A single voice reverberated in the silence of the church, but instead of making it lively, the depressing voice only served to make it duller.
"I hereby confess, that I am the one responsible… for Jake Armstrong's death."
Luke mouthed such words of confession for every person he had killed. He confessed all his sins, one by one to the Goddess. His doubts about the goddess's existence were all but gone now. He could not continue on without acknowledging that there was someone willing to forgive him, and so the goddess's existence had appealed him enough to shut out his reason.
Luke sat in front of a table, reading the names from Pansy's notebook where she had noted the names and details of every Merk. Pansy herself sat on the other side of the table, listening to his confessions carefully, she acted as an intermediary between Luke and the Goddess.
Even though her notebook, where she had painstakingly written every Merk's name was finally coming to some use, she could hardly be happy about it. She never would have imagined that her notebook would come to be used in such a fashion.
She couldn't help but feel responsible somehow, had she been a better intermediary between the people and the Goddess, the people would never misunderstand the goddess's intentions, and a tragedy could have been avoided. Now though the best she could do to serve the people was this.
They did not need anyone to tell them, to know that the people must have heeded the words of the mythos, the angels Felicia and Liebert had fallen from the skies when they had lost everything, the people probably saw that as their final calling, as what their goddess wished them to do when they had no meaning left. Of course that was probably only an excuse to relinquish a meaningless existence, an existence of uncertainty and suffering. The goddess had graciously provided them with that excuse. The words 'be careful what you wish for' rang truer than ever before.
--- --- ---
"Not this one either!"
In the library, Salvia plucked one book after another from the bookshelves, poring over each hurriedly before jumping to the next, the sense of urgency was palpable, and yet Jack sat motionless, not a word in his mouth, he stared down to his feet, boring a hole through the ground.
She had theorized that the people must have heeded the words of the mythos, the angels Felicia and Liebert had fallen from the skies when they had lost everything, the people probably saw that as their final calling, as what their goddess wished them to do when they had no meaning left. Of course that was probably only an excuse to relinquish a meaningless existence, an existence of uncertainty and suffering. The goddess had graciously provided them with that excuse though. The words 'be careful what you wish for.' rang truer than ever before.
Salvia clicked her tongue in frustration, it was very uncharacteristic of her to be searching through her old books to find something, typically everything she read was always preserved inside her head in the same condition, she had never once in her life had to recheck anything from a book. Yet here she was, searching through every single one in her library, had she truly forgotten something? Or was she trying to convince herself that she had forgotten something?
Seeing her pointless struggle, Jack finally decided to let out a few words, "What is the point of searching through books now? It is too late, we could not save a single person, reading books is not going to bring them back. Are you so stuck up in your world of books that you cannot even notice when reality has passed you by?"
Salvia continued her search through the library as she responded, "You have much to learn it would seem."
"Yes, unfortunately for me, I care too much about human lives to study at times like these."
Salvia heaved a sigh, "If you are not willing to listen to me, then there is no point in telling you what I am doing."
"So be it."
With conversations shut down, Jack leaned back motionless, the events from before had been too much for him, Luke had completely shut down and had started to confess his sins to the very goddess he had condemned, unable to take any more of it Jack had run to the library, hoping that Salvia who always knew everything would somehow know of a way to ease his heart, but now that she had proven to be more useless than ever, he was more than a little frustrated at her. He knew it was none of her fault and that his anger was unjustified, but he had to channel his negative emotions somewhere.
The roadblock in their conversation however did not mean that Salvia had stopped her efforts, she kept at it for another hour before all the books had been exhausted.
Salvia plopped onto a chair nearby, "It makes little sense. There was nothing in my books to help with the situation."
"Truly surprising!"
"If you have time for sarcasm then make yourself useful. Anything comes to mind?"
"Well, how about you tried leaving your shelter for a bit? Being a hermit will not do anyone any good."
"As futile as I think that would be, there's really nothing else to do so I might as well oblige here."
Salvia made for the door, but before opening it, she turned around, "Well? You're not coming?"
"I'd be of little help to you. For now… just leave me be…"
"If that's how you want it."
The sound of the closing door was the final to make itself heard in the library, for after that, mind-numbing silence ensued, but for Jack, it was now even louder than before, the jumble of his thoughts all crying out together, made him wish Salvia had stayed there to keep him distracted even if it annoyed him.
