The man picked up Kiyotaka and ran away so fast that a Sleeper's eye could not even catch a glimpse of him. He ran through the pinkish-red, never-ending path, going past countless hills, rocks, and identical trees. Looking back occasionally, he saw nothing pursuing them.
They had not even reached the end of the first entrance of the last maze on their side.
The man looked down at Kiyotaka, who was barely conscious. His entire body was burned, he had almost no hair left, and his right arm was gone completely from the shoulder down. Behind them lay a trail of Kiyotaka's blood.
The man jumped over rocks and spun past trees so his speed would never drop. Even after running for so long, there was no end in sight. The entrance of the first tunnel to their far left ended, and they were now in front of the second entrance, though they did not go inside either one.
The man kept looking back to check if anyone was following.
Eventually, he slowed his pace and set Kiyotaka down behind a large rock before standing beside him.
Kiyotaka kept his eyes lowered, staring painfully at the ground on his right where his arm used to be.
With a shaking left hand, he reached forward. The man agreed to the gesture and shook it, transferring two Memories to Kiyotaka.
Kiyotaka's body began to gather essence on its own until it parted and transformed into a set of chainmail armor. It fit like a cage of cloth surrounding his entire body, with the right sleeve hanging empty.
Once the Memory armor settled, Kiyotaka brought his left hand to his lips, summoning a glass bottle filled with water. Bringing it to his mouth, he drank greedily.
He drank for a full minute, his gaze still fixed on the ground beneath him, before addressing the man in a weak voice.
"It is a pleasure meeting you again, Caster."
Caster looked down at Kiyotaka with an expression of doubt and disbelief, his eyes remaining glued to the top of Kiyotaka's head. The boy had not looked up once. Caster took a peek behind the rock to check for pursuers.
"What took place back there? How are you so close to death? No, how are you even alive? A Sleeper cannot survive this level of damage."
Kiyotaka had asked Caster to procure a set of Memories for him a night before the solstice as part of a Vow. It seemed Caster had only managed to get two in time.
"My Flaw activated at the wrong moment, and I lost my reasoning."
A storm of questions crossed Caster's mind. Yet, due to his own Vow with Kiyotaka, he could not strike him down while he was at his lowest, nor could he simply walk away.
"They were good. Each arrow came out at nearly the same time, meaning they did not panic when a man covered in eyes ran toward them. They took their time to aim, and the other man maintained a comfortable posture when he made a circle with his fingers to target me."
It was difficult for Kiyotaka to speak, but he fought against his darkening vision and agonizing pain to remain conscious.
Caster and Kiyotaka were not close enough to act friendly after meeting in a state like this, but neither wanted to abandon a partnership. Caster still needed Kiyotaka's mind to navigate the Trapped Land and figure out what [Trapped] really meant, though he doubted the boy would survive another day.
"Caster, can you break the ground right here?"
Uncertain, Caster summoned a sword and struck the dirt with its pommel, loosening a pile of earth. Keeping his eyes cast downward, Kiyotaka scooped up a handful of dirt with his left hand and pressed it against his bleeding shoulder.
Caster watched the desperate act.
"So why do you think that happened back there?"
Kiyotaka nodded slowly and tried to stand, only to collapse back onto the ground. Caster simply watched him fall, noting that even through the struggle, Kiyotaka never raised his face.
"It was just..." Kiyotaka took a heavy breath. "It seems three or more plans happened to clash at the same time, resulting in a stalemate."
"How is it a stalemate if you are this close to death?"
Finally, Kiyotaka lifted his head, looking directly into Caster's eyes. The sheer intensity and knowledge in his glare caught Caster off guard, as he had assumed the boy was too broken to even look at him.
"You are right. It is not a stalemate at all. I came out on top. I have their plans in my grasp, while they probably think of me as a brainless brute."
Caster tilted his head above the gaze of the broken boy.
"You remember our Vow, right? Where another condition was that if we did not meet within a week, I would die. My plan was going so well. I was deliberately making them move at a pace that would only get us to this place on the seventh day. While on our way, I made sure to make it look like I was being manipulated by them so well that they must have begun to think they had total control over me. But that was the old me!"
