Chapter 75: Eden, the Garden (14)
Rrrrrrrrumble…
The earth heaved. Heat surged up from the ground, and countless mouths snapped vicious teeth together, clack clack.
The mouths began to stitch themselves together, slowly. Great maws fused without end. Soon the entire surface beca Dionea’s mouth.
The darkness of greed overflowed. The hellish gullet wrought by the Witch of Greed heaved as if it ant to swallow the sky itself.
A low, rising hum rolled through the air.
The wind blew.
Dionea frowned up at the sky.
“...Pointless nonsense.”
Light speared down, rending the storm clouds.
Radiance drove back the dark.
The pitch-black maw shrank away from wherever the light fell. A precious patch of footing opened for Nike’s party. Elena sang with joy at the miracle of God.
She spread her arms and received the falling light with her whole body.
“Descend.”
—!
A pillar of burning light struck Elena. A golden cross seed to rise upon the dark earth.
Hestia couldn’t open her eyes. The light was too fierce. Shielding her face with a hand, she forced herself to watch what was happening.
Sssss.
From the ground where Elena stood, a golden vapor spread outward. Heavier than air, it clung to the surface.
‘...It’s hot.’
Hestia’s skin burned with heat. It was the heat flowing from Elena’s side.
The pillar faded. Hestia peered closely at Elena.
What stood there was Elena, yet not Elena.
Her skin glowed vermilion, like iron steeped in a blast furnace. Behind her shoulders, many strands of light braided like thread into eight wings.
The great spear in her grip held an imasurable divinity.
‘That’s… an angel.’
At a glance, Hestia understood a being of staggering rank had co to rest. She dropped to her knees and bowed.
It felt like she must not dare et its gaze.
“Raise your head and answer what I ask.”
The angel that had descended into Elena’s flesh spoke. Hestia knew it was addressing her.
“...May soone as low as I am presu to speak.”
“I permit it.”
“Understood.”
Trembling, Hestia lifted her head. Sanctity poured from the angel. Even Hestia, who had no faith, felt belief sprout within her.
“I ask you. There, what is that fiend glaring at with wicked eyes.”
“...She called herself Dionea, the Witch of Greed who once served the Witch of Sin.”
The angel regarded Dionea with a faintly disgusted look. Dionea, too, scowled at the descended angel.
As the Sun God’s emissary, the angel was a mortal enemy to those who served evil gods.
The angel muttered in a voice edged with wrath.
“A bastard child of Sin born three hundred and fifty years ago. But she swallowed sothing dangerous.”
“...Th-Three hundred and fifty…”
Hestia shut her mouth in shock. SHe was far older than she’d imagined. There were scarcely any recorded cases of a seventh rank witch.
It ant the hunters’ logs might harbor witches they had never properly identified.
The angel turned its head and asked again.
“One more. What is that loathso thing fallen behind you? It looks more dangerous than the witch.”
“Huh?”
Hestia looked back. The being the angel indicated was none other than Nike.
Outwardly, he was only an ordinary boy, yet even an angel asked after his nature.
‘Even an angel asks what Nike is…’
Sweat beaded as Hestia hesitated.
For so reason, she felt she must not answer plainly. A woman’s intuition.
In truth, she didn’t even know what she should call Nike.
“...He’s a witch hunter like . He collapsed while fighting the witch.”
“Why would the Key be playing as a hunter…? Well, that isn’t for to ddle in now.”
The angel wearing Elena’s skin narrowed its eyes. Tilting its head a little, as if intrigued, it turned back to the witch.
“Hear , low one. This flesh wasn’t born a warrior, and even its faith is tarnished. For so reason, black greed has taken root within. Perhaps it’s the witch’s influence. As things are, I cannot wield my strength in full.”
“...Then what shall we do?”
“That witch has gathered power for far too long. For now, I can buy ti and purify roughly half of the power she holds.”
Half, erased. Even that would be a staggering miracle. After that, it looked solvable if Hestia and Nike worked together.
“Beyond that, you low ones will have to manage on your own. Do you understand?”
“…I understand.”
The angel paused, then ford a golden sphere in its palm.
“That loathso one is closer to a born warrior. Make him swallow this light. He suffered grievously under the witch’s curse.”
The sphere flew to Hestia as the angel finished. She caught it like a precious treasure. An indescribable warmth pulsed from it.
“…Understood! Thank you for your grace!”
Crack.
The angel tightened its grip on the spear. Golden fire climbed from the spearpoint. The black maw that had begun to creep back into place shrieked and fled.
At last, the angel looked to Hestia and spoke.
“Low one. Your inborn fate is pitiable.”
“…Pardon?”
“Choose carefully. Your life will be a chain of choices. Only the worst and the less-worst lie before you.”
“…?”
Hestia lifted her gaze, uncomprehending, but the angel in Elena’s form had already taken to the sky.
It leveled the spear and charged the witch.
Craaaash!
A thunderous crash split the air.
Divinity and darkness collided. A golden shock wave burst out, and the ground rolled like a tide.
It was the manifestation of battles recorded in holy scripture.
* * *
As the angel began to fight the witch, Hestia snapped herself out of her daze and ran to Nike.
The golden sphere wouldn’t slip from her hand.
“...Nike. Nike! Wake up!”
“Ugh…”
Nike groaned in pain. The lted flesh had healed, but black blotches now mottled his body.
It was the sa sign that had appeared on him before the archbishop had treated him.
Mana like venom rampaged inside him. Its density thickened, and the air grew hot.
Hestia touched his brow. It was so hot it could have burned her, and she jerked her hand away.
