The terrible screams and shrieks were dying down. There was no way to know where all those people had gone. They might have escaped this place and fled toward some other shelter. Or, in the end, they might have been slaughtered by the things that had invaded.
Flames soared upward, and the deserted road felt sinister. Ji-an lowered the blinds over the window and drew the blackout curtains. After shutting out the light completely, she held her breath.
She had just checked on her mother one last time and was about to quietly step out into the living room. That was when it happened. All of a sudden, she saw a tiny sliver of light seeping in through the gap in the blackout curtains. Whoooong... Then came an eerie noise. Ji-an’s movement stopped dead as she instinctively sensed danger.
Thump, thump, thump... Her heart began to pound wildly, and with her body trembling, she turned her head.
There was something outside the window.
Her body shook like an aspen leaf. She could not control the fear surging over her like a wave.
Booom! In that instant, an explosion erupted. Ah! It felt as though the world were collapsing. Under the tremendous impact, the already precarious building began to cave in—the ceiling crumpling like a sheet of paper, the floor giving way. “Aaaagh!” Ji-an ended up screaming. At the same time, the wall came crashing down. And then Ji-an saw it. Something enormous, its terrifying eyes gleaming...
And that thing suddenly seized her mother and carried her off somewhere.
“N-no...” she cried softly, reaching out to grab her mother. But cruelly, her outstretched hand did not reach her. Rumble... Another deafening roar followed, and the floor beneath Ji-an’s feet collapsed with a crash. Swept away by the caving floor, she was swallowed by pitch-black darkness. Ji-an could not resist.
“M-Mom!! Mom!!!”
She fell endlessly. It was as though she were being sucked into a deep, deeper darkness like absolute pitch. Into the profound darkness of despair, where no hope could be seen...
//////
“Hurk!” She gulped in a breath and blinked several times. Her breathing, tinged with a metallic rasp, burst out in ragged gasps. Her face was covered in cold sweat. Pain was slowly flooding in. Soon, her gaze caught sight of the sky burning red. She thought it looked just like that day.
“Haa...” The breath she had been holding burst out of her. A cool breeze blew. Riding the wind came the pleasant scent of earth. And around her, shhh... came the sound of trees rubbing against the wind and shivering. It seemed as though the trees themselves were trembling in fear.
“Ah...” She carefully let a sound slip between her chapped lips. Pain surged through her voice. She drew in and exhaled one more deep breath, then finally tried moving her body. Her fingers, stiff as if they had hardened, barely moved, leaving behind an aching stiffness. She tried moving her toes as well; a prickling numbness spread through them as though the blood were not flowing, but they moved nonetheless.
Instead, the clearer her mind became, the sharper the burning pain in her side grew. Was it like being scorched by fire? “Hoo...” With a low breath, she lifted her head and checked her side. Drops of blood had spread across the torn cloth. She was bleeding quite a bit.
Squinting one eye, she placed a hand on her side. After several deep breaths, she put strength into her body.
“Uuuuugh...” It felt as if her waist would snap in two. The terrible pain was enough to bring tears to her eyes. Even so, she somehow managed to sit up. Was it fortunate, at least, that she could still move? It meant there was still some chance she could survive here.
When she looked back, she saw a towering cliff. A broken tree branch jutted out midway down. It seemed that when she had fallen from the cliff, a tree growing between the rocks had cushioned her fall. Of course, her entire body ached as though it had been smashed to pieces, but the fact that she was alive like this was something.
With a sigh of relief, Ji-an lay back down on the ground once more. The whole area was extremely quiet. The sky where the sun was setting looked as though it were on fire. At times like this, the past would suddenly surface like trauma. Even though quite a bit of time had passed since that day. Ji-an stared at that sky for a long while, struggling to soothe her complicated feelings, then once again staggered to her feet.
The sun was slowly beginning to set. So she had to find a safe place quickly. It was far too dangerous to remain sprawled here.
