CHAPTER 63: EMPATHIC DEATH
Amethyst stakes squelch into flesh, squelch into flesh, the scintillations of shattered purple crystals drowning the hallway in light. Countless spears aim for Elsa's slender body from every angle, now surely perforated full. Victory seems absolute. Subaru swallows his breath in response to Beatrice's overwhelming magical prowess. But even while witnessing the power of this girl before him dismissing the murderer, Subaru cannot completely suppress the foreboding feeling expanding explosively through his chest.
—There was something, something he felt he was forgetting. Which he must not lapse on, something.
Many feelings obstruct his thoughts before he can draw what that something was from his memory. What was Elsa's goal in coming to the mansion? Having seen the death of the Frederica he doubted, his heart roils both with shame and at the circumstances of said death. Petra still remains in his thoughts. His deepest emotions scream commands to confirm Rem's safety. What to do about Beatrice, and what must he talk with her about? Subaru reaches not a single answer for any of the questions confounding his heart.
Subaru: “—”
And so Subaru misses an opportunity which should not have come, and regrets.
Subaru: “—Dghuh, au?”
Shooting through the scintillations, something spears deep into Subaru's right shoulder. Looking down at the source of the pain, seeing the seeping blood, Subaru's thoughts blaze red. A serrated scream rushes up his throat. He presses down on the wound, flinching back as he falls on his behind to the hallway floor.
Beatrice: “Why!? But I got a direct hit, I suppose!?”
Yells Beatrice, seeing a wounded Subaru. His thoughts scorched with pain, it is in hearing Beatrice's yell that Subaru realises it. He realises. She was wrong. Or no. She did get a direct hit. That was definite. But,
Subaru: “ELSAAAAA!!”
???: “I can hear you, no need to yell for me with such fire.”
The seething pain stimulating his hatred, shrieks and fury spill from Subaru's mouth. The response comes from across the hallway of dancing lights—spoken in calm voice, and not suggesting any life-or-death situation with its lusciousness.
Beatrice: “Uninjured is inconceivable, in fact.”
Elsa: “If I had been naked, I probably would've died to that.”
Beatrice shakes her head. Elsa answers with her long braid swaying. Not a trace of Beatrice's magic assault besmirches Elsa's form. Her appearance is exactly the same as before. Or no, there was one point of difference. She had shed her black cloak, and now donned only her dark outfit beneath.
Subaru: “Her magic nullifying coat!”
Elsa: “This would be the second time you've seen it. Considering that, you were certainly slow to tell that girl about it.”
Subaru: “Fuck!”
With a blunder by the term 'I forgot' unforgivable, Subaru pushes back his pain as his rage boils up. Elsa's cloak rendered magic impotent only once. —Subaru was supposed to have witnessed that back during the confrontation with her in the Capital. This unforeseen attack, even considering his failure to coordinate with Beatrice, was the kind of blunder which should not have happened.
Beatrice: “Once you know the trick, it isn't anything shocking, in fact.”
Elsa: “—Good. Very, very good. You're strong, you're sweet. I'll be enjoying a warmth unlike that of any simple simpering girl.”
Beatrice again readies her magic. Elsa smiles, flipping her kukri about in her hands. Her smile of blood and those words out her mouth—realising who that SIMPLE SIMPERING GIRL refers to, Subaru seethes.
Subaru: “You don't have any fucking right to mock Petra!!”
A small throwing knife jutting from his right shoulder—with a hooked point, which hinders its removal. Gritting his teeth at this thing biting into his flesh, Subaru unhesitatingly yanks it out. Violent pain dyes his vision stark red. He senses fatal damage to the whole of his right arm's functioning. But he ignores all the injury, pitching the removed throwing knife with Elsa as the target.
He throws with his full power, but he lacks any training and the toss is sloppy. That it still soars straight fixed on Elsa is essentially a miracle. As is its speed. But when faced with a murderer possessing skill transcending human reason, Subaru's throw will come to not any effect.
Elsa: “Good spirit, but this won't—”
Subaru: “I'll wring out everything I've got! SHAMAC!!”
