A bloodcurdling scream, something not many people get to experience in their lifetimes, not genuinely so. Even less hear it erupting from their mouth, I'm one of the unlucky few. I lurch my body forward, hunching over, a wave of agonizing, searing, suffocating pain erupting from my arm. Or what is left of it, I'm currently clutching the bloody stump of my right arm, cleaved clean off from the elbow and lower. Blood, spewing out of the wound like bile from the mouth of a newborn infant rejecting it's mother's milk, it should be standing out on the linoleum floor under me, but this floor was already blood red. As are the walls, the doors, even the ceiling, soaked blood red, the erupting flow of viscera from my stump stands out about as much as water would on bck tiling. My legs stamp downwards, forcing my injured ankles down, sliding across the slickened with sanguine floor.
As I pnt my left foot down, my foot skids, making me fall forward. Jamming my left elbow against the floor, it takes the brunt of the impact as well as stopping my forward momentum. Scrambling, I press myself up with my intact arm, hands stained red from the spilge I've left. I get onto my feet, the impact left a dull ache in my arm, but the agony from my severed limb is far too distracting. Sprinting forward, forcing my weakened body to carry itself with as much force as it can exert and more, I fil around wildly as my untrained and injured self tries desperately to escape. My jaw unhinges, my mouth wide open, "HELP! SOMEONE HELP ME!" a guttural cry rings out. "PLEASE! HELP ME! HELP!" I am begging, there is no one here, but there has to be someone who could hear me. I'm in a library, a public fucking library, why is no one here?! "HELP! HEEELP!"
A sharp turn, twisting my torso to my left, causing the ankle of that side of my body to give out, only for a moment before I continue to run. A simir looking hallway to the one I came from, yet with at the end is what looks like a dull gray door made of metal, bnd salvation. I swing my intact and severed arms around wildly, as I sprint forward, I need to get away I have to it's behind me.
CRASH! My neck twists around, the wall to my right has a massive crater in it suddenly, the invisible force which had been chasing me, which had attacked me, which had dismembered me; it crashed into the wall. The floor underneath it is spped with a wet colliding of what I can only assume is blood soaked flesh and linoleum, and then another, an almost invisible bloody footprint, or paw print, to hell with wondering. I let out a horrified scream, my body throws itself into the air, a leaping sprint. Another fall, this time I can barely do so but grip the floor, and crawl forward, before springing up into a sprint. Almost there, almost there, almost! I swing my arm at the door handle, luckily using my left, and smash my wrist downwards onto it. My wrist twists around awkwardly, and I yank the door open, it's heavy metallic form almost hitting me.
Throwing myself inside, I grab the other side of the handle as I fall in, and sm it shut, a deafening click plunging me into darkness and total silence. I wait, the only thing I can hear is my ragged breathing, shivering from fear, trembling in agony. It must be about to crash into the door, that will be it for me, I can't escape now. My breath stops, anticipation killing me...
And yet nothing, silence, not even a step can be heard. It stopped? Why? How did this door stop it when a solid concrete wall only dazed it? I can't mull this over! Swinging my left arm wildly, I wriggle out of my bzer, grabbing the end of the intact sleeve with my left hand. I awkwardly wrap the loose sleeve around my stump using only one arm, my teeth, and the determination to not bleed out. My teeth strain as I yank, tightening the tourniquet around my wound so tight, I can feel the flesh underneath turning pale white from the pressure. With it tightened I fall forward, nding chest first onto concrete, or what feels it, my ragged breathing resuming thusly.
The sounds of electrical buzzing whirs above my head, followed by white fshes so sudden I shut my eyes, having become used to the pitch bck. I force my eyes open, squinting, hoping to see I've made it out at least.
The stairwell, again, I'm back in the winding almost spiral hell of concrete, the one I spent an hour descending. I got no where, this is where I came into the red hallway from, I'm back where I started. All that agony only to find myself back in this damn stairwell! The endless ascent meets my eyes as I look up, it looks like a smile, one so wicked I feel nothing but despair as I do. I lost an arm, nearly died, got the attention of an invisible demon!
