LIGHTNOVELSTORY Chapter 33 - Nightmare.
[Trait: {????} has interfered with thoughts.]
[Modifying…]
[Trait: {????} has detected infected unidentified data.]
[Deleting…]
[Impossible.]
[Item has already been transferred to {Target: Aaron Dight}.]
[Reviewing file deletion…]
[Impossible.]
[This penalty window {Avalon} ‘s modification authority level cannot arbitrarily delete {File: Memory} without {Target: Aaron Dight} ‘s secondary permission.]
[Reviewing countermeasures.]
[Using already transferred unidentified data as {File: Dream} instead of {Target: Aaron Dight} ‘s {File: Memory}.]
[Simultaneously with consumption in {File: Dream}, moving unidentified data to {File: Delusion} category.]
[Deleting {File: Delusion}.]
[……]
[Confirmed]
[Countermeasure approved.]
[Executing.]
—–
-Thump thump
I walked down the corridor where the moonlight was streaming in.
Gripping different types of longswords in each hand so tightly that my palms were stained red, I walked down the ornately decorated corridor with an expressionless face and unfocused eyes.
-Thump thump
Though it was just walking, the footsteps carried such determination.
At the end of the corridor,
There was a massive gate.
My hands trembled briefly but soon formed into fists filled with resolve and reached for the gate before me.
The gate flew away, and beyond it swirled a cloud of dust.
“So you’ve come at last.”
As if knowing I would come, an elderly voice filled with power came from beyond the smoke.
Soon, the smoke cleared.
What appeared were dozens of swordsmen.
“Little butler. Would you cut us down to pass through here?”
The old swordsman, who seemed to be commanding the others, asked while gripping the handle at his waist.
A proposal like a plea carrying the meaning of finality.
After briefly agonizing, grinding my lips until they bled, I shook off my hesitation and opened my mouth.
“Yes.”
The old swordsman lowered his head briefly at my answer.
“Little butler… do you really have to go beyond here? Even now…”
The old swordsman tried to persuade him, taking his hand off the sword at his waist.
His eyes reddening as if recalling old memories with me.
But,
“Master, you were the one who taught me that a butler must risk their life for their master. Even now, aren’t you standing before me to protect your master?”
I merely steadied my stance and steeled my resolve.
“Haha… who would have thought I’d end up blocking my own disciple’s path like this.”
Having confirmed my determination, the old man drew his sword and pointed it at me.
And I, briefly lowering the swords in both hands, bowed.
“Then, die he-”
-Splash
Before the old man could finish speaking, his head fell into a puddle.
No.
It fell onto the blue carpet soaked with blood.
“Farewell, Master.”
-Thud thud thud
Simultaneously, the necks of the many swordsmen beside the old man fell.
But even with their necks severed, their hands still gripped the swords they were drawing.
That sight clearly showed just how formidable these swordsmen were.
“Thank you, servant brothers and sisters.”
He, covered in the swordsmen’s blood, moved forward carefully between them so as not to disturb their sword-gripping postures.
Not knowing whether what flowed down my cheeks was tears or the blood of those who had been like family, I had to pass through them.
My footsteps, which had been almost running until just now, gradually slowed.
The more I moved forward to pass through them, the more faces I saw rolling on the floor.
Faces I knew were rolling through the corridor.
When I tried to run past, not wanting to see them, heads I had cut rolled in puddles of blood whose owners I couldn’t identify.
Each time that sight entered my eyes, nausea rose bit by bit as if regretting my actions.
“Urgh…!”
Finally, vomit rose until it filled my mouth.
But I grabbed my mouth with one hand as if to tear it, holding back the vomit, while with the other hand, I began hitting my chest hard enough to bruise.
Like that, for several minutes, I beat my weakening legs among the headless corpses, standing like statues, even leaning against the wall to hold back the nausea.
“Huff… huff…”
Finally, I somehow managed to swallow back the risen vomit.
“This… is the responsibility I must feel… no matter how disgusting, I must bear…”
To not run away from the guilt and self-loathing that came from cutting down those who were like family.
I knew better than anyone that if I fell to my knees here, I would be trapped by the rushing emotions and unable to stand again.
Amid nauseating sickness and headache, I wiped off the vomit on my hands.
Leading my staggering body out of the room, I walked down the connecting corridor.
Though my legs were merely stained with blood, that blood was heavier than any shackles in prison.
That was what guilt was.
Wearing those shackles, I finally reached the end of the corridor.
There was another massive door and a man standing as if guarding it.
Walking down the corridor as if limping, he straightened his collar and bowed to the man before him.
“Greetings, Great Master.”
After a moment of silence, came the response.
“You’ve cut down all your family to come here?”
“Yes. Because I couldn’t find a way to break the hypnosis you placed on them.”
Though the answer came so quickly it could have cut off his words, I merely answered before hesitation could surge in.
If I hesitated now, I might never have acknowledged it, just repeating excuses to myself forever.
