"Nah, it happened." Elegy shook his head, "By the way, what was that "gaslighting" thing you mentioned?"
"I never said anything about gaslighting." Sorbet replied.
"Oh, my bad, must've misheard." He chuckled, "But seriously, you have the same golden part pattern and initials as my friend Sab. You sure you're not..."
"We're not friends..." Sorbet mumbled.
"What was that?"
"I-I said I'm not your friend Sab." He quickly corrected himself, "Look, I've met dozens of people since waking up and no one knew anything before they woke up. What makes you so different?"
"I-I... I don't know." Elegy looked down, frustrated that he couldn't prove his memory retention to Sorbet, "But I know what I saw!"
"Uhm." Hatwell suddenly raised his hand, "I remember stuff from before waking up."
"...Come again?" The both of them looked baffled.
Hatwell, previously known as Haunt, or more accurately the rampaging madman wreaking havoc in the streets of Heaven 2.0. A couple cycles back, Elegy deduced he must have died before properly growing up, hence why he was so naive of the world's offerings. Of course, since this was a while ago, the current iteration of Elegy has since forgotten this. Sorbet was even worse, for he hadn't even met that Haunt. They both knew it was possible to retain one's memories under certain scenarios, but as far as they knew, Hatwell didn't fall into either one. He neither looked the part of a seraphim nor a shopkeeper, so this was quite the shock.
"W-What kind of memories?" Sorbet asked.
"Scary stuff, I don't like talking about them." Hatwell looked down, "But, if you wanna know..."
"We wanna know!" Elegy jumped on the chance to learn more about memory retention, "If you don't mind, it would mean the world to me... to us, if you told us your experiences."
Glancing at them with a face of uncertainty and anxiety, Hatwell was backed into a figurative corner known as peer pressure. His inexperience in dealing with the social phenomenon caused him to fold under said pressure all too quickly and tell them, no matter how scary it was to recall. With a deep sigh, coupled with a shaky, quivering voice, he meekly elaborated.
"Skull heads." He muttered.
"The White Monsters...!" Sorbet muttered before realizing he interrupted him, "A-Ah, sorry. Please continue."
"...I remember waking up two days ago." Hatwell continued, "Back then, I didn't know where I was. I didn't know anyone, and I was scared of everyone's White bodies. They didn't look human."
"Makes sense, we're no longer humans." Elegy nodded, "But Heavenly Beings—Angels and seraphim."
"Yeah, but I didn't know that back then, so I ran." He continued, "I ran and ran, as fast and as far as I could. I eventually reached some sort of gate with a knight that didn't let me pass."
"Knight?" Elegy tilted his head.
"That's probably the guard." Sorbet looked at him, "Heaven's divided into tons of districts, with guards protecting each one from people hopping over between them."
"Hm..."
"O-Or so I've heard."
Despite his incessant denial of being Sab, Elegy still didn't fully trust his words. Regardless, he couldn't think of any reason for why Sab would be lying to him, so he decided to let it be for now. Also, he secretly really liked the new name he was given.
"Can I continue talking now?" Hatwell got a bit fussy over constantly getting interrupted.
"The stage is all yours." They promptly shut up.
"Ugh, stupids..." Hatwell let slip a slightly immature comment before continuing his story, "So, where was I? Oh right, the guard was super mean to me, then he slammed his spear on the ground-"
"Polearm." Sorbet couldn't help but correct him, only to get smacked on the back of the head by Elegy, "Ack!"
"...He slammed his polearm on the ground." Hatwell sighed, "Then that scary thing showed up, and I fell asleep right away."
"Mn, that makes sense..." Sorbet thought in his head, "But he should've forgotten everything from that day the moment he dropped to the ground. I know I shouldn't be saying anything, 'cause a similar thing happened when I got devoured by the White Monster horde. But it's different for me, since I turned into a seraphim right before that. Gasp, he couldn't be...!"
"Hm, what he said lines up with what we know..." Elegy made a mental deduction of his own in his head, "Just like me, he remembers the previous day. But our situations were different. He was eaten by that White Monster thing, while Maggie and the rest of us were tussling with the Gods. At first I assumed the Gods let us keep our memories of that encounter so that we "wouldn't think to do it again", but I guess that theory kind of falls through now. Wait, could it be...!"
Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.
"Ah, but then I woke up back in the same home I woke up in the day before." Hatwell interrupted both of their trains of thought, "I was so scared, I ran out and started beating everyone whose body was White."
"Isn't that everyone?" Elegy chuckled.
"Yeah, I think that was what you saw, and that's why you thought I was gonna hurt Sorbet." He nodded, "Sorry, but after seeing such a scary nightmare, I kinda didn't wanna look at anyone that even sort of resembled that thing..."
"So you're not a seraphim?" Sorbet popped the question at an awkward time.
"Sera...phim?" Hatwell could only blankly stare back at him.
"You sure know a lot about Heaven, despite claiming you only know stuff from today." Elegy glared suspiciously at him.
"I-I like to ask around, okay?!" Sorbet defended himself desperately, "I think I was a detective in my past life, because finding all of this info out came naturally to me, y'know?"
"...Maybe so." Elegy nodded, albeit still not moving his Eyes off of him, "Honestly, we could do with a guy like you, in that case."