--- --- ---
Luke was now at his thousandth confession, it almost felt never ending. Pansy winced as Luke kept saying each name, she could remember the names clearly, yet she could not remember a single thing about any of the people whom they belonged to.
The guilt was eating away at Luke and so he took a moment to stop and say a few words to Pansy, "I do realize that the gravest of sins need actions to be forgiven, that words of apology are mere platitudes in the face of such overwhelming loss…"
"..."
"But still… I am truly sorry..."
Pansy shook her head, "All you ever did was show them your worldview, it is not your fault that they were unable to accept it."
"I knew full well that it was irresponsible of an outsider, of someone who knew nothing to go in and try to force his help on them, I had been reminded that time and time again in this town, and yet in my vanity, I shut my ears to those words, convincing myself that helping others was the right course of action, somewhere in my heart, I wished to be hailed as a hero, I donned the mask of one, both literally and figuratively!"
Luke slammed the table as he spat those words, his fists shook ever so slightly, but they were soon calmed to a halt, another hand lay on Luke's, gently comforting him, "It must be tough…"
"Huh?"
"It must be tough holding onto such intense emotions of guilt. I want you to know this however, all who feel guilty, are not so. Just because I am sitting here in front of you listening to your confessions, that does not mean that I think you're responsible, I'm only doing my job as an intermediary, I have never once thought to blame you."
Luke felt a tinge of relief at her words, validation from others was a very powerful thing and especially so in Pansy's case because she was the very person he was confessing his sins to, but before Luke could put his gratitude into words, Pansy trailed off, "And just because you are here giving your confessional, that does not absolve me of responsibility…"
"Why the hell would you blame yourself?"
"Everything went awry ever since I let the sacred chalice be stolen. Is it not a very natural to think that that was the cause of everything? That bad things happened because the holy relic was defiled? And even after all of that, I hardly performed my duties as intended, if only I had been a better intermediary, if only I had conveyed the goddess's feelings to the people, they would not have jumped to such grave conclusions."
This time, it was Luke who gripped at Pansy's hands, "It's not your fault, someone who works as hard as you, as desperately as you cannot be at fault, if even after all of that effort, you could not save anyone, then it was simply impossible from the beginning. I would certainly never blame you for not being able to achieve the impossible."
A familiar voice suddenly rang out throughout the church, "Well, I'll be! Have to write this one down somewhere, it'll make for a fine romance piece."
As Pansy raised her head to see who it was at the church door, her face flushed red and she hurriedly removed her hands from Luke's , "M-Miss Librarian, what brings you here?"
"You have quite an eye for women, huh? The first time that you came to the library begging to learn about the goddess must have been because of this."
Luke turned his head and gave Salvia a sidelong glance, "Salvia, this is hardly the time to joke around."
"Is that so? I'm sorry I must have misinterpreted your intentions when I read your little game of forgiving the other person yet not oneself as a little ironic and comical. It must have been a very serious scene. The fault lies with the reader I guess, for not understanding the writer's intentions."
Luke heaved a sigh, "Your sarcasm is as tasteless as ever."
Pansy tilted her head, "I'm sorry I can't get up right now, but what brings you here?"
Salvia folded her arms together, "Pansy, I've come to absolve you two of your sins."
"What?"
Luke let out a sigh, "I'm sorry Salvia, I know you mean well, but you could hardly do anything with mere knowledge and information, the situation is far beyond anyone's hands now."
Salvia scratched at her head, "It's amazing how you two can keep blaming yourselves like that, but no matter, your interpretations stand no chance against the truth that I'm here to reveal."
A fourth voice then joined the fray, "Salvia! Wait!"
"Ah, you're here Jack."
"Can you finally tell me what all that was about?"
"I had been willing to from the beginning, if you were willing to let me speak."
"Well, sorry about earlier…"
"I was finding a way to rebuild context."
"What does that mean?"
"Knowledge of any kind you see, only has value within particular contexts, as an example, think of a piece of clothing which got stained badly at the edges, you decide to cut it at the ends to compensate, but then you realize that any further trimming of the cloth would make it unfit for wearing, so you decide against your initial decision, here the context changed so your perspective and decision about the item in question changed."
