After the death of Veno and the disappearance of everyone else, I used up both of the flowers containing magical energy to regain my sanity. Whilst I was still sane, I ventured towards south, opposite direction of the Temporal Spatial Pyramids, in hopes of finding Tahgweiy along with the Southern Sentinel Group's main unit.
It wasn't just the island me and Yawei fought on, the rest of the continent and maybe more of the planet was left devastated by something powerful, as if giants trampled the world whilst asteroids crashed into the lands, wiping out most life and nature. Is this truly the end of Cvvoer? I kept asking myself that again and again. If the revival of the Blood God wasn't bad enough, the current Demon Lord is the Hammerhead Demon, and is somehow capable of destroying everything known to man. Meanwhile, the Hero of the Great Catastrophe and his team came back for an unknown reason. So this entire gallimaufry should be the least of everyone's concerns.
Still, what even is happening anymore?!!
The world's in chaos. I still feel intense pain all over my body, but it's not as strong as when I woke up in the dirt now. If I can just get something to ease this pain, then I'd be able to do a lot more, and find the answers to at least most things. The spare blood in Veno's home wasn't enough for me to be able to heal myself with magic again. I couldn't eat Veno's corpse, since that's just wrong. You know I'm still not in that level of insanity.
Fortunately, [Blood Panel] has info on the kingdom nearby which is a kingdom filled with elves, and the info is quite promising. Elf medicine is better than Human medicine because the average Elf is just smarter than the average Human. I can't see how they wouldn't have any medicine, even if the world is ending right now.
I noticed how along the way, the ground became less incomprehensible whilst foliage began to show up more often. A large structure resembling a portal was sitting at the center of this region, so naturally, I went to investigate it before trying to find the elven city. It didn't look functional, as it was broken and shattered already. But there were strange scriptures carved into the lower parts. Luckily, [Blood Panel] was still able to translate them for me.
"Portal to the Demon Realm."
Seems quite sketchy. The Demons wouldn't just leave a portal out in the wilds and make it as obvious as this. I don't have a reason to go to the Demon Realm now, but if only I found this earlier... Wait, I don't think this even existed 27 years ago.
Chirp chirp~!
The birds were chirping all around me. The tall trees made the surrounding forests darker, but I also realized how it was darker than usual. Nighttime is almost here, huh? I must find the city quickly. It's supposed to be nearby according to [Blood Panel]. Though, I can't really see anything other than trees and this destroyed portal. Are the elves really that stealthy, or am I just blind? I swear I don't rely on my 12 senses that much.
Ah! I can see a dirt road ahead. Maybe if I follow this, I'll arrive at the city! But I still need to confirm whether or not the city is here, and if it is here, does it still have people and the supplies I need, considering the current situation?
My steps echoed across the road, accompanied by the rustling of the leaves. The atmosphere seemed to be blood red, reflecting it's wicked beauty on the greenery. I can feel the breath of the wind blowing against my hardened blood. My scythe was creaking worryingly each step I make. At times like these, I could feel the world in it's most peaceful state. Oh, how nostalgic it is to achieve this feeling once again! There was a long, dying path of blood that ran towards the path I followed.
At the end of the road, there lied the corpse of a woman I knew. An arrow had pierced her through the back, and the trail of blood seemed to stop just under her body.
Chirp chirp~!
I looked back to see the world blue. My pain has disappeared along with the last bits of my insanity. I came back to my senses, but why hasn't the body of Rayan Cross gone away as well..?! Nows not the time for you to be dead, you know?! Goddamnit!
Shoot, I can't stop the tears falling down my face. If there really is someone deciding my path, I'd love to meet them. Really, I hope they'd just show up in front of my face and tell me directly how they're going to torture me until the day I die. Whoever they are, I'll spit-roast that fuck.
I can't seem to get hateful enough, can I? This isn't the end of the torment, isn't it? I'll have to continue down the road and find the one behind all this! Currently, the road leads me to the ruins of an Elven city. Nothing but death and destruction is present here. The locals appeared above me, aiming bows and ranged weapons at my hopeless self like I'm some sort of demon. Don't you all know you're the demons here?! Why am I supposed to suffer?! I'll butcher all of you pointy eared cucks!! Especially you who murdered dear Rayan! Even if we weren't together for a significantly long time, my allies are my friends! Who are you to take them away from me?!
So, around the time I was sulking, my mental illness got so bad that I lost all sense of time and place. Along with my confusion were the errors my brain made; since it was literally melting and experiencing multiple life-threatening issues after reawakening from death, it tried to fix itself through any possible means. One of it's solutions for the lost memories was to put in whatever it thinks is the most realistic thing that happened as a replacement. While these memories did not actually happen, they are the best results my brain came up with so the chances of them being true and useful are... Well, nevermind, most of them just makes things more confusing and complicated.
