BW C47

Chapter 47

Why.

For what reason.

Because of what.

While he floundered in confusion, Jeokudae took up a perimeter at measured intervals. The weapons they held flashed with a savage glint. Without blinking, they looked left, then right, searching for something. It seemed they were waiting.

It was a scene beyond understanding.

To Hoeun’s eyes, this was simply the place where a man had been pointlessly killed. Yet Taemuk and the soldiers of Jeokudae all looked as though possessed by something.

Yes. That made more sense. Otherwise, how could such—such a situation come to pass.

“S-Sergeant.”

Hoeun called to Gilsang in a constrained voice. Even as he called, he did not know why. What was he going to ask, or was he going to protest? As Gilsang began to turn toward him—

Thud!

The door of the thatched house right beside the dead man flew open. And from within—

Kaaaaaaaaaa!

A monster emerged. Its body was not so large, but its helmet-bone was so massive that as it came through the doorway the nearby wall crumbled to pieces. It was strange—the small body and the oversized head, and stranger still that a monster, of all things, had opened a “door” to come out.

The creature from the house thudded across the raised floor. At the same time, a rushing sheet of dark red blood poured out of the house like a waterfall. Beyond the door, the interior was drenched in blood. The floor, the walls, even the ceiling were splattered and smeared. Clothing soaked in blood lay in piles here and there, some large, some small.

“…”

Hoeun’s pupils shrank hard. Surely, the reason there were no villagers to be seen…

Kaaak, kak—kaaaak, kak-kak!

The monster screamed into the air. Its helmet, grotesquely big, was slashed and gouged with many marks—like the wrinkles of a long-lived old man. At the center of that helmet-bone sprouted a trident-like feeler. It looked larger and tougher than any feeler Hoeun had seen on any other monster.

Each time the creature cried out, the feeler shivered and rattled. And then—

Thump, thoom—thump, tonk!

Monsters burst out from here and there among the thatched houses. A dozen or so appeared. Their number was not great. Each of them was drenched in blood. Now and then a jacket or trousers was tangled around a shoulder or leg, likewise soaked through.

And a small straw sandal, fat with blood, came rolling from somewhere. Barely as big as Hoeun’s palm, it was clearly a child’s.

“Ah…”

Hoeun let out a small groan and closed his eyes. His heart was clamped in a vise. So the villagers truly had all been eaten by those things. He felt guilty, though he had done nothing wrong.

No—was there truly nothing? If he had not been sick, if their schedule had not been delayed, if Jeokudae had arrived sooner—might they not have been spared?

Of course, he would have stood uselessly as he did now—but still, still…

While Hoeun sank under a flood of black feelings, Taemuk kept issuing orders to the soldiers.

“Don’t approach. Wait.”

At that, the soldiers stepped back and set their weight behind them. They lowered their stances, ready to strike at any moment.

Kak—kaaak—krrrk—kak!

Kaaaaak!

But for some reason, the monsters did not charge Jeokudae either. They merely bared their blood-red teeth, and stomped savagely here and there among the houses. They did not advance.

The standoff held—a bizarre stalemate.

Then—a slightly smaller monster set a hand to the ground, lowered its body, and crawled forward. It did not come toward Jeokudae. It went toward the dead nobleman.

It grabbed the noble’s calf and began to drag him away. Even on the brink of battle, hunger could not be denied. As the creature pulled the man, the arrow scraped the ground and the man’s head jittered and shook in a grotesque tremble.

Kaak—kak—krrrk—kak!

The big one with the trident feeler shouted noisily. Its meaning was unknowable; it was unclear at whom or what it cried.

Then—Taemuk snatched a spear from a nearby soldier. He hurled it with force at the monster dragging the corpse.

Shweeeee—

Cutting the air, the spear made a harsher sound than an arrow—as if it tore the air, not split it.

The feeler-creature shouted when it saw it, but could do nothing about the flying spear. In a moment, with a wet thunk, the spear punched through the small monster’s head. It shot out the other side and drove into the ground. Dark, sticky blood ran in rivulets down the shaft.

