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Piyoung.

As I stared intently at Jinseong for a long while, one by one, the capybaras emerged onto the water’s surface. Then, as if playing a prank, they blew forcefully through their nostrils, causing droplets to splatter like they were spraying water guns, accompanied by a deep snorting sound.

Lightly frolicking on the surface and revealing their presence, the capybaras swam around, using their clawed hands to splash about, and began to swim in a group out of the pool.

The capybaras moved up the stairs, made to the right height for their bodies, one step at a time. Once they made it outside, they shook themselves as if to dry off, then one by one took their place outside the pool. Perhaps due to the fear they experienced earlier, they started closing their eyes.

And a few approached Jinseong.

Kkwik.

The capybara, making a sound more akin to an effect you’d hear in a movie than an animal’s noise, approached Jinseong with wide, curious eyes. Then, stepping out into the warm air outside the pool, it shivered from the chill and, seemingly seeking warmth, snuggled up close to Jinseong’s leg.

Jinseong muttered as he watched the scene unfold.

“Hmm. They’re quite sociable, more than I expected.”

While capybaras are naturally friendly animals, this one seemed unusually fond of humans. Even the smell emanating from Jinseong was not one typically enticing to animals, yet the capybara approached without hesitation, clear evidence that it had been touched by human hands.

‘Hmm.’

Recently, Jinseong had performed a ritual in an underground space that once served as a slaughterhouse.

Naturally, a person’s scent gets influenced by their environment.

Jinseong’s body must have retained the thick smell of death that only animals could perceive. Though he had no direct connection to that place, it didn’t seem strange for sensitive creatures, especially prey animals, to be wary of that odor.

Yet, this capybara was following him too well.

It could only mean it had been in contact with humans.

But then a question arose.

If it had been touched by human hands, whose hands had it been?

‘Excluding Iserin, who wouldn’t be interested in such things. Iarin clearly showed signs of fear towards the capybaras—perhaps she had eaten a few or tried to? Or maybe she had achieved a significant level of martial arts and exuded a hunter’s instincts, scaring them off.’

For now, it definitely wasn’t his siblings.

That leaves Lee Yang-hoon and his concubines?

There was a possibility.

Yet, instead of those figures, two faces came to Jinseong’s mind.

The faces of two individuals reminding one of small, adorable creatures, with their albino-like red eyes and white hair.

‘Ella, Anastasia.’

And among those two, the one most likely to show interest in capybaras was…

“Anastasia.”

Jinseong murmured the name of the girl with the nickname Danbi, the true owner of the strange presence he had felt ever since Iserin and Iarin started fighting.

“Correct!”

As soon as he muttered the name, a voice leapt out as if waiting for the moment. The voice, bouncing in like a spring-loaded clown doll from a jack-in-the-box, announced its presence while scattering colorful, fantastical pollen around as if its appearance was a blessing.

And with that loud entrance, Anastasia appeared, swaying from the ceiling.

Just like a scene from an old horror movie, as the ceiling gradually darkened.

Kki-geek.

The surface that was turning pitch black seemed to absorb light as if conveying that its existence was a rift in space, or perhaps a hole capable of transcending dimensions somewhere in the universe. It endlessly swallowed the light from the lights set up in the room, creating a distortion at that point, from which a slender tentacle emerged.

The tentacle resembled a branch, moving like the legs of an insect along with its joints, burrowing into different spots on the ceiling. It used those burrowed limbs as supports to pull its body from the ceiling, revealing a huge body that resembled wood.

And within that tree-like body, nestled like an escape capsule from an SF movie, Anastasia smiled brightly.

Seeming pleased to meet Jinseong, she waved from the window-like curve ahead. When the capsule was about halfway down to the pool, she removed the window blocking her way and, with a peculiar battle cry of ‘Hu-chya-‘, jumped down to the floor.

Then, getting right up to Jinseong, she made a V sign with her fingers and said,

“Hello!”

Anastasia cheerfully greeted Jinseong. However, when he casually waved back without much enthusiasm, she tilted her head, as if that wasn’t what she wanted, and greeted him again.

“Hello?”

When he didn’t respond properly to the second greeting either, she made a face as if she had just realized something and shouted,

“Annyeonghaseyong!”

