Volume 6 - CH 1.6

The man finished telling his story, strands of saliva dripping from his mouth. Mayuzumi’s sinister smile remained as her pale fingers silently dug into the girl’s illusionary eyeballs.

“So you keep stabbing the eyes you couldn’t gouge out,” Mayuzumi said.

The man nodded furiously. Tears and drool flew.

I swallowed. He kept stabbing the eyes that he couldn’t gouge out.

“You didn’t see your sister’s eyes close. That’s why the mere thought of them fills you with terror. You direct the animosity you hold for your sister’s eyes towards the eyes of other women. Your sister’s eyes had turned to ashes, never to be gouged out again. Alas, you can’t rest easy until you have gouged out her eyes.”

It was likely an uncontrolled outburst at first, a momentary spasm. But a mistake made could never be undone.

“After my sister’s passing, I started carving the eyes out of dolls, relentlessly gouging and gouging until I realized something was wrong with me,” the man said, his hands shaking. “So I kept to myself, holed up in my room. But one rainy day, I stepped outside to take out the trash and stumbled upon a woman.”

He lowered his head, blood trickling down his wrist. He clutched his head with both hands.

“And then I saw her eyes beneath the umbrella…”

It was easy to imagine what happened next. The man had a weapon in his hand.

It was still in his arms now, stained with blood.

“I don’t want to gouge out anyone’s eyes anymore. I don’t want to crush them. I… Why…”

Regretful words tumbled out amidst the sound of tears splashing onto the floor.

He let out a gut-wrenching scream. “Why can’t I think of anything else but gouging out my sister’s eyes?!”

His monologue ended. The man doubled over, trembling. His voice brimmed with genuine remorse.

I reached out to touch his shoulder, trying to say something.

“If that’s the case, why didn’t you go to the police?” Mayuzumi asked. “Or seek help from the appropriate agency?”

Silence hung heavily in the air. The man’s crying ceased abruptly, and he remained face down.

From his lips escaped a low rumble. “I don’t like the police. I don’t want anyone to look after me or to pity me any longer. If I so much as caught a glimpse of someone’s eyes, I’d stab them. That’s why I don’t leave my home.”

“I see, so you refuse to leave your home. But why do the number of victims keep growing?”

A calm voice interrupted the man’s words. My hand remained extended, frozen in place.

The man maintained his silence and kept his head lowered.

Wearing a smile, Mayuzumi regarded him with the gaze of someone observing a worm. “Your pain and regret seem genuine, but you should drop the tragic tone. There must be more to it, no? You’re addicted to gouging out eyeballs. And why is that? Why can’t you stop? Pain and pleasure are two sides of the same coin. At the sight of an eye, a tragic memory erupts in your mind. I’ll give you that. But do you truly hate gouging out eyeballs?”

The man said nothing. He was like a different person from earlier. He sat in eerie silence, clutching a red umbrella in his arms, painted with both fresh and dried blood.

My breath caught.

Why did he have it?

“It doesn’t rain inside. So why are you holding onto that gruesome weapon?” Mayuzumi asked calmly.

The man did not respond. Mayuzumi’s eyes betrayed disappointment.

“You don’t have any intention of being saved, do you?”

Suddenly, the man bolted up, covering both of his eyes with his palms, and erupted into uncontrollable laughter.

“Hahahaha, ahahahahaha, hahahahaha!”

His laughter echoed in the room, and his body contorted like a fish in a storm. I quickly grabbed his shoulders to keep him away from Mayuzumi, but he resisted me with all his might, still howling.

“Please calm down,” I said. “What about what you just said?! You should go to the police or the hospital. You should tell someone about your condition!”

“No! I don’t want to go. I don’t want to!”

“It’s pointless, Odagiri-kun. He may have regrets, but he’s a coward. Only he can save himself. Hence, no salvation will come to him. Shall I point out the other inconsistencies in his words?”

The red parasol twirled. Mayuzumi pulled her fingers from the girl’s eyes. Sitting elegantly on the bed, she continued.

“Back in the parking lot, why was his umbrella coated in fresh blood? You were unconscious, but surely you can imagine what was inside his minivan. And why was this house remodeled with the intention of keeping people captive? Do you think there’s only one body stashed away in the underground storage space?”

His regret and agony were genuine. But so were his pleasure and desire. One cannot exist without the other.

“He yearns for remorse. He simply cannot endure the same agony he felt when he deserted his sister.”

The man’s eyes flickered wide. He lifted his face and shot Mayuzumi a glare.

Their eyes met, and Mayuzumi smiled serenely. In her eyes was genuine pity.

“Your eyes. They look just like hers!” the man shrieked, swinging the umbrella like a madman.

I quickly turned my face away. A moist redness passed by my neck, sending shivers down my spine.

Spitting out saliva, the man pointed the umbrella at Mayuzumi. “Your eyes look like hers, like my sister’s! Why do you pity me?! Why?! Why am I a burden to you? What was I supposed to do? Don’t look at me, please. Don’t look at me, or else I…”

Tears streamed down the man’s cheeks. He cried like a child.

“I wish you didn’t have those eyes! I could’ve protected you, stayed by your side. I didn’t want to gouge out your eyes. I shouldn’t have wanted to.”

The agony in his voice contradicted what Mayuzumi had said. His words and actions were at odds with one another. He was caught between the pleasure and pain of his twisted desire to gouge out his sister’s eyes.

