WeTried Translations
Translator: ZERO_SUGAR
Editor: ZERO_SUGAR
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Chapter 505: The End, an End to Everything (5)
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To unfold a Sanctuary, an inner world was essential.
Only with an intense landscape held within one's heart could it be spread out and displayed as a stage. Therefore, the size of the Sanctuary, or stage, that a Constellation could unfold was proportional to the intensity of their inner world.
That raised a question.
‘What kind of inner world would one need to unfold a Sanctuary vast enough to cover the whole world?’
The Witch of the Abyss had made the entire world her Sanctuary. Until now, Najin had thought of it as something close to a divine miracle, but after gaining the thirteenth star and becoming Morgan's equal, he saw something else.
The Witch was no different at her core.
This was a stage unfolded from an inner world.
What sort of inner world had she possessed to create a stage this vast? He couldn't know all of it, but Najin was certain of one thing.
The place where he stood now was the center of the Witch's inner world.
A vast night sea, the Dark Sea.
He had climbed the tower that rose into the sky and arrived here. This place, where the darkness covering the world had begun, was Morgan's origin.
Splash.
Waves rolled across the night sea. As time passed, they grew fiercer, overflowing and crashing down like a tsunami. The night sea, which had been calm until now, began to churn as if reflecting its owner's state.
The Witch, whose reverse scale had been touched, was furious.
Najin, on the other hand, was calm.
By gaining the thirteenth star, Najin had realized something. He was still in the process of realizing it. The Wall that had blocked his Growth had crumbled, and nothing would stand in his way anymore.
Najin let out a long breath and adjusted his grip on his sword.
Kiiiiing.
The blade vibrated. An enormous amount of starlight gathered in Excalibur. The Stars that had existed separately until now were bound together beneath the Star of Transcendence. A single theme running through every story gave the narrative Coherence.
Coherence, something threaded into one.
The Stars held one another. They meshed together like gears and added to each other's strength. If the interaction between Stars had been addition until now, from this point on, it was multiplication.
The amplified Sword Aura even looked like a Star itself.
Najin had already reached the state of Unity of Body and Sword. He regarded the sword as a part of himself, and had gone further still, becoming able to recognize himself as a sword as well.
Tick, tididididik.
An enormous amount of starlight began pouring from Najin's body as well.
The power filling his body was different. His speed was different. The scope of his perception had changed.
Within the drawn-out sensation of time, Najin exhaled.
‘Now.’
He stomped down.
Leaving even the sound behind, Najin moved. Only after he had cut through the waves and reached the Witch's face did the air finally explode behind him with a boom.
Within the slowly flowing time, Najin met the Witch's eyes.
She followed Najin's movement precisely. Her outstretched hand collided with Najin's blade.
Light burst forth.
A platinum flash of sword light cut through the Witch. The Crimson Blight Star burned Najin. His sword shot through the flames, and the Witch reached out, shattering the recoil created by the Sword Aura.
Clench. Her hand gripped Excalibur.
Unlike before, Najin did not panic.
He released the hilt. Stepping in, he stomped on the Witch's foot with his raised leg. Then he reached out and seized Excalibur again in a reverse grip.
Using the Witch's body beneath his foot as a stepping stone, and her body itself as a scabbard, Najin drew the sword.
Unable to withstand the Sword Aura that erupted in an instant, the scabbard burst apart. The Witch's grip around the blade swelled, then burst like a balloon. Her arm exploded as well.
Then Najin spun, trailing a whirl of platinum light.
Najin was a Sword Master. A superhuman of the sword had no need to distinguish between movements. Drawing and swinging the sword flowed into one another like water.
Whenever sword light flashed, the Witch's body was cut apart, and long platinum sword marks carved themselves into the night sea with a ripping crack.
He cut, stabbed, burst apart, and shattered.
He was cut, stabbed, burst apart, and shattered.
Najin fought the Witch at close range. She was still powerful, and wounds appeared on Najin's body, but she was no longer overwhelming as before.
He no longer felt as though he were sailing a vast sea with no end in sight.
‘I can see it.’
Every time Najin swung his sword, the night sea swayed. Its surface grew visibly shallower. Just as the Witch gnawed away at Najin's life force, Najin was gnawing away at the Witch's very existence.
