Fremd Torturchen - Volume 5 - Chapter 6

6

Searching for Answers

Now that they knew that the Butcher had escaped, they had to act fast.

Leaving the warm, comfortable campsite behind them, Kaito and the others plunged once more into the world of ice and snow.

The air shimmered and sparkled as it had before. The snowflakes were unchanged, too, still piled high atop the vast plain of ice. The scenery before them was radiant and beautiful, as though they’d stepped inside a snow globe.

The vast, endless snowscape seemed just the same as ever.

Kaito’s group, on the other hand, had expanded. At the end of their procession stood Lute, clad in thick winter gear due to his inability to use magic. As the copper wolf stared straight ahead, Kaito called out to him.

“Are you sure you wanna come with us? There’s no telling what’s gonna happen after we catch up with the Butcher, you know.”

“Whatever are you talking about? Sitting idly by after being insulted so would be a disgrace to my name as a warrior. And you say that this escapee of yours is not only the Apostle who summoned us to the World’s End but may even know the Saint’s whereabouts?! Why, how could I not pursue him?!”

Lute’s ears perked up as he gave his determined reply. However, he had ordered his subordinates to wait on standby at the camp. He’d claimed that too large a group would be too conspicuous, but that was likely just a pretense. He probably intended to personally take full responsibility if things went south with the Church. Kaito had been concerned about the extent of Lute’s resolve, but he hadn’t stopped him.

Everyone’s got pride, something they refuse to back down from. Right now, it’s probably for the best if I just don’t say anything.

With Lute having joined their ranks, Kaito had decided to leave Vlad sealed in his jewel. The jewel in question was shaking at regular intervals as though trying to express its displeasure. Kaito, however, staunchly ignored it.

With Lute added and Vlad subtracted, the five of them advanced, spearheaded by Gargantua.

In the end, they’d decided to head for the Church’s encampment.

They were aware of the risk that they’d run into the Church’s main force, but the amount of information they had on the Butcher’s whereabouts was fundamentally deficient. In order to get a sense of which way he’d fled, they’d decided to covertly track the Church’s movements.

In order to avoid getting into a fight, all Deus Ex Machinas besides Gargantua were hard at work searching for their foes.

It appeared that the Grave Keeper had left on foot. Her footprints were so faint, they hardly seemed to be there at all, but Gargantua followed them unhesitatingly. At present, it was equipped with extra parts specifically for that purpose. After borrowing Jabberwocky’s warped glass, it had fashioned what appeared to be a pair of eyes. They were enlarged, as though they were looking through glasses, and they swiveled and turned as Gargantua made its pointy way across the icy ground.

The plan had been for Gargantua to switch off with Pantagruel once the Grave Keeper’s footprints faded so it could track her by her mana. However, it didn’t look like that would be necessary. Kaito and the others continued following Gargantua in silence.

No matter how far they went, the scenery never changed. That, in and of itself, was unsettling.

If all of it is beautiful, then it kinda feels like everything in it is dead.

A chill ran down Kaito’s spine, one completely unrelated to the cold. The notion that they were merely going around in circles began captivating him. Right as it did, though, Gargantua came to a sudden stop.

Thrusting one leg into the ice to use as a fulcrum, the automaton spun around. It turned to face Jeanne and rattled its head up and down. It was clearly conveying something to her, as Jeanne quietly nodded back.

“Ah, I understand now. C’mon, ya lumps! Keep up!”

Jeanne and Gargantua changed course. Turning to the side, they set out perpendicularly from where they had stopped. Kaito found it rather difficult to believe that the Grave Keeper had traveled in such a bizarre manner.

It would appear that the two of them had stopped following the Grave Keeper’s tracks altogether.

But then where are they going?

Right as doubts started crossing through Kaito’s mind, though, Gargantua stopped and began walking parallel to their original route.

Kaito and the others followed after it. As they did, the scenery around them began gradually changing. The ground began sloping up at a much more noticeable angle than the hill they’d visited earlier. Kaito found himself on the verge of slipping a number of times. Each time, though, Hina successfully managed to support him. Constantly thanking her, Kaito laboriously made his way up the silvery hill.

Especially large snowflakes began crunching under his feet, and he called ahead to Jeanne.

“So why’d we stop following the footprints and come this way instead?”

“The number of sets of prints increased. Do you know why that is, mister?”

“…The Grave Keeper must have met up with her subordinates. We must be near their camp.”

“Precisely. A keen hypothesis, coming from The Fool. Furthermore, the Deus Ex Machinas share information among themselves. According to Pantagruel, this cliff is the optimal location from which to observe their camp. Also, do make sure you avoid walking in front of Gargantua. Falling to your death before we meet our first foe would be a hell of a bad joke!”

