I am the fool who cursed the world.
It was the confession of her sin;
With my body drenched in their blood, I stand alone where all are buried.
The consequence of what she did;
With my hands weighed by their deaths, I wield a thousand blades.
And the punishment she deserved.
The curse that began and ended with my desire—I call upon the gate of abyss:
To see the world I once dreamed.
***
It all felt like a dream to him.
From the first day he woke up and opened his eyes, through the years they all fought together, the times they lost their comrades, until the end when he was the only one who remained.
One of the thousand clones—0201—that's who he was.
They were created from the blood and soul of the one who cursed the world, of the sinner who called upon the gate of the abyss, unleashing all manner of monsters that ended the world.
All for a childish dream of seeing what was called a world of fantasy and magic.
They were supposed to protect what was left of humanity, to fight and become stronger, to absorb the bodies of their fallen comrades, and gain the power to recreate the world.
It was a punishment they deserved, an atonement she enforced upon them, for they were of her blood and soul.
They wielded their weapons and fought for her even after her death, and when there was only one of them left—when the thousand had become one again—when he gained the power to recreate the world, he would fulfill her wish.
Or so he believed.
Perhaps because he was a coward whose hands would tremble in fear each time he faced a monster.
If only it hadn't been him who survived,
If only it had been the one who always led them,
If only he could have protected her,
If only he had been the one who died instead of her—then she could have recreated the world to fulfill her wish.
"If it had been you, 0054, Project Arezu would have worked."
In the end, all he could do was continue to fight until the bitter end, when he finally closed his eyes and accepted his death.
The promise to fulfill her wish, I leave it to you, Arezu...
But when he opened his eyes to the memory of her voice, what he saw wasn't the raging battlefield filled with monsters, not the blackened ground where the world was buried, nor the dark sky that would never see the light of the sun again.
A meadow of greenery stretched beyond what his eyes could see, and a blue sky expanded until the horizon.
What he saw was like a childish dream—a world of fantasy and magic.
It was the world his creator had dreamed of, the world he was supposed to create with his power.
Yet it wasn't relief or fulfillment that he felt.
He only felt guilt and regret as he resented himself, for this wasn't his world.