Beams of golden light enveloped Shion. The streaks of light were tangled like a skein of thread and turned into a golden chain.
As he had done on the island of Athens, he seemed to have once again taken away all the power that had been used in the capital's defenses.
It was a splendid sight, but Odette could no longer look at Shion. The deeper she was sucked into the disaster, the stronger the pull on her.
"I feel like my limbs are going to be torn."
The force of Odette's body was pulled in all directions, and her skin and muscles were tightened.
Moreover, as she fell deeper into the calamity, the walls of the plague were covered with long, sharp teeth.
They pounced on Odette, trying to bite at her flesh.
'It hurts. It hurts, it hurts! It hurts so much!'
Wow. One of them grazed her shoulder, and a burning pain came over her. A scream of terrible pain escaped from Odette's throat, but the scourge's sucking power swallowed it up.
"Odette!"
Then Shion flew over her and embraced her.
His left arm supported her waist with warmth. Shion broke the tooth that was pressing against her with his remaining right hand.
"Even if it's unpleasant, you're still in my arms. If you do something wrong, you'll get hurt badly."
After whispering, he pulled her close to him with his arms. He seemed to be trying hard not to create a gap between the two.
'...hurts...'
Odette nodded helplessly. If she struggled to hate this embrace, she was sure that her body would be torn apart by those teeth.
Holding her in his arms, Shion muttered a command. He heard the golden glowing eyes and the rattling of chains of light beneath his feet.
It seemed that he was trying to stop the disaster with his senses.
"Damn it. Why doesn't it work?"
It didn't seem to do much.
"Damn..."
Shion, who was singing in a low voice, changed his strategy.
Instead of stopping the catastrophe, the golden chain focused on cutting the teeth that were about to attack Odette.
Chaeng!
The sound of chains tightening rang in Odette's ears endlessly.
Every time Odette flinched in surprise, Shion whispered in her ear as if to soothe.
"It's okay, Odette. You're safe. You don't have to be afraid."
It is not very convincing to say in the stomach of a disaster that it is no different from hell.
How long has it been since I fell into the endless abyss? In the distance beneath her feet, she could see what looked like a dot of pure white light. She knew it instinctively. That point is the end of the disaster.
They fell to a white dot in an Instant.
The moment they fell, a black splash and a sound of cold water enveloped her whole body.
Bubbly.
Odette heard the sound of dark air bubbles.
"This is..."
The fishy and salty taste came into her mouth and nose at once. With a familiar feeling, Odette could recognize the Identity of this place.
'It's deep.'
Odette gasped at the sensation of water entering her lungs.
She could breathe in the seawater, but strangely. It was hard to breathe in this water. It was as if the rotting water of the corpse was rushing into her lungs.
'Shion, this guy can't breathe underwater at all!'
Just as she was thinking about it urgently, she remembered the status window with a ringing sound.
['The Master of the Status Window' has reached the World Tree!]
[Status window forms a protective shield to protect its owner!]
'...World Tree?'
This place that is as black as the belly of a disaster is the World Tree?
Without even having time to understand the phrase, the status window created a protective shield that looked like a giant soap bubble.
Only after the transparent curtain surrounded Shion and Odette was Odette able to breathe comfortably.
"...Hah."
Odette slumped to the floor behind the curtain and realized that she was still embraced by Shion.
Odette spoke to Shion.
"Your Excellency. Please loosen your arm."
"..."
"Your Excellency?"
Despite Odette's request, Shion still hugged her tightly.
"What...?"
Odette pulled herself up and slipped out of Shion's embrace. At that moment, Shion's body fluttered to the floor, and she collapsed with a sound.
It was then that she saw Shion's face.
"...Sir?"
Odette was stunned. Shion was completely covered in blood.
Both ears and one eye were torn off as if they had been bitten by an animal. His left arm was also torn near his shoulder and completely severed.
He seemed to hold on to his severed left arm with his right hand in place.
So that Odette in his arms would not be hurt.
"Are you crazy? How can you be like this?"
An uncharacteristically leaky voice came out of Odette's throat. Shion groaned low and raised his upper body.
"That's it. It's okay."
However, his words did not continue. The pain was unbearable because Shion bit his lip.
