Surviving without God

Throughout Audrey House’s long history, not once had even the slightest unforeseen noise ever been allowed.

Maybe that was why.

The moment the crashes and screams from the dining hall echoed through the building, the children who had been giggling in Dominic’s room instantly froze stiff.

The caretakers were nowhere to be seen. The other instructors did not rush in to help either.

It was obvious that something dangerous was happening, yet no one moved. The reason was simple: they had never once acted on their own without a direct order.

In the middle of that unnatural stillness, Remesia suddenly remembered a voice.

Raymond’s voice from several days ago.

“Remesia, somewhere on this continent, there is a kingdom of knights.”

She knew it.

Valloren, a member of the Union of Kingdoms. A nation she had heard about in history lessons. A land of heretics who denied the gods. A dangerous gathering of people who placed human vows above faith.

“Instead of faith, they revere what they call chivalry.”

“Chivalry...? What exactly is that?”

At that question, Raymond had only smiled faintly.

It was the expression of someone who had heard the same question before—a familiar, understanding look.

“Chivalry is a vow to refuse the choice that, in your own eyes, defiles who you are.”

“A choice... that defiles you?”

“You could say it is the resolve to spend your entire life for the good you believe in. To protect those weaker than yourself, not to swing sharpened power recklessly, and to follow the light even when it sometimes seems inefficient.”

The more power a person possessed, the more options opened before them.

They could save, they could kill, they could use others and throw them away—endless possibilities for calculation unfolded.

That was precisely why chivalry was a set of voluntary shackles.

It fundamentally contradicted everything she had been taught.

Remesia had looked at him in confusion. Under normal circumstances, she would never even have listened.

But, as fate would have it, in that very moment she had been holding Yuria’s hand.

She herself had already violated the dogma.

And because of that, Raymond’s strange words slipped into her ears with extraordinary ease.

“Remesia, if everything proceeds as it should, you will be sent to the Kingdom of Valloren as the Hierarch of Repose.”

A low voice, like prophecy.

“And you will shatter their will.”

You will force them to destroy with their own hands the very things they once protected.

You will make the spearpoint of the soldier who once shielded his sick neighbors turn against them instead.

You will make the old knight who cared for the peasants of his estate personally stack mountains of the heads of those he loved like his own children.

And though their ideals may be old-fashioned and covered in the dust of centuries, you will make the lands where justice once flowed drown in blind obedience.

In the name of “Repose.”

“That can’t be.”

Remesia reflexively shook her head.

Masiu... the one who had loved her like a true daughter, would never force her to do something like that.

And she herself would never use her power in such a way.

And yet Raymond’s words did not disappear.

They remained lodged deep inside her soul like thorns.

That was the power of one who spoke “truth.”

“Once you cross the line a single time, everything becomes easier after that. The Theocracy loves that moment.”

First, force upon someone one “unavoidable choice.”

Then make them keep moving through inertia, reinforcing it all with self-justification.

A vicious kind of suggestion, striking directly at the weakest places in the human heart.

Remesia cut off the memory and looked at the terrified children before her.

But Raymond’s voice, sounding almost like a hallucination, only became clearer.

“To trample the will someone spent their whole life cultivating is horrifying. Because it means completely crossing out and stealing away that person’s entire existence.”

“And what about you?”

“What about Yuria and Dominic standing before you?”

“What about the children whose will and right to choose were stolen their entire lives?”

And then that heavier look in his eyes.

“For all of you... for you, there is definitely a better path. I do not doubt that for even a second.”

Grab!

Remesia stared at her own hands in shock.

The boy who had been trembling in fear and unable to move a single step.

She herself was gripping Zenon’s hand tightly.

As if she were ready to run with him at any second.

“...Rem?”

Remesia felt her hands—no, her whole body—shaking violently.

She tried to calm herself, but it was useless.

A wave of horrific fear and betrayal crashed over her.

But even within that chaos, there was clearly a flicker of light and warmth.

There existed a judgment she had made herself for the first time.

“I have to follow this.”

Teacher Raymond had said that once you crossed the line once, everything after became easier.

Would that apply to decisions this difficult too?

She desperately hoped so.

Please.

Woooooo—

Divine power.

