The manor door closed gently behind him.
Guts stepped out — alone.
His shoulder was bleeding. His breath came short.
His sword, sticky with black blood, dragged across the ground like a dead limb.
The garden still bathed in the same ochre light.
The sun had not yet set.
Time, here, refused to move.
He didn't look for Rem.
Not yet.
His mind was still trapped in what he had just witnessed.
The cultists.
Betelgeuse.
Ram's gaze.
All of it spun in his head, unordered, senseless.
Then—
A scream.
Not one of pain.
Not a call for help.
A roar.
A sound from the depths of the gut.
He looked up.
And he saw her.
Rem.
Standing.
Surrounded.
Assaulted by cultists.
Her horn, glowing and throbbing, burst from her forehead like a white stake of light.
Her face... unrecognizable.
Twisted with hatred.
With pure, raw, unfiltered fury.
A rabid beast.
And around her... a black tide.
Them again.
Dozens of robed figures, snickering, slithering between hedges like fleshless shadows.
Rem was striking.
Tearing through the air.
Her morningstar spun like a mad star.
But there were too many.
Too fast.
And Guts saw it then...
Her eyes.
It wasn't the strong, kind Rem he had known.
It was something else.
Something broken.
Something ancient.
He had seen that look before.
Long ago.
Under a red sky.
When everything fell apart.
The Eclipse.
He had screamed too. Like her. For a long time.
But in the end... someone had come.
This time, no one would.
Not for her. Not for him.
Guts clenched his jaw.
A tremor ran through him.
A silent cry rose in his throat.
And without thinking — without shouting — he charged.
His body ran before he could command it.
His muscles, shattered from battle, remembered their strength.
He rushed forward.
Not to kill.
Not to win.
To pull her out.
To keep from losing her too.
Not her.
Not yet.
Not now.
They thought it was over.
But nothing moved.
And that — that was the problem.
Rem stepped back from Guts.
She was breathing heavily. Her gaze still hollow.
Guts gripped his hilt. He felt it — like a rumble beneath his feet.
And then...
They returned.
Silhouettes emerged again.
From bushes, broken windows, half-open doors.
The cultists. Again.
Like an endless army.
Like ghosts no one had ever truly killed.
They aligned, advanced, slowly encircling the two of them in silence.
And in the middle of them… he was there.
Betelgeuse.
Standing at the center of the circle, arms crossed in an almost paternal posture.
His eyes — void of reason — stared at Guts with painful fascination.
A slow, stretched smile devoured his face.
He tilted his head to the side, as if admiring a piece of art too fragile to touch.
Betelgeuse (trembling voice, exultant):
"Magnificent… Magnificent!
Suffering!
Loss!
A heart torn at the edge of the abyss… all of it… all of it because of love."
(He steps forward, arms open.)
Betelgeuse:
"What you feel now… that fire, that silent scream… that chasm inside your chest… that is love."
(He gazes at Rem, then at Guts — almost tenderly.)
Betelgeuse:
"To lose a sister, beside the one you love…
The purest love, mingled with the blackest grief.
That is what I worship.
That is what I cherish.
That is what I want to witness, again and again..."
(He trembles — with sick delight.)
Betelgeuse:
"Your love… it is beautiful. Tragic. Deadly.
But the love of the Witch…"
(He tears off a fingernail. Blood runs. His smile widens.)
Betelgeuse (screaming):
"HERS IS ETERNAL!"
The cry rang like a funeral bell.
Rem stepped back. Guts didn't move.
All around them, the cultists began to tremble.
Like statues waking from a dream.
Guts gripped his sword tighter.
His gaze shifted from Rem… to Betelgeuse.