Chapter 54: The seed... Is it starting to affect me?
Slash—!!
"Waah...! That was close, come on~ come on~ work for me... Wahaha."
Slash—!
Cut—!!
’Ah, damn it.’
Blast—!
’When... will this end?’
Crack—! Cut—!
As expected, even landing a single hit on Erness would be a miracle for Eiros. He darted here and there, toyed with like a fool.
Even if it were someone at the Luminous Tier, or perhaps even Radiant, chasing after Erness, the girl would probably still manage to survive.
What in the world was this absurd power?
Eiros lunged forward, his eyes fixed on Erness, who watched him with amusement, clearly enjoying herself. Every time he closed in and swung his sword at her, her body would vanish and reappear somewhere else.
Instead of making any progress, Eiros was burning through his Soul Essence to the point where he felt he should just stop here.
Chasing Erness was impossible!
But...
’Just one. One hit is enough. If I can land a single touch on her, that’ll be enough.’
That might not have sounded like Eiros at all. But somewhere along the way, he’d started thinking differently from how he used to.
Where he once would have simply given up, now, when he wanted something specific, he would actually fight for it.
Could this be called a good direction for Eiros?
That might be a hard question to answer, but Eiros understood that this mindset was exactly what he needed to hold onto if he truly wanted to survive to the end.
He let out a sigh.
"You’re not going to attack?" The question slipped from his lips as Erness sat atop one of the tall boulders, swinging her legs in a steady rhythm, looking truly delighted.
The smile on her face widened as her pupils narrowed like crescent moons.
"What for? Aren’t I the prey? Is it that hard to catch me?"
Instead of answering, she only threw back more questions, her tone cheerful.
Eiros sighed in frustration, then thought as hard as he could. He didn’t know how far Erness’s teleportation reached, he didn’t know how it worked, he only knew that she could teleport. That was all.
There was no other clue about her Stigmata.
As if sensing his frustration, Erness vanished from her spot, then reappeared just a few steps from him, her hands clasped behind her back, her body leaning slightly forward.
"How about we make the game a little easier?"
"...Easier?"
Wait, hearing her call it a game made Eiros truly realize she’d been toying with him the whole time.
"Yes."
But who was he to complain?
Erness smiled adorably, glanced up at the ceiling, then spun around and headed toward a tunnel.
"How about we play outside?"
Eiros opened his mouth to answer, but by then, Erness was already nowhere to be seen.
That same familiar chill crept up behind him, and he realized she had just teleported and was about to appear at his back.
On guard, Eiros put distance between them, spinning around to face her. But this time, nothing appeared.
"H-huh?"
Before he could react, he felt a familiar touch. The scent of winter, her pale, cold skin—those familiar hands wrapped around his stomach, just like she always did.
Eiros’s body went rigid, tensing all over.
"Hehe, I like your smell."
He listened to her soft voice whisper into his ear, her breath a strange mix of warm and cold, and he could feel just how openly she was sniffing him.
Then the world seemed to bend, pulled by some unseen force, and his consciousness felt as though it froze for a brief moment before returning.
But when his awareness returned, he found himself high up in the sky.
Roar—!
The rush of falling water thundered behind him, followed by the sound of delighted laughter, swallowed by the howling wind.
"Waaaah... Look! We’re in the sky."
Only then did Eiros realize he was standing at a height level with the mountain itself, a waterfall roaring dangerously close to where he floated.
His face went pale.
"H-huh?! W-wait...!"
He spun around to face her. But unlike him, Erness was clearly enjoying this, arms spread wide, her face lit up with pure joy.
"H-hey! I’m going to die!"
Erness looked at him and shrugged, a mischievous smile on her lips.
"You can just come back to life, though."
Yes, that was true, but...
Did Erness really just treat his death as something trivial? I mean, dying hurt!
And that was exactly what Eiros feared most.
But was that really still true?
As Eiros thought about the possibility of dying—finding himself hurtling down at terrifying speed, about to slam into the ground below and die a horrible death—
his face paled for a moment, then a strange calm settled over him, and he let out a hollow, empty laugh.
’That can’t be right... Since when did death become so... trivial to me?’
Was it because he was immortal, unable to truly die?
Or perhaps it was because he’d already died so many times within that hallucination?
As he thought it over, he suddenly remembered his earlier plan—the moment he’d let himself be killed, a spear driven straight through his heart.
’Why did I make that decision without a shred of fear?’
His heart pounded hard, a dark feeling creeping through his body, a feeling as though...
He’d been acting like someone other than himself.
He hadn’t felt afraid, not because he’d grown used to dying, but more like... he’d lost that emotion entirely, if only for a moment.
Cold sweat broke out across his face.
’...The seed... Is it starting to affect me?’
His frozen gaze shifted, realizing he seemed to have developed a strange tolerance to pain, and he turned to look at Erness, who was watching him with a relaxed smile.
"Are you okay, my darling?"
But even though Erness tried to play innocent, Eiros knew exactly why she’d come to see him, why she’d suddenly done all this—because she had noticed him starting to act strange.
His personality had suddenly turned reckless and bold, risking himself, toying with death, and in the end fighting with a smile on his face as though he were enjoying every bit of it.
So why did Erness want to make him die?
Did she want him to realize this himself? If so, it had worked.
Or was she trying to remind him of his fear of death?
’...No, actually, this could be used for my own growth. I can take advantage of this. That’s right. Haha, that’s right.’
He forced a smile. Once again, it was a mad thought, one that didn’t suit him at all, yet he realized the thought itself held some truth—he really could make use of this.
’If I really have lost my fear of death for a while, then I might as well make use of it. Let’s die, then, and make death something ordinary to me. This will work in my favor, right?’
By the time Eiros noticed, he was already much closer to the ground. His face, blank from the weight of his own thoughts, stared down at the earth below, then turned to Erness with a strange mix of emotion.
"If you get used to death, you won’t have to be afraid that dying and reviving over and over will make the seed grow anymore."
Her gentle voice was swallowed by the roaring wind. Her white hair whipped wildly upward, and the beautiful smile on her face nearly stole the breath from his lungs.
That’s right...
His own thinking about growing used to death aligned exactly with what she’d just said.
Even though the seed had already begun eating away at him, he could use this to slow its growth.
Crash—!!
Then came the impact, tremendous and violent, every part of his body crushed on contact. The pain was overwhelming, but there wasn’t a trace of fear in him.
Blood seeped out and pooled around him, his body sprawled helpless on the ground, eyes still open.
Erness had vanished right as he was about to fall, then reappeared beside him, her expression unreadable.
"...Three years is probably the longest it’ll take."
She said, into the quiet that followed.
***