Chapter 4, Part 71: "Ending List"

Shallow and sharp, the blade had sliced through skin and cut in—and from that wound, life bled away.

The spraying crimson spattered across the green meadow, and before the violet-haired young man looking down, he could see Subaru's body convulsing reflexively.

Eyes rolled back, foam spilling from the corners of his mouth, the neck coughed up a tremendous amount of blood. Gradually the force of the bleeding subsided, and just as a sound like air escaping could be heard— 『——』

Now, Subaru understood with perfect clarity: this was the self that had lost its life.

There was no shared sensation between his consciousness-only self and his past self. And yet, the raw, visceral feeling of a throat being slashed open continued to echo as a lingering reverberation that never faded, even for Subaru's consciousness—his soul alone.

"Emilia-sama, please… wipe his face. Subaru's face."

"——"

"He would want you to do it, not me. At least… with your own hands."

Wiping the blood from his knight's sword and sheathing it, Julius addressed the shell-shocked Emilia.

Slumped on the ground at Subaru's feet, the silver-haired girl had collapsed to her knees. The expression had drained from her violet eyes—she could not accept reality—and the tear tracks glistening on her cheeks remained unwiped, shimmering in the light.

At the sight of Emilia like that, Subaru's nonexistent chest was pierced by a sharp pain he had lost count of how many times he'd felt. Emilia's grief-stricken face was the punishment for all the times Subaru had looked away, and it clung to him, baring its fangs, scraping away every trace of the unfeeling way he had lived until now.

"S…Subaru…"

With a sluggish, crawling motion, she reached her hand toward Subaru's face. Emilia's palm gently wiped the face soiled with blood and vomit. Barehanded, heedless of the filth, she refused to let anyone else be the one to see Subaru's anguish-twisted expression—and when she had wiped the blood away, Emilia: "Why…? Why did Subaru… do something like this…"

A question mark. A hollow, empty question tossed at someone who would never answer.

She had no ears to hear, no mouth to respond, no function left in anything.

In Subaru's corpse, Emilia's words did not reach a single thing anymore.

『——』

Looking down at that scene, Subaru recalled which moment from the past this particular scene came from.

It was the aftermath of his second battle against Petelgeuse—when he had been unable to break free of the Archbishop's possession, and the madman had been destroyed along with Subaru's own body.

Hit by Felix's magic, which had thrown the mana circulation inside his body into chaos, the corpse had taken damage across countless capillaries and internal organs—to put it mildly, it was not a pretty sight. Blister-like rashes dotted the visible skin, and the half-open eyes had burst blood vessels, staining them entirely red.

Before being wiped, the lower half of his face had been covered in nosebleed. Without Julius's mercy killing, the death mask would have been far more wretched.

But even if the dead face had been a pretty one, it would not have saved the hearts of those left behind. Especially the people who had survived the battle against the White Whale, finished the final confrontation against Sloth, and were now vowing their triumphant return to the capital—their dejection, their expressions of bitter regret, were all heartrending to behold.

"Subaru-dono… I am truly… sorry…"

Dropping to his knees and bowing his head before the dead Subaru was Wilhelm.

Having cut down every last Witch Cultist under Petelgeuse, Wilhelm now wore a face of bitter resignation over the outcome of the battle, gazing downward. The old knights of the subjugation force shared his grief—some lamenting this cruel twist of fate, others hammering their fists into the ground. Some were even weeping from the sheer force of their emotion.

Subaru was left speechless at the sight of his death being mourned this deeply.

Perhaps that was because being shown the aftermath of his death—the thing he had never allowed himself to acknowledge—brought a crushing weight of pressure to his heart, far exceeding anything else.

"Subaru… why did you… go this far for me…? Please, why?"

Cradling the cheek of the silent Subaru, Emilia continued her unanswered calls.

Her grief-stricken figure made Subaru realize something even more belatedly.

In this world, Subaru had never returned an answer to Emilia's question.

He had never conveyed his true feelings in response to the question she had posed back at the capital—*"Why do you help me?"* And so Emilia did not know the reason for Subaru's devotion.

