Welcome back to Prideful plague. Prepare for suffering. Well…for Fomalhaut to suffer. I hope you guys enjoy


"I remember knowing with certainty that I had nowhere to go. Where was I supposed to run?" He looked at his si-at Theresia Van Astrea. She was shouting orders to soldiers in the distance as they took aim and fired arrows upon the monster. Slowly he stood up.

"I remember admiring her courage." There was blood everywhere. People dead on the ground, people still alive but dying. Mutilated corpses. Screams, shrieks and battle cries. Above all of it, the roaring howls of the whale.

"And so I…" His face set in a grim expression. His fingers clenched around the 9mm in his hand. He took a step forward.

"…Followed her."


Arc 1: The Promise that I made

"I don't remember very well what happened back then." He walked down the hill, his nose filled with the scent of horrifying death around him.

"My memories…they're like fragments. There is nothing coherent, no sequence or pattern." Twice he stumbled over dead corpses, once the wind from the whale's monstrous tail smashed him to the ground.

"I kept getting knocked down. Every time I fell I would scrape myself, and start bleeding. My blood would drop onto an unfamiliar earth." In the distance he could still see her ever so familiar form. Older, hair a slightly different shade, voice more mature and stern, but still so painfully similar.

"I know I wanted to reach her. I remember that I needed to ask her something. To tell her something important." He kept moving forward, clutching the pistol in one hand, the other on the strap of his backpack. He didn't even know why he was clutching these things. Was it because they were all he had? Because they were the only thing familiar to him?

"I don't remember what it was that I wanted to say…though it must have been important, as I kept trying to get to her. I remember that my body felt sick. I remember that my brain felt like it was on fire. I remember that I was afraid, so so afraid. Maybe I was hoping that she would dispel that fear…" The whale kept howling above him, the woman with the red hair, Theresia, had pulled out a brilliant white sword and it shone with incredible light. It hurt to look at, but he didn't turn away. He continued trudging forward.

"There wasn't much else there. I can't recall any details. I think I may have called out to her once, though I don't remember if she heard me, or responded. I don't think she did." Eventually he found someone that hadn't died yet, but was merely injured.

"I believe I tripped over him. That was how I found him I think. I…I remember that he begged for me to help him. He told me his name, but I can't recall it. I must've forgotten." They locked eyes. Fomalhaut and the dying man. The one on the ground reached out with a bloody hand and left a red trail across the young man's shirt.

"I had wanted to keep moving, to reach Theresia. That I remember clearly. I wanted to leave him, to turn away, but…" The man's blood slicked hand grasped the hem of his clothes. He held on like a drowning man clutching onto a piece of straw.

"At that moment I remembered something else. I remembered the face of one of my…one of my friends. His name was…it was…Urgh, I can't remember. It started with J. Jones? Joseph? Jonathan…yes, yes that's right, it was Jonathan! I remember that he and I used to talk. We had the same class in college." His bag dropped to the ground, he fell on his knees, and reached inside. With trembling hands he pulled out a small first-aid pack. He took out a needle.

"We…we had wanted to be doctors. That's…that's right, we had wanted to cure people. To save them." He started to stitch the wound. A massive gash, like from a giant tooth. He stitched the flesh of a dying man beneath the howls of a white whale.

"I…I remember regretting that I helped him. If I didn't, maybe I would have reached her in time." When he stood and looked up, the battle was drawing to a close. The great monster was howling in pain. It was dotted in wounds that did not clot, that streamed blood even as the pinpricks from regular arrows healed the moment they appeared. Theresia was advancing, her shining blade a beacon of hope.

"Maybe I could have saved her…" The whale was retreating. Waterfalls of crimson cascaded down from its hide, the fields were red and slick.

"…saved her from the Tumor." And then it wasn't.

Because his eyes had deceived him.


Re:Zero: The Prideful Plague

Chapter 2: My Heart Weeps


"How truly wonderful." A girl smiled, observing the screams of dying men.

She was the embodiment of what it meant to be perfect. So beautiful that it was unnatural. Looking upon her, he couldn't help but tremble. Tremble from how terrifying her beauty was, as if the gods themselves blessed her with it.

Her voice, clear and placid like a mountain lake rang out across the battlefield. Though she spoke softly, almost gently, her voice was heard by everyone, and pulled all attention magnetically toward her.

For she was vain, and she demanded that it be so.

The man he was helping was suddenly completely forgotten. Fomalhaut felt his gaze gravitate in her direction. Terror pierced through him as he glimpsed the crystal blue depths of her eyes.

