Laila stood motionless, unable to breathe. She wished she could faint, but even that was impossible.

Black holes stared at her as she stood there trembling.

The children looked merely ashen, with empty spaces where eyes should be, but otherwise not much different from living children. Realizing this, Laila suddenly felt her stomach twist.

“Come here.”

At that moment, a man’s arms pulled her trembling body into an embrace. Laila felt her mind snap to attention.

It was the warmth of a living person, something she had rarely felt even from her own mother. As it touched her entire body, her head tingled and she felt feverish.

“What are you doing?”

As Laila tried to turn her head, the man thrust his own head over her shoulder.

Laila, nearly kissing his cheek, struggled frantically to escape his embrace. But the man’s strength was incomprehensibly powerful.

“I’m sorry. Please bear with it and stay still for a moment. That’s it…”

One of the man’s arms loosened. Though it was now much easier to break free, Laila strangely remained still, following his words. It wasn’t that she wanted to… That was the strangest part.

Why didn’t she want to disobey this man?

As Laila pondered this odd question, the man fiddled with something that looked like an ornament attached to his monocle. There was a clicking sound, as if winding a spring, and the man spoke.

“Ah, I can see well. You really do have good eyes… Alright, stay still like this.”

“What on earth are you talking about?! We need to run away from here right now!”

Laila had shouted with all her might, but her own voice sounded pathetically small to her ears, like a mosquito’s buzz. The man glanced at her with his naked eye, not wearing the monocle.

“It’s alright, you’re safe with me.”

“What do you mean it’s alright…!”

At that moment, something began to crawl out of the twelve children’s eyes, or rather, from where their eyes should have been. It was exactly like what had come out of Tommy.

Some looked like thread snakes, others like centipedes. Some even resembled tangled spider webs. Whichever they were, it was horrifying, and even more terrifying was the fact that they were approaching to envelop Laila herself.

Just as Laila was about to scream and break free from the man, suddenly everything went pitch black and she couldn’t see anything. Laila cried out in terror.

“I can’t see! Oh God! I can’t see anything!”

“Shh, shh. It’s alright. Open your eyes. Look straight ahead.”

“What are you saying?! I already have my eyes open…!”

Her words and breath seemed to stop at once. Everything was dark and she couldn’t see anything. But the moment she put strength into her eyelids, Laila’s vision suddenly cleared.

“Can you see now?”

The man was still holding Laila with one arm, his head close to her shoulder as he looked ahead. At that moment, Laila realized something was strange.

Just earlier, when Laila had encountered Tommy alone, he had clearly tried to attack her.

That grinning face split wide open, that clear hostility – Laila couldn’t have failed to notice it. If the man hadn’t appeared, she surely would have died.

But the twelve ghosts before her now were different. Laila involuntarily felt their emotions flowing into her. Hostility, anger, and endless fear.

‘Afraid? You? Of what exactly?’

—Huu… Kuh…

—Kik, kikik…

The children began to make eerie sounds. Neither human nor animal. Just as Laila’s fingertips, shoulders, and knees stiffened like tree trunks, the man whispered.

“Good, they’ve realized it now. That you are ‘one who can see’.”

“What… What are you talking about? I don’t understand at all…”

“You will understand.”

He took out a small box from his leather bag. With one hand, he flipped open the lid, and a thin chain floated out into the air.

At that moment, the children’s jaws opened so wide they nearly reached their necks. Their mouths split and dark holes appeared. Then came a scream that could tear one’s ears apart.

—Aaaaaagh—!!

Stop!

Laila thought. She couldn’t even speak. It felt like her head was about to explode.

The sound they made, the screams they let out, forced their way into Laila’s mind like heavy rocks.

‘Stop, stop! My head feels like it’s going to burst. Stop, please!’

At that moment, the man’s voice was heard.

“The brass soldier at the window, the broken spoon in the fireplace.”

—Keeek…!

—Kik, kuuk…!

The box began to rattle. Even as she screamed from the headache, Laila clearly saw the scene before her. The ghosts’ forms were twisting grotesquely. It was exactly like Tommy. Only the sheer number made it even more horrifying.

“I ask if all things are in their proper place.”

As the man finished speaking, the chain floating in the air shot forward with a sharp sound like an arrow.

What had been only as long as a necklace suddenly stretched endlessly, wrapping tightly around the grotesquely twisted and tangled ghosts.

