The thunderous roar and the tremors of the snowy mountain beneath her feet made Miss Chloe want to look back and check on Shade's condition. However, she knew Shade would not want her to delay their progress; thus, even as the worry and guilt in her heart reached a peak, she bit her lip and continued to climb upward.
From a distance, the snowy slope of the platform at the mountain's highest peak was already visible, but the young witch with silver hair and crimson eyes felt she could no longer hold on.
In a daze, those thirteen companions she still remembered suddenly appeared around her, tugging at her hem and urging her to stop and rest. In another blur, every demon she had encountered in this lonely, eerie snowy mountain reappeared, laughing loudly and mocking her overestimation of her own abilities.
At this moment, it was the final stretch of the journey, the finish line right before her eyes, yet Chloe's pace grew slower and slower. The wind and snow seemed intent on blowing her flat on the ground; the mental chaos caused her memories to falter, and for a moment, she even believed she had entered this snowy mountain entirely alone.
When she came to her senses, she realized she was sprawled on the snow, struggling to crawl upward. Her labored breathing forced her to pull open her scarf. She rolled over, lying flat on the snow, gasping for air while staring up at the mottled black sky where snowflakes drifted down.
That mottled black was something Chloe had never witnessed anywhere else. She felt that at this moment, the sky was pressing down like a coffin lid, intending to lock her forever within this deserted snowy mountain.
"Keep... going."
She rolled over and struggled to stand, wanting to continue upward, but after stumbling just two steps, she fell again. Only this time, she did not land on the soft, cold snow, but plunged headfirst onto a layer of ice. She could not understand why the surface beneath her was completely transparent ice, but she saw countless corpses imprisoned inside the mountain, reaching out their hands to her from within the frozen mass, their hideous faces welcoming the arrival of the next lost soul.
"No, I'm going to the peak. I must... climb the final stretch."
Fear forced her back to her feet, but at that moment, the thirteen companions—including Mrs. Marques and the unknown man—appeared before her once more. They looked as if they had been dead for a long time; their shriveled corpses surrounded Chloe, attempting to block her path. But Chloe pushed aside their hands and shoved through their bodies, stubbornly continuing her ascent.
"What is real? What is an illusion?"
Amidst the mental chaos, she asked herself
"Do I really have companions? Or rather, could two of my companions truly have followed me here?"
The cries of her companions echoed behind her, trying to make her stop, if only to look back once.
At first, Chloe ignored those voices, but soon, the experiences of the journey through the snowy mountain with her companions flooded her mind. Those memories, indistinguishable between truth and falsehood and appearing utterly bizarre, forced her to actually stop. Yet, a moment before she turned around, she forcibly changed her mind.
Because she could still detect the taste of wine and blood in her mouth; she still remembered the embrace of that incredibly warm man, and that cute cat that was as warm as the sun.
"Even if everything is fake, even if this is a space constructed by my consciousness before death, at least... he is real."
Chloe told herself. Supporting her body with both hands on the snow, she struggled to rise and continue forward. The peak was right before her.
"But you don't even know his name!"
A mocking voice came from behind. Chloe knew her "companions" were still following her, but this time, the voice sounded as if she had spoken it herself.
"Name..."
"Poor Chloe, you think we aren't real! Then must he be real?"
The voice seemed to be whispered directly into her ear, like "another me" speaking within her heart. Chloe hesitated again, but the warmth in her body reminded her that the man truly existed.
"A man who can contact a witch, enter and leave this mountain range at will, and possesses such great power—is that truly not your hallucination?"
The voice was like a demon in her heart; even amidst the howling blizzard, it remained crystal clear. The young witch had bitten through her lip countless times by now. The pain did not make her more lucid, but the taste of blood gave her confirmation
"Yes, I believe... he truly exists."
Her expression became more determined, and her uneven steps grew swifter. The voice of her own self chuckled in her ear, as if it had achieved its purpose. "She" stopped obsessing over whether the "man" was real and instead asked the question the witch feared most
"So, he helped you so much, yet you abandon him to leave alone?
Perhaps, at this moment, he has already fallen asleep in the snow of the Silver Mountains, his body and soul unable to leave for ten thousand years. Perhaps that corpse is staring at the sky with open eyes, wondering why you truly never looked back, while his soul is torn and devoured by the evil spirits of the mountain. He really is quite pitiful."