Kaito cocked his head, confused by Jeanne’s warning. It sounded like there was a cliff in front of them, sure, but not even he was dumb enough to just fall over its edge. A moment later, he took it all back.

Gargantua had come to an abrupt stop. Before it lay nothingness.

The ground in front of its silver legs had cleanly vanished. It was like someone had carved it off with a knife, then stuck a fork in it and carried it away. No normal cliff declined so sharply.

Oh man, I would totally have fallen off there.

Narrowly stopping as well, Kaito broke out in an internal cold sweat. He timidly peeked over the edge.

He could make out the Church’s camp way down below. A number of tents were lined up in orderly, systematic intervals. Each one bore at least two flags emblazoned with white lilies and images of the Saint. Fires were lit throughout the camp, illuminating it amid the snow. They were clearly having to put much more work into maintaining their heat than the beastfolk had.

They’d probably even put their camp’s back to a cliff in order to stave off some of the wind chill.

The speck-like people in the camp were hustling and bustling, no doubt due to the Butcher’s disappearance. After he mentally recovered from the sudden appearance of the cliff’s edge, though, Kaito’s eyes came to rest on something else entirely.

“Hey, what’s…? Oh, geez.”

There was something above the cliff.

The figure had been frozen stiff with its arms spread out wide. It looked like a statue of some sort of pagan god or perhaps an inane scarecrow. It was a man dangling in the air. His body was supported by a thick stake, which pierced through his buttocks and exited his mouth. Frozen blood and feces dripped down between his legs.

His eyes were open in an expression of intense agony. It looked like the stake had been driven in while he was still alive.

With a second glance, Kaito confirmed the cruel truth: the man, clad in a luxurious vestment, had been impaled.

Then his body had been put on public display atop the cliff.

“Who is that?”

“…Yah Llodl.”

“What?!”

Upon hearing Elisabeth’s answer, Kaito let out a surprised yelp.

After Godd Deos’s death, Yah Llodl had taken advantage of the Church’s changing power dynamics to join its upper echelon. And even with just the small conversation he’d had with Yah Llodl over a communication device, the man’s pride had been abundantly clear. Yet, now, this was the state he was in. His failure back at the underground tomb had probably been the cause.

And as far as people who could have gotten away with purging him went, only one came to Kaito’s mind.

After all, when she’d heard about the Butcher’s escape, this was what she’d said:

“Good work out there. Now convey this to the lookout: ‘It’s Yah Llodl all over again.’”

“…The Grave Keeper.”

There was no doubt in his mind that she was the one behind the grim spectacle before him.

Kaito had long since gotten used to seeing torture. And loath as he was to admit it, looking at someone who’d been impaled almost had a sort of familiarity to it. Even so, seeing the corpse of someone whose arrogant laugh he’d just heard came as a blow. Elisabeth and Jeanne, on the other hand, seemed to regard Yah Llodl’s death with complete disinterest. Taking their eyes off the body, they looked back toward the camp.

“Hmph, I see.”

“Indeed. It’s rather unambiguous.”

There was no reason for Lute to know who Yah Llodl was, but he still seemed to find the Torture Princesses’ composure unsettling. However, he, too, realized that retreating would accomplish nothing.

Because of that, he cautiously followed their lead. Kaito and Hina lined up beside them and did the same.

Before long, Kaito found himself frowning. The Church’s camp was even more chaotic than he’d expected.

Cautious inspection made it clear that they were split into two large factions.

One group of people was wearing silver armor with pelts draped over themselves to keep out the cold, and the other group was clad in scarlet, executioner-like outfits. Each one was gathered together and acting as a unit, like two herds of different beasts.

“It falls well within my expectations, but it seems they aren’t a monolith, are they?”

“Indeed, that they are not. And it’s a big ol’ laugh, coming from chumps who’re goin’ on about reconstructing the world! You’re all pilin’ into the same damn grave, ain’tcha?! Shepherds and sheep refusing to get along—what a riot!”

Elisabeth narrowed her crimson eyes, and Jeanne raised her voice in scorn.

Kaito immediately deduced what the two of them were talking about.

The paladins and executioner-looking guys aren’t exactly enemies, but could it be that they’re on bad terms?

The paladins looked to be forming a search party all on their own. They headed south, but their spirits seemed low, and they could hardly be described as unified. Instead of rebuking them for their sloth, though, the executioner-like group merely headed north. Neither group seemed to have any intention of working with the other.

