Chapter 1502
Should I Save Them?
The rain grew even more murky, as if the entire sky had been soaked in some invisible putrid substance. Pereike's voice didn't grow louder, but it seemed to echo simultaneously in every raindrop, every gust of wind, and even in the intervals of every breath:
“I used to think that illness only took root in the flesh and blood... until I had been in contact with life in this world for too long.”
The longer you spend time with them, the more you understand how much they love their lives, and at the same time how much they despise them.
They can sacrifice everything for a grand ideal—belief, faith, background, self—with life being the cheapest thing in the world. If there were any ideal that could be achieved simply by giving up life, ten million people in the world would do it, while perhaps ten million would try to stop them. Yet, they can also struggle desperately to survive, resorting to killing, robbing, deceiving, and betraying. But usually, such people do not understand the meaning of life. For them, life is like a lifeline, as if as long as they hold it in their hands, they still have the opportunity to change or be changed.
The former included figures like her teacher, Titis, Carabosse, and every member of the Witches' Society; their disregard for life often frightened Perec. She saw far more examples of the latter, for as the saint of the Garden of Plants, the Grand Master of the Hospitallers, and the founder of the Red Cross, she had the most contact with patients, especially those receiving charitable medical care. These patients were from the lowest rungs of society, typically sharing similar characteristics: poverty, shortsightedness, loneliness, and a morbid obsession with life. Often, they would desperately grasp the hands of medical staff, kneel and plead, or refuse to close their eyes on their sickbeds, fearing they would never open them again—a state that inevitably instilled fear in Perec.
Does the former necessarily pursue an ideal? Does the latter necessarily grasp hope? If only that were the case. But based on Perec's own experience, ideals always clash with reality, and hope is often ridiculed and becomes a laughingstock. Sadly, no one empathizes with this. Over the long course of time, Perec personally experienced, or at least witnessed, that those who were willing to sacrifice their lives for ideals were mocked, and those who struggled desperately to survive were scorned. Mortals seem never to have reached a unified standard, defining what kind of person is worthy of respect and what kind is merely superficial. They simply follow their own joys and sorrows, recklessly squandering the emotions they have so painstakingly acquired, unaware that many years ago, billions of years ago, until the destruction of another world, many people paid a heavy price for endowing them with such precious qualities, including the goddess who created the world.
She finally understood that what decays earlier than the body is often the human heart; and what is harder to cure than illness is often the mind.
She broke free from her teacher's cage, accepted Tentis's invitation, and came to the mortal world. More than a thousand years have passed since then. During this time, she has never spread the seeds of disaster and disease again, and has personally saved the lives of thousands of people. In the end, she discovered that there is only one kind of disease in the mortal world: the shadow that grows between light and darkness in human nature, the ashes left after ideals have burned out, and the scab that congeals after hope has been repeatedly shattered.
It is a disease that even the young queen, who symbolizes cosmic plagues and governs the laws of evolution and elimination, cannot be immune to.
And now, she wants to spread the disease to Ovira.
As mentioned earlier, only those who have overcome this test, witnessed the ills of humanity, and still firmly believe that it can be cured, and firmly believe that they must cure it, are qualified to decide the future of this continent, this planet, this universe, and all living beings...
The rain was torrential.
Every drop of rain reflects light, not the color of matter, but fragments of emotion: the dark gray of despair, the turbid yellow of suspicion, the purplish-red of selfishness, the pale white of indifference... Countless tiny spots of light float in the rain, like billions of shattered mirrors, each reflecting those desperate moments in the history of civilization, where corpses lay everywhere and disease raged in every place.
The traces of illness flow silently, finer than a spider web, more ethereal than mist, seeping into the rain curtain, into the earth, into every ripple of magic, and even into the wrinkles of time itself.
Pereira named this peculiar, intense, incurable, ubiquitous, yet never truly noticed, illness—
despair.
……
Suddenly, Ovira felt the weight of the fairy sword Hydras in her hand change. For the first time, her hand holding the sword lost all physical sensation, as if she were holding nothingness. Without looking down, the girl could almost imagine the scene: on the ancient sword, forged by fairies, wielded by heroes, and celebrated in legends, the cold, moonlit light was visibly dimming, as if stained by the darkest darkness since time immemorial, no longer resonating with anything. The emotions entrusted to mortals by the fairies of Assyria, the land of paradise—longing, love, admiration, and blessings—had shattered and were heading towards collapse.
The shadow of Nibelungen was submerged in the heavy rain. She looked up and saw the majestic dragon phantom gradually blurring. It was originally the most powerful and proud memory from the past, but now it was so fragile that the pale green raindrops could pass through its massive body without any hindrance, shattering all futile resistance.
The text on the parchment scrolls is blurred, the ancient books on the bookshelves are covered in dust, the routes on the nautical charts have been cut off by daggers, and the markings on the experimental instruments have gradually faded due to long-term dust accumulation. The only force in the world that can fight against the epidemic is being lost. When no one believes that this knowledge can save lives anymore, knowledge itself becomes the greatest burden, and those who are unable to bear it are eager to discard it and rush towards the end of despair without looking back.
This is the power of "despair," which can erode even the human heart, humanity, emotions, self, and faith.
On this continent, the power of faith among all living beings is the cornerstone of all extraordinary power. For example, the fairy sword Hydras wielded by Ovira and the sky warship Nibelungen were forged from two diametrically opposed beliefs: the former stemmed from the beautiful wishes of fairies, while the latter was born from the intense resentment of an evil dragon. Even the Holy Grail, a product of the fusion of the two and possessing incredible power, is essentially a continuation of this belief. People might be wary of an evil god of unknown origin, yet they seem unreserved in placing their wishes on inanimate objects. The Holy Grail only possesses corresponding power when people believe it can grant their desires; and if no one is willing to believe in such bizarre legends, then it is utterly useless.
