22. Opportunity Cost
And so, bitten and cursed by a parasite-like being—
I realized the Blood Festival was already coming to an end.
Not that it was much of a festival to begin with.
Just a few food stalls lined up—dreary, hollow, and halfhearted.Originally, Oto was supposed to be offered as a sacrifice at the end of this festival.
But the god—Lin'chi—had already been buried alive."I have a question," I said, still carrying the sleeping Headless Child on my back as Oto walked beside me.
"In this village, a new sacrifice is chosen every day, right?"
"That's right."
"But it's been three years since you were chosen. We were being washed in that coin laundry all that time. So 1,095 sacrifices should've already been made since then. Meaning, today's Blood Festival doesn't really have anything to do with you anymore, does it?"It wasn't Oto who answered, but the voice from my back.
"That's because the spacetime of the coin laundry and the spacetime of this Venus are completely different."
"What does that mean? Weren't you asleep?"
"I wasn't asleep," she giggled.
"It's just… it's been a while since I had a head, so I was deep in thought. I processed so many thoughts that I half shut myself down."
Then she continued,
"To put it simply—the servers are different. The coin laundry shop and this Venusian village are running on separate servers."
"I see…" I pretended to understand, then asked the real question.
"So today is… the same day we entered the coin laundry three years ago?"
"Exactly."
The Headless Child nodded—or at least, her neck stump moved slightly, tapping my back."But hey, how do you even know we went to the coin laundry?"
"Idiot," she said, smacking the back of my head.
"You're my head now, right? Then of course I can read your memory."
"…Fair enough." I nodded and changed the topic.
"But if the sacrifice is gone, that means the ritual to offer something to the god can't happen anymore, right? Won't that make the god angry and curse the village?"
"Of course it will."
Her tone was casual, almost like spoiling the ending of a bad movie.
"This village will be cursed by an angry god—and destroyed.""…What?"
Oto looked up, frowning.
"Really?"
"Obviously, you idiot."
The Headless Child sighed.
"You buried the god without even knowing that? Fool."
She spoke in that innocent, childlike voice, but with the weight of an old sage lecturing a reckless youth."What was the god's name again… oh, Lin'chi, right. I used to be friends with Lin'chi, you know. So I know her well."
After a short pause, she continued flatly,
"She gets hungry if she doesn't eat a sacrifice, and when she's hungry, she gets angry—and when she's angry, she destroys everything around her. Her belongings, her world, everything.
No matter how many times I told her, 'Intermittent fasting has great autophagy benefits,' it never worked. Lin'chi was built to prioritize pleasure a million times over health."Oto's face fell. The silence that followed was heavy, frozen.
I stayed quiet too, maybe out of sympathy—or maybe because, honestly, I'd only been on Venus for less than a day, and it all still felt like someone else's problem.After a while, Oto murmured,
"…I thought, if I disobeyed, the consequences would only fall on me."
"Liar."
The Headless Child's voice sliced through the air, sharp and cold.
Despite her child's tone, it carried a precise, scolding edge.
Even without a head, I could feel her glaring at Oto.
I could feel it—because I was her head now.
Her emotions and thoughts flowed through me like a second heartbeat,
an internal sense that wasn't visual, but spiritual."You knew from the start," the Headless Child said, her voice lowering.
"You knew that if you escaped being a sacrifice—if you defied the god—the whole village would suffer."I glanced at Oto's face.
The guilt was gone.
In its place was a calm, almost defiant smile.
It was so pure, so serene, that it sent a chill up my spine—
and it was terrifyingly beautiful.
So beautiful it was horrifying.
So horrifying it was adorable."So what?" she said softly, her smile unwavering, her voice trembling just enough to shimmer with ecstasy.
"This universe is cursed from the start.
The fact that we're given the instinct not to vanish—that's the real curse, isn't it?
We act only because we're enslaved to the spell called wanting to live.
I just followed it—that fundamental motivation born from the true god of this world: the law of entropy.
Who could blame me for that?""The answer's obvious," the Headless Child said, lifting herself slightly off my back.
Then, with the confidence of someone who might have created the festival itself,
she shouted for all to hear:
"—Everyone in this village!"In that instant, the villagers who had been lazily enjoying the Blood Festival moved in unison.
All at once, they turned toward us—each movement perfectly synchronized,
as if they were drones sharing the same control program."Because of you, they've been cursed.
They have every right to judge you,"
the Headless Child said, in a flat, bureaucratic tone—
but beneath it was something final, inevitable.And I understood.
The villagers—the entire festival—existed for one purpose:
to feel safe knowing that someone else would die today instead of them.
That was the true nature of the Blood Festival—
a communal therapy born from the distribution of fear.But tonight was different.
It had all been ruined.
Lin'chi was buried alive, the divine feast never held,
and the grotesque ritual—meant to be broadcast across the network—never took place.
The festival was ending, yet nothing had happened.
No sacrifice. No god.Something was wrong—terribly wrong.
The whole village had begun to sense it,
some irreversible disturbance.And now, Oto—and by extension, I—
were pierced by the stares of every villager present.Their eyes began to change.
The light within them turned red, murky, metallic—
like blood boiling into liquid steel.
A color that mixed rage and hunger.
It resembled fire, but colder, older—
a primal, glacial fury."This looks bad," the Headless Child said cheerfully.
"Hey, head—maybe it's time we left."
I knew, but I asked anyway,
"Why?"
"Because the villagers are about to come for her—
to drag Oto'chi's little rebel back as a sacrifice."She said it as if reading a script of the future.
And just as she did, the villagers' skin began to pale—
their blood draining, leaving a purplish-gray hue.
Their eyes grew cloudy, their motions stiff,
their breathing unified into one collective rhythm.It was a vision stripped of reason.
A herd driven by the most primitive urge: survival.
Venus-made humanoid robots—cutting-edge machines—
devolving as if infected by a virus.A sight that had never existed on Mars—
The zombification of humanoid robots.All I could do was watch."We don't have to pay the price,"
the Headless Child said, almost singing the words.
"It's just the opportunity cost that Oto'chi chose to bear."