Book 11 Chapter 27
Episode 7 of the Side Story.
The Forgotten War, Spider Lord Extermination Battle (7)
"What kind of fluke did you pull off?"
As Archilea faced Shar’kash, she felt an unknown stream of memories flicker through her mind.
'My body, my head is dizzy.'
The warmth and image that always came to mind whenever she thought of her origin, it had never surged like a storm as it did now.
It was that memory that led her here.
She was certainly looking for her father, but a voice had guided her to this place.
- This way, Akki.
Archilea, who had clutched her head and staggered for a moment, spoke.
"You… are in my memory."
"…?"
"What in the world have you done? Have we met before?"
It didn't take long for Shar’kash to notice the change in Arachish, no, Archilea.
"Do you want to know?"
A wry smile played on Shar’kash’s lips as he began to circle Archilea.
"It seems painful memories are surfacing. Memories of being abandoned by your mother."
"Akki, it's all lies, don't listen to that kind of talk!"
"Your mother hated you. She treated you like baggage, handing you over to humans whenever an urgent matter arose."
Shar’kash’s young body began to boil and expand grotesquely with repulsive matter.
"I don't have a mother."
"Hahahahahahaha, yes, you wouldn't want to acknowledge her as your mother. Because she abandoned you like that!"
The five heads roaring towards the stars were products of madness…
The body, resembling a human, stretched out large and nauseatingly, but the lower body, branching into a dozen limbs, was vaguely that of a disgusting spider.
And, ah, were the elements that formed that body not all indiscriminately tangled human hands and feet!
"Even that foolish one eventually died hating you. It's not surprising. You got in the way, so you died by my hand!"
That storm of madness, that wave of delirium, hundreds of demi-humans collapsed with their heads exploding.
Hundreds more were infected with the madness, laughing wildly or chanting bizarre gibberish as they danced.
The overwhelming presence of that transcendent form was enough to make even Kasena and Valensidis buckle, and only Archilea stood upright.
"Lies, it's lies… Akki, Arachish, Arachish loved you…"
Kasena, collapsed on the ground, barely managed to gasp and mumble, but couldn't finish her sentence.
Because she loved her so much.
Loved her more than her own life.
It was just that she couldn't be with her whenever she was in danger, she never abandoned her.
"I will personally comfort that sorrowful heart of yours, for being abandoned."
Archilea tumbled in the snow from a spider leg's blow but quickly broke her fall and stood up.
Immediately, a second spider leg rose like a cliff and slammed down, stirring up a furious snowstorm.
Shar’kash’s chosen strategy was a swift, decisive battle born from deception.
At that moment, Archilea was overwhelmed by a waterfall of unknown memories, surging in like a burst dam.
'Strange.'
This had never happened before.
There had never been a time when unknown memories engulfed her mind to this extent.
Is there some connection with that guy?
"If we leave her like this, Akki will…"
At that moment, Kasena struggled to her feet, thinking desperately.
Is there no way?
A way to protect Akki from Shar’kash's lies, a way to let her know those fragments of memory.
'Like Arachish back then.'
In that instant, her eyes snapped open.
Under the oppressive weight on her entire body, she urgently spoke to Valensidis, who was treating Prisvia.
"President, Isla, please bring Isla here!"
"Who is Isla?"
"Kasena, what in the…"
"It'll only take a moment. And anyway, if Akki falls, not only us but Isla will die too!"
Prisvia seemed reluctant to expose Isla to danger but finally agreed.
Valensidis, after getting a rough explanation from Kasena, moved to the bridge of the hospital ship base.
He re-operated the defense system working through the black yin scales, then moved to the laboratory.
From the central test tube, he extracted an infant with white hair and dragon horns already sprouting.
The dragon child embraced in his arms was lighter than a fallen leaf. Its eyelids trembled delicately.
"If I take her outside like this, she'll freeze to death…"
Valensidis cast several cold-warding spells and wrapped the child's body in his cloak before crossing dimensions again.
The battle of the transcendent beings was in full swing.
A feast of immense power that felt like bodies were being crushed.
