Chapter 291: The Dream Tavern

The remote town lay far from any clamor, yet the tavern of the caravan inn halfway up the mountain was lively beyond measure.

Warm-hearted servers brought cold drinks to people who had come from far away, washing the weariness of the road from their bodies.

Merchants pulled off their heavy sweaters and cloth shirts, raised their cups, and drank hard, determined to rest well in this little town for a few days.

“How many years has it been since the war ended? What a false alarm that was. As expected of the gods!”

“Hey, they didn’t win it easily. I heard even the Pope died…”

“Don’t go saying things like that here!”

In a corner of the room, a girl held a cup of warm milk and gently blew across the steam.

She seemed distracted.

Her hands trembled, and a few white drops fell onto her black leggings.

She pulled her cloak tighter and shrank farther into it.

Though she was one of the caravan, she showed no intention of joining the mood.

She only huddled in the corner with her hood drawn.

The people around her seemed used to it and did not treat this unusual girl as an outsider.

When several men, dead drunk, began to make a racket, the tavern’s atmosphere turned blazing at once.

There was applause, shouting, calling out, and the sound of beer going down.

No one noticed the light footsteps drawing closer until they pushed open the tavern door.

In that instant the whole room fell quiet.

The one who opened the door was a girl.

She had silver hair and wore white clothes, like an elf who did not belong to the mortal world.

Her eyes were pale blue, like a condensed sky, and in their depths lay the pattern of a silver-white cross, gentle yet carrying a pity that stood apart from dust.

A sacred light seemed to radiate from her body.

That godlike bearing made everyone stop what they were doing and freeze in place, as if the only thing they wanted to do was pray.

Yet more than prayer or worship, they wanted to know why a girl who shed divinity had come to a place this poor and remote.

Gabriella was just as puzzled.

She did not know this tavern, and she did not know why she had pushed the door open and walked in.

While she wondered, she looked over everyone in the tavern, then locked her gaze on the girl in the corner and walked straight toward her.

In a voice that was ice-cold, she laid bare the identity of the girl holding the milk.

“Lartomia.”

“I have something to discuss with you. Can we talk?”

Gabriella snapped her fingers.

It was like pressing a video’s play button.

Everyone went back to drinking and making merry on cue, shouting and calling out as if they had never seen Gabriella at all—or rather, as if some power had forced them to ignore her existence.

“You… why?”

“Releasing too much power makes it impossible for humans to observe me.”

“That isn’t what I meant. You didn’t call the other Heavenly Oracle Envoys.”

Lartomia’s tone carried very clear anger, but more than that it carried confusion.

She pulled down her hood and revealed long orange hair.

Then she sighed, sat at the counter, and the owner prepared a second cup of milk for her.

A haze settled over Lartomia’s eyes.

“Did you come to kill me?”

“I came to talk.” Gabriella sat down beside her.

Only then did Gabriella realize she was dreaming.

To be precise, it was a memory—something that had happened in the Heavenly Oracle Era.

From her birth, to being raised by Olivia, to meeting the Evil God Isabella and becoming her friend, to encountering Lartomia in the God War and defeating her…

Clearly the battle nine years ago had left a wound on Lartomia’s heart.

Gabriella could clearly feel that Loli… no, Lartomia’s body was trembling.

Of course, she herself was equally awkward at the moment, because she still could not control her body inside the dream.

It was like experiencing past history in the first person, moving in step with everything that had once happened here.

“How surprising. You actually managed to find a place like this…”

“Finding you is very easy. What I want to know more is how the humans of the other plane were destroyed.”

Gabriella’s voice was quite serious.

“You’re a powerhouse who inherited that civilization’s legacy and relics, aren’t you?”

Lartomia looked at her deeply, took a sip of milk, and looked as if she meant to refuse.

That gaze said she intended to refuse Gabriella no matter what, and to fight to the death either way.

The tavern owner, who wore a small mustache, quietly wiped a glass as if he could not hear their conversation at all.

The drinkers behind them were the same.

It was as if Lartomia were the only existence in the whole world that still had color.

What surprised Gabriella was that Lartomia actually agreed.

“The humans of that plane once developed to the third stage. There were three reasons they were destroyed.”

Lartomia’s eyes seemed to look toward a past even more distant.

Gabriella felt briefly dazed, because it was so remote it was hard even to imagine.

A pity that the legacy that civilization left behind was only the Heavenly Oracle Envoys and the repair pods.

If one counted Lartomia as well, the sight was almost too wretched to bear.

There were many causes of destruction.

The most direct one was still the Evil God.

“The Evil God?”

“Creis really doesn’t tell you anything, does she? Not that it matters. You Heavenly Oracle Envoys are, at best, machines that carry out a mission.”

Lartomia’s voice was full of mockery.

“I inherited that civilization’s [Memory]. I can tell you there were only three fundamental reasons for the destruction.”

As she spoke, she held up three fingers.

“First, the Divine Arms System was infiltrated, and humanity’s weapons of resistance failed.”

“Second, the awakening of the Heavenly Oracle Envoys failed, and the ultimate weapons all fell into slumber.”

“Third, the god was defeated.”

Gabriella’s voice grew somewhat agitated.

“Can you explain in more detail? You mean the Evil God killed the god of that plane?!”

“That’s right. Her name was the [Star God]. She was a deity strong in both wisdom and combat power. She created the [Star Court] and let several high beings govern the world together, and she even brought them to the third stage of civilization for a time… though her defeat was the most fundamental reason the world was destroyed.”

“Isabella… destroyed a world…”

Gabriella murmured to herself.

The coldness in her voice that resembled Creis’s faded a little, replaced by doubt.

She pressed on.

“If it really was the Evil God who destroyed the world, then what happened after that? The Evil God was encircled by the gods, then luckily survived and descended into this world?”

A flicker of amusement passed through Lartomia’s eyes.

“No. The gods would never be that gentle.”

“To be precise, before the Evil God acted… no, before the Evil God even had the thought of acting, the gods had already decided to destroy the civilization.”

“What?”

“The ones who killed the civilization were those sanctimonious gods, not the Evil God.”