#111

Was it back in elementary school? We did a planarian regeneration experiment during class.

It was an experiment devoid of both fun and emotion.

After cutting something that looked like eraser crumbs, what on earth was I supposed to feel while staring at the wriggling shapes?

Why did I have to do this myself?

The fact that planarians regenerate after being cut was already a proven fact. Why did I have to repeat something that others had replicated hundreds or thousands of times?

The number of planarians was small. One per group. The person who wanted to cut it held the scalpel. The planarian in our group did not divide. Its movement stopped, and it died just like that. The teacher told us to observe with the group next to us and to write the reason for the failure in the experiment report.

Why didn’t the planarian regenerate?

Perhaps the blade was dull, and the state of the cross-section was poor. Or maybe the temperature was too high. That’s what I wrote in the report.

But inside, I thought this:

‘It probably just didn’t want to be cut anymore.’

The surviving planarian went back into the tank. Once it grew enough, it would be used in the next class.

It would be sliced, chopped, and crushed again.

For the sake of an ‘observation’ that could prove nothing further.

…Is there any meaning to such a life?

Wouldn’t it be better to just die?

‘Like this one.’

The planarian that died while stuck to the glass vanished, washed away by tap water. The dead one might be happier than the survivor. Because the pain ends in one go. Perhaps it died ‘just because,’ without any particular reason. After realizing that everything is meaningless….

[Is that so? Is that what you thought?]

Hearing my story, my mother laughed and said I thought too much.

But she said she liked that about me.

My mother listens to everything I say.

She asked in a gentle voice.

[Then what would you want to do? If you were that pitiful bug.]

‘If it were me….’

I think I’d rather have them kill me.

[Then why not grant that wish?]

‘Wish?’

I blink. Looking where my mother points, there is a tank filled with something pitch-black.

‘…Did we have something like this at home?’

Something slimy wriggles inside the tank. It was too large and glossy to be a planarian. If I had to describe it, it looked like a leech….

[Now, put your hand in here.]

My mother grabbed my arm and plunged it deep into the tank. I screamed. I struggled, but the hand she held wouldn’t budge.

‘I don’t want to!’

My mother cackles with laughter.

Wriggling things cling to my hand.

Leeches eat into my flesh and crawl inside.

‘Help me!’

[When you ask for a favor, you should say who you are asking for help.]

My mother whispers to me.

[I can’t help you if you don’t call me.]

‘Mom….’

[Yes, I am your mother. My cute child.]

‘Mom, Mom, Mom….’

[But if you call me “Mom,” wouldn’t countless people look back? You must call my name accurately.]

A name….

‘You shouldn’t call a name carelessly.’

But if I don’t call it, I’ll be eaten by that thing.

The bugs are eating me. If I leave it be, I will be consumed by the bugs, and only a bug in my shape will remain. I will be dead, and only a bug that thinks it is me will remain. Disgusting bugs. They mimic the creature they eat and replace it. The mimicry continues until the entire group of that creature turns into bugs. That is the essence of the bug. Even if someone forcibly gave it a name and tamed it, a bug is a bug. Someday, it will swallow me whole….

[If you say you hate them, the bugs cannot enter you.]

‘Really?’

I thought that I hated the bugs.

Then, just as my mother said, the black, wriggling things fell off my arm in a flurry.

But strangely, the spot where the bugs had been became as cold as if it were freezing.

It seemed the bugs had sucked all the warmth out of me.

I trembled.

[Come here. Mommy will hug you.]

My mother leans her head toward me.

Blood-red hair flows down over me.

‘Mom….’

…….

…Wait.

‘There’s no way this is my mother.’

[What a disappointing thing to say.]

Once I felt the dissonance, everything became strange.

This space, this situation….

[I am your mother.]

‘No….’

The red hair casting a shadow over me grew longer and longer, covering the floor.

Everything around me is red.

It began to hum a lullaby. I’m sure it’s the first time I’ve heard it, but for some reason, the melody is familiar.

[My baby, I will take you out of this terrible hell.]

A voice, from an unknown source, echoed and hummed.

I can no longer see a face.

Only hair is winding chaotically in all directions. The more I struggled, the more the hair wrapped around my body.

I screamed. The sound of a baby crying was heard.

A giant eye looks down at me.

The humming voice echoed.