That—while decisively different from the scene shown before—was yet another consequence of Subaru's sins, sins that could never be undone.

"The Witch Cult, which tormented the world for so long—its vanguard, Sloth, has been defeated. That is an enormous achievement for the world. —However…"

Gazing down at Subaru's corpse, Julius tapped the pommel of his sheathed sword with his fingertip. Again and again, the rhythm repeated, gradually growing faster— "Not all of the sacrifices made for that can be forgiven. —I wanted to have more conversations with you. Natsuki Subaru."

With a pained murmur, Julius turned his face away from Subaru's death mask.

Tilting his gaze to the sky, sorrow dwelling in his eyes, the knight whispered: "I wanted to call you… my friend."

Julius's faint, powerless whisper brought an end to the world of the meadow.

※※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ Another blackout, and then—return. Subaru's body jolted as he woke with a start.

"—gh—ha! Aaah… hah… aah!?"

Thrashing about, he found himself on a hard, cold floor.

The smell of moss invaded his nostrils as he rolled across the ground, throwing himself into the empty act of thrashing in a desperate attempt to escape the storm of emotion building inside him.

He must not think about what was happening.

Rolling, rolling, punishing his inner ear, straining his lungs until breathing became a gasping fight—reducing even the slightest sliver of consciousness that could be allocated to thought, sinking into the unconscious however much he could.

"—uugh!"

But even this broken, inhuman way of coping fell apart the moment he slammed into a wall and bounced back.

The pain transmitted from his struck back, the sensation of blood seeping into his abraded forehead. Pressing his face to the floor, gasping with ragged breath, tears had already begun spilling from the corners of Subaru's eyes.

—Pathetic. Meaningless. Beyond saving.

How many times, how many more times, would Natsuki Subaru be beaten down by his own weakness?

What did he have to do to obtain a heart of steel—one that would never waver, never break, no matter what crisis struck or what suffering hammered him?

So weak, so fragile—that was why Subaru had always been— "So this is the bill… for looking the other way… for pretending I didn't see…?"

It wasn't as though the thought had never occurred to him.

At the edges of his consciousness, Subaru had, more than once, allowed the possibility to surface.

And yet it had never risen above the periphery—because on an unconscious level, he had refused to examine it, refused to contemplate it.

That Subaru, who 'Returned by Death,' might have to face a world that existed *after* death—once he allowed himself to think about that possibility, Subaru's entire way of fighting would crumble from the ground up.

Everything he had tried to save would leave Natsuki Subaru behind.

No—it was Natsuki Subaru who had been leaving things behind. By embracing 'death' in such a pathetic, selfish way, Subaru had abandoned the world and fled alone into a new one.

If the world abandoned by Natsuki Subaru's reckless judgment still continued to exist, then the scene he had just been shown was precisely that world.

The scene beyond the hell unleashed by Subaru's death.

"No… way…"

His consciousness suddenly began to grow hazy and distant once more.

Not drowsiness—a forced dissociation from reality, as though his awareness was rapidly whitening over.

*'Behold the impossible present.'* By his ear, once again, a voice he could not identify whispered.

As his consciousness blurred further, he tried to trace the voice's owner—and realized.

—It was unmistakably his own voice.

※※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ Before a corpse whose skull had been shattered, a girl knelt.

Fallen from a great height, the human body of flesh had not withstood the impact and had burst apart. Black hair had spilled its contents across the ground, blooming in a vivid, blood-red flower of death.

『——』

Once again, the sensation of switching consciousness came—Subaru was no longer surprised by it.

After the forced shift, it was expected that this kind of phenomenon would follow.

If there was anything he hadn't expected, it was only the specific scene that would unfold before his awakened consciousness— "Right to the very end, spouting nonsense… I've had enough…"

Standing beside Subaru's body, which had splattered across the ground in the shape of a kanji character, the pink-haired girl spoke as though spitting the words out—Ram.

