softly.
The irretrievable tragedy at the manor had already run its course.
He seared the entire sequence of events into his memory. The grief of sending these two off now—he would never forget it, burning it deep and hard into his soul.
And the next time around, he would wipe clean this regret he had carved into his spirit. Only when he accomplished that could he truly take responsibility for their "deaths."
"Once I've confirmed what needs confirming, I'll head back to the '
The sunlight was slowly beginning to sink.
If Subaru's understanding was correct, the darkening world was approaching the night of the third day. Confirm what needed confirming, leave the manor by tomorrow morning, and he could return to the "Sanctuary" before nightfall on the fourth day.
One and a half days of leeway before the sixth and final day of his的命运. And this would also be Subaru's first experience leaving the "Sanctuary" and then returning to it.
He had to protect the manor and break through the "Sanctuary."
These two hurdles—the only ones he'd decided he absolutely had to overcome—his experience from clearing them before had to be kept sharp for the next attempt.
What changes might the "Sanctuary" undergo while Subaru was away?
Most likely, it would follow the same course as when Subaru had been struck down by Garfiel and locked up. If that was the case, then on the night of the fifth day, Otto and
"I need to get back before that happens…"
Garfiel was also a worry.
Subaru had used a desperate measure—using Ryuzu as a shield—to prevent Garfiel from pursuing him. He could only imagine how much that had enraged the young man, knowing his own actions had crossed a line.
And then there was the matter of Frederica's death to convey to Garfiel, her own brother. Suspecting her of being a traitor and failing to take measures to help her—that had been Subaru's blunder.
He would have to accept the full force of Garfiel's fury.
"Let's head back to the 'Sanctuary.' …I want to see
Thinking of the heavy events piling up, Subaru let out his true feelings in a daze.
It was close to a whimper.
But right now, he simply wanted to be honest about it.
He wanted to see Emilia's face. He wanted to touch her.
His heart was on the verge of breaking, and he wanted to mend it by feeling the reality of Emilia's presence.
He was just that exhausted.
※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ —Subaru first noticed something was wrong when he entered the forest near the "Sanctuary."
Riding double on Patrasche, with the sleeping Rem cradled against his chest. The posture was precarious, threatening to throw off his balance, but fortunately Rem didn't stir an inch, and Patrasche perfectly compensated for her master's inadequacies, allowing them to make steady progress.
As expected, they couldn't run flat-out the way they had returning to the manor. The trip back took roughly seventeen hours, and the night of the fourth day was already setting in.
The one and a half days he'd planned to spend in the "Sanctuary" could be considered down to just one day now.
He needed to use his time wisely. He didn't blame Patrasche in the least.
But the miscalculation for Subaru, who had been traveling so cautiously, was this— "This really isn't a joke… What the hell happened here…!"
Halfway along the path to the "Sanctuary," through the forest where the barrier existed, a piercing cold had begun to engulf the world.
Frost clung to the green leaves, and the bark of the trees had taken on a faint white glaze of ice. Water in the hollows of the ground had frozen over, creating patches of black ice here and there.
The abnormal drop in temperature—cold on par with deep winter or worse—made Subaru tighten his hold on Rem. He looked around, white breath streaming from his lips.
The forest was, as always, thin on signs of life, but even the vitality of the trees seemed to be fading in the face of this cold. The fact that the forest had done nothing to prepare for this extreme freeze was perhaps the clearest evidence that this was anything but a natural phenomenon.
"Cold enough to turn everything white in front of my eyes… I'm getting nothing but bad feelings. Patrasche."
"————"
"Hey, Patrasche?"
Urged on by the unpleasant premonition swelling in his chest, Subaru tried to urge Patrasche forward, but received no response from the dragon herself.
Frowning, he looked down at his companion, and saw that the pitch-black dragon had stopped in her tracks, breathing in ragged, agonized gasps.
"Patrasche!"
Panicked, Subaru pulled on the reins to halt her, slid off her back, and reached for her neck. The surface of her neck had the texture of rock, and it felt roughly as it usually did—but it was terrifyingly cold. And Subaru realized.
"Could it be that earth dragons are vulnerable to cold…? She looks reptilian, so what do they do in winter?"
Many reptiles like lizards and snakes hibernated during the winter to survive the cold. Given the many similarities in appearance, there was a possibility that Patrasche, an earth dragon, shared the same nature.
