Chapter 109: S#18. Bleedy Witch (6)

“Pfft… Bwahahahaha!”

Reiko burst into loud laughter as she crouched down.

She laughed so hard tears formed at the corners of her eyes. Yeoreum furrowed his brow.

“What’s so funny?”

“Final girl… It’s just too hilarious.”

Reiko stood up after catching her breath.

“Why don’t we see if that’s really true?”

She strode purposefully towards Yeoreum.

Yeoreum turned and fled, diving into the thick undergrowth.

His brilliant blonde hair fluttered as he ran, legs flashing with striking curves.

It was the quintessential back view of a blonde beauty from a slasher film.

Reiko sneered.

“Where’s all that Final Girl bravado now? Why’re you suddenly running away?”

The chase began.

Yeoreum fleeing. Reiko in pursuit.

Yeoreum reminded himself that the forest was horror movie territory.

Reiko was strong. Strong enough to have taken down even the superhuman Summer. But according to horror movie rules, he could still win.

He recalled the horror films he’d watched with Yuna.

In the final scene, a cornered human faces off against the monster.

The monster is overwhelmingly stronger than the human. But humans possess something monsters lack.

Wisdom and courage.

With wisdom and courage, humans can overcome adversity and defeat monsters.

Yeoreum hadn’t forgotten these horror movie lessons.

Though Yeoreum ran while Reiko walked leisurely, the distance between them gradually closed.

The Final Girl’s destination was a swamp.

A sticky mud swamp.

“A swamp? What’re you planning by luring me here?”

Reiko scoffed.

“Forgotten this terrain favors me?”

Suddenly, someone rose from the mud.

“…Not today.”

It was Summer, who had been hiding face down in the swamp.

Ellen, who had been lying next to him, also stood up.

Small boxes in Summer and Ellen’s hands. Homemade bombs courtesy of the Hyper sisters.

Yeoreum had lured Reiko here.

Two bombs flew towards Reiko.

BOOM───────!

They hit and exploded. A flash of light burst forth as the explosion shook the ground.

Yeoreum, who had ducked to avoid bomb shrapnel, raised his head to look at Reiko.

Caught in the blast, her facial skin had been stripped off and one shoulder torn away.

But no sooner had the shock subsided than new flesh began to grow.

An incredible regenerative ability that shrugged off even explosions.

“With mere toys like these…”

Reiko’s words were cut short mid-sentence.

Bang-!

A gunshot echoed through the forest.

Smoke drifted from the muzzle of the gun Yeoreum had drawn.

The fired bullet pierced the center of Reiko’s forehead.

“A… gun…?”

“Officer Bob Bojangles’ gun that I picked up in the yard. Brought it for emergencies.”

Pull.

Yeoreum repeatedly pulled the trigger.

Bullet holes riddled Reiko’s body. Staggering, she collapsed.

He couldn’t give her time to close the wounds again.

Summer threw an axe. Yeoreum caught it by the handle.

He swung down hard at the fallen Reiko, decapitating her. Red blood sprayed as the head separated from the body.

It was a fierce beheading.

“Haa… Haa…”

Yeoreum panted heavily. He stepped on the severed head rolling at his feet.

Even Reiko should be dead with her head cut off…

…Or so he thought.

Red tentacles sprouted from the severed surface of the head. The tips of the tentacles extended like arrows, plunging into the severed surface of the body.

Through the connected tentacles, the neck and body stuck together with a squelch. It healed seamlessly as if it had never been cut.

Reiko stood up.

“I-Impossible…”

Yeoreum fell backwards. Reiko looked down at him with a relaxed smile.

It was the smile of a victor.

A pale hand gripped Yeoreum’s throat.

As she lifted him, his feet dangled in the air. He couldn’t breathe.

“Kuh… Keuugh…”

“It’d certainly be absurd for me to kill you with my own hands. I’m the killer, and you’re the Final Girl after all.”

Ignoring Yeoreum’s struggles, Reiko pulled a coin from her pocket.

A Japanese coin hanging on a transparent string. She dangled it in front of Yeoreum’s narrowed eyes.

“So commit seppuku instead.”

Yeoreum’s focus blurred on the afterimage of the coin swinging left and right. His consciousness was helplessly sucked into hypnosis.

Reiko set Yeoreum down on the ground.

Hypnotized, Yeoreum was like a puppet. He moved according to Reiko’s commands.

Seppuku… Seppuku… Seppuku… Seppuku…

In a daze, he picked up a sharp stone. A stone to rip open his belly.

Ellen and Summer, buried in the mud swamp, shouted.

“What’re you doing?! Stop right now!!”

“Yeoreum, no…!!”

Their desperate cries didn’t reach Yeoreum.

He lifted the hem of his shirt, revealing his smooth abdomen.

He pressed the stone against his skin. Reiko commanded again.

“Show me your intestines.”

Just as he was about to slice open his belly with the stone clutched in his hand.

-Yeoreum…

A familiar voice flitted by.

It rang vividly in his mind. His deeply submerged consciousness rose to the surface.

The owner of the voice that pulled his consciousness from hypnosis was none other than Yuna.

Yuna… How did you…?

-Don’t worry, Yeoreum. I’m watching over you.

It was like a narration.

While grateful for waking him from hypnosis just before committing seppuku, he was at a loss for what to do next.

