Chapter 24

So far, Ode was probably the only one who would casually declare his goal of god-slaying in front of Faust, saying it so offhandedly as if it were just a passing mention—a foregone conclusion that didn’t even warrant explaining his thought process or future plans.

Faust paused for an instant, caught off guard by the aura of absolute certainty Ode exuded in that moment, as if accomplishing this outlandish goal was simply inevitable. Before he could respond, however, Ode seized control of the conversation again.

“As for the recruitment incentive you just offered, I don’t need you to buy the ancestral home for me. I can handle that myself. But after I retrieve Grandfather’s body, I hope to ask Eva for a favor.” Ode paused briefly, then continued in a calm tone utterly devoid of self-pity, “I’d like her to examine Grandfather’s remains and confirm that he truly didn’t die from mental pollution.”

“You’re full of contradictions,” Faust said, gazing at Ode as if he were a beautiful paradox made flesh. “Sometimes I think you’re avoiding the truth, yet you’re so ruthless toward yourself. Haven’t you considered what you’ll do if the results aren’t what you hope? Aren’t you afraid of the truth?”

“Afraid? Does that make the truth go away?” Ode countered. “If that’s the case, why keep waiting for the other shoe to drop?”

“Anyway, that’s my only condition for joining up. And you don’t need to worry about me burning the candle at both ends—last night’s rest was plenty.”

“No.” Faust smiled as he rejected him again, his tone just as firm and unyielding as Ode’s, leaving no room for negotiation. “This has nothing to do with rest. You have nothing to worry about there. What I need is for you to head out immediately to the GORCC training grounds.”

“……?” Ode slowly arched an eyebrow in sarcastically polite disbelief. “Do I have the honor of knowing what’s on your mind? That Old Madman could trick someone else into walking into his trap at any moment—you know I’m the most efficient way to deal with him. But you insist I go get some certification first?”

“You must have held a high post on Downing Street at some point. No one marinates in that bureaucratic style for a decade without sounding as authentic as you do.”

Stung by the jab at his inefficiency, Faust humbly placed a hand over his heart and bowed deeply, as if he’d just received a compliment. “You’re too kind, sir. I only spent a short time at MI6—hardly worth mentioning—”

Thud!

Ode roughly pinned Faust against the uneven stone wall, his voice a low hiss. “Who complimented you? You come from an action agency, so why do you have all the stink of a paper-pushing bureaucrat?”

“And you come from the political track, so why do you have all the stink of a field agent?”

Smiling, Faust gently took Ode’s wrist and removed it from his tie. “Rough, quick-tempered… I’ve read the evaluations from your instructors. You’re almost the polar opposite of who you used to be.”

“Have you never noticed how those ‘incomplete memories’ have changed you? Or did you notice, but decide it wasn’t important?”

Faust pushed Ode away and smoothed his rumpled suit. “Go get yourself fixed first, then come back to fight.”

“I promise to keep you posted on any progress with the town or the Old Madman. You don’t need to worry about the ancestral home or the body, either.”

“…” Ode couldn’t deny Faust’s insight into human nature, so he made one last struggle. “I still have an appointment to keep.”

“With that Duke Cavendish?” Faust said without surprise. “Don’t worry about it. Leave it to me.”

Given Yog-Sothoth’s omniscient nature, Ode hadn’t revealed Cavendish’s true identity, so Faust assumed the duke was just some unlucky fool who’d stumbled into the town.

This, in a way, proved how right Faust had been to verify Ode’s story with evidence before believing it outright…

Ode’s mouth twitched—half in exasperation, half in amusement. “How exactly are you going to ‘handle’ it? Planning to sleep with him yourself?”

“……??” Faust, who had just been in full control, went rigid. “Does this bed-hopping have to happen? Can’t it wait? Surely not—”

“Oh, it surely does.” Ode didn’t think Cavendish’s temper would hold if he kept getting brushed off, and besides, he had his own reasons for keeping the appointment.

In that memory of undergoing the memory shaving surgery, someone had explained it to him like this: “After the procedure, as far as Yog-Sothoth is concerned, you’ll be in a space They can’t observe or touch.”

But he’d clearly interacted with Cavendish multiple times before, and Cavendish had even restrained his berserk self at the bottom of the sea… Had something gone wrong with the surgery over time? Or was there some other mechanism he didn’t understand?

Ode mulled these questions over in his mind, then firmly reiterated to Faust, “It can’t wait. I need to see him now. Who knows how long training will take? If I don’t satisfy him and he runs off with someone else midway, what then?”

