Chapter 236
She Completed Her Mission
“Hah… Hah…”
Isabel gasped for air, leaning on the wall as she painstakingly shuffled forward.
She had long lost count of how many times she had died, and couldn’t tell which dream layer she was currently in.
It hurt so much…
Each death brought her intense punishment.
Initially, it was just a slight fever and weakness. Although it was painful and uncomfortable, she could still investigate.
After being pushed down the stairs and killed for the first time, she woke up tied up and sitting in the hall.
Besides herself, there were six other people present. Some cursed loudly, while others remained silent.
A young man with brown hair and deep features found a violin from who knows where, and played discordant noise by the window while admiring the storm.
Yes, noise—at least by Isabel’s standards, her violin playing after three months was better than this.
It wasn’t any piece of music, but an improvisation, yet the player lacked the theoretical basis for improvisation. The result was a torturous mishmash.
This finally made her unable to bear it and she spoke up to stop him.
“Lulu… Your Highness, is it?”
The man turned back with a cool, arrogant demeanor and bowed respectfully to everyone at the table.
His fingers were distinct, and the bow in his hand looked like a sword.
Even as the crowd cursed him louder and louder, he remained unfazed.
“You should go down first. I still have to wait a while. But don’t worry, I will go down before time runs out.”
He didn’t introduce himself, but Lulu easily guessed his identity—her intuition assured her that this was Sherlock, not Merlin disguised as him.
“What should I do… to help you?”
“Daiya” at the table asked earnestly, “I investigated Room 201 on the previous level…”
As she spoke, she consciously ignored the curses and arguments around her, and told Sherlock everything she had seen.
Sherlock was slightly surprised by Isabel’s resilience and proactivity. The corner of his mouth twitched upwards, and he rarely showed a smile of approval.
“When you go down, confirm who died on each level and remember them. After you find the Fox, tell him what you saw and then tell him my strategy.”
Sherlock said calmly, “I choose to wait here. By seeing how many people fall to my level, I will know how many levels I should descend consecutively. I am confident I can recognize Merlin; he cannot deceive me.”
“Of course, I might also fail. For example, if someone above me misjudges the level and doesn’t come down until the end, then I will be eliminated with him.”
“—In conclusion, those waiting at the bottom might see more than one person missing, or everyone will be there. But it’s impossible to see only one person missing.”
“If this happens, there are two possibilities—because I chose an extremely safe strategy, Merlin will likely disguise himself as me to counteract the situation I’ve created. If that’s the case, then the missing person must be below my level.”
“Take these words of mine to the Fox, and he will understand.”
After speaking, the detective raised his gun and aimed it at Daiya, pulling the trigger without hesitation.
—And it was from this death that Isabel began to feel pain.
The high temperature became more intense, and she began to vomit continuously. Her heart pounded violently, but it pumped little blood because it contracted without fully expanding. Her body temperature kept rising, and her consciousness began to blur.
“Three people dead,” she chanted repeatedly, “woman, monkey, old man.”
She was already too weak to pull the trigger.
Looking at the corpse of the vicious man on the ground, she found the gun he was carrying.
Isabel knelt on the ground, burying the muzzle of the gun deep into her throat. She placed her two index and middle fingers together, using her body weight to press the trigger—
And brought herself to the next level.
And from here, she was terrified to discover… her skin had begun to crack.
Her skin turned pale, with fine cracks throughout. Ominous purple radiance seeped out, mixed with hints of pink gradient.
The girl’s bell-like laughter became clearer, as if echoing in her ears.
As her memories began to blur, Isabel repeatedly muttered to herself everything she had seen.
“Merlin’s story… fairy tale book, little bear… dead end…”
She stumbled in search of corpses, continuously chanting in a dry, hoarse voice, “Level minus one, the detective… either two are missing, or everyone is here…”
“Level minus two, three dead… woman, monkey, old man.”
“—Sister, want to play together?”
The girl’s voice sounded in her ear, interrupting Isabel’s chanting.
“Don’t be noisy!”
