Chapter 117

The Forgotten Social Gathering (2)

Seraphia stood rigid, unable to do anything. Bloodcurdling shrieks erupted from every direction. All manner of grotesque things filled the tea party, their limbs twisting as their shrieking forms crawled across the ground. Things with human faces that were not human writhed before her.

In an instant, the once-elegant tea party had been steeped in unspeakable horror.

"Aaaah...!!"

... She was terrified. Truly, utterly terrified. Fear and terror had frozen even her mind. She could not take a single step. In the end, she squeezed her eyes shut.

Just then, Adrian's voice reached her once more.

"Don't look away. Face it. Fear can be contained once you can see it."

Seraphia slowly opened her eyes and saw Adrian's back. He stood between her and those grotesque things, facing them head-on. Her lips parted as she stared at his back.

It was so broad that no one seemed capable of getting past it. So solid that nothing seemed capable of breaking him. A back broader than any fortress wall on the continent, sturdier than any shield.

At that moment, the grotesque things lunged from every direction at unimaginable speed. But an even swifter, more tremendous force exploded from Adrian's fingertips.

CRAAACK!!

A razor-sharp blast of wind swept across the scene.

SK-SKREEE!

Chilling screams rang out. In an instant, the grotesque things had been swept away. They no longer charged at him.

They could not.

Instead, they began shuffling backward, as though Adrian had frightened them.

... He was incredible. Truly, utterly incredible. Before she knew it, Seraphia no longer felt any fear or terror.

'Brother is protecting me...'

Nothing scared her. Nothing frightened her. Seraphia drew a breath.

WHIIIIINE!

An ink-dark line of cold spread outward from Seraphia in every direction. It grew colder and more intense until, for an instant, her eyes shone pure white.

CRAAAAACK!!

The ensuing explosion of cold silenced the tea party in an instant.

* * *

An explosion of cold engulfed the tea party. I lowered the sharpened nails of Dragon's Claw[A].

'It's over.'

Sure enough, every last grotesque thing caught in the blast had frozen solid. Even the screams had frozen at the tea party. Everything stood still.

"Haaaaah...!"

I heard Seraphia exhale as the tension left her. She slumped to the ground, seemingly exhausted by the effort.

Seraphia had awakened the Authority of Bitter Cold.

'She clearly can't wield her Authority properly yet.'

But she was still inexperienced. Come to think of it, she had only started wielding it recently. She was literally at the stage of having just awakened it.

Perhaps that was why she had failed to properly control that explosion of cold. The air froze unevenly, and ice erupted in entirely the wrong places. Its power was also absurdly weak compared with what I had seen in my previous life. Next to the Sovereign of Bitter Cold, she was less than a novice. For that matter, was it even conceivable that the Sovereign of Bitter Cold would be afraid of mere Gremlins?

Even so, Seraphia was growing stronger. She had improved since the Shameleon incident, and even since the rampage in the palace.

'The Sovereign of Bitter Cold is still the Sovereign of Bitter Cold, I suppose.'

She had not been called [The Allied Army’s Greatest Enemy] for nothing.

... Anyway. I calmly gathered my thoughts. First, those grotesque things that had overrun the tea party were not nobles. They were not even human. Predatory Instincts[S] had revealed their identity...

'So they used Gremlins.'

Gremlins were cunning, malicious demons. Devious, evil creatures that elicited the fear and terror within other beings and devoured their minds. Only a being powerful and dangerous enough to govern their malice and chaos could command them.

In other words...

'Luseria, then.'

Luseria, the Enchantress of Lust. This was her doing.

The Gremlins' trait: Formless. They had no appearance of their own. With no fixed shape, they could transform into anything. But it was not a particularly useful ability. Their lack of form also meant they lacked substance.

Without substance, they could not define themselves. They could become anything, yet ultimately could become nothing. In that sense, Formless was not an "ability." A property... perhaps? That was why it had no rank attached to it. As such, there was nothing for me to gain through Predation[S+].