‘How is he even alive…?’
His condition was so bad that the fact he lived at all felt like a miracle. Sothing had certainly happened inside the witch’s belly.
“Nike! Swallow this, now!”
He would die at this rate. Hestia pried his mouth open and pushed the sphere in.
But Nike scread with pain and spat the sphere back out. The black blotches crawled over his whole body and crept up to his jaw.
She couldn’t say how, but she was certain that once the blotches covered him entirely, Nike would die.
Cold sweat ran down Hestia’s spine. Her hair stood on end. The bad feeling turned to panic and smothered her reason.
The blotches spread onto the hand that had touched him.
“Ugh…!”
Agony so sharp she could barely make a sound tore through her. It was a miracle she didn’t faint on the spot. Nike had been enduring this much pain.
‘Hurry… he has to swallow the sphere.’
Hestia knit her brow. The blotches were spreading, and even she struggled to use her strength.
Gasp.
Hestia swallowed the sphere herself. Then she pressed her lips to Nike’s.
“Grrrk!”
Nike thrashed in pain. Hestia clamped his cheeks with all her might and pried his mouth open with her lips.
“Mm…!”
From lips to lips.
From tongue to tongue.
Love, and the golden sphere, passed across.
“Hah! Hah, hah…!”
Nike barely swallowed it. Hestia shut his jaw and covered his mouth so he couldn’t spit it out.
He arched his back like a shrimp and shook. After a mont the pain seed to ebb, and he stilled. The blotches began to recede.
“Nike…?”
A short breath of wonder escaped Hestia. The angel’s divinity truly had healed him. Having lived a miracle firsthand, her faith grew firr.
“Ha… Hia?”
“…Nike. Are you okay?”
“I’m fhine...”
His tongue was twirled around, and his words slurred, but his eyes were open and his color had returned.
Hestia let out a weary smile and collapsed. Now she was the one sweating like rain.
“Tia!”
Nike lurched up. Hestia panted out hot breaths. Black blotches marked her palms and forearms.
Nike’s heart pounded fast.
It was the curse carved into him.
It was transferred to Hestia.
“Ugh…! Witch of the Sword…!”
Nike bared his teeth, shaking with rage.
He was fine with suffering, but he couldn’t stand to see soone precious in pain.
His eyes flared red. He gently took Hestia’s forearm and closed his eyes.
‘Bloodfla.’
Then,
‘Golden fla.’
In a fogged consciousness, Nike recalled the mont of the angel’s descent. The two fires were alike, yet different.
One was a fla that withered life. One was a fla that breathed life in.
The curse was evil, and its root was mana.
If he mixed the principles of the blood-red fla and the golden fire, he could make a fla that erased evil.
It wasn’t backed by research or theory.
It sprang to him by instinct.
“White fla.”
Nike’s own color rose in his mind’s eye.
A fla of extre purity.
It purified everything and returned it to nothing, then turned and created life in a wondrous cycle.
Blaze!
White fire blood on Hestia’s forearm.
“…?”
The pain vanished. Hestia’s eyes flew open. A pale fla danced upon her arm.
“...It’s cold.”
The fire was cold.
Awe filled Hestia’s heart.
Even when she had beheld an angel, she hadn’t felt this much. A cool faith settled in her breast. A woman’s heart was like a reed.
It was an inexpressibly complex feeling.
“Tia. Are you all right?”
Nike asked quietly. Hestia nodded slowly.
“Good.”
Nike answered with a pure smile. Strength drained from Hestia’s whole body. Her heart hamred fast.
“Rest now. I will kill the witch now.”
Nike bared his fangs at the witch.
Hestia blinked in silence. It felt as if she had witnessed a god.
* * *
The angel surged aloft on wings of light. Dustings of radiance fell from its pinions and washed the land. The mouths of darkness shrank and scattered.
A golden blast shook the world as the angel plunged and drove the spear down.
Overwhelming force.
Brimming divinity.
No paltry mana could endure it. Yet Dionea was no paltry foe.
Beloved of an evil god and servant to a sage, Dionea stood toe-to-toe even against an angel.
“...Kgh. For the exalted Michael of high heaven would descend so low! Have I risen, or have you fallen!”
The witch lunged to swallow the angel whole, taunting her. Jaws budding all over her body now jutted even from empty air.
The angel’s armor was gnawed in places.
“Enough nonsense. Take the mace!”
A resonant hum cut the air as the angel swept the spear. A golden blade slash flew to the dark horizon. Along its path the witch’s darkness evaporated in a blink.
“You… you never ant to fight huh. You’re only after my darkness.”
“You’re slow to notice.”
“It won’t help you. I don’t weaken from such things.”
Dionea stepped from a monstrous maw. Her body was flawless, a seductive witch’s figure.
Except for one blatant difference. Between her bare breasts, a severed leg was stuck fast.
“Heh.”
The angel’s brow knit in pure disgust.
“...Blasphemy.”
“Raise to your level and call it blasphemy? Correct yourself. It’s desecration.”
“Petty wordplay!”
The angel was about to charge in true anger, but it happened.
“Ghk…?”
The witch bent double as if her breath had been cut off. Her eyes bulged.
A wet, tearing rip split the air.
The severed leg lodged between her breasts suddenly ripped through her skin and burst free.
“What?”
While the witch gaped and the angel watched in cold silence, an ashen silhouette appeared.
“Hehe. Fooled you!”
“You are…?”
Veins standing in her eyes, the witch glared at the ashen boy. In his hand, he held the severed leg.
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