Fortunately, the legends of heroes, evil dragons, and the Holy Grail have long circulated in the province of Atoliga, supported by countless accounts and rumors. Therefore, at least in this land, it still exists. Ovira obtained it and was able to use its power, combined with the abilities of the Mystic King, to fight against the Anti-Plague Witch without being at a disadvantage. But unfortunately, when humanity is corrupted and faith is lost, how long can their power last?
Swords are covered in dust, warships have fallen, and even the legendary Holy Grail is teetering on the brink of collapse.
"Once people lose their faith, they will contract a disease called despair."
Pereira's voice was like a sigh, or a pronouncement, "And despair... is contagious."
With her sigh, scenes seemed to appear before Ovira's eyes: in the dark, sunless mines, people gathered in solitude, the quietly simmering plague and imminent death keeping them from approaching each other despite being in the same world, gradually drowning in heavy sorrow; in the torrential rain, ancient rock paintings, the result of generations of sacrifices, were blurred and indistinct, the strongest warriors did not die from enemies that swords could not defeat, the traditional rules unique to savagery collapsed in an instant, leaving only a low sob in the rain; on the battlefield where life and death were fought, yesterday's enemies and today's comrades sat back to back, fighting together against an enemy more terrifying than war, one living as if dead, one dead as if liberated, before the vast and unpredictable world, everything lost its meaning.
If you were to shift your perspective upwards now, passing through the land shrouded in cumulonimbus clouds with a diameter of 330,000 square kilometers, through the province of Atoliga where heroes and evil dragons once summoned lightning and spewed evil flames in the rain, through the continent of East Divant, ruled by barbarity and savagery since ancient times, until you could overlook the entire planet, you would discover a gray haze, too vast to be perceived by the naked eye, spreading outwards at an alarming speed from the battlefield where the two young queens fought. It is the messenger of despair, the harbinger of plague, the symbol of the end of the world, seeking to stain the world with its own color. From then on, the sky, the earth, the ocean, and the isolated islands will all be its domain.
This unprecedented catastrophe is even more alarming than the resurgence of plagues unleashed by the Plague Witch across the globe. The latter has appeared countless times in human history, each resurgence documented in writing, and there are instances of its defeat. Therefore, people's fear of it stems more from death itself. But a plague that erodes the heart and corrupts faith has never appeared before, or rather, it has always existed, only ignored by ordinary people. Because people tend to glorify ideals and despise life, regarding so-called despair as mere groaning, since they don't consider it a disease, they naturally don't bother to research treatments, offering only a few words of lukewarm comfort.
"Don't be afraid, cheer up, there will definitely be a way," "As long as you're alive, there's hope," "The world is so beautiful, don't just see the sad side"... Such words are nothing more than a pretense of concern to cover up one's indifference.
What can truly cure despair? Perhaps everyone knows the answer, but few are willing to do it. When life in this world becomes so indifferent, the truly incurable disease is born.
In essence, it originates in people's hearts and affects people's hearts, so the price is naturally borne by people.
At that moment, all the evil gods and false gods on the continent of Dongdi Fant who had ascended to godhood by seizing faith felt immense fear, as if this power no longer belonged to them. They watched in horror as their thrones crumbled, their divine kingdoms collapsed, and their once-lofty statues, worshipped by all, were reduced to wooden carvings and earthen stones, crumbling and disintegrating. They could no longer feel the fervor of their believers, nor trace the source of that consciousness. Ships that had been securely anchored in harbors were forced to sail into the stormy seas, enduring terrifying waves. And all of this stemmed from the spread of the plague, as people gradually lost hope, their faith was corrupted, and they ceased to pray to their gods.
The power of believers is the power of the gods, and the faith of believers is the beacon anchoring the gods' reason. Only by maintaining the purest faith can the gods protect their own purest power. Why, knowing this, do they still rule their believers with slaughter, destruction, and fear? This is a mystery no one knows, but at least for now, many gods will no longer need to ponder this question, nor will they have the chance to regret it, because they have fallen from their divine thrones, or, having lost the support of the power of faith, have been corrupted by magic, completely out of control, and descended into madness.
In Atoliga's most magnificent yet most dilapidated palace, atop the gray hills where Anseth's eagles once again took flight, in the crystal-clear city of the chaotic seas, in the tribal wizards' tents filled with the decaying scent of time, beneath the enormous bookshelves bustling with city-state scholars, in the silent, snow-white laboratories of scholars clad in white robes, in every corner of the world and in every speck of dust in the universe... a scene of utter desolation.
People are always waiting to be saved. Ovira grieves for this fact, yet understands it's not their fault, but a characteristic bestowed upon them by reality and fate. In essence, there's little difference between those who save others and those who wait to be saved. Who can wade out of the mire of despair and guarantee they'll never fall into it again? Their positions are constantly shifting, which is why Perec deemed the disease of despair incurable: the person who can save you today may be the one needing saving tomorrow. If there's a disease whose causes, symptoms, and cures are never recorded, and even the positions of patients and doctors can change at any moment, then who can confidently utter the word "hope"?
Fortunately, Ovira had anticipated this moment.
Because she is the King of Mysteries, the one who knows everything in the mortal world, she naturally anticipated the Plague Witch's methods and made preparations in advance.
If mortals need to be saved, she couldn't help but think, then let me save them.
Then he thought of the young man who hadn't yet woken up, and his idea subtly shifted: Let's save them then. (End of Chapter)