Caster, instead of stopping Kiyotaka and helping him come out of his Flaw's influence, listened to the story while making sure no one was coming toward them. He was quite intrigued by the explanation.
"You do not understand how close I was to making Parrot grant me a wish in her Binding Vow just a few minutes ago. Then you would appear soon, and I would make Parrot go unconscious using the Vow. It would not even count as a betrayal. Then you would force Hawk to make a Binding Vow with you and make him your own tool. After that, I would use one of my wishes on you and have you share the ownership of Hawk with me. Caster, we would have a cloner in our hands! A cloner that can somehow make us transfer our soul to other bodies. He thinks that I did not notice it, but the pre-existing Vow I had with them disappeared when the arrow pierced them, only to come back a second later to tell me they were alive! But [Embraced by Fate] ruined it all!"
While Kiyotaka said all this, a wild smile spread across his face that seemed to disregard all his pain. His eyes shook and tears fell, but Caster was shocked by the depth of these plans. Still, he did not stop Kiyotaka from falling deeper into his Flaw.
'Oh, how the mighty have fallen.'
"I am sure of it. These two groups know each other. In fact, this was a planned sacrifice! You know what Parrot said when I pried too much? She said my arm would no longer be attached to my goddamn shoulder. Look at me now! I do not have my arm anymore, and this is not all. How did they know they were about to be shot and transferred the Memory to me?"
Small bits of laughter escaped Kiyotaka, and his body shook from excitement.
"The choices I made earlier caused the other group to see me as nothing more than a brute. After the way I killed them and ran straight to the archer, they think I am stupid! They think it will be easy to get the Memory from me. I have them right in my hand. They need me alive long enough to get the Memory, but I do not need them alive. They think they know me, but I know them far better."
Kiyotaka kept speaking rapidly, and Caster listened to everything, gathering as much information as he could.
"They are a bunch of people who think they are smart. I will show them what it looks like to be so deep in the grave that not even the stairs of heaven can reach them. I will create a situation where not even luck can get them out-"
In one motion, Caster disappeared from his spot, grabbed Kiyotaka, and ran away so fast he became invisible again.
"Caster, why are we running away? They should run away from me! They cannot defeat me, Caster!"
Caster gritted his teeth while running straight away from the figures he caught out of the corner of his eye.
"CASTER, LISTEN TO ME, GODDAMN IT"
Kiyotaka screamed, yet no reply came. As the silence settled, the sudden surge of relief from surviving gave way, and the Flaw's influence faded. His face went back to being completely expressionless.
Caster felt the frantic movements in his arms gradually disappear. Looking down, he saw Kiyotaka back under absolute control of himself.
"Caster, I am using one of my three wishes."
***
Just a few minutes earlier, three figures slid down the slope of a hill. One was a girl wearing a thick winter coat filled with cloth and wool, her neck covered by a high collar. She held a bow in her hand, and a black hood with a white mask concealed her face.
She brought her bow closer to her lips.
"It is with great regret I report that Hawk has grown wings, deciding to pay child support to a freak covered in eyes. Now that freak has been carried off by someone invisible, taking him right out of our hands."
She spun her feet on the ground, rotating her bow toward a man sitting beside her. He wore no armor and carried no weapons, clad only in black clothing from head to toe beneath a black mask and a white hood.
"So, Mr. Rahhh, I can see it all Rahhh. How does it feel to fail to secure the Memory and have Flash snatch it away? Are you going to Reverse-Flash him now?"
The sitting man stood up and walked forward, picking up Kiyotaka's severed hand before continuing down the path.
The archer did a full spin, turning to her right, and pointed her bow behind her toward a large man. His entire body was covered in medieval armor, almost identical to what Owl used to wear.
"Mister Lark the Owl Hater, would you like to translate what Mouse's silence meant?"
The dangerous-looking man turned toward the rock wall and slowly grabbed it.
"Mitochondria is the powerhouse of the cell."
No one could see what expressions Lark and the archer were making behind their masks. To an outsider, it was just two masks staring at each other.