At any rate, their insubstantial nature made Gremlins easily subservient to a nightmare's Authority. Luseria, the Enchantress of Lust, was a cambion who had inherited that Authority. She was also a black mage who wielded powerful black magic.

Black magic used the magical power of darkness. Except it was not actually dark "magical power." By the same token, it was not black "magic," either. According to Iliana, the allied army's Archmage—

["It's sorcery."]

Sorcery. A power that borrowed mysterious forces to produce various phenomena and bring about inexplicable changes. In other words, it was classified as a modified form of aura energy.

["It will be easier to understand if you think of the supply commander's spirits."]

The power wielded by the allied army's hero, the Spirit Mage, was also sorcery.

["To explain the power of sorcery in detail..."]

Something or other based on the law of sympathy. Blah blah, the laws of similarity and contact. Homeopathic sorcery, imitative sorcery, contagious sorcery, whatchamacallit.

... My head started hurting, so I stopped listening beyond that.

There was only one thing I could understand.

["For these reasons, sorcery is generally mysterious, and at times bizarre or overwhelming."]

... That was all I understood.

Anyway, Luseria was probably watching this social gathering from somewhere right now.

'Even the Spirit Mage had trouble dealing with her.'

Cambions were born with immense power. More importantly, there was the being of the Abyss that had chosen Luseria. A queen born in the Void of the Abyss who had subjugated the Abyss itself. The she-spider of the Abyss, carrying fifty thousand young. The Spirit Mage's spirits embodied the natural world, but even they struggled against the abyssal offspring the she-spider carried.

Fortunately, Luseria had not yet been chosen. Even so, she was a powerful black mage. Which meant that if she was involved in this gathering...

◆Error: Inventory is not responding.

This phenomenon, the Inventory failing to respond... Judging by my experience in the Infinite Labyrinth, this was a separate space detached from reality.

'A space inside a barrier.'

Of course, a barrier could not be established in an instant. It required a great deal of time and effort at a specific location. There was no way anyone could establish one in the heavily guarded palace. But what if Queen Marceline had been bought off?

'Then setting up a barrier in the palace would have been entirely possible.'

In other words, the entire palace had been a "black mage's domain."

I slowly heightened my senses. Then I expanded their range beyond the tea party to encompass the entire palace and used Predatory Instincts[S]. The truth hidden within this gathering lay fully exposed.

◆The Forgotten Social Gathering (The Vanished Social Club)

: You have become trapped in a social gathering that is endlessly forgotten. Familiarize yourself with the [Rules] below and reach the final day.

===[Rules]========================================================================================================================================================================================================

[Rule 1] - Recover your memories of the first social gathering. They are your only guide to identifying the anomalies that occur here in the Forgotten Social Gathering.

[Rule 2] - Anomalies that did not occur in the original social gathering will occur in the Forgotten Social Gathering. Do not miss a single one.

[Rule 3] - If you discover an anomaly, eliminate it immediately, then proceed to the next event of the social gathering.

[Rule 4] - If you discover no anomalies, proceed to the next event of the social gathering.

[Rule 5] - If you eliminate a phenomenon that is not an anomaly, you will return to the initial state. Exercise caution in your actions.

[Rule 6] - If the next event of the social gathering proceeds without an anomaly being eliminated, ⱩἷⱲἰⱷⱲⱩⱾ will devour your memories and soul. Be sure to eliminate all anomalies.

[Rule 7] - The Forgotten Social Gathering will repeat endlessly until you escape.

[Rule 8] - Familiarize yourself with the rules above and reach the final ball.

* * *

I was lost in thought as I returned to the palace guest suites.

'I've figured out their entire plan.'

I had seen through everything Queen Marceline had in store. She was in the palm of my hand. All that remained was simple: dismantle her plans one by one and completely overturn her intended outcome. Then...

'You won't be able to stay hidden in the darkness forever—'

◆Successor's Will[EX] resists the fragmentation of your self!!

