Chapter 6: Riverside and Outskirts (6)

“Heeheeheehee! Jiiheeheehee! Heeheeheehee! Hahahahahahahaha!”

Laughing.

Laughing up at the sky.

The boy’s corpse dangled limply in its hands, swinging back and forth, glaring and grotesque.

I didn’t know what to say.

He had just become our companion. Just seconds ago, he was talking, smiling at me.

And now, already…

I should be mourning.

I should be grieving.

I should be burying him.

But in this moment, above all else, what I felt first was danger, followed by an uncontrollable fear.

This thing with spring-loaded legs was different. Different from those big-mouthed, halitosis-breathing fiends.

It was strong.

Incredibly strong!

“Shitshitshitfuckfuckfuckfuckkkkkk—RUN!”

Booker reacted instantly, spinning around to flee, but stopped in his tracks. Run? Run where? We were on a rooftop, and the only ladder was stretched across to another rooftop—on the other end of which stood that trench-coated monster.

“Fuckfuckfuck what do we do?! There’s nowhere to run!”

“Don’t—don’t move! Nobody move!” I shouted, the blood-red haze from Vaclav’s death slowly fading from my vision. There was something more urgent than grief—staying alive.

“Don’t move? That thing’s gonna kill us!”

“Fall off the roof into that pile of monsters and we’re dead anyway!”

Booker fell silent the moment I said that. From the corner of my eye, I saw him trembling as he stayed rooted to the spot. Jelena stood beside him, eyes locked on the trench-coated creature. I tightened my grip on the butcher knife at my belt. Beside me, Felice picked up a piece of scrap wood from the roof.

“…”

But strangely, the trench-coated monster didn’t attack.

Just moments ago, it had leapt from the ground up to this rooftop—dozens of meters in a flash—and killed Vaclav instantly. With that kind of speed and force, it could’ve torn through all of us during our panic. But it didn’t.

“Jii! Heeheehee! Jiheeheeheehee!”

It let out a bizarre cackle, holding Vaclav’s headless corpse in its bladed hands, flipping it over, turning it around, gazing at it from every angle—like it was playing with some oversized toy.

A wave of nausea welled up in me.

It’s… playing with a corpse?

A glance at the others—Booker and Jelena looked like they were about to puke too, though mostly out of terror and disbelief. Even Felice frowned, her shoulders trembling.

“Jijijijijiheeheeheeheeheehee!”

Its attention was fully absorbed by Vaclav’s body. It didn’t spare us a single glance.

“Heeheehee~~”

With another round of cackling, it hoisted the corpse over its shoulder. The springs making up its legs compressed suddenly, and in the blink of an eye, it bounded across the street and landed atop a chimney. The sheer speed was jaw-dropping.

“It’s… gone…”

“That thing… some kind of psycho killer?”

“If it were just a regular psycho killer, we’d be lucky.”

Whatever it was, the trench-coated freak had left. From the start, it had targeted Vaclav—and after claiming the corpse, it seemed satisfied. Could it be some twisted behavior? Collecting corpses? Once it got what it wanted, it retreated.

As I was running all these thoughts through my head, I rushed to pull the ladder over as fast as I could—

…Wait.

Vaclav’s body?

From earlier experience, we knew that those who drank from the poisoned river dissolved into mist upon death.

Which meant Vaclav would—

“Giiyaaaaaahhhhhhhh!”

The trench-coated monster suddenly let out a piercing shriek. It clawed frantically at the air, fumbling over its own body, but all it could grasp was a slowly fading yellow mist. Vaclav’s body had dissolved and vanished right before its eyes.

“Ji—Jiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii!”

Realizing its prize had disappeared, it unleashed a mad howl. The red light in its eyes flared even brighter, its mouth gaping wide to reveal jagged fangs. It was utterly enraged.

“Shit, shit, shit! It’s coming back!”

“Go! Down!! Now!”

I had already set the ladder in place. Down below—yes! No monsters. Just as I’d hoped, the other creatures feared the trench-coated one. They had all scattered at the sound of its fury.

“Go go go!”

I gave them a hard shove. Jelena snapped out of her daze and began climbing down, but her hands were trembling so badly she could barely hold on.

“Don’t go one rung at a time, fuck, just slide down!”

Booker’s shout made her panic. She lost her grip and fell—thankfully, she was already halfway down, so it was only a short drop. No serious injury. Booker followed right after, gripping both rails and sliding down like lightning.

“Felice! Go!”

She looked hesitant, worried for me. Please, just do as I say! That’s the best way to show you care right now. I grabbed her and shoved her toward the ladder—

“Fuck—Duck!”

At Booker’s yell, I dropped flat, just as a rush of air tore past my head, followed by the screech of metal clashing. 

Cold sweat broke out all over me. If I’d reacted a second slower, I’d have been decapitated. I glanced back. The spring-limbed freak was less than ten meters away. Its claws had just slashed past me. Its arms were spring-loaded, able to extend and retract at will.

“Ugh!”

I reacted on instinct, snatching up a roof tile and hurling it at the creature. But it casually swiped a claw, slicing the tile into clean shards. Each fragment had razor-smooth edges.

Hey…

This… this really isn’t funny at all.

This thing wasn’t even in the same league as those lizard monsters.

It raised its head. Under its top hat, its blazing torch-like eyes locked onto mine. Not with hatred, but like a merchant appraising goods.

I could already see the image of my body in pieces.

Time seemed to slow.

In a daze, I remembered what Vaclav had said.

“Just like a novel.”

A novel?

If I were the protagonist of some novel, this would be the moment my powers awaken, right? Magic, superpowers, something.

But I had nothing.

Whoever brought us to this world—probably some god—hadn’t given us any perks. No magic, no superhuman strength. I was as ordinary as ever. No legendary weapons either. The first weapon I picked up was a weeding fork. Now I only had a butcher’s knife used for slaughtering livestock.

Faced with this monster, I couldn’t even imagine how to escape, let alone win.

And yet—

“Really wish this were just a nightmare.”

—still, I tightened my grip on the butcher knife, took a stance I remembered from action movies as a kid, and glanced back to confirm Felice was halfway down the ladder.

I couldn’t just do nothing. Couldn’t just stand here and wait for my head to fall.

“Ji… jijiji…”

It spread its arms wide. The blades in its hands extended fully. The springs in its legs coiled tight. It was about to strike—burst forward at terrifying speed and—

Slit my throat? Pierce my chest? Smash my skull? Tear me limb from limb?

No way to know how it would attack. No way to dodge. Defending was out of the question.

I was going to die.

It moved.

Sky.

Roof.

Trees.

Town.

Ladder.

Fog.

Me.

It.

And then—

“Jump… down…”

A voice. From somewhere unknown.

Not Felice, not Jelena, not Booker. A new voice.

It rang out like divine command, like a prophecy, blasting through my nearly empty mind and replacing all thought with a single imperative.

No time to question, no time to hesitate. As the bony face lunged at mine, my legs made the strongest backward leap of my life.

More of a fall, really—just throwing myself backward.

The rooftop and sky receded in an instant. Wind whipped through my hair, tore past my body. I was falling—fast.

Thud!

The sound of impact came as everything went dark.

And the last thing I vaguely remembered was a face, rotting and ruined.