Prologue
Dreaming.
He was holding a heavy sword. Every time he swung it, the weight felt just right, and the sensation of cutting through meat was perfect. Even though the blade was stained with blood and grease, it remained as sharp as ever, with hot blood dripping down its groove, soaking the gloves even further.
There was nothing particularly good or bad about it.
It was somewhat pleasant, like when one stretches lightly to exercise.
However, as long as it wasn't the prey he was after, it was nothing more than the mere satisfaction of moving his body.
*Thud*. — One down.
*Thud*. — Another one.
"Where could it be...?"
He hummed to himself.
It must be somewhere in this building.
That formidable prey.
It didn't matter if it died. Or if someone else died in its place. Whoever was responsible for bringing things to this point would have to be dealt with.
Eventually.
"...Ah."
He smiled.
He found it. At the top of the stairs, shrouded in complete darkness, with no light at all.
"I'm good with my nose, but my intuition is even better. Especially when it comes to prey, I've never been wrong."
As he whispered softly, the prey began to flee. In the darkness, leaving behind just enough of a faint trace to be easy to follow.
It didn't utter a single word. The hurried footsteps as it fled sounded somewhat unnatural.
Perhaps it was injured somewhere.
But it didn't matter. All he had to do was catch it and slit its throat. Then again, who knows?
Last time, the gun exploded when he fired it; maybe this time, the blade would break. But
even with a broken blade, it wouldn't be hard to cut a man's throat. What miraculous luck
would it show this time?
Would it survive again? Even after this?
It didn't take long to catch up to the prey. He couldn't help but admire how it barely managed to dodge his blade with subtle movements. It was more reflexes than luck keeping it alive, at least for now.
Indeed, it wasn't going to die easily.
A thrill mixed with murderous intent began to creep up.
It didn't matter whether it died or not, but if he had to choose, it would be better for this man to die. It's always better not to have anyone with an unbreakable connection to that person.
Yeah. But at the same time, that was the problem. If he killed this man with his own hands, that person would surely resent him.
That was the only thing that dulled the tip of his blade.
But how far would this man's incredible luck go? He was tempted to test it.
At the dead end, he reversed his grip on the blade. Then, without hesitation, he thrust it
toward the prey, which was panting in the darkness right in front of him.
But just as he did, a gunshot rang out as if perfectly timed. The sharp scent of gunpowder.
"Step away from him."
Yeah, he knew it would come. He knew that person would come looking for this man. He
thought it wouldn't matter if they didn't, but it was even better that they did.
He smiled. It didn't matter who came first. Whether it was this man or that person. It didn't matter who killed whom or who died.
The fact that the other person had a gun was no obstacle at all. What actually hindered him was the sound of commotion from below as people started to make their way up. It seemed like the worms were finally crawling up.
He was injured, and so was that person.
His abdomen seemed to be deeply cut, but he merely clicked his tongue. This was just a light price to pay for tonight's brief enjoyment. He was thinking of sheathing his sword when the footsteps from below almost reached them.
Alright. Tonight was quite enjoyable. It would be enough if he never saw these people again, either in front of him or in front of that person.
He didn't care what those two men were shouting. He was already thinking about returning to Berlin. Yeah, taking that person who must be staying somewhere in this distant Frankfurt.
He flicked off the blood that had congealed and clung to his sticky blade. The thick, caramel- like blood glistened darkly under the flashlight that one of the men who had arrived had shone on it.
A beam of white light pierced through the darkness and shone on him.
Wiping the blade on his coat, he cast a disinterested glance around. There were his victims―or rather, the ones who almost became victims.
Before he could notice the gag that explained why the man couldn't speak while being chased, his eyes fell on the blood- and dust-streaked face.
Their eyes met. The hand wiping the blade froze.
"...—."
He stood there as if frozen, staring intently at the face. Blinking once, twice, as if he couldn't believe what he was seeing.
"Tae..."
For a moment, even the words that were about to leave his tongue froze. A name he was all too familiar with almost slipped out, but his mind suddenly went blank.
The owner of that name shouldn't be here.
That person shouldn't be sitting there.
The person sitting there was the one he had just tried to kill with his own hands.
The man, who had been staring blankly at him without blinking, finally blinked as the sweat mixed with blood dripped into his eyes. Only then did he realize his eyes weren't deceiving him.
Was that really the man I tried to kill?
If his hand had slipped even slightly. If he had seriously tried to slit that man's throat just a bit more.
He might have been staring at a corpse right now. The corpse of the man who would have had his throat slit by his loyal blade, lying under the beam of that flashlight.
"....."
The man, pushing aside the unconscious man who had collapsed on top of him, slowly stood up. Though his legs wobbled, and he briefly stumbled while propping himself up with his hands, the man staggered toward him. As he wiped his face with his arm, he clicked his tongue as if he had brushed against a wound.
When the man was right in front of him, he, who had been standing there blankly, just
staring, finally spoke.
"Ilay. You need a hospital."
"What...?"
He couldn't register what the man was saying. He just stared into the man's living eyes, confirming that his living lips were moving.
"Your insides are showing."
The man gestured with his head toward his abdomen, seemingly too scared to look down.
Following the man's gaze, he saw his guts squirming out from the gash in his belly.
So what? That didn't matter at all.
What were you thinking?
Did you call my name in your mind while running away without a word? Did you shout for me to stop? Did you scream silently as the blade tore your flesh?
"Let's go."
" —Where to?"
He grabbed the man who was turning away in a daze. The man looked up at him with wide eyes.
"Hospital!"
"...Ah....Hospital....Not necessary."
"I need it!"
The man insisted, his face turning pale. He looked down at the man for a moment, then
quietly followed behind. As they walked down the stairs, the man screamed at him to stop, saying, "Don't walk! Your insides will spill out! Get a stretcher!" So he had to stop again.
He couldn't take his eyes off the man, who shuddered and muttered that he couldn't tell the difference between him and a corpse if he wasn't moving.
He didn't die. He's alive. I didn't kill him.
The sensation of coldly freezing his heart was too much to call it relief. The heart, frozen as it was, slowly began to beat again as he watched the man run to the others and ask for a stretcher, then run back to him.
"Ah...Just looking at you makes my heart stop. If I stay with you, I won't die of old age."
The man, lowering his gaze carefully to his body, frowned. When he muttered something about needing to wrap it up with a bandage or something, and he replied, "It's fine," a fierce gaze shot back at him. Only after receiving that gaze did he begin to feel a faint sense of relief, and he quietly took a deep breath.
But.
At that moment, he realized.
This could happen again at any time.
Regardless of his will.
His nature, the people around him, and the entanglements with them could always lead to the same thing.
That was the price he had paid for the life he had built without any obstacles until now.