She was barefoot, and wore nothing but a simplistic white sheet that covered her like a toga. Her body appeared delicate and frail, almost ethereal, like a porcelain doll, something that might shatter from a mere touch. Yet it felt that even the mere act of touching her would be considered the greatest of taboos. Her hair, like a platinum waterfall falling to knees, waved gently in the breeze.

"Truly, such struggle, such drive to reach your desired goal. It's magnificent." She breathed, clapping her hands lightly. The sound rang out like thunder.

Fomalhaut stared uncomprehendingly. What was this being? Why had she appeared here, did she come to help the army against the whale? If that was the case, then why was it…why was it…

-that he felt bile rise in his throat when he looked upon her?

A flash of movement caught his attention. He saw Theresia turn toward the newcomer, and her expression changed to fear mixed with anger. She leveled her sword towards the girl.

"Why have you come here, monster?" She gripped the blade tightly, and Fomalhaut realized with dread that her hands were trembling.

"Ah, what passion there is in your voice," sighed the girl with platinum hair, "such raw emotion, it is such a glorious sight to behold. Your battle was truly inspiring, to fight against such overwhelming power, but I must ask you to cease and let me have the witch beast."

Theresia gasped, and her eyes darted up to the sky, Fomalhaut followed her gaze. The whale was still circling above, letting out eerie moans.

Yet something was wrong. Where are it's wounds?

"You…what have you done!?" screamed the red haired knight, leveling her sword towards the girl's chest.

"Oh my, it appears I have agitated you, perhaps I have been a bit rude?" The platinum haired girl's lilting voice carried across the field. The whale seemed quiet, as if the horrific monster was letting the other one speak. "I must be getting forgetful to do something like this. You seem to be struggling, so let me take the witch beast, and relieve you of your struggle."

Theresia squared her shoulders, took a deep breath, and narrowed her eyes. The blade in her hands shone once more, as she angled herself to ready a strike towards her…opponent?

Fomalhaut felt dread. Somehow, deep within his subconsciousness, he knew that if Theresia attacked this...this thing in the guise of a girl, it would cause nothing but misery.

He stumbled forward on unsteady legs. "S-stop," he whispered hoarsely, trying and failing to suppress the trembling.

Both women turned towards him, one with eyes blue as the sky, another with eyes blue as cold crystal, one frowned in worry, the other smiled placidly.

"Stop, y-you can't…" can't what? He didn't know what to say, he didn't know what to do. He just knew that if he didn't do something now then Theresia would…

She would…

"P-please", he stuttered out "please run, I-" he didn't finish his sentence. The words refused to come out of his mouth

Because he no longer had a mouth. He never had a mouth in the first place.

His arms shot up to his face, where his lips were before, but there was nothing but smooth skin. Wildly his hands scratched at it, and he recoiled in horror, stumbling back.

He couldn't move. His legs were locked in place, glued to the ground. He couldn't move at all, couldn't do anything. His struggles, his panic, his terror.

All was in vain.

Theresia's eyes widened in utter horror, she whipped her gaze back to the other woman, before yelling something out. Fomalhaut didn't hear what it was, his utter fear drowning out his senses.

"I must ask you to forgive me," the monster in human skin whispered silkily, continuing to smile, "but I would also ask you to please be quiet for a little while until my conversation is over."

She turned back to Theresia, "the noisy young man won't distract us anymore. Now we can talk properly." Her smile widened slightly. "Now, won't you please let me take the White Whale?"

Theresia looked at Fomalhaut, she looked at him with his sister's eyes. He looked back at her, trying to tell her to run. Begging her.

Theresia turned back towards the woman clad in a white sheet. "You ask me to hand over the whale to you?" Her voice was soft, yet it trembled with barely suppressed emotion.

"You would ask me to ignore all the sacrifices my comrades made, all the countless deaths that creature has caused?" Her voice grew a little louder, anger suffusing it, she grit her teeth upon seeing the girl's unchanging smile.

"You would ask me to turn back on all the suffering that the witch beast has brought upon the world? On all the pain that we have endured in this battle? To just give it to you, and let it remain unpunished?! Answer me P*****a!"

"Oh…I understand, you feel responsible for all the pain you were unable to prevent. What a truly noble soul you have. However, if you feel that way, then allow me to rid you of those responsibilities. There was never an army here. You were fighting against the whale alone."

Slowly, Fomalhaut turned around. The fields were empty, the whale floated above an empty grassland, it's hide pristine, not a shadow of the arrows dotting it remained. The blood that covered the fields was gone as well, for there was no one who was bleeding.