If that was the case, then Patrasche's march through this cold was essentially suicide.
Because if Subaru's guess was right, the closer you got to the center of the "Sanctuary," the more severe this cold would become.
"I can't take you along with me… At this rate, I'm worried about the earth dragons still back at the Sanctuary too."
He stroked Patrasche's body as it trembled in small shivers. It probably did nothing to ease her distress, but Patrasche pressed close to his palm as if clinging to it.
Going to the "Sanctuary" without her meant losing even more time—but if they kept going together, she would collapse before they got there.
"Patrasche. I'm sorry, but can you wait outside the forest… no, go back to the manor?"
At Subaru's decision and instruction, Patrasche let out a sorrowful snort.
But she was intelligent enough to understand Subaru's reasoning, her own physical condition, and the state of the forest ahead. After Subaru coaxed her gently, repeating himself several times, she finally bowed her head in apparent resignation.
Subaru stroked that head firmly, then pulled clothing and simple provisions from the load Patrasche had been carrying, layered on everything he could to brace against the cold. He dressed Rem in a jacket as well, strapped the remaining luggage to her body, and lifted her up.
"The way to the 'Sanctuary' is straight ahead."
"————"
"Don't give me that worried look. I'm more worried about you. You were already pushed hard, and I didn't even notice until it came to this. I'm sorry—I really am a thoughtless bastard."
At Subaru's bowed head, Patrasche let out a small snort as if to say there was no need for that. Then she turned and began walking toward the edge of the forest, and Subaru watched until she disappeared from sight.
She never once looked back along the way. There was a noble pride in her refusal to show attachment, and a kindness in sparing Subaru any sense of burden.
Subaru truly thought he'd been given an unfairly wonderful companion.
"Patrasche can make it out of the forest safely. …Rather than worrying about her, I've got far bigger things to worry about over here. Dammit."
He adjusted Rem in his arms and pressed forward, his footsteps crunching through the frost-rimed ground.
Biting cold assailed him—white breath, teeth threatening to chatter—but he pushed onward, ever onward, toward the "Sanctuary."
"What happened, Emilia…"
He called out the name of the girl who must be at the heart of this unnatural winter.
※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ Forcing his frozen feet forward, moving lips he'd forgotten how to control, shallow breaths repeated in ragged succession. He pried open eyelashes gummed shut, fighting to keep his vision clear through the white haze, and pressed on through the forest.
—The deep freeze enveloping the "Sanctuary" far exceeded even Subaru's lukewarm expectations.
With every step deeper, it felt as though the temperature dropped further.
His skin had long since gone numb. The only things keeping Subaru's body upright were a ghostly sense of mission, the will to keep moving forward, and— "————"
—the steady presence of Rem in his arms, still rhythmically sustaining her vital signs at a constant rate, unaffected by the environment outside.
He should have been going in a straight line, straight toward the "Sanctuary."
He couldn't verify with his own eyes whether his footing was correct. All he could do was trust that he was on the right path by the intensifying cold.
Snow had piled up to his shins, and the forest had at some point transformed entirely into a winter landscape.
The power to alter the very fabric of the world. He knew this power.
"————"
His lips trembled as he gasped for breath. The skin of his upper and lower lips had stuck together; peeling them apart sent a sharp sting and a trickle of blood. He touched it with the tip of his tongue, and the faint warmth confirmed that his body had not yet frozen solid from the core.
He could still go. He could still do it.
Nothing had been confirmed yet. If he stopped here, in a place like this, then everything he had sacrificed would have been for nothing.
So— "…Ah."
Suddenly, Subaru noticed something cutting across his white field of vision and stopped.
He rubbed at his half-closed eyelids and forced them open, squinting at the foreign shape intruding on his sight. Gradually it resolved into a human form, and then—into someone he recognized.
"Ryuzu… san?"
"————"
At Subaru's call, the girl responded only with a silent gaze.
Looking at that demeanor, Subaru immediately grasped that the girl was not "Ryuzu," but a copy of "Ryuzu Meier."
And at the same time—if she was a copy, that meant the authority to command her reverted to Subaru upon his return to the "Sanctuary."
"Just the person I need… Please. Take me to the 'Sanctuary'…"
"I'm afraid that request is one I can't grant!"