In fact, the executioners seemed to be avoiding the paladins.

“What’s going on? They came all the way to the World’s End, and now they aren’t even gonna work together?”

“The paladins have lost their commander. Though she was young, they put a great deal of trust and responsibility in Izabella. Trying to keep their morale up despite having her unjustly snatched away from them would be a fool’s errand. And this is the World’s End. Unlike the Capital, the Church can deploy their transfigured paladins freely. That scarlet bunch would likely have preferred to come here with themselves and their grotesque pawns alone.”

“However, while the reconstruction sect holds the reins of power within the Church, their control is not absolute.”

Jeanne took the explanation over from Elisabeth and dispassionately laid out the current state of affairs within the Church.

“Refusing to take the normal paladins along would have earned the distrust of the royals and some of the notable aristocrats. Even with the attractive proposition of escaping the grand burden of having to rebuild the Capital, the reconstruction sect will fail to sway many of the less devout. And the powerful have a tendency to value gold higher than God, y’see. They both have a way of slippin’ away when you really need ’em, though!”

Taking Jeanne’s mocking words into account, Kaito took another look at what the people down below were doing.

The streams of silver and crimson had completely split apart, serving well to illustrate the discord present among their camp.

“As a result, the normal paladins were taken along, but in name alone. The grotesque pawns are likely off searching, and the scarlet lot is no doubt going to join them and try to capture the Butcher. The paladins, on the other hand, seem to have been sent off in the opposite direction. With that in mind, it would appear that the north is far more promising. The Butcher fled quickly, though. I have my doubts as to whether they’ll truly be able to catch him…”

“Excuse me, Lady Elisabeth?”

“Hmm? What is it, Hina? …Oh-ho?”

As Hina repeatedly tapped on her shoulder, Elisabeth turned around. After looking in the direction Hina was indicating, she blinked repeatedly. A silly expression crossed Kaito’s face, as well.

At some point, something had taken a seat atop Yah Llodl’s corpse’s shoulder.

It was a small emerald-green mass, and it was gnawing on his frozen ear.

Startled, Lute reeled backward. As he pointed at the mass, a cry slipped out of his mouth.

“Y-you! You’re the irreverent whelp who invaded Lady Vyade Ula Forstlast’s bedchambers!”

“Kyau!”

The response he received sounded entirely innocent. The dragon whelp began turning lively somersaults in the air. Its splendid tail, which seemed a bit too large for its body, swayed behind it. It didn’t look repentant in the slightest.

How long had it been there? Just as that question crossed Kaito’s mind, though, a more pressing concern weighed on him.

The body was put on display up here.

In other words, the Church was fully aware of how well the cliff overlooked their base. It was odd, then, that they hadn’t stationed any guards there. As he carefully surveyed their surroundings, Kaito gasped.

“Hey, wait, Elisabeth! Look where you’re stepping!”

“Hmm? Ah, I see. Little wonder, then, that standing here was so comfortable!”

Elisabeth nodded. Beneath her high heels was a man buried in the snow. His scarlet hood peeked out from amid the white. He appeared to be unconscious.

Worried that the man might freeze to death, Kaito frantically reached out his hand. When he touched the man’s skin, though, it was strangely warm. Apparently, he’d stored magic stones on his extremities to preserve his body heat. A jewel designed for communications was installed on his chest as well. In all likelihood, he was the one who’d been in charge of guarding the cliff top.

But why, then, was he unconscious?

Kaito cast a sidelong glance at the whelp. Its emerald scales glittered as it spun around in the air. Each time it twirled, it lashed out with its tail. A blow from that looked to be about as powerful as one from a blackjack from Kaito’s old world. “Kyoon!” the whelp cried as it puffed out its chest.

Upon seeing the vigor with which the whelp was making its claim, Kaito nodded in conviction.

“Looks like this guy’s our culprit.”

“Aye, no doubt. Excellent work, you!”

“Dunno if that’s really something you should be complimenting it for.”

“Excuse me, Mr. Whelp, but why did you knock out the lookout and then stay here?”

“Kyoon!”

By means of answering Hina’s question, the whelp let out a loud cry. Then, with a chomp, it tore off Yah Llodl’s ear. After tossing it up in the air and catching it in its mouth, it gobbled the dead flesh down.

Kaito and Lute openly grimaced. Apparently done trying to cheer them up, the whelp shot into the air like a bullet. Then, without a moment’s hesitation, it began flying off into the silvery atmosphere.

For a second, it turned back toward Kaito and the others. It seemed to want them to follow it.

