Chapter 11 - Oni no Soranenbutsu

1

The second floor of the annex detachment.

Proceeding down the hall, Hiroshi and Takuro moved into the other room. An antique-looking bookshelf and desk greeted them. The room would have had a calming vibe to it if not for the unsettling purple light ruining everything. There was no way for anyone to read a book peacefully in here. Then there was the matter of the creepy paintings decorating the walls. Eyeball monsters glared at them from all around.

“These were in the hall, too. What are they? They’re so disgusting.” Takuro raised an eyebrow as he looked around.

“They look like demons from a guide to sorcery that was popular in Europe from the late Middle Ages to the nineteenth century,” Hiroshi answered, inching his face closer to one of them.

An iron stench assaulted his olfactory organs. Perhaps there was blood mixed in with the paint.

“Hey, I remember seeing these in the notebook my father left behind,” Takuro said, scratching at the gauze on his cheek as if it was beginning to bother him.

“Can you remember more about the notebook?”

“He wrote, ‘I have so much left to do. Where is this devil? If I could just find it.’ Stuff like that.”

“Hmm, that is curious.”

Takuro crossed his arms and shifted his gaze back to the paintings on the walls. Perhaps the reason his father had bought the property despite the rumors of a monster lay hidden somewhere within the mansion.

“Hey. We don’t have time to sit around culturing ourselves. If we don’t hurry it up, the monster’s gonna show up again,” Takuro said irritably.

Hiroshi had been staring intently at the canvas for quite some time now. Long enough to push Takuro over the edge.

“...Oh, yes. Right.”

It was true that this certainly wasn’t the time to get lost in thought about the hellish monster depicted in the artwork. Hiroshi had a bad habit of becoming fixated on anything that caught his attention, causing him to lose sight of all else. And that could prove fatal in this situation.

Hiroshi berated himself as he stepped away from the wall. Heading to the side of the room opposite Takuro, he began looking for something that could serve as a screwdriver. First he checked the bookshelf. On the spine of one particular book were foreign letters that formed the shape of a crawling snail. He had no idea what they said. In fact, he couldn’t even determine the language of the writing.

At the end of the bookshelf, however, was a pleasant surprise: a flashlight. He flipped the switch on it, and a white light spilled forth from the lens. This could be useful for their trip back through the underground path. Hiroshi put it in his pocket.

“How about this?” Takuro called from the other side of the room.

He’d been searching the desk drawers, and was currently holding up a box cutter in his right hand. It very well might work as a replacement screwdriver.

“Good idea. Let’s go try it.”

Not a moment after those words left Hiroshi’s mouth, a strange noise came from the corner of the room. His eyes immediately shifted to the source. A small cat had jumped out from the shadow of the bookshelf. Its eyes were not freakishly large, nor was its fur blue. It was just a normal mixed-breed cat. How had it gotten in here? The cat slipped past Hiroshi’s feet, jumped atop another bookshelf, and disappeared through a tiny crack in the ceiling.

“Yeesh... Don’t scare me like that.” Takuro breathed a sigh of relief.

Hiroshi’s heart was racing, too. He thought nothing could faze him, but after coming to this mansion, he’d become quite the coward. He made to move the corners of his mouth and give Takuro a smile when a strange creature appeared from the shadow of the bookshelf. This time it was no cat.

“...”

The shock of it was so great that Hiroshi couldn’t say a word. Its slick and gleaming skin was blue. The fangs in its mouth curved inward. There was no doubt it was related to the monsters that were relentlessly pursuing them. But this one looked unlike anything they’d seen so far. At around 50 centimeters tall, the monster stood there with its fangs bared and its beady, rabbit-like eyes trained on Hiroshi.

“Wh-What is that?” Takuro asked fearfully.

Hiroshi stared back at the monster. The monsters so far, though they all radiated the same vicious aura, were at least still somewhat humanoid in form. The creature standing before Hiroshi now, however, looked like no animal he knew of—human or otherwise. Short arms and legs sprouted from its angular body. Eyes and a mouth dotted the area that appeared to be its torso. It had no chest, neck, or head to speak of. The only thing Hiroshi could think of to liken it to was an animated, possessed block.