"Makes sense."
"Now the context itself is also built from knowledge, so all you need is knowledge that is capable of changing the context, a new perspective can then be born."
Luke shook his head, "All that is well and good, but how is any of that going to bring dead people back to life?"
"Oh it will, however…", Salvia turned her head towards the church altar, "I'd much rather you explained it yourself, Ernst."
"You leave me no choice then.", the head priest responded, he had appeared at the church altar at some point without being noticed.
Luke turned to him in his surprise, "When did you-"
"I was here from the start, only, you could not see me."
"..."
"Now that should have explained most things to you."
"You must be the one behind the delusions, but if you can appear out of thin air in front of me too then…"
Salvia continued, pointing at Luke, "Then you are not exempt from the delusions."
"What about you then?"
"I am still not bound by them, which is why I was able to deduce the cause behind everything. I can see everything as it is. What do you think I saw when I left the library in search of answers?"
"What you saw… Could it be!?"
"Empty streets, not a single gored or bloodied corpse, no one was dead. Which means the entire sequence of everyone jumping from the roofs was all part of a delusion!"
With those words, the space itself twisted and contorted and all of a sudden all of the church seats were filled, hundreds of people sat there, staring at the church altar in a trance, all citizens of Merkington. Paul and his companions sat at the front, there were even the hero and the villain sitting among the crowds.
Pansy let out a gasp, "E-Everyone, they're all alive!"
Salvia folded her arms under her chest, "I assume they are watching some delusion of you preaching to them right now?"
Ernst nodded, "Indeed, today is the church gathering after all. That being said, they cannot be allowed to know the harshness of the world, that they are replaceable, that they have no meaning, their hearts are too weak to handle it, which is why I must guide them, that is what my powers are meant for, the goddess has given me these powers to guide the lost sheep in times like these."
"Makes sense, which is why you would try to eliminate anyone with a reason to live, or anyone you could not control, because they would be anomalies in your society who could disrupt the delicate balancing game of keeping people irreplaceable, and their purpose unquestioned."
"'Eliminate' is a strong word, the people on whom the chalice does not work or on whom my powers don't work, the most that I do is scare them into leaving. I had done the same with Luke, there is some truth to your theory, I cannot control or command him through the goddess's voice, he has a will and therefore will not accept it, all I can do is delude him with visions, however even after I scared him into leaving, he came back the next day, which was problematic, but still nothing of alarm. What was of alarm however was the golden chalice being stolen, I could peek into Luke's memories and confirm easily that it was not Luke who did the stealing, however the person who did steal it, felt undetectable, so the only lead I had left to get to that person was through Luke whom the real culprit had framed."
"Is that so?"
"I refrained from showing Luke any delusions to convince you that he was not affected by them."
"Why me?"
"Why do you think I negotiated with you to give you a place in this town separated from everyone else, even though you are clearly a risk to the town's balance?"
"I assume it was to create a sort of fail-safe."
"Go on."
"In case someone got away from your hands, their first place of escape would be to the library, where you had implanted me with false notions or notions of your making that I wouldn't think to do a double take on. As someone far smarter than them and someone who is not a member of the town, they would trust me completely, in other words, unknowingly they would be trusting you."
"I would not have expected you to come out of your little bubble though. That is a first."
"I wouldn't have come out if Jack had not pushed me to do so. My father had once told me to not underestimate the depth of experience. I had agreed with him at the time and I still do, but that was all I ever did, I never valued those words, that piece of wisdom was a cheap decorations to add to my title of 'Wisest person in Protea'. Not just those words though, every piece of knowledge and wisdom I possessed was the same, I collected them out of a love for collecting them, I understood them, agreed with them but never really caught their value, which was why when the situation arose when I had to use them, my first instinct was to stick to my instinct and not those words."
"..."
Salvia pointed a finger in the air, "Which is why I conclude, that a single experience is worth more than a hundred pieces of wisdom."
Ernst chuckled, "It does not seem like my contingency plan will be working very well in the future. Well, no matter… My goal had always been the chalice, so it's not like I am very upset with the outcome."
Jack inquired in a shaky voice, "Say, you must tell me, if the goddess's words and the people's purpose are all delusions… then what is the reason for me to be shunned from the town?"