Kaito was reminded of the chunk of bone-in meat that had been left behind at the castle. It looked as though, just like back then, the Butcher had predicted their movements once more and had sent the whelp to guide them. He was clearly trying to send them somewhere.

Whether that was a good thing or a bad thing was still anyone’s guess.

Either way, our only real option is to follow it.

Knowing that, Kaito steeled his resolve. Leaving the corpse and unconscious lookout behind them, they all took off at a run.

Then, following the distant whelp, they began making their way down the pearly hill.

The whelp looked like it was flying aimlessly.

Its wings were comprised of thin bone and membrane, and it flapped them to fly high up into the milky-white, rainbow-tinged sky. Then it would glide for a while. It seemed to be rather enjoying its travels. However, for those trying to follow it, the wasteful movements in its flight path were the source of a great deal of stress. Kaito’s displeasure was painted all across his face.

“Hey, does that thing even really know where it’s going?”

“Hmm… It does belong to the Butcher, after all.”

“And Mr. Butcher is awfully fond of playing around. I suppose we can only hope.”

Elisabeth’s shoulders slumped, and Hina smiled to try to placate her.

Continuing forward through the unchanging snowscape was hard on the legs, but it was harder on the spirit. However, it quickly became clear that, despite the whelp’s playful flight, their efforts hadn’t been wasted.

A living creature’s corpse had appeared before them in the empty world.

When Kaito first saw it, his immediate reaction was shock.

Whatever the something was, it was made up of fragments of ice and snow. Its body was unsettlingly linear, and if he had to compare it to something, it looked somewhat like a fish. But even upon getting a closer look, it was difficult for a human to truly understand its appearance. After all, their brains refused to parse some of the optical information on it. In fact, it was hard to say definitively if living creature was really the right descriptor for it. The only thing sure about it was that it possessed a concept of “death.”

All in total, there were four of the somethings. They were lying horizontally, their pyramid-shaped heads all caved in.

“…Hmm. This land seems free of foreign invaders, yet they appear to have been killed by something.”

Elisabeth stooped down and began inspecting the damaged sections. Kaito did the same. Once they did, a commonality emerged. All four of them seemed to have been struck by something soft. Also, there was blubber stuck to their wounds.

“With my cunning intellect, I’ve unraveled all the mysteries. The weapon…was a slab of meat!”

“I’d be surprised if it was anything else. In other words, that means the Butcher definitely passed this way.”

The two of them nodded to each other. This time, the whelp’s somersaults seemed to be saying, See?

Now trusting its guidance, the group resumed their pursuit of the Butcher. They carefully walked among the somethings’ corpses. As Kaito stood atop an unsullied patch of ice, though, a snapping sound rang out from around his feet.

“Huh?”

“Is something the matter, Sir Kaito? Hmm?”

Lute turned around as well, and his ears perked up. The two of them started inspecting the ground at their feet for presences. The moment they did, a square chunk of ice directly below Kaito cracked and burst up into the air. Slipping along its now-slanted surface, Kaito narrowly managed to land on his feet.

“…!”

“Ah!”

A massive slab of ice had pierced through the ground. Innumerable cracks were running along its surface.

The slab then split into fine vertical segments. Its cylindrical fragments danced through the air, then recombined into a three-dimensional shape. The transformation it underwent was impressive, like a single sheet of paper being spliced into a meaningful form.

Chilly air blew off its body as the completed something bent into a fishlike shape. However, it had no scales and no mouth. It swung its smooth, clear, pyramid-shaped head down onto Kaito.

Drawing his sword, Lute stepped forward, intending to meet the hammer-like blow.

“Fall back, Sir Kaito! I shall repay the debt I once—”

“How dare you try to strike my dear husband, you hoodluuuuuuuuuuum!”

However, Lute’s noble declaration was drowned out by indignation and fury. His ears went slack, and he stopped in his tracks.

Hina dashed across the ice like a cannonball. Accompanied by her vaunted halberd, she twirled freely through the air.

“Hyaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!”

Her maid uniform fluttering, she raised her weapon aloft behind her back. Then, as she flew forward, she swung it down hard. Its blade crashed solidly into the something’s side.

There was the sound of glass cracking. The something’s body flushed with white, then shattered.

Its needle-thin fragments scattered all about. Upon mixing in with the snowflakes, they ceased to even be visible.

Hina then landed with an elegant thump. After courteously straightening her maid outfit, she gave a sweet bow.

“Phew. With that, the cleaning is successfully finished. How was that, Master Kaito?”

“Perfect as always, my dearest Hina.”

“Eek! Oh, Master Kaito! Not in public! Why, how embarrassing!”

