The God is Dead... and now, it had finally begun to rot...
The old man before them had spoken what seemed like an ordinary sentence in such a casual, natural tone, yet everyone present felt an indescribable sense of strangeness.
Magnan had already placed his hands on the table, loosely clasped together, his eyes fixed on the old man calling himself "Duvall." "Which god are you referring to?"
The old man smiled and answered openly, "Who else could it be? Naturally, the Upper Narrator."
When this suspicious old man uttered the term "Upper Narrator," Yuri and Magnan's pupils visibly contracted. Yet nothing unusual happened as they had expected, as though this were merely an ordinary conversation.
Gawain had finally made out some details from the damaged patterns on the old man's tattered robe. They depicted fragmented earth, with a symbolic hand hovering above it...
"You're a priest of the Upper Narrator, aren't you?" Gawain said evenly. "But why do you say that the God is Dead?"
Duvall did not answer immediately. Instead, he picked up a pastry from the lavish spread on the table and placed it before Nariter. The white-haired girl said nothing, merely accepting the pastry, lowering her head, and eating quietly but incredibly quickly, as if she had been hungry for a very, very long time.
"The god died many years ago. Before the world was destroyed, the god had already begun to die," Duvall said slowly, his words seemingly carrying the weariness of ages. "Once the god realized the truth behind the world, it went mad. And when a god went mad, it died... It took a century to die, then another century to rot. The world afterward became what it is now."
As he spoke, Duvall raised an arm and adjusted his excessively tattered robe.