Chapter 159: The Last Procession (6)
Misha pressed her lips together until they hurt. She understood Luka’s choice, and that only made it worse because understanding did not make it feel any less like abandonment.
People loved talking about courage as though it always looked noble from a distance. They imagined somebody standing their ground with a weapon in hand, refusing to leave anyone behind no matter how hopeless the situation became, but sometimes, courage looked uglier than that.
Sometimes, it meant admitting one person could not be carried without dragging everyone else into the grave with them, and sometimes it meant lettering someone decide how they wanted to spend the last few minutes they had left.
Since Luka had made that choice for himself, Misha had no right to rip it away simply because she hated what it meant. She swallowed the protest still lodged in her throat, forced her fingers to loosen around Caius’ shoulder, and started to turn away.
"Let’s go–"
The words barely left her mouth before a System window flashed across her vision.
「 Constellation Soul within the Capricorn Chamber Requesting Authorization. 」
"Huh?" Misha stared at the message, then another window appeared as soon as the first vanished.
「 Constellation Soul within the Capricorn Chamber Requesting Authorization. 」
「 Constellation Soul within the Capricorn Chamber Requesting Authorization. 」
「 Constellation Soul within the Capricorn Chamber Requesting Authorization. 」
A chill slid down Misha’s spine, and for once it had nothing to do with the Hushers closing in on them.
「 Constellation Soul within the Capricorn Chamber Requesting Authorization. 」
Olivia liked bloodshed, and usually treated possession as an opportunity to indulge in that. This did not feel like that.
"Please..." Luka dragged in a breath that shook halfway through. His eyes were wet, but he forced himself to meet hers. "Leave me while I... while I still have the courage to choose this for myself."
The honesty in his voice landed harder than it should have. He was frightened, and he did not bother pretending otherwise.
Then, a child cried out.
"Mama!"
Misha’s head snapped toward the left side of the road. The mother who had carried the sleeping boy was struggling near the left wall. Her son ran beside her now, his short legs unable to match her stride. She dragged him by one hand while trying to shield him with her body.
"Keep looking at the Bell House," she told him, though panic shredded her voice. "Don’t look behind you, sweetheart. We’re almost there. Just keep moving."
The boy shook his head, sobbing. "I can’t, Mama. My legs hurt..."
"I know..." Her voice cracked, but she forced a strained smile down at him. "I know they do. Just a little farther..."
His shoe caught between two broken stones. He fell, and his mother’s arms jerked backward hard enough to pull her off balance. She recovered quickly, lifted him into her arms, and tried to run with his weight pressed against her chest.
The consequence showed at once. Her stride shortened, and the distance between her and the survivors ahead began to widen.
Luka saw it too. His fingers tightened around his sword hilt as he looked from the mother and the child to Misha, then toward the Hushers closing behind Astrid’s scattered shots. Two more Blackthorn members had broken from Dorian’s formation earlier just to help her hold them back.
"I’ll buy you time. T... They need you more than I do." Luka’s voice cracked, but he forced them out anyway. "They need you more than I do. Dorian was right about that much."
Another System window flashed across Misha’s sight.
「 Constellation Soul within the Capricorn Chamber Requesting Authorization. 」
Misha stared at it. One thing she knew for certain was that she would not save everyone, and the Tower had only made the lesson crueler. But there was a difference between unable to save everyone and deciding she had already reached the limit of what she could try.
She did not need to wipe out every Husher, and she did not need to turn the entire Floor around. She only needed time, enough time for Luka to move, enough time for the mother to carry her son, and enough time for the remaining survivors who had fallen behind to reach the Bell House before the dead closed the gap.
"Cai," she whispered. "I know I’m asking for too much but–"
"I know." A faint smile touched his mouth, gentle enough to make something twist painfully in her chest. "I’ll support you with everything I can, just like last time."
Misha stared at him for half a second before heaving out a sigh. ’This boy.’
She reached up and ruffled his blond hair.
Caius went completely still. His eyes widened, not dramatically, but with enough quiet offense that Misha would have enjoyed the reaction properly if several hundred corpses were not currently trying to kill them.
"I do not remember consenting to this."
"Too bad." She forced herself straighter despite the tremor running through her legs, then drew Twinfang from their sheaths.
