Before entering the Gate of Memories, the space of the 71st Floor was a bizarre space where all sorts of things were jumbled together.
A landscape where time was chaotically mixed.
Night and day coexisted, buildings from the past and future stood in the same space, a place where summer and winter existed together.
But when I returned from the Gate of Memories and opened my eyes again, what I saw was a desolate wasteland.
While the previous 71st Floor, however grotesque, had a sense of mystery, the 71st Floor I opened my eyes to again wasn’t much different from the floors I’d experienced before.
A desolate land that somehow felt hollow.
A rather thickly settled Abyssal Curse.
No longer mysterious, it was the typical appearance of an Abyss floor.
“Awake, are you, Magician?”
A voice came from behind Hio as he opened his eyes.
“You have the look of someone who had a long dream. It’s the first time I’ve seen you so dazed.”
“……Vitalianus.”
Vitalianus approached Hio with a laugh.
Around him, I could see Airlights, Regarda, and others still lying with their eyes closed.
“It seems the others still have a way to go before waking up.”
“Seems so.”
“Falling asleep in the middle of a raid. How does that even happen?”
At Vitalianus’s rather cheerful tone, Hio’s gaze turned toward him.
“Vitalianus, did you not pass through the Gate of Memories?”
“Of course I went in. I just woke up a little while ago myself.”
Unlike Hio, who had a complex expression due to having just experienced Abelard’s memories, Vitalianus looked quite relaxed.
“For your information, I was the first to wake up, and you were the second. Being first always feels best, you know.”
Hio had seen and experienced the memories of Abelard Pavlenko.
He saw his growth, his relationships, and Kreutzvalt.
So, what had Vitalianus seen and felt?
“Vitalianus, what did you……”
Just as he was about to ask that.
“……Hah!”
With a sharp, urgent sound of a swallowed gasp, Antipus abruptly sat up.
He opened his eyes and shot upright at the same time.
What terrible memory had he seen?
Starting with him, then Freya, Regarda, and finally Airlights, they all opened their eyes and came to their senses.
The entire expeditionary force had escaped from their own, or another’s, memories and descended once more onto the 71st Floor of the Abyss.
They wanted to share what they had each seen and talk about it, but that would likely require quite a long time.
“First…… we need to finish the raid.”
“Or perhaps it’s more accurate to say we need to start the raid.”
First, they had to finish the raid of the 71st Floor.
Even though it seemed not much time had passed, the sooner a raid is finished, the better, right?
The strange phenomenon named ‘Belthesia’s Gate of Memories’ was probably a kind of arrangement left by Belthesia and likely had little to do with the 71st Floor raid itself.
So, as Vitalianus said, this could be seen as the proper start of the raid now.
“The goal is the same as before. Finish the raid as quickly as possible.”
“Right.”
Their expressions were deeply sunken, perhaps each having much to think about from the memories they experienced.
All except one.
Except for Vitalianus, that is.
“Then, let’s go.”
The full-fledged raid of the 71st Floor began immediately.
4 hours and 52 minutes.
[Abyss – Successfully raided the 71st Floor.]
That was the time it took to raid the 71st Floor.
Needless to say, it was the shortest record in history.
It wasn’t like there were many people slowing down movement, nor was there a need to be careful to protect each individual.
It was just an expeditionary force that had to move forward quickly and kill every Strange Entity in sight.
From the start of the 71st Floor, what they encountered were not Abyss Monsters, but clear Strange Entities.
But what use would that be against overwhelming power?
Hio only gave a warning that sometimes Entities that ignore the rules could appear, and after that, it was a smooth, unstoppable advance.
Two people who, though still novices, bore the title of ‘God’.
Two more knights who had reached the pinnacle with sword and spear respectively, handling Ideation.
With the last existing Dragon and a top-tier Awakened present, even if dozens of low-level Entities swarmed, they couldn’t even catch their ankles.
“It was more difficult when we were in that memory gate or whatever.”
With such figures gathered in one place, the raid was absurdly easy.
But that didn’t mean they could let their guard down or take it easy.
This damn Abyss would never provide an easy environment.
[Abyss – ’71st Floor’ sinks into the deep Abyss.]
[Returning to the original location.]
The proper meeting could only begin after they got outside the Gate.
A meeting that began immediately after successfully raiding and exiting the Gate.
Even though the black Abyss Gate hadn’t completely disappeared yet, they gathered in front of it without hesitation and the conversation began.
The first thing to discuss was, of course, what they had seen and experienced in the Gate of Memories.
“What I saw was……”
The first to speak was Freya, who had returned to her human form.
“It was the memory of Aerial, who is both me and not me. A very old memory from a time I can’t even pinpoint.”
Freya saw Aerial’s memory.
What she learned from it was that the Dragons had known about the Abyss’s invasion from early on.
The Gods did not answer the Dragons’ questions, and they planned to enter the Abyss themselves, but for some reason, they were counterattacked through the very passage they had prepared and were utterly annihilated.
“That was…… all of the memory I saw.”
A brief silence followed Freya’s words.
Freya and Hio glanced at Regarda, but his expression was as impassive as ever.