Perhaps sensing instinctive fear, Isla burst into tears.
Kasena received Isla and held her carefully. Her crying wouldn't stop.
"Please bring Akki over here. And just for a moment, truly just for a moment, buy us some time. If you operated the hospital ship base as I said, there might be a chance."
* * *
"You must never be swayed by any temptation. Do not open your eyes or listen. Do not lean to the left or right, but go straight on one path."
Mirngardia warned for the fifth time.
She was genuinely worried about her younger sister.
Setsunen, who had firmly imprinted the warning in her mind, smiled.
"Don't worry, Mirmir! Big sister will be back with Dad soon!"
* * *
"There must be a way, right?"
Valensidis stared at Kasena for a moment, then sighed and nodded his head.
"If not, why don't you just order us to die? That would be easier."
The moment Valensidis delivered his sarcastic remark, the hospital ship base transferred all power except emergency power to battle mode.
All operating gunports on the side of the hospital ship base simultaneously targeted Shar’kash…
Countless energy blasts pierced his body, which had been wantonly tormenting Archilea, creating a momentary opening.
At that moment, Valensidis appeared, took Archilea, and set her down beside Kasena.
And with his excellent disguise and bone-shrinking art, he transformed into Archilea and returned to her spot.
His presence was different, so his true identity would soon be revealed, but it would buy them a very short amount of time.
"Akki, listen carefully. Your mother always thought of you. She sacrificed everything to protect you."
To Archilea, who was struggling to rise with a battered body, to the daughter of her benefactor, Kasena barely managed to speak.
"From this place where her mission began, she just kept walking, longing for the day she would meet you… Even though every day was the same no matter how much she walked. She could have stopped walking."
To my chagrin, and truly sadly, this is all I can do.
So I must do my best.
It's nothing compared to what Arachish did, but if it's about conveying that feeling… there's no one else but me who can do it.
"But Arachish could never meet you. It's because of us. To protect me and Rain, from that monster…"
"Arachish…?"
"Isla… this child… is your genetic sibling. She was made from the same mother, Arachish's cells. Here, would you like to hold her?"
Archilea blankly accepted Isla.
Then, as if by magic, the crying stopped. Isla's small hand grasped Akki's finger tightly.
"Arachish wanted to hold you like that. She always sang songs to you, and whispered words of love with her forehead against yours."
"…"
"I've tried that with Isla many times too. Isla truly looked happy."
Having said that, Kasena ran to the scene ahead, where Valensidis was becoming half-dead from Shar’kash's attacks.
'Arachish?'
At that moment, Archilea looked down at Isla blankly.
What is it, I don't know what it is.
Should I be here right now? Shouldn't I be going to fight?
"Ma kiome…"
At that moment, Isla wriggled and mumbled that. Her scent felt somehow familiar, so she sniffed it.
At that instant, suddenly.
As if a dam of memories had broken.
Isla's body scent connected to the smell of firewood on a winter's day, and to the smell of cold snow.
'Ma kiome…?'
That language.
All those smells.
The warmth of holding something precious.
- Ma kiome!
It made the memories, which had been blurry as if looking into a broken mirror, clear.
'Arachish.'
On a distant winter's day, she heard the singing she used to hear when she was wiggling inside the egg.
She felt the warmth that always held her so preciously.
She heard the voice that repeatedly spoke to her when she couldn't say anything.
Inside the egg, she didn't know what that being was, but from the moment she broke out of the egg, she loved the father who had the scent of that being.
The moment her father first met her, he cried, saying, "It's not me."
Whenever her father said she wasn't her mother, his expression looked so sad.
Just before they parted in <Flame Myriad>, he said that he could never replace that person.
Until now, she didn't know why.
- Archilea, you must know your origin. Our origin is a fire dragon, but you have a different origin.
A snowflake landed on her head.
In that quiet resonance, the image of her mother holding her, a baby dragon, tightly and pressing their foreheads together filled her vision.
This was a dream.
A fragment of a dream, a genetic inheritance of a dream, that Arachish had wished to experience just once in her life.
- The emptiness in your heart, you must know your origin for that emptiness to be filled.