He could see the results, and strength flowed into his movements.
Thump, thump, thoom.
The Terminus Star that had burned Najin until now was beating as his heart. In place of Najin's exploded heart, it circulated blood through his body and burned away the remnants of the Blight Star clinging to him.
The Stars shone.
The shining Stars connected organically.
Starting with the Lighthouse that Illuminates the Abyss, Najin had defeated the Carnival King, Mordred, Atanga, and Leviathan. He had built a narrative of victory over those connected to the Blight Star.
That was not all. He had witnessed the Blight Star's birth and even gained the story of having saved a Blight Star.
All those stories drove Najin forward.
Atanga's sword cut the Witch. Horn Charge blasted apart everything blocking Najin's path. Sword of Triumph split the Witch's body in two, while Azure Hydrangea gathered the scattered starlight.
Desolation.
Merlin used the gathered starlight. Najin advanced through the raging cold, using every technique he had accumulated to carve the Witch's body to pieces.
Clap.
The Witch did not simply take it. The hands hanging from her hat clapped one after another. Blight Stars rose around Najin and spewed crimson flames. Shockwaves rocked his body, while noise and flashes of light burst out one after another to disrupt his senses.
Just as Najin's sword cut the Witch, the Witch's magic destroyed Najin's body.
The battle continued.
Focused on the sight before him, Najin realized too late that the scenery around him was changing.
Every time his Stars shone, darkness peeled away.
‘The night sea...’
No.
Najin realized that this place, which he had thought was a night sea, wasn't one. This black liquid was only water pooled on its surface.
Then what lay beneath it?
Dawn Sword, Cutting Night.
Along with the Witch's body, Najin cut out the night sea. Platinum Sword Aura split the sea apart. Najin saw what lay beneath the night sea, now torn wide open in an instant.
"You."
The Blight Star whispered to Najin.
"You saw it."
Beneath the split sea lay the history the Witch had swallowed over tens of thousands of years.
Civilizations and all that humanity had built rested there. It was a place where history no one remembered had been preserved.
That was the true nature of the Witch's inner world.
Tens of thousands of years of history lay there. Looking at the countless buildings, archives, and civilizations covered by the Crimson Blight Star, Najin swallowed hard.
The Abyss was there.
...Since ancient times.
The Abyss had often been described as hell.
And hell was the Bottomless Pit.
A pit without a floor. A sight worthy of being called the Bottomless Pit lay before him. Human civilization had been cast into a massive pit.
Did this Bottomless Pit have a floor?
Probably not.
It was called the Bottomless Pit because it had no end.
‘But.’
The Witch herself was different from the Bottomless Pit.
Beneath the night sea he had cut away, Najin saw something shining in the depths of the Bottomless Pit.
It was the first Star.
The Star that had been born first in this world, the origin of the being known as the Witch of the Abyss.
Najin witnessed the Witch of the Abyss's origin.
The Primordial Star.
The first Star shone at the bottom of the Bottomless Pit.
2.
She had no wish worth calling a wish.
There was only one thing she wanted.
An ordinary life like yesterday's. Even after hard labor, if she could laugh and chat for a while beneath the drowsy afternoon sunlight, she would have been satisfied with that. She wanted nothing more.
If ordinary days like yesterday and today could continue, that was enough for her.
A modest dream.
That was how modest the dream she held had been.
Morgan le Fay, a Night Fairy.
She had been born a Night Fairy, but she was one who actively mingled with humans. In truth, during the era she had lived in, even the word fairy was rare. Because they looked no different from humans, they had been accepted as human.
"The only difference between you and us is that you can dream longer and in greater detail, is it not? It is no great difference. You are humans just like us, so we gladly welcome you."
The Night Fairies were accepted as humans.
They naturally blended into human society.
They helped people who had endured difficult days rest peacefully in their dreams and avoid nightmares. Humans answered their kindness with kindness of their own. In return for the fairies protecting humanity's nights, humans protected the fairies' days.
That was how they maintained their balance.
They repaid kindness with kindness. Because each side helped the other, they lived peaceful days.
"I want to see him."
Until war began.
