(POV Bill)
As he stepped out of the narrow, dark, and foul-smelling alley, Bill's body was enveloped in the cold silence of the night, the only sound being the dripping of dirty water from the leaking pipe above him.
The horrific gaping wound on his neck began to close on its own.
With a soft hiss barely audible like a snake shedding its skin, the torn flesh and blood vessels fused back together, his pale skin knitting itself until no scar remained, leaving only the drying bloodstain on his shirt collar.
A crooked smile curved on his now perfect face, a smile that was not at all the original Bill's.
He returned to the inn, his steps now firm and confident, the thud of his boots echoing with a steady rhythm on the creaking wooden floor.
He stopped in front of Chloe's room but didn't knock immediately.
In front of the dark and dusty corridor window reflection, he practiced, trying various smiles on his new face: a warm friendly smile; a sincere regretful smile; a charming witty smile.
After finding the most convincing smile, he knocked softly on the door.
The door opened, and there stood Chloe, her face still pale and she looked much healthier than before, though a faint trace of fear lingered in her beautiful eyes upon seeing him.
Bill stepped in with the smile he had practiced perfectly, the faint scent of lily perfume from the room mixing with the subtle smell of blood still clinging to his clothes.
He sat on the chair beside the bed, and Chloe unconsciously shifted her body slightly away.
With a voice now deeper and soothing, Bill began to speak, telling about things he encountered outside, inserting light jokes that managed to slowly ease the tension in Chloe's shoulders.
The girl finally let out a small laugh, a laughter that sounded like music to the demon inside Bill's ears. "Why do you seem different..." she said, tilting her head slightly.
Bill smiled wider, a smile that now felt natural. "I've refreshed myself, maybe that's why I'm different from before," he replied, easily accessing Bill's memories to understand the strange terms from another world. "Which one do you prefer?"
Chloe fell silent for a few moments, her eyes staring intently, as if searching for remnants of the Bill she knew inside the man before her. "I like this one," she admitted softly. "But it feels... like it's not you..."
A thin grin nearly formed on Bill's lips hearing that statement, but he managed to hold it back.
"By the way, can you walk yet?"
Chloe nodded. "A little."
The demon inside Bill now began to sift through the original Bill's memories, searching for useful information, and he found it—a vague conversation about the way home.
He remembered when he was first sealed into the canvas. His former self had mentioned the way home!
"Good. I found a clue to go home. If you can walk, let's go check it out."
Chloe's eyes widened in surprise, but the sparkle in her eyes quickly dimmed. "Will Henri come too?"
Bill caught the worried tone in her voice, sounding like fear that the horrifying incident before would repeat if they were alone.
He became alert, but kept his soothing smile. "Of course!"
Chloe's eyes sparkled again upon hearing that.
After that, they both went to Henri's room, inviting him to join after Bill told a convincing lie about how he found the clue to go home.
Henri was initially hesitant, his sharp eyes staring at Bill with unmasked suspicion and he almost refused. However, after thinking that it would be far more dangerous to let Bill be alone with Chloe, he reluctantly accepted the invitation.
This was a decision based on his protective instinct!
Bill led them through the quiet village streets, searching from one empty house to another, deliberately pretending not to find anything just to build tension and make his story more convincing.
Henri, whose patience was wearing thin, began commenting cynically, making Bill, who was now easily irritated, nearly force him to shut up.
Chloe, walking between them, began to worry that a fight would soon break out.
At that moment, Bill suddenly stopped, as if sensing something. He walked toward a ruined burned house, and from under a pile of rubble, he pulled a gleaming metal object.
He touched the object with a victorious smile, and his friends immediately approached to observe it.
The object was shaped like an elegant silver pocket watch, but without time hands. Its surface was blank and smooth, with only one small button at the top.
When opened, inside was only a dull red crystal the size of a small bird's heart, silent and not pulsing.
Bill began to explain, with a voice filled with false confidence, that this was the object that could take them away from this cursed world.
Henri stared at him in wonder and suspicion. "How do you know this thing can take us home?"
Bill answered smoothly, telling a fabricated story about how he met a mysterious wanderer who told him about the pocket watch.
They both seemed to believe, but on the other hand, doubt still shone from their eyes.
After they observed the pocket watch in silence for a few moments, Bill suddenly smiled with his terrifying smile and pressed the button on top of the watch.