Its round eyes looked left and right. It was almost cute in its own way, but they couldn’t afford to let their guard down just because it was small. Piranhas were small, too, after all. And the rows of sharp fangs in this odd monster’s mouth were quite clearly enough to fatally wound someone.

The longer Hiroshi looked at it, the stranger the creature seemed to him. Was it a vertebrate? Where were its intestines? Could it right itself after falling down with those stubby limbs? His curiosity was piqued, but now was not the time to study it closely.

“We need to go, Takuro—”

He looked away from the monster for a second. That was a mistake.

“Hey, Hiroshi!” Takuro called to him, his expression stiff.

Pain ran up Hiroshi’s right leg. He looked down at his feet to see that the small monster had chomped into his calf. The curious beast squeaked like a mouse as it moved its mouth.

“Hiroshi, don’t move!”

Takuro vaulted over the desk. He raised his right hand high and then brought down the box cutter on the monster, stabbing it in the eye. It let out a high-pitched scream like a supersonic wave and jumped back. Fresh, bright red blood dripped from Hiroshi’s leg where its fangs had sunk in.

“Can you run?” Takuro asked.

“Yes, most likely.”

It hurt, but the wound wasn’t all that deep.

“Then hurry!”

They both fled the room. As they shut the door behind them, they heard the sound of the monster slamming into it. Dragging his right foot, Hiroshi followed Takuro down the hall. They could hear the door being beaten down with every step they took. Just how much power did that little creature have? Hiroshi glanced behind him and saw it coming straight for them, the box cutter still protruding from its right eye. Its legs carried it at an unthinkable speed compared to the other monsters.

Stabbing it in the eye must have made it mad, because the monster ran right past Hiroshi for Takuro. Jumping higher than even the cat had, it flew toward his face. He reflexively brought up his right arm to defend himself, and the monster happily bit down. Blood flew everywhere like a juicy piece of fruit had just exploded. The monster’s mouth began moving far faster than the eye could follow. It was like a squirrel nibbling on a walnut at hyperspeed. The delicacy of choice was just Takuro’s arm.

The sound of fangs scraping against bone echoed down the hallway. This was nothing like when it had bitten into Hiroshi’s calf. Perhaps that had just been its way of playing around, similar to the way a puppy might nip your hand.

“Let go! I said let go, you bastard!”

Anger filled Takuro’s face as he desperately swung his arm around. But the monster clung to him with its stumpy arms, determined to not let go. Its fangs continued to mercilessly stab at him over and over.

“Ow! Stop it! Uwah—waaahh!”

Hiroshi grabbed the monster with both hands and tried to pull it off Takuro. Unfortunately, its body was slick like a sea cucumber’s and easily slipped from his grasp.

“Ahhhhhhhh!”

Takuro’s screams shook his eardrums. He had to do something.

Hiroshi pulled out the plate fragment he’d been keeping in his pocket and drove it into the monster’s back. A strange blue liquid spilled out of it and pooled into the puddle of Takuro’s blood already on the floor, staining his shoes the same strange ultraviolet color of the lighting in this part of the mansion.

The monster ceased its attack on Takuro and turned its attention to Hiroshi. The box cutter fell from its right eye and impaled itself in the floor. The monster’s vertically narrowed eyes were just like those of a snake staring down its prey.

The small beast bared its bloody fangs and leaped at Hiroshi. Its speed was terrifying. He tried to evade to the side, but his wounded right leg was too weak to move.

No! Is this the end?

He prepared to meet his maker. But the small monster let out a short cry and landed on the floor. Then it scurried away back to the previous room.

What just happened?

Hiroshi cocked his head quizzically and looked at the door with the monster-sized hole in it.

“...Mika?” he heard Takuro say from behind him.

He turned around and followed Takuro’s gaze. Mika was indeed silently making her way up the stairs.

No, that’s not her. Don’t make that mistake.

Hiroshi shook his head. The small monster had appeared to have run off in fright. And the reason... was her.

2

Sometimes it takes losing something to realize how precious it is. For Takuro, that was Mika.