His left arm, which he had missed, fell to the floor with a loud hung.
"Your Excellency! I'm bleeding so hard right now..."
"That's it....After all, I'm a regenerative body. I still wanted to replace it with a new arm, but it went well."
"...Is it time to get a form? In the yard where the eyes, ears, and arms were ripped off alive?"
"It's bearable... Originally, the Intelligence Department started with pain tolerance training. If you whine that some of your extremities have been cut off, you won't be able to live as a transcendent."
His eyes, ears, and arms, none of them extremities, but Shion responded with a light, light voice.
On the subject of cold sweat because of the pain.
Odette's gaze fell to Shion's left arm, which had fallen to the ground. On his wrist, where the cufflinks were unbuttoned, there was a deep scar that had been cut and drawn.
The scars that Odette once saw and overlooked.
"Why are you doing this?"
Guilt appeared in her voice.
Shion was still disgusted and displeased, but she was not so heartless that she didn't mind seeing him ruined like this in front of her.
It was then that Shion's voice, which had been light all along, became heavier.
"Why do you feel guilty?"
"..."
"You don't have to feel guilty about me. I am alive to be used by you relentlessly."
"Are you doing this because I'm a purifier? If you get hurt or die, you're in trouble?"
Odette is distressed that Shion was hurt because of her. She was tired.
Unless there was something like hatred at stake, she didn't want to exchange any debt of heart with him.
"Do the Transcendent have a duty to protect the Purifier?"
The male lord and the evil woman. Transcendents and False Purifiers.
Isn't it best to end the bad relationship in the previous life with the bad relationship in this life? In this lifetime, she didn't want to be involved with them in any way.
Moreover, Shion hated her outright.
Shion stared at her. Even though blood was dripping from one eye, his gaze was calm.
"I didn't think it was that complicated."
"...What?"
"I just didn't want to see you get hurt. What is a purifier? Do you think you are crying because you are in pain?"
Odette was speechless.
'....Why... Your attitude towards me will change.'
It was uncomfortable. It was better to hate and loathe her. She's already used to it.
'Why... Now that I've given up on everything. Why...!'
Perhaps sensing her feelings, Shion changed the mood with a light joke.
"If you are worried about it, you can blow it to get better quickly."
She feels rather downset by such an attitude. She thinks he cares about her just like that.
"..."
After being silent for a long time, Odette finally sighed.
"Come closer."
"...Do you really want me to blow?... There we go. I was kidding. When you look at this hideous thing, you just throw away your eyes."
"Don't talk nonsense."
It sounds like an arc. What if she blew something like wind into his arm that was completely torn?
She reached out to Shion. She was going to purify him.
So that his pain can be alleviated. She thought that would relieve some of the pain.
But Odette couldn't hold his hand.
Ring.
With the sound, there was a curtain separating the two.
"Huh...?"
Shion's voice on the other side of the curtain was completely cut off.
Shion was startled and rushed at the curtain to break the curtain with her body, but she couldn't hear anything from the other side.
Ring
Again. The notification in the status screen rang.
[ Hello, Odette? ]
"...!"
It was him.
[ Finally, you ]
[ Watch out the door ]
[ Just remember this, Odette. What you have is the clearest. ]
Two years ago, he had been talking to Odette endlessly through the status window
The one who disappeared as soon as she awakened was a purifier.
[ Welcome to the World Tree. ]
He was talking to Odette again.
How could this be? How does he always talk to her at the most urgent and Important moments?
"What are you...? Why are you suddenly talking to me now?"
Odette asked about the status window in a trembling voice
[ I'm the status window, you're the owner of the status window. ]
The answer came back.
"You know what I'm asking? That's not a good enough answer. Give me the right answer."
Odette's voice was firm.
This time, she was going to get a proper answer from him somehow.
"Who the hell are you? What is it? How do you show up every time, at the most critical moment?"
After a bit of silence, the status window said:
[ Some people call me the first transcendental. ]
[ I don't want to be called that to you. ]
...The First Transcendents.
Odette took a breath.
One who was born as a transcendent and dared to kill a god and become a god himself, and who is considered to have given up becoming a god with his own hands.
Then, is it God who spoke to her?
[ I've been waiting for you for a very long time, so call me by my name. ]
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