As the man held out the box in one hand, the chain was sucked back into the box with a hissing sound. Once the lid closed, the screams that had been scratching at Laila’s mind disappeared. Not only that, but all the ghosts had vanished as well.

Cold sweat ran down her forehead. Only then did Laila realize she had been practically buried in the man’s embrace. She hurriedly stepped back. Her staggering body seemed about to collapse at any moment.

Laila’s lips trembled.

“You… What did you do?”

At that moment, the man raised one hand as if to signal for quiet.

Laila, who had never lived a life of taking orders from others, bristled at this too, but something like a hand deep inside her mind seemed to reach out and suppress her quick temper.

‘What is this feeling?’

While Laila was lost in confusion, the man opened the lid of the box that had closed on its own.

Laila flinched, worried that the trapped ghosts might burst out in an even more horrific state, but what came out was a black, round bead. Sleek and with an ominous sheen…

“Eat.”

The man said, raising the bead to shoulder height without even looking at Laila. At that moment, unbelievably black smoke flickered behind his shoulder and enveloped the man’s hand holding the bead as if swallowing it whole.

And then a terrifying sound began.

It was the sound of a living person’s bones being completely broken and crushed. Laila felt she could hear faint screams in between, and knew they sounded as thin as a child’s voice.

The man kept his hand raised until the crackling noise disappeared, his face twisted in quite an unpleasant expression as he turned his head away.

When the disgusting sound stopped, the smoke disappeared as if washed away. And the bead the man had been holding was no longer visible.

“It’s over.”

The man said with a sigh as he removed his monocle. Laila thought that this time she really needed to run away. At that moment, her trembling heel caught on a stone.

“Ah!”

A scream burst from her lips as she fell on her bottom. The man reached out his hand to Laila.

“Don’t touch me!”

Laila fiercely swatted away the man’s hand. Though it probably wouldn’t hurt much even if she hit him since he was wearing leather gloves, she had no desire to take his hand willingly.

But at that moment, she could clearly feel it. A sharp stabbing emotion in the center of her chest – it was guilt.

Why? Laila raised herself with a confused face. Why am I feeling guilty towards this man?

The man said,

“I was just trying to help you up.”

Laila glared at him as if to say it wasn’t necessary.

“You, what exactly did you do? Are you some kind of blessed priest or something? Someone who can get rid of ghosts? Or a magician? That bead just now… Who did you feed those children to? What kind of trick was it?”

The man chuckled.

“You have a lot of questions. Is your curiosity influenced by your mother?”

“My mother was not a curious person.”

“That can’t be true. All witches are obsessed with exploration. Don’t witches spend their lives exploring nature, magic, and strange things?”

Laila’s face darkened.

This man was not from the village. Yet he knew exactly about Laila’s bloodline, and even the fact that she could ‘see’ something.

“You… Who are you really? Did you come looking for me on purpose? Knowing that I’m a witch’s daughter? Knowing that I… can see strange things?”

The man was silent. But this time he didn’t laugh. Looking at Laila’s face intently, as if lost in thought, he said,

“Could I have a piece of bread? Then I’ll tell you about what you’re curious about. I’m about to collapse from hunger right now.”

* * *

Although there was some disagreement, Laila had no choice but to bring the man to her house.

She couldn’t let someone in such strange attire walk down to the village, and above all, she felt she wouldn’t be able to sleep for the rest of her life if she didn’t find out his identity.

The man really was hungry, as he devoured in an instant the half loaf of bread Laila had left from breakfast and the soup that contained only herbs.

His eating speed was incredibly fast, yet it didn’t feel crude, which was fascinating. Laila found herself observing the man without realizing it.

“That was delicious. Did you make this soup?”

“What, did you think a nymph brought it?”

Despite the sharp retort, the man didn’t seem offended and just smiled. Laila roughly tossed the empty plate and soup bowl into the sink and pulled up her mother’s old chair to sit opposite the man.

The man said,

“You look very serious.”

“Don’t even think about slipping away after just eating my bread and soup. As you can see, yes. I am really a witch’s daughter and I am also a witch. If you lie to me, I’ll dry up your tongue and turn you into a stutterer.”

Despite the quite vicious threat, the man didn’t lose his composure and smiled gently.

“Alright, I’ll answer honestly. What are you most curious about?”

Laila leaned her upper body over the table and said,

“Who are you and where did you come from? How did you know about me, and most importantly, what did you do earlier?”