EP.44 The Undead Have Something to Say
The immortal sat up with a jerk, like a person waking from a long sleep. Even though his arms and legs were gone, he didn't scream or recoil in horror. He only furrowed his thick brows and looked around. For someone who had suffered a tragic accident and had their body torn apart, it was a rather unremarkable reaction.
That made sense. For immortals who wouldn't die even if their limbs were torn off and their heads severed, this level of injury was an everyday occurrence.
The only difference from their everyday life was that this land was the Abyss with severed ley lines, so regeneration didn't work.
Coming to his senses, he shouted with a bewildered expression.
"Oh! What happened? My limbs were definitely torn off!"
"They're still torn off. Here."
I held out the fallen arms and legs. Instead of being horrified, crying out in pain, or being wary of me, he quickly took his limbs and pressed them against his stumps. With the attached hand, he even gave a thumbs up and laughed cheerfully.
As expected of an immortal. Losing limbs must be no big deal to them.
"Thank you! You're very kind!"
"Don't mention it. Just hold them on for now."
I've kept the audience waiting too long. Turning my back to the immortal, I spread my arms and shouted to everyone.
"There, you saw it? Ta-da, resurrection! A great success! I couldn't reattach the limbs yet, but the heart is definitely beating!"
The miracle of bringing a dead person back to life. Aren't I the reincarnation of a saintess? If I started a religion, I could fleece dozens of people.
Well, if you dig into it, I just forcefully woke up an immortal who had entered a state of suspended animation. Saintess my foot, I'm no different from a poorly-made Military alarm clock.
Anyway, it's true that I made the stopped heart beat again. I smiled proudly and looked at the regressor and the vampire. A magician is originally an attention-seeker who can only live when there's an audience. Their reactions were the driving force that kept me going.
Especially the regressor. The regressor who held clues to the past was the biggest reason I woke the immortal.
'With that method... I can open my eyes. So this is how the immortal woke up in the past! Then! Is this the point in time?!'
What point in time. Please stop talking like that and actually recall it. Don't just refer to the previous iteration and gloss over it with "that" - remember it properly!
Let's not be impatient. Leave the regressor as is for now. I can slowly dig it out later.
Then now for the vampire.
I read the vampire's thoughts with great anticipation.
The vampire didn't betray my expectations.
'Made the heart beat forcefully, you say?'
A wave of emotions crashed over.
The weight of 1200 years of time was immense. Like someone who had witnessed a miracle before their eyes, they stared wide-eyed in astonishment. Comparing the minds I read, they were far more shocked than the immortal who had actually woken up.
'No. This is possible because they're a native. Because they're an immortal who doesn't die even when killed, the stopped heart can be made to beat again. If you just provide a spark, they can move again. Right, that's just a mere spark...'
However, the vampire soon recalled another fact.
Vampires who manipulate blood with Blood Control Arts were also a type of immortal.
'...Could I, too?'
If only there was a spark to ignite the withered body.
If I could embrace that spark in my chest.
'Could my heart beat again, too?'
Someone's expectations.
Firmly held common sense.
A belief close to stubbornness.
The fact that a seemingly solid spirit is actually nothing, that firm beliefs are all illusions, and that they can be shattered to pieces by a single word from someone.
It's fun.
Even though I can only live this way, because of that, I feel even more ecstasy. The fulfillment of being alive, the self-esteem of being able to exist as myself, fills my body.
When humans eat food and feel taste and happiness, is it the result of evolving that way because it's advantageous for survival? Or does food itself inherently contain taste and happiness?
There's no need to make a distinction.
A sweet taste lingered around my mouth.
While I was intoxicated with fulfillment, the immortal who had finished assembling his limbs stood up. He had somehow attached the arms and legs, but no matter how I looked at it, I shouldn't expect results beyond what tape could achieve.
The immortal held out his right hand, which had been attached wrong so the back of his hand was facing inward.
"Nice to meet you! I'm Rash. And you are?"
Uh, even if it's turned around, a right hand is still a right hand, right? I firmly grabbed the back of his hand and shook it.
