12 O'Clock, 12 Nations (3)
The Jincheon Empire sector sealed off the corridor at an unprecedented security level.
"Your Majesty!"
Jingang, struck by the Mun Kingdom's blade, coughed up blood and collapsed before he could reach his bedchamber.
"What happened?!"
Dozens of court physicians swarmed in and, after examining him, reached the same conclusion.
"His qi has been weakened. This pulse isn't normal. He's been caught by some enemy sorcery."
"Is that your answer? The Jincheon, the strongest in the world, brought low by mere ki-trickery? You people—after everything—!"
"Enough."
Jingang rose from the bed.
"Your Majesty, you must rest." A wound from such a blade can disrupt metabolism; in severe cases, the victim can be possessed by malignant qi.
"I told you I'm fine."
Jingang was pale too, but his eyes burned fiercely.
"A kill-ritual… filthy trick."
Since the Mun Kingdom was the root of Jincheon, many aspects of their sorcery ran the same course.
"Kill—kill-ritual?"
The officials' faces flushed.
"The Mun Kingdom! Only Munryong could do something as despicable as this!"
Jingang walked calmly to his chair and sat.
Why didn't we stop it?
Jincheon wasn't without shamanic experts. They had plenty.
They had pierced every shamanic barrier and still landed a hit on me. That's impossible by human power alone.
It had to be the work of the Otherworld.
"Your Majesty."
Anchal of the Jincheon Space Bureau, who had brought the news, sank to her knees at Jingang's feet.
"Please kill me."
As head of the department preparing to intercept the Otherworld, she could not avoid responsibility.
Jingang did not blame her.
"Report."
"We detected abnormal demonic activity in a specific zone of Hell. It's estimated to have occurred about an hour ago, and the Jincheon Space Bureau only confirmed it seven minutes ago."
"Hmm."
Because the Jinseongeum was linked to the Gwangcheon Star, Jincheon could investigate the Otherworld.
Of course, like observing a planet in another galaxy, the data were ultimately mathematical.
The Gwangcheon Star alone has technical limits. Capturing it within fifty-three minutes is impressive.
Anyway, an hour.
I don't know whether there was prior coordination, but it smelled rushed. And if it's the Otherworld… we can't rule out Havitz.
In other words, the result of Satan's impulsive streak. A cornered rat biting the cat.
"They drew the blade first. We must respond. Anchal, you will do it."
"...Yes."
Though she was the director of the Jincheon Space Bureau, once Anchal removed her eyepatch she was the strongest intelligence operative, gifted with a demonic-seeing eye.
One official urged, "Your Majesty, please rest now. We'll find a way to purge the wound."
"No. There's no need."
Jingang stood, drew the emperor's short sword, and looked around the room.
He drew a long breath, but the suffocating grievance didn't leave; it only twisted him inward.
"Guhk!"
He staggered and coughed blood again, and the officials leapt up in alarm.
"Your Majesty!"
Jingang leveled the sword and kept them back.
"Do not come near."
A ghost?
Jingang's face warped grotesquely, a demon's visage shimmering like an afterimage.
"Kukuku. Kukukukuku."
"Ma—Majesty…"
"Munryong, you think you can kill me?"
Blood tears streamed in straight lines from his eyes as if he'd torn his chest open.
My daughter is in Hell. There is nowhere to run, no last refuge—only eternal pain…
A father's heart—
"I am the ghost! My heart is Hell itself!"
A heat haze flickered around Jingang, filling the room like thick, choking smoke.
Anchal's single visible eye widened.
He's reached the extreme.
A rotten stench filled the air and a rending ghost-wail followed.
"I will devour everything! Demon or god, I will chew you up and leave not a single bone!"
Veins stood out across Jingang's face; the officials cried out with tears in their eyes.
"Your Majesty, hold still! Do not damage the imperial body! Please…!"
Anchal held the officials back.
"Wait!"
"What is the director saying? At this rate the emperor will be in danger!"
"Just—please wait."
Beyond the staggering Jingang, already sliding toward frenzy, a ghostly face took form.
He is suffering.
The strongest killing-spell, the cry of a maiden's grudge amplified by Hell's demonic force, was howling.
"Your Majesty, fight it! It makes no sense for the Jincheon Emperor to fall to a ghost!" Anchal shouted.
"Director!"
"The emperor's judgment is right. If you cannot control your mind, the ghost's resentment will only grow."
"So we should stop it now, shouldn't we?"
"Grief is an emotion that cannot be borne without someone to blame. A ghost whose resentment remains unresolved will seek a new target. The ones who suffer first are the—"
Anchal turned to the officials.
"The one who drew the blade is a shaman. Depending on the rituals performed at the time, it might have ended there, but it didn't. A ghost stoked with rage will harm everyone who was present until its grudge is released."
Only then did the officials understand.
"No way…"
"Yes. During our intelligence operations, the Mun Kingdom's diviners called this phenomenon—"
"Yeoksal. Reverse Killing."
Around midnight.
