3 bar menu

Last Embryo Volume 4 Prologue Part 5

Translator: DarkHeartedAlchemist

For example, even if a person loses their life in the outside world, then as long as they are recognized as worthy by the gods of the religion they were a part of, their souls may be granted passage to the afterlife where their souls would know no further strife and would be able to enjoy peace until the end of time, or if they lived a life filled with malice and evil deeds, their souls would end up condemned for eternal torment in the fiery pits of hell or would be dragged to the underworld or be forced to wander around the land of the lead, never to reach their destination. After all, gods are mysterious creatures who have views of the universe that are different from how mortals perceive it, so doing something like that would not be that big of a deal to them.

A belief that as long as one has faith in one’s heart and continues to walk the path of righteousness then they will be able to avoid death and begin anew in the next life. . . that is what is commonly known as the Law of Reincarnation, according to which mortals believe in the Gods of their choosing and entrust themselves to them after death, hoping that the years of their devotion will be rewarded with them being able to start anew in the next cycle of life and death.

When the dead body is returned to the earth instead, it will eventually become the spirits of the blue star through the process of spiritualization. And if those spirits become deified through the concept of ancestral worship, they will eventually become what is universally known as gods who would then be able to influence the world around them in accordance with their own outlook on the universe. As for those who have been worshipping those deified spirits, if their god sees it fit, it may bestow its followers with a part of its own divinity, allowing them to be reincarnated as its agent.

In order to ensure that their existence in Little Garden will continue, it has been established that the gods who reside there need to continue to gather more beliefs and worship through their achievements and beneficial deeds, increasing the level of their divinity. But how exactly are they going to do that? That part is actually rather simple. In order to keep increasing the level of their divinity, these higher forms of existence need to have the people of the Outer World recognize the value of their accomplishments and the paths they walked in life. But with all of that being said, what can be considered to be a true death of a person, spirit, or god, the one so finite and decisive that no amount of divine intervention would ever be able to change that outcome? Well, some people believe that this happens when a person achieved nothing with his or her life and was not recognized for anything by anyone.

Among all the reincarnation cases, the one that I went through was probably the rarest of the rare, because the process of bringing me back to life involved the boundaries of the sun themselves.

My reincarnation. . . has been carried out on the day when the boundary between the stars and the All Hallows Day was at its thinnest. It was a reincarnation method based on the Celtic concept of sun worship, and the one that could be carried out by only two individuals across the entire history of the world: Queen Halloween and Saint Peter, the first Apostle of the Chr* * * * *n¹ God.

In Celtic folklore, October 31^st was the day when the sun’s power over the world was believed to be at its weakest point throughout the entire year, and Celts believed that on that day the boundary between life and death could be torn apart, allowing the souls of the dead to come back from the afterlife and walk the earth once more. This is the very same belief that has been adopted by the Chr* * * * *n religion, eventually getting turned into the All Hallows Day as we know it today. However, in my particular case, this reincarnation method was not the same as your usual rituals to revive the dead.

When it comes to my reincarnation, two different methods have been applied to the process. The first one was to create a new life for me in a completely different timeline. In order for this to work, my appearance and memories needed to be reset, but I was allowed to keep all of the experiences I gathered throughout my life, all so that I could become 『A swordswoman absolutely dedicated to serving the Queen’s purpose』. However, this method, while being the most suited for the Queen who still required my services, had one drawback, or I guess side-effect would be a better word to describe it: the one performing the reincarnation ritual needed to impart a part of their own divinity to the one who was going to be reincarnated. As a result of that, even though in my previous life where I served as Queen’s Knight my hair were as white as the purest snow, after being revived they changed their color to the same shade of gold as that of Queen Halloween, because now a part of her own soul was residing within me. In the civilized sphere, this process has been dubbed as 『Incarnation of the Soul』. It can be said that a similar thing happened when Surya, the Indian Sun God gave all of his divinity to his sons, but that was an exception even among exceptions.

The second method was killing my twin sister from the timeline I was supposed to be born into and taking over the role that she was supposed to play. And the name of that sister. . . was Kudou Asuka. This special type of reincarnation where I was supposed to take her place was only possible to be carried out the way it did because I am her twin sister. Even taking into account the fact that fate is not something that can be easily changed with something as simple as the snap of one’s fingers, tinkering with it is not as difficult as it would seem at first glance as long as you are the spirit of appropriate class. And since I happened to be the right type of spirit, Queen has chosen this type of method because it would not require her to damage her own divinity any more than it was absolutely necessary.

So. . . there you have it. That is the way I have been reincarnated, and the reason why I continued to hone my skills as a swordswoman. . . all of that so that I could fulfill my purpose of killing my twin sister. Three months have passed since I was summoned back to Little Garden, and all this time, that was the only emotion that kept on pushing me forward, and the only reason for which I have endured many difficult trials and finally arrived where I am now, taking the final exam for becoming the Queen’s Knight.

But, the thing is. . . no matter how firm my convictions might be or how well my body may be trained, those things alone would never have been enough to let me master all of the world’s martial arts to perfection. I was only able to get to such a level of mastery with them only because Scathach-sensei was always there for me to offer her wise words of guidance whenever I needed them.

(. . . . . . . . . . . so maybe. . . but just maybe! Maybe I should be a little more grateful to her?)

If it was not for her help, I probably never would have been able to pass this final exam safely, so maybe it would be okay for me to allow myself this one bit of selfish weakness and give her my honest, most sincere words of gratitude, just this one time. . . ?

「But you know what, the longer I am thinking about it, the more I am convinced that this was such a waste. Do not get me wrong, I am happy and proud that you managed to pass the exam, but this was such a wasted opportunity for me! If only you failed miserably, I was going to give you a scolding like no one has ever heard from me in order to utterly crush the remains of your already tattered self-esteem to make it easier for me to make sure that you would listen to my instructions in the future without any of that back-sass of yours. It’s such a shame that it makes me want to cry!」

1. Seriously, the raws have the word Christian partially blotted out in the same manner as we use * for. Why doing this for this specific word and not for any of the other religious terminology baffles us no end.