Another Stage
Darkness. Gnawing, crawling darkness is the first thing that meets my awareness. Is this death? The end of all things? I don't think so. It's not quite right, and there's no shady blonde guy here looking to make deals.
I open my eyes, but nothing changes. The only thing here is darkness. I remember… what do I remember?
I was fighting. I know that much. A series of pitched battles, with limited resources, until… until…
"Until you faced an adversary that you could not believe. What was it about her, that made it impossible in your eyes, my accomplice?" His voice calls out, through the gloom. "There were others who ought to have been allies, that you did not blink twice at the presence of."
"...Pepe was someone I had resolved myself to someday face. Even if he died in Fairy Britain, and that resolve was left with nowhere to go, it was still present," I say after a bit of consideration. "As for Goghie… I guess the influence on my mind rationalized it as the Foreign God gaining too much influence, and I needed to suppress her long enough to talk to her - or something like that."
"And Jeanne Alter?" He asks. "Why was she different? Surely you might have believed that there was some version of her amidst the multiverse that did not recall your bond."
"Count, what are you talking about?" I ask, a little confused. He should know as well as I, after all. "An Avenger never forgets."
"Ha…ha… Kuhahaha! Very well, my accomplice! If that is your resolve, then let us proceed, further and deeper into the darkness!"
(And yet, isn't there something I've forgotten? Among those other faces I somehow witnessed opposing me, there were one or two more, right? Additional people who would never become enemies of Fujimaru Ritsuka, no matter what.)
But as I follow the Count into the depths, tracking him by his tattered yellow coat fluttering in the darkness, they're lost, just like everything else.
***
Act 4, Scene 11
"-I've been having Len scout you guys' dreams, so I've got some gist of what's going on," says Nanaya after I manage to pick my jaw back up off the floor. "But as for that 'bug' - what did it look like exactly?"
It's a little difficult to describe, but-
"Master said it looked like Fujimaru was waking up, right?" says Shaula.
"...Well, something like that, anyway," I nod. "At this point I'm about ready to believe I imagined the whole thing, though."
The cat on his shoulder tilts her head, and he grins at her. "-If it's about being asleep or waking up, I think Len can probably confirm it for you. She's a [Dream Demon], even if an artificial one - I guess you could call her a succubus." The cat stares at him, and although her expression hasn't changed I think I detect a bit of exasperation. "I'm not being misleading. It's the truth, right? You're capable of draining energy from dreams, even if you don't need it now that you've got a contract with me."
"...She's a cat, though," I can't help but point out.
"A cat is -" He starts to say something weird, and Len claws his cheek. "-She can shapeshift, at least in dreams. If you ever meet Tohno, you should tell him you know what he did the night he first met her. It'll be funny."
I don't think I'll do that. "But the point is, she can detect if there's some kind of consciousness within that figment in the simulator?"
"Well, yeah. Probably," The serial killer says. "As for getting her in there… if you make a contract with her, make her your familiar, you'll probably be able to bring her in with you. Technically speaking, she's a corpse; any life in her is lent by her master."
The cat blinks, looking at him with a blank face, and Nanaya scoffs. "What? Did you think I wanted to keep you? It's taking everything I have to keep me from chopping you to pieces, Len. You're not the white cat from the dream that birthed me; we don't have any special relationship."
She blinks impassively once more, and his eyes fade to a dull, unseeing silver as she leaps off his shoulder and slinks over to me, giving my leg an experimental sniff.
…No, I can't accept this. "I'm already-" Len's nose wrinkles and she turns her head away in disgust. Well, I guess our refusal is mutual, then. "I've already got an exclusive contract, so this isn't an option anyway."
If having Servants isn't already a breach of it, then acquiring a familiar will definitely violate my contract with Beatrice.
"...Ah, seriously? Are you stupid, or what?" Nanaya asks.
"There's gotta be some other person who could take her on… what do you think, Recorder?" I ask.
But, there's no sudden harsh snap from him, and I find myself frowning reflexively. He had to be watching, right? I pull up my communicator, and press the call button- no signal?
Something's wrong. I can still feel the others below with [Cor Leonis], but something is still definitely wrong! "Shaula! We're going back downstairs!" I shout as I run straight towards the starway. "Nanaya, I don't really care what you-!"
"A-ah, Master?" Shaula calls out as I reach the fifth step on the way down, and I freeze. The sound of cloth shifting behind me, the sound of flesh contorting, is all too familiar. "I don't thiiiinnnkkkk…" Her voice dies off into the clicking chitters of an insect's mandibles, and I'm already to the tenth step, without a second glance behind me.
"Now!? You've gotta be kidding me, just who-!?"
Who broke the tower's rules? Someone did it; that's why she's transformed. And at the same time, I've lost signal from Chaldea… Is it some late triggered scheme of Wallachia, or-
I don't have time to complete my thought, because I bump into someone on the way up. Or, something I mistake for 'someone'.
A shape like a mockery of a human, with four arms like the legs of a spider holding it up as its long 'legs' trail down the steps behind it. A long head more like a black tentacle than a true head, split vertically by a mouth with unmistakably human teeth. It twitches strangely as it pauses its motion, but otherwise gives nothing that could be seen as an acknowledgement of my presence.
I take a step back, and something like a human voice issues forth from its strange vertical mouth. "! 4b@eq< 4b@eq! !"
One of its forelimbs twitches, and I don't quite register it at first. I'm distracted by the skittering claws of a scorpion drawing closer.
And as I turn to look behind me-
Slap. Something wet lands on the ground in front of me, and I stagger as my weight suddenly shifts. What-
My vision swims as I look back to the front, and see a tangled mass of red-stained 'rope' there. What is-
"0o4 0o4 0o4." The thing twitche, and I finally scream as it tears my arm off. What is this, what is this, whatisthiswhatisthiswhatisthis-
"qkde qkde! g@'fffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff!" It babbles, and I finally understand the thing is laughing at me as it begins to carve my skin off my body.
"----b;f? b;m 6ud@ MONO?" Another voice calls out, deeper down the dark stairway. And then another, and another, and-
The clatter of claws behind me draws close. The stairway fills with light, illuminating an endless tide of the horrors coming up to meet me. But, amidst those toothy monsters, there's one out of place. Emerging from their muddy forms, in response to that very light, is man in a black trenchcoat, wholly nondescript, save his eyes. Those shine, a searing vermillion, their gleaming X-shaped pupils extending out of his eyes and carving themselves upon his cheeks. But before I can comprehend, before I can even make sense of that stranger's presence among the monsters-
Shaula's [Hell's Snipe] removes my head before I even realize it, and I find myself standing in an empty white space.
***
TATARI Watchtower
Fourth Trial: Perfected Chaos Tide - NRVNQSR
Number of Participants: All
Number of Attempts: 1
Begin