Butterfly (6)

She was an evil spirit but she had no memories from the other world.

A part of me almost laughed at the fact that she expected me to believe her. How ridiculous!

But suddenly, I had a bolt of inspiration.

“By any chance… were you resurrected with a Resurrection Stone?”

If that were the case, it would make sense.

To use a Resurrection Stone, several conditions must be met, but the biggest penalty was undoubtedly memory loss.

I’d used that stone to revive my allies a few times. But their relationship value would drop to zero and they would leave immediately, so the stone would basically be wasted.

“Resurrection Stone…?”

But she had a strange reaction on her face.

“I don’t know what you mean by that, but this has nothing to do with a Resurrection Stone.”

“Then why do you have no memories?”

When I asked this, Jayna clenched her hands tightly.

“I… once offered all of my memories of that world to Karui. That’s why I don’t remember anything.”

Ah, I see.

I was sure it was because of the Resurrection Stone.

This is embarrassing.

…You can even offer memories as a sacrifice, huh.

Thinking back to when I used to play Karui’s priest, I suppose it wasn’t completely impossible.

Whenever everything failed and I neared a game over, he would always appear with an offer:

I’ll save you. But give me something in return.

The price was always random, and the options were incredibly diverse.

Things like all of my relationship values with other characters dropping to zero. Or having one of my essences taken away.

Permanent physical disabilities, and sometimes even demanding the life of another allied NPC.

‘The craziest one was when the price for saving me was to return to the city and become a wanted criminal.’

Deals with Karui are absolute.

Even if you pay the price later, if you break the promise afterward, the character receives divine punishment and dies.

Anyway, that’s not the important part…

“…So things were that desperate that you had to offer your memories?”

“You must have been in a pretty desperate situation to offer up your memories,”

Jaina’s expression wavered “Yeah… I guess so. Probably.”

I considered pressing her further, but she spoke up first.

“That day, I offered two sacrifices. First, to get all of us to safety, I offered up my memories of my original world.”

“The second… the second time was to save someone who was on the verge of dying. In exchange… I lost every memory I had of them.”

“Was that person precious to you?”

“I’m not sure… but I suppose so. I mean, I paid that kind of price for them.”

“What happened to that person?”

“Nothing happened. They died in the labyrinth shortly afterwards.”

“You don’t need to take it so seriously. Even as he died right before my eyes, I didn’t feel particularly emotional.”

Listening to Jayna’s calm voice, it actually hit me harder.

I understand why the people of this world call Karui an evil god.

“Then how did you end up traveling with Lee Baek-ho? Are you trying to return to your original world?”

“No, I’m not particularly interested in that world. I don’t remember anything about it anyway. To me, this side feels more like reality, and that side is like a dream.”

Although our paths were wildly different, her situation wasn’t so different from mine. Maybe that was why. Initially, I was only interested in gathering information from her, but before I knew it, I was genuinely curious about Jayna’s story.

“There’s only one reason I travel with Baekho,” she continued.

“What is it?”

“I need to offer an enormous sacrifice to regain my lost memories”

“…I see.”

It made sense. In Dungeon & Stone, the price paid to Karui could be recovered.

Even permanent physical loss could be reversed.

As long as Karui deemed the offering sufficient, that is.

“If I stay with Baekho, I can obtain high-quality sacrifices easily. There’s no other reason.”

Phew, I had no idea there was such a backstory…

Earlier she said she had no interest in her memories of the modern world. So the memories she wants must be about that person. But that raises another question:

“…Why are you so desperate to recover those memories?”

She already has no memories of ‘that person.’She even said herself that she felt nothing when they died.

So why is she going to such lengths?

“Just… it feels a bit suffocating.”

Her answer was very simple.

“When that person died that day, I couldn’t understand a single word he said or the expression he made at all. It was just so frustrating and irritating. …Why? Is it strange?”

“…No, not at all.”

Soon after, Jayna’s detection spell picked up the presence of a monster, bringing our conversation to an end. We never returned to that topic, or anything similar.

However, the conversation we had kept swirling in my head.

‘An Evil Spirit who lost her memories…’

There really are all kinds of lives in this world.

***

BOOOOOOM!

Unlike the constant meteor showers of the ‘Star Tomb’, the climate in the Primordial Lands changed unpredictably, and each change was deadly.

“Haa… Haa…”

This time, it was a heatwave.

Well, I’m not sure if ‘heatwave’ even begins to describe it.

WHOOSH

Smoke began to seep from the green trees, which were unable to withstand the heat. Some even caught fire and burned fiercely.

Thanks to the Fire Orb, I was fire-resistant, so I wasn’t burned or damaged continuously, but there was nothing I could do about the heat.

If we’d had a mage, I would’ve told them to turn on the air conditioning or something.

“…We’re surrounded.”

“What do we do?”

“We can’t outrun them at our pace. We’ll have to fight.”

Although we had tried to avoid monsters while travelling, some battles were unavoidable.

Tanker and Priest.

