Chapter 1060: The Truth of the Blood Source 4
On the eve of this outsider's arrival, all of Yharnam had already fallen into disarray, with no single organization able to fully control the city.
Master Willem's Byrgenwerth College still remained on the far side of the Forbidden Woods, maintaining its reverence for the Old Blood.
The School of Mensis, led by Micolash, abducted Yharnamites in Yahar'gul and schemed to bring Mergo down into the nightmare.
The power of the Healing Church had been nearly exhausted, and the last elite members formed the "Choir," advancing toward the Forbidden Woods.
Long ago, the members of the Choir had already begun to doubt Laurence's methods. They believed that obsession with the Old Blood would lead to the Healing Church's downfall, and they resolutely followed Master Willem's teachings.
After the Blood Moon descended, a great number of clergy transformed into beasts. The Choir took control of the Healing Church, inheriting its research results: the brain fluid experiments and the Third Umbilical Cord of Kos's orphan.
The second phase of the brain fluid experiments yielded astonishing results. They successfully created many blue-skinned, large-headed dolls. These dolls would extend fine hairs from their massive heads, allowing humans to make contact with the Great Ones—provided they offered a token of the Great Ones.
Thus, the Choir came to Byrgenwerth, retrieved the sealed Pthumeru Chalice, and summoned a Great One, Ebrietas, in the Orphanage.
One excited member used the "Make Contact" gesture to welcome her, but was instantly burned into a dried corpse, for the human brain could not bear the knowledge of the Great Ones, nor were human eyes worthy of gazing upon their visage.
The Choir revered Ebrietas as the "Daughter of the Cosmos," but this Great One did not open the door to alien knowledge for them. Instead, she pointed to an area beneath the Orphanage, indicating that they should dig there.
Later, a vast cavern was excavated beneath the Orphanage, and within it, a statue shaped like a spider was unearthed.
Ebrietas meditated before the statue every day, as if still weeping. For a long time, the Choir could not comprehend Ebrietas's intent.
At this time, a spy the Choir had planted in the School of Mensis sent back word: Micolash had entered the dream, and he was about to perform the ritual to summon the Blood Moon once more.
This news plunged everyone into panic. The last Blood Moon had brought about the destruction of Old Yharnam, and the horrific scenes were still vivid in their memories. If another Blood Moon occurred, how many more would die from madness?
Perhaps by then, all of Yharnam would become a true hell.
The Choir discovered that the spider statue before Ebrietas was the remains of a dead Great One. This Great One possessed the power to control time, and even its corpse retained some ability to reverse time.
So, the Choir sent the Third Umbilical Cord of Kos's orphan to Byrgenwerth, hoping that Master Willem could prevent the Blood Moon's descent.
Master Willem had only one choice: to create a new Great One, replicate the power of this spider-like Great One, control time, and stop the Blood Moon from falling.
When the outsider hunter jumped into the Moonside Lake and killed the vacuous spider Rom, he wondered: why was this Great One called "vacuous"?
(In Japanese, it was even more bluntly referred to as "idiot.")
Some believed it was because Rom never actively attacked others. Even when hurt by the hunter's blade, it only knew how to dodge, showing little sign of intelligence—hence, "vacuous."
However, Yharnam was filled with many similarly feeble-minded creatures. Clearly, measuring a Great One's wisdom by human standards was highly inappropriate. Rom possessed the wisdom of a Great One and could harness the power of the cosmos; calling it "vacuous" was obviously wrong.
In truth, the vacuous spider Rom was created by Master Willem himself to prevent the Blood Moon's descent, using the spider statue and the Third Umbilical Cord. The "Lumenflower Gardens" scattered throughout Byrgenwerth were the failed products of this research process.
The vacuous Rom was once a disciple of Master Willem. As Byrgenwerth steadily declined and most people followed Laurence away, this dull-witted student, Rom, remained by Master Willem's side, willingly becoming such a bloated worm to fulfill the mission Master Willem had given her: to continuously rewind Yharnam's time to just before the Blood Moon fell.
Perhaps weary of this endless night, or perhaps the outsider hunter's experiences stirred regret in Master Willem's heart, he tremblingly raised his staff and pointed toward the Moonside Lake. Thus, the hunter killed Rom, and the Blood Moon descended.
The Blood Moon drove all of Yharnam's residents into madness. In Oedon Chapel, the prostitute became pregnant with a child of the Great One. In Iosefka's Clinic, the younger Iosefka, who had turned patients and her own sister into large-headed dolls, was killed by the hunter, and she too gave birth to a strange creature.
The hunter obtained two Third Umbilical Cords. Adding the one Gehrman had left in the Hunter's Workshop, he now possessed the power to ascend as a Great One.
The hunter entered Micolash's nightmare through Amygdala. He killed Amygdala, killed Micolash, and through the Eye of a Blood-drunk Hunter, entered the nightmare created by Kos's orphan, understanding everything that had happened in Yharnam's past.
He defeated Ludwig, who had turned into a beast; defeated the failures of the Research Hall; defeated Maria of the Astral Clocktower; killed Kos's orphan; and ended that nightmare.
Finally, the hunter arrived beside Mergo's crib. But he could only hear crying; he could not see Mergo's form. Mergo's wet nurse, the guardian of the infant Mergo, launched a frenzied attack on the hunter. Yet, under the hunter's skilled combat techniques, the wet nurse fell, and Mergo's cries gradually ceased.
The hunter held Mergo's Third Umbilical Cord in his hands. By now, he had obtained four Third Umbilical Cords, sourced from Gehrman (the Moon Presence), the prostitute (Oedon), the false Iosefka, and Mensis (Mergo).
After killing Mergo, the hunter had completed the task the Moon Presence had arranged for him. He returned to the Hunter's Dream and found it engulfed in raging flames.
Now, the outsider hunter only needed to find Gehrman in the garden to awaken from the Hunter's Dream and welcome Yharnam's sunrise.
Three different endings lay before the hunter. He had already learned the truth of Yharnam: all this disaster stemmed from Master Willem, Laurence, and Micolash's exploration of the Old Blood and their ambition to become Great Ones. In reality, they were merely pawns in the hands of the Great Ones.
The Moon Presence, which had constructed the Hunter's Dream, was still lurking somewhere, watching with bated breath. After Mergo's death, the Moon Presence had become the sole remaining Great One, having used the hunter's hand to eliminate all its competitors in Yharnam.
So, what would happen if he went to find Gehrman now?
Clearly, the outsider hunter still had one final mission. Thus, he used all the Third Umbilical Cords, to pursue the deepest secrets of Yharnam, to achieve what no one in all of Yharnam had ever achieved before.