The Villain Carries the Holy Sword – Chapter 181

Chapter 181: When the Nightmare Calls (1)

「The depth of the sea can be measured.

The height of the mountain can be measured.

Then how do you measure this sorrow?

How vast is this darkness?

I do not know.

But I know one thing.

Just as winter ends and spring comes, just as the rising sun sets in the evening, someday this heart will also fade away.

I pray that it may be so.

━The prayer of thee who shall not be named 」

《You…… deceived me.》

In the world of nightmares, crumbling like a shattered mirror, Procell asked Cain.

Cain, in his complete form from the Great Wall era, brushed back his jet-black hair.

“Me?”

《I thought something was strange, but now I understand. From the beginning, this wasn’t your nightmare.》

The nightmare shown by the Devil of Lies, Procell, is a time like a thorn stuck deep in that person’s heart.

If only I had made a different choice back then.

If only I had moved differently.

A way to relive a desperate moment from the past that you desperately wish for again and again.

As a human, Cain couldn’t even comprehend why his past, still in its infancy, was in a place like this, but what he couldn’t understand even more was this moment.

Cutting down his master, Johnny-Walker.

At this moment, Cain didn’t think of anything else. Just calmly doing what had to be done.

At first, he thought it was a Nightmare where he tried to save his master, but since there was no choice in the first place, this is just a Daydream.

Procell, slowly changing to a different color at the border of the nightmare, asked Cain.

《You didn’t even consider another choice. How?》

Cain shrugged lightly.

“I already broke my nightmare.”

[‘Winter’ smiles at you.]

There was no way to measure the nightmare and despair permeating Cain, but the biggest one was this.

That day, on the cliff, the fight with Abel.

[25% of the world smiles upon you.]

Cain risked his life.

He ran relentlessly and changed the moment that would have become a nightmare. That’s why no matter how hard Procell tried to dig out Cain’s nightmare, it was impossible.

“All that’s left is my season.”

Cain, carrying the magic sword ‘Winter’ that could only be held under this ‘night’, began to walk steadily into another changing dream.

Then he stopped for a moment and looked back.

‘I wanted to see you again like this.’

Cain missed Johnny-Walker.

Even in the current world, Great Wall’s Lord East, Johnny-Walker, is alive. But would he be the Johnny-Walker that Cain knows?

The Johnny-Walker who cried and laughed with Cain, and ran through the snowy fields at night.

He wouldn’t be.

The Johnny-Walker of the present and the past must be different people.

‘I’ll be back to see you soon.’

Cain glanced at the Johnny-Walker he knew and moved on. Procell stood tall and watched Cain’s back.

As if searching for something.

Or perhaps frozen, as if reminded of someone from a nightmare a devil dreams.

🔹🔹🔹

“Elena.”

She must have been ten years old now.

Elena, with her brilliant golden hair that looked like it was made by crushing the autumn sunlight and her vivid purple eyes sparkling, raised her head.

“Never get married.”

Her mother was dead.

Baron ■■■’s hunting ground.

The baroness resented the ‘bought’ mother. She, who had been eagerly waiting for an opportunity, tried to kill her without anyone knowing.

“This world will be ruined.”

High up in the tree, beyond the reach of Elena’s small arms.

Her mother’s neck was tied to a terribly strong rope and hung limply.

Her mother, who had been physically weak from the beginning, was dead with a broken neck, and after a few days, mayflies were swarming.

Underneath it, Elena slowly repeated her mother’s last words.

“Elena.”

Below her mother’s corpse.

A small sapling had grown.

Elena instinctively knew about the Dryad species from the tree that had grown, feeding on her mother’s death.

The end of the wood nymph who had left the tree and come out into the human world was herself.

“Never get married.”

Rustle━.

There was a sound of something rustling through the forest.

“The nerve of that thing.”

And the baroness appeared, accompanied by a few knights.

The baroness pinched her nose at the awful stench of the rotting corpse and fanned herself.

“It’s already been seven days since her mother died.”

“This world will be ruined.”

Elena didn’t even look back.

She just looked up at her mother dangling in the air. The baroness, feeling ignored, snapped her fan shut.

Flick━.

Then she pointed at the back of Elena’s head.

“Kneel.”

The rugged knights grabbed Elena’s slender shoulders and forced her to kneel before the baroness.

She frowned and lifted Elena’s chin with her fan.

“Are you crazy? Or are you pretending to be crazy?”

Even she, a woman, flinched at Elena’s beauty. She was still young, so it was like this, but she couldn’t imagine what she would become when she grew older.

Moreover, thinking about the baron’s face, full of useless greed, the baroness clicked her tongue.

“Whatever. Throw this child into a brothel.”

“…….”

The two knights exchanged ambiguous smiles, glanced at each other, and looked back at the baroness.

She took a breath and gestured, and the knights laughed.

“But take down that filthy corpse.”

“Understood.”

One of the smiling knights drew his sword and cut the rope that was holding the corpse.

Thud.

As they were about to kick the corpse that had fallen to the ground like a puppet whose strings had been cut.

The world stopped.

And from afar, a voice could be heard.

《I can change your despair.》

Procell’s voice fell towards Elena. Like an angel whispering, like a god extending a helping hand.