Reiko still stood before him.

“Why’d you stop the seppuku? You shouldn’t have broken free from the hypnosis?”

Reiko stepped closer.

Yuna’s voice in his head gave a new order.

-When I count to three, throw the stone in your hand at her face. You absolutely can’t miss.

What good would throwing a stone do?

The opponent was a monster who shrugged off explosions and gunshots. Mere stone-throwing couldn’t possibly hurt her.

-Just trust me. I have a plan. Yuna spoke as if to reassure him.

Yeoreum decided to trust her.

There was no other option.

Yuna began the countdown.

-One, two…

“…Three!!”

Summer, buried in the mud, shouted.

Yeoreum hurled the stone in his hand at Reiko with all his might. At the same time, Summer rushed at her.

The timing was perfect. Summer seemed to have received orders from Yuna too.

As Reiko flinched from the unexpected stone strike, Summer’s body slammed into her.

Thud-

Not stopping there, he stabbed Reiko’s shoulder with a tree branch embedded in his chest.

The branch tip pierced deep into her flesh.

With her shoulder impaled on the branch, Reiko smiled eerily.

“Summer, such a foolish act…”

“Shut up.”

He hugged Reiko tightly and leapt into the swamp.

Mud splashed. Rough ripples spread across the brown surface where the two had jumped in, then bubbles gurgled up.

The mud swamp grew calm.

Though Summer had charged like a rhinoceros and heroically perished with Reiko, it was too early to consider the fight over.

The two must still be locked in battle beneath the mud.

Ellen and Yeoreum waited for over five minutes, but neither surfaced from the swamp.

“Summer…?”

Ellen called out cautiously.

Then a hand suddenly shot out from the previously calm mud. Yeoreum and Ellen were startled.

The mud-covered arm that appeared was thick and muscular.

“Summer…!”

Yeoreum and Ellen joined forces to grasp the hand and pull.

Summer was hauled up. Though battered, he was still alive.

His harsh breathing was mixed with blood.

Yeoreum asked, looking at the swamp.

“What happened to Ishikawa Reiko?”

“She’s… submerged under the swamp.”

Buried in the mud. She had been vanquished.

It might be a stretch to say they defeated her with wisdom and courage… but they had won nonetheless.

However, there was no time for celebration.

The trees shook.

Long octopus tentacles stretched out and entered the mud swamp.

They grabbed and pulled up Reiko who had been stuck there.

The tentacles took her and disappeared deep into the forest.

Watching that hollow scene, Yeoreum and Summer muttered.

“The killer never dies…”

“Just like the cliché.”

—
Raei  Translations
—

I walked through the forest, supported by Yeoreum and Ellen.

In the end, we lost Reiko.

But I had a strong feeling we’d meet again soon.

Next time, I won’t go down so easily.

The battle had left deep wounds.

My joints ached and my heart beat irregularly.

When I pulled out the tree branch stuck in my chest, the bleeding was so severe I nearly met the Grim Reaper.

I barely survived thanks to the hemostatic agent. I was grateful to the Hyper sisters.

Unlike on our way in, we didn’t get lost on our way out of the forest.

We emerged from the woods. Seeing the open road without the dense forest brought relief.

I turned my head to look at Yeoreum supporting me.

I still didn’t know his real name.

“By the way, Yeoreum, I never heard your actual name.”

“Just call me Yeoreum.”

“But that’s my name.”

Then he made an unexpected confession.

“I… want to live as Han Yeoreum.”

He said he wanted to live as an ordinary university student in 2020s Korea.

Choosing a frail body over his superhuman physique was an irrational decision.

Perhaps he was a masochist?

“Why?”

“There’s no YouTube here. It’s a harsh era where I can’t even watch baby cat videos.”

“……”

“Summer… Don’t you miss YouTube?”

“I don’t need such things. I can watch slasher films in their golden age at the theater.”

“I don’t understand you.”

“I don’t understand you either.”

Yeoreum preferred 2020s Korea, while I preferred 1980s America.

Though our choices were polar opposites to each other’s souls, somehow it felt like we had found our rightful places.

“Above all, in that world, there’s someone I love.”

Yeoreum said.

I could understand what he meant.

Because there were people precious to me here too.

The warmth of Ellen’s hand in mine proved that.

-Then I’ll switch Nancy and Yeoreum. Get ready. The voice in my head said.

The voice had changed, seeming to be a new narrator.

She had instructed me to attack Reiko in tandem with Yeoreum.

I don’t know what happened in that other world. Anyway, things seemed to have worked out well enough to save us.

The sun was rising.

Sunlight bathed the earth.

Though we had stayed up for two straight nights and were battered and bruised from the fight, seeing the morning sun felt refreshing.

Before parting, Yeoreum extended his hand to me.

“It was an honor to meet you, Summer.”

“Likewise, Yeoreum.”

We shook hands, smiling.

Yeoreum slowly closed his eyes. Nancy’s body swayed.

I caught her delicate frame as she collapsed.

Long eyelashes trembled. As sunlight touched her pale eyelids, her closed eyes opened.

“…Summer?”

The soul that opened its eyes was Nancy.

She had returned to my side.

“Nancy, I missed you.”

“Me too…”

Nancy wrapped her arms around my neck and hugged me tightly.

Our soft lips met.

—