“…………” Faust’s face turned green. It was clear this man, for all his smooth talk, was the sort who’d die for his bros. Ode couldn’t help recalling how, at that banquet in his dream, Faust had grumbled about instituting a no-office-romance rule for his subordinates. “You lot—shameless! Fine, you get two hours. Two hours should be enough, right? No—make it one. That duke seems like a total recluse, holed up in his estate. Probably no one in Britain even knows he exists. How much trouble can a sheltered noblewoman like that cause? I’ll have Old D drive you there and wait outside for an hour, then take you straight to the training base!”

“…” Ode’s gaze flickered. He suspected Cavendish’s stamina far exceeded Faust’s estimates.

But he wasn’t planning to fuck himself into immobility before training camp anyway—his goal was intel, not exhaustion—so he grabbed Faust’s hand with utmost sincerity. “Then I’m counting on you as my chauffeur, sir. Knock on the door right on the hour and drag me out, okay?”

Faust, who had been smug about breaking up the lovebirds, paused. “……?”

What did that mean? Was the duke that ravenous? Why did it sound like Ode was afraid that if he wasn’t fished out after an hour, he’d be wrung dry in bed?

While Faust stewed in confusion, inside Cavendish Manor.

The study was shrouded in darkness by heavy curtains.

Cavendish sat on a deep blue Chesterfield leather sofa, with a trembling, scrawny figure huddled at his feet, shaking like a leaf.

Hein, standing attendance at his side, asked the same question for the third time. “Why did you have people staking out Dreamcatcher Town?”

Pity filled Hein’s eyes, but it was overshadowed by the fear of shared doom.

He still remembered the Earl’s reactions to his first two queries.

“What stakeout?” The man had responded arrogantly the first time. “Little Cavendish, perhaps your father once held a high position in the Deep Sea Mansion, but he’s dead now. What makes you think you can speak to me like this?”

“I don’t mind telling you—we in the mansion have been watching Dreamcatcher Town. But what does that have to do with you?”

“You’re a sheltered young master. Isn’t it enough to stay home and enjoy the endless wealth old Cavendish left you? Why run off to that town?”

“For your father’s sake, the moment I heard you were spotted outside the town, I sent Hein to pick you up… Shouldn’t you be thanking me? Hm?”

The second time he asked, the once haughty earl had collapsed like a deflated sack, snot and tears smeared across his face. He twitched and curled up, screeching hysterically.

“You… you know everything!! If that’s the case… why ask me at all?!”

“Kill me… kill me! If I die by your hand, the whole mansion will mourn me! My family, my name, will live forever in the shadowed annals of history!!”

This was his third time asking.

The earl on the floor clutched at his pant leg, sobbing. “Plea… please put in a good word for me, Hein! Hein!”

“I know I was wrong… I shouldn’t have acted on my own. I nearly exposed the Deep Sea Mansion. I shouldn’t have meddled in Cavendish family affairs… But I gave you money! I gave you money, Hein! Please save me…”

“I don’t want… It… It won’t kill me. It won’t even let me go mad! It wants to slowly… torment me… and won’t let me escape…”

“My—dear—brother.” A strange voice, laced with buzzing static, suddenly echoed from the dim corner of the room. It startled Hein into a shudder—he was sure he’d locked the doors and windows. There was no fourth person in the study!

A pair of eerie, tri-lobed eyes gleamed in the darkness. The voice continued in exaggerated tones. “I never imagined you’d develop a taste like mine… Mind if I join in?”

A chaotic aura of death mingled with palpable malice drifted up behind Hein, sniffing lightly at the nape of his neck before enveloping him suddenly. “This doddering old human is perfect for my debut—elderly gentleman, heart failure. Ha! No one will question the cause of death… Saves you the hassle, my blood kin.”

“…” Hein trembled desperately in the thick malice, realizing the intruder’s identity: Nyarlathotep, one of the Three Pillar Gods like his master—one whom followers called the Crawling Chaos, the Thousand-Faced God, Herald of the Outer Gods.

But most importantly, it was an evil being that reveled in disorder.

When the mood struck, it could masquerade as human and put on shows for city folk, only to hurl an entire populace to the Outer Gods in a fit of pique when called out for mere science tricks.

It harbored no notions of right or wrong, dignity or image—only the glee of chaos, driving it to act on every whim.

“…z…” Hein tried to cry out to his master for help, but no sound escaped.

Even if he could speak, what then? He knew his master’s temperament—birth and death were as mundane as blooming and withering flowers to it. Why would it quarrel with a peer over a traitor, a mere speck of a human?

