I am merely an imitating shadow, a false mask. It should have been me who disappeared, and yet...

  Yvette felt herself falling into an endless spiral. Perhaps death would not bring relief, but only plunge her into yet another, deeper dream.

  Something withered fell off behind her. Turning to look, she saw those crimson tendrils that had once grown on the Rat Island. Judging by their appearance, Martha's honey-sweet mead must have been severely problematic, having caused her mental instability and near-loss of control.

  Regardless, she must handle the matter at hand first...

  She was born to endure hardships, long accustomed to forcing herself—no matter how painful or disheartened, she would fulfill her duties or obligations without fail.

  Just like in her previous life, when the side effects of chemotherapy had caused severe neuralgia and vomiting, severely damaging her internal organs and leading to their functional failure. Almost every meal was torture. Other patients would have lashed out or refused to eat, but she continued to eat obediently, pretending the food was delicious, despite the conditioned reflex of physiological disgust she had developed for it.

  By now, she had already prepared herself to vanish, only to unexpectedly find everything restored to how it was before. Her mind was in a daze as she mechanically burned the withered tendrils, buried the ashes somewhere farther away, and dug a large pit to temporarily bury Edwin's body in the woods.

  The camp had ready-made tools like shovels, and she quickly dug a pit deep enough for an adult man's remains. Then, she approached Edwin's cold corpse.

  [—A discarded, tattered husk. Now his pure soul has ascended like a metamorphosed butterfly, light and soaring to a higher place, leaving behind but a witness to a decayed past. Praise be to you, merciful Lord, the Most Holy Messiah who grants eternal life to this brother.]

  A voice inexplicably echoed in the depths of her heart.

  ......

  Ledbetter stood at the doorway of the white hospital room, offering prayers. Within his sight, a skeleton wrapped in leather-like, tattered flesh stumbled past unconsciously, walking by the maid, Miss Moore, who held a broom—she paid him no mind but did not go out of her way to trouble him either. The other residents deeply resented Edwin for summoning eldritch abominations, but since the Lord of All had forgiven him, how could mere servants act harshly, tarnishing their master's benevolence?

  Nor could the tattered one, his mind largely fragmented and lost, perceive this isolation and disregard. Day after day, he wandered aimlessly through endless corridors and rooms, like an ascetic destined never to reach his goal.

  Ledbetter, however, considered this a blessing. At least his brother had escaped his former decadent and depraved life, now lost within the sacred halls of the Lord of All. What supreme glory worthy of celebration!

  This was their master's dwelling, where a fragment of her great true spirit had once slumbered. Everyone knew this, though none could reach her sanctuary. Only a few had witnessed her briefly leaving her room on occasion, after which the dwelling would invariably gain another room.

  For some reason, since she had last saved his brother, her spirit had departed from here, plunging the residents into terror. Though the entire dwelling was part of her, her absence left them fearing whether she deemed human greed and sin unworthy of salvation...

  Had she grown disappointed by Edwin's defiance?

  They privately debated this possibility, filling Ledbetter with guilt, but the Snake Man mysteriously cut short their baseless conjectures with a warning: "Do not presume to speak idly of our master."

  Her departure had rendered her former chamber discoverable. Though none dared enter, the glass panes on the door allowed observers to see inside—blood splattered across the floor, sheets and blankets soaked in crimson. What a breathtaking and sacred sight! Only the Messiah's own blood could be so flawlessly red. Even absent, her holy blood had transformed this empty room into a gilded chest, a pilgrimage site to cleanse sinful souls.

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  He bowed devoutly to the room once more, then followed the tattered one's footprints into the endless corridor.

  ......

  By the pit, Yvette's shovel had fallen to the ground at some point.

  [I call this "a controlled mental collapse"—because most of what you know, whether about yourself or others, is built upon illusions crafted by the truths you hold dear. To pierce through them is to risk losing these things, meaning much of what you believe constitutes "who you are."

  The "you" you know ceases to be, and all else may never return to what it was. You will face a fear you wish to avoid, along with the self-awareness hidden behind it—obscured by your rationality through fear, yet radiating a fatal allure that may lead you to ruin, for that path leads to madness.]

