it and had in fact mostly forgotten that it existed at all. However, it might well be just the thing they needed to resolve their current situation. The only problem was how dangerous it was. Kaito, of course, had strong feelings about being used as a guinea pig. "Okay, that's gonna be a reeeeal hard pass from me!" "No, no, it'll work! I haven't the faintest shred of proof to support that notion, but I have this strange feeling that you'll do just great!" "That's a little too important to leave up to a notion, don't you think?! Stop, stop, stop, stop, stop! If you're gonna shove someone into something, at least make sure it works first!" "You're a man; have some guts! Worry notâ€”if anything happens, I'll be sure to retrieve your ashes!" "Oh, so we're just working under the assumption that I'm gonna die... Hey, wait, ahhhhhhhhhh!" However, this had all been his fault to begin with, so his human rights were forfeit. Elisabeth ignored his protests and pressed him against the device. With a shoop, he got sucked insideâ€”or so he likely thought. Transporting his entire body would have been far more trouble than it was worth. Instead, the device was designed to split off the tip of his soul and borrow it for a little bit. When it did, his consciousness went along for the ride. Back in reality, he had merely passed out. Elisabeth left his body on the floor and began observing what was going on in the device. "Now, then. I've my suspicions about his nightmare's true form. Let's see if I'm right." Inside the glass, the flowers were glowing crimson, and their bloodred forms were endlessly shifting. They became butterflies, then turned back into flowers, then became butterflies again. They gently scattered and flapped their wings. And the beautiful cycle continued. Suddenly, though, something changed. The dream world's administrator, a black-and-white tapir, made its appearance. Kaito unguardedly made his way toward it. When he tried to touch it, though, it casually gobbled his hand up. "I mean, 'twas the right answer, but still, what kind of fool allows themselves to be eaten so easily?!" Elisabeth could scarcely believe what she had just watched. Sure enough, Kaito was a dimwit, an idiot, and a simpleton. Then the tapir burst. Its skin split from the top down, then fell gently to the ground. The animal had been reduced to a horrible blob of muscle fibers. Chunks of meat began cascading off it, dripping with mucus as they delivered the data about the nightmare the tapir had eaten to the world itself. Then the inside of the glass ball sharpened. The field of flowers ceased its perpetual expansion and shed its crimson hue. All that remained was a vast array of silver needles. The butterflies' wings followed suit, thinning out and becoming knives. The entire space was filled with objects designed to hurt people. Elisabeth heaved a heavy sigh. "As I thought... 'Tis like a veritable cage of pain." Her silky black hair swayed as she turned around. With a faint smile on her face, she called out: "Ah, another expectation met. Sure enough, you heeded the call. This device piques your fancy, doesn't it?" She was looking out the room's open doorâ€” â€”toward the pool of crimsonâ€” â€”that was expanding and spreading forth like a sea of blood. Countless viscous balls of foam bubbled on the pool's blackened crimson surface. This gave it the appearance of a putrid, burbling swamp. An especially large bubble formed on its surface, then popped, revealing a gaunt set of fingers. The rest of the lone arm rose up shortly thereafter, as did a single leg. Together, they dragged the torn-up body across the stone floor. The gruesome corpse looked up at Elisabeth. It offered her no other reply. However, it did give its skin, flesh, and organs a meaningful shake. Elisabeth nodded. Sure enough. The thing longed to be able to share its pain with the living, and it responded to the pain of others as well. Its sole desire was to merge its pain with someone else's, then force them to take on the entirety of this combined pain on their own. That was the reason behind the corpse's fixation on Kaito Sena. At the moment, it was staring at the magical device so hard, it seemed liable to bore a hole in it. "Grrr... Urrr..." "Aye, 'tis a world constructed from pain. Interested, aren't you, in seeing which fool cooked it up? O pitiful wretch sheared apart by the Knight while still living and used as part of his beast." And with that, Elisabeth casually revealed the corpse's true nature. Originally, it had just been a normal old human. However, after it was captured alive by the Knight, the weakest of the fourteen ranked demons, it was torn apart and tied together with countless other such victims to form a massive patchwork beast. And the only reason it had suffered that horrible fate was because it had had the simple misfortune of living in a village near the Torture Princess's castle. In a certain sense, it was Elisabeth's fault that this villager had come to harm. However, she didn't even know his name. To her, he was just another innocent, nameless victim among countless others like him. Even so, the corpse showed no sign of holding any special grudge against the Torture Princess. And that was to be expected. He didn't have the capacity to resent any one specific individual. The atrocity that innocent villager suffered was beyond the scope a person could even comprehend. When someone had their body torn up and stitched together into a horrible beast, they generally lacked the presence of mind to attribute blame to a particular person. Suspended in that state of confusion, the villager had suffered untold agonies. However, the Knight's death had freed him. Or rather, it should have, but for some reason, he was still trapped in that state of pain. 