Instantly, the red crystal inside began to pulse slowly, emitting a dim terrifying red light.
The crystal's pulsing then quickened, stronger, until perfectly synced with Bill's heartbeat!
An extremely bad premonition immediately assaulted the three of them.
"Throw that thing away, Bill! Now!" Henri shouted.
As Bill was about to throw it, the pocket watch exploded in a blinding red flash.
The explosion produced a pure invisible energy wave so strong that the air around them vibrated.
The three of them were flung far, crashing hard into the wall of the house across the street!
The back of Chloe's head hit the stone wall with a dull thud, making her faint once again.
Bill, who was closest to the explosion's center, suffered the worst impact. He lay dying in a pool of his own blood, his body shattered, and his consciousness beginning to fade.
As his vision was about to turn black, he muttered his last words with full hatred.
"Damn king... you tricked me!"
***
(POV Chloe)
When Chloe regained consciousness from the explosion, she was already lying in her own room, a warm blanket wrapping her body.
She stared at her familiar room ceiling with a strange gaze, her head feeling dizzy and empty.
At that moment, her eyes fixed on a figure sitting on the chair beside her bed, waiting for her to wake up.
It was Henri.
Chloe slowly raised her body, staring at Henri with a innocently confused gaze.
Henri, surprised to see her awake, immediately opened his mouth to speak, but he stopped.
He saw Chloe tilt her head and ask in a clear and emotionless voice, "Who?"
Hearing the question, Henri's world seemed to collapse.
His best friend's eyes stared at him without any recognition.
His eyes immediately trembled, he turned his face away, unable to bear that empty gaze. He sat back down, hiding his face behind his hands, his shoulders shaking violently.
Only one word managed to escape his mouth, a whisper full of regret and despair, "Sorry...," the word continued to haunt the silence in the room.
"Sorry...."
***
(POV Furina)
Far in the darkness of that damp and cold pit, Furina began speaking with the mysterious old man she met, her trembling voice sounding so small and fragile amid the oppressive silence.
The scent of wet soil, mushrooms, and something faintly like long-decayed rot filled the stuffy air, making it hard for her to breathe.
The old man, who introduced himself as Armand with a hoarse and dry voice like dead leaves rubbing together, began telling strange stories about a concept he called "System"—a word often discussed by "his friend" with a mix of admiration and fear, something he himself didn't fully understand.
Furina also didn't understand what it meant, but the word felt so familiar, an echo from the strange conversations she often heard from her friends, Charles and Arthur.
At that moment, a spark of desperate hope ignited within her!
"How can we get out of this place?" Furina asked, her widened eyes staring intently at the figure before her.
For her, this old man didn't look like the ordinary undead wandering the village; there was a glimmer of terrifying ancient intelligence in his unblinking eyes, as if he were a relic holding forbidden knowledge from a long-forgotten era!
Perhaps, just perhaps, she could find the answer from him!
After a long and torturous silence, the old man finally mentioned that to escape the hell they called Abyss, "something" blocking the system must be destroyed.
The man, with his cold and lifeless gaze, spoke, "Defeating the king is the only key to returning to your world."
Furina then, with a slightly braver voice, began raising the topic about the village residents, and about her friends who might still be trapped somewhere in this vast forest.
The old man stared at her, and for a moment.
At that moment, Furina swore she saw a flash of strange emotion in his glassy eyes—a mix of pity and such deep despair.
"They can't escape," he said in a flat voice that pierced to the bone. "They have become food for this world."
Furina shuddered hearing those words, making her involuntarily hug her own trembling body.
However, she remained silent, forcing herself to listen to the end of the horrifying story from the old man, who now began explaining in detail that made her stomach nauseous.
Armand told how this Abyss was not just a place, but a living and hungry entity, an ancient prison that slowly absorbed the life essence from every creature trapped inside it.
He described how the village residents, who were once humans, experienced various things: their souls gradually eroded, their memories faded, and their emotions dulled, until finally they would become empty shells wandering aimlessly.
This was the inevitable fate for them, the locals, becoming eternal fuel to keep this Abyss existing.
Every word from his mouth painted a picture of such total despair, a fate far worse than death itself!
Furina couldn't help but realize with utmost horror that she was now trapped in a place far worse than just a prison.