Elsa: “—!?”
In counter to an Elsa readied to defend, Subaru stresses his throat for his third Shamac. Scraping together his internal mana, already exhausted from the first and second casts, Subaru expels both his life force and his magic out his untrained gates.
Blood shoots through his eyes, trails from his nose. The scream of his soul succeeds. Darkness spreads across the centre of the corridor, covering the space between Subaru and Elsa.
The knife Subaru threw plummets into the dark. Flown into the dusk of confusion, piercing through its middle, the knife rushes for Elsa—its trajectory invisible to her. Subaru: “Now hit her—!” Elsa: “I'm rather surprised. But, you only have to stay low to avoid it.” Says Elsa as she ducks down, sliding aside.
This evasive action could occur because Subaru's Shamac had not reached far enough to encompass Elsa. The knife flies out of the curtain of black, stabbing into its owner's flesh not at all and proceeding to vanish down the hallway. Subaru's attack so ends uselessly—or so it seems, when—
Subaru: “Beako!!” Beatrice: “Don't spontaneously call me that, I suppose—!” Were Subaru the only one present, the attack likely would have ended in failure.
But here Elsa faces two opponents—one being a girl who, in the short period of time Subaru had bought, had prepared her next canto. Beatrice: “Here I will show you, in fact. —What true yin magic is.”
???: “What're—” You about to do? Was the statement then voiced maybe by Subaru, maybe by Elsa. Beatrice's next action would make determining even that impossible. Meeting her small hands before her chest and with her glare fixed on Elsa, Beatrice quirks her lips. She says only two words—and they paint the world over.
Beatrice: “—Ul Shamac.” —In a magnitude unlike Subaru's knock-off yin magic, the mansion shrouds with genuine DARK.
※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※
When Subaru comes to, he finds himself in darkness.
Subaru: “—?”
Or rather no, in this dark he could not even judge whether or not he was conscious. Where was he? Was he standing? Sitting? He could not determine anything. Left down, up right, front back, all vague. Was he breathing in? Breathing out? His blood flowing?
Pulse thumping? Alive? Dead? He could not determine a single thing. He had not a single answer for any question. With Subaru's Shamac, he could at least feel the sensation of his feet on the ground, and the fluctuations inside his own body. He could not comprehend any external factors, but conversely his attention sharpened in on his interior.
But in this darkness he could not even manage that. Like melting into the shadows, he could not even tell where he was. He could not tell whether he still retained human shape. He could not judge how to move his arms, and so he could not feel his own body for confirmation. For attempts to confirm his location, equally he could not judge how to move his feet, and so he could not walk. And what exactly was walking? What exactly was confirming? —And in the first place, just who on earth was he?
The boundary between himself and others was fading. The boundary between himself and the world was fading.
His ability to think was melting. Dissipating. Disappearing. And just like this, just like this, just like this—
Ending was he. Ending was. Ending.
※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※
???: “...Enough, now wake up, I suppose.”
A slap peals out against Subaru's stiffened cheek, dragging his consciousness back. He blinks. A sound close to a groan slips from his mouth as his vision suddenly fills with brilliant light. Hearing it, the pain which woke Subaru up now pummels his cheek again. Twice, from left and right.
Subaru: “S-stop punching me!”
Beatrice: “I was only thinking to get you definitely conscious, in fact. And the second one just somehow happened reflexively, I suppose.”
Glaring at Beatrice's cool face, Subaru belatedly notices that he is collapsed on the hallway floor. He uprights himself and checks that his body is lacking in serious deficiency. A pain stings on his right shoulder. He unwittingly looks over to find a fresh wound oozing blood, asserting itself.
Subaru: “Aauh, ow... Um, can you do like a targeted Shamac?”
Beatrice: “It isn't that I can't, but doing it would only make you forget about the wound, not remove it, in fact. You putter around without any healing, and you'll just die of blood loss, I suppose.”
