Chapter 113 :

***

“P-Please, spare me. Please.”

Looking at Lady Dersian, who was bowing low in front of me, I inwardly nodded.

A wretched, ruined appearance.

A face growing more hollow by the day.

She must have grown fearful of “purification,” and eventually reached me.

The terror of not knowing when she might be killed had driven her to her knees.

‘She thinks she could become a sinner.’

If she weren’t a player, she could have simply stood tall.

But perhaps the people disappearing day after day came to her as fear.

Or maybe she has something to hide, and that’s why she’s acting like this — something I had to find out.

“······ Spare you?”

After organizing my thoughts, I murmured heavily. Lady Dersian nodded frantically.

“Y-Yes! If you just spare me, I’ll do anything you command.”

I slowly stroked my chin.

She was never on the “sinner” list from the beginning.

However, Lady Dersian wouldn’t know that.

And I had no reason to tell her.

‘Lady Dersian believes I’m a member of the Reaper Church, with a rank equivalent to Number 1.’

Not entirely wrong.

Number 1 had also called me the “guardian of golden orthodox.”

I approached the young lady, quietly leaned forward, and lifted her chin with my hand.

The moment our eyes met directly, Lady Dersian’s pupils shook wildly.

She truly feared me.

She believed I could kill her at any time.

If so—

“Anything?”

“If, if you just spare me······.”

If spared, she would do anything.

I smiled leisurely.

It was a misunderstanding on her part, but I could use this misunderstanding — so I began “acting.”

“Isabella Von Dersian. Do you know why you are here?”

“B-Because, I came up on the ‘suspect’ list······?”

“Do you know why you were put on that list?”

“That’s······.”

She didn’t know.

There was no way she could.

But every one of the hundred “auction participants” gathered here were on the “suspected sinner” list.

Each had reasons to be suspected.

Lady Dersian must have had hers as well.

“Are you really Isabella?”

“W-What······?”

As if wondering what nonsense I was speaking.

I changed the question.

“Since when have you been Isabella?”

“Since birth, of course······.”

She wasn’t lying.

She truly believed she was “Isabella.”

I frowned inwardly.

I thought she’d be aware she was a fake.

So does that mean the Isabella who should now be inheriting the throne in the desert city of Faisalmer is the fake?

‘No — that memory is genuine.’

Impossible.

Isabella awakened in the desert with her memories erased.

The only thing she remembered was her full name.

But that name could not be false.

Though she was a character I raised, her “True Name” was Isabella Von Dersian from the start — not a nickname.

The name you set when creating a character is just a nickname — like an alias.

The character’s true name is separate.

Thus, the Isabella in the desert is undoubtedly Isabella Von Dersian.

“How far back do you remember?”

“··· My first memory is from when I was three.”

“You were in the ‘House of Dersian’ even then?”

“Y-Yes, without a doubt. Why do you ask······?”

“Just answer what I ask. You weren’t a twin? There weren’t two ‘Isabellas,’ right?”

“No······. Ah!”

Her eyes widened as if something came to her.

“I-I think I once saw a child who resembled me. Is that what this is about?”

“Continue.”

“There was a child with ‘divine disease’. Not a twin, but strangely similar to me, so I remember her. B-But I was told not to approach her······ and one day she suddenly disappeared.”

Divine disease?

The disease of gods. Was there such an illness?

“Divine disease, huh.”

“Well······ it’s only something I vaguely heard from the elders of the house. I don’t know what sickness it actually was······.”

I probed gently, and she showed clear ignorance.

My head grew heavy.

It seemed highly likely that Isabella and that so-called “divine disease” child were connected.

‘They do resemble each other.’

The Isabella before me and the one in the desert — there were subtle similarities.

With age, differences appear, but as children they could have looked like twins.

“I-It’s not me. It must be that child. That child is the sinner!”

Lady Dersian argued desperately.

She freely interpreted the intent behind my question.

Anyway.

‘The elders of the house know. If the child with divine disease is the desert Isabella, the House of Dersian may have abandoned her.’

I needed to investigate further — but I still didn’t know whether finding her origins would be salvation for the desert Isabella.

But one thing was certain.

“I shall spare you.”

“Aaah······!”

“But, there is a condition.”

“W-What is it?”

“Return to your house and quietly investigate the child with divine disease. Afterward, find me in Arcana through Hudson. If what you say is true, I will consider it. But if you speak or act beyond what I ordered, I will put you back on the list for ‘purification.’”

“Y-Yes! I absolutely will!”

Lady Dersian nodded desperately.

Along with her relief, her eyes burned with determination.

She firmly believed she was brought here due to being mistaken for that divine-diseased child.

Her misunderstanding deepened her trust in me.

So I asked:

“Is there anything else I should know?”

Tell me what you know — voluntarily.

She hesitated, then spoke with a serious expression.

“······ The Dersian family intends to capture all the Four Evils and use them as ‘weapons of war.’ They failed once in Delphia, but they will not give up. And supposedly, if they capture Baal, they can awaken the remaining Four Evils······.”

Her continuing confession was like a bolt of lightning.

‘Hah.’

To survive, she sold out her entire family.

······ Truly, an admirable attitude.

***

After the “disinfection” and the “auction” both ended.

Seventy-five participants remained. Twenty-five participants and all their aides had been kidnapped and killed by the Reaper Church.

