Chapter 143: Mixed Colors (7)
It resembles the scenery of my holand.
Gazing into the distance, Monika thought.
The desolate land of Portsmouth was being restored. Underbrush spread to blanket the ground, while trees grew thick and dense. Flowers sprouted between soil stained green with foliage, and leaves dyed in countless colors fluttered together on the wind. As though innurable hues were blending into one another.
‘Yes.’
Crunch.
Monika’s great sword drove into the earth.
‘This is the scenery of Sarrifis.’
She had lost that place long ago, yet she had not forgotten it.
She could recognize it at a glance. The environnt of Sarrifis was being laid over Portsmouth. The collapsed ecosystem was being corrected, spreading outward as purification took hold.
The reason all of this had been possible was—
“Shall I explain on behalf of the spirits?”
Lizer, a spirit wearing a human form, spoke.
“Congratulations, Monika. It seems the Spirit’s Nest has accepted your Aura. Put simply……”
The spirits looked into your heart and decided to accept it.
Lizer murmured as much.
“……What does that an?”
When Monika tilted her head and asked,
“Well.”
Lizer gave a small chuckle and shrugged.
“Aura is power given form through conviction. You could say it is the result of the heart growing firm and taking shape. Then what is the heart made of? The soul, emotions, and mories……”
Probably sothing like that.
I am not entirely sure. About the human heart, that is.
Murmuring so, Lizer stepped forward. Standing at the edge of the hill, he spread his arms wide.
After gently opening his left hand, he exerted force toward the staff held in his right. He closed his eyes and swept both arms through the air.
He had begun to command the spirits.
“Senior…… are you a spirit?”
Staring at Lizer’s back, Monika asked,
“That’s right.”
Lizer affird it without hesitation.
“You would know if you cut open. I do not have organs. I do not even have blood. My body is nothing more than a shell shaped by mana. Unlike humans, my essence is not a soul—it is mana, through and through. Just like the spirits.”
Whoosh.
As Lizer swept his arms, spirits welled up beyond the hill.
Shining particles drifted through the air. Masses of light surged upward from the ground, gliding swiftly. Unlike the mont they had touched the Spirit’s Nest, unlike when they had remained within the Mother God’s domain, the spirits’ voices could not be heard.
“The spirits did not forgive the residents of this land.”
Thus, Lizer spoke in their stead.
He murmured quietly as he continued directing them.
The spirits moved back and forth, breathing vitality into the scenery.
“They simply chose to believe in you.”
Monika tightened her grip.
She lifted the great sword that had been planted in the soil.
Resting the guard upon her shoulder, she stepped forward.
“After glimpsing your soul that longs for your holand, your emotions, and your mories, the spirits judged you. They decided you are a human who understands the value of nature. A human who knows how precious soil and grass, trees and air—all of it—is.”
The sa goes for .
Lizer murmured softly.
“Monika, you must have grown up in a truly wonderful place.”
“……Yes.”
Though it has all disappeared, she added quietly, standing beside Lizer.
“I do not think so.”
Lizer wore a faint smile.
“I can feel it through the spirits’ senses. I do not know exactly why your holand vanished, but you rember it with extraordinary clarity.”
Look before you, Monika.
Everything here was changed by you.
It changed because you did not forget your holand.
“So let us begin. It is ti to go on the counteroffensive.”
Because this land has chosen to help you, Lizer whispered.
‘But I…….’
Monika wrapped her hands around the sword hilt.
One hand of flesh, one hand ford from a monster’s remains.
With both hands, she supported the great sword held high.
‘……I know.’
Her holand was gone.
It was precisely because it was gone that she could rember it so clearly.
Anyone would be the sa. The absent are rembered the longest. The reason mories of her lost holand were so vivid, the reason the faces of those she lost were so clear, was simply because if she did not rember them, she could never keep them at all.
Suddenly, a voice reached Monika’s mind.
She gently closed her eyes and listened to the voice etched beside her ear.
Fleur’s voice rang out.
And that was not all. Countless souls were circling around Monika. The souls that had touched the Mother God’s domain had reached this place as well.
Monika pressed her lips together.
She steeled her expression and opened her Aura.
Green Aura flowed from her grip, dyeing the great sword. Vines coiled around the barren blade, and before long, blossoms began to sprout. The form of her Aura was being given shape.
Yes, that would be so.
Monika could accept it without difficulty.
Those who had died unjustly would not easily abandon their resentnt. Even if most of Portsmouth’s residents had known nothing of the truth, it changed nothing. The wraiths’ hatred was directed at the land itself. They wished for everything in Portsmouth to be erased.