Is Beatrice's horrifying diagram of the future. Plugging the wound shut with his hand, Subaru narrows his eyes in recollection. Subaru: “Anyway...” Subaru: “What happened to Elsa? You're leisurely, so that means she retreated?”
Beatrice: “What on earth are you saying, I suppose?” Subaru: “Like there's any damn what. If she's still around then this isn't the time to be doing this. I mean yeah my Shamac doesn't compare to your one, but with just that...”
Beatrice: “That your powers of perception are this poor is pretty pitiful, in fact.” Subaru furrows his brows in irritation at a stunned Beatrice. Beatrice looks to be very optimistic about things, but that's because she doesn't know how persistent or frightening Elsa is. If she knew how abnormal that murderer was, she would likely make to understand Subaru's caution. Subaru's internal thoughts present uninterrupted on his face. Beatrice this time gives a completely stunned sigh. He doesn't understand her reaction. Beatrice, from her place in front of Subaru, slowly steps aside. Beatrice: “If you don't understand it, then look clearly with your own eyes, I suppose.”
Subaru: “—ue, oe,” Beatrice gets out of the way, and the scene she had been blocking now enters Subaru's vision. A groan escapes his mouth in seeing it.
Beatrice: “You ask what happened to the terrifying opponent, in fact?” Subaru has no response to Beatrice's bragging. Behind Beatrice—with purple spears skewering her limbs to the hallway wall, staked through the heart like a slain vampire, dangles Elsa's corpse. Corpse—yes, no mistake, that had to be a corpse.
Subaru: “She's dead... right?” Beatrice: “If it's still alive after having its chest bored open and being this riddled in wounds... then that isn't a human anymore, it's something else, in fact.”
Subaru stands up, fatigued and shaking his head. A terrible dizziness assaults him the moment he stands, his upper body swaying. A hand promptly comes from aside to support him.
Subaru: “S-sorry...”
Beatrice: “It's fine...”
Beatrice averts her gaze and avoids looking at him. Subaru leans some of his weight on her palm as he drags his feet over to Elsa. Her head hangs limp and a spear has half-severed her long braid. Skewers to her knees and elbows pin her firm to the wall. The painful severity of it makes Subaru want to look away—but he nevertheless approaches close enough to be in breathing range, checking that the murderer is truly devoid of breath.
No respiration here. He reaches out, touches her motionless body. Still warm—but she gives no reaction particular to the living. He touches her neck. No pulse. And most importantly even with Subaru's utterly undefended behaviour, no surprise attack comes.
Subaru: “S-she's really dead...?”
Beatrice: “That's what I've been telling you, I suppose.”
Subaru: “Being someone who knows her strength, couldn't just agree so easy. ...Can hardly believe, seriously, this is possible...”
Subaru winds up dumbfounded at the unreal victory. He had thought her an enemy he needed to defeat, but hadn't anticipated that Beatrice would solo her this easily. That said none of the outcomes he had anticipated allowed for any victory without Garfiel.
Subaru: “Puck and Emilia took her on together and still couldn't finish her off, this chick.”
Beatrice: “...If Bubby were serious, then this shouldn't have been any match for him, in fact. And Betty too, perfect as I am now, wouldn't lose so easily as humans do, I suppose.”
Puck being serious—most likely, that meant his form as an enormous lion-beast. Indeed considering that he freezes the world simply by existing in that form, Subaru doubted that even Elsa could stand any chance. Beatrice would also be a spirit possessing corresponding power, then. Four hundred years—an overly huge discrepancy in time lived in apprentice.
Subaru: “Ri, ght. Rem!”
After a period following his confirmation of Elsa's death, Subaru jerks around to face the room. Frederica's grisly cadaver remains leaned against the door. Somehow managing to get her stiffened body out of the way, Subaru puts his hand to the blood-slaked door. He takes a breath, readies himself, peers in. And,
Subaru: “—Rem.”
He calls. She doesn't answer. But, Rem lies there on the bed in her sleep with her breathing even, and Subaru finds not single hint of the massacre outside having reached this room. Elsa had not entered here.
