About the time I was picked up and adopted by Tallulah

"Shark——Laurentina…!"

Skadi immediately came to the side of the glass, and the killer whale eagerly approached the glass, staring at the Agor girl in nun's clothes lying on the bed, her body covered with various experimental instruments, her eyes closed, lying on the bed as if she was captured in a dream.

"Is that Miss Ghost Shark?"

Orson also walked to the glass compartment and quietly watched the white-haired girl who appeared in his sight.

This was the first time that Orson saw Ghost Shark, a patient who once only lived in the "Mystery of Rhodes Island", with his own eyes.

Ghost Shark lay motionless on the hospital bed, her long white hair slightly blown away. She was wearing a black silk nun's uniform, her hands crossed in front of her chest, her eyes slightly closed. Only the electrocardiogram displayed on the instrument and the faint rise and fall of her chest could prove that she was alive.

Contrary to the rumors and the testimonies of the operators, the adjectives "bloodthirsty, crazy, extremely violent" could not be associated with this white-haired nun girl at this moment. She just lay there quietly, as silent as a lily.

"Shark...is she sleeping? Has she found the long-lost peace?"

Skadi stared at the ghost shark and asked softly as if talking to herself.

however,

"No... Even now, she hasn't found any peace. Her soul is constantly trembling, as if being artificially stretched and shattered time and time again. This process will be repeated until the other party's melody is completely reduced to meaningless broken notes."

Orson, who possesses the ability of tuning sound, whispered that he could sense the pain hidden under the ghost shark's seemingly calm appearance.

The pain even reached Orson's soul, like a severe pain that was twisting him into a ball, and it was happening to the girl all the time.

"Laurentina...I..."

After hearing about the ghost shark from Orson, Skadi's expression became more solemn. She was angry and helpless, not knowing what she could do to heal the broken soul of the other party.

"Leave it to me, Miss Skadi. Since you have chosen to trust me, please try to believe it to the end, okay?"

"—"

The voice of the Chimera boy made Skadi's anxiety subside. She looked at the boy, and as expected, he showed her a smile that made her feel at ease and peaceful as always.

"…Please help her, Orson."

Skadi nodded to Orson, who had already put on his personal vital signs monitoring equipment.

"If any of your indicators show any abnormality, I will forcibly terminate this operation. Do you understand, Orson?"

Kal'tsit checked that the equipment was functioning properly and said to Orson.

"Well, I won't be too stubborn, so--"

Kal'tsit opened the door of the isolation room, and Orson walked into the room and came to Ghost Shark who was lying on the hospital bed.

"Nice to meet you, Miss Ghost Shark."

Orson reached out and gently placed his hand on the ghost shark's forehead, starting the long-lost "tuning" of the soul.

Picture.jpg

5. The Sacrificed Nun (Part 2)

After a moment of darkness, Orson vaguely regained consciousness.

The first thing I heard was a sound similar to that of a bell.

But if it is called a "bell sound", then the sound is a bit too dull.

"Well……"

Orson stood up from the ground and found that there was a void of dark liquid under his feet. The liquid was boundless and lightly touched his ankles.

Above the dark liquid, Orson saw a building protruding not far away. From the outside, it looked like a monastery.

Orson walked towards the "monastery", and at the same time sighed that the "monastery" in front of him, standing above the sea of nothingness, gave him a completely different feeling from the Landon Monastery located among the wheat fields.

Dark, horrible, dilapidated, and faintly mingled with the stench of decaying flesh.

Although he had anticipated that the ghost shark's soul would not be pure and clean, the scene he actually saw was still far beyond his original expectations.

Rather than being a realm of consciousness and soul, this place is more like a place that once existed in a corner of the world, making people feel instinctively panic.

There is no trace of the ghost shark around, so the other party's soul is probably in this monastery.

"..."

Orson came to the gate of the dilapidated monastery, and some low voices were heard from behind the wooden door.

squeak--

Orson reached out and pushed open the closed monastery door. A humid heat mixed with a fishy smell hit him in the face, followed by an extremely noisy sound of people praying.

"This is……"

Orson was shocked by what he saw. The interior of this monastery, or church, was filled with people bowing their heads in prayer.

Those people were wearing tattered black and gray robes, and they were muttering something from their mouths with all their hearts. Those words were not words that Orson could understand, but more like some kind of uncomfortable chant.

The point is, these people who bowed their heads and "praied" did not belong to any race. In other words, these people did not even look like humans.

If I had to describe it, those people who were praying with their heads bowed at this moment looked more like a group of unruly squids or octopuses.

Those things filled the church pews, and in front of the church, there was a wooden table.

The table was soaked with scarlet liquid, and a dagger, still bleeding, was stuck in one of the corners.

The handle of the dagger emitted a strange color. Orson thought for a long time before finally remembering that it was the color emitted by "Source Stone", a wonderful color like amber.

"What exactly is here..."

Orson was completely at a loss for what to do in this situation. The essence of [Tuning] was to listen to and correct the target's inner noise. However, now that Orson had entered the ghost shark's mind, all he could hear was an increasingly noisy and irritating "whispering prayer." He didn't even know where the ghost shark was.

"Hmm? Are you a lost guy? Why are you here?"

Just when Orson was at a loss, a girl's voice suddenly came from behind Orson.

That voice was completely different from the prayers of these indescribable things, like a sudden breeze blowing into an old room.

Following the voice, Orson turned around and saw the white-haired, red-eyed Agor girl - Ghost Shark - sitting on an empty bench.

Picture.jpg

The other person looked at him with anticipation, and stretched out his right hand to wave at him in greeting.

"Are you Miss Ghost Shark?"

