WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR

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◈ SSS-Class Revival Hunter ◈

Chapter 361: The Heaven that Gathers Wails (3)

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Before the world was swallowed in pitch-black darkness, the last thing I saw was the Staff of Time Immemorial gaping in shock.

Perhaps the mage screamed something.

"---, -------!?"

But I couldn't even perceive the mage's shout. The noise had already torn out my throat, and I did not use my aura to postpone my death. Death was fast. It was slow.

[Re-enacting the trauma of your killer.]

My mind could not keep pace with the speed of the scenery changing in an instant. Something became mixed together in the discord between fast and slow. Water and oil. White and black. And, if it may be put this way, soul and soul.

Like a grain of snow falling onto a brazier, my dead mind gently melted into the body that had killed me.

[Re-enacting the trauma of your killer.]

She was a fisherwoman born long ago. Thus, I was a fisherwoman born long ago. Within the tautology, she was me, and I was her.

Just as when I became Raviel. Just as when I became the Master.

Amidst the trauma of the human realm, she, no, I gazed at the wine-colored sea.

『The waves are weeping.』

The waves were rough. A harsh scent was in the air.

The fisherwoman knew that even water had a scent.

On calm sunny days, the water was clean. But when waves surged from afar, the water sweated. It was the smell of salt. When the smell of saliva lingered, whirlpools formed at the straits. It was the stench of decay.

And now, the waves were shedding tears.

『I must escape. The waves are weeping.』

She merely muttered out of instinct.

It was an era when humanity had not yet shed its bestial origins.

They said there was a towering golden temple in the vast desert to the south, where everyone was a shaman or magician, capable of trapping all human voices in bizarre drawings.

I knew that the golden temple resembled a 'pyramid' and that their sorcery was 'writing.' She did not know. In an age when only a minuscule fraction of humanity enjoyed the blessing of writing, a woman was sailing, fishing.

『I must hurry away...』

Kururururu-!

Turning the boat, the woman glanced back. A volcano was erupting in the distance. Hot lava gurgled at the mountaintop. Dark clouds. Lightning. Mud rain. The volcano bellowed as if proclaiming the end of the world.

『.......』

Instinctively, the woman slowed her boat. She steered only where the tears of the waves were faintly detectable. It took more than half a day to return to her home, her village by the sea, which would have been quickly reachable under normal circumstances.

The village had vanished.

『.......』

Only a few pieces of wood remained on the water's surface. With each slap of the waves against the cliffs, the wood trapped against the rocks gently swayed.

There were no survivors.

She looked up at the sky.

Clouds were rolling in. These were not clouds from the sky but clouds that had burped from the ground. The clouds rising from the earth were much denser and had a much stronger scent than those in the sky.

The entire sea was weeping in black.

『...I must escape.』

She steered the boat.

Not only had her homeland disappeared, the neighboring village had disappeared too. And the village neighboring that village. The neighbor of that neighboring village had disappeared too. Clinging to the coastline like clumps of barnacles, barely clinging to a sliver of life, all the villages were gone.

『Are you alive?』

Every vanished village left behind exactly one survivor. Just like herself.

『I survived.』

『The waves are weeping. They continue to weep.』

The survivors were like me, able to smell the scent of the waves. I, she, nodded.

『I know. I too can feel the tears of the waves.』

『Many have died. God is angry. Must we die too?』

『We must escape. Quickly. Quickly, we must escape. Follow me.』

『Where to?』

『To the largest village.』

She steered the boat.

One became two. Two became three, four, five, sixteen. They were all survivors. The sixteen survivors represented the death of sixteen villages. Only those most acquainted with the waves from those villages could survive.

『Everyone is dead.』

There were no survivors in the largest village.

『Nothing. No one. Nothing at all.』

『.......』

She looked back.

By then, the number of boatmen had swelled to thirty.

Crossing one village to the next, and to the next of the next, the survivors' languages changed from mine.

『Where are we going now?』

The first survivor I met sounded exactly like me. Everything was understandable.

『Are we ■ destined to die?』

From the sixth village onward, the sounds began to diverge. Not everything was understandable. Still, there was no problem in mixing sounds and sounds.

『■This is divine punishment■. God's wrath■.』

Passing the twelfth village, the sounds began to howl bizarrely. My ears buzzed. It was difficult, but if I narrowed my eyebrows and listened carefully, I could understand.

『■■ is weeping ■ inside ■■.』

After the twenty-fourth village, she couldn't understand the sounds. Nothing was understandable.