This proved that Frederica's earnestness as she died protecting this door had excelled the abhorrence of the murderer. Subaru: “...I am so sorry for doubting you, Frederica.” As he strokes the forehead of the lovely, sleeping girl, Subaru again apologizes to the woman put to rest in the corridor. No longer did her soul exist anywhere in this world. Subaru's words would never reach her.
Beatrice: “What will you do now, I suppose?” Subaru: “We can't leave Rem here. Frederica, and Petra... I'm thinking of leaving her to the villagers in Arlam, and having them look after her.”
Beatrice: “You're fine to do that, in fact. She would be delighted too, I suppose.”
Subaru: “If I were in a situation were I could care for Rem then that's all I'd want to be doing. But I can't. I... need to be taking you to SANCTUARY.” He glances back, still touching Rem, his gaze meeting with Beatrice's as she watches him from the doorway. She snorts.
Beatrice: “How nice of you to decide that, in fact. Our talk was simply interrupted before and is yet proceeding, I suppose.” Subaru: “Well I know. This's my answer to that. —I am never going to kill you, I'm dragging you out of this mansion, and I'm taking you to SANCTUARY. Itinerary planned.” Beatrice: “Selfishness in the extreme, in fact. You ignore Betty's objection, and try to force your opinion through. —How do you dare, and who do you believe yourself, that you can speak this garbage, I suppose?” Subaru: “If your objections were what you really felt then I would give them some thought.” Beatrice: “—What do you mean, in fact?” Says Beatrice, her voice low, exerting a pressure near to threatening. Feeling something close to goosebumps run across his skin, Subaru nevertheless gives his head a small shake.
Subaru: “It's not like I clearly understand the minute details, either. Just, I'm thinking there's still more needed to dig out the true fundamental part of you.” Beatrice: “—Don't, I suppose.” Subaru: “The relationship between you and SANCTUARY's still hanging out in the air there. Your relationship with the test site Echidna made. ...Honestly, I don't have a very good hunch.”
Beatrice: “Stop, probing in fact.”
Subaru: “Declined. ...If it's not me, who's going to bust in and figure you out? All you ever do is hole up in that damn room.”
Beatrice falls speechless. Seeing that, Subaru turns back to the bed and picks up Rem. He would take her to Arlam village, entrust her to the villagers, and head to SANCTUARY with Beatrice. If they had Gate Crossing's assistance things would move quick, but he wouldn't ask the impossible. Returning to SANCTUARY while riding Patrasche would likely end up taking half a day.
Subaru: “You can be unwilling to go to SANCTUARY, but I'll still be asking Roswaal and the Lewes¬sans about you. And if I can, ask someone more fundamentally involved, too.”
When Subaru truly craved with the WANT TO KNOW, the Witch of GREED would answer. It was Now. He had more information in-hand than previously, and the accordant hypotheses. If he went Now with all these new mysteries, he felt he could likely be invited again to the castle in a dream. He also felt that then, he could likely unveil the secrets of SANCTUARY, and truths behind its notable cast that everyone had held their tongues about.
Subaru: “Whether it happens before long or after long is the only difference. Though I get your feelings of not wanting to purposefully speed things up of your own accord.”
Beatrice: “How far do you intend to go in making idiots of people, I suppose...!”
Subaru: “Idiots? That wasn't what I was tr...”
Beatrice: “You merrily intrude into places where people want no intrusion, dishevel and disturb them, put them in disarray, and then you spew this drivel, in fact? Put an end to your ridicule, I suppose. And so easily, you abandon the dead two.”
Subaru: “—”
The last of Beatrice's words strikes Subaru with a scathing pain. He grimaces. An instant of hesitation appears in Beatrice's expression, perhaps wondering whether she went too far. But, she immediately conceals it beneath a cool facade.
Subaru: “Petra and Frederica're... after I hand Rem to the village, I'll lay them to rest. With Petra there, I mean I can't just say nothing.”
Noticing that what he's saying smells of excuses, Subaru starts walking, his face hopefully out of Beatrice's view. Her statement had skewered Subaru through the chest.