Because I would have tried to run from my sins.
So I smiled.
I grinned.
Wide enough to show teeth.
Wanting to hide from myself, at least this pain stabbing my chest.
“You. It’s not too late even now. Go back.”
Why were his eyes trembling as if about to shed tears?
“Impossible. It’s already too late.”
Clearly, though I was smiling, why did my eyes hurt?
“You are no longer a butler of House Cabala. Not even a slave. There’s no reason to risk your life.”
Right.
I am no longer a butler.
“Even if you get past me now, nothing will change!”
No.
“It will change. I will change it.”
I looked at the massive gate behind him.
“Why… you don’t even know what’s behind there!”
“No. I know. At least more than you do.”
Seeing my eyes and realizing it wasn’t a lie, he stared at me with blank eyes.
“You, you know what that is and still want to go?”
“Yes.”
“Why on earth? Don’t you know that’s a being that several Swordmasters like me charging in together couldn’t do anything against?”
Bewilderment showed on his face that he couldn’t comprehend.
“No. I know that too.”
How could mere Swordmasters be a comparison? Even several Grand Masters that supposedly exist in the setting couldn’t even approach that thing.
“Then why on earth are you trying to go! Nothing will change by going there now!”
What I felt from his appearance was fear, not anger.
“One thing, you’re misunderstanding.”
I corrected one thing in his words.
“It’s not that I’m trying to go. It’s that I must go because someone is calling me.”
“You…”
“I don’t want to go either. I’m scared. I don’t want to die.”
My voice began trembling beyond my own control.
“But you see, I accidentally made a promise to my master.”
Though trembling, though scared. I convinced myself with words rather than thoughts to steel my resolve.
“When I cry, when I’m scared, I would at least throw a handkerchief from beside.”
“……”
“So now, please step aside.”
Wiping my eyes mixed with blood and tears, I gripped the swords in both hands until they bled.
“Because over there, beyond there, my master is crying.”
The man dropped his sword with a hollow laugh.
“It seems you’re more like her family than someone like me, after all.”
“Do you still think of yourself as a father when you sacrificed your daughter as an offering for fear of losing your power?”
“Haha… now that you say it, it seems so.”
I passed by him as if ignoring him, and he lowered his head with closed eyes as if asking to be cut down.
“Why…”
“Don’t misunderstand. You still have something you must do.”
Grabbing his bowed head by the hair as if to tear it off, I met his eyes.
“You need to apologize to your daughter who suffered in there after being abandoned by you, before you die.”
The man rolled helplessly on the ground as I threw down his head that I had grabbed by the hair.
“You’re still an adult, even if a cowardly one. If so, take responsibility for yourself.”
I turned my head and walked forward, leaving him pressing his head to the ground.
“That’s the least you could do for her.”
The swords in both hands filled with aura.
Swinging them widely in a cross shape, I cut down the door.
And what was inside…
“Aa…ron…”
Was my master.
“Master. I’m sorry I’m late.”
I immediately cut away the filthy branches holding her.
Carefully catching her as she fell, I gently stroked her head.
“You’re… too late…”
My master’s voice was hoarse from crying so much.
I wiped away the tears flowing from her eyes, which seemed to have dried up.
At the same time, I touched her arms.
“As I thought… you were already being eaten.”
My master whose arms had disappeared, not by cuts or burns but by something else.
Though there was no blood flowing or burn marks, her arms had vanished as if they had never existed.
And I knew the cause.
“Could you wait just a little longer?”
While stroking her head, I carefully bowed to set her down.
“No… don’t… go…!”
When I tried to put her down, she bit my shoulder with all her might.
Not wanting to be separated, begging me not to go.
She cried out with her hoarse voice many times, but I couldn’t do that.
Now that her arms had already been eaten by that thing, this was the only way to reverse it.
“Gwen.”
How long has it been since I called her name in front of her?
She stopped her flowing tears when I called her name.
“I’ll be back.”
I smiled brightly as I bid her farewell.
Wanting to hide my trembling hands.
Wanting to stop myself from running away right now.
—–
“Aah!”
Aaron shot up from bed, flailing both arms.
“Huff… huff…”
Taking deep breaths, he calmed his excited self for a moment.
“Phew. My chest finally feels a bit lighter.”
Perhaps it was the effect of continued deep breathing. The heaviness that had remained throughout his body disappeared.
He placed his hand on his pounding chest.
“Somehow… it was really suffocating.”
Inexplicable stuffiness felt even while sleeping.
Not just pressure, but pain as if stabbing his chest.
“Maybe I had sleep paralysis.”
If not that, then a bad nightmare.
“What was it?”
Though he couldn’t remember the exact content, faint visions remained bit by bit.
“Master-”
Huh?
“What did I just say?”
Why can’t I remember what I just said?
—–
[Successfully dele-]
-Crackle
[Is this method of passing it on too forceful after all…]
-Crackle
[-ted the unidentified data.]