Orson walked to the girl, and the latter's eyes opened slightly after hearing the name.

"Do you know me? Haha, this is really interesting, so interesting, Miss Sister~"

The ghost shark looked at Orson in surprise at first, then burst into laughter.

“Miss Nun? I’m not a nun—Wuwaaaa…!?”

Orson instinctively objected to Ghost Shark's name, and just as he reached out to Ghost Shark, Orson suddenly discovered from the corner of his eye that his clothes had turned into a nun's outfit similar to Ghost Shark's.

Orson quickly looked down, and sure enough, the clothes on his body had been replaced with nun's clothes in the depths of his soul at some point in time.

"Well……!"

Orson quickly pressed his legs together, his cheeks flushing slightly. Meeting someone for the first time was such outrageous women's clothing, and Orson's mind was almost shut down by embarrassment.

Unfortunately, there is no way to change clothes at this moment, and taking them off on the spot is naturally not feasible. Judging from the feeling from my lower body just now, I have become a particularly bad match.

"Haha, what a weird guy."

The ghost shark laughed when it saw Orson's embarrassed and strange behavior.

At this time, Orson noticed the smiling Agor, who looked younger than Skadi, and his height seemed to be about the same height as himself.

"Well, please sit down, strange nun."

Ghost Shark patted the empty bench next to him and motioned Orson to sit down.

"Thank you, and I'm not a nun..."

Orson sat down next to Ghost Shark and grumbled in response.

Many people may have a misunderstanding that although Orsen "often wears women's clothes" and "is good at women's clothes", he himself is still very "resistant to women's clothes".

As a short boy whose goal is to become a towering macho man in the style of Fist of the North Star, he would not feel happy at all if he was praised for "wearing women's clothes that suit him well".

"Do you know where this is, Miss Ghost Shark?"

"Here? I have no idea. But it doesn't matter where it is. After all, I can only stay here and wait for the next [Sacrifice]. Compared to those - you smell very nice, don't you, Sister~?"

"Sacrifice? Anyway, this should be your heart... Ugh?!"

Orson was still analyzing what emotions this picture represented in Ghost Shark's heart when the Ghost Shark next to him suddenly came closer. The Ghost Shark, who was also wearing a nun's uniform, had half of its body pressed against him. Because there was nothing underneath Orson's nun's uniform at this time, he could feel the other's skin particularly clearly.

"Ha, what an interesting reaction."

Contrary to the first impression given by her appearance, Ghost Shark is nothing like the "quiet and peaceful" nun. She raised her head slightly and rubbed Orson's cheek, then showed a mischievous smile.

——By the way, is this the nature of Miss Ghost Shark's 'heart'?!

If she thinks she's a nun, then she's a total lesbian! And she's the type who starts off by hugging and cuddling!

Orson complained loudly in his heart that as of now, there were no normal people among the deep-sea hunters.

"Wait, wait a minute, Miss Ghost Shark... You don't have to stay in this place. In fact, I'm here to take you away--"

Swah——

The moment Orson said the word "leave", the church, which had been filled with low prayer sounds, suddenly became extremely solemn. Those indescribable creatures stopped praying together, and stood up from the benches in unison and looked at Orson.

“Heretics have mixed in”

“The sacrifice is being questioned”

"Clear, eliminate, and remove heresy"

"Drive her out, swallow her in"

"Let the sacrifices go, let the prey go, let the experimental subjects go—"

“Ugh…!! What’s going on—”

The sounds coming out of the mouths of those indescribable creatures rang directly in Orson's mind. The boundless noise and chaos made Orson moan instantly.

"It seems you're not very popular, Miss Sister."

Ghost Shark gently placed his palm on Orson's body, and the sounds disappeared instantly.

"You just said you wanted to take me away? This is the first time I've heard such words. I don't know why, but I feel quite happy."

Ghost Shark smiled at Orson and then stood up from the bench.

"But—that's impossible. I can only exist here, and my meaning has long been fixed."

"Ghost Shark...Miss?"

"I don't know how you got here, but this shows that there are still people who miss Laurentina, right? That's enough."

Ghost Shark took off the nun's hood, revealing all her white hair. She smiled at Orson, and at this moment she had the feeling of a "nun".

"It's time to begin the 'sacrifice'. I am 'Laurentina's' last remaining 'sanity', or 'soul', and the only meaning of my existence here is to be sacrificed again and again until it dissipates."

Ghost Shark left Orson and slowly walked towards the blood-soaked table at the front desk of the church among the countless indescribable crowds.

"Sacrifice...wait, what does that mean!?"

Orson gritted his teeth and stood up from the bench, while those things had gathered around the edge of the table, as if they were gathered to pray.

"What's going on—wait, wait!"

Orson had never encountered such a situation before. When he performed soul tuning in the past, he could only see the soul and consciousness of the person involved.

Although he didn't understand the situation, when Orson saw the ghost shark lying on the bleeding wooden table and one of the "things" walked up to her and pulled out the Originium dagger, Orson realized the seriousness of the problem.

Something is wrong. Normally, in a tuned soul, the person concerned will only construct the scenery that she is familiar with and reflects, and those things themselves cannot affect the other person's soul.

But at this moment... these things seem to have independent consciousness, and not only that... the purpose of these things is to harm the soul of the ghost shark!

"Leave, Sister. I tried to resist, but it was only meaningless torture. Accept the [Sacrifice], so that I can at least get a fleeting moment of 'peace', even if the price is to further damage my already fragile soul. Although I don't know who you are, but - I am happy that you are here."

The ghost shark lying on the table looked at the Originium dagger and said softly.

The next moment, the dagger in the hand of the indescribable thing fell down -

“You must be joking…!”

thump!