Sighing, I quickly took down the elves and left. Two magazines were thrown away, and a bit of meaningless bloodshed took place there.
Although this story is insanely edgy and just dark without reason, I can finally begin to see it making sense. This isn't some kind of fairy tale, this is just the end of the world. Nothing anyone does works, everyone'll just die. But I do wonder what happened to the Baphomet and the Goddess of Order... If they're still alive, then they should've been trying to resolve this entire mess the moment it began. With their power, what makes this situation so hard to deal with? Or has the Goddess of Order already began her move, starting with Yawei killing me, then creating a bunch of angels to fly around and fix this planet? Well, no matter, the Blood God's resurrection is still not cancelled. Somehow, I just know that these angels won't be able to do anything to their revival.
Now that I could see properly, I found that the world was trying to repair itself. The survivors after the year I died rebuilt major cities and nations with the help of Yawei, crowned as the Archangel Yahweh, who led an army of angels to heal everything they walked through. I still have hallucinations and nightmares about him, but I heard he was currently out at the west side of the planet, meddling with the Western Alliance, or what remained of it after the apocalypse. It wasn't as unpleasant as the times during the apocalypse, but the sunlight was becoming a problem for me. For some reason, everyone was also against me and the members of the New Heroes party. The Old Heroes party on the other hand, noone really knew what happened to them, except for Frillet Tofan who always roamed about searching for something. He's still out today, but it doesn't look like he's looking for me. He's a strange guy for sure, however, I should be safe from him right now.
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I couldn't fully recover mentally and physically. The only places for me to sleep in were the sewers and the abandoned cities. Fortunately, my body developed an automated spell to pair with [Blood Panel]. The spell, [Catarax], allowed me to perceive things like how I would under Full Concentration Mode whilst forcibly removing hallucinations and other things not useful for me, that includes rocks and whatever is too insignificant to be considered an obstacle. Whilst using [Catarax], I was blind in human terms, and they'd only see a crimson red void if they stared long enough into my eyes. This spell not only kept my sanity at bay, but it also managed to get me to one of the largest human settlements currently available.
I believe they called it "Tu'awoi Ra' alin." This city was once the greatest city, but that was only before the apocalypse. After it's collapse, and after the apocalypse settled down, the city began to prosper again when it was blessed by Yawei, transforming it into a place of worship in the process. The people here are more insane than the me one year ago. Yes, that whole memory of me meeting everyone who's died so far can't seem to go away, and that was only a year ago, but my brain's faulty self-repair systems made it feel like it just happened a few months ago.
Fish, fish, and fish. I emptied 5 whole magazines on the fishermen because they kept bugging me with fish. The ocean wasn't too far away, but land animals are also present everywhere, you know? Can't you people hunt anything other than fish?! The only thing you can eat here is fish and the dead bodies of "non-believers." I don't plan to stay here for long, but I do have to rest more in here than in any other place I've been to these days. Noone really gives one look at the corpses stacking up on each other, nor do they care about the foul stench of fish and death.
Right now, my left eye is half-closed whilst my teeth have been tightly shut. The blood and guts of the people here have stained me both physically and mentally, but it's still better than getting found out by the angels that walk this continent. They make their rounds like the army of an empire who has successfully ruled the world. There isn't just one army as well, there're 580 according to human news. The demons say they have 500, while the elves thinks there's 522. I hoped I'd find their numbers less than 500 so I asked around before coming here. There's not much I can do to harm these monsters who use Divine Magic without any hesitation whatsoever, especially in my current form.
Thirteen days before I had to leave, the cultists held a ceremony for the angels who has successfully reclaimed yet another one of the lost cities. Since my bloodstained cloak and underwear was no longer suspicious, I took part as well. It wouldn't be so bad to hear them preaching, talking about how good their god is, despite what they're doing on this planet right now.
"Rejoice! Today, the voice of god spoke to me, that another one of our brothers and sisters have joined the kingdom of god!! Us humans created under his image are to serve him directly, and to take in his angels as our saviors! Archangel Yahweh has almost completed his mission after 27 years, so as devoted followers of the God Most High, we must celebrate this victory and drink our wine and eat our breads!! Archangel Yahweh is only here for the mission god has given him, in a few years he will be gone back to heaven, so we must spend the time he's still in Cvvoer the best!! Praise the lord!!"
Mmmm... The god 'Mars,' is more believable than this shit. He's the god of war, and I've actually prayed to him a lot more than you'd think. I do fight constantly after all.
After taking in this information, everyone began eating and drinking. Bread is now sold, but I didn't see one yesterday, and I still don't see one today. Well, it's obvious that these breads are nothing more than just an illusion. Without [Catarax], I'd have thought they made bread by crushing and mixing fish together and then dying it brown. But they don't even have bread at all!! The preacher... I think his name was Myua M'so, pronounced as Mi-o-wa Mi-soh, he gave out these nonexistent bread to the locals, but how'd he do it? He doesn't seem like a magician, so it's more likely that the very thing he worshipped made him do this.
