Chapter 67 : Chapter 67
Chapter 67: Moonlight Day (3)
“Amidst the journey, I met a traveler.”
Fleur recited the scripture.
“In a wasteland more desolate than any, where not a single bush could be found, we met, and when I turned my pockets inside out, they were full of only flower seeds.”
It was a passage from Eschatology, one of the seven scriptures.
Of the Platinum Round Table Orthodoxy's scriptures, only Soteriology and Eschatology were distributed to the public. If Soteriology was a teaching about the beginning, Eschatology was a collection of revelations that explained the end.
Soteriology foretold the sacrifice of the World God and the journey of the Hero.
Eschatology measured the time of the Demon King's appearance and the great annihilation.
“I shall ask, for what purpose are these seeds?”
Fleur read Eschatology more often than Soteriology.
There was no particular reason for it. The judgment of the World God, who sacrifices himself to achieve creation, seemed foolish, and the prophecy about the Hero’s journey was absurdly sublime and thus dull. Any hint of nobility felt like a pride that was good to recite with a firm lower abdomen.
“The traveler shall answer, it is my mother’s last cry.”
I wish this world would disappear.
She had never, ever had such a thought.
“My foolish mother had no feet, had no hands, had cut them off herself, and was nailed somewhere like a flower, merely scattering seeds.”
What would my mother have done?
I still don’t know. Fleur thought so. In the midst of the cold north, what was the world of Pertillier de Saint-Pierre, who was trapped in a castle decorated with ice walls?
“I shall ask, for what purpose are these seeds?”
Her mother's chamber was a small world.
Fleur believed so. If a plant's roots are too tough, they will break even the pot. Might it not be that her mother had plotted to destroy her own world over and over again by extending her hands, extending her feet, extending her tough roots?
Might that not be Pertillier's madness?
“The traveler shall answer, I have killed my mother.”
That is why she ends up guessing.
That perhaps her mother did not want to die, but
“My pure mother had no heart, had no soul, had fallen ill herself, and had withered somewhere like a flower, so I shook off her seeds.”
even if she had to destroy her own world,
might she not have wanted to survive somehow?
“I shall declare, that is not your mother.”
The seed buried in the soil will soon sprout, but
is the greenness of the new sprout merely beautiful? Is it not desperate?
“It is the father of us all.”
If this world is the corpse of the World God,
then the soil that makes up the heavens and earth is a vast grave, and all the flowers that sprout from it are…
“All the flowers of this world are the hands of the World God, and all the scenery of this world is the sacred body of the World God.”
might they not have been dead from the moment they sprouted?
‘You’re right, Monika.’
Did you say all the flowers here are a mess?
Fleur thought, gripping a small magic wand. The flowers that made up the greenhouse were vibrant in a more than perfect shape, but that was why they were monstrous. Some flowers should grow in spring, some in winter, some in warm places, and some in cool places, but Fleur’s greenhouse was immaculately clean and full of vitality at the same time.
‘Unlike me, you…’
Fleur waved her magic wand.
‘would be better suited to just growing flowers.’
And so it was revealed.
The spell stored in the magic wand was dismantled, and the light illusion, the everyday magic that had covered the common scent of flowers, was lifted.
The color was stripped away. The scent evaporated.
The flowers that made up the greenhouse were all withered and dried up. The blackened stems were as gaunt as the legs of an injured bird, and the thin stamens were as bleak as if they were modeled after the face of the dead. That was why a foul odor tickled Fleur’s nose. Just as the smell of decaying flesh could not be called the scent of skin, the smell of a withered flower could not be a flower’s scent.
It was nothing more than the stench of a corpse.
‘Shall I go now?’
Fleur held a smile.
The moment she was about to place the toe of her flat shoe on her shadow,
“Monika…”
Suddenly, the sound of a presence.
“...Is that you, Monika?”
Fleur’s head bobbed. As she pushed back her greenly curved hair and looked in the direction the sound came from with clear eyes,
“Good day, Fleur-nim.”
A certain boy gave a silent bow with a demure posture.
Who is this? Fleur wiped the smile from her lips. A man she didn’t remember was approaching. His brown hair was grown so shaggy, and his eyes were so thin that his pupils were not visible, and he was so ordinary in every way that it was embarrassing to keep him in her memory.
“It has been a while since we last met.”
If there was anything that caught her eye, it would be the bouquet.
The boy was holding a bouquet made of fresh flowers.
“Good day to you.”
Fleur bobbed her waist to greet him.
“I’m sorry, but this is private property. It’s embarrassing to show you a poorly managed greenhouse. If you would please leave…”
“I am Marco da Materazzi.”
So what about it?
Who on earth is Marco da Materazzi?