Stammering out white puffs of breath, Subaru called out to the copy of the girl. But a voice from above cut across his words.
He looked up. The instant he did, something plummeted onto the snowfield beside the girl and landed with a heavy crunch, snow spraying outward. There stood a young man.
Short golden hair, sharp eyes, and the whole of his body radiating hostility so intense it looked as though he might gun Subaru down on the spot.
"Garfiel."
"Well, well. What face did you come crawling back with? Can't believe you actually had the nerve to show up again. 'A liar's bow is always a showy one,' they say."
His incomprehensible turns of phrase were alive and well as Garfiel bared his teeth at Subaru.
He glared down with vexed contempt at the panting Subaru, then his eyes fell on the figure Subaru cradled in his arms, and his eyes flew wide open in shock.
"Hah…? Why the hell are you carrying Ram— no, wait, that ain't Ram. Huh? What's the deal here? Who the hell is that woman…?"
"Hard to explain, but whether it'll make sense is anyone's guess. …It's Rem. Ram's genuine, real little sister."
"Ain't never heard anything about Ram having a sister, but… it's hard enough to call that a outright lie. Dammit."
The spirit draining slightly from the young man who was facing a girl with the face of his beloved was enough for Subaru to gauge that Garfiel was still capable of reason—at least enough not to strike immediately. He shelved the decision of whether to fight back or flee for later.
Then Subaru glanced at the copy standing quietly at Garfiel's side.
"What do you mean she won't listen to me?"
"Simple enough, ain't it? After you hightailed it out of the 'Sanctuary,' I went into the Trial chamber myself. Overwrote her command authority, took it back, is all. Pain in the ass having to go through all that again, though."
"Can command authority really transfer that easily?"
"The gist is touching that thing, right? You went through the same thing yourself."
"That thing" Garfiel was pointing to had to be the crystal where Ryuzu Meier's original body was sealed. If touching it was the condition for transferring command authority, then it was only natural that it had returned from Subaru to him.
In any case, "Coming all the way out to welcome me—how thoughtful."
"Ain't planning to humor whatever garbage comes out of your mouth. Just look at the situation we're in now and it's obvious we're long past the point of having a friendly chat, got it?"
"Yeah. …Then let me get straight to the point."
Nodding at Garfiel's aggressive stance, Subaru shook his head slightly, drew a breath, and spoke.
"Is this Emilia's doing?"
"That I don't know either. 'Cause she ain't come out of the Tomb."
"She hasn't come out of the Tomb?"
Subaru furrowed his brow at the unexpected reply. Garfiel clicked his tongue irritably at the reaction, then kicked up a dramatic spray of snow at his feet.
"Ever since the day you vanished, half that damn girl's been acting strange. Seemed fine at first, then she shut herself inside the Tomb and look what happened. Before you knew it, the whole 'Sanctuary' was wrapped in ice. …Same damn thing as the
"You know about Emilia's hometown…?!"
"You think I wasn't paying attention? Roswaal may be a bastard, but he does answer the important questions. That's exactly why I don't trust that Emilia person of his."
He spat those words out coldly, then stepped closer to Subaru, whose expression had hardened. Caught off guard by the movement, Subaru couldn't react, and stood helpless before Garfiel.
"That pathetic look on your face."
"Wha—!?"
A palm struck his chest, and Subaru toppled clumsily backward.
He tried to shield Rem in his arms, but his hand grasped empty air. Because— "Hey— Rem—!!"
"Want me to hand her back? C'mon, c'mon. Pretty damn obsessed, aren't you? I thought the girl you were after was Emilia?"
A direct hit to the sorest spot. Garfiel snorted.
In his arms was Rem, the very girl Subaru had been holding just moments ago.
Subaru desperately tried to move his frozen body, reaching for Garfiel, but the other man had already leaped back out of reach.
"What are you planning to do with Rem—?!"
"Relax, I ain't gonna hurt her. That'd be out of line, and I've got standards. Things that don't make sense just rub me the wrong way."
Garfiel looked down at Rem, and in his eyes there was certainly no intent to harm.
At the very least, Garfiel's nature was not so twisted that he would hurt a girl who wore the face of the one he loved.
Opening his mouth to ask why, then, Subaru was preempted by Garfiel's words.
"Get into the Tomb. …And drag out that half-devil inside."