"I explained earlier, did I not? Usually with the townsfolk I use the delusion of the goddess' voice to push people towards whatever they are good at, I try to make that their purpose. However with you, there is nothing you are not good at, you are probably the single greatest threat to everyone in town, you are good at everything you do and you have the ability to replace every single person in town. I had no choice but to isolate you."
"But I…"
"I know. All you ever did was for the good of the people, you never did anything for yourself, but… it's the truth that all of that has been in vain. In fact the more you sacrificed yourself for the sake of the people and the more you sacrificed your own wishes and tried to become better, the more you endangered them, and the more you isolated yourself."
"Wh…"
There was no meaning to Jack's existence, even long after the Eustache family was gone, he continued his duties meaninglessly, even if he wished for some meaning, he didn't find one, he decided that he must not find one, for the good of all, and so he continued his meaningless duties looking forward to the day of their conclusion.
That had been his life all this time, but even all of that turned out to be meaningless. Despite understanding his own purposelessness, in a twisted way, he had come to feel that staying purposeless was in fact his purpose, now even that phantom of a sense of meaning was denied. It was comical, he thought it was an already established fact that his life was meaningless, yet somehow at that moment, he felt like he had lost all meaning, meaning that he did not even know he had.
"I tried easing your pain by creating illusory guests, but it turned out to be too difficult to maintain their forms the whole time they were with you… I'm sorry to say, but you were a necessary sacrifice… At least I got the opportunity to tell you the truth directly. "
Ernst's face suddenly became grave all of a sudden, he turned to face Luke, who was now up from his seat. Luke's visage remained hidden as he continued to stare downwards.
Salvia twirled at her hair, unsure of what to make of the sudden shift in the atmosphere, "What's the problem?"
"I… I can no longer access his mind."
A whistle escaped Salvia as she turned to Luke, "Now that's a scene I can take seriously."
Luke raised his head, in his eyes was a fire, a fire that burned unflinchingly, a fire of wrath, a fire of determination… a fire of meaning.
Luke looked around the church with newfound clarity and facing the church entrance, pointed his finger to the very last row of seats, "About time you showed yourself, Mr. Sterling."
A man emerged from behind all the crowd, he wore a black suit and a monocle, he had an indifferent and calculating look on his face, "So it comes to that after all."
Ernst cast an uneasy glance towards Rose, "You! But, I thought you were dead! Just… who are you?"
"I am, the will behind happenstance, the intention behind synchronicity… I am the mastermind, behind everything."
--- --- ---
Luke pointed his finger at Rose, "Your death in the alleyway was a farce. It was intended to convince the head priest that you were dead, so that you could continue your ploys without anyone snooping around in your mind."
Rose had no reaction whatsoever to this revelation, he seemed completely out of it, "Alright I get it, you know everything, and what now? You want me to give you a medal? Yes indeed I was planning to show my dead body to one of the town's citizens, and since Ernst here can access people's minds, he would see me dead too, convincing him that I was no more, then I would be free to do anything I wanted, the coincidence I wasn't expecting was that you would see me dead too."
"I wouldn't have been able to notice the inconsistency had I not seen you dead back then."
Luke realized that, in retrospect it could have only been one person, no citizen of Merkington would fake their identity, it was the one thing they valued the most, as such it could only have been an outsider who did it, and the only other outsider other than Luke was...
Ernst clenched his fists, "You! You are responsible for everything! Where is the golden chalice!?"
Rose shook his head, "What a pain… You don't understand the position you are in do you?"
"What are you trying to say?"
"Why do you think you could not find me anymore just because I showed you that little act of being dead? You definitely would not be looking for me actively after that but that did not change the fact that you were looking for the mastermind, couldn't you still stumble into me while going through the eyes of the townsfolk?"
"..."
"Do you not find it strange that he was able to find me so easily right after he was freed of your delusions? I understand the part about him noticing the inconsistency but that is something that applied to you too, you could have noticed it too, besides, how did he even manage to spot me within all that crowd, I was even making sure to hide in the very last row?"
Ernst turned to Luke with an uneasy expression on his face, "…"
Luke continued with his silence, unable to say a word.
Rose clicked his tongue, "You won't understand unless I spell it out to you huh? Then listen carefully, it is because the aforementioned crowd does not exist."