I scream, not in agony, but defeat. Enough. Enough! You won! Whatever this fucking library is you won! Kill me! Stop toying with me! Enough! Enough! My scream continues on with no ending, only stopping as my vocal cords shake from exertion, and breath leaves me. I roll onto my back, the gray skin of the concrete demon that's devoured me meeting my burned retinas.
It's not a what anymore, I know what this library is. Hell. I died going up the library, trying to get to the archive. Did I fall? Maybe the escator's railing shocked me, killing me instantly. An aneurysm? Don't care. The devil is mocking me, the bowels of hell have digested me and spat me out, my eternal torture has only just begun. I wasn't there for him, if I was, if I was a good caring person, a thoughtful person, he'd still be on this earth. Hell is mocking me with an eternal descent, because I couldn't pull him from his. Thinking about it like that, it makes sense, I'm fine with it. A failure who can't save one person, denied the answers to his mystery, hunted for eternity. No, this is the result of my karma, not the Judeo-Christian hell, but Naraka. Not eternal, but functionally so, the Naraka I must be residing in is Kasutra, there must be bck lines covering my body that I can't see. I deserve ten million years of this torment, and after let my soul be pced into the lowest creature earth houses, or whatever this pnet will be by then.
"Sorry..." Despite knowing I deserve this, my voice creaks out a weak apology, to who? Him? He can't hear me he's not dead, he wouldn't be here if he was. "I'm sorry..." Another weak apology, it feels good to say, though. "I'm so sorry..." Tears form, blurring my vision. Shut up, just shut up, how low can I get? Just-
"Could you please be quiet?" A voice that's not mine, a new voice, squeaky and a tad nasally. I sit up, blinking rapidly, but see no one. "H-hello?" I ask, looking around. "Wegh..." The voice lets out an odd sigh, like their nose is stuffed up. "Sorry, I'll say it nicer." The voice isn't in front of me, but under? I stand up, my body wildly swaying as I do, my vision is blurry as well. I lost so much blood it only makes sense.
A girl is id out on the stairs under me, just in front of where I'm stood, ying as if she's on a soft bed and not hard concrete. She looks young, about my age by a simple guess. Laid out on the stairs, she seems to stand at about 172 centimeters, has has skin a sickly white, and legs so long they're almost startling. She has pinkish, orangeish hair so long it goes down to her ankles, messy, tangled. Yet in spite of it's messiness, her hair is clean, soft looking, a beautiful head of coral colored hair, shimmering beautifully in the pale lights. Her eyes, sky blue, with big bck frame gsses shielding them, which is sat on a small button nose. She's wearing a dark blue bzer, over a brown pid sweater vest, with a white button up underneath. Her bck skirt is down to her knees, that type of skirt is usually cut shorter with our age group, but that's hardly uncommon. Frankly, she looks like something out of a horror story. A red haired beauty, found id out on the stairs, likely hiding a rge stab wound on her back. Fitting, a head of red hair in a crimson hell... And yet this woman has the presence of a yabout, a scker who you caught napping on the job, a neet who you've discovered hasn't left the house in a week. How carefree... In spite of the oddity of this all, I lean forward, expecting a polite request.
"Shut the hell up, please?" That was ruder than before! Way ruder! Wait why does that matter, why is she in Naraka!? Why is she so casual about being in Naraka!?! I have a million questions, but the best I can muster is thus.
"That was ruder!" Wait why am I still hung up on that!? The girl blinks, staring up at me oddly, before showing a small smile. She giggles, and raises her hand up to the side of her head, and knocks on it. "My bad."
This is the part when I'd finally introduce myself. I am the unwitting protagonist to this story, right? This incredible story of horrors, discoveries, maybe even some meaningful message. It's all starring me, right? But that assumption is wrong, fundamentally, categorically, and morally incorrect. The protagonist of this story is gone, any meaningful message you can take from this was taken with him, and there is nothing to be had from this blood soaked story.
But I guess I have to tell it in his stead, the story of a hellish library, a lone girl, wounds, demons, and the human scum who's going to tell you it.