Takuro had always been the center of attention. The adults praised him as a great student. He was the popular kid in class. The cool guy. No one ever had anything bad to say about him. And yet he always felt alone.

The reason was obvious. He only thought of other people as pawns in a game, and no one ever seriously tried to challenge him. They knew what he was really like; they just pretended they didn’t. They considered it dangerous to have him as an enemy, so instead they tried to curry his favor. The adults only praised him because they wanted to have an in with his father, the most powerful man in town. Everyone wanted to be close to him, but no one ever really wanted to be his friend.

Except for Mika. She was different. She was the only one who truly loved him. Sometimes she would pointedly say things to make him angry. It was irritating, but he now realized she only said those things because she genuinely cared for him.

And he had betrayed her. The last time they’d gotten trapped in the Jailhouse, he’d used her as a human shield to escape from the monster. He still couldn’t forget her expression as he pushed her. There was no way he would make the same mistake again. Especially after witnessing the pathetic end his father had met.

“You okay?” Mika asked, drawing her face closer. “That’s a nasty wound.”

It wasn’t until she said something that Takuro finally realized the extent of the damage he’d taken from the monster’s “nibbling.” A gaping section of his forearm was horribly gouged. He could see bone through muscle fibers. It was serious enough that it was a miracle he hadn’t passed out yet. Was it all the adrenaline pumping through his body? He felt pain, but it wasn’t anything he couldn’t handle.

“Did the monster do this? We have to stop the bleeding. Sit there,” she said, taking off her coat and wrapping it around his arm.

“Takuro, we need to run.”

Takuro turned his head when he heard Hiroshi’s warning. He was standing there with the box cutter pointed at them.

“That is not Mika.”

“What’re you talking about?” Takuro snorted and laughed. “It clearly is. Are you so scared that your brain short-circuited?”

“Remember what happened to Takeshi. He looked just like his old self until he revealed his true form.”

“Hiroshi... What’re you talking about?” Mika asked, a look of confusion on her face.

“Mika, look at me,” Hiroshi said, shining the flashlight in her eyes.

She blinked her eyes a few times, but that was it. There was no violent reaction like a werewolf catching a glimpse of the full moon. She simply looked bewildered.

“I thought as much.”

However, Hiroshi seemed to have come to some sort of conclusion. He shook his head as he pocketed the flashlight.

“Mika is dead. You aren’t Mika. You’re a monster with Mika’s memories.”

“...Huh?”

“Heh, don’t worry about him. He’s just a bit rattled,” said Takuro, smiling reassuringly as unease clouded Mika’s face. “More importantly, where have you been this whole time? I was worried.”

“I don’t really know. I sort of remember being attacked by a blueberry-colored monster in a child’s room...”

“It is possible that the monster has the unique ability to instantly analyze the DNA of anything it eats and then transform into a complete copy of it.”

Hiroshi’s words resurfaced in Takuro’s mind. He studied Mika’s face. Could it really be? No, that was ridiculous. Her skin was white and smooth. Her lips were glossy. Her tiny dimples were even there when she smiled. There was no way she was a monster.

“When I came to, I was in this building. Then I heard you shouting, so I came upstairs... Speaking of, where are we, anyway? This isn’t the Jailhouse, is it?”

“Unfortunately, it still is. It’s just a separate section of the annex. We have to find the last piece of the keycard and get out of here.”

“Oh, I think I found that,” Mika said, her voice bursting with excitement. “We can open the front door with this, right? Isn’t this it?”

She retrieved a plastic fragment from her breast pocket and handed it to Takuro.

“Seriously?” His heart leaped at this unexpected turn of fortune. “Mika, where did you get this?”

“I don’t know. I just had it when I woke up.”

“Hey, Hiroshi, do you see now? Would the monster just hand over the card like that?”

“I’m afraid you’re the one who doesn’t see, Takuro,” Hiroshi answered solemnly, shaking his head. “Judging from its shape, that’s the piece the monster ran off with. What’s in front of you isn’t Mika. It’s the monster that attacked you in the entrance hall.”

Mika’s... a monster? That can’t be.