"What?"
Rose turned his head towards Luke, "Isn't that right? Tell me, how many people are here in the church, and can they really be called a crowd?"
Luke raised his face, "… I did not wish to reveal it like this… but he is right. I could see the truth once I was freed from your delusions."
Ernst turned to Salvia in a panic, "Salvia!?"
Salvia scratched at her head, "There's nothing to refute, I'm afraid."
Rose let out a sigh, "Can you still not see it? Your ability to 'guide' people as you say, is no such pretty thing, the real core of your ability lies in perpetuating your delusions to everyone, which means, every delusion you have, everything you believe in, is seen as truth by everyone, and you are included in 'everyone', therefore your delusions appear as truth, to you too."
As those words escaped Rose's mouth, reality distorted once again and this time a huge chunk of the population in the church was wiped out of existence, to the point that the tightly packed seats became lonely adornments for the sparse few that still remained, the beautifully designed, and painstakingly well maintained church too, started to crumble and resemble the ruined buildings in the destroyed section of the town.
Ernst shook his head vehemently, trying to reject the reality, literally unfolding before him.
Rose sighed, "You never were supposed to control this power of deluding people, all this power was supposed to do was create a confirmation bias for your delusions, but since you started to believe that you had the power to 'guide' others, that delusion of yours too was made a reality by the same power."
Ernst slammed at the decrepit church altar, "Then… That means, but then what happened all those years ago… I knew nothing…"
"Indeed, you knew nothing, you tried to delude yourself into believing an outcome that you were able to accept, but reality hit too hard, you were unable to erase the horrors of that tragedy from your mind, so the goddess gracefully provided you with what you wanted, namely the ability to forget the past and create a false perception of it that could not be challenged, and it absolutely wouldn't have been challenged, if you hadn't convinced yourself that your power was to 'guide' others and not to 'delude' them. Since guidance could not be forced, you believed that it was a power that could not be used on others forcibly, that it could control only those who opened their hearts to you, your delusions stopped affecting people who had their own purpose and had a limited effect on those people who did not open their hearts but had no purpose too, which is why Salvia, I and now him are unaffected by your delusions."
"No… no… no… but then, what have I been doing all this time? The people I was supposed to guide… I could not protect them, and on top of that I had been misguiding the remaining few all this time… I… I am… a failure of a leader…"
"It escapes me how you thought this entire arrangement of everyone being irreplaceable could work in a big society. People become replaceable precisely because there are so many of them in the first place, so the fact that your fantastical system could work was living proof that the town had a population deficit."
Salvia let out a sigh, " 'To delude the world, start from yourself' huh? Think I've heard that one before…"
Rose turned towards Luke, "How does it feel to know that you are not responsible for their deaths? Pretty relieved I suppose?"
Luke looked down at his feet, "Relief… is the last thing I should be feeling when a tragedy of such a scale has been revealed, yet I feel it all the same, the more prominent feeling however is disgust. I am disgusted at myself for being so self serving. With this, my mind has been made up."
"Is that so… and what does your resolve entail?"
"I am going to help others."
"An awfully cliched conclusion to come to, but do tell me how you read that meaning from the situation, and then I can tell you how you're reading too much into it."
"The ambivalent emotions of relief and disgust I feel right now, have made me realize how puny it is of me to worry about whether it is right or wrong to help others, it's honestly laughable how simple the solution to all this was."
"And what was that solution?"
"Acceptance."
Luke walked to the half-destroyed statue of the goddess and looked up at it with a renewed resolve, "It was cowardly of me to have hesitated like this, I had lost the moment I started thinking like this, so I'd like to try again, and this time, I'll help anyone and everyone without wavering, no matter how heavy a cross I have to bear for it, I'd much rather be the devil who helps others than the angel who stands still, too afraid to get himself tainted with sin."
"... You and me, we can't see eye to eye after all. I will do the least bit of formality towards you and hear you out at the very least."
"That is very like you… Looking back, all of this was very obvious, right Jack?"
Jack sluggishly raised his head upon hearing his name, but remained silent since he was unsure what Luke was talking about, not like he had the will to talk anyway.
Luke turned to him, "The moment you decide to do anything, you open yourself up to the possibility of failure… right?"