There was no one there at all. There had never been anyone there at all.

There was a shattering sound. Dimly, the young man from another world realized that shattering had come from his mind.

"Ah, I have inconvenienced you," came a sweet voice from the lips of the thing with platinum hair and blue eyes. "Now that my request is over, I shall return you to who you were. Speak your mind, you are free to do as you please."

There was a tingling, and he felt his mouth appear on his face. He didn't say anything. Horror and a primal non-understanding had struck him with the force of a thousand sledgehammers.

Yet he could still see, and thus he saw how different Theresia's reaction was. There was fear in her eyes, but there was…anger there as well. There was that indomitable feeling of standing up to something greater. Defiance.

He held his tongue. He simply looked on, and hated himself for doing so.

"You…took all of them away…" murmured Theresia to herself, her voice was agonizingly similar to how his sister sounded when she would lose something important to her. "All of them, they're all gone. All the sacrifices they've made, you just took all of it. For their sake…"

Suddenly she charged the woman in white with a cry of rage. "For their sake, and for the sake of all those that suffered at the hands of your cult, I'll stop you here and now!" She angled her blade.

My name is Theresia Van Astrea, the Sword Saint! In the name of all the people of this world, all those that I love and protect, I'll strike you down!" Her sword, he just now noticed that it had the motif of a dragon on it, shined once more, brighter than it ever did before.

Yet even it seemed to pale next to the incomparably horrific beauty of the monster in front of her. She simply spread her arms welcomingly and smiled.

"How glorious. Your desire shines with such purity, despite being weighed down with such a burden." She took a step forward as if to greet the red haired woman seeking to impale her.

"I see that you cannot let me have what I wish for as long as you are burdened by your title. You languish under its weight, carrying it with the brilliance of your soul. I shall set you free. Theresia Van Astrea no longer has the divine protection of the Sword Saint. It has been passed down to her successor, as it should have been."

Fomalhaut watched. He watched as Theresia's eyes suddenly lost focus, and she stumbled. It was only for a moment and passed so quickly that it almost seemed like it never happened. Then she was on the attack again, but there was something different now. The shine in her blade appeared duller now, almost like it was weakened.

"Now you have no more reason to burden yourself with saving others. You are no longer the sword Saint, therefore you have no reason to fight on or refuse to listen to my request. You can put down your blade and leave, and I shall leave too, as soon as what I want is in my possession."

Theresia simply shook her head determinedly. "You truly understand nothing do you. A person like you cannot possibly comprehend humanity. Even if all my titles are taken away, even if all of my meager power is stripped from me, even if my own body betrays me, I will never stop protecting those who need it! You, who merely toys with humans, have no right to ask us for anything! Do you hear me, Witch of Vainglory?!"

"I see. Your convictions are noble, and blindingly beautiful," spoke the witch, "however, I must insist on having what I ask for, and if you will not listen to my request, then I shall have to remove you from the way."

Her voice was soft, almost loving. "Theresia Van Astrea isn't attacking me. She was killed by the White Whale."

Finally, Fomalhaut found it in him to scream.

Theresia suddenly let out a choking gurgle as the jaws of the massive beast closed around her. Her blade clattered to the ground, sinking into the grass. There was a crunching noise, teeth crushing into bone.

The whale carried her into the air before releasing her, and her body fell limply to the ground. She landed with a sickening splat.

Fomalhaut watched her path. There was a horrible ringing in his ears, a shattering sound echoed through his mind, somewhere on the edges of the world he heard someone, himself, release a sound full of agony.


It was night. The road was illuminated by the streetlights. It was a bright day, the sun was shining onto the grassland.

No…

His sister had smiled at him as they crossed the empty street, her blue eyes shining with mirth from some joke she told him. Theresia had looked at him with concern, her blue eyes shining with worry for those she wished to protect.

No…please…

The screeching of the tires had appeared out of the darkness, two headlights shining from the darkness like yellow eyes. The whale had appeared from the blue sky, its yellow eyes shining with malice and hatred.

W-why…

An impact, screaming…A crunching of teeth…a spray of blood…

W-where…did you go…

A coffin lowered into the dirt, cold rain pouring on his shoulders, the wails of the Andersons muffled in his ears. Her body falling through the air, a rain of crimson soaking the ground, the howls of the witch beast deafening him.

Where did you go…where did you go…

Shattering mind. Shattering mind. Helplessness. Helplessness. That was the moment…where his fate was sealed.