"That is a fact, Mr. Lark but I am talking about the hidden wisdom behind Mouse's silence."
Lark brought a gloved finger to the chin of his mask and rotated it, mimicking a thinking pose.
"That is a good question, but why are you asking me?"
The archer began another spin with her bow, preparing to ask her next question, but the weapon vanished from her hand mid-rotation. She went silent, looking in the direction Mouse had gone.
A few meters ahead, the small figure of Mouse stood quietly, peering back at her through a circle made by his fingers.
"I hate that guy so much, Lark."
"If I hate him too, does that mean your hate and my hate will make a positive, resulting in you loving him?"
"That is not how it works."
The archer and Lark turned back, walking away from the trail of blood toward Mouse, who was waving Kiyotaka's severed hand at them.
Four corpses lay nearby. Two were pinned by the archer's arrows, while the other two had been killed brutally. One had been beaten to death, while the other was shredded into scattered parts across the ground.
Mouse stopped looking through his fingers, allowing the archer to reactivate her Memory. Her bow reappeared. Reaching forward, an arrow materialized in the air, and she drove it into one of the corpse's chests. When she pulled it out, the heart remained stuck to the tip.
Suddenly, she aimed the bow at Mouse and released the string.
"Cupid's Arrow!"
Mouse glanced at her through his circled fingers again.
"Ouchie."
Mouse let out a heavy sigh, pulling a large piece of fabric from his clothes, and began gathering the dead bodies into it.
"We cannot follow the blood trail any longer. We are running out of time and need to return to the positions assigned by the City Lords. Being absent any longer will go against Lizard's orders."
Lark and the archer dropped their playful tone, immediately paying attention.
"I have already reported the situation to Lizard. He assigned an Awakened with three Sleepers to take over from here, so we must head back."
The archer pointed to the body killed by her arrow.
"So, supposedly, that was Hawk. And he passed the Memory to the Sleeper so he could escape torture and just die. Meanwhile, a third party, either invisible or super fast, snatched the Sleeper away."
Mouse glanced at her and nodded.
"The Sleeper made it this far, so he clearly did not choose death willingly. It seems Hawk manipulated him completely. We do not know the Sleeper's Aspect Ability, but considering how he slaughtered those two men abused by Hawk, he does not seem to have much training in martial arts."
Mouse stared at her sideways.
"What? Am I wrong?"
Mouse touched Lark's shoulder, prompting him to move forward.
"Bat, it seems to me you are jumping to conclusions too quickly. You completely ignored the fact that they navigated the deadly maze alone. That indicates Bear and Owl died along the way. Given the Sleeper was in critical condition, claiming he lacks physical ability is a bit of a logical leap."
The archer, referred to as Bat, fell silent and stared at Lark.
"I prefer it when you stick to academics."
Lark ignored her comment.
"We should also consider that neither Hawk nor Parrot knew the way out of the labyrinth. The Sleeper being the only one in a critical state means..."
Bat leaned in, curious about his conclusion.
"It means what?"
"Why are you asking me? That is as far as I could figure out. The theories suggesting the Sleeper is more than he seems crumble the moment I look at them in depth and compare him to Hawk and Parrot. Anything else would be a logical leap."
'If the Sleeper was so close to death while Bear and Owl died, is it alright for me to deduce that the Sleeper survived the hell that killed Bear and Owl? No, it does not make any sense at all.' Mouse glanced toward Hawk's dead body. 'This has to be Hawk's doing.'
Mouse stepped forward, standing behind Lark and Bat as he looked back toward the path they had traveled.
Four people came running down the hill, following the trail of blood. The leader was covered in blood from head to toe, suggesting they had already been in a fight elsewhere. He glanced briefly at Mouse.
Mouse stood upright with his hands behind his back, though his fingers were already forming a circle just in case things went wrong.
'Running away with those two would be impossible... Can I manage to buy enough time against those four... Just enough that these two can get away?'
The four runners continued past, ignoring the group entirely.
Mouse let out a shaky breath of relief.
"We are heading back now. That Awakened just took a glance at us three Sleepers. Let us not stand out so much that they start viewing us as competition."
