The Frightened

Its powers newly granted, the egg-shaped being tells Luca how it watched Albion swell with refugees who perished as fast as they came, undone by the very hunger and disease they had fled, while the Holy See kept up the pretense that their lot was improving. It had seen the desperate turn to heresy in the cave and burn for it, and it despised all that it observed. One girl in particular drew its notice, a girl who leaned on another for the comfort she craved yet only sank deeper into her troubles by doing so.

Luca understands that the girl is Nina and that she herself is the one Nina clutches. The being observes that every person clings to the single thing that both soothes them and lays the world's cruelty bare.

Guts drives the Dragon Slayer down hard enough to split the baby-faced disciple's wheel and gash its shoulder. The pliers-wielder jabs wildly at his face; he parries, then flips the hilt up to send the creature spinning through the air. Before he can finish it, the misshapen-skulled disciple's claw clamps around his blade, leaving him open to the wheel disciple's ram.

Recovering, Guts hacks at the charging disciple's legs and severs one, then buries a thrown knife in the pliers disciple's eye. The clash lulls as he rises to meet whatever comes next. Mozgus and his surviving disciples are pinned to a wall with Casca as their hostage, Jerome, Isidro, and Farnese look on in dread, and Nina finally shatters, weeping for Luca.

Part of the Conviction Arc, the chapter ran in Young Animal issue 8 on April 14, 2000. It closes the being's meditation on human dependence and marks the turning point where Guts begins dismantling the pseudo-Apostle disciples. Luca, the egg-shaped being, Guts, Jerome, Puck, Isidro, Nina, Mozgus, and Casca appear.