episode_0082

“Where should I start talking… … .”

The young lady said that and closed her eyes.

Her clean skin, without any blemishes, glowed palely in the moonlight.

To those who don’t know it, it may seem like beauty that just comes from mystery, but to me, it was just an absolutely terrifying sight.

“Mel, what do you think happens when a person dies?”

The words spoken by the young lady, who was quietly closing her eyes, were not about her past, her principles of action, or her identity, but were a simple Zen question and answer.

What should I answer? What kind of answer did you want, why did you ask such a question? What came before understanding was the question about the meaningless Zen question and answer.

I felt like I had to answer somehow, but I didn’t know what to answer. The question of what answer to give changed over time to a question about the intention of the question itself.

Why are you asking such a question? I wanted to ask, but I couldn’t. In this situation, I couldn’t answer the young lady’s question with another question because I thought I might die.

Even though I remained silent, the young lady did not urge me in any way. He just looked down at me quietly, as if waiting for an answer to come out of my mouth.

The interrupted conversation and the silence between the young lady and me were like a noose, tightening my neck as time passed.

“Dying… … I think so.”

I regretted it after spitting it out. This is the only answer I worked so hard to come up with. I wanted to sew up this mouth that gave me an answer that was nothing more or less than a play on words.

As I kept my mouth shut out of fear, I heard the girl’s laughter overhead.

It was not the stuffy feeling I felt in the cellar that night, but rather a refreshing laugh that made me feel good just by hearing it.

“Ahaha, ahahaha! that’s right! When a person dies, they die. That’s it. It doesn’t mean anything more than that. but… … . The way I think of death is a little different.”

Did I give the right answer… … ?

Before I could answer the question that came to mind, the young lady looked at me with a wide smile.

“Death is the blade of the guillotine, and life is the rope that holds the blade of the guillotine. And the person holding that rope is a person.”

“You can hold on to the rope until it breaks over time, or you can let go of the rope and choose death. Waiting for death and choosing death. Choosing either way is human will.”

“Okay, then, one question here. What do choosing one’s own death and death coming to oneself have in common?”

I felt the underside of my eyes flutter as I heard another Zen question whose meaning I could not understand.

“Well, I don’t know… … .”

“The correct answer is liberation.”

For me, I wonder what on earth the lady wants to say. I couldn’t understand what he was thinking when he said that.

“The rope becomes so weak that it breaks on its own, or it lets go of the rope on its own. What they have in common is that they are liberated from life through death.”

As I continued to think about interpreting the meaning of those words, instead of coming up with a proper answer, I only felt dizziness that made my eyes spin and nausea that felt like my stomach was turning.

“From painful things, scary things, fearful realities, aging bodies, and truths we don’t want to accept. In other words, you will be completely liberated from the countless endless tasks. You become truly free.”

Even though we were clearly speaking the same language, the feeling of something being off, that slight sense of disconnect, was very unpleasant.

I felt a strange nauseating feeling, as if something writhing in my stomach was slowly reaching out to get out of my mouth every time I exhaled.

“If that freedom dies, doesn’t it mean nothing…? … ?”

A question I asked without thinking.

Against my will to keep my mouth shut, my mouth moved on its own and spit out those words.

It was my unconscious expression that I should not take the death at that strange point in time that the young lady spoke of at face value.

Can not be done. He will be angry if you climb up like he did then. I gritted my teeth and closed my eyes tightly because of the pain that would come soon, but strangely, no pain came.

When I slowly opened my eyes, I made eye contact with the young lady who was still looking at me with a kind smile.

“It’s natural to think that way. Any human being would naturally think that way. Why is that? That’s because we don’t know what happens after death.”

The young lady’s smile and voice were so kind, but at the same time so cold.

Just sitting in front of her and looking at her face made me feel like my heart was freezing.

“Ignorance equals fear. However, from my perspective, death is truly liberation. lets think. Think about it from your own standards as a living person. When your mother died from drug addiction in a brothel, think about how you felt when you saw her.”

You shouldn’t think about it. When I think about my mother――Ah.

The more I tried not to think about it, the more vividly the image of my dead mother came to mind.

That terrible memory came to mind, the disgusting death of my mother.

“Tell me. What did you think when she died in front of you?”

“It’s terrible… … . It was disgusting.”

“And?”

“I’m afraid it will end up like that too. I’m afraid I’ll die the same way… … . Oh, I was scared.”

