#4
“What… are you doing here.”
Johannes’ voice was hoarse. His stern rebuke was so low it was barely audible. He clearly looked terribly exhausted, and seemed angry at the improper visit.
I was at a loss for words and forgot to make excuses for a while. Moving without a plan, driven only by anxiety, I found myself speechless when actually facing him.
Now, what should I do? I tried to apologize somehow, but inadvertently stepped on something with my bare feet and closed my mouth. Hearing the sound of something rolling, it seemed to be shattered pottery or something similar. Why hadn’t he cleaned it up yet? I was momentarily flustered. I didn’t know where to step.
My vision was blocked, making my whole body feel unsteady. Dizziness struck as if I would fall over any moment, and I finally reached back to grasp the doorknob for support. Johannes, who had moved far away, showed no intention of helping me. I didn’t approach any further either. I simply spoke haphazardly.
“The floor is still… a mess. Why haven’t you cleaned… Look, I’m sorry for coming. I thought you’d be surprised, but I was worried. I couldn’t sleep easily worrying about you. I’m sorry. Are you… alright now?”
My heart wasn’t fully composed yet. Though I didn’t raise my voice lest it leak outside, even to my own ears my words sounded rushed. Johannes rejected me.
“Go back, Inette.”
“The knights were treating you roughly. Are you injured anywhere?”
“I’m not hurt…. I’m fine, so go back.”
“No. Look, I can’t leave. You, you looked so unlike yourself earlier, so I was really worried… Ah, I can’t find the lamp. Where’s the flint? Won’t you open a window? It’s too dark.”
“……”
“Or come here, Johannes. At least let me see your face.”
“I.”
Johannes, who had opened his mouth hastily, abruptly cut off his own words. A brief, impulsive silence followed, and there was a sound of his Adam’s apple moving as if swallowing words he couldn’t say. And shortly after.
“I’m fine.”
Though I couldn’t guess the content, it was clear that the following words had completely cut off his true feelings. It was a voice that seemed forcibly, forcibly squeezed out against his will. But unable to simply turn back, I pleaded.
“Show me.”
“…I said I’m fine…”
“I want to confirm for myself. Otherwise I’ll be too worried to sleep. Please?”
“How many times do I have to say I’m fine. And it’s too late.”
“Yes. It is late. You’re right, but…”
“If you know I’m right, then go back.”
“We’re not strangers, and after what happened, what’s wrong with just letting me see your face…”
“You should have at least brought Griselda with you. Go.”
“Even so…”
“What do you mean, even so.”
Johannes was adamant, keeping an invisible, vast distance. There was a black river there that day. The futile argument continued.
Come here, do you want to see me die of worry, in the time we’re talking you could just show me your face once. With an anxious heart, I persistently requested, scraping together all the eloquence I could muster. Johannes, seeming to think this was dragging on too long, remained immovable without any response.
“Then I’ll go if you see me off.”
To my desperate proposal…
“Stop trying.”
A dry laugh came back. As if to say don’t pretend to care, as if to say I’ve already seen through your half-sincerity. It was a coldness I had never received from Johannes before. I was momentarily at a loss for words. As I had been sufficiently suspicious of myself, my feet began to tingle.
The deed I had already committed that day. The hope that it wasn’t an irresponsible mistake and my desire to end that anxiety. That shallow selfishness. The stone coffin. Since there was no other reason I had come all the way down to Johannes’ bedroom despite all the risks.
So it was already a lost cause. Feeling it would be disappointing to stop now, I persistently clung on, and Johannes finally lost his temper.
“What’s wrong with you today? Why are you being so persistent? Damn…”
Johannes couldn’t stay in one place. He prowled around like a tense sentry. The sound of debris being kicked around under his feet was busy in the distance. Johannes spoke quickly.
“Let’s stop this. You made a mistake from the start. You, you shouldn’t have come down in the middle of the night. Did you drink ox horn soup for dinner? What did you eat to make you so bold as to come down to a dark man’s room… Are you in your right mind?”
“No, Johannes. I came down, but you’re the one who let me in…”
I had been hurt by his unprecedented attitude from the beginning. Adding indignation to that, I argued a little. At that, Johannes seemed to be overcome with resentment. He blurted out in a rather rough tone.
“What if I hadn’t let you in? What was I supposed to do with you in that situation?”
“You could have left me. Then I might have just left on my own…”
“……”
The low noise that had been continuing suddenly stopped. It was a steeply falling silence, even the sound of breathing collapsed. I was taken aback by that extremely quiet yet intense reaction.
In fact, Johannes was born bright and clear, someone who managed to smile faintly even during the war. So it was the first time that day I saw Johannes display such anger. Moreover, as the image of Johannes having a fit flashed in my dark mind, I even felt afraid.
He’s so dumbfounded he’s lost for words, it was my fault for pushing it. I had such thoughts even in my anxiety.
“…I’m sorry.”
There was no answer.