Her usually impeccable grooming was in disarray. Snags and tears hung from the edges of her uniform. On her profile, carefully composed into its usual blank mask, complex emotions and raw anger seeped through.

It was less a face mourning Subaru's death—more a face burning with fury at the result.

Ram roughly scratched her own head, then turned around.

"Is this all part of your plan as well, Beatrice-sama? Is obstructing Ram's path truly your—"

"——"

Ram's expression, which had been launching accusations at full speed, froze. Her words cut off.

Ram's pale-crimson eyes found Beatrice, who had dropped to her knees just short of Subaru's corpse. The girl sat directly on the ground, heedless of her dress hems getting soiled—and at the sight of Beatrice in that state, Ram's eyes wavered with shock.

"Beatrice-sama…"

"…Why?"

A quiet murmur.

Without so much as acknowledging Ram's presence, Beatrice stared fixedly at the dead Subaru.

From the edges of her blue eyes, tears traced paths downward. Subaru could see it even from where he was.

—Beatrice was crying.

Before Subaru's 'death.' That fact drove a blade of guilt deep into Subaru's heart.

The pain of having his heart torn open, a heat spreading behind nonexistent eyes—he wanted, right now, to rush to that small, childish body and say something, anything.

But he had no legs left to do it with. No arms. No mouth. Nothing at all.

"That you're not… that person… I know that… but…"

Beatrice's face had gone expressionless, her words falling like a sleepwalker's murmur as the drops of tears continued to fall.

At the sight of her in such a state, Ram seemed to give up on saying anything more to Beatrice. She let out a sigh and cast a look of contempt at Subaru's corpse, whose neck bent in an impossible direction.

"The things you love most… truly, there is no saving you, is there."

※※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ *'Behold the impossible present.'* ※※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ A white, misty chill had seized the world—an air so cold it seemed to freeze the very atmosphere itself.

The frozen forest cracked and shattered with every gust of wind. The landscape, forcibly drained of its mana, could not maintain its existence and crumbled to dust.

Trees, towns, living creatures, the world itself—blown into white crystals by the howling wind, scattering into fragments, as a whitening end slowly encroached upon everything.

『——』

This time, what lay before Subaru's eyes was the end of the world.

The world was meeting its cold, merciful end—just as consciousness whitens to nothing.

And yet— "So it is you after all."

A deep voice, one that could make the atmosphere itself resonate, rumbled with a note of acceptance.

Immediately after, a tremor shook the earth, and the impact of a titanic body falling transformed the scenery entirely. Trees were mowed down, and the fallen trees crumbled like frost, chain-reacting until an entire stretch of forest lay flattened.

In the leveled, frozen woodland—the cause of all this destruction was a four-legged beast of towering stature, a feline-looking creature with grey fur.

The beast's fangs, too large to fit in its mouth, had been snapped midway, and through the gaps of its sword-like teeth, it exhaled white breath as it fixed its blazing golden eyes straight ahead—even lying on its side.

And then, trembling as though the whole of its body were convulsing— "How vexing… knowing this would happen, yet being unable to change it."

"I understand, roughly, what has transpired. And that is precisely why I find it regrettable."

An intelligent voice—calm, not even pride in defeat, simply accepting the facts before it—was answered by a crystalline, beautiful voice.

In this world of endings, a voice that did not lack so much as a fragment of its vital strength. Standing tall, red hair swaying in the white wind, was a young man with blue eyes.

"Emilia-sama and Subaru… they are nowhere to be found anymore?"

"Ria is asleep—for eternity. A world without her… holds no value. This body that could not protect her, and that man—they are equally guilty—"

"And so, for that reason, you would destroy the world?"

"You knew you would be stopped. But this is my oath."

From the scabbard engraved with dragon claws, a gleam of steel was drawn and leveled at the beast's nose—the true form of Puck, who stood before him. Gripping the sword, the 'Sword Saint' Reinhard quietly shook his head.

In his blue eyes, he carried deep sorrow and compassion.

