Chapter 211: The White Void
Barlow's eyes snapped open.
He was surrounded by an infinite, blinding whiteness. There was no sky, no
ground, and no horizon—no points of reference at all. It was as if he were
standing on a colossal sheet of blank parchment.
He looked down at his hands. He was still clutching that tattered, one-eyed rag
doll.
"Am I... am I dead?"
Barlow stood rooted to the spot, his mind reeling. His last memories were
anchored to the moment the mine collapsed. The crushing weight of the slabs. The
agonizing splintering of his ribs. Then, this void.
"Hey! Is anyone there?!" he bellowed, his voice flat and lacking echo. "Where is
this place?!"
He waited, but silence was his only companion. Driven by a hollow instinct,
Barlow began to walk. Though there was nothing beneath his feet, the "ground"
felt as solid as the stone of Leaffall City. He walked for what felt like hours,
yet the scenery never shifted. It was white—pure, sterile white.
Just as he was about to succumb to the emptiness, a silhouette materialized
ahead. It was a woman.
Barlow halted as she approached. She had flowing hair, features that seemed
sculpted by a master artist, and a tall, graceful frame. Barlow's breath hitched
in his throat.
"It's you!"
He recognized her instantly. She was the mysterious "adventurer" from his
dream—the woman who had looked at them with that strange, detached pity.
Skele-Lust stood before him. She offered no answer, merely watching him with an
inscrutable gaze.
Barlow instinctively took a step back, and that was when he noticed it. His
hands were wrong. They were no longer the rough, calloused hands of a laborer.
They were withered, blackened, and twisted into jagged claws.
He looked down at the rest of his body, a wave of horror washing over him. "I...
I've become a monster?"
When he tried to speak, his voice had changed—it was raspy, grating, and layered
with a spectral hiss. He raised a claw to touch his face, but where his fingers
met skin, he felt no warmth. There was no pulse. No life.
"Why... why did it turn out like this?"
As the fog in his mind cleared, the weight of his reality brought him to his
knees. The doll slipped from his grasp, but he didn't reach for it. He buried
his face in those monstrous claws and began to weep.
"Hilde..."
"I... I never got to apologize to you."
"I never got to tell you the truth. Your father didn't really hate you. I was
just... I was so useless."
"I couldn't even buy you a proper toy. I couldn't find a way out of the dirt. I
couldn't even sit down and share a decent meal with you without snapping."
As he spoke, a thick, black miasma began to pour from his empty eye sockets—his
Od was manifesting as the physical smoke of resentment.
"I'm sorry... I'm so sorry. I was a failure of a father."
"I said such horrible things. How could I compare you to your mother like that?
How could I tell you I hated you?"
"I loved you... I loved you more than anything. I had so much I wanted to say. I
wanted to tell you I'd been promoted to the Guard. I wanted to tell you we
wouldn't have to eat that bitter black bread anymore. I wanted to tell you I'd
be home for dinner every night. I bought you a gift, Hilde. I bought you a..."
Barlow's voice broke into a jagged, spectral sob.
"Papa loves you. He loves you so, so much."
Just then, a pair of small, warm hands reached out and embraced him.
Barlow froze. He lifted his head slowly, stiffly. The woman was gone. In her
place stood a young girl with twin tails.
She had flaxen hair, a rough homespun dress, and a trace of flour on her cheek.
It was Hilde.
She looked at the monster he had become and spoke softly, her voice like a cool
breeze on a summer day.
"Papa."
Those two syllables made Barlow's entire frame tremble with a violent, rhythmic
clicking of bone.
"Hilde! Hilde! Is it really you? Is this... is this real?"
Barlow reached out with his twisted claws, wanting to touch her face, but he
jerked back, terrified that his monstrous appearance would frighten her. His
hands hung in the air, trembling.
"Papa," Hilde said, reaching out to seize his claws. Her hands were warm and
soft—exactly as he remembered. "Don't be afraid. I'm right here."
The dam broke. Barlow pulled his daughter into a crushing embrace. The black
smoke of his regret poured out like a flood, staining the white void.
"I'm sorry... I'm so sorry," he sobbed. "I shouldn't have said those things. I
never hated you. I was just so tired... I didn't know what to do."
He stroked her hair, over and over, just as he had done when she was a toddler.
"I love you. You were the only precious thing I ever had. You were my only
reason for living."
Hilde remained still in his arms, resting her head against his shoulder. Then,
she spoke, her voice carrying that specific, playful lilt from his memories.
"Papa. I know. I've always known."
"The things you said that night... I know you didn't mean them. I know you were
exhausted. I know you love me."
She tilted her head up and offered him a smile—a warm, radiant smile that cut
through the darkness of his soul.
"Because I love Papa most of all, too."
Barlow's spectral tears flowed even faster. "Hilde... I have so many wishes for
you. So many things I want for your life."
"Don't worry, Papa. I'm listening."
Barlow took a deep breath, his hands continuing to smooth her hair.
"I want you to eat well. Don't skip the meat to save coins. I want you to sleep
well. Don't stay up until midnight waiting for me. I want you to play. Don't
hide in that house alone anymore."
"I want you to learn. Find a craft, a trade—something better than digging in the
dirt like I did. I want you to make friends. I want you to laugh with children
your own age."
"I want you to be angry when you need to be. I want you to cry when it hurts. I
want you to smile when you're happy. I want you to do everything I couldn't."
"I want you to live a normal, boring, beautiful life."
Barlow squeezed her tight, as if trying to transfer every ounce of love he had
ever felt into her soul.
"Even if you cannot find tears... even if you cannot find laughter... even if
you face walls you cannot climb... even if you are left with nothing... even if
you find it hard to be loved, or hard to love another..."
"Papa just wants you to live!"
The black smoke began to dissipate. Barlow's spectral body was growing
transparent, fraying at the edges. He knew his time was up, but for the first
time in his life, he wasn't afraid. He had said the words. The debt was settled.
"Hilde," Barlow whispered, patting her head one last time. "Papa loves you.
And... thank you."
With those final words, his body dissolved into a thousand shimmering specks of
light, fading into the white expanse. The only thing left behind was the old rag
doll, lying silently on the "floor."
The avatar of the young girl flickered and shifted. Skele-Lust returned to her
true form. She knelt and picked up the tattered doll.
"I see," she murmured to the empty void.
"So this is what the living call 'Love'?"
"So fragile. So small. So powerless. And yet... so utterly overwhelming."
Lust looked up toward the end of the white space, where the last of Barlow's Od
had vanished.
"My Sovereign," she whispered, clutching the doll. "I think... I finally
understand a fraction of the weight you carry."
☆☆☆
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