***
The three Sleepers and one Awakened followed the trail of blood. The Awakened leading them glanced toward Mouse before continuing on.
"Sir, why did you look at those three just now?"
The Sleeper following the Awakened asked out of curiosity.
"Listen, the Trapped Land is large but limited in connections. Always look for weaknesses whenever you see anyone near decease. For those three, the weakness is the man who looked toward us. He is what you might call someone who takes down anything he can before dying as per the rumours I have heard."
They ran past countless hills, rocks, stones, and similar trees.
"What do you mean, sir?"
"He is the type to actually trust and protect people close to him."
While running, the Awakened signaled them to stop.
The Awakened and the Sleeper behind a rock made eye contact before Caster's eyes widened and he disappeared again.
"Run fast."
They ran for a few more minutes until they met the Sleeper again behind another tree.
The four slowly walked forward, seeing Caster huffing a little while grabbing another Sleeper who was badly burned and missing an entire arm.
'That is the target.'
The Awakened made a gesture using two of his fingers, and the Sleepers slowly surrounded Kiyotaka and Caster, stopping them from going anywhere.
Caster brought his sword close to Kiyotaka's throat.
"I will kill him if you don't listen to my demands."
The Awakened carelessly took a step forward.
"Do you think you will remain alive if he dies?"
The Awakened saw the Sleeper's sword tremble, but it straightened out, base up and edge below, before sliding into Kiyotaka's shoulder where his hand was missing.
The Awakened stopped and assessed the situation.
'The Memory itself is not the definitive key to achieving the goals. It is also the holder of the Memory, which was supposed to be bestowed to Hawk. Now that he gave it to the Sleeper, things have gotten a little complex at the start. Still, if we are able to secure the Sleeper, it will be far easier than it would have been with Hawk.'
"What do you want to know, Sleeper?"
Caster slowly retracted the sword, which had not gone deep, leaving just a small cut.
"Are you able to get me to safety?"
'It is hard for me to understand this situation. Did this Sleeper take the other Sleeper hostage to create an opportunity to negotiate?'
A balance Memory appeared in the Awakened's hand.
"If the balance goes up, it means I am telling the truth, and if it goes down, I am lying."
The balance went up.
"Neither I nor anyone I know will kill you if you give us the Sleeper."
The balance went up.
Caster asked for the balance, and the Awakened threw it to him. Catching it, Caster spoke.
"Lies can be framed as truth in this Memory if you shift your words enough."
The balance went up.
The Awakened just stared at them.
Caster continued.
"If any of you try to make a move right now, I will run away with this guy as long as I can."
The balance went up.
"What do you need?"
Caster grabbed Kiyotaka's throat and lifted him off the ground, making two chains appear in the air. One connected to Caster's throat, while the other stopped right before the Awakened.
"I just want to ask the Awakened five questions. Once he reveals the answers, I will run away. This mongrel's Aspect Ability lets us make a vow sort of like a contract. Just a small exchange of questions is all it will take."
The balance went up.
'I can subdue this Sleeper without a doubt, but can I do it while stopping him from killing the Memory holder? Even if there is more than a fifty percent chance of success, taking the risk in a situation like this is foolish. Still, this Sleeper is smart, yet I cannot see how a simple question can be harmful. That Aspect Ability itself seems quite interesting, making it even more appealing to keep him around.'
Unknown to anyone, within Caster's armor there was a Divine Ledger that was making Caster see moments from the Academy. Using the Divine Ledger that belonged to Kiyotaka activated the essence of him, activating [Embraced by Fate] by default, Resulting others lowering their guard without Kiyotaka actually being the one talking.
Soon, Caster would strike as planned by Kiyotaka.
***********
Well, the next chapter is the last chapter of Kiyotaka's POV.
Let us see how the introduction of the new characters plays out.
Kiyotaka's plan for Parrot and Hawk being ruined by [Embraced by Fate] yayyyyy
The entire first NM has been rewritten. If you want to pass the time and have nothing to do, I would suggest reading Chapters 2 and 3.
I guess that is it.
Peace.