  Ulysses's earlier warning resurfaced vividly in her mind.

  She had always believed that her knowledge formed the entirety of herself. Now, the superficial veneer had crumbled away, and the other self that had split from her depths—the one who kept her secrets, hid her aberrant soul-devouring acts—was no more.

  The crimson dawn pierced the thin mist, painting the forest red.

  The dreamt dwelling, a prison for the souls she had stolen, would now serve as a brand she bore, a reminder of the inhuman crimes she had committed.

  I understand now.

  I am the aberrant. I am the anomaly.

  ......

  Unbeknownst to Yvette, the seemingly peaceful village was now experiencing an extraordinary moment.

  "...You're saying you used the mead to lure the outsider, but he escaped?" A "village elder" demanded sternly.

  In the most sacred subterranean shrine, a dozen priestesses like Martha, all chosen by the Bee God, had gathered to deliberate over the matter.

  "I apologize," Martha replied hoarsely, scratching her neck.

  This was not the first time she had made this gesture. In the half-hour since their assembly, she had scratched there repeatedly.

  If there was anything unusual about it, perhaps it was that the spot had been smeared with Yvette's blood...

  "The village's secrecy cannot be compromised. Which way did he go? You said toward the lake? There's only forest and wilderness there. He carried no luggage, so he can't have gone far. Perhaps we could... Hey, Martha! This is the Bee God's shrine. Show some decorum! Especially after such a grave mistake—you've been acting frivolously and rudely this whole time. What is wrong with you?!"

  "Me?" Martha snapped out of her daze, feeling her fingertips damp and sticky.

  Sweat? But why did it smell of rust?

  Unbidden, she recalled those lake-green eyes, burning quietly under the moonlight.

  Her tongue instinctively licked her fingertips—blood. She had been stained by his blood. Did that mean the fluids seeping from her broken skin now carried a part of him?

  She had been cleansed by his blood, washed clean of crimson sin, pure as snow...

  "Martha? What are you—urk..."

  The other priestesses clutched at whatever support they could find, groaning as they slid to the ground. Beneath their skin, small protrusions squirmed like countless living worms awakening within their bodies.

  And not just them—the village above had erupted in chaos. Lights flickered in farmhouses under the dim dawn, accompanied by the shattering of pots, the toppling of tables and chairs, and the choked, pained moans of people.

  A farmwoman drawing water from the well clutched the crank for dear life, barely stopping herself from plunging in headfirst. Gazing fearfully into the well, she watched as the water turned murky with churning mud, bubbling like a witch's foul cauldron.

  Beneath the village, something long dormant had awakened.

  In the shrine, the first afflicted priestesses had their skin breached, their abdomens spewing forth fat, pale worms that devoured their flesh. These gluttonous insects consumed even bone and hair—though these priestesses once shared a symbiosis with such swarms, borrowing their power, the creatures now turned on them.

  When had it happened?

  Martha recalled her own transformation into a priestess—being placed in a wicker basket, submerged in the lake. Near drowning, on the verge of unconsciousness, she felt something, a tendril or a tube, connect through her navel to her insides, filling her abdomen with an alien presence that remade her entirely.

  Now, looking back, her ovaries and uterus had changed from that moment, like grafting a wild rose with a Roisin rose's stem—it would bear Roisin blooms.

  Her ovaries had become a nest for these creatures, naturally birthing only their spawn.

  But now...

  Martha staggered forward, giggling faintly, stepping over collapsed or dying bodies with ruptured abdomens. Her bare heel crushed a worm engorged with flesh, smearing its pale, bloated body and half-digested meal into a pulped, strawberry-like pink.

  I've been saved...

  The cramps in her abdomen lingered briefly before fading. With each step, warmth spilled between her thighs, thick blood and clotted tissue sliding down her legs.

  This decayed meat, porous as honeycomb, riddled with holes, bore countless tiny, unhatched worms. Too young to kill their host, they perished alongside her twisted uterus and ovaries.

  All thanks to him...

  Cleansed by his blood, washed free of crimson sin, she was now white as wool...