Volume 2 Chapter 22 Interlude - The Hell Lene Saw (Part II)
"...What... is this...?"
My first words upon returning to the village were a stunned whisper.
The village, shrouded in an eerie silence, was completely deserted.
Tattered, bloodstained clothes lay scattered, telling a grim tale of what had transpired.
There wasn't a soul in sight──not even the hunting dogs we sometimes took with us, their collars abandoned on the blood-soaked ground as if their bodies had been whisked away somewhere.
It felt as though they had vanished, leaving nothing but emptiness behind.
"Is anyone... is anyone here?!"
I screamed desperately, my voice higher than I'd ever known it could be as I ran.
But no one responded to my frantic call.
"Mom and Dad...!"
Despite my resentment, the worry for my parents, who had raised me, gnawed at me, urging me to sprint toward our home near the village exit.
Yet again, there was no one there.
Just a living room that bore the signs of struggle and 2 sets of clothes, both riddled with holes, lying abandoned.
"Where is everyone...? Everyone just... vanished? I mean, sure, I hated this village, but they didn't have to just disappear like that! I was even thinking about making amends!"
Clenching my fists and shaking with anguish, I found tears streaming down my face in despair.
* * *
Exhausted and overwhelmed, I headed toward the center of the village, pondering what to do next.
Finally, I caught sight of someone──
But that person was an elf, someone who shouldn't have been here at all.
"Huh...?"
There stood an elf, her back facing me, with semi-long hair swaying in the same shade of vivid green that I had.
There was no mistaking it.
It was my sister, Emerada.
Despite having supposedly left the village, I couldn't help but wonder why she had returned──yet, piecing together the situation, I quickly came to the chilling realization that she must have eliminated the villagers.
She had set up a small table in the central square of the village, atop which sat a bizarre pedestal featuring a golden orb. It was as if she was invoking something, both of her hands raised towards it.
Yes, that was it──what we had seen in Cattle Village.
But there was one stark difference: the orb was voraciously sucking in countless tiny beads of light.
"......Is that you, Lene?"
The voice that turned slightly toward me was unmistakably that of my sister.
Yet, there was something about it, a hint of icy detachment that felt foreign, a far cry from the warmth I once knew.
It was hard to reconcile this voice with the one that had once been my only ally in this village.
"Big Sis, what are you... doing...?"
I managed to stammer with a hoarse voice.
As the words left my lips, she finally turned to me, a smile on her face that felt utterly out of place.
It was a gentle smile, too tender for the atmosphere, and it sent a shiver down my spine, a sense of madness creeping in.
"Ah, Lene, welcome back. I've finally found you."
I wanted to ask, found what?
But the words caught in my throat, the motion of opening and closing my mouth yielding nothing.
I was reeling, my knees trembling from the weight of the madness surrounding us.
"I've discovered a god who will save weak beings like us. Thanks to God Abnella, the people who tormented you, Lene, are no more."
That story about that god... I'd heard it before.
The Evil God Abnella who destroyed the previous generation of gods, called the Old Gods.
There was a rule against worshipping that Evil God here in our village too.
And my older sister... well, she was an uncommonly rare thing for an Elf: a priestess of the light god Sigmund.
What could have possibly driven her to this?
Back then, all I could think was that my head was spinning.
"So, my sister... became a servant of the Evil God...?"
As soon as I mumbled those words, she probably realized how scared I was.
My sister approached me, plastered on a crazy-nice smile, and hugged me.
But I remember how terribly cold that embrace was.
"Yes, yes, Strong people are the only ones who get salvation. God doesn't care. The Evil God Abnella is the one who offers salvation to the weak."
She spoke with a sincerity that was almost funny.
Like me, she too was treated with suspicion by the villagers just for being a priestess.
But I realize now that wasn't the reason she started worshipping the Evil God.
There must have been something in her past.
She leaned close to my stunned ears and whispered.
"You were also being mistreated, weren't you? Come with me, sister."
"With you..."
It was an invitation to live as a heretic, worshipping the Evil God Abnella.
Honestly, it was a tempting offer for someone like me who already had trouble communicating with others.
I hesitated, unsure whether to agree.
"Stop it! Let go of her, heretic!"
Someone was there.
The Alchemist.
His voice trembled, but he gripped several vials tightly in both hands, ready.
I still don't understand why he risked his life to save someone like me.
"...What do you think you're doing? Just because the villagers have already been summoned to God Abnella doesn't mean you can waltz into the village!"
"Shut up! She's not weak! She's someone who can face her own reality──"
"Ah..."
Before I even had a chance to speak.
The Alchemist's chest was pierced by a golden tentacle that emerged from the ground behind him.
"Honestly, eavesdropping like that is so rude. Right, Lene?"
I couldn't tell how it worked, but my sister barely took her eyes off the fading Alchemist and stepped back a little, giving me that smile.
"...Why did you kill him?"
"Because that man didn't even try to understand God Abnella. That just means he doesn't understand the weak."
She must have thought my trembling voice was from fear.
I was just furious at her arrogant attitude.
"I hate you, big sister."
"W-What!?"
I shoved my sister aside and spat out the most hurtful words I could find.
My time with the Alchemist had been short, but he was someone who understood me.
That's why I couldn't forgive my sister for killing him after relying on the Evil God, deceiving the weak.
"I hate you, big sister. That man understood me better than you ever did."
"N-No way! That's not true!"
Maybe she never expected her little sister, who had always looked up to her, to reject her like this.
My sister was desperately searching for excuses to plead with me.
But I wouldn't forgive her.
"──So just disappear. Don't ever show your face in front of me again."
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