The World After the Bad Ending - Chapter 123



Flowers in Both Hands and a Shell

Vinesha didn’t even name Sharin, just glared.

There was a thick malice, telling her to get away from me, now.

Sharin just stared at Vinesha for a second then snorted.

“Hanon asked *me* to help first.”

“What?”

Binesha’s eyes went wide, whipping around to face me.

Her gaze was a question – was that what I’d said, the truth?

Binesha, who, when it came to anything involving me, had to be first, always.

Whatever it was, asking Sharin for help?

For Binesha, that was an unforgivable thing.

“My— My Lord, is that… is that true?”

The corridor window began to tremble, slowly.

The sunset that had been creeping in was gone, now, swallowed by a drape of dark.

Something unseen, from another side, flickered past beyond the glass.

“Binesha, that’s it!”

And, then, I let out a cry, filled with pure joy.

“Y-yes?”

From noble mtl dot com

My glee had taken Binesha aback.

She hadn’t expected me to be pleased by the power she’d revealed so carelessly.

“Right now, we have to go to the Other Side. We’ll fetch Grantoni from there.”

“T-the Other Side? My Lord, do you even know what you’re saying?”

The Other Side was the world of the dead.

To cross over there was as good as courting death.

But I wasn’t making this decision on a whim, either.

“We’ll be fine if we have a Divine Relic.”

A Divine Relic.

An object where a god’s power is directly contained.

Those who possess a Divine Relic have a god’s blessing woven into them.

I have Thunder’s Call.

Of course, even with a Divine Relic, we can’t stay in the Other Side for long.

So, we’d have to get it done within that time.

“And Sharin has Star Gaze, as well.”

The biggest problem in the Other Side is the dead who roam.

But Star Gaze, which sees all, will make sure the dead won’t dare approach.

“Vinesha, you’re a contractor of the Other Side.”

In the Other Side, there are many things, including transcendent beings.

Vinesha had made contracts with such dangerous entities.

Naturally, the dead would all scramble to run in front of her.

With these three, we can go to the Other Side.

I wasn’t just blindly asking for help.

“Vinesha, right now, you’re the only one who can open the Other Side.”

If Vinesha didn’t help, the Other Side and the real world would become mixed.

She was supposed to play the role of a mid-boss, but now, she had to become an ally.

“I don’t know exactly what’s going on, but…”

Vinesha walked to the window and extended her hand.

Then, her hand passed through the window as if it were entering a viscous liquid.

“How could I just stand by when my lord wants this girl?”

Instead of asking what the situation was, Vinesha chose to help me first.

I approached Vinesha with Sharin.

“More importantly, my lord, this Grantoni kid, she isn’t a woman again, is she?”

Vinesha opened the Other Side while giving a chilling laugh.

“Vinesha, hold onto this.”

Before replying, I handed her the pendant.

Vinesha took the old pendant, her eyes widening.

“My lord, are you giving me a gift?”

Indeed, Vinesha’s memory was completely shattered.

She didn’t remember Grantoni, nor even the pendant anymore.

And as time passes, the day her memories completely break…

The day she won’t remember anything, will come.

“Yes, it’s a gift.”

A gift given with the hope that you wouldn’t forget the memories your master gave you long ago, not me.

Vinesha, unaware of that fact, carefully put on the pendant.

“My lord’s gift, I’m so happy! I’ll treasure it for life!”

It was yours, a treasure from the start.

And a treasure even Grantoni left behind in the end.

But this, I couldn’t say.

No matter how I spoke to broken memories, Vinesha would only be puzzled.

Then, Sharrin nudged my side.

“What ’bout meee?”

She blinked.

Was she asking for a gift now?

“I’ve bought you plenty of bread so far.”

“It’s all gone now.”

Of course, it’d be digested, turned to nutrients.

Sharrin was especially competitive when it came to Vinesha.

“I’ll buy you something when this is over.”

“I want a houseee.”

“That’s impossible.”

I didn’t have that kind of money.

Sharrin looked at me displeased, then glanced at the pendant around Vinesha’s neck.

Then, with her long fingers, she poked my side again.

“Then, another accessory.”

I looked back and forth between the finger she showed me and Sharrin’s languid face.

Did this one even know what she was saying right now?

I had spent enough time with Sharrin.

Enough to grasp her personality to some extent.

Everything Sharrin was doing now, it was all unconscious.

Not one bit was done with awareness.

‘When she realizes this later.’

I had no idea how she would react.

“My lord?”

Vinesha finished making the window into a portal to the other world.

But her face was more twisted, like a demon’s, than any ghost beyond the veil.

“Why you always whispering with that one? Looks like you two got something deep going on.”

Vinesha’s jealousy, it was pushing limits, teeth grinding away.

Before her jealousy could really blow, I turned to Sharine.

