Simulate the universe, starting with speedrunning Greek.

however--

96

Chapter Ninety-Six: Only after countless prayers will God descend upon my wretched state.

Bakana—!

Accardo? He said his name was Accardo.

Dracula, Dracula, Dracula—!

His life's glory was also his life's pain, and the man who abandoned that precious name actually called himself...

Ah... Kado?

In an instant, the Grand Duke's mind went blank, and his face turned deathly pale! His expression was filled with disbelief!

How ironic!

What Vlad III always wanted to do was to reverse the world's slander against him and wash away the stigma of being the progenitor of vampires that Dracula carried, rather than actually abandoning the glory of Dracula.

But—Alucard the vampire!

At this moment, this vast Hellish Song, this river of the dead, seems to be the greatest mockery of Vlad III's steadfast principles.

Look, in the other world, you not only failed to protect these things, but you also utterly trampled them. You considered them the greatest stain on your life, and even after death, you longed to cleanse yourself of that stigma. Yet, in the other world—he… “accepted it willingly”?!

Actually, saying that he was happy to accept it as a perilous situation is not quite right.

Although Alucard chose to submit to the primordial blood out of a desire for survival, he had long been tired of living. If given another chance, he might prefer to follow the same path as Vlad III.

Not to mention, this moving miracle allowed Accardo to completely reconcile with his deepest obsessions, and he was reborn with a desire—a desire to return to the embrace of God!

Just like a baby longing for its father's embrace!

However, these emotions cannot be directly expressed or clearly explained in words, so let's fight—everything will become clear in battle! Alucard firmly believed that in battle, the beliefs between people could be transmitted to each other.

This is a very common thing in the world of Hellsong.

And so—when their eyes met again.

This time, they both understood where that "strange yet familiar" look in their eyes came from.

Even if they ultimately chose different paths, their lives and their pasts were the same... They all had the most similar life experiences and emotions.

They were all 'Dracula'! Counts, Grand Dukes, monarchs of Romania! But—once.

And so they gazed at each other intently, so deeply and dreamily—as if time and space had been distorted—and in the next instant—the scene before them seemed to change, leaving them both stunned.

Memories—like scenes from the past, long-buried images from the deepest recesses of our being, suddenly and quietly surface.

Then—they heard a voice that was both strange and familiar.

For Vlad, that wasn't his voice; for Accard, it was a voice he had long forgotten.

"Fight! Everyone, fight for God! ... God will not help those who beg for help."

As the sun sets, the count, clad in armor and leading his cavalry in a galloping charge, shouts in a low voice.

“I will not help those who beg for mercy. Because that is not prayer... it is merely begging from God.” Then, his voice gradually turned deep and steady, as if he were about to fall into an endless abyss.

"Just die, for battle is prayer. Only after countless prayers will God descend, only then will Jesusalem [the Kingdom of God] descend."

The Count, leading his vast army, began his conquests, even repelling the notoriously fierce invaders of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the dominant power in Europe at the time—the Sultan's personal guard. However—as Accardo now knows—before night fell—the gods had never descended, for before that, there were no gods in this world.

God would not descend! No matter how hard he tried, it was destined to be a tragedy.

"Shattered, destroyed, annihilated, vanished..."

"Only after countless prayers will God descend upon me, the pitiful one, and upon us, the pitiful one." Standing on the blood-stained plains, the count's voice was full of magnetism and conviction. Standing in the piercing rainforest, his face was weathered, melancholic, and handsome.

Amidst mountains of corpses and seas of blood, in the crimson hue, only that lonely, solitary figure could be seen.

Just like the pathetic self he described, the entire world in the picture seemed to be shrouded in a sorrowful gloom.

"Only in this way will God descend..."

Accardo: "God will descend, descend from heaven, and then what?"

At this point, the illusory scene, which seemed like a hallucination, disappeared.

The final sound was like Accardo and the Count murmuring simultaneously, as if the space itself overlapped.

Ah, I remember now.

That day, the afterglow of the setting sun was so beautiful.

On the day of his execution, did his 'god' descend upon him?

At that moment, on the day he lost everything, all his beliefs vanished into thin air. Like a sycophant, he humbly licked his boots until he was left with nothing. Faith, in the end, amounted to nothing. And then...

------

"What is it? Answer me, Your Majesty. Mad King..." The questioning voice, seemingly emanating from the Earl's past, echoed simultaneously in the mental worlds of Acado and Vlad.

Because they share the same origin, perhaps they can witness the same scene. Besides them—only in the golden demon city of Night, where the will has already permeated the entire universe, can that scene be seen as well. Within the golden demon city—other heroic spirits can only glimpse that spiritual world through the radiant power of the gods.

That magnetic middle-aged man's voice was so calm, as if he wasn't questioning himself, but speaking to someone else, yet it possessed a chilling magic!

For a moment, Vlad III even had the illusion that the other party was questioning him.

He had the same experience as the other person, so he was most able to empathize with their feelings at that moment.