Mom, Ma kiome.
The being who should have heard that first cry of her life, the being who had longed for that cry more than anyone else.
The name of that being, Arachish.
"Ma kiome."
The origin of my soul…
Mimicking that illusion, she embraced Isla in the same way and pressed their foreheads together.
Countless memories intertwined and merged into one, flowing down her cheeks in hot streams.
- Akki, whenever I tried to talk about your mom, Dad would make a fuss saying it was him, so I could never say anything… but I hope someday the day comes when I can tell you about your great mother.
The sorrow of homesickness, cherished in her heart for a lifetime, turned into joy, and joy soon became wrath and murderous intent…
The next moment.
Transcendent flames exploded and surged, punching a hole in the sky where even dark clouds were frozen.
So much so that Shar’kash, the White Young Lord, who was about to finish off Kasena and Valensidis, flinched and turned back.
"Shar’kash."
That explosive heat suddenly concentrated in one spot, becoming a terrestrial sun that brilliantly illuminated this dark, frozen land.
That sun was Archilea.
Flames covering her entire body blazed dazzlingly. Furthermore, her still immature horns and tail were expanding, becoming closer to an adult's.
Her golden eyes blazed more brilliantly and fiercely than any heart of fire.
"I will turn you into ashes right now."
* * *
Setsunen plunged into the cosmic rift.
'Mir said it would be an intangible space.'
The path was a yellowish space, as if boiling with pig fat. It was a blood-stained space.
She closed her eyes and covered her ears.
Then an intangible voice sprouted like tentacles in her mind. It began to project certain landscapes directly into her consciousness.
'I must not focus.'
An unnamed monster with stakes driven through all three of its heads, blood dripping from the ceiling above, laughter coming from the dirty floor.
Monster.
Ceiling.
Blood.
Laughter.
Groans echoing from the dirty floor, tears pouring from the ceiling above, an unnamed monster with stakes driven through all three of its heads staring directly this way…
'I must not be conscious of it.'
Cosmic knowledge was trying to penetrate her perception and infiltrate her mind.
The moment she paid attention to any one of those sights, she would stray from the path.
The tentacles and antennae of the gods who governed outer space were groping, as if tempting her consciousness, each trying to claim a new and interesting sacrifice.
Monster.
Floor.
Tears.
Crying.
Her consciousness continued to become hazy.
Every time she tried to clear her mind, her consciousness would again be caught in a vortex of a different universe and churn.
I'm curious, I'm curious, but Mir told me not to look.
Mad laughter.
Groans.
Wall.
Monster.
'They' were filling the emptiness in her mind warmly and dimly white, calling Setsunen…
As if they would never let her go…
As if they would make her come to them from this path she was walking…
- To keep your reason working until the path ends, you must clearly recall something.
Something sticky, submerging her ankles, was boiling.
Nen then opened her mind's eye.
She pulled deep and read the memories of those distant days, memories that felt both close and far.
Those late spring days…
Twilight grasses covering the vast plain stretching to the horizon awakened one by one in the sunset…
Rain, Miria, Akki, Nen, Mir, all gathered in one place, looking at those flowers, laughing and playing with each other…
That memory was a ray of light.
And a handful of scent.
With that light and scent, no darkness or foul odor could intrude. It was an unapproachable radiance.
Setsunen could not see it, but a sacred radiance enveloped her body.
The presence of outer space would burst upon touching that light, unable to come near.
Absolute purity that shook off all temptations of outer space.
One step.
One step.
Fear disappeared from her mind. Her slowly taken steps gradually began to quicken into a trot, and then she started to run.
The scent is getting closer.
And the light is getting stronger.
Almost there.
At the end of her full-force strides, the next moment, *clang*, came the sound of dimensions shattering.
"…?!"
"…?!"
It was a space where nothing existed but bluish spiderwebs and grotesque blizzards.
In that space, Rain and Miria, resisting and being chased by countless outer space tentacles, flinched and looked up at Nen…
Nen took her hands off her ears and shouted happily.
"Dad! Cute Nen has arrived!"