However, the emotions leaking out were something even he seemed to have difficulty controlling, as they trembled faintly.
Freya inwardly sighed in relief and nodded to herself.
It was good she didn’t convey Aerial’s final memory.
It was better not to tell him that until her final moment of being eroded by the Abyss, she thought only of Regarda, worrying and caring for him.
It was the right judgment for Freya to keep that memory to herself alone.
“……I saw my own past. It was the memory right after sealing Aerial.”
Next, Regarda opened his mouth.
As if it had never happened, his emotions were gathered, and he continued speaking with his usual calm and steady tone.
“Perhaps because it was my own memory, I wasn’t simply retracing the memory; I could move the body directly.”
What Regarda experienced was also quite shocking.
Before meeting Kreutzvalt, his original body.
He said he moved and acted with it directly.
But even then, not much would have changed.
He was a Dragon Knight, and it was the situation right after sealing the Dragon.
He would have protected the Dragon the same way, and he would have fallen the same way under the infinite onslaught of the Abyss.
And then Kreutzvalt appeared.
The one who allowed Regarda to continue his previous mission and gave him a new body.
“I met Kreutzvalt again.”
From then on, the situation flowed strangely.
Since it was a past memory, Regarda tried to use this opportunity to extract information, but Kreutzvalt, on the contrary, realized that place wasn’t reality.
“He asked me from which era I had come. Right after that, we clashed, and the memory ended there.”
“That’s…… too unexpected.”
They already knew Kreutzvalt’s existence itself had long since transcended the human realm.
But wasn’t that a past Kreutzvalt, before he clearly became the Lord of the Abyss?
Yet, deducing it from just a few words of conversation opened up various possibilities.
For example, the possibility that Kreutzvalt had accurately foreseen the future at that time and thus immediately realized it wasn’t reality.
Or the possibility that he was already the Lord of the Abyss from back then.
“Next is me.”
***
After Regarda’s story, Airlights stepped forward.
The memory Airlights glimpsed was of the previous Goddess of Love, Venus.
The discourse of the Goddess, beginning with the story of Venus and Liphyue.
Each word held so much meaning that Airlights had to recite the entire conversation from beginning to end without summarizing.
And the conclusion drawn from it was quite cruel.
“They knew the Dragons would all perish, yet they left them be.”
The Gods knew the Dragon Race, who had protected the world since its birth, would all perish in an instant, yet they left them be.
However, no one could point fingers at them for that.
“And they themselves chose eternal annihilation.”
To eliminate the darkness that had fallen upon the world.
For the stronger the light, the deeper the shadow it creates.
Without a single objection, all the Gods willingly chose annihilation.
‘How could one judge that heart with a human measure?’
“The fact that the conversation of the two Goddesses remained as a memory ultimately means Belthesia permitted it……”
It means she judged that leaving it would be more beneficial.
She must have thought, based on the information obtained, she wished for something to be done.
To know what that is, they must hear all the remaining memories and piece them together.
“I…… saw a war.”
The next to step forward was Antipus.
He said he saw the war between the Lord of the Abyss and the Gods.
He guessed it was an event after Airlights’s memory.
However, he couldn’t pinpoint the exact time period.
He said that war was vast and majestic, yet simultaneously silent.
How could that be amidst all kinds of powers and authorities clashing?
It could be a type of authority and Entity, or perhaps Antipus simply couldn’t comprehend it.
What was certain was that the Gods truly executed their plan as intended and produced the result.
“What I saw was the memory of the Lord of the Magic Tower, Abelard Pavlenko.”
Hio began explaining what he had seen.
The second longest memory after Freya’s, spanning hundreds of years in the memory.
There was much information related to Abelard, but he conveyed only the important information, excluding unnecessary details.
Like the location where the gate leading to the Abyss was.
Information related to the Suicide Squad.
“Based on the memory, I guess the path to the World’s End, the Abyss, can likely be found in a few specific places where certain Dragons are.”
“……Since the Abyss invaded through the passage the Dragons prepared for a counterattack. Does that mean it might still be there?”
“It’s just a guess. So we need to check for sure.”
Those pieces, combined with the others’ memories, began to fit the puzzle together one by one.
“First, let’s hear the last memory.”
Now, only Vitalianus remained.
And so, everyone’s gaze turned toward the Sword Saint, Vitalianus.
“Hoho…… What to do about this.”
Vitalianus only scratched his golden hair at the back of his head and smiled awkwardly.
“I just saw a bit of my childhood memories and came back, that’s all.”
“Huh? That’s all, Mister Sword Saint?”
“It seems so, Lady Freya.”
“Eh…… Why?”
“Must be because I’m just an ordinary human, I suppose.”
Freya tilted her head in confusion, Antipus silently sank into thought, and Airlights showed no particular interest.
Only Hio and Regarda, the two who could handle Ideation, observed Vitalianus intently.
Then they shifted their gazes, briefly looked at each other, and drew a conclusion.
“Hoho…… Sorry I couldn’t be of help. But this is embarrassing, so let’s move on quickly.”
Vitalianus was lying right now.