From Corpse to Crown: Reborn as a Mortician in Another World-Chapter 92: Echoes Beneath the Weft

They’d been camping for about two weeks now--sleeping in the inn was far too dangerous.

Still, I’m amazed at how we’ve adapted. Lucian stoked the fire as he stayed awake for first watch. Now that they wanted to unravel the memory...who knew what waited on the other side.

If anyone told me I’d be camping outside for more than two days, I’d think they were crazy.

"And yet," Lucian mumbled. "here we are."

He remembered his wish--a life where he could just be normal.

Well, going outside is kind of normal. I just think it’s weird because I’m used to working in funeral homes.

+

Lucian stood in the heart of spiral ring five.

The wind had stopped again. Not in warning—just waiting.

The sealed page in his hand fluttered like it breathed.

The Rite of Lingering EchoesReveal the grief that never found a voice. Use only where silence is deepest. Whisper once. Burn nothing.

Alice stepped quietly to his side. "This is where you’re starting?"

Lucian nodded. "It feels... heavy here."

He knelt. No glyphs. No thread. Just breath and presence.

Lucian touched the stone.

He whispered a word—not a name, but the feeling of loss, sharpened to a point:

"Stay."

The stone vibrated. The spiral lines beneath his feet glowed a faint silver.

The world blurred—just at the edges. Not an illusion.

A memory.

✦ Memory Unthreading Begins

A woman’s voice echoed, but there was no body.

"They said to wait. That we would be honored."

Shadows filled the square. Dozens of them. Silhouettes frozen mid-turn, mid-wave, mid-breath.

"We wrote our names in thread. We bound our promises. And we waited."

As the figures in the echo wove in and out of clarity, Lucian noticed something new.

The shadows were not just playing back what had happened.

They were reaching toward him.

Hair-fine and silvery threadlines unraveled from their fingers and tried to sew themselves into the sleeves of his coat. Even more crawled into the folds of Alice’s scarf and the nape of her neck.

Lucian tried to back away—but the moment he moved, one thread tightened around his wrist.

His heart pounded.

"Alice—don’t move."

Too late. A thread grazed her cheek—and for a split second, her expression flickered.

She wasn’t Alice.

She was a woman Lucian had never met—eyes gray, voice faint. "We waited for the bells to ring."

Alice blinked, staggered. "Lucian?"

He caught her before she fell. "The echo’s trying to pull us in. Not just show us. Use us."

The Loom at his hip twitched—once, twice—like it was straining against an invisible leash.

I want to intervene.

Let me sever this.

But you forbade me.

Lucian cursed. "If you cut it now, we lose the thread entirely."

He was right.

But the echo grew hungrier.

+

Lucian saw a white-lacquered door appear against a building that hadn’t existed seconds ago. Several children’s drawings were posted, drawing in crayon.

"They left us"

"Vanished beautifully"

The door opened with a soft creak.

But no one stepped through.

Instead, the shadow of a man (tall, antlered, completely indistinct) stood at the threshold.

Alice gasped. "That’s...it’s him."

Lucian didn’t ask how she knew.

Auren Valier didn’t move.

But every echo froze around him, like he was the center of a dying orbit.

"He told us not to grieve until he returned."

Lucian took a step forward.

And all at once—

SLAM!

The door closed with such ferocity the building shook.

The rite stopped.

And the memory fled, like thread cut by scissors.

[System Alert – Rite Interrupted: Force Feedback]

Lucian -4 SAN, Alice -2 SAN

Lingering Echoes partially awakened

Auren Valier Resistance Level: Moderate to High

Lucian stumbled and felt blood drip from his nose.

Alice grabbed his arm to steady him.

+

They sat in shaken silence. Lucian felt blood in his mouth and touched his bottom lip. He hadn’t even realized he’d bitten it.

The Grimoire at his side opened without his command.

Pages flipped—rapidly, chaotically—until they stilled on a page Lucian had never seen before.

"Memory Sacrifice Detected: 0"

Warning: Unspent memory offers are piling up.

Skill inheritance frozen.

You may offer one (1) core memory to awaken a latent technique.

Beneath it, two choices flickered:

Submit memory anonymously

Select type of memory

Lucian stared.

It would be faster.

Easier.

The Rite drained him.

The echoes were becoming more dangerous.

He needed power.

But he’d been here before.

[Lucian’s Memory Flashback: The Forgotten Letter]

He remembered the first time he’d made the trade.

It had been shortly after he’d been summoned to this world. Cold, anxious, and completely out of his element.

The Grimoire had offered.

He’d sacrificed a memory for Rosa.

And true to the Grimoire’s word, he hadn’t known what was taken.

Until weeks later.

He’d been cleaning out his closet and found a letter in his coat pocket.

It was addressed to somebody named Camellia.

He didn’t remember writing it.

Didn’t even remember her.

There was a vague aching absence, but it disappeared as soon as he tried to focus on it.

Lucian closed the Grimoire and shook his head.

"I’m not doing that again," he whispered.

Only as a last resort.

+

Alice, still pale from the backlash, reached over and gently touched the Grimoire’s cover.

"You were tempted, weren’t you?"

Lucian didn’t answer, and that, in itself, was an answer.

+

They sat in silence for a few minutes after.

Lucian wiped the blood with his sleeve.

"He’s embedded himself. Not like a ghost. More like a... knot of memory that refuses to unravel."

Alice rubbed one of her sleeves absently.

"He didn’t want to be remembered. He wanted to be obeyed."

Lucian looked toward the white door, now gone.

"But grief doesn’t wait," he murmured.

Alice nodded slowly.

"Neither should we."

+

Merry arrived then, breathless.

She’d scouted spiral ring six.

"There’s something you need to see."

They followed her past twisting paths until they reached a collapsed watchtower.

Inside was a mortician’s coat.

Folded neatly.

The Grimoire beside it was split down the spine—blank pages splayed like wilted petals.

Lucian picked it up.

No name on the front. Just one word carved into the inside cover in blood-thread.

"Unthreadable."

Merry turned to him. "Looks like someone tried what you’re doing."

Lucian closed the ruined Grimoire.

"They failed."

Alice looked at him. "But they didn’t have a Guide."

+

That night, Lucian used his new skill—Echo Pulse.

The air rippled like silk dropped in still water.

And from the buildings around them, faces began to form.

Not ghosts.

But fragments.

Children. Elders. Lovers. All paused in unfinished grief, some weeping, some praying, some holding invisible hands.

Lucian counted eighty-seven.

And that was just from one ring.

Should we even press forward? Who knows how powerful he really was... But even as Lucian finished his thought, he already knew what he wanted.

We’ve come so far. We should try to see it through to the end.