Only the ability to feel the tears of the waves.

That was the only commonality.

『.......』

She looked up at the sky.

For many days, the world had been dark.

It was cold. The fisherfolk huddled. They covered their flesh with whatever straw they could gather, but their teeth chattered. Click, even now, someone's teeth clacked. Click. Click. She, I, quietly listened to the sound of the teeth.

『We must escape.』

『To ■where?』

『Somewhere.』

It was the Little Ice Age.

An era that had provided humanity with comfortable rain and waves for thousands of years was now coming to an end. The volcano had merely hastened the end. I knew this as knowledge, and she knew it as instinct.

To the south. Along the coast to the south. Following the washed-away villages and abandoned ruins, to the south, to the south.

『■■■■!』

How many villages had we passed?

『■■■■ ■■■■! ■■■!』

Before long, the number of boatmen following her had exceeded sixty. They finally succeeded in reaching a 'surviving village,' but she couldn't understand a word the 'villagers' shouted. Not in the slightest.

The villagers were holding spears for some reason. They threw stones. A spear thrown by them pierced a 'survivor's' chest, and a rock shattered someone's head. Splash. Splash. The boats capsized, and bodies fell.

The man from the first village looked this way.

『Are we to die?』

A question always asked.

And for the first time, she opened her lips to answer.

『No.』

A massacre ensued.

The boatmen drew stone knives and killed the 'villagers.' Including her, all the survivors were the most skilled helmsmen. Killing people was always easier than steering boats.

『What are these people saying?』

After the battle, she called the survivor from the forty-eighth village and asked. They were a fisher who had lived relatively close to here. They should still be able to hear the sounds of this place.

『■■...... ■■■ ■■ ■■■......!』

『It seems they're saying we'll receive divine punishment.』

The forty-eighth survivor interpreted. They said they weren't entirely sure.

『And they called us pirates.』

『Pirates? What does that mean?』

『It seems to refer to seafolk.』

From that village onward, the survivors were no longer called 'fishermen' but 'pirates.'

The sixty pirates grew to ninety. More. More. More. More. Like the remnants of shipwrecks gathering and surging like waves, like young animals rubbing their skins together on a cold day, all the survivors of the destroyed seaside villages came to her.

『■■is ■■■.』

『The world has ended.』

One boatman filtered the words of another boatman.

『■■■ ■■.』

『Everyone is dead.』

『■■ too ■■■ ■■■?』

『Must we also die?』

A hundred fishermen looked at her.

And she now knew what she had to say, what she could say, and what she wanted to say. It was as clear as the scent of the waves.

『No.』

Even in front of two hundred.

『No.』

Even in front of three hundred.

『No.』

She answered the same.

『We must escape. Follow me.』

Five hundred boats followed her.

『■■■■!』

Fights broke out wherever they went. They didn't know why they had to fight. But what they could gain from fighting was clear. 'Unruined villages' hid grains. There were clothes. There were sharp stone knives.

There was no reason to refuse a fight.

『■■■! ■■. ■■■ ■■■■......!』

To the south. Along the coast to the south. Sweeping through villages and discarding ruins, to the south. To the south.

『■■■■■■!』

The world was cold.

The world was dark.

Just like the white seashells clinging to the sea cliffs, merely clinging on with their fingernails, holding onto life, the world wouldn’t end as long as they clung here.

『■■■.......』

Splish.

Beneath the burning 'large village,' she swung her sword.

『■■■■.......』

『■■, ■■■ ■■■■■.......!』

『■■ ■ ■■■■.......』

The 'large villagers' shed tears.

Looking at the bodies, and at the 'large villagers' who weren't bodies yet but would soon be, she suddenly said.

『What are these people saying?』

『.......』

She called the survivor from the twelfth village. The twelfth survivor called the thirty-second. The thirty-second called the fifty-first, the fifty-first called the hundredth, the hundredth called the hundred and seventieth, and the hundred and seventieth called the two hundred and fifty-second.

『Why are you trying to listen to what these people are saying?』

Eventually, the five hundred and eighty-first asked. To exchange a question and an answer with the five hundred and eighty-first, dozens of interpreters were needed. Dozens of people chattered away.

Like waves.

Like waves, like waves, like waves. Overlapping dozens of times, the fishermen whispered to each other.

『These 'large villagers' are shamans.』

She too whispered.

『They know a magic that traps sounds.』

She picked up a clay tablet and showed it to the fishermen. There were pictures on it. She didn't know how to read or write it.

