Chapter 212

Chapter 212: Diverging Paths – The End.

All the Cathedrals fell in a short time. One blazing “fireball” after another rose from underground all across the city-state, burning away Pland’s last anchors to the Mortal Realm. The bells fell silent one after another. In only a few moments, this Sea Jewel had nothing left but endless ruins and ash.

Vanna rushed through burning intersections and streets like a storm, heading toward the Cathedral in her sight, the one crowned by a pillar of fire reaching into the sky. Yet in her eyes, the Cathedral had already changed in that short time—

The main building had collapsed. The thousand-year-old frame of the structure had melted and sagged like wax. The tall side wings had, in the blink of an eye, turned into twisted, red-hot skeletons.

Above all this, a Sun hung quietly in the air over the great Cathedral. Its edge shone white, but inside it was dark, black-red like dried blood. It looked like a horrible, hollow opening into an endless abyss, yet it kept releasing destructive light and heat.

Along the edge of this blasphemous Sun Wheel, bright red drops of liquid kept flowing and falling—molten lava, or perhaps the blood of the blasphemers.

Now what could she do by rushing over there? Kill some mastermind? Reverse the history that had already overlapped? Or use all her strength to die bravely yet uselessly, proving her own faith and loyalty at the very end?

Vanna did not know. She did not know what else she could do. But she still ran toward the Cathedral on instinct.

Just then, something twisted and ghostly green flashed at the edge of her vision, as if something flickered through the sea of fire. A stern, deep voice rang directly in her mind: “Go to the Great Bell tower.”

The voice came so suddenly that Vanna stopped on reflex. She searched for the source of the sound, or for any trace around her that might prove the ghost captain was turning his gaze toward her.

But all she saw was roaring fire. Molten drops from that blasphemous Black Sun fell down, igniting the last inch of ground near the great Cathedral.

At that moment, another sound broke her brief hesitation.

She heard a bright, long peal of bells suddenly ring out—the sound came from the ancient bell tower behind the Cathedral.

The bell rang so loud it seemed ready to cover all of Pland again.

But that bell tower had already been burned through by fire. It should not have been able to make any sound at all.

At that moment, Vanna dropped all doubts and worries in her heart and ran toward the bell tower.

She no longer cared what intention the ghost captain had, or what consequence might come from following his directions. With all the Cathedrals falling in an instant, with the whole city-state already burned down, the only path left for her was the bell tower that still rang.

She crossed the plaza in front of the Cathedral.

The defense forces that had once assembled on the plaza were completely wiped out. In the rolling waves of heat, she could only see countless twisted, ruined steam walkers and steam tanks. The defense line that Guardians and the Guard Corps had formed had become layers of charcoal, all buried under shocking ash.

She cut down countless ash shadows that swarmed at her, then passed through the Cathedral’s main hall and sanctuary, which had already burned into ruins. She crossed the wide-open courtyard and saw the bell tower standing high at the end of her sight.

Hot ash fell from the sky. Sparks flew like fireflies.

It made her remember what she had seen not long ago on the other side of the Veil, the Pland she had seen that was burned down by fire in 1889.

False history had covered true history. What lay behind the Veil had replaced the Mortal Realm world in front of the Veil.

But the bell still rang.

The door leading into the upper levels of the bell tower had collapsed. The stairs inside had broken and fallen away. After seeing this, Vanna gave up on climbing the tower by the normal path. She came to the foot of the bell tower’s outer wall, lifted her head to quickly pick a route, then reached out and grabbed the protruding stonework, climbing straight up.

The outer wall had been baked by fire for a long time. It was as hot as a red-hot iron plate. But Vanna’s climbing speed did not slow at all. She swept upward like a gust of wind. In only a brief moment, she reached the upper part of the bell tower, crossed the stopped clock face, and stepped onto the top of the tower where the bonfire and the Great Bell were placed.

The top was broad. A pointed roof open on all four sides gave some cover. Under that roof, besides the fire basin, stood the bell-striker mechanism—a huge machine of gears and levers.

The Great Bell hung under this machine, hidden inside a resonance chamber.

Vanna vaulted onto the top of the tower and landed.

She looked back toward the way she had come and saw the city-state beneath her sinking into a sea of fire. Scorching lava flowed down the streets, leaving shocking ravines behind. From this height above the city, she looked down on a living hell and saw only ruin.