***
(POV HENRI)
Amid the oppressive silence in the dimly lit inn room, Henri stared at an old parchment in his trembling hand.
To him, this was his only hope.
The air around him felt heavy and cold.
Previously, with a pounding heart, he had inscribed a question on its blank surface with his trembling fingertip: 'Is there a reward in this world that can heal Chloe's memory?'
He waited for a minute that felt like forever, his eyes fixed on the parchment, holding his breath. Slowly, the fibers inside the paper began to writhe like worms, darkening, and forming a short answer that ignited hope in his chest:
'Yes'.
Now, a new instruction had appeared below it, accompanied by a sketch of a house drawn with ink that seemed made of shadows: "Go to this house and hand this paper to its owner."
With breaths still unsteady, Henri compared the image on the parchment with a dilapidated house across the quiet village street.
Its broken windows stared at him like empty eyes, and its peeling paint looked like flaking skin.
"Not this one," he muttered, his voice hoarse amid the silence.
He continued his search, stepping cautiously along the moss-covered stone paths, the faint scent of decay and wet soil constantly piercing his nose.
The village, which might have once been lively and full of life, was now just a silent graveyard, where the only remaining residents were undead wandering aimlessly in the distance, their odd silhouettes moving slowly under the eternal moonlight that strangely felt cold.
Every house he passed felt increasingly wrong, increasingly far from the image in his hand, making him wonder, 'Maybe not in this village?'
A cold despair began to creep into his heart.
He leaned against the wall of a long-abandoned shop, closing his eyes for a moment to calm his racing heart, before finally forcing himself to continue the search.
After comparing the image for the tenth time with a nearly collapsed wooden hut at the village's edge, he finally found it.
Every detail matched perfectly, from the crack in the front door to the broken flower pot on the porch.
Carefully, he approached the door and knocked with his knuckles.
The knocking sound was so loud and awkward amid the silence, but there was no answer from inside.
At that moment, he remembered, they were undead!
He checked his robe's hood again, ensuring his face was fully covered by shadows.
As long as they didn't see him as a warm, breathing living being, they wouldn't chase him. At least, that was his assumption!
With trembling hands, he turned the rusted doorknob. The door opened with a long and heartbreaking creak, revealing the thick darkness inside.
He stepped in, and a musty smell of dust and stronger decay immediately assaulted him, making him nearly cough.
Inside, the furniture was covered in worn white cloth, thick spider webs hanging in every corner like funeral curtains.
He explored the silent main room, but found no one.
As he was about to turn back, he bumped into something standing right behind him.
His heart seemed to stop beating.
It was the house's owner!
A skinny old figure, his skin pale and stretched over his bones, his cloudy eyes staring at him expressionlessly, but his mouth slightly open, revealing blackened teeth.
Henri immediately backed away in fear, his hands raised in front.
At that moment, the creature suddenly stepped forward, its movement stiff but aggressive, like a starving predator.
With panic, Henri thrust the parchment toward it. Instantly, the undead stopped, its empty eyes fixed on the paper in Henri's hand.
It extended its thin and rotting hand, taking the paper with its long and fragile fingers. It stared at the paper for a few moments, then shifted its gaze to Henri.
With slow motion, it raised its rotting index finger and pointed toward an old wooden chest lying in the corner of the room.
Henri rushed to the pointed spot, his back feeling cold and goosebumpy as he felt the empty gaze of the creature following him.
He opened the chest hastily.
Inside, on faded velvet cloth, lay a single gold coin gleaming dimly.
At that moment, he suddenly heard the sound of paper being roughly torn.
His eyes widened in horror.
Without thinking, he grabbed the gold coin and immediately fled.
The undead was now chasing him with a horrifying silent scream.
Henri managed to get out and slam the door shut, holding it with all his body weight.
Loud and brutal pounding sounds came from inside, making the old wooden door vibrate violently.
He held it for five seconds that felt like forever, before finally fleeing as fast as he could when he felt the door starting to crack.
The commotion had attracted the attention of other undead outside.
They began moving in unison toward the house, their hoarse groans now filling the air.
The door finally shattered into pieces, and the house owner came out, screaming, which now echoed throughout the village.
***
A/N: Like volume 2, it will end soon!
Btw, I'm still expecting comments!
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