“Nice to meet you, Frau Lentz.”

As Anastasia changed her greeting, she beamed when he responded back, her expression as proud as a child who just guessed the right answer.

After exchanging pleasantries, Anastasia smiled broadly and turned her attention to Jinseong’s carrier.

Then, suppressing her fidgety excitement, she asked him,

“Benefactor? Can I see what’s inside that carrier?”

Her voice resembled that of a lady requesting something politely.

But her attitude bore an uncanny resemblance to a predator eyeing its prey.

Jinseong chuckled lightly at Anastasia’s demeanor and moved his hand to unlock the latch.

And finally, when the carrier fully opened, what appeared was a wooden sword.

“Ooooh.”

A cheap wooden sword, something you would commonly find in a souvenir shop at a study trip site in Japan.

So common it was practically rolling around everywhere, utterly worthless as a souvenir.

Even upon seeing its shabby appearance, cut awkwardly just for style, it seemed to have little combat usefulness.

Yet, despite its pitiful looks, Anastasia reacted profusely.

She widened her eyes as if seeing something for the first time, her mouth agape in awe—deliberately accentuating it to indicate it was genuine surprise. Marvel and greed painted her face, and her eyes sparkled with interest.

“This is a very rare item…!”

She reached out her small hands and carefully lifted the sword with both hands, kneeling as if it were a precious relic, raising the sword higher to be better seen in the light. While peering up at it, she examined it thoroughly for quite some time.

After a while,

Anastasia stopped examining the wooden sword and handed it back to Jinseong. Then, with a face full of admiration, she posed a question.

“You truly are amazing, Benefactor! How did you manage to acquire something like this?”

That question bore meanings beyond the ordinary.

It was a question only a witch, able to traverse the boundaries between dreams and reality, could make—only someone who had experienced various things in dreams and could discern what was within the wooden sword would be able to ask such a question.

“Destructive and violent, yet friendly to the benefactor’s presence! It’s superb!”

It was a question that pierced through the essence of the sword.

Upon hearing that question, Jinseong briefly shifted his gaze.

Then he fixed his gaze back on Anastasia.

He stared into her eyes that shimmered with a bright red hue reminiscent of jewels, a state containing the dancing blue energy that seemed to envelope the image of the wooden sword.

“Cornea and retina. You see the essence directly without any filters in between.”

Jinseong smiled.

“If you cannot see with your heart, seeing purely with your physical eyes is the most efficient method. Frau Lentz, you possess a most excellent pair of eyes.”

“Thank you.”

Anastasia beamed as if thrilled to receive the compliment from Jinseong.

“Your eyes are exceptional too, benefactor.”

And she reciprocated the compliment Jinseong had given her.

It wasn’t a customary response, but rather something rooted in her observation of the essence.

“The warmth and coolness coexisting, embers constantly moving as if they could ignite at any moment, writhing as if alive… They resemble the eyes of the grandfather I saw in my dream.”

As Anastasia spoke, she seemed to remember something and tilted her head in thought.

“Uh, but that grandfather seemed a bit different. Anyway, is it similar in depth?”

After pondering for a moment, she soon seemed to change her mind and redirected her excitement elsewhere.

“Oh right, benefactor. Please grill me some capybaras too. That way, for three of them… I want my sibling to have some too, so that’s four! Can you grill four for me?”

Anastasia exclaimed, snapping her fingers.

At that, some nightmarish entity hanging from the ceiling extended a long, black arm, its end splitting like pincers and ensnaring a capybara. From there, four more black arms grew, capturing capybaras like toys from a claw machine.

Thus, five capybaras were caught in total.

Anastasia followed Jinseong’s gaze towards the captured capybaras and grinned.

“One is for that child.”

She explained as though boasting to Jinseong and demonstrated this by making the nightmarish entity move. Then, a gap split open in the black, tree-like body, and an arm moved to shove a capybara right inside.

Gulp.

The capybara disappeared without even a scream, vanishing with a dazed expression through the gap, while the unknown entity closed the gap with a loud swallow, shivering as if satisfied.

It was a scene that seemed befitting a nightmare.

 

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