Then she turned back toward the bell-striker mechanism, which clearly had lost all power, yet still kept moving.

A figure—or rather, a clump of charcoal barely keeping a human shape—was clinging to the lever beside the bell-striker mechanism, using the last of his strength to keep the heavy gears turning.

Vanna stepped forward on reflex. The charcoal figure seemed to feel her coming closer. He slowly lifted his head and turned his face. A pair of human eyes looked at the young inquisitor who had appeared on the top of the tower.

“Hold… the tower…”

The charcoal figure rasped in a hoarse voice.

Then he crashed to the floor. His completely carbonized body broke apart. The last heat faded from the rubble of his remains, and the glowing red cracks on his body slowly went out.

A Storm Emblem, symbol of the Deep Sea Church, rolled out of the pile of charcoal and onto the ground.

Pland’s last bell finally fell silent.

“Archbishop!”

Vanna recognized those eyes. She rushed forward, wanting to save that heap of ash, or to push the bell-striker mechanism again herself. But just as she took her first step, a sudden, crushing pressure forced her to stop.

Vanna froze in place by sheer will and turned toward the direction that pressure came from.

A tall, thin figure in a ragged gray robe, body shriveled and dry like an ascetic monk, stood quietly at the edge of the platform.

The “monk” looked at Vanna with pity in his eyes. Behind him, in the sky, hung the Black Sun, its edge blazing bright, its body dripping molten fire.

Vanna did not know when he had appeared there. His arrival was so silent that she had not sensed it at all. It was as if he had been standing on this high tower from the very beginning, from long, long ago—even before the fire started.

“You have struggled with all your strength, child. You all have. You even delayed things several times longer than expected. But this delay and this defense have no meaning. No one will come to save you. In this already closed-loop historical Vision, any reinforcements are fated never to reach Pland before history correction is complete…”

The thin, black figure spoke slowly. He lifted his hand a little. His bony arm seemed to shimmer with flame in the light of the Black Sun behind him. “Now, embrace this new future. Rise from the ashes, child… your survival and return did not change anything.”

Vanna stayed silent. She simply took the greatsword from her back.

“Oh, so the talks have broken down…” The Ender saw Vanna’s action, yet his face stayed calm and full of pity. “Of course, you can easily kill me. But that has no meaning. The Sun’s spawn is already ready to welcome his descent.

“As for me, I am only a witness to this moment of the End. I will witness it now, and I will witness it again someday.

“And you… do you see that Sun?”

Vanna lifted her gaze a little. Her eyes passed the Ender and finally noticed that, deep in that blasphemous Sun Wheel, something dark was pulsing, like a forming embryo, like a heart slowly waking.

A strange unease rose sharply in her chest.

She finally realized that the crushing pressure from before had not come from the weak and thin Ender in front of her. It came from the Black Sun behind him.

Something was waking inside that Sun!

“This plan met many setbacks. A force we never fully saw kept interfering with our correction of history again and again,” the Ender said, still looking at Vanna’s eyes with that pitiful gaze, his voice low and almost hypnotic. “The disturbance it brought made some eyes, which should never have opened, notice the truth.

“You were actually only a step away from uncovering everything. Really, just one step away—but fate is like this.

“Child, fate is this unreasonable.”

He sighed with pity and slowly walked forward. He came to stand in front of Vanna, who still stood firm. Like he was reading out a sacred Truth, he said: “But you are blessed. You have truly resurrected, and you will live and die again. You have received the highest divine blessing… so you have the chance to embrace all this.”

Vanna tightened her grip on the sword. For the first time in her life, her killing intent rose not from justice or duty, but from fierce hatred.

But in the last second before she swung, her movement was cut off by a stream of fire that suddenly burst up along the edge of the platform.

A door of ghostly green flame appeared out of nowhere behind the Ender. From it stepped a tall, majestic figure, his whole body wrapped in spirit form fire.

The Ender seemed not to notice the door behind him at all. He spread his arms, like a prophet preaching to the world before the final judgment, and declared:

“Blessed child, do not resist. As you can see, the age has changed…”

He suddenly stopped.

A nameless terror stabbed into his clouded mind. A chaotic noise, as if straight from Subspace, blended into the roaring flames of Pland.

The madman tried in panic to turn around, but before he could, a hand rested lightly on his shoulder.

“Turn back.”

A calm voice spoke.