Seventeen thousand fairies were stationed at the entrance to the forest called the Green Ocean.
Deep inside that forest, beyond where humans ever trod and where the floodplains ended, lay the elves' homeland.
"This is awkward."
The fairies with riotously multicolored wings were one and a half times larger than the others.
Small compared to humans, perhaps, but their aura was mountainous.
The Fairy King, Crown.
The sole male among the highest-level fairies of the 72 ranks.
He embodied the very concept of the Highest. The fairies knew it.
For as long as the lake held water, for as long as wind blew through the valley, for as long as fire boiled in the lava, Crown had stood at the peak. Now that even Ikael had abandoned Heaven, it was natural for him to try to make himself king.
A senior of the 72 ranks reported, "Crown, the scouting party has arrived."
Adorably camouflaged fairies with fierce makeup flew in toward Crown.
"We found the elf fortress. They've set up defenses, but we can guide you immediately."
Crown propped his chin on his hand.
"Hmm."
Boyishly beautiful, he nevertheless carried the bearing of ancient ages.
We chased them and finally drove them here. But elves in the forest are another matter.
It was the largest forest in the world—an impregnable stronghold from the fairies' point of view.
The Flame Clan's powers and the micro-world creation are tricky. We must be ready to risk annihilation.
Then a roar split the sky.
"An ambush?"
All the fairies looked up as a flash of light descended before them.
A colossal archangel who dwarfed the fairies—Uriel—stood there with his arms crossed.
"Crown."
There was no angel of Ikael's rank left among them, but Uriel was another matter entirely.
"Great Archangel of Destruction."
To avoid being destroyed, Crown immediately descended and bowed.
Even the Highest bristled.
A proud archangel comes to request our aid. Ikael has already abandoned Heaven.
Uriel's words shattered Crown's doubt.
"I need your help."
"What?"
A request, not an order—such a thing had never happened in Heaven's history.
What on earth is going on?
Under the suspicious gazes of seventeen thousand fairies, Uriel waited.
At the night's deepest hour.
In the "Heaven's Village," the truth the Holy See had worked so hard to hide, Shirone's party waited.
"Mika."
- Melkidu does not exist.
There had to be a reason the catacombs led by Gyoerok had kidnapped Seina.
"Rami Church is the world's largest religion. And the Satanists grow in its shadow. If that shadow disappears, what happens? The Satanists will die out."
That was Iruki's opinion.
It had merit, but Shirone couldn't shake a bad feeling.
Is that really all there is to it?
Because Gyoerok is his demon.
"Mika."
- Melkidu does not exist.
Shirone summoned Mika every thirty minutes to check whether Melkidu had materialized.
Mika only extracts information about specific keywords. It cannot detect things on its own.
When Shirone didn't call, Mika was just a nameless portrait.
As dawn approached, Shirone spoke again.
"Mika."
- Melkidu has materialized.
Shirone bolted upright; Iruki, Nade, and Eden felt it instinctively.
"Found it?"
Shirone asked Mika.
Where is it?
- It is here.
What do you mean?
No matter how he looked around, Heaven's Village showed no obvious change.
- From the point where location detection became possible until now, four people worldwide have entered.
Shirone intuited.
They have it—something I don't.
A presence of darkness.
"Mika, can you copy and transmit the psychological states of those who entered Melkidu?"
If the hypothesis was correct—
- Value judgments about psychological states are impossible. Copying brainwaves is possible.
That's enough.
At the instant Shirone finished speaking, someone's brainwaves overlaid his mind.
"Ugh."
Of course, identical brainwaves do not reconstruct the events exactly.
What Shirone felt were foul desires and, beyond them, an overwhelming unease.
"Shirone, over there…"
Nade pointed ahead; a black space exhaled gray smoke.
"Yes. That's probably Melkidu. It revealed itself when it sensed my darkness."
"How do you know?"
"By murder. The brainwaves show someone was killed a moment ago."
The others hesitated to comprehend, but Shirone moved without explanation.
"Let's go in. We'll know once we're there."
Shirone's group plunged into the sucking black void.
After crossing the boundary, through thick mist they saw the silhouette of a running human.
Criminals from around the world.
Every time they inhaled, voices echoed in their heads.
- Someone, help! I don't want to go to prison!
- It was a mistake! I didn't mean to kill! I was just angry—so angry!
- They'll never catch me. I'll kill more. More women, more pleasures...
They walked with grim faces for about five minutes until the gray smoke cleared. They were in a dense forest.
"A momentary impulse."
A woman's voice spoke.
"Or years of repressed longing culminating in something irretrievable?"
Shirone and the others pressed backs together and scanned the area.
"Where are you? Come out!"
"No, it's not like that."
Based on Andrei the Labyrinth's experience, Shirone guessed what Melkidu was.
"I don't know how long it's existed, but at first it probably just drew in darkness. Then those who committed crimes began to gather here one by one."
"So it's a system they created."
"Right. It became the safest place for those who must answer to society to hide."
"Those who crossed the forbidden line," the woman said.
"Welcome to Melkidu's starting point."