“Isn’t that the only thing?”

What can I say? I just――

“Ah… … .”

The emotions that I had been trying not to think about, that I had suppressed and hidden so that they would not be visible or surfaced, slowly raised their heads.

“Lethal death… … .”

“Why did you think that?”

“You made me like this and made my child die… … . It’s shameful to feel comfortable alone… … .”

While I was speaking, cold fingertips touched my face and silenced me.

The ice-cold hand gently pushed my chin up, and I naturally made eye contact with the young lady.

“Do you understand now? What I mean.”

Death is liberation. It is liberation from the pain of life and freedom from the fear of death.

I felt like I was going out of my mind. I felt like I was being forced to accept something I shouldn’t have accepted. I felt the familiar feeling of being kicked in the stomach.

Just like back then, just like when I was pregnant, I felt like something was wriggling inside my stomach, squeezing my intestines and kicking my stomach from the inside.

Just before something distorted, it covered everything. Don’t remember. no. Don’t accept it. This is not this. It’s wrong.

As I was catching my breath with my hands on the floor, I heard the young lady’s voice above my head.

“I am. I was deprived of my natural right as a person called death.”

When I raised my head, what I saw was the young lady’s face, all expressions gone. The face, without the mask of expression, contained an unknown strangeness.

Skin like porcelain with no trace of vitality, eyes like glass without any emotion. A mouth that emotionlessly spits out its thoughts.

The sight of something other than a human imitating a human was not only unpleasant, but also came across as an indescribable horror.

“You, Hermel, your father, your mother, your younger brother, Sera, and Seria, everyone who lives in this world has an equal end called death, but for some reason, I am outside of that equality.◦ @◦

The eyes of the young lady who said that looked somewhat sad.

“Of course, I also hold the rope. But… This rope I am holding is not a guillotine rope, but a rope for the purpose of closing the door in front of me.”

“I cannot die even if I let go of the rope. When I let go of the rope, instead of a giant blade hitting my neck, the closed door opens. Do you know how painful this is?”

“Eternal repetition, never knowing when it will end. Even if you die to someone, even if you kill someone, the door to the next place will eventually open. If I’m dead, someone picks up my body and throws it over the next door. And then it starts again.”

“Do you know how great the loneliness of being released alone in a world where everyone except me is tied to the guillotine, this feeling of being different from everyone, and the fear of not knowing when this cursed life will end?”

“Do you know what number of lives I live? Do you know how many times I died from Sarah and how many times I killed Sarah? How many times have you been admitted to the academy? How many times did you kill your father? What was killed by him?”

“You asked me what it was?”

Every time the young lady said something, I felt like bugs were crawling in my head.

“I don’t know either.”

In the end, I lowered my head due to the unbearable nausea and vomited out what was inside.

“Wow!! Whoop! Kahak, haha… … . ha… … . Woooo!!”

As I vomited up what I had eaten and vomited out gastric juice, my throat felt tingly as if something was pricking my throat with a needle. The unpleasant stickiness and smell of undigested food lingered in my mouth.

A kind but twisted hand touched my cheek. I shivered as I felt my heated body cooling down in an instant.

The young lady traced my face and smiled.

“Do you understand?”

I nodded to the last question.

* * *

I looked down at Mel, who was trembling.

“Okay. It’s all good, but you lied again at the end. How do you understand something that even I don’t understand?”

“Hehe… … ?”

“Hehehe, that’s naive. The last question is a trap. A trap to see if you will tell me the truth or a lie.”

Mel blinked with a confused expression on my face.

“I told you this a while ago, right? Be honest. But you lied again and again just because you wanted to escape the pain. To escape the situation. You broke your promise to me again.”

I sighed and shook my head.

“But it would be too wasteful to kill you here.”

With a grin, I let go of Mel’s imprint that I had been suppressing, and it wasn’t long before. Mel wrapped her arms around her stomach.

“Ugh… … !!?”

“Originally you would have died, but you still have a lot of use to you. therefore. In return for lying to me, I will take what you value most.”

At those words, Mel opened her eyes and called to me anxiously.

“No, no, no!! no–!!! Please, lady!!”

“If you’re asking for one more chance like Sarah… … .”

no.

With a cooing sound. Mel’s uterus was crushed.

“Ah, ahhh!!! Off–!! Ahhh!!”

“Now you don’t have to worry about having an abortion. Congratulations Mel.”

I smiled and patted Mel’s head.