Chloe's steps stopped again. She tried hard to control her emotions, but the imagery described by her own words seemed to become a reality she could see, incessantly urging her in her mind to turn around and descend the mountain.
The tiny figure in the wind and snow was so helpless, while the dozen or so different voices behind her laughed so happily.
But in the end, she still did not look back
"I am the witch, Chloe."
She did not say this to herself in her heart, but actually spoke the words aloud
"I believe in myself, and I believe in him."
Looking ahead, she no longer cared about the voices behind her, nor the forces that had once pulled at her. Though her pace was slow, she continued to ascend steadily. After a final climb that lasted perhaps a few minutes or perhaps several hours, those hands, frozen to the point of numbness, finally gripped the edge of the snowy platform's slope at the mountain's summit.
She shifted her body, bringing her entire self to the highest point of the peak. Struggling to stand, she widened her eyes, gazing out over the vast snowy mountains and the distant darkness.
"Is this... the highest peak..."
There was no joy at this moment, but rather an indescribable sense of emptiness. Panting sounds came from behind; turning around, she saw Mrs. Marques carrying the luggage and the cowering man, supporting each other as they struggled up.
"Those just now... were indeed hallucinations. I really climbed up. It's time to go home."
Although she had reached her destination, she felt as if a part of herself had been lost forever in this snowy mountain. There was not a shred of achievement; the boundless void made her doubt whether she had truly reached the summit, or if this was merely a hallucination while she lay unconscious on the final slope.
Unconsciously, she opened her arms to face the wind and snow, but this provided no solace
"Why did I do all of this?"
She began to doubt everything, doubting the meaning of the journey. The sense of soul-splitting grew stronger; she truly felt that this snowy mountain was imprisoning a part of her soul.
"Oh, I should have learned my lesson—when the snowy mountain lets out a dragon's roar, there will be an avalanche!"
Suddenly, a complaining voice drifted through the wind, and then a disheveled Shade climbed up from below.
It wasn't that he had exhausted himself—the clump of snow given by the deity contained enough spiritual energy. Rather, he had nearly been swept away by an avalanche and had put in a great deal of effort to reach the summit again. The mountain did not make things difficult for an outsider like him; as long as he wasn't infected by the Whisper elements or mental pollution, climbing was not strenuous for him.
Miss Chloe did not speak to Shade, but instead reached out to help him up, standing shoulder to shoulder with him as they gazed at the undulating snowy mountains from the peak.
The silver-white mountains were so eerie yet so enchanting. Shade knew the girl beside him was likely very confused right now, but fortunately, he already knew the truth
"You haven't reached the end yet."
He reminded her. When the witch looked at him in confusion, Shade pointed higher
"There are thirteen more steps above."
Miss Chloe didn't understand, but suddenly a spark of inspiration surged in her heart, and she realized something
"I didn't come here simply to climb a snowy mountain."
Aside from the temperature remaining low, the influence on her mind was gradually diminishing; she was reclaiming her own memories.
An extraordinarily ethereal golden staircase appeared before her. Eleven steps represented the status of an Eleventh-Rank Witch.
"Mrs. Marques."
Shade called out softly. The middle-aged woman stood up from the snow sheepishly and approached the two of them.
Shade asked
"Your wish is to press the boot of your master, who was lost in the snowy mountains, into the snow layer of the summit. Now that we have arrived, could you give the boot to me?"
"Yes, sir!"
Mrs. Marques replied immediately, her face flushing with inner excitement.
She took out the boot she had hidden in her bosom and handed it to Shade. When Shade had first encountered this boot at this point in time, he had noticed it was as small as Miss Chloe's foot, but at the time, he didn't know what that signified.
Holding the boot, he crouched down and signaled for the young witch to lift her foot. The latter paused, clearly thinking of something. Then, her face flushing red, she stopped Shade, put on the boot herself, and stepped firmly onto the snow.
Shade said to Mrs. Marques
"With this, your wish has been fulfilled."
Then he said to Miss Chloe
"You never have to worry about being abandoned by others or facing life's journey alone. Chloe Marcus Marques, do not always rely on others; you must become the one others rely on."
"Yes, Chloe, you are not alone."
Mrs. Marques said to Miss Chloe, bowing slightly toward Shade. Then, her body became transparent and ethereal until she turned into a series of golden points of light, flying toward the top of the witch's eleven steps and becoming the twelfth golden step.
(End of Chapter)