[Then what would you want to do? If you were a pitiful bug.]

The giant eye rolls.

It is a child.

A child is holding their mother’s hand, looking at a bug caught in a spiderweb.

[If it were me….]

‘No.’

[…I think I’d rather have them kill me.]

‘No!’

I don’t want to die!

* * *

I opened my eyes, taking a deep breath.

My heart was pounding.

‘A dream?’

Something….

I feel like I had a dream about becoming a fucking horrific bug.

‘…Was it a dream where I became a planarian being experimented on?’

I think I heard the laughter of kids asking how many more pieces they could cut while I struggled, telling them to stop cutting.

‘What kind of nonsense dream….’

I sat up. When I touched the back of my neck, it was drenched in cold sweat.

I let out a long breath.

‘…Have I been stressed lately?’

But where is this?

This isn’t my studio apartment….

[

SYSTEM

‘Heaven Above, Earth Below, I Alone Reign Supreme’ effect has blocked ‘Nightmare’.]

‘…System?’

Ah.

I remembered.

‘I’m Fabio right now….’

A strange sense of emptiness washed over me.

Even when I was in the training center, I’d occasionally be dazed for a moment when I hadn’t fully woken up, thinking, ‘Where am I?’

When I recalled that this place is the army and there’s still a long way until discharge, it couldn’t feel more futile.

‘At least back then, there was an end.’

I let out a long sigh.

‘…So, where actually is this?’

It was truly a place I had never seen before.

‘What was I doing last?’

I remember coming to the library with the wax tablet.

I kept going down.

Then suddenly, the Blessing of Record appeared in my hand, and….

‘…….’

Arm.

My arm.

I quickly felt my left arm.

‘It’s fine.’

The back of my hand was clean without a single spot.

I let out a sigh of relief and brushed my chest.

‘It was all a dream.’

My god, how much did I not want to be dragged to the lab that I had a nightmare about Callister chasing me with an axe?

“Are you conscious?”

‘…Callister?’

A man with a complexion as pale as a corpse was standing leaning against the doorway.

He brushed back his deep purple hair with his right hand.

‘Was his hair always purple?’

No, that’s not what’s important.

‘This is still a dream, right?’

How do you wake up from a dream?

In movies, you just have to jump….

“Really, it would have been better if you told me in advance that you had a rejection reaction to the Blessing of Healing. I consumed nearly five times the amount of Sacred Vessel.”

‘…Blessing of Healing?’

“If you had hinted that even the blessing that removes pain wouldn’t work, I would have used another method.”

‘…….’

Cold sweat poured down.

My stomach felt nauseous, and my head throbbed.

‘It wasn’t a dream.’

It was all reality.

I gripped my arm tightly.

My memories remain only in fragments, like snapshots.

A severed arm rolling on the floor,

Callister slicing his own flesh to pour out the Sacred Vessel….

‘…It’s so unrealistic that I don’t feel anything.’

It felt as if all of that had happened to someone else.

I feel as if I’ve only heard about it.

And yet, it was all so horrific that it didn’t seem like something that actually happened….

“Ah, I haven’t introduced my name yet.”

‘You’re Callister.’

Does he think I’ve forgotten?

I’ve heard the introduction twice already.

“I am the priest serving Ledeia, Columba.”

‘…Columba?’

The lab director?

‘If he’s the lab director, he’s definitely a mass of bugs in human form….’

I scanned Callister up and down again.

‘…He doesn’t look like that at all?’

“Was the name Callister a pseudonym?”

“That is the name I was called before I was chosen as an apostle by Ledeia. But it is not a pseudonym. Because the one you met was indeed Callister.”

‘What does that mean.’

Does he mean that his Baptismal Name is also his name, not just the apostle name?

Columba pointed to his hair.

“To give you a simple way to distinguish, if the hair is purple, it’s Columba, and the ones that are black are Callister.”

‘…Ones?’

Is Callister plural?

“Are you saying there are multiple Callisters?”

“That is correct. Callister is a kind of living Sacred Vessel reliquary.”

‘Sacred Vessel reliquary?’

“To bestow the Blessing of Healing, a Sacred Vessel is required. The Sacred Vessel is a part of the priest. Therefore, every time Ledeia’s priest uses a blessing, it is equivalent to cutting off and distributing a piece of my own flesh.”