"Why did you leave…" a lost and broken child asks the silent gravestone. The name Theresia Anderson is engraved upon it.

"Come…back…" a pitiful being pleads on his knees in front of a red haired woman.

"PLEASE DON'T ABANDON ME!" a desperate animalistic howl.


"My, it appears you've lost someone dear to you," a soft voice spoke. The being leaned in and whispered in his ear, her spindly cold fingers gently caressing his head. "To care so much about someone you've met so recently, you must be truly heartbroken.

Heartbroken…

He stilled. Though he didn't see it, his eyes had turned dead, whatever spark of life might've been seen in those dark orbs had vanished. There was only blackness now.

But deep in that blackness…a different sort of light ignited. A burning spark, full of hatred.

He stood up and turned towards the woman.

Inhumanly beautiful, a delicate figure, crystal blue eyes, an angelic voice, long silky hair.

A truly hideous being.

It was a plague.

His hand rose, the 9mm slowly being raised upwards until the barrel pointed at her head. His hands trembled.

She's human! She's a monster! You can't kill people! She's not human! It's wrong! She killed her! She…killed her. She killed her, she killed her, she killed her!

The witch smiled radiantly.

Fomalhaut Anderson, a young man who had wanted to be a doctor, and save the lives of people, pulled the trigger and watched as the inhumanly beautiful girl fell over, a smoking hole in her skull.

He collapsed onto the ground, heaving. He retched, and for some odd reason, his mind calmly remembered the four humors from hippocratic medicine.

Tears streamed down his face, ugly wretched sobs bubbling up. He wailed in misery, shock, terror, hatred, and helplessness. All of it, a giant wrecking ball of emotions tearing through him on the inside. He never felt so vulnerable.

The witch smiled radiantly.

"What a truly fascinating boy you are. To react so suddenly, I seem to have caused you great stress." She was pristine. Perfect, as she always has been and always would be. She had never been hurt. Nobody had shot her, nobody had touched her.

Your feelings are truly beautiful. Such Glory. Though I am afraid that your eyes have deceived you. For I was never here, The White whale has killed Theresia Van Astrea, and you are now far from this place.

Whatever fragile remnants of him remained, desperately clinging on to the person he was before were ground into dust.

All his struggle was in vain.

And yet that spark within him, that tiny spot full of hatred. He held on to it, the only thing he had left. He made a promise in that moment, an oath that he swore he would fulfill.

He thought of the girl with platinum hair.

"Just wait right there.

She was the only thought that remained within the wastes of his mindscape.

"I promise I'm going to-"

-kill you.


Echidna observed the young man stumbling into her tomb. He wore strange clothes and held an unknown item in his hand. It piqued her curiosity, but it wasn't the material things about him that interested her. It was the fact that he appeared out of thin air, and had an overpowering miasma on his person. Her curiosity grew.

She observed him carefully, like she always observed everything. His hollow eyes. Why were they hollow, she wondered? His backpack he carried on his shoulders. What was inside of there, she obsessed? The unsteady away of his feet. What sights did he witness to make him so broken? She wanted to know, she needed to know.

She watched as he walked inside of the tomb, unseeing. She smiled, deciding to greet him. She was the hostess in this situation, and it would be quite rude not to introduce herself.

She wanted to ask him so many things, she wanted to know all that he was.

She was greedy after all.

Opening her domain, she watched as he materialized on the infinite grassland that she and the other witches shared with each other. She sat herself under her parasol and watched him. Ever curious on what he would do.

He looked around with an empty gaze. He seemed to not even comprehend where he was, to the point that he didn't even see the difference between the walls of the tomb and the Castle of Dreams. A person that was so shattered from within, so completely devastated that their senses had abandoned them, she could not wait to learn his story.

Perhaps it would do well to reach out to him, it didn't seem like he was in any state to start a conversation.

"I don't think I've ever seen a young man so brazenly stroll into my home in this manner," she spoke to him, letting him know of her presence. She couldn't wait to see how he would respond.

He looked up at her. He had an analytic expression on his face, a sort of calm abstraction. There was a strange detachedness in his eyes, like the mind operating the meat puppet had simply left the control on a crude autopilot that was breaking down the longer it operated.

She felt her grin widen, she didn't know the word "autopilot" before meeting this person. She wondered where he came from, and if he would share that information with her. She wondered what he would ask of her in return. She wondered how much she could learn from him. Her curiosity burned within her like an inferno.

