CHAPTER 6
Translator & editor : Cuties
Ten frail sheets of paper were lined up on the table. But, the dust that had been piled up on them was gone because the boy cleaned it off. There were no spider webs hanging under the table either; the boy cleaned those up too.
The boy has beco a young man, and has not visited since the day I found out that he was not the warrior who could kill . Quite a lot of ti has passed. It was just horrible for to think that I still had more ti to pass this way.
When I turned a card over, the picture of death was revealed. The future was not going to change either because we couldn’t change the present. I know the future but I couldn’t change it. The young man had no choice but to change it himself.
I didn’t know when my future was coming. When will the light that will give eternal rest co? How long do I have to wait like this? How long do I have to repeat this terrible ti?
After organizing the cards, I sat against the wall. It was all right to go back to the way it was. I had to be so dead, forgetting the ti, thinking nothing like before I t the boy.
I lie on the floor and perate into the endless darkness.
*
“Why do you keep pushing away?”
The warmth I felt on my cheeks woke up with a jolt. The young man’s white face was too close. I was so surprised that I tried to escape, but there was a wall behind my back that I couldn’t move. Hot breaths dispersed through the young man’s lips filled with the sll of alcohol.
“Why… why do you keep trying to die?”
Why won’t you let die when I’m not even alive? And in fact, the young man’s words weren’t completely sensible because even if I tried to die, I couldn’t, so he didn’t even have to worry about my dying.
I turned my head away from the young man’s red eyes. His hand swept down my hair. My flesh shriveled with goose bumps. But the hair he was fumbling with ca down to cover my face and neck so I had no choice but to remove his hand.
“What are you doing?”
“I didn’t know you were this young. I was scared at first, and then I couldn’t recognize it because you were covered in black things. But now I see you’re younger than .”
“You must have forgotten that I am a witch.”
This young man seed to forget that I was a witch, though he had been doing that for a while. My ti stopped when darkness swallowed the world, just when I was about to beco an adult. But the days of my life were imasurable.
I was alive before this young man was born, even before his parents were born, and was going to live even after the young man died.
When I first t him, he was a young boy, but now he is a decent young man, and soon he will grow old alone and beco dirt. Unlike .
“Yes, witch. This is the tower where the witch is locked up.”
The young man gave a self-deprecating smile. At first, this young man had co to kill , a witch. However, starting from a certain point, he tried to save , and now he tells her not to die. It was beyond my comprehension.
The young man, who was once a warrior, was trying to save the witch the world was trying to kill.
“But you’re really pitiful and affectionate.”
A young man who was once a warrior was now sympathetic to the witch. I didn’t know whether to be happy or sad. So far no one has sympathized with . They never tried to find the reason for living an eternal life, nor did they ever stop coming up with more ways to kill . They just branded as a witch who laid a curse on the world.
“And beautiful.”
The young man was even saying the witch was beautiful. Seeing my skin badly distorted by wounds, my hair and eyes resembling the darkness that drove the world into pain.
The eyes of an angelic young man seed to see the world differently. As a witch, I can’t even imagine how it looked through his eyes. My appearance was so disgusting that I was better off covering my whole body with rotten blood, which slled bad. I couldn’t find my forr self.
“Look at .”
The young man forced to turn my head, but I was not confident enough to see myself reflected in his eyes, so I held my head down stubbornly. But I was soon confused by what I heard next.
“I love you.”
It threw off guard. The young man smiled at my visible surprise. Whenever his body shook, his white hair also disturbed my vision. I had to doubt my ears. Maybe my ears were broken.
No, maybe this young man in front of was a fignt of my imagination. There was no other explanation for what I heard just now. It must have been a series of lucid dreams since the first ti he aid his sword at . At so point, I created the angel that I desperately wanted.
“You didn’t know? Really?”
What? That you’re from my imagination? Are you asking whether I had believed you were real this whole ti? Are you laughing at for being crushed by a re phantom?
“I’ve never forgotten you since the first ti I first saw it. I tried to disregard it, but it was hard. I kept thinking about you without realizing it, and eventually I ca. The more I t you, the more I tried to ignore you, the better I liked you. To the point of madness.”
I couldn’t get myself together. The hand of the young man which was sweeping my hair grabbed by the back of my neck and pulled hard and led right in front of his face. His breath felt hotter. I lowered my gaze and tried not to look into his eyes.
This is my fantasy. I ended up going crazy. I spent a long ti alone, and I couldn’t stand it, so I created a fantasy. If I don’t get back to reality now, I’ll suffer forever.
But the mont the young man buried his face in my shoulder, I couldn’t fool myself anymore. He was hot and solid. This young man was alive and breathing.
It wasn’t my imagination.
“I understand you. I want to be with you. Don’t push away.”
My body trembled at the young man’s whispers. Understand ? You? Is the young man who was once a warrior saying he understands the witch? Has the man who ca to kill , co to love instead? A witch who is terrible, ugly, dirty, and makes the world groan in pain?
Is this another curse given to ?
“You…”
“Huh?”
“You understand ?”
I pushed the young man hard. As the warmth went away, I felt montarily cold. It was always like this, though I never thought it was cold, but now I did. It was because of the young man in front of . He shook everything I was used to.
I tore off the clothes covering my neck. The cool air caressed my neck following the ripping sound. The young man, who showed signs of embarrassnt for a mont, soon opened his eyes wide. Then he reached out his hand.
“The wounds…”
He looked shocked when he saw the wounds on my body that had previously been covered by my hair and clothes. The wounds always healed by themselves, leaving only traces, but new wounds kept adding up to old ones to create terrible shapes. My face hidden in the darkness was similar. It was just less than the rest of my body.
“This is what humans did.”
The young man, reaching out to my neck, hesitated. His hands got suspended in the air.
“You’re human, too.”
Eventually, he withdrew his hand. The young man’s lips opened for a while as if he had sothing to say, but then they closed up. I spoke without taking my eyes off his lips.
“When I see you, I think of the events of those days. The sight of your eyes reminds of the pain of burning.”
I rembered the faces of n who caused pain and the days when I cried endlessly. It shook , who was as dead as I could possibly be in the dark; to bring all that had sunk deep into my mory to the surface.
The hair reminiscent of snow, the eyes reminiscent of the sun, and the face of a young man like sunshine reminded of happy days. It troubled by reminding of the happiness that I could never go back to, and that I could never have again no matter how I desperately wished to.
The young man covered his face with his hands. I didn’t know whether it was to stop from seeing him, or to stop him from seeing .
“And you will die earlier than I will. I will have to spend a long ti alone again. You remind of all my mories and emotions, and you slow down my endless ti, and, most of all, you leave. With only satisfied. You don’t think about who’ll be left behind. Is that what you call understanding ?”
The young man still didn’t understand . No, it was better to say that he didn’t even an to understand . He only thought from his point of view, he never considered my excruciating situation. That’s why he kept coming and shaking .
“If you understand , don’t co back again. Don’t show up in front of . It’s better for to wait like the dead as I always have until the warrior who’s going to kill appears.”
I couldn’t stand being alive.
“…I’m sorry.”
The young man eventually left and I was left alone in the dark.
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