What was the trigger?
Was it hearing about marriage?
Or was it forcibly fighting with a high priest while dragging a tired body, using Equalization?
Was it depleting all of my mana?
Or was it not being able to rest properly due to being on guard?
Perhaps it was all of them.
Aslan couldn’t meditate and fell asleep, having a nightmare.
The dream was burning.
Everything in sight was burning black.
The rising flames were so red that it was hard to keep my eyes open, and all I could see were charred corpses and rising smoke.
In the center of it all, Aslan was holding a sword.
When Aslan looked at the blade, he saw a woman looking up at him with a desolate gaze beyond the blade.
The woman was kneeling, bleeding, and laughing.
When Aslan looked at the woman, their eyes met, and they each made different expressions.
The woman, blushing, smiled happily, while Aslan looked like he was about to collapse.
As the contrasting expressions intertwined, the woman softly whispered.
“I love you.”
As the woman’s purple eyes disappeared into a smiling gaze, the man dropped the sword he had raised high.
The severed head rolled on the ground.
The rolling head, with its long hair trailing, rolled down a slope.
That slope was a pile of corpses she had built, a calamity she had brought.
The rolling head reached the end of the slope and bumped into someone’s foot.
A pure white, clean foot, untouched even amidst the chaos of flames and blood.
The owner of that foot carefully picked up the head and spoke.
Aslan gasped at the horrifying fact whispered in a soft voice.
Then the world, the nightmare, slowly crumbled.
Amidst the scattered fragments of the nightmare, only a woman with goat horns smiled mischievously.
“…Ah.”
At the edge of that nightmare, Aslan opened his eyes.
Breathing heavily, he wiped the cold sweat with the back of his hand and made a troubled expression.
“What, did you have a nightmare?”
Aslan, who had closed his eyes to wake up his exhausted mind, opened his eyes belatedly at the sudden voice of a girl.
In front of him was a girl. A girl with crimson hair and bright golden eyes.
Aslan wiped his forehead and chewed over reality. He was in the border count’s territory, not in the nightmare.
“No, it’s nothing.”
“Hey, you’re lying. Anyone can see it’s something.”
The girl tapped Aslan’s shoulder and sat down.
“I might look like this, but I’ve been the boss in the tail section a few times? Spill it. I’ll listen.”
Of course, the girl’s boss role was only applicable among her peers. Aslan chuckled at the girl’s attempt to comfort him.
“Don’t laugh! I’m serious!”
As the girl protested, Aslan gradually stopped laughing. A faint smile remained on his face, but the girl didn’t press further.
“I’ll listen to everything, so tell me. It’s usually better to talk about nightmares to feel relieved.”
Seeing the girl’s strangely boastful demeanor, Aslan was about to say it was okay.
But before he could speak, Aslan unknowingly closed his mouth.
After all, she would find out eventually.
The girl wasn’t just a companion; she was the protagonist.
If he wanted to prepare, he had to let her know.
He had to speak voluntarily. As Aslan let out a tired smile at this realization, the girl tilted her head.
Only after picking up the arrow and knife Aslan had dropped while sleeping did his mouth open.
“…I was once married.”
Aslan spoke while attaching a sharp arrowhead to the shaft and fletching the arrow.
“I married a very bad woman. So bad that if I didn’t stop her, she would often do bad things.”
Angie flinched at the mention of marriage but quickly responded as expected.
“So?”
“…For a while, she didn’t do bad things under my control. I was relieved by her behavior, and she found her own peace. We lived together like that.”
Aslan spoke while moving his hands. The finished arrow was surprisingly well-made, enough to catch Angie’s eye.
Aslan casually placed the arrow into the quiver at his feet.
While preparing the arrows, Aslan recalled the image of a certain woman.
Her beautiful black hair was long, and her eyes shone like jewels, a deep purple.
She laughed, cried, and whispered love.
Aslan felt bitterness and pain as he recalled her image. It showed on his face.
Seeing his expression, Angie spoke.
“…If it’s hard to talk about, you don’t have to. I’m not, like, super curious or anything.”
Since the point was to talk about the nightmare and feel better, Angie was worried about Aslan.
“It’s okay.”
But Aslan refused, remembering that he had to speak.
She would find out eventually, and then he couldn’t hide it. Aslan picked up the next arrow shaft and continued.
“That bad woman and I lived in a quiet small town in the western corner of the southern continent. We settled down, found a house, got acquainted with the city’s nobles, and lived there for about a year.”
It was settling down. A settling down that Aslan hadn’t expected. To the point where he thought maybe giving up on returning wasn’t so bad.
“I thought everything would work out. It seemed that way. The priests didn’t come looking for me, and there weren’t many monsters around.”