“Seriously, what are you two talking about?” Mika arched her eyebrows in suspicion. “What do you mean... I’m a monster?”

There was true fear on her face. It was too hard to see her as an enemy like this. Understanding Takuro’s misgivings, Hiroshi continued.

“Takuro, you must not be swayed. The girl you see before you is simply acting based on Mika’s memories. She herself believes she’s the real Mika.”

“If she’s got her memories, then doesn’t that make her the real thing?” Takuro said angrily. “I can’t betray her again. If her heart is still in there, then there has to be a way to save her.”

Takuro defiantly turned away from Hiroshi and grabbed Mika’s arm.

“We only need one more piece of the card to open the front door. Mika, come with us.”

However, she quickly untwisted herself from his grip.

“...Mika?”

“No.” Mika shook her head. “Hiroshi is probably right.”

“Huh?”

“Something feels weird. I’m super hungry. When I look at the blood flowing from your arm, my mind gets even cloudier. I feel like I’m losing myself...”

“You’re not. You’re still you.”

“Takuro, you’re shivering. I can see your breath and everything. It must be really cold here. But I don’t feel it at all. I even gave you my coat. Honestly, I’m so hot that I can’t stand it. It’s like there’s a fire in my guts...”

She stepped away from Takuro and shook her head over and over.

“I’m sorry, Takuro, but this is goodbye. I’m happy you tried to protect me. Thank you,” she said before fleeing down the stairs.

3

Mika always had a lonely look on her face. Even when she was fooling around with her classmates or laughing at a TV show, there was a loneliness deep in her eyes. Now Takuro understood. He’d come to have special feelings for her because he sensed the same loneliness that he felt in her. He thought that if they were together, he might be able to fill the giant hole in his heart.

“Hey, wait!”

He reached out for her, but it was too late.

“Takuro, no!”

Ignoring Hiroshi’s cry, he chased after her.

Don’t run away, Mika. We have to be together.

Mika ran down the stairs, proceeding further into the building. She pushed open the double doors to the left.

“Mika, no!”

She went inside without turning around, but Takuro wasn’t about to give up there. Placing his hand on the unique, over-the-top golden door, Takuro pushed it open and followed her in.

“Where is this...?”

He gulped at the sight before him. Rows of ancient wooden benches lined up before what looked like an altar. Was it a chapel? The mood of the room was distinctly different from the hallway. He looked up and saw a domed ceiling high overhead. It seemed the building was shaped like an upside-down U, with the chapel at the center.

Returning his gaze to the front of the room, he spotted a white statue of a goddess on top of the altar. But the thing at her feet didn’t look the least bit holy. Covered in creepy feathers, thin arms sprouted from its giant eyes—it was the same eyeball monster he’d seen picture after picture of since coming here.

He could hear Mika sobbing nearby. He found her curled up in the shadow of one of the pews, shivering like a child who’d lost their mother. He kneeled down, softly hugging her from behind. The warmth he felt from her settled his heart.

“Why did you come?” she asked, still hiding her face.

“I want to save you from this nightmare.”

He wasn’t lying.

“It’s too late. I’m already dead.”

“You’re not dead. You’re right here, aren’t you?”

“No. I’m not me.”

“Yes, you are. You’re clearly you. You have that same sadness in your eyes even when you smile—that’s the Mika I know so well.”

“Takuro...” Her back still turned to him, great tears began to fall from her eyes.

Takuro heard the heavy doors to the room open again. Hiroshi must have come after him.

“Hiroshi, don’t bother. No matter what you say, I won’t abandon Mika—” Takuro began to say as he stood up and turned around.

But towering over him was the giant monster. Its sharp fangs instantly pierced his chest. He felt like he could hear Mika screaming from somewhere far away.

No. I can’t die yet. I have to save Mika...

“Noooooooo!”

Mika’s face swelled horribly as she wailed.

“I’m sorry... Mika...” he whispered as he watched her transform into the monster. “I... betrayed you again...”

He couldn’t tell if she heard him or not. His vision was rapidly fading. And just like that, his consciousness sank into a deep, dark abyss.