"He's dead. They say he died on the battlefield. I don't even know how he died. He promised he would return. He definitely said he would, so why..."
War brought tragedy. Tragedy made life miserable, and misery robbed people of the will to live.
Such an era arrived.
"I want to see him. Please, I'm begging you. Let me meet him, even if only in a dream."
The fairies couldn't refuse their pleas. They showed people the dreams they wanted and gave them beautiful dreams instead of their miserable reality.
"Ah, ah, ahhh..."
She had promised it would only be once.
But the woman who had lost her lover did not keep that promise.
"Once. Just one more time."
That was the beginning.
Many had lost lovers, family members, and precious people in the war. They wished to meet them again, even in dreams, and the fairies eventually granted their requests.
Fairies had always been gentle beings unable to refuse a human's request.
At first, there was one.
Then ten.
Then dozens, then hundreds.
Countless people dreamed the dreams they wanted. Before long, they turned away from reality. They wanted to live in dreams filled with beautiful things rather than their miserable reality.
Because they turned away from reality, the city became silent as a grave even during the day, and no one worked.
...The balance had collapsed.
The humans who were supposed to protect the day depended on the fairies even in daylight. Then they began treating fairies not as beings like themselves, but as special beings.
"Hah."
To be special meant to be different.
"Are you the ones who trapped my people in dreams?"
It could not look good to those in power.
"Wicked and strange. Completely perverse. You let humans who should be living in reality live inside dreams? Those who should be working are asleep even during the day, and the country is rotting from within. No wonder we cannot win the war."
The king gave a dismissive click of the tongue and motioned to the soldiers.
"Kill them. They are wicked beings."
"Your Majesty, may I speak?"
The king had ordered them killed, but the king's retainers thought differently. In their eyes, the Night Fairies were useful.
They could spread poison and rot a country from within. What an excellent weapon that was.
At a retainer's words, the king smiled.
"So be it."
Click.
Shackles were fastened around the fairies' necks.
The fairies' pleas to leave this place were ignored. The fairies who said they would pay for their crime also came to regret those words after what followed.
They witnessed with their own eyes just how cruel humans could become.
"Ah."
At first, they captured the fairies to use them as a strategy, but they changed their minds.
Beings who could make people dream whatever they wished for. Wasn't it wasteful to use them only as weapons?
The fairies became slaves to those in power.
Those of exceptional beauty were sold for high prices. The powerful kept fairies as slaves and did not consider them lives like their own. Day and night, they forced the fairies to use their abilities.
Morgan, who had been sold to the king as a slave, saw it.
"..."
She saw her people withering away.
A Night Fairy's power was not limitless. Nothing in this world came without a price. The fairies forced to use their abilities withered away until they collapsed like dying flowers.
"You've used it for a long time."
Then humans threw the fairies into pits as if discarding broken tools. They did not even give them proper funerals. Funerals were a luxury for slaves.
Maggots crawled over the corpses of her people thrown into the pits. Fairies who should have been beautiful met death in a more wretched state than anyone.
"...Ah."
She saw one of her people, still wearing shackles, stagger down a road and collapse. Their owner did not help them up. The owner clicked their tongue and motioned to a servant.
"Clean it up."
The fairy who had exhausted their strength was thrown away like trash. Some fairies were sold to brothels, while others died broken in back alleys.
Those in power called fairies wicked, yet they coveted their abilities and beauty and did not hesitate to force them to mate with their children.
"Ahhh."
Morgan watched all of it.
"Why..."
From the highest place, in the lowest posture.
"Why can't you show us even the barest decency? You can at least give them a funeral. You can at least express your gratitude. We aren't asking for anything difficult. We and you..."
"You say strange things."
With chin resting on one hand, the king answered Morgan.
"You are different from us, are you not?"
"..."
"Why should beings who are not human be treated as humans? Respect, gratitude, decency, those are things one shows to fellow humans. What kind of human shows deference to a beast?"
The king burst out laughing.
"That would be quite a sight."
That day, Morgan realized something.
They had not even been slaves.
She realized they were being used as creatures lower than livestock.
It had begun with kindness.
The beginning was kindness, but the place the fairies reached was hell.
Footnotes:
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