It wasn’t the best team for fighting monsters, but we endured just fine. And the reason for that was—

「Jayna Flyer has cast Rotten Wind.」

「Enemies in the area take continuous dark damage and suffer reduced physical resistance.」

She wasn’t a normal priest.

And..

「The character has cast Swing.」

I’m not exactly a regular tank, either.

CRUNCH—!

We could handle anything up to Level 4 monsters, though it took us some time.

Kooong-!

“There’s Bartanus over there!”

“Get on my back!”

Anyway, even while fighting like that, if a Level 3 or higher monster appeared, we quickly retreated.

Given that we’re a Priest and Tanker combination, it wouldn’t be impossible to defeat one if we fought for several hours, but only in a one-on-one situation.

And we didn’t have hours to spare.

 

‘…Huh?’

I stopped in my tracks, and Jaina cautiously asked why I’d stopped. Instead of answering, I pointed to a spot in the distance.

A torn piece of cloth was hanging from a tree. A sign that someone had been here. And it definitely hadn’t been there before.

Swish.

I reached out, unfolded the cloth, and found writing inside.

[If you see this…… ……, …… to the central monument.]

The middle had been burned black from the heat, but the message was clear enough for me.

“It’s telling us to go to the central monument of the Primordial Forest.”

Baek-ho, Ruin Gramps, Archer, GM.

One of the four must have passed through and left this.

“…Why four?”

“Do you think Aures would leave something like this?”

“Ah .makes sense.”

“In any case, if we go to the central monument, we’ll meet at least one of them.”

It was welcome news.

After all, aside from Aures, the rest are all damage dealers.

No matter which of the four we found, we’d complete our damage-tank-healer setup. After that, both our safety and our movement speed would increase dramatically.

“Let’s move quickly.”

“Yes.”

Realizing we might lose them if we delayed, I moved as quickly as possible in that direction.

And…

1 hour, 2 hours, 3 hours…

As we continued without stopping, a familiar man’s voice suddenly broke the silence.

“…Ba-Baron?”

Whoa—

I almost swung my hammer by reflex.

I turned toward the voice. “Havellion?”

The GM suddenly appeared out of thin air, releasing his invisibility.

Surprisingly, we had encountered an ally even before reaching our destination.

“Baron!!!!”

I dodged GM’s hug and asked, “Did you leave that cloth with the writing on it back there?”

“No! I found it earlier and was following it myself!”

I see.

Things are going pretty smoothly somehow.

At this rate, there should be one more ally waiting at the monument— the one who hung that cloth on the tree.

And just like that, the two of us became three.

“Baron, How did you manage to—”

“We’re almost there, so let’s talk when we arrive.”

 

I was curious about GM’s circumstances too, but since we were so close to the destination, I decided to stay focused and keep moving.

And after about another 30 minutes or so…

“What is that…?”

We pushed past a dense brush and saw the monument buried in a crater.

But the problem was…

“That… wasn’t there before, right?”

“Definitely not.”

Next to the monument was a strange building. It looked like a temple entrance, but it had no door. The stairs led downward, but even when I leaned in to look, the inside was pitch-black.

“The writing on the monument… it’s red.”

“That definitely wasn’t there before. I checked it in detail.”

Unfamiliar hieroglyphs were inscribed across the top line of the monument.

Just what was going on here?

Everything was confusing, but there was a more important question.

“Why is no one here?”

We followed the message to reach this place, but there was no one waiting here.

“Let’s wait for now. They might have gone to leave more messages nearby.”

“Right…” GM replied reluctantly. “I’ll take a look at the monument for now. I can feel a flow of mana coming from it—different from before.”

“I’ll take a look at the building. Something about it feels familiar,” Jayna commented.

“Familiar?”

“It’s hard to explain in words. Just think of it as a kind of aura connected to something ancient.”

“…Alright.”

With that, the two of them began their investigation, while I kept watch and observed their progress.

And…

‘Why the hell isn’t anyone coming?’

After waiting nearly three days for someone to appear, just when I started to question whether there was any point in staying—

“Seems like I wasn’t too late.”

Ruin Gramps showed up, looking unusually relaxed.

It was hard to believe that a mage could wander around the 9th floor alone for more than three days and look this unscathed.

…Looks like he can handle the game solo to some extent, even as a mage.

It was unexpected, but I had something to confirm before worrying about his skills.

“Were you the one who hung the cloth?”

“…Cloth?”

He reacted as if he had no idea. When I explained about the cloth tied to the tree, he replied that he hadn’t seen anything like that.

“I simply came here thinking that if I stayed at the center, someone might show up.”

“So, you don’t know who tied the cloth either.”

“No, that was probably Baek-ho’s doing.”

“How can you be sure?”

Aures wouldn’t have done such a thing, so that only leaves one other person, doesn’t it?’

‘Huh? But couldn’t it have been left by Mr Bright?’

The GM tilted his head and asked the question. Ruin Gramps replied curtly.

‘Bright is dead.’

 

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