High School of Demon Hunting

Chapter 1482: Chapter 226: The Devil Remembers, but Doesn’t Repent

If necessary, Dreamland can exist without night.

The Sun could hang perpetually at the sky’s edge, casting sunlight the color of orange peels, stretching shadows long across the land, the air tinged with a rainbow of emotions and pervaded by the brilliant colors of diamond dust.

A group of ugly, massive figures formed a circle, heads bowed, watching two little girls sitting shoulder to shoulder on the grass, enjoying the Dreamland sunset together.

”I haven’t seen my hands in a long time,” Zhou raised her hands high, admiring the sunlight filtering through her fingers, her face in awe: ”So beautiful!”

”Whose hands were you seeing before then?” No Face asked, puzzled.

”Big sister’s.”

”Nikita?”

”Yes.”

”What’s your relation with her, and why do you call her big sister? Where did your hands go?”

”...You ask too many questions,” Zhou withdrew her hands mid-air, visibly annoyed as she glanced at the little girl named Zhuzhu, hesitated for a few seconds, but still seriously replied: ”Mom told me to call her sister because she could help me survive. But this world is too terrible; both of us couldn’t stay alive, so we ended up surviving together.”

Her words sounded like a riddle, or perhaps, the clumsy prophecy of a Diviner.

Surprisingly, No Face actually understood.

”I once borrowed a snake molt from a snake; it didn’t want to die at the time, and that snake molt tormented me for a long time.” No Face quickly found a topic that resonated with Zhou, complaining and boasting half and half: ”So I obediently acted as its pet according to its obsession, until it died satisfied... Are you now merely an obsession?”

”What’s an obsession?” Zhou was too young to understand this complex term.

No Face was suddenly at a loss.

In its long career of disguises, it hadn’t gone through a systematic magical education, so it was difficult to describe the term as concisely and powerfully as a textbook might.

But it could sketch a vague definition based on its understanding.

”An obsession is something we hold onto tight, like a Ghoul’s affection for corpses, a Vampire’s thirst for blood, or a Demon’s pursuit of Wizards.” It spread its arms, its crystalline red eyes sparkling with a color called longing: ”...The captain said, the stronger the obsession, the further we can travel through history.”

”Sounds like a good thing, but why do you think I am an obsession?”

”Because you’re still alive.”

Upon hearing this, Zhou fell silent for a long while. So long that the Ancient Leather Giants sitting around them out of boredom started snoring, several Shatake birds tired from flying landed among the grass, and the Zus fell asleep and woke up then went to sleep again.

”Maybe,” the Little Witch finally spoke again, her voice tinged with melancholy but without much resentment: ”Actually, I don’t know if I’m alive or dead now. I remember, I’ve died... it was quite uncomfortable when I died.”

”Uncomfortable in what way?” No Face asked, curiously.

Once again, the Little Witch fell into a prolonged silence.

With the experience from before, No Face quickly shifted its attention, capturing a well-proportioned Zu as its model, then picking the slender grass and pale yellow small flowers nearby to weave a beautiful long green dress, which it let the Zu model try on.

It wasn’t until the long dress was finished weaving that it realized it was chatting with Zhou and quickly turned around to look.

But it saw Nikita’s tall figure sitting in Zhou’s original spot, hugging her knees, gazing indifferently into the distance. No Face was frightened by the suddenly appearing figure.

”You... you’re awake?” It hastily gathered up the grass-green long dress and with a kick, propelled the model back into the Zu Ge troop.

Nikita glanced at it lightly.

”Zhou was eaten by me,” she described a horrifying fact in a calm voice: ”When she was still alive, I ate her piece by piece. So, she was very uncomfortable when she died.”

Although No Face claimed to be a Demon, it had never done anything so horrifying.

On the contrary, having stayed in the world of wizards for a long time, its values were largely influenced by Traditional Wizards. Therefore, after hearing the Female Demon’s description, it instinctively shivered.

”Then now she...” Thinking of that slightly smaller figure, No Face couldn’t help but timidly ask.

Nikita stood up, looking around.

The Ancient Leather Giants woke up from their slumbers with a start, wiping saliva, their throats issuing deep roars; the Shatake bird flock took off again, converging into a deep dark cloud in the sky; Ghouls ran towards the distance, acting as Scouts; the Zu Ge tribe also lined up neatly once more, carrying that lightweight palanquin.

”This is the Dreamland,” Nikita sighed softly, ”The dream and reality, illusion and clarity, existence and nonexistence, all converge here. You said something right, she is an obsession.”

”But she is my obsession.”

”I stole fragments from the Bible to cloak my naked misdeeds in old, bizarre outerwear, masquerading as a Saint, but in reality, still playing a Devil.”①

”Devils may reminisce, but they do not repent.”

...

...

”The Dreamland is the place closest to the Conscious Sea of every individual across countless dimensions. Thus here, one can see the deepest marks of everyone’s heart.”

Xiao Xiao sat in the main seat of the Pumpkin Car, engaging in conversation with the two Young Wizards on the co-driver’s seat: ”For instance, your tails and ears, the fat man’s blue skin, etc., these are all manifestations of internal projections in the Dreamland... It is said that some entities with dual souls, when they fall into Dreamland, transform into a pair of twins, and this is the logic behind it.”

Jiang Yu listened with great interest.

Zheng Qing, however, felt a bit bored.

Although it was his first time riding in a Pumpkin Car, he didn’t have many special feelings. He felt that the Pumpkin Car was not much different from riding in other cars, carriages, or even planes and ships.

The sound of wheels buzzing was in his ears, and the view outside the windows sped past on both sides. An orange Little Orange Lamp hung by the window, swaying left and right with the swing of the carriage. Through the sweet-smelling walls of the Pumpkin Car, one could clearly hear the Flower Cat driver cracking his whip and cursing at the Zu Ges.

”This truly is a cat-loving city,” inside the Pumpkin Carriage, Zheng Qing, while looking at the rapidly passing street signs through the window, said to Jiang Yu, ”So far, every street I’ve seen and heard is named after a type of cat breed.”

Xiao Xiao also left his convoluted theories to return to reality.

”This has to do with President Wusa,” he once again found a point to show off his knowledge: ”It’s said that he once made a famous remark in the council, ’In this world, only time, beauties, and cats must not be let down,’ which led to the council unanimously passing the new street names.”