Even then, he knew it was strange, but there was nothing he could do.
Aslan was helplessly happy.
“I think I was… temporarily happy back then.”
“…Hmm.”
As Angie interjected, Aslan sighed, holding the freshly completed arrow.
The painful memory, the overwhelming emotion, seemed to scratch his brain as it surfaced.
“It happened on a winter day when even the sea breeze froze coldly.”
As the voice recounting the facts grew somber, Angie realized that what was coming next was the nightmare.
“The bad woman who should have been sleeping soundly beside me was gone. The window was wide open, and the winter wind blew in. That wind carried a gloomy and ominous smell.”
Even now, closing his eyes, he could vividly recall the smell.
The smell of burning flesh and scattered blood.
Aslan opened his eyes and spoke.
“I grabbed an old sword. I went to the city. To the city glowing red from afar. There, I met the bad woman.”
Aslan, who had been calling her the bad woman, let out a hollow laugh.
“It was a city strewn with shattered, dismembered humans. I found my woman there. All the monsters were bowing to her.”
“No way…”
“The city of Beryl fell into her hands and disappeared. I had to kill my woman.”
Aslan spoke and took a deep breath.
That nightmare and memory had a secondary part that followed.
But Aslan blatantly kept quiet about it.
Talking about it would only cause confusion.
So Aslan closed his mouth and smiled bitterly.
“The woman’s name was the Black Witch Lewena. The priestess of the Twilight Flock, whom I beheaded.”
At the same time, it was another failure for Aslan.
The Black Witch Lewena was a chapter boss that decorated the latter half of the game Eternal Dominion.
The nightmare and memory Aslan had just spoken of were traces of Aslan’s attempt to intervene in the game’s story, only to fail.
Faced with that miserable memory and Aslan’s gloom, Angie couldn’t hide her flustered expression and spoke.
“The nightmare I expected was just… a dream where everyone dies or something…”
Aslan laughed weakly at Angie’s naive reaction. Meanwhile, Angie groaned and pondered.
“If it’s that kind of dream, it’s a bit hard to comfort… Ugh, then…”
After pondering, she groaned and scratched her head. Aslan was about to tell Angie that she didn’t need to comfort him.
“What did you think after having that dream again?”
As Angie spoke, Aslan’s words got stuck and he stopped.
“…Well, I thought there might have been a better way, a better solution. Maybe… I could have prevented the situation from escalating like that.”
Aslan suddenly spoke and then closed his mouth. It was a reflexive response.
“Do you regret it?”
“…Yes.”
But Angie didn’t give him time to gather his words.
Hearing the answer, Angie pondered. She pondered while stroking her chin. After stroking her chin for a while, she spoke.
“I’m not that smart, and I don’t know much. So I’m not good at difficult words, and I’m not sure how well this will… get across.”
As Angie looked at Aslan with her shining golden eyes, their gazes met.
“From what I see, there’s no better way to handle that situation. But you seem to want something better from there. Right?”
Aslan, unsure of what the question implied, remained silent for a moment before answering.
“…No, I regret not being strong enough to prevent it.”
If Aslan had been strong enough to prevent such things, maybe it wouldn’t have happened.
Angie, hearing Aslan’s words, muttered about strength, then.
“Then you don’t have to regret that anymore.”
She said.
Aslan, hearing that, raised his head in confusion.
Angie, having said that, was grinning.
“You told me I’m the Ancient God’s Maiden. And that… pretty girl I saw in the big city said the Ancient God’s Maiden is something really great.”
It wasn’t exactly like that, but Aslan nodded in agreement.
Then the girl smiled and said.
“That great thing is your companion who protects your back, right? You won’t be lacking in strength anymore. You can achieve all the things you regretted, right?”
Aslan, at those naive words, momentarily forgot what to say and stared at the girl.
Angie, feeling that gaze, nodded. Thinking she had caught a flaw, she spoke confidently.
“Of course, I haven’t been able to do much until now because I was lacking. But it’ll be different from now on. I’ll get stronger gradually.”
It was a confident statement. It was also true. The girl would grow stronger every time Aslan raised her stats.
The girl, with those words, tapped Aslan’s chest.
“We’re companions, right?”
Aslan could only smile faintly.
“…Yeah, we’re companions. That’s right.”
Aslan answered like that, placing the completed arrow into the quiver.
Angie, seeing that, spoke.
“Feeling better?”
“Yeah, I’m better.”
Thanks, Angie. As Aslan added that, Angie scratched her head, looking awkward. It seemed she was uncomfortable with gratitude.
As Angie and Aslan stopped talking, silence flowed.