Fleur’s eyebrow twitched. The Materazzi family was a county in the frontier, but she had no time to pay attention to a son from there. Fleur managed a smile and swallowed a sigh. As a desire to simply chase away the man named Marco welled up,
“You don’t remember me.”
We met at the Brilliant Sun Royal Palace before….
Marco muttered with a cautious expression.
“Of course not. I remember everything.”
Fleur covered her mouth with the edge of her hand.
So that’s what it was. Come to think of it, she seemed to remember meeting him at the Brilliant Sun Royal Palace. Was it during a banquet? Or was it while strolling in the garden? She couldn't be sure. What conversation she had had with that boy, even that felt strange to Fleur.
“Surely…”
If there was anything she could be certain of,
“Marco-nim said that you admired me.”
it would probably be only that person's feelings.
Fleur thought as she removed the edge of her hand. She showed Marco a stoically hardened expression.
“That is correct.”
Marco didn’t mind.
He knelt on one knee to show his respect, then offered Fleur a colorful, tangled bouquet.
“Fleur de Saint-Pierre-nim. The moon in the capital tonight will be exceptionally beautiful. Would you not enjoy the Moonlight Day with me?”
Fleur did not answer.
She just reached out her hand. She took Marco’s bouquet and looked at it quietly. Ardisia, phalaenopsis, cockscomb…. They were all plants tied with flower language related to love. Fleur smiled slyly and buried her face in the flowers. A thoughtful scent caressed Fleur’s skin.
“Please rise, Marco-nim.”
And so, Fleur held a smile.
She opened her mouth towards Marco, gripping the bouquet.
“Although I am ignorant of the ways of the world, I have heard about the Materazzi family.”
Listening to Fleur’s voice,
Marco stood up with a gentle movement.
“You are not interested in political struggles and only rule your domain in the frontier, but you have a good relationship with your people and enjoy banquets together, is that right? That’s not all. I heard that Count Materazzi makes political decisions together with his people.”
“That is correct. The Materazzi family is…”
“You don’t have to say it.”
Marco-nim, she said.
Fleur whispered, tilting her eyes.
“I am so afraid of people like you. I am so afraid that it is difficult to keep you in my memory.”
Because you are upright.
And so, you must believe.
That children respect their parents, and parents cherish their children.
That love, consideration, friendship, you would regard all the positive feelings of this world as your nature. That a human being would naturally know how to love, know how to be considerate, and would believe they could willingly share friendship.
That is why you,
Marco-nim, would admire someone like me.
“But it’s different, Marco-nim.”
Not me.
I don’t think so.
Because I’m broken. I, Fleur de Saint-Pierre, am completely broken.
A person’s emotions are just inherited through learning. It has nothing to do with nature. If you are not loved, you cannot love. If you do not know consideration, you cannot be considerate of anyone. If you cannot feel friendship, you cannot share friendship, and if time passes like that, you can no longer go back.
“That’s exactly why. I cannot return your feelings.”
Because I cannot love someone, cannot be considerate of someone,
and I don't even know what a single grain of friendship is.
Fleur de Saint-Pierre is that kind of…
“a terrible human being.”
who makes a flower bloom,
and can’t even take care of it, letting it rot──,
“a hopeless human being.”
Marco did not move.
He was just listening quietly to Fleur’s words. Fleur, who had been speaking in a dry voice without any inflection, pursed her lips. How foolish. Why am I confessing like this, as if I have been wronged? Fleur thought, sweeping her hair back. And so, the moment she sighed and lifted her head,
“It’s alright, Fleur-nim.”
Marco smiled.
“──Because, I knew everything.”
Fleur’s light blue eyes wavered.
The outline of Marco within them became clear.
“How could I not know? I admire you. Truly. You live with a secret that you cannot confess to others buried in your heart, with a smile that seems drawn on. Fleur-nim, you seem to consider such a disposition pathological, but to me, you just seemed like a clumsy person.”
I knew everything, Fleur-nim.
The fact that my affection would never be returned.
But as you said, I, as a mere ordinary human, believe. That love, consideration, friendship, all the positive emotions of this world are connected to human nature. That you just haven't realized all those emotions.
“So, Fleur-nim.”
I do not wish to receive anything in return from you.
I wish to give it willingly. To you, who does not know affection, I just wanted to give all my affection.
By sending a love letter filled with embarrassing metaphors,
by suggesting we dance in the middle of the Brilliant Sun Royal Palace,
by all means, you will be able to live like that. By just enjoying the festival that takes place in the capital…
“...You too will be able to live an ordinary life.”
Marco gave a light, silent bow.
He then turned his back on Fleur. Marco’s footsteps, heading outside the greenhouse, seemed light.
And so, it became quiet.
Fleur stood still, holding the bouquet.
An ordinary life. What on earth is that? Fleur thought with a blank expression. If you live in an ordinary way, can you even give away affection so easily? Without receiving anything in return, just like handing over a bouquet.
