···It's pulsing. The building—or rather, the white, mucous-like substance clinging to it—beats as if it were breathing.
From far away it's hard to make out, but my eyes could see that grotesque sight clearly.
No matter how strong my stomach is, this is still a bit much.
At the sight of something so far removed from anything normal, Gregor spoke without bothering to hide his shock.
"What in the world could happen to make something look like that...?"
"If Pilot's story is right, then the last thing the Double-Hook Pirate Crew said before leaving this place was... 'A calamity is coming.' Was it...?"
At Hong Lu's words, information that had been sleeping deep in my brain stirred awake.
...Oh, right. Damn it, there was something in the information Pilot told us recently that was related to this.
Calamity, pale white, that shape... Ah, shit. So I wasn't imagining it. I wish I had been.
"It reminds me of what happened around the time we first started working. Hmm... the atmosphere, with all that biological tissue clinging to it, is quite similar."
"Ugh... At the D Corp branch? I wonder if there's poisonous gas filling the inside like there was then..."
"Back then, there was simply a traitor. It is not an apt comparison to the present situation."
"The situation seems like it'd be worse, if anything, not better..."
Gregor was right. We have to go in there and... investigate it ourselves.
...Aaah, I really hate this. If that insane monster is involved, the inside is probably a complete mess.
"Then... what about Pilot's companions...?"
"If they haven't become merfolk... that would be fortunate."
"So the thing you called a calamity was..."
It seems the prisoners are starting to catch on. If you're talking about the whale of the Great Lake... then you can't avoid talking about its most representative example, the Five Calamities.
Probably Vergilius will explain the details. He's always been the one to give us information about the mission.
He had always explained things in his own way, kindly enough. It's just that fewer than half the prisoners ever listened properly.
"Well, the world is full of all kinds of calamities. In this Great Lake, there are five calamities. Ah, or rather, four now."
"What do you mean?"
"What I mean is... hmm. You'll find out in time."
...He was just praised a second ago, and now he's being rude again. Ah, maybe he'd stopped playing the role of friendly guide a long time ago.
Whatever. He isn't the only one who can explain that thing. Come on, Ishmael.
"No matter how carefully you try to avoid calamity, it still comes for you... Those things have the power to move outside the rules, so they appear without warning."
"Now... it's time to row straight into the hell they left behind. For the Lobotomy Corporation branch, take the small boat to the next lake over. As a precaution, I'll keep my distance and wait here on this lake."
Good grief... both of them are speaking in circles for no reason. And I can't even explain this myself, seriously.
Come to think of it, Ishmael's given up on being the model student a long time ago too. Faust... well, forget it. It'll work out somehow.
"Wouldn't it make more sense for you to come with us, just in case?"
"Who knows what's going on in that man's head."
With a simple operation from Faust, the small boat tied to Mephistopheles slowly drifted closer to the lake.
It was the same boat we'd used when going to the ship where the party had been held earlier. Right, that one.
The prisoners boarded the boat as if by instinct, and with a small engine's hum, it cut across the water and set off.
"We really do end up using this boat a lot."
"It's tiny... and like I said before, it doesn't inspire much trust."
"Indeed, Rodion's weight... ah, no. My apologies. Could you please put that axe down?"
"...You want to die?"
"Yes."
I nearly died before we even entered the branch.
"Is there usually this much fog on the lake? The last lake was like this too..."
"Hmm, it would be wise to be cautious! Things suddenly appearing out of the fog are a basic formula for adventure!"
"Ah, we've arrived. Please disembark."
We moored the boat properly and climbed the stairs leading to the branch.
Hah. Seeing it up close makes it even more horrifying. It really does look as if the branch has been swallowed by some gigantic organism.
Every step up the stairs sent a chill through me.
It's been a long time since I've felt this way. I genuinely do not want to go in.
"How is it, Dante? Can you feel the Golden Bough...?"
"Not yet..."
"Hmm... are you sure?"
Rodion dragged the words out. As if, once she heard there was no Golden Bough here, she'd want to turn back immediately. I'm not in much different a situation, though...
"Ugh... I feel like I'm making a fuss every time we come to a place like this, but... this time I've got an even worse feeling about it..."
Maybe the others felt the same. Right when we reached the entrance leading into the branch, the prisoners' feet stopped.
So I, who'd been in the back, somehow ended up at the front. I'm not the kind of person who'd ruin things just because I felt repulsed by them.
Seeing that, Ishmael frowned and asked, "What are you doing? Aren't you going in?"
"You... aren't bothered at all? This feeling we're getting... if anything, someone like you, who's used to the lake, should feel it even more strongly, shouldn't you?"
"So, are you going in or not?"
"Tch..."