"Hello," said the other man quietly and calmly. He seemed completely unaffected by her miasma, or was it that he had experienced something so traumatic that he simply didn't register it? Another question she simply had to find an answer to.

"I seem to find myself lost," he said. "Do you know where we are?" Echidna realized that his voice wasn't calm. It was dead. Like his eyes. He didn't so much speak as mechanically form word-like sounds without any thought. How truly fascinating.

"A conversation like this shouldn't be held on unequal ground. You are standing and I am sitting down, why don't you join me?" She gestured at her table adorned with an elegant tea set.

He moved his head to look at it. His eyes continued to stare in one direction and he didn't seem to comprehend the concept of moving them. He walked over slowly to where she sat, methodically putting one foot in front of the other. In his hand he continued clutching the strange device he held on to. Now that he was a little closer it was apparent that his body was trembling ever so slightly.

He sat down and stared at her. Or rather, an animated corpse stared at her.

"My," she said, "your body appears alive, yet you stare at me with such dead eyes."

He didn't twitch at the sound of her voice, he didn't react at all. In the same hollow monotone he responded. "Your body appears so dead, yet you stare at me with living eyes."

A human would expect a slightly amused reaction after giving a response like that. Therefore she did that thing that humans did when they threw jibes at each other, giggling. Bringing a hand to her mouth she laughed lightly.

It seemed to agitate him, as his hand clenched tighter. That was quite an interesting reaction. She wanted to know why he reacted this way. Now, how to get him to begin a conversation?

"Aren't you going to introduce yourself, you did come to my castle, did you not?" She took a sip from the cup, letting the burning liquid inside slide down her throat.

"…aren't you going to introduce yourself, you did bring me to your castle, did you not?"

She had to admit, she didn't expect that one. This time she found it much easier to create the giggling noise. Perhaps even natural. That was interesting too. Everything was. She had to know more.

"My, not only do you not answer my question, but you reverse it back on to me? I don't quite know how to react to this situation. I am just a tender young maiden you know."

He simply stared at her. "You are not a young maiden. You are a witch." It was said in the same dead voice as before. There was no accusation there, just a simple statement.

"Oh, and how have you come to that conclusion? That's quite the accusation to level at a girl you know?" She truly was curious at how he deduced that so quickly. Perhaps he had come to take the trials? But he didn't come from the village, and he didn't look like a person who would know anything like that, so what was the mystery behind his logic? Oh how she wanted to know, her greed scorched her from within.

"The other one was a witch. You have the same smile."

Echidna's grin faded. So that's how it was then? If that was the case…suddenly a new question, a new curiosity, formed. One that swept away all her previous ones regarding this person.

"If you met a witch already, then how are you still sane hmm? In fact, may I ask how do you remember her existence in the first place? That one doesn't quite like to let people have any recollection of herself. Quite strange considering how vain and self absorbed that woman is…"

That did get a twitch out of him. For a moment his eyes shifted and there looked like there was a bit of movement in them. It was more comparable to a dead body's convulsions than anything else, but it was a reaction nonetheless, and that was interesting on its own.

"The medical definition of insanity states as so: A mental illness of such a severe nature that a person cannot distinguish fantasy from reality, cannot conduct her/his affairs due to psychosis, or is subject to uncontrollable impulsive behavior." He said it mechanically, reciting from memory obviously. "I do not know anymore if I myself am insane."

"You are a doctor then?" she asked him.

"I wanted to be," he replied.

For a moment there was silence as clouds gently glided across the sky constructed from the dream of a witch.

"I…I…know she exists. I…can't remember where I met her. There was a whale and…" the first real emotion she saw from him crossed his face. Pain. "I know that I hate her. But I don't remember when I met her. I must have forgotten." He stopped for a moment. Then he looked at her. "Do you know?"

A strange feeling rippled in her chest. Something akin to pity. Not quite that, but from what her knowledge told her, close enough to pass for it.

"I see. Then may I ask a favor of you?"

He looked up at her, his head inclined quizzically.

"My name is Echidna, the Witch of Greed. I am the witch that wishes to know everything in the world. So won't you tell me your story? If you do so, maybe I can help you with your memories?" She knew that she couldn't, but he didn't and thus her offer was genuine to him. That made it genuine to her too.

For a long moment he said nothing. Then he opened his mouth and began speaking.

"I've never considered myself to be some kind of special individual…"

End of Chapter 2.

That's right. Those moments at the beginning and end of chapter 1 was him talking to Echidna.

Hope you guys enjoyed it. Make sure to follow, fav and leave a review. Goodbye