Jack's eyes opened wide, "Ah…"
"Whatever happens is a possibility all along, it is one of numerous possibilities, so there's no need to blame oneself for the whims of fate."
"Those words… That means, back at the mansion, all of that… all of that was real!"
Luke did not respond to those words, a warm smile spread on his face as he turned to the statue once again, "If I wish to help people, it goes without saying that I have to take responsibility, it takes courage to accept that responsibility, knowing full well that the worst possible outcome could be blamed on me. Even if my actions indeed end up beckoning the worst possible outcome, the fact that I decided to act instead of staying stagnant, already proves that I've made the right decision."
Luke turned his head towards Ernst.
Ernst had been listening to everything Luke was saying, but yet clutched at the lukewarm nihilism gripping at his body, "How can you be like that… after all that has happened…"
"Regret from inaction is the the only correct form of regret, every other kind is just mere nitpicking."
"..."
"Ernst, even if you were wrong, choosing a path and moving forward was the correct choice, at the end of the day, our choices are the only things we have control over… scratch that, the ability to choose is the only thing we have control over, no matter what we do we are always controlled by someone or something, in this instance, that happens to be fate."
Luke felt, he had heard similar words before.
In Merkington itself, there had been so many layers of delusions, the first layer intended to throw off people's senses, the second layer that built upon the first to create misconceptions, and the final layer in which the deluder himself was deluded.
This labyrinth of the mind where there was no way to know right from wrong, where everything one believed in could be used to manipulate them, proved that no matter what one did, they were always controlled by the information they acted upon, the only real agency, the only real choice ever given to them was whether to act or not and it did not need to be said, which was the correct option.
Luke gave Rose a sidelong glance, "And that is why, I see no reason to hesitate about anything. Regardless of circumstances, only one choice ever stands before us, and the correct option is always self-evident."
Rose had a grimace painted on his face, "That optimism, that force of will to live a fulfilling life… I cannot help but hate you…"
"I could tell you would, and don't worry, I have no plans to be friendly with you either."
Luke heaved a sigh, "I'll be more than willing to spar with you… but first,", he then eyed Ernst once again, "Ernst. I believe there's someone you need to talk to."
Luke pointed a thumb towards Pansy.
Ernst looked up at the girl, "Pansy, I…"
Pansy was clutching her robes tightly, "Father… What happened all those years ago, why can I not remember the tragedy, why can I not remember the very people I serve… please tell me everything…"
Ernst shook his head, "It is best that you remain in the dark, you should not have to burden yourself with such thoughts at your age…"
"So you will not tell me after all…"
Salvia chimed in from the sides, "Being in the know isn't always better than being ignorant, there will come times when you will regret ever wishing to learn the truth, are you aware of that Pansy?"
Pansy shook her head, "I will not regret it, no matter how difficult it may be to accept."
"Really? You won't feel the slightest tinge of regret, I can't help but have my doubts."
Pansy's hands trembled, and her lips quivered, "I-I admit I still have much to learn, that I don't understand most of the things that have happened today, it honestly fills me with an inexplicable feeling of foreboding, I'm scared, but still, just as Mr. Traveler said, not trying to know about it is the wrong decision, not making a decision, is the wrong choice, and so, as much as it scares me, I want to know about the past, I can remember none of it, how a tragedy of this scale came to pass, I must know. Is it not about time that you told me, father?"
"Hear that Ernst? That's the little sister I'm proud of. Now stop cowering like a little bitch and let her grow up already."
Pansy looked up at Salvia with bewilderment in her eyes, "Little S-sister?"
Ernst heaved a deep sigh, "Are you really sure Pansy?"
This was it. Once she said 'yes', there would be no going back, Pansy could not help but hesitate before answering, however…
"It's alright sister, you can do it.", Salvia hugged her from behind, with one hand gently caressing her head, "When you remember everything, let's catch up on old times."
As far as Pansy could remember, that was the first time in her life that someone had hugged her, the warmth and empathy of a person, human contact, evoked in her emotions she had never known before. She wished to learn about this big sister of hers, she loathed the fact that she could remember nothing about her, it must have pained her greatly.
She felt like there was a lump in her throat, her voice cracked, her fingertips ached, and her eyes watered, and with that final push, the answer came out, "Y…Yes…"