"If you're not going, then wait here."
Ishmael lightly shoved Gregor aside and looked at the rest of us, as if asking whether we were coming.
"Old man. That bastard stopped making sense ages ago—what were you expecting?"
"He seemed like he'd become a little more cooperative... was that just my imagination?"
"We... have to go."
The prisoners moved forward, unable to hide their displeasure.
Fear comes from the unknown, they say. Sure enough, this place ahead of us could be called a hellscape that inspires fear of the unknown.
Still, the unknown is one of the words farthest from me. Half-jokingly speaking, I probably know more about the City than I do about what I don't know.
Or is that old news now? Most of the information in my head has been locked away anyway.
Once we entered the branch, the white mucous that had been visible from outside was plastered all over the interior too.
...Disgusting. From the perspective of someone who knows the truth, it's a chilling sight, but Yi Sang seemed not to recognize what it was and asked calmly, "What is this white mucous-like substance covering the entire building?"
"Could it be... mold?"
"No idea."
Hmm? Does Ryoshu know what this is? No, thinking about Ryoshu's personality... she probably knows not the exact identity, but rather what kind of slaughter scene this sort of thing appears in.
Anyway, starting from Ryoshu's objection, a debate about the identity of the mucous broke out.
The participants were Ryoshu, Yi Sang, and Otis.
"If it were fungi, it would need to possess other characteristics..."
"Hmm. Even to my eye, it does not look like fungi. Rather... it seems like living biological tissue. Like a random mass of vessels growing all over the place."
"Ridiculous. Are there really this many fools who don't know?"
"What do you mean?"
"Do you think there's a pattern to a work born from chaos? Look at the whole, idiot."
"If you're thinking about the whole, then wasting energy on this needless discourse seems even more unnecessary."
End of discussion. With such a limp conclusion, Otis clicked her tongue.
"You lot aren't planning to stop either, are you? There—Miss Ishmael's already gone that far ahead."
Oh no, I'd stopped walking while listening to that interesting deduction. Better catch up quickly.
There's no one besides me who can ignore that person and force the issue down. It feels a bit like I'm the brake, but...
After that, we walked for a while without incident.
Yi Sang seemed to be deducing the identity of the mucous, but no clear conclusion came out of it...
"······."
Then, all of a sudden, Don Quixote, who had always been darting around without ever stopping, halted in her tracks.
Her gaze was fixed on the wall covered in mucous. There was something there... ah.
"Did you find something interesting, kid?"
"Here, in the wall."
"Hmm?"
"There's a person inside..."
"...I-it's a model, right?"
As Don Quixote said, there was... a person inside that wall. I wish Rodion had been right and it was just a model, but...
"...If a model could have this much vitality, I'd kneel and beg to be taken in as a disciple."
If Ryoshu says that, then there's no hope. If that woman were a scholar of cadavers, she'd at least be a doctor.
And that wasn't the only horrifying thing. The clothes those people were wearing, embedded in the wall...
"Ugh... wait, don't tell me these people are... the ones Pilot was looking for..."
...were LCCB uniforms.
"Hey! Is that person all right!"
"Why are you even talking to it?!"
"··· ··· ···."
When Don Quixote spoke to it, a strange vibration came from inside.
...Huh?
"Look here! This one is alive!"
"Ah, damn it. It's been a long time since I felt this sick..."
"You there! We should get them out, shouldn't we?! They're alive!"
Don Quixote said that, but it wasn't accepted.
The biggest reason was that even Hong Lu shook his head, meaning the condition was already beyond saving.
"Hmm... even if I wanted to, it seems like we're already too late."
"I wonder if there's any way to get them out without cutting them apart. Heh."
"What...?"
She seemed unable to accept it, but... there was no saving that. Unless we had K Corp ampoules, maybe.
Gregor, already resigned, muttered quietly.
"Well, it's not like this is the first or second time we've seen something like this. By now..."
"They're firmly embedded in the wall. With ordinary force, it would be difficult even to separate them. But with extraordinary force, their forms will definitely be destroyed."
"Unless we have something like regeneration ampoules, there's no way to repair those broken forms. It's a dead end."
"An unforgivable... deed of evil..."
"There doesn't seem to be any sign they were forced in there... incredible. They're displayed so naturally. As if they'd been born that way."
"I promised them we'd be able to save them this time... I promised..."
"······."
Yi Sang patted Sinclair's shoulder to comfort him.
...Bitter. I expected it, but seeing it with my own eyes makes it worse.
I thought I wasn't expecting anything, but even if it's your own heart, you can't know everything about it.
One of the sub-objectives of the Lobotomy Corporation branch exploration—rescuing the LCCB squad—seems to have been a complete failure.