Somehow, the way the monster died looked to Hoeun like the nobleman who had died with an arrow in his brow.

Kaaaak! Kik—kaaaaaak!

The feeler-creature glared at Taemuk with burning red eyes, as if in fury. Why kill my friend—or family? It had no speech, no expression—but that was how Hoeun felt it.

Could they—have bonds? Like humans?

Then, in an instant, the creature cut off its cry. The ground rumbled, and monsters came crawling from the house doors, from within the roofs, from under the floors, from the pond, from behind the crocks—pouring out without end.

“Ah…”

Hoeun exhaled a despair-soaked breath. The number that appeared easily exceeded a hundred.

A monster cuffed a charging Jeokudae soldier with the back of its hand. With that tremendous force the soldier flew—lifted from the ground. He did not fall; he gouged the ground with his hand to slow himself. Then he moved to rush the creature again. But—

Kaak!

From behind, another monster leapt down onto his shoulders. Unable to bear the weight, the soldier went down; another monster bit hard into his thigh. Another sank its teeth into his opposite calf.

“Aaaauuugh!”

With their numbers far fewer than the monsters, Jeokudae’s soldiers had to face—no, shoulder—three or four apiece. Each with a creature clinging to arm or leg, they swung their weapons with a desperate fury.

Crash! A crock rack shattered. A thatched house splintered. Wet thuds rose, and screams—beast’s or human’s, impossible to tell—mingled, while blood spattered everywhere.

Monster arms, fingers, ankles rolled across the ground. Men’s, too. But the monsters snatched them up and popped them into their mouths, making them vanish in an instant.

“…”

Hoeun’s mouth fell slack. Even in the valley, even in the bamboo forest, fighting monsters had not seemed easy. But now—it was no comparison. It made him think that what he had seen till now had not truly been the field of battle.

I must—I must do something. Be of use.

He was awkwardly swinging his leg to dismount when—

Thump—thump—thump—thump.

A monster charged at Hoeun—or rather, at Gilsang. Hoeun had been hidden at the very rear of Jeokudae’s formation; for a monster to reach him here meant the line had been breached.

“Uaaaah!”

Gilsang, who had stood guarding Hoeun all along, swung his sword with a kiai.

But—

Krrrk…

The monster twisted its head and dodged Gilsang’s blade. Because its body was so big, the blade still bit into its shoulder, but its weak points—the neck and face—were untouched.

At that, Hoeun felt his blood go cold.

It dodged?

An attack?

A monster?

Every monster he had faced till now had been mad with hunger, charging even as its neck was cut or its mouth was slashed—never dodging. And now it had dodged Gilsang’s sword.

Yet Gilsang did not falter; he chained his blows. The sharp blade sent sprays of blood—shh—shak—shh—flying from the creature. But it was blood from the shoulder, the arm, the chest—none of it mortal.

Kaaaak—kak—krrrr…

The monster did not seem to suffer even as it bled. Eyes flaring red, it hunted Gilsang’s flesh. Then it grabbed his blade and yawned its jaws wide for his head. Between saw-toothed teeth, saliva dangled in long ropes—

Bang!

A gunshot split the sky.

“…”

Hoeun’s hand that held the pistol trembled. His wrist tingled from the force of the shot. Though he had carried it all this time, this was the first he had fired. So he had, in truth, entertained a hope.

That with this gun, he could kill a monster. That he could save someone.

In truth, the bullet struck exactly where he had aimed, sank—into the creature’s hard helmet.

But—

“Ah…”

It only sank in. The flattened slug was visible to the naked eye, as if lodged in a shield. Which meant—it had done no harm.

In that instant, Hoeun was truly terrified. Not of death. Of defeat.

He feared Gilsang would die. He feared he would be eaten. Not for any other’s sake, but because he might die protecting someone as useless as Hoeun—that thought filled him with a piercing fear.