Isabel rarely lost her temper.
But just shouting made her head hurt even more. The needle-like pain made her stop and gasp for breath, holding her head.
—Now, no one could help her.
On the contrary, she carried the hope of victory on her shoulders.
Looking at the corpses, Isabel had already guessed the rules of descent.
Without her information, Eivass might descend to the wrong level due to incorrect information… Sherlock might also die…
She should have felt powerless.
After all, she had always been like this… always protected behind others. She had never independently taken responsibility for something important, nor had she ever carried the lives of others.
“…Hah… Hah…”
She panted softly, the cracks on her skin flickering as if breathing.
…Speaking of which, was this life-threatening?
Isabel’s consciousness began to blur.
This seemed to be an Ascension Ritual… it didn’t matter if she lost…
Let’s stop here. It’s too painful. If I go further, I might die from the pain.
—Although she knew that no one would blame her even if she failed.
But Isabel was still unwilling to give up. Green flames reflected like an illusion in Daiya’s pupils, and she seemed to regain a little strength and her consciousness became a bit clearer.
The closer she was to her limit, the more spirited Isabel became.
The more pain she felt, the stronger she became.
I don’t want to lose yet—
“Merlin’s story… teddy bear… ha… 201…”
Isabel shuffled forward, leaning on the wall, murmuring softly as if in a trance.
At this moment, she saw a strange illusion before her eyes.
A blonde girl threw a ball towards Isabel.
“Want to play ball, sister?”
Her voice, filled with earnest expectation and an ethereal echo, rang out, “Let’s play ball together?”
Isabel subconsciously wanted to reach out and block the ball. Her already strained body was hit directly by the ball and she fell to the ground.
The ball and the little girl vanished like phantoms, but the sensation of being hit by the ball was so real.
In her heart, the little girl’s voice sounded again, “Sister… will you leave me?”
The voice became panicked.
She was so lonely and afraid… this made Isabel’s heart soften.
She couldn’t help but cry, as if for herself and as if for this girl.
But after crying for a while, she got up again, silently wiped away her tears, and continued to walk forward, into the darker places.
She passed corpse after corpse. Some had been alive before, and now they were dead; some had died once, and then died a second time.
Her consciousness became blurry, and she had long forgotten that she was in an Ascension Ritual, in a dream. The increasingly clear pain tormented her, making her experience at this moment so real. She even forgot her name was Isabel for a while.
“Remember these people.”
A cool and arrogant voice sounded, “Take these words of mine to the Fox, and he will understand.”
“He will understand…”
Isabel repeated the words, and radiance reflected in her copper-like pink-purple pupils.
Her skin was cracked in large areas, and pink blood flowed down as she walked.
Some living people met her on the way—seeing the little girl with a high fever, everyone would want to take her away.
But after approaching Isabel, their bodies began to become blurry and transparent.
They rushed towards Isabel with concern, but before they could pick her up, they became transparent. And after Isabel passed through them and left, they stood up as if nothing had happened. As if they had never seen her.
Not only living people—even the world around her occasionally became blurry and transparent.
She remembered the corpses on each level, but couldn’t remember how many levels she had descended. Her memory was still functioning, but she could no longer think.
—Finally, she saw the long table lit by candles again. She saw the familiar detective, and the vicious man sitting at the head of the table.
It was like a painting, imprinted on her heart.
Isabel’s tears instantly fell.
Just a glance, and her intuition told her—this person was Eivass.
“…Eivass…”
Isabel stumbled forward, running into his arms.
—Although they looked exactly the same, this was definitely not that vicious-looking man. Her eyes told her so.
She no longer remembered that she should call him Fox, but her instinct told her not to say his name.
“In Room 201, there was Merlin’s storybook and a teddy bear; after picking them up, he walked into a dead end…
“On level minus one, I met the detective, and he told me to convey this to you…”
Isabel’s voice became fluent again, “The deceased were…”
She spoke out the names of the people she had memorized in one go. Everyone listened quietly to the information she brought.
—Her mission was complete.