For now, it still remained a tool they could manipulate at will.

That was especially true for “candidates,” who had not yet officially inherited the office and were not directly bound to a god.

That was precisely why tricks like this were possible.

Remesia silently looked at the power spreading among the children... the power that would push them forward.

Tap-tap-tap—

The quick footsteps of tiny feet began echoing one after another through the residential wing.

***

“Brother!”

The instant Remesia’s voice rang through the air, Dominic reflexively jerked his head up.

The other children came running behind her, gasping for breath.

Something hot burst out from the deepest part of his chest.

“...It worked.”

Everything was going according to plan.

Just now, he had completely cut off Audrey House’s power source.

Under normal circumstances, that would have been impossible.

However, Raymond’s lessons and the blueprints he had left behind made it possible.

The dreams that had continued over the last few days.

In that strange space, together with Grand Crow and Raymond, he had learned many things.

The hidden structure of Audrey House, the flows of energy... even the exact point where a strike would cause everything to collapse.

The knowledge Raymond had obtained through “Vision of the Heavenly Mechanism” had also become part of this plan.

...Thanks to that, the “death zone” that had made escape from inside absolutely impossible had been neutralized.

“Now all that’s left...”

Was to meet the allies who would guide them ➤ NоvеⅠight ➤ (Read more on our source) into the Kingdom of Nereus.

The first rendezvous point was half a day away at a run.

That meant by dawn they could break free from Luthien’s grasp.

Of course, many difficulties still lay ahead.

A pursuit might begin.

The children, so accustomed to indoctrination and dogma, might protest.

But even so—

This was an undeniable “beginning.”

That was what Dominic thought.

And at that exact moment—

Baaam!

One explosion after another thundered from the dining hall.

Through the breaches in the half-collapsed building, the inside was laid bare.

Amid smoke and dust, one person stood unmoving.

Raymond.

Dominic’s gaze locked onto him.

The priest’s robe had already been reduced to rags clinging to his body, and through the tears here and there, horrific dark-red wounds could be seen across mangled flesh.

But that was not all.

The curse of Seren Mayra was raging through his veins.

His flesh melted and knit itself back together over and over.

His body rotted down to the bone, only to be restored again as if held together by force.

The pain had to be beyond imagination.

And yet he did not fall.

Silently, he kept throwing his fists forward.

Blocking the instructors rushing toward the children.

He was shining.

It was blinding.

When Raymond had spoken to Remesia about “chivalry,” Dominic had been there too.

Now Dominic felt that he finally understood what Raymond’s chivalry truly was.

He was a heretic and a traitor to the Theocracy.

By all rational standards, the optimal choice would have been to slaughter every child candidate and escape alone.

But he did not do that.

Knowing that what followed would be monstrous pain and mortal danger, he chose to save the children.

Those who, the moment they betrayed Luthien, would become powerless burdens.

“Inefficient.”

Dominic muttered it inwardly.

A man who, instead of the optimal answer, always chose the harder path—the path where he had to shoulder more.

The light born from that choice.

The faintest light, yet one that would never go out even in darkness.

The kind that would never disappear.

He desperately wanted to possess it.

Desperately wanted to become the same kind of person.

A person who, like Teacher Raymond, would become a lamp in the deepest, bleakest moonless night.

“Teacher.”

His sticky eyelids lifted, and their gazes met.

Go.

There were no words.

But that fleeting exchange of looks was enough.

Yes, this was not over yet.

The plan was still in motion.

Dominic had to lead the children away first.

Raymond would remain here, hold them off, retrieve Zenon, and join them later.

A scene anyone else would have deemed impossible.

And yet Dominic did not doubt it.

Tap-tap—

Grabbing the children by the hands, he stepped across the boundary of Audrey House.

Cold... piercingly pure air rushed into his lungs.

The world, and the countless possibilities their teacher had spoken of, awaited them.

.

.

.

Naturally, Gunther had no intention of dying here.

Because of the child on his back, yes—but above all because he could not allow himself to die before the children’s escape was fully secured.

In a situation where there was no telling when this phase would end or when his consciousness would return to the present, dying here would not be risk.

It would be desertion.

He had to endure as long as possible and, if he could, alter the past to his advantage.

In that sense...