I don’t know. I still don’t know. The scent that welled up from the neatly tied bouquet was just refreshing. Is this also just an ordinary gift?
“...Sir Alberge Hildeberg.”
Thump.
The toe of a flat shoe brushed against a shadow.
Alberge emerged from within the pocket plain. His spectral light flashed as he scanned the greenhouse, which was littered with withered flowers, and
<It seems your conversation with Monika-nim was a failure.>
he diagnosed the result in a calm tone.
“That’s what happened. It’s a really difficult thing.”
To convey one’s true feelings to someone…, she thought.
Fleur muttered as she placed the bouquet on the round table.
<What is that bouquet?>
“I wonder. It’s a gift from a certain kind person.”
<Are you ready?>
“...Of course.”
Fleur picked up a fountain pen and aimed it at a piece of letter paper.
An elegant script was engraved on the white paper. It was a handwriting too mature to be Fleur’s.
A special class is scheduled, so attendance is requested.
6 PM, Naflansee District 2 of the capital.
At the Arcturus family’s villa.
-Raphael de Arcturus.
A seal was stamped on the concisely written letter.
It was Raphael’s. The proof requirements possessed by the Arcturus family were tools that Fleur, the young lady of the main family, could use as much as she wanted.
<The supplies promised by the Parousia Denomination have been delivered.>
“That’s a relief. That it wasn’t late.”
Fleur sealed the letter.
She tapped it with her magic wand and transferred it.
Towards Fabien, the golem who assisted Monika.
<Will you be leaving right away?>
“Just a moment.”
A long sigh.
Fleur picked up the necklace that had been scattered on the round table. After putting it on, she straightened her clothes. She swept her sky-blue hair to fix its shape, and tightened her indifferently hardened lips. To be able to create an exceptionally clear expression.
And a flower crown. She placed a flower crown woven with colorful flowers on her head. She reached out her thin fingers and rummaged through the flowers, then plucked a marigold and tilted her eyes towards a corner.
“Lisian.”
Woof.
The reply of a dead dog was heard.
Woof.
The reply of a dog that was not dead was heard.
“You two are really close.”
Fleur approached Lisian and Thunderstorm.
A dead dog with only bones left, and a dog that had recently become plump and was not dead. She bent down and sat towards those two dogs. Fleur stroked Thunderstorm once, then tilted the marigold towards Lisian’s skull.
“How was it, Lisian.”
Between the gaps in the bleak skull,
a bright yellow marigold was placed.
“Were you satisfied to meet your husband dog?”
Fleur’s sleeve slipped down.
And so, the stigmata was revealed. Numerous knife cuts were engraved on Fleur’s wrist.
“When I made contact with the underworld, I read your emotions, and you wanted to live again more than anything, but…”
Whine.
Lisian stretched out its front paw with a whimper.
Lisian’s bone touched Fleur’s wrist. It was cold. Lisian looked up at Fleur with its spectral light tilted thinly.
“...The time has come.”
Be well, she said.
Fleur stood up, whispering softly.
The floor of the greenhouse made of insulation, the shadow of Fleur engraved there flickered for a moment. As if everything that filled the shadow was screaming.
<Let us depart, my lady. It is time for action.>
Alberge stood on Fleur’s shadow.
To the message of the knight with only bones left, Fleur smiled faintly and nodded.
“Alright.”
Alberge melting into Fleur’s shadow.
“Let’s go.”
After glancing once at the back where Alberge had disappeared,
“To end everything.”
Fleur did not look back anymore.
She took a light step and headed for the greenhouse exit. She opened the glass door heated by the sun, and, stepping on the rustling fallen leaves, she melted into the crowd. As one student joked with another, as one student sang with another, as one student praised the Moonlight Day,
‘Mother.’
Fleur thought quietly.
‘My mother.’
The deserted greenhouse was steeped in silence.
Only the occasional cries of the two dogs, nestled together, could be heard. The withered flowers remained black even in the sunlight, and only the bouquet on the round table was foolishly vibrant.
‘Where are you?’
Then, suddenly, a chill was engraved on the glass surface of the greenhouse.
A thick fog settled, and frost-covered cracks began to be engraved. As if a plant was taking root in the soil, as if a rough hand was scratching the boundary surface, the surrounding glass became covered in cracks and the bright sunlight vanished.
‘I call your name like this…’
In the middle of the darkened greenhouse.
A wind blew from somewhere, and
‘I thought you might be in the underworld, so I searched over and over again…’
a black woman appeared.
The evil spirit Monika had seen at the training ground. The skin of her entire body was melting, and she was a woman with only bones left, wrapped in a black mist. She glided inside the greenhouse, shaking the withered flowers. A gust of wind that did not seem to be of this world blew in, and the flowers that had already died shook as if they had come back to life.
