Chapter 1325 (1/2)

Alta Bounty found the entire concept of a concert rather peculiar. There was a time in her life that she had found the prospect intriguing, and then a quaint diversion, but as she had aged, all she could see is the wasted excess at these sort of events. All the effort, the pomp, the lavish expenditures that changed nothing… in a way, it was similar to the pyre that Alta had made within herself to destroy a world.

It was a vast maw of fire that consumed much to create something brief and bright. Yet people’s reactions to the two parallel phenomena were completely different.

No one had cheered as Alta burned everything to ash. Even she was left bitter and full of regrets after the experience.

There were fully three performers that night. Alta admitted that each was more talented than the last, eventually culminating in a soulful performance that had the entire crowd swaying and bobbing like the people had been transformed into a living sea. There was a oneness that Alta couldn’t understand as everyone present listened to the music. They became a metaorganism balanced precariously on the rhythm of the song.

In that expanse, Alta was a stubborn rock. Perhaps some part of her acknowledged that she would be worn down eventually, but tonight was definitely not that night.

More than anything, the concert left her… confused. Her whole existence had become confusing since she had ‘died’ to become fertilizer for Randidly Ghosthound’s Soulskill. She had recently avoided facing that deep existential rift in herself by throwing herself into the work of being part of the pantheon in the Alpha Cosmos. But here, outside of that world and cut off from her intimate connection with the images and stories of the world… all Alta had was herself.

Seeing everyone connected made that hole insider herself slowly grow outward.

And she looked into that hole in her heart and found emptiness. It was hard even to muster up the emotion to care at how deteriorated her mental state had become. If Alta didn’t have a role in the pantheon… the emptiness inside of her would likely rise up and devour her fully. The flames of that same bitter hatred that had driven her to destroy her world had died out, but the charcoal left in their wake still tainted all of her being.

Standing entirely still, Alta’s neck pivoted back and forth, sweeping across the assembled people. Part of her was looking for an answer, but another part was deathly afraid that she would somehow destroy the surrounding unity just by existing. She didn’t deserve to be here, after all.

When did it all go so wrong?

“Are you alright?”

Alta’s visual sweep was pulled sharply to the left when a woman’s low voice spoke to her. She turned to find a young woman with amber eyes and dark hair standing next to her. The music continued to seeth around them, making Alta suddenly unsure whether the woman had spoken to her, or whether she had misheard by some weird coincidence of percussion.

But then the woman smiled encouragingly and offered Alta a hand. “Want to go for a walk?”

Rather numb, Alta gave the woman her hand. Compared to Alta’s rather clammy appendages, the woman’s hands were warm and dry. Quickly, the woman led Alta back to the far side of the ballroom and up the staircase to the second floor. It was like they traveled to another world. Although the music was still audible, it was muted enough to allow for casual conversation.

The woman let go of Alta’s hand and performed an elaborate curtsy. “So nice to meet you. I am Le. I saw you standing unaffected in the music… and somehow, I just knew that we needed to speak.”

“...I simply didn’t find the music to my taste,” Alta said awkwardly. She had been treated a lot of ways by a lot of people since she had attempted to destroy a world. But to have this woman be so immediately amicable… it seemed dishonest. Like it was only happening because the woman didn’t know who she was. “But it is also nice to meet you. I am Alta Bounty.”

“Alta Bounty…” There was clearly no recognition of that name in Le’s expression, but that only made Le’s eyes twinkle with additional interest. “Well met then, Alta. Can I ask you a personal question? Who are you to Randidly Ghosthound?”

The question was one that Alta had been thinking very deeply about over the past few hours. Her chest ached with imaginary burns as she tried to find the words to capture the rift in her soul. “I am… someone who attempted to destroy something very precious to Randidly.”

“Indeed?” Le gestured and led Alta forward. And as they approached the banister to look down across the lower area of the ballroom, the tide of the music receded before them. To the point that when they arrived and looked over the people standing below, the singer bowed and was rewarded with thunderous applause for her work.

Le cracked her neck and then grinned at Alta. “From what I can tell, Randidly Ghosthound is the direct type. So after everyone’s mood is high from the concert… while the group over there continues to struggle to finish the first challenge…” Le gestured toward the central island where a score of people continued to sweat in silence. “Randidly will strike. He will crush those emotions with power. Such is the prerogative of the protagonist.”

“A protagonist, huh…” Weirdly, Alta felt strangely comforted to hear Randidly labeled as such. She hadn’t read any sort of fiction in quite some time, not since her family had been massacred on that fateful day, but she still remembered the well-trodden paths that stories took. The hero… and the villains.

So I’m just one of the villains that lost and began to follow the hero, huh… I wonder then… if someday… I can redeem myself…?