"I'm the newly assigned instructor here. I found you in the cafeteria grease trap, no, cabinet, and revived you."
The moment he raised his hand to shake, his right hand fell off with a thud. Then, as if afraid that his right arm would fall off from the main body, he grabbed my hand tightly and dangled. I suddenly became a man with two elbows.
Silence lingered in the room. The immortal, looking at his fallen right hand, scratched his head with his remaining left arm and smiled awkwardly.
"Haha. Sorry for the trouble. If this were the surface, it would reattach in less than a second. As expected of the Abyss, it takes quite a while!"
"Well, that happens."
After peeling off each finger one by one, I attached them back near the immortal's elbow. The immortal creaked his regained right arm and said.
"What's the occasion that the Military sent a living person down! Usually they only send iron lumps to peek in! Anyway, what about the rest of the people? Did they all escape?"
"If you mean the trainees who were originally here, they all escaped. The only ones remaining are these people."
I said that while casually reading the immortal's memories. To find out how he ended up with his limbs torn off and thrown in the grease trap.
The immortal Rash was a prisoner. He was moved in many ways by the Military's advanced laws and systems and wanted to know more about this place, but the Military didn't put in as much effort as he wanted to know about it.
The ecology of the immortal race was too different from that of ordinary humans. They didn't care about getting hurt, and if physical labor was needed, they always took the lead to get it done. They never tired easily, and even when their bodies were injured, they just laughed it off.
He was definitely an excellent neighbor. The kind you'd want one of around.
That said, Rash wasn't a pushover.
As the immortal race had no fear of injury or death, they instead valued honor and norms. Even if someone slashed their body with a sword, they'd laugh it off, but they wouldn't tolerate insults that degraded their honor.
Unfortunately, a citizen who had forgotten the proverb that the law is distant but fists are close provoked him. The Military's military law, which was closer than any ordinary fist, seemed to have twisted his survival instincts.
He solemnly recited a prayer that, among friends, would be nothing more than a bad joke about how barbarians lack refinement and never tire, so slavery is their calling, but in front of a barbarian, transforms into a suicidal prayer. Rash, like a civilized native who knew manners, exercised patience once and admonished him, but a fool's suicidal prayer usually strikes twice or more.
Rash, like a civilized native who knew manners, humbly accepted that intention and tore him to pieces.
The people who attacked Rash to save him were also torn to pieces, as he considered them to have agreed with that intention.
The Military tried to execute him, but there was no way to kill someone who would get up fine even with bullets lodged in him and walk out of fire. When the Military's skill to kill something was insufficient, there was only one way to dispose of a prisoner. The Military leadership made a decision.
And Rash fell into Tartarus, was doing well, but ended up getting caught up in the Abyss prison break incident.
Hmm. Interesting.
Wait. Then if he witnessed the Tartarus prison break directly, doesn't he know the method too?
I cautiously broached the subject.
"Trainee Rash. You mentioned earlier, right? Whether they all escaped."
"I did, but?"
The dead tell no tales.
Therefore, an immortal who doesn't die becomes an excellent witness who can pass on words.
Just as he was a witness in the regressor's future, the immortal is a witness to me now. A precious witness who might know a way to escape from this prison.
"The Military authorities are very curious. This place is the Abyss, a land where entry and exit are impossible through normal means. But how on earth did they succeed in escaping?"
Pretending to interrogate, I asked the immortal while pushing my telepathy to its limits. If he just recalled the related memories, I too could obtain the card of the Abyss escape method. The regressor fell into the Abyss just before they escaped, so they didn't know much.
I looked at the immortal with great anticipation.
"I don't know!"
I had to quietly watch him shout brightly.
"The trickster did whatever he wanted and then suggested we all escape together, didn't he? He said it's more advantageous to escape together! Well, there was no reason to refuse, so I nodded!"
"...Really?"
"That's right!"
Damn it. This useless immortal.
"You must have heard something in passing. Who he was, what method he used."
"How would I know? That feeble trickster. He must have used some bizarre method to escape."
"Come on, try to remember a bit more sincerely."