But magic is always like that.

『With their magic, we can also leave behind our sounds.』

『Why do we want to leave our sounds behind? The wave is a wave only when it crashes. Sounds disappear. That is the way of the wave, and we follow the way of the wave.』

『This is the 'somewhere' we can escape to.』

She pointed to the clay tablet. One by one, she spoke while making eye contact with each fisherman. She wanted them to look here, at this place.

『We must escape. Here. The place I told you to follow me to is here. We've arrived. We're here. Tell me.』

『......』

『What are these people saying?』

The waves stopped.

『I don't know.』

The five hundred and eighty-first wave said.

『I don't know.』

『......』

『I don't know what they're saying.』

Then the two hundred and fifty-second wave said they didn't know. The hundred and seventieth wave, the hundredth wave, the fifty-first wave, the thirty-second wave, and the twelfth wave, softly, said they didn't know. As the waves receded, making sounds,

『No one knows.』

The wave lapped at her feet for the last time and gently rippled.

『......』

And the sound of the wave disappeared.

『......』

Only the wave was shedding tears.

『......』

The scent of tears was perceptible. Very close by. And she knew why the scent never ceased. Maybe she knew it would come to this.

Towards the burning flames, she threw the clay tablet.

『Where should we go now?』

『I'm sorry.』

Thud.

『No■, where should we ■o?』

『I'm sorry.』

The flames blazed.

『■■ where should ■■ go■■?』

『I'm sorry.』

Thud, the fire blazed. Thud. Thud.

『■■ ■■■ ■■ ■■■?』

『I'm sorry.』

Quietly.

[Trauma re-enactment complete.]

[The target’s ego has remained intact.]

[Ending the penalty.]

Somewhere, I think I heard the sound of waves.

"You----, what on earth are you thinking!?"

I staggered to my feet.

The procedure to regress 24 hours had not been activated.

This was the first basement floor. Was it said that the flow of time here differs from other floors? Or did the Pillars, the administrators, arbitrarily apply a brake on the skill? Now that the fox isn't by my side, does my timeline no longer hold absolute priority?

Either way, it doesn't matter.

-Grrrr...

Before me was the noise.

There was a life that had become noise.

Something that could no longer make any sound, merely growling, whatever it had been. Clank! It thrashed as if it was about to pounce on me, chained.

"So, by using trauma, you can live the life of the dead? And so, you can make a more accurate judgment than me, who can only watch? Is that your answer? Ha."

I drew my sword.

"Yeah. Maybe. But didn't you insist that you have to ask the soul directly? Even if you witness the trauma, no matter how close you get, it's not the soul speaking direct..."

And I cut down the noise.

"-----What?"

The mage did not even have time to open her mouth and stop me. My blade split the noise. The noise did not scream, perhaps because it was already doing nothing but screaming, and was cut down easily.

The noise scattered and vanished like ash.

"Y-You. What have you done......"

Skill card open.

[Activating the skill.]

That was the gold card I had earned long ago.

+

[Ghoul Reincarnation]

Rank: SSS

Effect: You summon those you've personally killed. The deceased do not inherit their abilities from life. However, if you wish, they can inherit their memories and appearances from when they were alive. If you do not wish it, they will only be summoned as monsters.

+

I lived the life of the noise.

By doing so, I pinpointed the noise's [coordinates].

I cut down the scream that had become noise.

By doing so, I became able to [summon] the noise.

Therefore.

[Ghoul Reincarnation has been activated.]

All conditions were met.

The ash that vanished into the air turned into black liquid ash from below and rose. The black water gradually took shape.

Eyes I recognized, a face I knew.

With the movements that were once mine.

"......"

The one with eyes as blue as the sea blinked, looking at me.

Silence surrounded us.

The Staff of Time Immemorial was silently watching us. The other Pillars remained silent too.

At this moment, only she and I were permitted to speak.

"......"

She opened her mouth.

"Who are you?"

Somewhere.

I think I heard the sound of waves.

"Hello."

I said.

Not in the first language I learned, not in the language automatically translated by the tower, but in the language I learned through living her life, through her ears and mouth. Rough and rugged. Carrying the scent of the sea. Just as it had briefly rushed from the distant sea, crashed against the cliffs, and vanished, white and white. In the sound of the waves.

I could say her name.

"The First Wave."

And what I would become for her.

"I am your Last Wave."

I will become somewhere for you all.

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