“I’ll do it when I get back.”

“You promise now.”

Sharine, just like that, got so happy she was humming a tune.

Vinesha, she didn’t like that one bit, but I was there, so she held it in.

“Hanon Ayley!”

Right then, Eve comes up the stairs, she’d arrived.

Last piece of the puzzle, she was.

Waited a long time.

Eve, she had a look like she wanted to say a lot, stared me down.

But, seeing how things were, she just sighed, didn’t say more.

“We’ll talk more later.”

And with that, Eve joined us.

The best damn team I could put together in this other world, right now.

“Let’s go.”

I would bring Grantoni back, no matter what, from this other world.

＊＊＊

The Other World.

The world of the dead, they called it. A world in shades of grey.

The place itself, not too different from the world we knew.

One thing, though, in the grey sky, always a white moon hanging there.

And in that Other World,

somehow, I was walking with my arms and back pinned.

By my sides, two women, beautiful as could be.

On one side, Vinesha, dressed and made up like one of those ‘landmine’ girls.

On the other, Sharine Sazarris, with her languid face, a regal air.

Both of them, right now, they had a good grip on my arms.

Don’t, please.

Arms feel like they’re gonna burst.

But it ain’t just them holding me.

On my back, another woman, clinging.

Her name’s Eve.

This whole mess, it started right after we crossed into the otherworld.

Binesha, she latched onto my left arm the moment we landed.

Her, uh, generous chest pressing against me, made me stumble a bit, but nothing much came of it.

I’m sleeping with Iris damn near every night.

She’s got this habit, a clinging kind, always gotta hug me close.

Being held by a woman, I’m used to it now.

‘Is this really a good thing, though?’

A bitter taste filled my mouth.

Anyone lookin’ in would cry their eyes out with envy, a bloody mess of it.

But, with love cut clean out of me, all I feel is trapped.

‘That Bandage of the Veil, scary thing.’

So, while Binesha’s got me pinned, wouldn’t you know it, my right arm gets snagged too.

I knew from the summer swimsuits, there’s some serious softness and bulk there.

Sharin wasn’t looking at my face.

Instead, she was glaring, daggers out, at Binesha.

Seems like she felt a competition, with Binesha, and just lunged in first.

What kind of crazy situation is this?

Somehow I ended up with flowers on both hands.

Eve, well, she stuck to me after seeing a ghost in the otherworld.

“Screeeeaaam!”

She let out this shrill yell, then plastered herself to my back like some leech.

The ghost, more scared by Eve’s scream, actually ran off.

But Eve wouldn’t let go after that.

Today, I found Eve’s weakness, for sure.

She’s scared of ghosts.

Scared to a freakin’ ridiculous level.

‘Even when I saw the fiend, I had a vague inkling.’

Coming to the other world, that feeling solidified.

More than that, I can’t fathom how she dared follow into the other world when she’s this terrified of ghosts.

‘This is practically a trauma level.’

It seems there was something ghost-related that happened to the past Eve, something I never knew.

“All three of us are awkward to move like this.”

“Right, that’s what I’m saying! Fox-girl, the master is uncomfortable. Get off him, quick!”

“Who do you think you’re talking to?”

“……”

Their silent battle is anything but gentle.

It looks like it will explode into a real fight soon.

Eve didn’t say a thing.

“Vinesha, how’s the pendant?”

I tried to change the subject, acting as a mediator for the moment.

Vinesha, hearing my words, lifted her upper body to show the pendant more clearly.

My eyes drifted to other places as my imprinted instincts took over, but I didn’t feel an emotional sway.

It was strange to me too.

“It’s so great because Master gave it to me!”

Vinesha flaunted it openly, telling Sharleen to see.

Sharleen just narrowed her eyes and stared at me.

“Besides that.”

“It’s really beautiful!”

Though it was far from being a beautiful antique.

It seems like it didn’t evoke any specific feelings in her.

‘Is my hypothesis wrong?’

I had a hypothesis about the pendant Vinesha was wearing.

‘It still might be early though.’

No need to be too discouraged.

More than that, the grip of the two of them on my arms was starting to tighten.

It was almost the right time to say something.

It was just then, as I was thinking that.

[This one, a real rake, no doubt about it.]

A familiar voice echoed in my ear.

I lifted my head, and there, stood a man of brutish muscle.

A ghost from the other side.

The moment they saw him, Vinesha and Sharin’s demeanor changed.

Eve began to constrict my back like mad.

Don’t do this. I’ll really die.

Before Vinesha and Sharin could unleash their killing intent, I raised both my hands, which they were clinging to, to stop them.

“Barkhabaran.”

[I thought I felt something familiar, thought maybe you’d gotten struck by lightning and died again.]

The original owner of the divine weapon I wield, Thunder Caller.

Barkhabaran.

He had appeared there.