Chapter 61 : Chapter 61
Volume 1
Chapter 61 : The Love God’s Whisper (1)
In the end, Ann still walked up to the door.
Although that man feared this place so much, there was no way anything good could be inside.
But just like a button with a “Do Not Press” note on it only made people want to press it more, humanity’s inborn curiosity and contrarian nature drove her to stand here.
No, that was not the only reason.
There were also some subtler motives, the kind that were hard to put into words.
For example...
Her intuition.
Ever since stepping into this village, Ann had felt that something was wrong.
In the shadows, she always had the sense that something was there. Yet whenever she looked, there was nothing.
After meeting Eluca, that feeling only grew stronger.
It was as though something was hidden beneath Eluca’s lively, adorable smiling face.
Something far more terrifying than what she let others see.
And yet that very thing made people unable to resist wanting to pry deeper.
Like the serpent that tempted the first child to eat the apple.
“I’ll just... take one look.”
Ann placed her hand on the doorknob.
The icy touch calmed her a little.
She held her breath and listened for a while, making sure Eluca was still busy in the kitchen.
Then—she pushed.
With a faint scraping sound, the door opened.
Ann cast her gaze into the room.
And then, her pupils contracted violently.
...
From the moment she entered this house, a faint floral fragrance had lingered in the air.
Ann recognized it as the scent of perfume, since she used it occasionally as well.
But once this door opened, that floral fragrance became even stronger.
No, stronger was not the right word.
It was suffocating.
As if several bottles of perfume had been smashed inside the room at once, the overpowering floral scent was almost enough to make breathing impossible.
And yet even so, Ann still caught the smell hidden beneath the perfume.
The smell of blood.
A blood stench so thick it would not disperse.
Ann saw it.
The room was not large.
In the dim, flickering light, several moths circled around the lamp, forever on the verge of throwing themselves into the flame, only to be stopped by the cold glass shade.
Beneath that light, upon an iron bed, lay a young girl in silence.
Completely naked.
And across her body, from her rounded breasts all the way down to just above a private part, there stretched a huge and gruesome wound.
Her organs had spilled messily out from the gash, and so much blood had flowed that it seemed long since exhausted. One could even see the darkened membranes clinging to the exposed viscera.
The girl had been disemboweled.
“Urk—”
The sheer shock of it made even Ann feel her stomach heave.
She clapped a hand over her mouth and instinctively staggered back a few steps, only to step into some kind of liquid and splash it all over herself.
It was blood.
A vast quantity of blood covered the entire floor of the room.
That coppery stench, too strong for even the heavy perfume to hide, came from this.
There was no way this much blood could have come from just one person.
Then where had all this blood come from?
“Ah... gghk... gghk...”
Just as Ann’s mind descended into chaos, she suddenly heard a hoarse voice, as though it were being squeezed out from deep inside someone’s throat.
Like the voice of a vengeful ghost.
Ann slowly lifted her head, her neck stiff with dread.
To her horror, she discovered that the disemboweled girl was not dead yet.
But her organs were scattered all over the place. How could she still be alive?
Perhaps disturbed by the noise Ann had made, the girl slowly turned her head and looked toward the maid standing in the doorway.
“Gghk... gghk...”
The girl’s face was as pale as paper, her eyes vacant.
Whether she still possessed something like sight at all was impossible to tell, but she faced Ann, her lips moving weakly, like someone at death’s door trying to use the last of her strength to cry for help.
But what came out was not a plea for help.
It was—
“I... love you...”
With a twisted expression, the girl forced out those words from her dried-up throat, a confession that seemed overflowing with love.
“I love you...”
“I love you...”
“I’m sorry, I love you...”
“Wuu... I love you...”
The girl’s voice drifted through the room like a cold wind.
It made one’s skin crawl.
But just as Ann was on the verge of turning and fleeing no matter the cost, a familiar voice rang out.
“My Master found out.”
The crying stopped at once.
As though a wailing infant in the dead of night had truly run into a man-eating monster.
It fell silent immediately.
“Eluca...”
Ann slowly turned her head.
The process of turning felt unbearably long. She could almost hear the bones in her neck grinding.
“Why did the Master have to open this room?” Eluca sighed helplessly, carrying a tray of tea like a young girl whose little secret had just been discovered. “According to my plan, this was supposed to happen much later.”
“Much later? What... what do you mean by that?”
“It means that... everyone... is going to come and receive my vast and boundless love.
Just like they did.”
Eluca casually tossed aside the teacup in her hand, then smiled and lifted her blouse in front of Ann, exposing her abdomen.
—On Eluca’s pale lower belly, beneath her cute pink underwear, a dark human face was embedded.
Without much thought, Ann recognized whose face it was.
Because she had seen that face not long ago.
—It was Eluca’s mother, exactly the same as in the painting.
“I love you...”
“I love you...”
The face wailed in pain, but the words spilling from its mouth were still those same three words, brimming with love.
As though it could no longer say anything else.
“And this one too.”
Eluca turned around again.
On her back was another darkened face.
—Her father’s face.
“I love you...”
“I love you...”
That somewhat aged face was streaming with tears.
It seemed to be enduring unimaginable agony, yet its lips were stretched into a high smile.
When it repeated those three words, its expression overflowed with joy.
Twisted enough to inspire terror.
“What... what is going on here...”
Ann instinctively stepped back, trying to put distance between herself and Eluca.
Only now did she finally understand that compared to the disemboweled girl behind her, horrifying as she looked, the smiling Eluca before her was the true source of terror.
“First my dearest father and mother, then dear Ade, then all the neighbors who always looked after me, and after that... it’ll be your turn, Master.”
Eluca turned back around and counted them off on her fingers one by one, just like a child counting her favorite sweets. Pure delight shone in her eyes.
“Look, Master. I have so many people I love. I’m so happy.”
“Eluca, get a hold of yourself. These things...”
“I am very clear-headed.”
Eluca cut her off with a smile.
“In fact, I’m very grateful to you, Master.”
“Grateful... to me?”
“That’s right. It was you who taught me what true love really is.”
“What—” Ann’s mind went blank for an instant.
“I taught you?”
“Yes. Didn’t you teach me that day by the lakeside, Master?”
Eluca raised both hands high, overjoyed.
“True love is something above all else! It has no taboos! It lets people rightfully possess the thing they love! Wasn’t that exactly what you told me?”
“After I came back, I told the divine being about your teachings, and the divine being was very fond of your way of thinking too.”
“The divine being?”
“Yes. The one who granted me the power to love others—the great, benevolent deity who governs all love in this world—Lord Love.”
Eluca reached out a hand toward Ann and smiled.
“So, will you accept my love as well, Master?”
“Love... a god...”
Ann’s mind was in utter disarray.
Too many things, too many developments she had never anticipated, were battering at her reason.
And yet, drawing on the composure and knowledge she had cultivated for so long, she still managed to sort out one line of thought amid the chaos.
A line of thought...
The worst possible line of thought.
“Eluca, you...”
Ann lifted her head and looked at Eluca in bewilderment.
Then, in a low voice trembling in a way even she herself did not notice, she asked:
“Have you... been corrupted by an evil god?”