"I'm sorry, but I don't have the hobby of remembering every word a man mutters. Especially if it's just the vanity of a trickster."
Without even trying to recall his memories, the immortal answered perfunctorily.
Good grief. I never imagined there would be someone who actually erases their memories just because they say they don't have a hobby of remembering.
The immortal, who had been picking his ear, asked back.
"So, what was your question again?"
"So not having a hobby of remembering includes my words too?"
There really isn't a single person here who can help me. How can there be no useful information at all?
No, no. It must be because I haven't drawn out the memories enough yet. I asked with a sliver of hope.
"Then my second question. While all the other trainees were escaping, why couldn't you escape? Did you have a disagreement?"
"A disagreement? Hmm. There was."
The immortal said while recalling the past.
"That feeble trickster said he'd free the prisoners. However, perhaps his mind had gone strange from the long prison life, he suddenly tried to kill everyone who wasn't a prisoner."
"People who aren't prisoners?"
"I mean the laborers. Yes, the ones who cooked and cleaned here."
Tartarus was a massive facility, a place where vicious criminals brought in from all over the world were imprisoned.
It was a place that even the Military couldn't control, so they had practically left it to run itself. This place was both a hell realm and the Military's execution ground. It was a land where if you sent someone down, they would die on their own.
Therefore, the Military would often sentence political heavyweights who were burdensome to simply execute or thought criminals who caused social chaos to Tartarus labor sentences. As another name for a death sentence.
"The other prisoners killed so many that only a few remained, but they were still people who were with us. I had some attachment to them. But even though we could have just escaped together, he insisted on killing them. I opposed it, but that trickster was relentless."
"If it's the Abyss, the laborers must have been pretty major criminals too, why did he kill the laborers?"
"I don't know! I'll say it again, I don't have the hobby of remembering every word a man mutters."
That's quite the boast.
"Anyway, I fought him and lost! Maybe because I got beaten up so hard, my memory is hazy! Man, if this weren't the Abyss, I would have regenerated immediately and punched that smug face!"
"Is that it?"
"Well, is there more to say?"
He's really not helpful at all.
Oh well, whatever. I've extracted all the information I can. Let me pass it to the regressor now.
"Trainee Rash. There, can you see that person?"
The regressor, who had been leaning forward and watching this side with great interest, flinched when I pointed at him.
'Huh? Me? Why me?'
The immortal looked at the regressor and said casually.
"That boy?"
"Yes. That person. I don't know why, but that person is very interested in you... Ahem. In a rather peculiar sense."
"What? What kind of nonsense is that!"
He keeps trying to just watch like a bystander, but that's not happening. I don't tolerate the existence of someone who gets a sweeter deal than me.
I couldn't extract any good information, so I need to at least read your thoughts instead. Go find out yourself.
"Trainee Shay, not interested?"
"Of course I'm not interested!"
"Then is it okay to let him fall asleep? Trainee Rash will probably fall asleep again soon."
Right after my words ended, the immortal staggered in place. He looked down at his body and made a surprised expression.
"Oh? Now that I think about it, my body condition is strange. I opened my eyes but my body hasn't fully healed yet! What method did you use?"
"I ran electricity through the heart and forcefully woke you up, so to speak."
"Oho! That's also impressive! How did you do that!"
The immortal kept examining his body, seemingly fascinated by the precarious state of his vitality. Maybe because he's an immortal, he really has no sense of crisis. I asked the regressor once again.
"Trainee Shay, are you really okay? If we leave him alone, Trainee Rash will fall asleep like this."
"...And?"
"Trainee Rash is the only one who knew Tartarus before we arrived..."
I noticed Azi yawning at the back of the classroom. Come to think of it, that one was there too. Probably won't be helpful though.
I corrected my words.
"The only human, I mean. Trainee Shay. If you have any questions, this is your chance to resolve them."
"What does that have to do with me?"
"You have no questions at all?"
"None..."
The regressor, who was about to shout, recalled something and closed his mouth.
'No. Since the immortal woke up now, there's something I must check.'
With that thought as the end, the regressor's memories began to trace back to the past.