"We?" Sorbet inquired.
"My friends." He smiled, "You may not believe me, but I do remember stuff from yesterday. I met a friend named Maggie, a guy named Sheep, and two seraphim named Throne and Sab. We tried infiltrating the Gods' Abode, but they caught us."
"...And what happened then?" Sorbet asked, feigning ignorance.
"I woke up and found you two."
"Yeah, you just made all that up." Sorbet felt there was a need to retcon some info from that story, "To begin with, no one's ever met the Gods personally, much less been to their Abode or whatever."
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At this point, Elegy was beyond confused. If this person was Sab, he would immediately know not to trust his words, but since Sab and Throne worked closely with their party before, he had no reason to doubt him. This only left the more unfavorable possibility, that being that this indeed was a completely different person who just shared similar gilded parts and initials with Sab. But if that was the case, then that would mean that Elegy would have to start doubting his own memories and mind. Regardless of which one he wanted to choose, both seemed quite terrible in their own way.
"I talked to the Gods personally. I was inside their house, for Prylos' sake!" He argued.
"Yeah, yeah, save the fairy tales for a more gullible audience." Sorbet kept teasing him.
"I believe you, Elegy." Hatwell chimed in.
"Grrr, alright then! What does this supposed Abode look like?!" Sorbet quickly stopped them from growing too attached to one another.
Even for Sorbet, this was still far from a calm situation. He was effectively walking on a tightrope with each sentence uttered, for if he accidentally pretended to doubt Elegy too much, the Hatwell and Elegy would just leave Sorbet and continue with their investigation themselves. Likewise, if he accepted that what Elegy said about his past was true, then his hidden identity as Sab would be found out all too soon. If he wanted to exact his perfect revenge, he had to be a lot more careful than he was up to this point.
"It's a huge yard, like 9 times the size of everyone else's." Elegy explained, "And the house on top of it is more like a mansion on the outside, but on the inside it's like a church!"
"A mansion that's a church on the inside?" Even Hatwell began to doubt such a farfetched description.
"See that? Even your dearest follower doesn't believe you." Sorbet noted, "Look, I get it. You had a whacky dream that you thought was real, and now you're struggling to admit it wasn't. Happens to the best of us, but you gotta move on."
"Yet you believe Hatwell!?" Elegy lashed out suddenly.
He was quite literally on the brink of leaving Sorbet for good. The guy was as skeptical as they get, and though Elegy did admit he would be a great asset to the team, he didn't want to have to deal with someone constantly nagging him and telling him he's crazy until they met back up with Maggie and Sheep. Sorbet had to dial it back ASAP, otherwise this entire plan would fall through.
"...Hatwell told us about the district borders and their guardsmen, not to mention White Monsters." Sorbet looked at him with a genuinely worried expression, "You only talked about stuff I've never even heard about. Not only that, but no one I've asked had heard about it either apparently. No offense, but would you listen to something as bizarre as that if it came from my mouth?"
"...Tch, I know what I saw." Elegy clicked his tongue, "All I need to do is find my group and they'll tell you."
"And where is that group now?" Sorbet felt a chance begin to show itself.
"I-I don't know."
"I wanna believe you, Elegy." Sorbet said with the corners of his lips twitching, "So may I make a suggestion?"
"Hm?" Elegy furrowed his brows.
"There is a place, far far away from where Heavenly Beings reside." Sorbet explained, now fully showing a nasty, wolfish grin, "It is a place known as the Shrine. From my investigations, I've concluded almost everyone knows about it, so I'll bet your friends are gunning for it too. That is, IF they exist, of course."
"Shrine?" Elegy looked confused, "What's so special about it?"
"I've only heard rumors, but legend has it that people who go there will learn the secret to revival."
It appears the information Throne had given him all that time ago hadn't gone to waste after all. Despite the fact that both Gale and Throne betrayed him for their own gain, he still couldn't help but acknowledge them as being helpful in this current situation. Gale left for the Shrine with Sorbet's wings, and he came back without them. This can only mean one thing—Those wings are still there, waiting for their rightful owner to come back.
"I was planning on going there anyways, and it seems you two are eager to learn more about this place anyways." Sorbet extended a polite hand once more, "So, what say you? Shall the three of us form a team and do our best to reach that place? At our finish line, all of our answers will be revealed. Doesn't that sound romantic?"
"...You're a damn good investigator, Sorbet." Elegy returned the handshake enthusiastically.
"Eugh, romantic?" Hatwell hesitantly followed suit, "I don't care about love though, especially not with other guys!"
"Romantic doesn't always mean love." Elegy explained, "In general, it can also mean something that's incredible and adventurous. Like in stories where the protagonist is described as a hopeless romantic, but in actuality that just means he longs for a hero's journey."
"Protagonist...?" Hatwell didn't understand any of those complicated sounding words, "Hopeless romantic? Hero's journey?"
"Dude, have you ever read a book before?"
"Nope, never." Hatwell shrugged.
And so, the three began their journey across Heaven 2.0 by foot. It would be an extremely grueling journey, one that would most definitely take countless days, if not weeks until they made it. Each night, they would have to survive the onslaught of White Monsters, and every day they would have to deal with hopping the inter-district borders. But Sorbet wasn't dissuaded, for once he got his wings back... All Hell would break loose.