She reached toward the heavy bag lying beside her. If there was one more fortunate thing, it was that she had not lost her belongings. If she had lost even this, things would have been even bleaker. Ji-an opened the small front pocket of the heavy backpack. Inside were various first-aid medicines and bandages. She had put them in the front pocket so she could take them out quickly at any time.
She took out a bandage and some hemostatic powder. Ordinarily, she would have sewn up the gash in her side with needle and thread, but unfortunately, there was no time for that now. The shadows were growing longer and longer. Night would soon arrive. And that meant their time would soon come.
Earth no longer belonged to humanity. Night was even more so. It was the time when those who had become the new masters of the surface moved most actively—and it was also hunting time. So she had to move quickly.
The moment she applied the powdered hemostatic to the deep wound in her side, “Hrk!” Once again, a pain that felt like her waist was snapping in two shot up her spine, and she gulped in a breath. She barely managed to hold back the scream that almost escaped her.
Cold sweat poured down like rain, and her body trembled slightly.
Fortunately, amid the pain, the hemostatic seemed to be slowly taking effect. “Hoo... hoo...” Breathing roughly, she wound the bandage tightly around her waist so it would not come loose, then gently tried moving her body. Thankfully, she felt that it had become much easier to move.
She wiped the sweat running down her forehead with her sleeve and picked up the backpack. Damn, standing up was extremely painful. Still, this much pain was bearable enough. She had suffered wounds worse than this before. By now, she had grown fairly used to pain.
This place was a mountain packed densely with tall trees. In this place, where there was naturally no trace of people to be found, darkness arrived faster than ever.
As expected, there was no time. She had to move. In her anxiety, Ji-an took one careful step after another. Crunch, crunch... Each time she walked, a sharp pain shot through her left ankle. It seemed she had sprained it. In the end, she could not take more than a few steps before leaning against a tree and having to rest again. “Fuck... this is seriously bad.” She spat out the curse irritably and checked her throbbing ankle.
After untying the laces of her high-cut boot and checking her foot, she saw that it was not merely blue, but blackened. It seemed to have swollen to twice the size of the other ankle. This was troublesome. At this rate, even walking was difficult, and if she were to encounter those things in this condition...
Ah... there was absolutely no way she could run away.
In her agitation, she looked around. In the deepening twilight, the air already seemed to be growing colder. After hesitating for a moment, Ji-an put the backpack down again and took a filthy handkerchief out of the largest pocket. Then, with the machete at her waist, she cut off a fairly thick tree branch in one stroke.
She intended to make a splint. She placed the branch against her ankle and wrapped it tightly with the handkerchief. “Hrk...” It hurt so much that Ji-an found herself thinking it would have been nice to have even one bottle of liquor at a time like this. Of all times, she had no alcohol left now.
‘If I’d known this would happen, I should have saved just a little...’
Belated regret washed over her.
Well... it was always like that. She always consumed things without thinking, only to regret it later. Just like now. But after the world had changed like this, even the idea of saving something had become a luxury. They lived in a world where they could die tomorrow. No, a world had arrived where it would not be strange to die today if one was unlucky. The things that had become the new masters of the surface possessed the power to wipe out humanity in an instant if they so desired. To avoid them, humanity had abandoned the surface and hidden underground.
There was no hope. Their numbers were increasing more and more, and humanity could not live hidden underground forever. Especially not with limited resources. So it was a foregone conclusion that humanity would perish. In such a situation, what was the point of saving anything? Even if one saved it, once annihilation came, everything would return to nothing in the end.
“Hoo... hoo...”
The splint was complete. She set her foot back down on the ground. “Hngh...” It was no use. It hurt all the same. She thought it might be better if she had a crutch rather than just a splint, but it was difficult to find anything usable as a crutch here. There was one somewhat long stick, but it was rotten and looked as though it would break with even the slightest pressure.
Meanwhile, the twilight was growing deeper and deeper. She grew impatient. Now there really was not much time left. Night would truly arrive soon.
///