While he had received a shock from Petra and Frederica's DEATHS, Subaru had already determined to reset this world. Repelling Elsa was one of his benchmarks and he had succeeded in it, but the sacrifices paid to achieve it had been too large. Too many painful things were present in this world for it to continue. Being the person who had barked “Don't die!” at Beatrice, he certainly feels a shamelessness. I can, you can't—the pinnacle in selfish logic.
Subaru: “Well whatever's happening with our going to SANCTUARY, anyway it'll have to be after we sort out the mansion. Our talk'll be after that.”
Subaru passes by the Beatrice standing in the doorway, continuing to walk to the corridor. Beatrice says nothing, but seems willing to silently join Subaru. Being that she was not permitted to suicide, Beatrice had to rely on another's help if she was to meet the END. She couldn't independently act to encourage it. Whatever her thoughts may be, she had to stay within Subaru's reach. The guilt is enough for Subaru's self deprecation to boil up—Knowing her situation and still acting like this? A cruel man indeed.
Subaru: “—oe?”
Subaru, sick of how grungy his thoughts are, abruptly cries out. Because of a light impact. The touch of a hand pushes at his back, and with Rem still in his arms he unwittingly pitches forward. He sloppily catches himself, and glances back to discover the perpetrator Beatrice behind him. Subaru's brows furrow, wondering whether this was revenge for his previous statements, and he opens his mouth to complain—
Beatrice: “—a,”
—When he notices the dull gleam stabbing out from the girl's chest.
Subaru: “—Wh,”
The blade piercing through Beatrice's back and out her chest slowly drags from up to down—from her breast, on descent to her belly. Beatrice's small body shudders with the movement of the blade. All Subaru does is watch on, dumbstruck.
Beatrice: “...Now,”
She mutters. Subaru stands still and stupid at the sight. Beatrice raises her head to look at him. Her expression, her eyes, tell of the great breadth of her emotion.
Beatrice: “Finally...”
Subaru: “Wai...”
Beatrice: “—u,”
Not even Subaru knows what he was going to say. But, before that unknown feeling can take form, Beatrice slips a ragged breath. With that sound as the end, Beatrice's body morphs into a concentration of dim light, within a single blink turning to yellow light particles and dispersing to nothing.
Her little frame, curly cream pigtails, charming peevish face, extravagant and cumbersome and well-suiting dress, all of everything, fading away—
???: “—My, a shame. I try cutting open the belly of my first spirit, and it disappears.”
There, at the spot where the vanished Beatrice had been. Half a step back there stands a woman holding the weapon which had stabbed her. Subaru had immediately deduced her identity the moment he heard her voice and saw her blade. Immediately deduced it, however the reason he had not immediately deducted it was because his brain rejected this as possible. But even his stunned consciousness recovers after a handful of seconds, and Subaru grits his teeth. His molars crack. Tasting blood, he glares ahead, screams.
Subaru: “—ELSAAAAAAA!!”
Elsa: “There's nothing you can do now, is there?”
The pommel of the kukri bashes the side of his face. His head cracks at the hard impact, his body unable to counter the force as he is slammed against the wall. The only resistance Subaru manages is to keep ahold of the Rem in his arms. Blood spills from his split head, his vision dimming to black with the intensity of the blow, his will to fight failing to reach his limbs. Nevertheless, Subaru catches Elsa in his strobing vision, her nimbly juggling the kukri in her hands, him spitting hatred.
Subaru: “Wh-y... the fuck're you alive. I was pretty damn sure I confirmed you dead...!”
Elsa: “Why, you're right. I did die. If you'd gone on to burn me to ashes, then I probably wouldn't be here now.”
Subaru shivers. The speared Elsa assuredly had ceased of biological function. She had died. Unmistakably. So, what was this Elsa before him? Was he having a nightmare where shockingly Elsa had duplicates like Lewes?
But blood yet drips from this Elsa's limbs, her cloak shredded and re-purposed into a covering for her destroyed chest. The vestiges of battle thick upon her designated this as undoubtedly the same person. The only issue here was her being alive.