‘...Mother.’
Fleur thought, and
<Fleur…>
the black woman muttered.
‘Please, look at Fleur.’
<Where are you, Fleur.>
‘Please take care of Fleur.’
<I feel you so strongly…>
‘Please love Fleur.’
<...Why can’t I reach you.>
The black woman’s gaze tilted in all directions.
But it was meaningless. Death was a moment that would forever stand still, and it could never catch up to the speed of life.
‘I am here.’
<──Gone! Gone! Gone! Gone!>
The black woman wailed.
A grotesque scream, as if mired in mud, echoed, and the withered leaves that made up the greenhouse stirred violently.
‘Mother, my mother.’
<Fleur, Fleeeeur──.>
There would be only one person left.
A person who would declare even such a woman beautiful.
‘You are truly beautiful today as well.’
* * *
Meanwhile, in the slums of the capital Naflansee.
Iron plates, wood, and cloth. Buildings, built from all sorts of materials, were tangled together like a fortress, and
‘This is…’
Creak.
The sound of a door opening.
‘the culprit’s hideout?’
Abel had just entered a certain building.
A ball of thread formed by the fourth chapter of the Underworld Theory, ‘The Thread that Connects the Labyrinth’, was on his right hand. The red threads extending from it were connected to the dead. The dead, who had been roaming the capital according to their instincts, had finally stopped.
At the end of tracking the one who had killed them.
‘How strange.’
Most of the buildings in the slums were empty.
The owners had disappeared. Just as Monika had lived in an abandoned funeral home, they would either flee in the night or be killed every day. The labyrinthine buildings were no different from caves found during a journey. It would have been fine to stay in an abandoned building for a few days.
‘What is the culprit’s identity?’
The inside of the building was extremely chaotic.
An excessively expanded spiderweb hung down, and at the same time, insect eggs were scattered on the floor.
A tattered Platinum Round Table Orthodoxy scripture, a soiled teddy bear and toys, a worn Platinum Round Table Orthodoxy symbol, and graffiti that looked like it was drawn with crayons. It seemed a religious person had stayed here, and it also seemed a child had stayed here.
- I no longer feel anything.
- Are we too late?
- Why is no one here?
Abel ignored the whispers of the dead and went on.
Warmth remained in the building. He must have missed him by a hair's breadth.
<God of War, Lantern.>
Abel’s lips twitched.
The first chapter of the War Theory, ‘Lantern of the Battlefield’, was cast.
With a light forged from divine power on his left hand, and gripping the ball of thread with his right, Abel stood facing the inner wall that spread out in the deepest part of the building.
- Stop, cleric. It is time to keep the contract.
- Do you still have business with us?
- Did you not promise? That you would guide us to the underworld.
A map of the capital was fixed on the inner wall.
It must have been to formulate a plan. A red line indicated the direction of infiltration, and a blue line indicated the escape route.
The target became clear.
Raphael de Arcturus, and also Fleur de Saint-Pierre.
The names of the two people were scrawled at the destination.
‘The culprit’s destination is…’
The 2nd district of the capital, the Arcturus family’s villa.
‘There’s no time.’
Abel dismantled the ‘Lantern of the Battlefield’.
As the surroundings darkened, ‘The Thread that Connects the Labyrinth’ was also retrieved. The red ball of thread scattered, and a wind began to blow. Without a specific direction, as if endlessly rotating inside the space. The souls that had lost control had begun to run wild.
- What is this! Are you planning to abandon us!
- No. I can’t see. Which way do I have to go to reach the underworld?
- Keep your vow! If you leave us like this, we will become evil spirits!
──Salvation, salvation, salvation, salvation, salvation!
The moment the cries of the dead blew in with the wind,
“That’s right.”
Abel opened his mouth.
Facing the door of the building.
“I certainly promised you. That I would guide you to the underworld myself.”
Abel looked back.
The wind stopped, and silence descended.
“But it can’t be helped.”
A faint smile spread on Abel’s lips.
At the same time, thud.
“For some reason, it seems I will be disturbed.”
The entrance of the building opened roughly.
“Of course.”
Along with that, a woman’s voice echoed.
The dead simultaneously thought. That they had heard it somewhere before.
But they didn't believe it. Because she would not use such a polite tone.
“I do not guide sinners to the underworld.”
A pitch-black evening dress, and along with it, a black mesh veil.
A woman, dressed all in black, stood with the sunset at her back.
“I just…”
The woman, Iris, extended her hand.
While raising her light pink eyes coldly.
“...obliterate them all.”
Sound, sound, sound.
The cries of the dead tore through the withered space.
It was only for a moment that they blew in like a mere wind. The cries of the dead faded like a dying ember.
Without reaching the underworld, without experiencing the process of reincarnation,
they flickered out like a flickering lantern.