In an instant, the anger he had felt for Alucard's tarnishing of their shared 'honor' quietly dissipated. He trembled, opened his mouth slightly but remained speechless.

He is different from Accardo after all.

Although the Pigeon God of the Moon World is a pigeon and rarely descends to the mortal realm, the Heroic Spirits all know that he truly exists.

Vlad had never faced a life-or-death choice before. If given the chance to live, would he choose glory or life?

Vlad, even in death, could certainly say with certainty that he would choose honor.

But what about him when he was alive?

Can his current thoughts truly represent his thoughts when he was alive?

It's just a hypothesis, a presupposition; anyone can talk big.

Just by looking at that desolate spiritual world, one could almost feel the immense loneliness and emptiness, and sense Arcado's already exhausted and broken heart. Vlad III suddenly realized that this man had already been punished for his choices and had paid a huge price.

Even his ego had been completely worn away. If it weren't for this miraculous night that awakened the soul sleeping in the deepest part of his being, he would have been completely 'dead' by now.

97

Chapter 97 A Clash of Beliefs? Shirou, Archer: I know this one well!

Accardo stood there, his expression calm and sorrowful, as if he had become a walking corpse.

He saw it—the weathered, unshaven 'Earl,' who seemed to have been dressed in plain prison clothes in an instant, walking barefoot on the crimson wasteland, being pushed step by step toward the execution platform.

He heard those questions again.

"Everyone's dead, everyone's dead! For you, for your faith!" Thump!! The Count's legs suddenly gave way, and he collapsed to the ground, uttering a pitiful yet agitated murmur. The Count's calm yet deeply hidden questioning voice echoed in the ears of both "Draculas."

延!

At this moment, the terrifying River of Death seemed to vanish, leaving only the calmly flowing, sorrowful Styx stream, so captivating that one couldn't help but forget everything else, a despairing spirit that only wanted to sink into its depths infecting the soul.

The Heroic Spirits—even those whose lives were full of wonder and who had their own regrets—were witnessing the obsessions of other Heroic Spirits and so clearly feeling the essence of a hero for the first time.

Within the Golden Castle, even the saints and saintesses couldn't help but feel pity. Even Joan of Arc herself, whose fate was even more tragic than Vlad's—burnt to death—couldn't help but pray for Vlad. "May you find true rest in the embrace of the Lord..."

Because—unlike Joan of Arc, who harbored no resentment and maintained a pure heart until death, although Joan of Arc never considered herself a qualified saint, but just an ordinary country girl, her heart, in all the worlds of biblical systems, was absolutely among the purest and strongest.

Joan of Arc did not view death or her tragic fate as suffering.

But she sensed the deep pain within Vlad III of this world.

It was a sorrow that overflowed from his words, a pain that even the most indifferent tone could not conceal.

Perhaps it was this mental breakdown that turned Vlad III of this world into that monstrous form.

That's why—even though the shadow of that past 'Earl' was madly questioning God, the true saints and saintesses, with their broader compassion and tolerance, were not too angry about it; they just felt that the scene before them was too tragic!

They wouldn't blame Dracula for this, nor would they question the gods like he did; they would only blame themselves—they hadn't lived in the same era as Vlad III, otherwise they would never have stood by and watched such a devout grand duke receive such unfair treatment.

Even if it means abandoning the name of saints, they would not hesitate to choose to save this lamb that has fallen into confusion.

however--

There are no heroic spirits in this world, gods will not descend, and saints and saintesses who lived in other eras are even less likely to descend.

"For your paradise, for your God."

"Everyone died because of your prayers." The figure, lying helplessly on the ground with wooden shackles on his hands and head... the 'Count' weakly opened his eyes.

His calm, terrifying eyes stared intently into the distance, fixed on it.

Under the sky dyed red like blood by the setting sun, on this land where he once fought and protected with his blood and sweat.

"You killed the enemy, you killed your comrades. The subjects you were supposed to protect, the country you were supposed to govern! Men and women alike, the old and the young. Even you yourself—"

Even so, if you still don't want to give up...

With a whoosh, Vlad III saw the man whose hysteria had vanished from his mind, whose despair, as if filled with exhaustion and pleas, had disappeared, finally calmed down by the will to survive and faced hell with equanimity.

The 'Earl' gazed at the pool of primordial blood, causing the guillotine of sin to bow its head.

He finally bowed his head, his pride—his self-respect as a human being—shattered into pieces.

Is he a human? Or a dog?

From then on, they even tamed themselves, and didn't care if they were treated like wild beasts.

That face and those eyes gradually merged with Akkado, who was now standing atop the towering mountain of corpses.

The Grand Duke trembled as he saw the figure who looked at him with incredibly sorrowful, weak eyes, like a wounded little animal.

The night air was so still.

What should have been a figure that inspired fear and disgust, like a demon king, appeared to Vlad III as if his chest had been ripped open, revealing the most hidden, vulnerable side of his heart that he did not want the world to see.

Is that the Demon King? Perhaps—but only to outsiders.