Choosing the Dark Night Vanguard had truly been flawless.

[I love betrayals. Look at their faces. That moment when faith collapses and rage boils over.]

There would be time to explain later, but...

The Dark Night Vanguard was a deity whose mythological origin was deeply intertwined with “betrayal.”

The betrayed hero and the hero who betrays.

That dual narrative was clearly empowering him now, and it was no illusion.

[Activating “Art of the Battle Dance” Lv. 1]

Black mist exploded outward in every direction.

This was not ordinary smoke.

The darkness devoured light and tore apart all sense of space.

Seize. Break. Strike. Throw. Crush.

Despite Seren Mayra’s curse and the desperate resistance of the instructors, more than five people were already sprawled across the floor as bloody wreckage.

The moment the curse-bonds of the evil gods weakened, his body had begun rapidly reclaiming its strength.

In gazes that had once held only disgust and fury, fear had begun to emerge with painful clarity.

Especially because of “Absolute Evasion,” the defining trait of the Dark Night Vanguard.

In a one-against-many situation, the effect was truly vicious.

Attack angles and timings that should have landed without fail went off course and split empty air.

And in that instant, into the opening created, Gunther’s crushing counterattack drove in.

“Fuuuh...”

After taking one short breath, Gunther launched himself forward again.

Toward the silhouette trying to slip away unnoticed in the distance.

Toward where the children had vanished.

Pshhh—

Space split apart.

Gunther’s figure shot out from the crack.

His muscular legs, like the limbs of a purebred warhorse, gave him explosive acceleration as he aimed straight for the enemy’s head.

The opponent barely managed to block in time.

“You filthy heretic...!”

The instructor who had taught hand-to-hand combat to the children of Audrey House.

If not for this man constantly tying him down, the fragile bodies of the other priests would have been blown apart long ago.

But the opponent, too, was already at the limit.

The body of “Raymond,” filled with the power of the Dark Night Vanguard, was truly monstrous.

[That is also thanks to the magnificence of the offering you brought me.]

“Die, heretic!”

The enemy struck with his sword, pouring every ounce of fervor into the blow.

[Activating Absolute Evasion]

Gunther’s hand slid into the forcibly created opening.

Kkh!

Without metaphor of any kind—the enemy’s neck was caught in a grip the size of a pot lid.

Unable even to twitch, the man went limp.

Leaving the corpse behind, Gunther turned back toward the dining hall once more.

No matter what, he had to prevent the instructors from giving chase.

Even if Remesia had agreed to help, the instructors were the ones who had spent years washing the children’s minds.

A single word from them would be enough to make the children instantly want to return to Audrey House.

“Do you think you’ve achieved your goal, heretic?”

Audrey, standing at the head of the instructors, bored into Gunther with her gaze.

The wrinkles on the old nun’s face writhed as if alive.

The vicious malice rising from beneath her skin twisted her features into something demonic.

“......?”

At that moment, Gunther felt a strange unease.

Faint, yet unmistakable.

A sense of something alien.

...It was that same unpleasant premonition that always appeared whenever he had overlooked something.

“What’s wrong?”

Even though the children had escaped, there was only fury in Audrey’s eyes.

“Why... isn’t she in despair?”

The escape of Hierarch candidates.

This was not merely a mistake.

It was a catastrophic failure.

And this was not just about the real accountability to the higher-ups.

The situation was equivalent to divine vessels shattering en masse.

For Audrey, who was so fanatically devoted that she belonged to the Society of Holy Flame, it would have been natural to be writhing in self-reproach and despair to the point of death.

The moment Gunther’s thoughts reached that point, he froze.

“No way.”

No way.

***

Dominic looked straight ahead.

Across the endless reed field, people in robes embroidered with flame patterns stood lined in formation.

The Society of Holy Flame.

Despite the deep night, the surroundings were as bright as day thanks to the fires they had set everywhere.

Each time the flames swayed in the wind, sinister shadows raced through the reeds as if the reeds themselves were running.

The children looked around in confusion, unable to understand what was happening.

Some, on the contrary, brightened the moment they recognized the robes.

The man standing at the head of the group, his neck grotesquely bent to one side, laughed in a scraping voice.

“It’s been a long time.”