Chapter 45: Can You Touch Me?

“Ha, ha, ha! Are you surprised? Of course, you would be! To think a person with no face and no heart exists.”

What is this.

The moment I recognized his face, fear washed over me.

A peripheral, instinctual, irresistible terror embedded within humanity itself.

From the sky above, from the earth below, from the cracks in the concrete, shadows extended their arms, my vision dimmed, and I was caught by jet-black hands, sinking into the depths of the abyss…

Snap.

The sound of fingers snapping brought me to my senses.

My entire body was drenched in sweat.

“…What in the world did you do to me?”

I stumbled backward, brushing the dirt from my hands and wiping the cold sweat from my brow as I asked.

“That’s what I’d like to ask. How does my face appear to you?”

“That thing, that pitch-black hole is your real face?”

“Oh! You have talent. You certainly do. I’m talking about that lump hanging on your chest.

If you weren’t a magical girl, I would have scouted you on the spot. This… I’m still half-convinced, but if it’s you, then surely…”

Ignoring the man who was muttering incomprehensible nonsense, nodding to himself, and talking to himself with a flick of his fingers, I brushed off the dirt and stood up.

A lump, he said, a lump on my chest.

Right, you people, the Conclave or whatever you’re called, you definitely know something.

“You monster.”

“A monster, you say! I am clearly human. Well, for now, I am still human. I can show you my old identification card if you wish. I’ve never had a genetic test, so I can’t prove I have human genes, though.”

So he’s saying he’s quit being human. No different from a monster.

Perhaps not so different from magical girls, who are also transformed into something other than human.

Anyway, there’s something I must do first.

I was momentarily flustered by the incomprehensible phenomena and stream of nonsense, but he had kidnapped her.

How he found out my personal information, how he brought her here, what the tumor really is—I can ask about all that later.

Defeating him is the priority…

“Ah, right. I almost forgot about this. My attempt to surprise you, my prank went too far. Please, do forgive me.”

At some point, the sack covering the brown-haired woman’s head had been removed, and she was now cradled in the man’s arms.

I didn’t recognize her face.

“Ta-da! The mysterious victim’s true identity is… a complete stranger who merely resembles Miss Ahn Yujin. What do you say? Instead of my heart, which offers no thrill to stab, why not pierce hers? I won’t interfere.”

Thud.

The dull sound of the rapier, dropped from my limp hand, falling onto the grassy field.

From the moment this madman appeared until now, I haven’t understood a single thing he’s said, or a single thing that’s happened.

So much so that it doesn’t feel real.

“Hee, hee, hee.”

So I accepted it.

“Mmph, mmph…!”

I grabbed the jaw of the gagged woman with my bare hands and crushed it, then transformed the gushing blood into needles and stitched her limbs to the ground.

The man mutters something, as if critiquing my work, but I can’t hear him.

I surrender my body to the impulse and dismantle the victim’s body.

With every splatter of blood, flesh, and bone that lands on my face, I ascend to a new level of ecstasy.

“Ahhh…”

It feels so good…

I’m happy.

A little disappointing, though. That there was only one. And I was too hasty, just breaking her.

Then again, it’s not like I’ve ever learned torture. I’ve enjoyed this enough.

“Ah.”

No, this isn’t me.

The one smiling after turning someone who resembles Yujin into a ruin of blood and flesh is not me.

Relieved that it wasn’t her, yet I murdered this woman with ecstasy, as if I were killing her.

This wasn’t what I intended.

…No, that’s not right. I’m getting tired of these excuses.

“It makes no difference to me either way, you see.”

“What did you say?”

“It’s a personal matter of mine, and I can’t tell you directly, but… hmm.

Let’s just say, Miss Sanguine Obsidia, I still don’t know if you’re the one I’ve been looking for, but if you keep progressing as you are now, you could become a magnificent being.”

Clank.

Crack.

When I wrapped the man in chains of magic, he immediately grabbed them as if they were nothing and crumpled them.

“To be honest, I wasn’t sure, so I came to meet you in person, but seeing you has only made me more unsure.

Well then! It seems you’ve received my gift well, so I shall take my leave now.

There is, in fact, much I wish to discuss, but it would be wrong of me to take up so much of your time.”

Where do you think you’re going?

You suddenly appear, spout nonsense, and now you’re just going to disappear?

You’re just like those two crazy bitches.

No, you’re worse.

I can’t just let you go.

I drew up my magic, flowing it into the corpse’s blood, into the bloodstains absorbed by the earth, forging chains and blades,

“Then let us meet again someday!”

BOOM—

“Ugh… Ahk…”

Only after the man had vanished did I realize what had happened.

The flattened ground.

My body, embedded in the earth.

The ground indented along the outline of my body.

My magic, my power, all of it was nullified, scattered, and I was crushed in an instant.

I was played by him from beginning to end.

That I could become a magnificent being—what a joke.

It’s undoubtedly some trite nonsense about something being hidden in the tumor, and that I have the potential to become something great and evil, whether a demon, a demon king, or a monster.

I will never let you have your way.

No matter what. Your business is none of my concern.

And, I have to go back to her.

Now.

I hope I’m not too late.