◆110 Sanity has accumulated.

Messages suddenly appeared before my eyes. At the same time, the memories of my fragmented self pieced themselves back together.

... My memories had been erased yet again.

It was a truly terrifying Authority. But even so, I resisted it. The fragments of my memory were restored.

'... Was there another anomaly?'

Apparently, there had been another anomaly besides the Gremlins. Come to think of it, the [Rules] only said there would be an anomaly, not that there would be just one.

'Sneaky.'

In the end, I had missed an anomaly. And apparently, [Rule 7] had returned me to the beginning.

[Rule 7] - The Forgotten Social Gathering will repeat endlessly until you escape.

That meant it was now before the social gathering began. In other words, before any anomalies occurred.

◆Error: Inventory is not responding.

The Inventory was not responding this time, either.

'Which means the Inventory failing to respond wasn't an anomaly.'

There had definitely been another anomaly besides the Gremlins. This also confirmed that this was a barrier: a separate space detached from reality.

But...

'Luseria shouldn't be able to use a barrier like this.'

As a powerful black mage, she could use barriers. But not this kind. It was not that she chose not to use them. She could not.

The erasure of memories. Oblivion on this scale was beyond Luseria's power. Before being chosen, commanding Gremlins and wielding powerful black magic were the limits of her abilities. Frankly, even Iliana in my previous life could not have done this.

Only one being could. One of the six Sovereigns who served the Emperor.

'So the Sovereign of Darkness has finally intervened.'

After I thwarted every scheme at the social gathering, he had finally been forced to act. That meant this barrier was a space Luseria had created by borrowing the Sovereign of Darkness's Authority. In other words, this was no black mage's domain. It was a "domain of darkness," where every phenomenon was thoroughly distorted.

Even Ian had been unable to resist it. It was a space no one could escape—but that did not apply to me now.

Successor's Will[EX].

I could certainly feel the pressure of the Authority, but it could never erode me. I alone was completely free of his control.

Which brought me to [Rule 6].

[Rule 6] - If the next event of the social gathering proceeds without an anomaly being eliminated, ⱩἷⱲἰⱷⱲⱩⱾ will devour your memories and soul. Be sure to eliminate all anomalies.

Despite missing an anomaly, my memories and soul had not been devoured. That was thanks to none other than Successor's Will[EX]. The limit of my mental fortitude was aleph-null. In other words, it was infinite.

Thus, each time my memories and soul were devoured, I accumulated Sanity instead. The latest gain was 110, bringing my current Sanity to a whopping 682.

'Should I hit 9,999 before leaving?'

... I seriously considered it.

After all, until now, my only way to accumulate Sanity had been Predation[S+]. Each monster gave me an average of three to five Sanity. And Sanity determined the power of the transcendent skill Berserk[?].

It was great that Successor's Will[EX] had removed the limit. But Sanity trickled in so slowly that I had been unable to properly understand Berserk[?]. There was so much I did not know. What "super-combination skills" could I obtain by transcending skills other than Promote Metabolism[C+]? How much Sanity did each rank require? How much would I need to reach [A] rank, and how much more for [S] rank? Could I even transcend skills to a rank beyond [S+]? What would happen if I transcended the rank of Predation[S+]?

Beyond that, could I transcend two skills at once? If so, would there be side effects? What kind? I wanted to test it for myself and find out, but I could not. Accumulating the Sanity that determined Berserk[?]' s power had been too difficult.

But a single, effortless activation of the Authority of Oblivion? A whopping 110 Sanity, just like that. The efficiency was staggering.

Here, I could use, test, and experiment with Berserk[?] as much as I wanted. Successor's Will[EX] would let me accumulate Sanity endlessly. I could create new, utterly broken super-combination skills and combination skills.

I had no idea what this ⱩἷⱲἰⱷⱲⱩⱾ that devoured my memories and soul was, but...

'Do I have to escape this place?'

... Was there really any need?