「 Constellation Soul within the Capricorn Chamber Requesting Authorization. 」
Misha’s grip tightened around the daggers.
"I said I’d protect them," she whispered, her lips curving beneath the mask. "So I’m going to fucking deliver."
「 Constellation Soul within the Capricorn Chamber Requesting Authorization. 」
"Come, Olivia."
「 Authorization Accepted. 」
「 Possession Initializing... 」
「 Control Transfer Complete.
Possession Time Remaining: 00:25:00 」
Olivia Bloodthorne stepped in.
Misha’s sagging body straightened once more as though invisible strings had pulled her upright. Her shoulders settled, and her exhausted muscles drew taut beneath a will that treated pain not as a limitation but as an inconvenience that could be acknowledged whenever survival became less demanding.
Amber light burned through Misha’s eyes.
Olivia did not look toward the Hushers, she looked at Luka. More precisely, at the crest stitched across his chest.
The broken crown wrapped in thorns held her attention for several long seconds. The usual amusement disappeared from her face beneath the mask, and there was no delighted spark at the prospect of murder.
Olivia became completely still. Then, she turned toward Dorian.
The current Guildmaster was already far ahead beside the funeral cart, helping force the procession toward the Bell House.
"So," she murmured, her voice carried no humor at all. "Some things truly do not change."
Misha hovered beside her own body, looking at it in confusion. "What do you mean?"
Olivia ignored her. Her gaze returned to Luka’s insignia, and pressed her lips together for a second. Then, she crouched beside him. "You shall not be abandoned today, young thorn.".
The title seemed to unsettle Luka for reasons he could not immediately explain. He had heard Dorian call his people guild members, Blackthorn, and subordinates, but he had never heard him address one of them like that.
She reached out and touched two fingers to the broken crown embroidered on his shoulder.
"A thorn willing to bare steel when the hand above it withdraws is still worth keeping."
Then she rose and turned toward the other two Blackthorn struggling to help Astrid.
"A promising thorn needs to survive."
Just before a Husher lunged at one of them, Twinfang left Olivia’s hand in a black-silver blur and struck the corpse’ head.
「 You have killed a Husher!
EXP +90 」
"Come."
Before the body finished collapsing, the dagger ripped free, spun once through the air, and struck neatly into her waiting palm.
A second Husher lunged before the first touched the road, and Olivia stepped toward it. She caught its wrist, redirected the arm past her body’s shoulder, and drove Twinfang upward beneath the jaw. Then she twisted the dagger through the roof of its mouth and into the skull.
「 You have killed a Husher!
EXP +90 」
There was no laughter, or a delighted little chuckle coming from her. Olivia loved fighting. More accurately, she loved the thrill of violence, and the control of it. This time, she fought like the class attached to her actually meant something. Executioner.
Astrid fired past her shoulder.
The ice-coated round struck another Husher through the chest. Frost spread across its ribs in a branching white web before Olivia pivoted and drove Misha’s heel into the frozen section.
Then, Caius stepped onto her right. Purple lightning crawled over Valecyr’s shaft and gathered around the spearhead in small, restrained arcs before he drove it into a Husher’s head.
The corpse’s entire body seized before collapsing sideways.
Astrid fired again while Olivia moved along with Caius, and the three of them settled into something resembling a line across the road.
Misha watched the road behind them. More survivors were reaching the Bell House, but they needed more time for those who had fallen behind to catch up.
Then, the funeral cart passed fully into the Bell House.
The change was immediate as soon as it did. One second, the Hushers were charging, and the next, every corpse stopped.
A Husher less than three paces from Olivia froze mid-step, one clawed hand raised toward her shoulder. Another remained bent low beside a Blackthorn member, blackened teeth exposed as if it had been about to bite.
Silence spread down the road. Then, one by one, the Hushers lowered themselves and knelt. Their hands came together.
Inside the Bell House, something ancient moved, then a deep metallic toll rolled outward across the Floor.
The same creature that had been sprinting after them only seconds earlier returned to the posture they had first seen. Only this time, the Hushers bowed their heads lower.
Ding!
「 〔FLOOR QUEST COMPLETE〕
«The Last Procession»
The funeral body had reached the Bell House.
The Last Procession has been completed. 」