Hein closed his eyes in despair. But amid his taut nerves, he heard his master say, “I need him alive. You shouldn’t have come to see me, Nyarlathotep.”

He was released just like that, hurled out of the study by the power of space like a puff of air. As he passed through the wall, he could still hear Nyarlathotep laughing with utter nonchalance. “Is that so? I thought you’d be desperate to see me—or anyone who could help you.”

Nyarlathotep strode past the count, his hooves clacking crisply against the floor. Amid those unhurried clops, the count died in utter silence, his face frozen in a twisted mask of horror.

“A few hours ago, in Dreamcatcher Town. Shub and I both sensed a strange power… That power briefly seized time itself—immensely powerful, and immensely… dangerous. It made us wonder: if that force could seize the authority of time, could it not also seize our power?”

Nyarlathotep padded lightly behind Cavendish, his pitch-black fingers brushing across Cavendish’s shoulder. “Doesn’t that trouble you? Or… is it just another forbidden fruit born of your thirst for knowledge?”

“You know our stance…” Nyarlathotep paused by the edge of the desk, resting his chin on his arms as he sprawled across the surface, gazing at his rare peer with what seemed like affectionate longing. “If it’s just one of your experiments, we wouldn’t care. After all, you wouldn’t kill us. Such a future would be merely one of countless dull, predictable possibilities for you.”

“But if it came from something beyond you and me…”

“It was my experiment.” Cavendish’s sea-blue eyes seemed shrouded in a layer of fathomless, frigid ice. “Does that surprise you? Then tell me, what’s the story with the marriage contract? Don’t pretend you’re innocent. I can sense your power woven into it. How else could a contract from some lowly race take effect on me?”

“…?” Genuine surprise flickered across Nyarlathotep’s face. He straightened up, taking a few seconds to process it, then couldn’t hold back a laugh that split his cheek—even warping space itself. “You? A marriage contract?! Ha! With whom? With what?? Oh, Azathoth above—how could I possibly know what fruits all those seeds I’ve sown might bear? But… you didn’t foresee this happening?”

“That’s what I want to ask you. Why couldn’t I foresee it?” Cavendish’s gaze turned icy as it fixed on the uninvited guest by the desk. “Among all those… ‘fruits’ you’ve scattered, did you tamper with any on purpose, to keep me from sensing it?”

“Of course not… Oh.” Nyarlathotep started confidently but trailed off, a spark of intrigue and regret flashing in his tri-lobed, burning pupils. “Now that you mention it… I do recall one.”

“Good lord, you’ve only got yourself to blame for this. If things had gone as planned, that fruit was meant to be my Lettuce Princess. But you—God knows what you did to turn my Lettuce Princess into yours.”

Silence fell over the study. Nyarlathotep propped himself up with one hand on the desk and leaned in close to Cavendish, whispering, “But it’s not too late to fix it, is it?”

“Listen… I hear a car approaching the manor. Is that my Lettuce Princess? I could take her away, free you from—”

In the blink of an eye, the study grew utterly transparent and bright. Nyarlathotep, still lounging on the desk, and the count’s cooling corpse on the floor vanished together.

When Hein heard the bell from his master’s room and rushed in, he could faintly catch Nyarlathotep’s furious curses. But a few seconds later, even that mosquito-like muttering faded away.

Hein couldn’t help but feel uneasy at Nyarlathotep’s shouts of “You’d better be telling the truth! Madness is my domain, not yours! Don’t court destruction just for that thirst of yours!” But he didn’t dare ask.

Instead, he bowed respectfully. “What are your orders, Your Grace?”

The Duke—who seemed to have been sitting behind that antique old desk for a century, or perhaps countless times longer—rose to his feet and stepped out from behind it into the sunlight.

As the light fell into those dark eyes, igniting a blaze deep within like the ocean floor, Hein suddenly had the illusion that his master was anticipating some approaching future. It would be as blazing as Icarus flying toward the sun—and the destruction that followed would be as inevitable as it was foreseeable.

Hein shivered involuntarily but quickly dismissed the notion. After all, his master was always calm. And in the rare tales of Yog-Sothoth, he had never heard the word “madness” paired with Them.

“Greet him and bring him in,” his master said. “No need for small talk. Take him straight to my bedroom. We don’t have much time.”

Meanwhile, at the manor gates.

Ode stepped out of the car, straightened his collar, and craned his neck to take in the ancient castle—parts of it still under repair. He turned and rapped on the driver’s side window.