Aslan lightly shook the completed quiver to arrange the arrows, and Angie was staring at Aslan.
After a brief silence, the girl spoke.
“Is that crazy bitch really coming here?”
“Yeah. That’s why I’m preparing this.”
Angie looked at the arrows and took a deep breath, feeling uneasy.
Challenging a defeated opponent again required more courage than one could imagine.
Moreover, it was an enemy that didn’t match the difficulty. Originally, it was an enemy that couldn’t be defeated.
Originally, Ereta was a chapter boss that appeared around the mid-game.
It wasn’t supposed to appear at the beginning.
Perhaps, like with Lewena, the story could get severely tangled, and many things could go wrong.
But Aslan believed that even if he caught what was supposed to be caught later, it wouldn’t drastically disrupt the main quest’s flow.
He couldn’t just run away or give up the fight because he wasn’t supposed to catch it.
So, seeking a way to win, there was only one.
Only one plan could bring victory.
“…Is that plan really okay? I’m not saying I don’t trust you, but honestly, I’m a bit scared.”
And that plan sounded insane to others.
Angie, who hadn’t been learning for long, felt the same.
As Angie’s eyes turned to the scroll beside Aslan, Aslan smiled slightly.
“If it’s not this, there’s no way to win. Only death awaits.”
Angie still had an uncomfortable expression, but she trusted Aslan and closed her mouth.
As he said, there was no other plan.
*
Two weeks after fighting the veteran of combat and the Ancient God’s Maiden in the capital.
Ereta took some time to turn back, but she finally reached Shengqilus.
The border count’s territory of Shengqilus, bordering two nations and accessible by sea, was where Aslan was expected to have passed through.
Ereta thought she could find traces of Aslan or the man himself in that city.
No matter where he was going or trying to hide, the only place he could go was Shengqilus.
So Ereta led her forces and approached through the forest located west of Shengqilus.
The number of partially priestified followers and monsters following her wasn’t large, but it was enough to conquer Shengqilus.
To be precise, it was slightly insufficient, but with the element of surprise and Ereta’s own formidable combat power, it wouldn’t be difficult to conquer.
After conquering, she planned to find the Ancient God’s Maiden and return to the cult or move on to the next trace.
It wasn’t a bad plan. Being standard, it seemed flawless. If she, a high priest, died, the plan itself would fall apart, but she wasn’t worried about that.
For a high priest, death was always something delivered unilaterally to others.
As Ereta moved forward in her confidence.
Ereta’s keen hearing caught a sound.
“Huh?”
As she let out a questioning sound, the woman quickly drew the axe she had slung on her back and covered her face.
Then arrows rained down.
Clang, clang, clang!
The flying arrows struck Ereta’s axe, bouncing off or piercing through the monsters and followers, knocking them to the ground.
Each arrow wasn’t particularly powerful, but there were too many for the non-priest followers and monsters to withstand.
‘Ambushed? In reverse? Was I anticipated?’
Ereta had erased her traces and taken a detour without drawing attention. So, it shouldn’t have been possible for the border count to predict exactly which path she was taking.
Yet, she was ambushed.
Ereta, puzzled, looked in the direction the arrows came from.
“Aha.”
Then she could see the answer.
Among the archers who shot the arrows, there was one noticeable man.
A man holding a long bow, with emerald green eyes shining.
The Ancient God’s Maiden, the veteran of combat.
Seeing that man, Ereta recalled the moment they locked eyes in the capital.
With sharp intuition, he had detected her and rendered her ambush plan useless. If it was that man, it was entirely possible.
‘As expected of the veteran of combat.’
Ereta showed overwhelming anticipation. She raised her axe.
She would settle the unfinished match and defeat the veteran of combat. Make him kneel.
Just imagining it made Ereta feel a heat rising in her lower abdomen.
To turn that imagination into reality, Ereta charged forward. At that moment, the man calmly raised his bow and aimed.
He nocked an arrow, lifted it as if pushing the sky, and slowly drew the bowstring.
As the taut bowstring made a chilling sound, Ereta raised her axe.
She raised it to cover her face.
Meanwhile, Aslan, watching the high priest charging with her face covered, indifferently aimed the arrow.
That arrow was black.
‘Knight Slayer.’
Thunk!
He repeated the moment and released. He let go of the bowstring and shot.
The arrow, shot from a bow with strong tension, slid through the air as if gliding.
The arrow that flew like that pierced through the axe.
To be precise, it passed through as if the axe wasn’t there.
“Huh.”
The moment Ereta’s eyes met the arrow that pierced through the axe.
Thud!
An arrow sprouted from Ereta’s head, tilting it back sharply.