‘…So he’s basically some kind of Ho-X man?’

“Usually, one prepares ‘extra’ Sacred Vessels inside the body, but a slight problem arises there. The Sacred Vessel has a property of trying to replace a lost part of the body. So, if you put a Sacred Vessel into a body with no injuries, that Sacred Vessel wanders inside the body until it finds a spot it can replace. If you’ve seen another of Ledeia’s priests besides me, you’ll know what I’m talking about.”

‘…Something wriggling under the skin?’

“If the amount of extra Sacred Vessel isn’t much, it’s just a bit itchy, but as the amount increases, the act of storing it becomes quite difficult. When preparing a large amount of Sacred Vessel ahead of a major battle, it almost becomes like a giant pouch. If there’s surplus Sacred Vessel, it would be great if I could make something like a third arm to use conveniently normally and then convert it back to a Sacred Vessel when needed. However, the Goddess of Healing does not permit deviating from the original form.”

‘…This guy is a mad scientist.’

To be an apostle and yet imagine something other than what the god permitted.

He’s a Unit with low Faith.

‘But why am I listening to this explanation?’

Isn’t there something more important right now?

I’m sure he woke me up urgently, saying there was something to do before explanations….

“That said, if you put the Sacred Vessel outside the body, it begins to lose its Divinity from that moment. It becomes no different from a lump of meat. If blood doesn’t flow, the severed piece of flesh quickly becomes useless.

So, I changed my thinking and experimented to see if I could ‘preserve’ the Sacred Vessel by cutting off my arm and attaching it to a living creature….”

‘He’s a complete lunatic.’

He uses his own arm as experimental material?

No matter how much it regenerates, still.

“…For some reason, they died quickly. Even if I poured in the Blessing of Healing, abnormal reactions continued to appear until that part was separated. I found the reason after reading many books from heretics.

Because every living being is unique, it rejects mixing with another living being. The body recognizes and accepts its own arm even if it’s cut off and reattached, but if it’s someone else’s arm, it attacks it until it rots and falls off.”

‘That’s called an immune response.’

That’s why people who receive organ transplants take immunosuppressants.

‘To have that kind of medical knowledge, it must have been a fairly advanced civilization….’

“Realizing that fact, I realized that instead of someone else, I just needed to create myself. I cut myself out and stitch it back together to make it a state where blood flows and it breathes. Then, as a result, it becomes possible to store the Sacred Vessel outside my body!”

“…Wait, what?”

What are you cutting and stitching?

“Do the heart or head regenerate as well?”

“Of course.”

‘…….’

That’s possible?

Many questions flashed through my mind.

If the head regenerates, doesn’t that mean they’ve already died once?

What about memories? Do memories regenerate too?

More than that….

‘No, I shouldn’t ask.’

If I look interested, my life is ruined as of today.

The Status Window will probably label me as a Researcher (Slave) instead of a Chanter.

“That is exactly the Sacred Vessel reliquary, ‘Callister.’ Now there is no problem even if there are many targets for healing. I can just create more Callisters.”

“To call it simply a Sacred Vessel reliquary, it spoke… and it moved.”

“Isn’t that why it’s convenient?”

I was speechless.

‘…I need to get out of here.’

There was a reason people told me not to get entangled.

“However, my most brilliant research is not something like a Sacred Vessel reliquary.”

Callister—no, Columba—smiled gloomily.

‘I didn’t even ask, so stop talking….’

Just hearing that almost triggered a SAN Check.

“Wait, before that. Did anyone come looking for me?”

“Ah, I almost forgot.”

‘I wish you’d stop forgetting things that important.’

“Athanas is waiting for you. Outside my laboratory.”

Hearing Athanas’s name, it felt as if my heart dropped.

I felt like I was going to throw up.

‘…Athanas.’

He must be pissed, right?

No, it wouldn’t just be “pissed.”

I jumped up and opened the door to go out.

I knew where Athanas was.

If I open one more door from here….

‘A space completely drenched in blood….’

…was not there.

Instead, a tired-looking Athanas was standing leaning against the wall.

“Athanas?”

Athanas looked at me blankly.

“Were you looking for me? For what reason…?”

“He left this behind.”

Athanas placed the reliquary in my hand.

Cold sweat flowed.

‘Is he… not angry?’

Strange….

Chapter 112