***

I wash off the bloodstains, change the color of my hair and eyes, and change my clothes.

“Ah.”

No.

On a bench on the ruined station platform.

I saw her, collapsed as if dead, and ran like a madwoman.

Please, please, please.

A gentle, rhythmic breath.

The surging terror subsided once more.

Thank goodness.

That you’re not dead, that you weren’t kidnapped, that you haven’t disappeared.

That you didn’t abandon me and leave.

I lifted her head and laid it on my thighs.

You waited a long time, I’m sorry. For disappearing on you so suddenly.

I love you.

So please, don’t ever disappear again.

After the impulse and the fear had subsided, I brought my calmly beating heart close to her ear and stroked her hair.

“Mm… Seoa…”

Her lovely smile as she slowly opened her eyes and reached her hand to my cheek.

“I was worried. Wondering if something happened, if there was something you couldn’t tell me, if you were sad.”

“I’m sorry. It wasn’t like that, I was just…”

The words caught in my throat.

“It’s okay.”

Yujin said, sitting up beside me.

“You don’t have to tell me. Why, sometimes urgent things just come up.”

But her face showed a slight, a very faint hint of anxiety.

I hope she doesn’t notice the lingering scent of blood.

“Sometimes my period cramps are so bad, I have to run out in the middle of work. Um, ahaha. Forget what I just said. I was a little flustered…”

“It’s not like that.”

Seeing her try to brush it off felt like a dagger twisting in my heart.

“The truth is, the truth is, I.”

“Shh.”

She whispered, bringing a finger to my lips.

“It was the same last time, and it’s the same this time.

When you’re ready to tell me everything about yourself, I’ll listen then. Seoa. So, it’s okay. No matter who you are, or what you’ve done.”

In the end, I couldn’t tell the truth.

I lied.

I mumbled something about encountering a monster, whatever words came to mind.

How pathetic.

***

We stood on the train tracks, burning red in the sunset glow of the sun hiding between the distant mountains.

The disappearing sun, a vermilion light, flickered through her brown hair as it swayed in the wind.

The sunset.

I’ve watched the sunset with her countless times, but this was the first time I faced her with the sunset at her back.

The first time I looked at her, bathed in twilight, after realizing my love.

The scattered light reflecting off the rusted rails dizzied my eyes.

My vision blurs with affection.

Lies and love and affection and murderous intent all mix together, and only one emotion emerges.

She is lovely.

Even the pain of guilt clenching my heart is lovely.

I lied to you.

I killed someone again.

Someone who looked like you.

You said you would accept me, but I’m afraid you won’t.

I’m afraid you’ll disappear.

If someone, someone I don’t know, or someone who knows Sanguine Obsidia, harms you, kills you…

I feel like you’ll vanish as fleetingly as the sun disappears beyond the horizon, gone forever with a moment’s sunset.

I took her hand.

I’m afraid of being abandoned by you.

I’m afraid you’ll hate me.

I’m scared of being despised by you.

But, Yujin, I’m more scared of losing you.

The thought of you disappearing is what I fear most.

So,

“I like you.”

Please stay by my side.

I know you won’t leave me, but give faith to the foolish, despicable me, the me who cannot trust you.

Give me fanaticism.

I’m foolish, and a coward, and always trembling in fear, but I felt if I didn’t say it now, I never would, so I had no choice but to say it impulsively.

I had no choice but to let the sunset-tinged emotions take over and confess.

So please, please answer me.

“I like you too, Seoa.”

Hand in hand,

“I really like you.”

She smiled, and let go of my hand.

The flowing clouds, the clothes fluttering in the wind, the rattling stones, the sunset light scattering along the tracks,

Stopped.

In this world, there was only you and me.

No.

That’s not it.

I don’t like you as a friend.

I don’t like you as a neighbor.

I can’t be without you.

Lee Seoa cannot exist without depending on you.

I’m always thinking only of you.

I want you to think only of me too.

I….you…

“I love you.”

I love your body, your heart, everything about you.

“It’s not that I like you. I love you. I want to be your lover. I want us to love each other.”

Please accept my heart.

“I love you.”

The frozen world began to move again.

My legs tremble in the wind, the sunlight makes me dizzy.

I sink into the sensation of the earth’s chill seeping into my bones, into fear.

My vision blurs.

Ahn Yujin grows distant.

Her silhouette fades.

I’m being rejected, abandoned, broken…

And then,

The sensation on my lips.

The touch of her lips, which I’ve felt countless times, carrying a faint scent, pressing against mine.

“As for an answer, is this enough?”

She said, stroking my lips after they had parted.

How much time had passed?

The burning sunset glow faded, and the sky took on the color of ash.

Our first kiss.

Two lips, two loves, had finally met.

But it’s still not enough.

“…Do it again.”

Because I’m still anxious.

A peck, where our lips, both slightly puckered, just briefly touched.

“More, do it more.”

We pressed our lips together for longer.

The frantic thumping of our hearts, pressed against each other in an embrace, is transmitted between us.

More, one more time.

As if to weave together a love that lasts but a moment by repeating it over and over.

On the abandoned tracks, submerged in the cold chirping of insects as darkness completely descended,

We shared short kisses. On and on, endlessly.