Subaru: “No way... you don't mean, your body's immortal...”
Elsa: “That is definitely a no way. My life is just a little more devious than that of a person. Now nevermind that, that girl certainly did quite a number on me. I can count on my fingers how many times my body has been this ravaged.”
Subaru: “...What a coincidence. I can count on my fingers how many times I've been tortured to death on your par, too.”
Subaru's statement is sardonic, but not a joke. But Elsa seems to take it as a jape, her smile deepening as she pivots around. Her finger holds down her half-severed braid as she silently looks down at Subaru.
Elsa: “I hadn't heard about her.”
Subaru: “...Then would you like to pretend you hadn't seen her and overlook this?”
Subaru doesn't think Elsa will accept his proposal, but he still needs more time before his limbs will start listening to him. He must buy time with this ridiculous conversation.
Elsa: “This was a surprise for me as well, so I wouldn't particularly mind, but... The spirit girl, and the big maid. The little maid was added later.”
Three targets. Beatrice, Frederica, and additionally Petra. Even with his consciousness soldering white, Subaru strains his ears to focus on the essential part. Rem's absence on the target list was probably because Elsa's employer had forgotten about Rem's existence. He had entirely thought that that had been Frederica, but her death debunked that speculation.
Subaru: “Yeah, you fucking liar.”
Elsa: “Liar?”
Subaru: “I mean Frederica. —In the Forbidden Archive you talked like you'd only killed Petra, but look at that.”
Subaru brings attention to Frederica, laying aside the hall. Elsa looks over at her, gives a comprehending nod, and looks back to Subaru.
Elsa: “It wasn't a beautiful end.”
Is all she says. There is no way Subaru could understanding the aesthetic sense of a murderer. It's a stolen life, and this is the crap she comes up with? Fury wells up inside him, but faced with Elsa and her readied kukri, even that vanishes.
He wants to get one over on her, but his body had not recovered enough to be capable of possibly attacking Elsa. Falling before Elsa's knives, just like this, was pretty much standard practice.
—So here was where this try would end.
As he recognizes the impending DEATH, what skirts through Subaru's mind is the information he acquired this loop, those new incomprehensible mysteries. His exchange with Beatrice, and that final look he saw on her face.
Why had the girl going I WANT TO DIE PLEASE KILL ME I WANT TO DIE PLEASE KILL ME ultimately shoved Subaru out of the way? Her promptly noticing Elsa's survival and pushing Subaru out of danger meant what, exactly? Subaru didn't want to be enough of an imbecile to not understand it.
Elsa: “Those aren't eyes I'm fond of.”
Subaru: “Huh? —Ghbha!?”
The kukri's pommel again smacks his face. His left cheekbone shatters, several cracked teeth falling to the floor. He crumples—when another strike hits him across the opposite side. Seething pain races through his right eye, and with a flash of her knife his left ear cleaves away. The blade and pommel proceed to switch turns in shredding, breaking, tormenting Subaru's body. She fails to grant the imminent DEATH he had anticipated, gifting him only pain and pain and pain and pain as he writhes, spitting blood and wails.
Elsa: “Struggle to the last moment that you still retain life. Don't, and what is the meaning in living?”
Subaru: “...I don't wanna hear any lectures on life and death from you.”
Smack. His forehead splits open, the insides of his skull almost feeling to spill out as he collapses. His consciousness grows distant with the hard impact. Subaru can tell his body is being dragged into a steadily cooling world.
This is probably where he dies. Even if it's just a loss of consciousness, what happens when you fall unconscious around the GUTHUNTER? Subaru can figure the answer. This was the end. This loop stops here.
Next time, no blunders. Next time, definitely. That expression, he saw last, he could not forget, so he, no matter what.
Subaru: “—Beatrice.”
In the final moment of the girl who had asked for her death were her eyes, wet with tears. With that sight still seared in his mind, Subaru's consciousness—slowly—swallowed into darkness —vanished.
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