‘He’s a lucky bastard.’

Number 53, Master, had narrowly escaped the trap.

Even after the second day, the tests continued, but he avoided all of them.

Luck and incredible intuition both.

“This is the main sanctum of the Reaper Church.”

······ After the purification ended, I followed Number 1 and arrived at the main sanctum of the Reaper Church in an instant.

Crossing several warps, a massive and luxurious palace appeared.

This vast territory was unmistakably—

‘The Imperial Palace.’

Undoubtedly, it belonged to the Empire.

A region I had never reached in all my time playing Pangaenia.

**

Rage God (凶神)**

Crack.

On Earth, Master ground his teeth.

He escaped from the Empire alive, yet he couldn’t suppress the humiliation.

‘You bastards dared to bait me?’

The prestigious auction he had eagerly anticipated.

The relics he had hurried to sell for funds.

The loss was indescribable.

But monetary loss could be recovered.

The problem was the humiliation that could not.

They treated him like prey caught in a trap.

A man who had reigned as a sovereign reduced to a pitiful creature barely surviving day by day.

Still, even that could be endured.

But—

“That bitch. If you want to live, you better explain yourself.”

Master stared at Black Jade, radiating killing intent.

Black Jade swallowed hard, trembling.

“W-Why? What’s wrong?”

“You were playing both sides — between me and the Empire.”

“W-What are you talking about? I told you, I was kidnapped!”

“Bullshit.”

“It’s true! I was kidnapped and they tried to make me spill your information! I didn’t say a word, and thanks to that, we could survive—”

Crunch!

Master thrust out his fist.

Crackkk!

The air around Black Jade shattered like glass.

Space Shattering — one of Master’s innate abilities.

“You expect me to believe you were kidnapped and didn’t spill anything about me?”

Black Jade wasn’t in the banquet hall.

It was impossible for her to slip away alone.

If judged by common sense, kidnapping seemed plausible — but this was Black Jade.

If kidnapped, she’d be in a completely disadvantageous position — the type of woman who would willingly fabricate lies about Master just to save herself.

If she wasn’t kidnapped, only one possibility remained—

She had been the Empire’s pawn from the start.

“But this much you can believe. If you don’t spill everything right now, I’ll crush you entirely. First the face. Then I’ll rip out every strand of hair, pull out each tooth, burn you, pour melted salt on your gums and wounds, and crush you slowly.”

“A······ uh······.”

Black Jade shuddered.

He meant every word.

Master intended to break her completely.

“F-Fine! Fine, I’ll talk! But don’t misunderstand — I really didn’t know it was that kind of place! I just sold a little information about ‘players’ at good prices······!”

“You sold mine too?”

“Never! Even I wouldn’t go that far! That would make me a target too! And if I’d known that masked man was that kind of monster, I wouldn’t have gone near him! Damn it, I was tricked too!”

“Since when?”

“H-He approached me not long ago. Maybe half a year? Please, believe me!”

She sounded genuinely aggrieved.

She must have been selling player information as a business.

She likely wasn’t alone.

She, and others like her, must have compiled player information and sold it — which was then used to invite people to the auction.

Black Jade licked her dry lips.

“But still, we got out alive, right? Now they’ll never think we’re players. The Reaper Church would never have spared us if they knew we were players.”

“No. At least you — they let you live on purpose.”

Master was certain.

They knew Black Jade was a player.

They released her intentionally to use her again.

Betrayal is hard only the first time — the second time is easy.

Especially for someone who had already taken money to sell information.

Black Jade frowned.

“They know I'm a player? Even though I mixed real and fake information before giving it to them?”

“Yes. And if they approach you again, you won’t be able to refuse. If both sides brand you as a traitor, death is guaranteed.”

“······ This is too unlike the Reaper Church.”

The Reaper Church never contacted sinners.

If they judged someone a sinner, they attached a reaper or killed them.

Reaper Church doing business with sinners?

Impossible by their previous actions.

“They must have changed methods. The situation has changed.”

“What situation?”

“Wilhelm is dead.”

“······ What does that have to do with anything?”

To Black Jade’s sincere confusion, Master clicked his tongue.

“The only human the Reaper Church knew was a gamer’s avatar, yet couldn’t touch. The only human they couldn’t even approach. That was Wilhelm.”

“Wait. They knew?”

He didn’t explain further.

But unlike Black Jade, Master knew more about the Great Expedition.

The Reaper Church knew about Wilhelm.

But they couldn’t approach him.

Not even attach a reaper, not even brand him a sinner.

‘Wilhelm was clearly some kind of inhibitor to the Reaper Church’s rampage.’

Master didn’t know the exact reason.

But he was certain the Empire’s refusal to participate in the Great Expedition was connected to Wilhelm — and the Reaper Church was tied to it too.

But this scale of “player purge” had never happened before.

If it had, he wouldn’t have missed it.

Why did the Reaper Church suddenly change its method?

Was it because Wilhelm died and they no longer needed to restrain themselves?

‘And half a year ago — that’s when Wilhelm died.’

There was another reason for his suspicion.

The time the Reaper Church approached Black Jade overlapped with the Great Expedition’s failure.

It was no coincidence.

And if it wasn’t coincidence—

‘Reaper Church. Do you intend to purify every player in Pangaenia?’

Such malice.

······ They were treating them not even like pests, but like germs.