《Wish upon me. Ask me to change this situation. Then I will grant your ‘dream’.》

Wide open━.

Next to her mother’s corpse, whose limbs were twisted in directions they shouldn’t be from the impact of the fall, her mother, who had been smiling brightly, appeared.

“…….”

Elena was haggard, but she looked at the two mothers with her purple eyes that hadn’t lost their light.

Black miasma rose.

And then it gathered and Procell, dressed in a neat suit, appeared.

《Offer it. Just one word is all it takes.》

Elena lowered her head.

“Devil of Lies, Procell.”

And slowly raised her head.

Her appearance was young, but inside was the thirteenth princess.

Procell flinched for a moment and took a step back.

“Thank you.”

《How do you remember…….》

“I divide everything into 17 characteristics and remember them separately, then I check the integrity of my memory with the 18th verification.”

Procell understood what she meant.

If he hadn’t been the face of the black miasma, he would have been staring at her with wide eyes, his expression painted with astonishment.

“That’s why I knew from the beginning. I expected it because you said it was a nightmare.”

《You are neither the End nor the owner of the sacred treasure. But how?》

“I don’t know. I’ve been like this since I was born.”

Whether it was because of the blood of the Kreuz imperial family or because she was a child born from the desire of a dryad who longed for freedom, Elena was Elena from the beginning.

“I was too young then. I didn’t know how to use my power. I always thought it was annoying.”

Elena grinned.

Procell shook his head.

《I thought you were an easy opponent, but you were a crazy one.》

“Thank you for giving me the chance to kill them again.”

The world that had stopped began to move again. The image of her mother, who had been standing next to the corpse, disappeared, and so did Procell.

“Elena.”

Elena began to rise from her spot, repeating the words she had been repeating.

The baroness nervously gestured to the other knight standing there, signaling him to push Elena down.

Push━.

The strong knight put both hands on Elena’s small shoulders, which looked like they would break if he touched them, and pushed down.

Susssut━

But no matter how hard the knight tried, he couldn’t stop Elena from getting up.

“Ruin will come.”

The young girl’s fist was aimed at the knight’s leg. The knight, who had already felt her unusual strength with his hands, was startled and pulled his leg back, but.

It was too late.

The fist, which had accelerated in an instant, broke his leg in one swift motion.

“Ugh━.”

The knight instinctively tried to grab his sword.

But Elena, like a beast climbing a tree, instantly grabbed his right hand, jumped up, and twisted it in the air until there was a crunching sound.

And that’s not all.

She jumped at the knight who was running towards her with his sword drawn from under the tree.

Crack━.

She instantly twisted his neck once, killing him.

She snatched his sword and threw it at the heart of the other knight.

Thump, thump.

Elena, who had killed two knights in the blink of an eye, approached the baroness, whose face had turned pale, with a clear smile.

“You must never.”

The baroness backed away but ended up collapsing on her behind.

Thud.

“G, Go away! Monster!”

Even as she said that, she used her arms and legs to crawl away from Elena.

“Get married.”

Kick━.

Elena kicked a stone on the ground.

And the baroness’s head disappeared.

Elena, standing among the three corpses, turned her head and looked back at the mansion in the distance.

She smirked subtly and stomped on the ground.

How much time had passed?

She came back.

Whoosh━!

A fire began to rise from the baron’s mansion, which had been standing majestically behind her.

Then she heard a voice.

“No screams from within the flames.”

It was Cain.

He was leaning against the tree where her mother had been hanging, arms crossed.

However, Elena was looking down below him.

Where her mother’s rotten corpse should have been, there was a small mound with a wooden cross stuck in it.

“……You didn’t have to go this far, even if it was just a dream.”

Elena looked up at Cain, who looked much bigger than before.

Cain reached out his hand.

“Because no one would have done it in reality, it had to be done, even if it was just a dream.”

“Where did you start watching from?”

“Nowhere.”

Both Elena and Cain knew.

That the words just spoken were a lie.

But because it was a lie, one felt at ease, and the other could be comforted.

Because it was the first time he realized that his job could cover things up with a lie.

“Procell’s dreams are all connected, so let’s go wake up Lourens and the Director.”

Elena looked down at Cain’s hand, hardened from training. She thought she understood why Lourens, the head of the Special Intelligence Division, had hesitated.

“Aren’t you going to ask?”

“No need.”

Cain knew that Elena’s past was unusual, but he didn’t know it would be this bad.

But Cain had heard enough stories from the others at the Great Wall. It was just like snow piling up on top of it.

Squeeze.

Elena grabbed Cain’s hand.

And her nightmare was shattered.

🔹🔹🔹

Procell clicked his tongue as he watched the four, trapped in their dreams, stir.

《At such an absurd pace. I underestimated you.》

Procell, who had been watching Cain and Elena for a while, got up from his spot.

Sensing that things were not going according to his plan, he immediately escaped from the dungeon.

The dungeon might have been stronger, but the outside was also engulfed in ‘night’. And he looked at Anje and Mauve sitting by the lake.

Rustle━.

The black miasma moved towards the two.

The Devil of Lies headed for Mauve, to whom he had wished in the previous timeline.

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