Johannes. I managed to summon courage and called him a few more times, and as I prodded, coaxed, and soothed him with no response, I gradually grew accustomed to the darkness. Soon I could see a shadow standing in the middle of the room. Without any sound or movement.
I read a firm rejection in Johannes’ silhouette. There seemed to be no other way. That’s enough, it can’t be helped now. Just as I was about to turn away, having given up on persuading him.
“Ah.”
Suddenly, Johannes let out a groan.
At first listen, it was closer to an exclamation than a groan. As if suddenly remembering a forgotten promise, or as if unexpectedly stabbed in the neck in an unexpected place, a brief vocalization that sounded a bit surprised. He collapsed forward, clutching a broken bed slat.
“Johannes?”
“No! Don’t… come, don’t come!”
When I took a step forward, Johannes cried out like a scream.
After that, it happened in an instant. A scene like a vision of hell began to unfold. I couldn’t even think of averting my eyes, I just covered my mouth.
How disorderly and arbitrary are memories?
I witnessed it. Something suddenly bursting out from Johannes’ back as he writhed and twisted his entire body sprawled on the floor. Johannes’ distorted shadow growing grotesquely large. And Johannes, crouching like a newborn beast cub, slowly rising to his feet on the floor. And the sound.
The sound of flesh tearing. The bizarre sound of bones dislocating and realigning with a crack. The sound of seeds taken out of the belly suddenly growing into a living body rang out fiercely. And the sound of fragments scattered on the floor breaking again and again.
The whole situation was as brief as an era ending in an instant. Only his groans lingered long.
Ah, ugh, uuugh…
Long, long, and cruelly long.
Johannes, changed beyond recognition, staggered to his feet. I was trembling so much I could barely stand. I truly felt like I would cry.
Even in the pitch darkness of the room until then, Johannes standing silently with his back to me looked excessively large. He had always been taller than me since he was fifteen, but especially so now.
Johannes’ posture was unnatural. It was strange, like an unknown beast standing on its hind legs rather than a person. There was something on Johannes’ back. Something wide and long stretching out, I recalled it looked just like when a bat in a tomb folded its wings covered in membrane.
Then Johannes turned to look at me. Like another darkness in the darkness breaking, the chilling sound of a spine twisting rang out.
“…Jo, hannes?”
“……”
Beasts about to hunt are silent. Though my fingertips had been trembling in fear for a while, I couldn’t move carelessly for fear of provoking him. I simply turned my body quietly, grasped the doorknob, and slowly, turned, opened the door.
When the corridor light cut into the inner room, I met eyes with Johannes who appeared even darker in the light. With eyes filled entirely with silver without any whites, and pupils narrowed to slits, it truly did not have the appearance of a human. With a face resembling Johannes, tilting its chin to follow me like relentless wildness, its eyes were those of a dragon.
So it was a demon. No matter how you looked at it, it was clearly the demon passed down in my mother’s family.
Johannes was not there.
This is how a person reacts when faced with extreme terror. First, thoughts disappear. The brain, with no time to think, shuts off, and something that can barely be called instinct flares up and moves to the muscles, making the limbs twitch. Vision narrows extremely, fixating on the threat before one’s eyes.
But in fact, it can’t even be called “seeing,” it’s merely a screaming reaction of “I want to live, I want to live!”
Did I scream then?
What commotion arose then?
I don’t know well.
I only remember an arm that seemed to tear through the air roughly closing the door again. And since it covered my mouth, I may have screamed at the top of my lungs.
With my mouth blocked, my breath caught in my throat. If it hadn’t been embracing my waist, I surely would have fainted backwards. Its chest pressed against my back. Grrr…. The low terror settling in my ears like a beast rumbling its throat is still vivid.
Only then did I regret bitterly. I should have heeded my mother’s warning that it should not be used carelessly because no one could predict in what direction it would manifest. Ah, I didn’t know it would turn out like this. If it was going to be like this, I should have begged for that old man to be killed, begged for him to be killed on the wedding night. Ah, demon.
You intend to kill me to prevent that marriage.
When the male lead is punished by carrying the female lead’s child and having periods like a woman
“I’ve given birth to two children for you, yet you still think about him.
Was I nothing but his substitute to you from beginning to end?”
Synopsis:
Meng Huan, a scumbag who has dated countless girlfriends, transmigrates to a female-dominated country.
Day 1: Whether it’s female dominance or not doesn’t matter. The beauties here are passionate and amorous. Isn’t it easier to date them than in modern times?
Day 2: After a night, Meng Huan discovers the differences in the female-dominated world. Men here actually have chastity locks and menstrual cycles. This hinders his ability to perform, damn it!
Day 3: What’s wrong with sleeping around? I don’t want you to marry me. I’m meant to be a playboy. I don’t care about male virtues… What? You want to drown me in a pig cage? Marry, I’ll marry!
Day N: Meng Huan inexplicably vomits and receives the shocking news of his life… He’s pregnant.
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