As she let out quiet shrieks, Hina covered her reddening face. Watching over her with affection, Kaito nodded. Lute stepped back as he commented, “Very…very well, then,” and a bemused expression overtook Elisabeth’s face.

The sole member to ignore the commotion and continue walking was Jeanne. Everyone else then hurried after her.

And with that, Kaito and the others left the somethings’ corpses behind and continued pursuing the Butcher as though nothing had changed.

Eventually, their surroundings started to transform with increasing speed. Snow began falling from the empty sky.

The massive flakes resembling delicate lacework fluttered gently through the air. Upon closer inspection, each one of them had a unique shape. In all likelihood, no two of them were alike.

The strange rainbow membrane covering the milky-white sky was beginning to get thicker as well. Snowflakes tumbled lazily down from within it. It looked like silvery flower petals being spat out from inside an oil slick.

Anywhere else, such a blizzard of petals would have been unimaginable.

The area around Kaito’s group had long since taken on an otherworldly quality to it. If someone had told them it was the afterlife, they practically would have believed it. Kaito’s eyes were captivated by the landscape’s untarnished, lifeless beauty.

The world was hollow and empty, and it was terrifying. But at the same time, it was also endlessly fascinating.

As Kaito was preoccupied by all that, the whelp abruptly stopped advancing.

“Kyau!”

With a loud cry, it gave its wings a powerful downward flap. After making a sharp nosedive, it suddenly vanished without a trace.

“Wait, where’d he go?”

Kaito looked down in a panic. The scenery, which had had a bare minimum of regularity to it, had come to a complete and total stop. At some point, a narrow, deep fissure had appeared before them. In contrast with its transparent icy walls, the ravine was filled with a pervasive darkness. The whelp must have flown down into it.

It was almost like it was trying to say that its task was complete.

Now convinced that something awaited them beyond the crevice, Kaito turned to look up.

The fissure extended farther and farther. Little by little, it grew wider and deeper. Beside it, a new fissure stretched out its distant arm as well. They continued on like a pair of wide rivers.

Eventually, they met up and converged on a colossal hole.

The pit resembled a volcano’s crater with its gaping maw.

Suddenly, a strange conviction assailed Kaito.

Let’s say hypothetically that all the ice in the World’s End melted. What would happen?

The water probably wouldn’t reach the sea. Regardless of whatever differences in height there may be, every drop of it would flow into that hole. Yet, even so, the void would remain. Even if it swallowed up everything else, nothing could ever fill that abyss.

And at the same time, Kaito remembered something he’d once heard.

Someone once said that the world has no end. The world is round, they proclaimed, and as such it has no terminus.

Someone once said that the world has an end. It’s like a waterfall, they proclaimed, one that swallows up anything and everything.

Someone once said that the world has an end. For God created that place, they proclaimed, and designated it “the World’s End.”

“…The World’s End.”

Kaito mumbled that phrase once more. Unlike the world he’d come from, in this one, there was a real chance that all three stories about the World’s End were true. The world was round, and it had no terminus. But it did have an End, one that God had designated. And therein lay a waterfall that swallowed up anything and everything.

As those thoughts rattled around in his head, Kaito’s vision wandered.

Given that the whelp had disappeared, this was no doubt the “answer” they’d been searching for.

“Master Kaito, over there.”

“Ah, there, huh?”

After looking to where Hina was pointing, Kaito nodded. A narrow path just barely lay between the two crevices. And someone was standing at its end. The figure was black, and it was standing alone before the pit.

In a way, it looked lonely.

As though it had been waiting a long, long time for someone who had never come.

“…The Butcher.”

A brief murmur escaped Elisabeth’s lips. Kaito was about to break out in a run, but then he heard something.

“Ah, what an excellent job you all did finding him! Now, at long last, I’ve finally reached a complete understanding!”

A loud voice called out from behind him. Lodged within it was an unfathomable amount of joy.

Goose bumps rose all across Kaito’s flesh. Horrified from the bottom of his heart, he felt his face stiffen as he turned around to look.

“Blessings on you, and blessings on me! Everything is just as you will it!”

Standing behind him was exactly who he’d expected to find.

Her snowflake-covered crimson cloak fluttered, and she was flanked on all sides by grotesque, transfigured paladins.

The image of the giant men protecting an adorable little girl was almost picturesque, like a painting of a maiden surrounded by monsters. But in reality, it was the girl who was the monster, not the transformed men.

It was the living symbol of zealotry, the Grave Keeper.

As she looked down upon Kaito and the others, a smile dripping with affection spread across her face.