"Sister Vixen, how do you like your stay here?"
A young girl stops next to me holding wine. While I doubted the existence of wine in such a world, the wine I never thought I'd see again appeared before me in the hands of a blue-haired little girl. Before I developed [Catarax], I'd see Reyana Sorret when I looked at children, so I'd always run away holding my head, or straight up shoot them with Pure's Glock-40. Gun ammo wasn't an uncommon find in Demon-occupied places, so I'd always empty magazines everytime I use this gun. Now that I'm fully sane, would I mag-dump this kid? Probably, unless all my calculations prove that they're 100% not a threat in every single way possible. ...What? Did you think I'd say "No"? Kids are getting on my nerves these days, alright? That creepy one, Hili, the annoying one, Sting Ray, the other one, Manta Ray, and then the other creepy one, Reyana Sorret, they all irritate me! And then this one...
"My name is Se' wa Al Arikk Fewa' nawa. I'm Hatzegopteryx Thambema's unprideful dog. It's a pleasure to meet you, Satan. Could you please take off your hood so I can see your face more clearly?"
"Uuu- Uaa- UAAAAAAAAAAAAGH!!!!"
Bang-bang-bang-bang-bang-bang-bang-bang-bang-bang-bang-bang-bang-bang-bang!!
With a loud scream, my hands moved on their own to clutch the gun on my vest and open fire at the kid. I don't know why, but hearing that word again really drove me to this. I promise you I'm not insane, nor am I mad! But this was my last straw, there were just too many times Reyana's figure appeared when I saw things in her shape, and now, I just want to throw that out of the window..! I'm shaking, barely even holding the Glock in my hands because of the psychological trauma and the hardened blood on my arms.
Her body drops to the ground, blood everywhere. Noone even gave one glance at the scene, as if it was normal here. I know it wasn't normal- no, this is not normal!
"UAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGHHH!!!"
With a bloodcurdling scream, I began shooting down everyone in my sight. Once I ran out of ammo, I used my bare hands to tear them all apart. Seeing them not reacting to the violence just made me even more violent. Why won't these guys do anything?! Are they really that far gone into their own delusions!? Your god doesn't exist, you fanatics!! You people have gone insane! This is the only way for me to save you now, so I'm sorry!
Whilst I was butchering everyone, the preacher grabbed my shoulder with a blank expression. I stopped attacking and stared at him for a while.
"O' Satan, doth ye realize 'tis in best regards for thou to act not against thy fellow innocent bystanders but yet? As Se' wa Al Arikk Fewa' nawa proposed upon thee, when the smell of entrance opens through into a cascade, one should seek the comfort of the other even with the slightests of the slightest. Yea, thine figure shall be bestowed on WE, the faithful! And comes the birth of the Anti-Christ as Hatzegopteryx Thambema knows it!!"
"K-KAA- UYAAAAAAAAAGHHH!!!"
I fell to my knees, holding my face whilst trembling in terror. The man behind me tried his best to see my face. In anger, he tried using force, but failed every time. I continued screaming to make the preacher go away, but he only continued to push through.
"SAITAN!!! Why do you wish to doom us all?! I-If only- if only the master was here..! Please..! The prophecies will be fulfilled, a-a-and as a faithful worshipper of the God Most High, I should be able to perceive the world that is within your eyes!!"
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGHHHH!!!"
I screamed out loud again. The man persisted on trying to get a good look at my face, but since my hardened blood arms were too sharp and heavy, he couldn't force his way through. Oh, wait. He's prying my arms open by digging his own hands into my tiny blades. I almost forgot these guys were no longer in the world that I knew. ...Pain shouldn't bother them anymore..!
It was probably because they felt no pain that the kid that I just shot down with an entire magazine of 15 10mm bullets stood back up to her feet without any support. Her face had been torn beyond recognition, but she still managed to speak out her last words as I looked up at her.
"Sister Vixen, go apologize to my sibling and take responsibility. She tells of herself as Hili. My death shan't go to waste, so please take my body as an offering to the Anti-Christ."
And then she fell to the ground as the heat escaped from her body, as seen through [Blood Panel]'s heat detection systems.
The man didn't care one bit and only focused on looking at me clearly. As soon as he got a good gaze at my eyes, he was fixed without any further movement. He froze in place and collapsed to the ground, foaming at his mouth whilst shaking aggressively. I covered my face again, still kneeling down surrounded by the corpses.
A while later, all the residents of Tu'awoi Ra' alin fell victim not to the air bread, but to the neurotoxins in the air.