"I understand your grief. I share the same feeling. But that does not give you the right to lash out blindly with that grief. Your actions, the result of that oath—they will bring upheaval to the world. —I cannot permit that."

"Because it's not… the right thing to do?"

"Correct. Because it is not right. —I am the standard of righteousness. A sword set to correct wrongs. And so, with your permission, I will cut you down here. Great Spirit."

Despite the overwhelming difference in mass, which side held the advantage was clear to anyone's eyes.

Even in his true form, Puck could not so much as disturb Reinhard's composed expression—he was reduced to gasping for air. If the sword tip that had been thrust at him so much as flickered with silver light, that alone would have been enough for Reinhard's blade to cleave even a spirit's existence in two.

The ferocity of the sword pressure that erupted made that abundantly clear to all.

"—Kuf."

Therefore, at the sudden sound that echoed out, Reinhard furrowed his brow.

Even the consciousness-only Subaru colored the depths of his limited emotions with a question mark.

He could not tell what that brief, broken sound had been.

Because he could never have imagined he had heard what he thought he'd heard.

"Kuf… kufku… haha, fuhaha!"

"What… is so funny?"

With a trembling throat, on the verge of death, Puck's face twisted into a laugh.

Life and death held in another's grasp, his actions having been thwarted—and yet Puck was laughing. Unable to understand the Great Spirit's true intent, Reinhard posed the question.

But Puck seemed to find Reinhard's response only made things funnier— "What's so funny? Of course it's funny. It's hilarious. Reinhard, you… no, *you* understand nothing."

"……"

"I remember now. What I should have been. It's a belated understanding. And the fact that *you* still don't get it—that's what's so impossibly amusing."

The words were utterly unlike Puck—especially the pitch, different from his usual form.

For Subaru, who had interacted with the spirit known as Puck more than a few times, this was the first time he had ever seen Puck address someone with such malice in his voice.

Even when he had been consumed by hatred toward Subaru and Petelgeuse after Emilia's death—back then, Puck had still been Puck.

But now, the way he mocked Reinhard felt like a completely different entity from every Puck Subaru had known before— "…I will not allow any further harm. If you must resent someone, resent me."

"I won't resent you, Reinhard. You're a hero. A hero has a role, an action that only a hero can take. I won't resent you for adhering to that."

"——"

"You are a hero, Reinhard. —A hero who can be nothing else."

At the very end—those words were, without question, the most openly malicious thing he had said the entire time.

Hearing them, Reinhard raised the sword he had been holding at the ready above his head, imbued it with sword pressure, and in a single flash—following the glint of the blade, a tremendous surge of heat erupted.

It split the sky, pierced the atmosphere, shattered the earth, whipped mana into a vortex, and cleaved every object in the blade's linear path in two—light converged, and before Subaru's eyes, the world shifted.

『——』

The white, cold world that had been shrouded in frost was restored after the torrent of the slash subsided.

The shifted world repaired itself. The swirling mana formed a circle and was returned to the world. Flowers sprouted from the shattered earth. Warmth was reborn within the pierced atmosphere. Sunlight streamed down from the cleaved-open sky.

The Sword Saint's slash—bringing both the world's destruction and its rebirth simultaneously.

And the colossal beast torn apart by that slash had been uprooted from the world entirely, without leaving so much as a trace.

The titanic body that had been there just moments ago had vanished. Even the aftershock of the destruction it had caused was nowhere to be found.

『——』

With a sharp ring, Reinhard sheathed his knight's sword.

The wind blew through, tossing his red bangs. Squinting against the sunlight, Reinhard tilted his gaze to the sky and released a sigh so faint no one could have heard it.

"…Felt-sama would be upset, wouldn't she."

With eyes closed, he murmured.

※※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ *'Behold the impossible present.'* ※※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ *'Behold the impossible present.'* ※※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ *'Behold the impossible present.'* ※※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ *'Behold the impossible present.'* ※※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ *'Behold the impossible present.'* ※※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ *'Behold the impossible present.'* ※※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ *'Behold the impossible present.'* ※※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ *'Behold the impossible present—'*