Believe in what?
What, exactly, had they chosen to believe?
Not only the wraiths, but even the spirits—
Monika wondered.
Why?
Why had they chosen to believe?
Not only the wraiths, but even the spirits—
Monika could not fully comprehend it.
anwhile, Lizer lowered his arms.
The spirits moving through the scenery glided toward Monika. They lted into the Aura surrounding the blade, adding their mana. Fresh soil, thick grass, sturdy trees, and beautifully colored flowers. The mana that composed the ecosystem mixed with Monika’s Aura, forming a radiant glow.
She knew. She had long thought that might be the case.
It was not sothing she wished for. Rather, she had hoped it was not so. She had wished that they would remain in the Underworld without longing for the living world. That they would turn their backs on everything and reincarnate. She believed it would be better to imagine the next life than to look back on the previous one. That went for Fleur, and for everyone who had lived in Sarrifis.
Scenery rembered even after vanishing without a trace.
Existences rembered even after fading without a trace.
Because of that, the spirits and the wraiths chose to trust Monika’s intent to purify this land.
CRACK!
Fissures streaked across the air.
A green wave spread outward from Monika’s great sword.
Aura and mana intertwined, beginning to form an Aura Blade. The wind twisted as space shuddered, and the Ley Lines buried deep underground gathered beneath Monika’s feet, surging with vitality.
Everything, everything, everything.
Voices overlapped at Monika’s ear. n and won, youths and elders. Everyone Monika had lost spoke as one.
So, Monika—
as all of them whispered together—
──RUMBLE!
Along with Monika’s strike, the mont the Aura Blade surged toward the distant horizon—
Silence.
Sound vanished.
The scenery vanished as well.
The voices circling Monika’s ears disappeared, as did even the faintest breeze. The scenery before her eyes vanished, and not a single leaf remained. A green flash swallowed everything.
“Monika.”
Suddenly, Lizer’s voice reached her.
No—was it imagination? Monika was not sure.
She had poured every last remnant of Aura from her body. Her consciousness blurred, her body grew heavy. As she staggered, about to collapse—
“You did really well.”
Slide.
Lizer’s arm supported Monika’s body.
“I am counting on you from here on.”
Lizer whispered, but Monika could not hear him.
Unbothered, Lizer continued.
“Because you have to save the world.”
***
An endlessly spreading green radiance.
Nodens watched it.
Light was surging outward from the vicinity of Portsmouth. From the center of the Black Sea it appeared faint, yet it seed to be swallowing not only Portsmouth but the surrounding scenery as well.
Did they kill them? Did they kill everything? Standing dazed, Nodens wondered. The banshees that had advanced toward Portsmouth. The ego of Nodens, connected to his kin, stirred. He had infused his own will into the banshee swarm to move them, yet the monster cores pulsing within the banshees’ bodies seed to have vanished.
“Conviction.”
Suddenly, Abel spoke.
Nodens, who had been silently contemplating, looked ahead.
Abel stood at the heart of the Black Sea. Banshee corpses lay strewn everywhere, and Abel’s body was stained with wounds from prolonged battle.
“Conviction purified the cursed land and eradicated the monsters.”
So it succeeded.
Abel thought to himself.
Aura Blade of that scale could not have been manifested by Monika alone. Spirits, or souls—or perhaps both. And finally, the power of the Ley Lines must also have been added for such a release.
“Your army is gone.”
Intelligent Species, Nodens.
What will you do now?
Abel asked.
“Without an army, invasion is impossible. Will you attempt to destroy Portsmouth by yourself?”
You cannot.
You do not have much strength left. Your stamina as well—
Abel whispered, and—
“Nothing changes, human.”
Nodens muttered impassively.
Just as Abel’s body was covered in wounds, Nodens’s flesh had also been damaged. Cracks riddled his outer shell, and his right arm—developed like a saw blade—was on the verge of crumbling.
“I will destroy you.”
Whoosh.
Nodens swept his right arm.
“I will destroy you, and then destroy every human like you.”
And thus protect it.
Murmuring so, Nodens bowed his head.
“……Is that so.”
Abel also lowered his head.
The darkened seawater rippled.
Beneath the pitch-black depths, sothing even darker seed to stir.
“Then you…….”
Abel felt as though he knew what it was.
An enormous shadow was moving beneath the sea.
“You have no intention of stopping.”
The being that gave birth to you, and the being that birthed the banshees—
Abel murmured.
“Unless your progenitor is destroyed…….”
You will never stop.
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