“?” The driver rolled it down, only to hear Ode say, “One hour from now, if you knock and I don’t come out within five minutes, don’t knock again. Just leave. I’ll… find you at base when I’m done.”

“??” The driver watched Ode’s retreating back in growing confusion, thinking, You lovebirds better not get too carried away—one hour’s plenty for two or three rounds… This guy’s acting like it’s now or never.

Ode had no idea what lurid nonsense was churning in the driver’s head. He simply slipped a metal handcuff from his pocket—the one he’d swiped off Faust earlier while stripping him in the car—and hooked it somewhere more accessible. Then, with a smile, he faced the old butler. Under Hein’s friendly yet dazed guidance, he passed through the entry hall and corridors into the main study.

Bang…

As the old butler withdrew and shut the door, the two men crashed together in an embrace, slamming hard against the sturdy oak.

Ode tilted his head back with a soft gasp. “We only have an hour…”

The rest of his words were swallowed in Cavendish’s devouring kiss. “That’s fine. If time mattered that much, eternity wouldn’t be as long as people imagine.”

Cavendish gripped Ode’s waist and hoisted him up with one arm, striding to the desk amid their fervent kiss. With a whoosh, he swept all the books and letters aside.

Ode’s back hit the desk, and he surged upward with sudden force. His strong legs clamped around Cavendish’s waist, flipping them sideways. They knocked the high-backed chair askew as they fell, pinning Cavendish beneath him.

“—I never said I’d be on the bottom.”

The struggle shook the floor with thuds. Downstairs, the old butler listened for mere seconds before fleeing to the back garden in a panic.

On the thick rug, all the expensive, pristine fabrics soon lay scattered. Ode panted raggedly, a stray button clamped between his teeth. Cavendish seized one of his hands, yanked it up, and snapped the handcuff onto the arm of the high-backed chair with a sharp click.

“…”

The tussle paused briefly. Both men breathed heavily.

Cavendish knelt half before Ode, his knee pressing between Ode’s legs against the floor. He reached up to stroke Ode’s jaw. “You did that on purpose.”

“Bringing those handcuffs on purpose. Testing me with this little fight.”

He leaned in, forehead to forehead. “Did you get the answer you wanted?”

Of course.

Ode’s lashes drooped lazily as he yanked hard on the gleaming handcuff with a loud jangle.

These metal cuffs were made for restraining prisoners—durability first, comfort nowhere on the list.

Even so, the sharp angles bit cruelly into Ode’s wrist without leaving so much as a red mark.

“You—your deity might be able to grasp me, but there’s still a layer of space between us. No matter what it tries to do, the attack gets blocked outside that space.”

Ode relaxed contentedly against the heavy chair leg, a shameless grin spreading across his face. “How unfair… It can never truly harm me, but I can still tear a chunk out of it.”

Even as he said it, his expression betrayed no real sense of injustice. Cavendish tilted his head slightly and could almost hear the delight in Ode’s heartbeat.

“Enough with the fake sulk and that pout,” Ode said, shirt gaping open as he bent one leg, his knee teasingly rubbing Cavendish’s bare chest. “You know full well… you didn’t come out of this empty-handed.”

Cavendish’s solid frame bore down, engulfing him like the misty glow of that dream. The expensive rug on the floor shifted out of place, its once-fluffy surface left rumpled and sodden, dark patches matted from the damp.

Cavendish’s centuries-old Chesterfield leather sofa soon suffered the same fate. Amid the rocking, Ode thought hazily that he hoped the old butler wouldn’t lose it while cleaning up… or maybe Cavendish would handle the mess himself?

An hour wasn’t long—especially when both parties savored every moment.

At precisely noon, Ode emerged from the manor in an ill-fitting shirt and trousers, a touch awkward. He was about to slide into the Jaguar with a sigh of satisfaction laced with lingering hunger when he froze at the sight of the vehicle waiting at the gate, his mouth falling open.

A matte-gray private jet sat there, its special coating absorbing the light, its sleek and austere lines sharp enough to slice through the wind.

The driver waiting at the boarding stairs—dressed in crisp white air force uniform—clearly enjoyed the wide-eyed newbie look. He stood ramrod straight by the steps and saluted Ode. “Please board, Mr. Douglas. It’s a long flight.”

“…” Ode’s heart pounded wildly. He reached out instinctively to touch the jet’s surface but forced his hand back midway. “Uh, long flight? Where are we going? I thought Faust wanted me at the training base.”

“We’re headed to the training base. It’s in Egypt, in the Sahara Desert.”