But the eyes of his sister could never be gouged out forever. So he took the eyes of others, as it was similar to gouging out his sister’s eyes, for eternity.

The joy of fulfilling his desire and the agony of his actions were two sides of the same coin, inseparable.

“Is it truly your sister’s eyes that you need to gouge out?”

A soft voice interrupted his frenzied screams.

Mayuzumi spoke calmly, her gentle words halting the man’s movements.

“Huh?”

She held the man’s gaze with clear eyes. “When you look into a mirror, you see your own emotions reflected back at you,” she spoke as if talking to a child. “Human eyes are like mirrors. What you fear isn’t really your sister’s gaze. What you fear is your own thoughts, that she pities you. Your blaming yourself for hurting her and making her sad. That’s why even when your sister’s gone, eyes still haunt you. That emotion comes from deep within you. People’s eyes are just mirrors. As such, anyone’s eyes become your sister’s eyes. Even if you gouged out a thousand eyes, the urge will never be satiated,” she declared gravely.

Tears brimmed in the man’s eyes as he looked up at Mayuzumi, his trembling lips parting to speak, but his words fell on deaf ears.

Snap.

Mayuzumi closed her parasol, and the image of the dead superimposed onto the doll slowly faded away.

The dark hollows returned.

“The hatred you feel is directed to yourself,” Mayuzumi said. “No amount of eyes you pluck out can ever heal that wound.” Her lips curled into a gentle smile.

She ran her fingers over the empty eye sockets of the doll.

“Thus, your agony and pleasure will know no end.”

The man screamed, howled like a wild animal, brandishing his umbrella like a lunatic. I grabbed his shoulder and pulled him back, but he writhed wildly. The moment I tried to kick the weapon from his hand, it flew in the air, hurtling towards Mayuzumi with great force. I acted on instinct, catching it in my hand, not thinking of the consequences until my palm touched the blood.

My eyes were stabbed.

The tip of the umbrella touched the surface of my eyes and dug deep. The brief jolt felt unnaturally vivid. My eyeballs ruptured as the point penetrated, allowing blood and fluids to pour out, the entire orbs pressed into my brain. Stabbed through the eye sockets, violated, killed. Pain flooded me, exceeding what I could bear, and screams poured out of my mouth. My tongue convulsed and stiffened. A woman’s screams tore through my ears.

Countless shrieks overlapped.

A young woman’s screams rose and fell, followed by a man’s.

Before I realized it, I was screaming myself. My eyes shed viscous tears that felt like hot blood, streaming down my cheeks. I couldn’t stop screaming.

Intense pain filled my eyes. All my muscles tensed up, and I collapsed onto the floor, unable to breathe from the pain. Drool and cries spilled endlessly. My brain hadn’t suffered any damage, but the slightest misconception could stop my whole body from functioning. Arching my body, I banged my head on the floor, touching my eyeball directly with my finger to make sure it was still intact. Tears flowed down my fingers and hands.

Calm down, calm down, calm down, I told myself. I’m okay. I’m okay.

A groan came from my stomach. Responding to my pain, Uka touched my stomach from within. I pressed down on my belly.

“Stop… Don’t come out…”

I couldn’t bear any more pain.

Papa?

Small, bloody fingers wriggled and brushed against my palm. I tried to push the child back into my stomach, fearing that if it emerged any further, it would mean my death. The baby might even devour the man. But pain prevented my arm from moving properly.

“…Ugh, ah…”

The man seemed to retreat away from me. He picked up something from the floor, probably the umbrella. He stood motionless for a moment, but then began to move.

My eyes, which I believed to have been gouged out, were unresponsive. I couldn’t see the man. But I knew he was headed towards Mayuzumi.

“Mayu-san… Run…”

I tried to move, but to no avail. Mayuzumi wasn’t making a move to escape.

There was a snap.

“So, are you going to kill me? I don’t mind. But from now on, you’ll have to keep gouging out eyeballs. You have recognized your own deceit. Come take out my eyes. It shall be the second trigger.” Her words sounded like a curse.

The man froze. Heavy silence enveloped the room, broken only by the sound of rough breathing.

“What’s wrong? Make your choice,” Mayuzumi goaded. “Do you genuinely wish to avoid your own fate? Or do you want to accept it and live happily?”

The man groaned, gnashing his teeth like an animal. Suddenly, the sound stopped.

I didn’t know what the man said.

“I see. You wish to be saved,” Mayuzumi said earnestly. “I never save people. If you don’t mind that, then listen close.” Her voice was as soft as a sigh.

A shiver ran down my spine. Mayuzumi does not offer salvation. Sometimes, however, she gives them a choice. It was up to the person to choose.

“I will grant your request,” Mayuzumi said. “All you have to do is gouge out eyes one more time.”

My hackles rose. I tried to stand up, but the pain was overwhelming, and my body refused to obey me. Uka wailed in my belly. Blood seeped from my wounds, pooling on the floor.

I raised my head. Even blind, I could see Mayuzumi wearing a serious look, the same face she made when she grasped my hand under the cherry blossoms.

“Gouge out your own eyes,” Mayuzumi whispered, sweetly and gently.

What the man feared most was self-hatred. His own mind that said he was being pitied. Such thoughts emerged whenever he saw people’s eyes.

By crushing his own eyeballs, he would no longer need to fear anyone’s gaze.

But that’s…

“No… Stop…”

I reached out into the darkness, moving my fingers in the pitch-black void.

And then, I heard the sound of something being crushed.