'Tis doubtless because he couldn't accept... No, rather, he couldn't understand what had happened. Normally, the villager should have died the moment his body was torn apart. However, the Knight's magic had forcibly kept him alive. Even when he suddenly returned to his proper state of "death," he couldn't understand that that was what had happened. Instead of disappearing like normal, his soul stagnated. And because of that, he changed. All he knew was pain. The simple intensity of his agony had overwritten his very humanity. That was what had reduced the villager to the monster it was now. However, releasing it from that state would be easier said than done. Its consciousness had been worn away too badly for it to respond to reason, and on top of that, Elisabeth was the Torture Princess. Hurting people and causing them pain was the sum total of who she was. She possessed neither the virtue of a saint nor the compassion of a hero. However... "That said, continuing to have you haunt me seems a rather unpleasant proposition. Perhaps I'd best do something about you after all. Now, the boy who created this world is inside the glass ball. What do you say?" The device glowed silver as Elisabeth pressed her palm against it. Inside, Kaito was engaging in an act that was either gallant, reckless, or simply stupid beyond belief and setting off across the brutal landscape without so much as faltering before the pain that was going to entail. Blood trickled across the world of knives and needles. Upon seeing that, the monster immediately reacted. It reached out with its one arm and leg. How simple it was, how pitiable, and how foolish. Elisabeth let out a callous laugh. However, those same traits would go on to save it. Whether or not the monster would truly attain salvation, though, Elisabeth had no idea. "Very well, then, I shall allow it. Come along now." The monster accepted the Torture Princess's invitation and leaped. Its body, which was composed of nothing but its soul, vanished inside the magic device. Elisabeth ran mana through her palm and shifted her consciousness and part of her soul along after it. And with an illusory shoopâ€” â€”Elisabeth got sucked into the ball. "You fear pain, aye, but you're far too accustomed to it. I daresay that that contradiction there is where your warped personality stems from." As Elisabeth fell, she let out a quiet murmur. Kaito must have heard her, as he frantically glanced around. When he did, though, he twisted his body a little too far and lost his balance. Like the fool he was, he'd forgotten that his foot was still impaled on the needles. Elisabeth frowned. Well, that's not good. She flapped her dress like a bird's wings and whistled. Darkness and flower petals whirled through the air, eventually coalescing into a black ball and materializing with a pop. The dream's master had made its appearance once more and was now far larger to boot. Elisabeth landed gracefully atop the massive tapir. As she made it do a nose dive, she checked back in on Kaito's situation. He was right on the verge of completely toppling over. "You're incorrigible, you know that? What, do you have some secret quota of blunders you feel compelled to meet or something?" Exasperated, she reached out her arm and snatched Kaito's hand as it flailed through the air. Then all in one go, she yanked him upward. After plopping him down on the tapir's back, she sat down herself before he had a chance to come to his senses. Then she rested her arms on her knees and went back to observing the world. Sure enoughâ€”they merged. The corpse had come inside along with her, but it was currently nowhere to be seen. However, just because it wasn't visible didn't mean it wasn't there. Not only was it no more than a soul, but it was also little more than a mass of resentment and obsession with pain. Given that the world they were in was composed of nothing but pain, it and the monster were practically identical. As a result, the monster had gotten absorbed by the world the moment it came inside, much like the tapir's meat rain had. In a sense, the corpse and everything that was visible were now one and the same. It had been spread throughout the entire world. Elisabeth nodded. Everything was going as she'd anticipated. When she did, an angry shout came from behind her. *** "Oh, hello there, Kaito." "Don't you 'oh, hello' me, dammit! Do you have any idea what I just went through because of you?!" When Kaito continued loudly shouting, Elisabeth lowered the hand she'd been lightly waving at him with. Then she shrugged and gave him a nonchalant reply. "Well, you say that, but even I hadn't the faintest idea that your nightmares' cause would take such a form. And besides, who exactly was it who refused to wait for me, striding across those needles on his own like an utter fool?" "Well, it does sound bad when you put it that way... Wait, hold on a minute. This is the cause of my nightmares?" "That it is. 'Tis a contradictory sight indeed." Elisabeth gazed down at the transformed field of flowers as she spoke. Still seated, Kaito scooted over until he was right next to her. What an easily distracted fellow he was. Elisabeth faced the world of knives and needles as she went on. "To pinpoint the precise source of another's nightmares, one must first dive deep into their memories. However, this is but an experimental device, and such a complex feat is beyond it. Instead, it displays a symbolic manifestation of the fear that drives its subject's nightmares. What you see before you is its result. You fear pain, yet you're accustomed to it and, at times, even accept it willingly. As I said, contradictory. 'Tis