Chapter 111
Chapter 111
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Translator: Mod7
Chapter: 111
Chapter Title: Chapter 11 - Vibration
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Just as the sun was setting, Jenny rushed out of the tent, and Nefer drew her daggers. She still didn't understand what was happening.
“Jenny, what is it?”
I, too, was confused by Jenny’s sudden outburst, and I poked my head outside the tent.
Crack-
A hand, skeletal and withered, erupted from the sand.
And then another, and another.
Countless hands, emerging from the sand, clawing at the air.
“What? Wait…”
“Elder! Stay here!”
Even Nefer seemed taken aback by this. Her usual composure was gone, replaced by a tense, wary expression as she pushed me back into the tent.
“No, it’s fine. Let me go.”
“It’s dangerous…!”
But I pushed her hand away and stepped outside. I couldn't just hide behind others forever.
“It’s okay. If they wanted to attack, they would have done so already. They’re trying to tell us something.”
My breath fogged in the cold air, but I followed Jenny, confronting the strange figures.
“Just when I thought things were settling down. I’m not even surprised anymore.”
It was a truly bizarre sight.
The skeletal hands, which had initially emerged from the sand, were now pulling their bodies upwards, their movements slow and labored.
“Ugh, damn it.”
I instinctively covered my nose. The stench of decay was overwhelming.
Were they even alive? They looked like corpses, yet they stumbled towards us, their movements jerky and unnatural.
“Kyagh-!”
Hiss-
With a single, swift movement, the heads of two or three of the creatures flew through the air.
Jenny’s tail, a blur of motion, easily decapitated them.
“Uh… Jenny, good girl.”
They were surprisingly weak. I had assumed they were a serious threat, given Jenny’s reaction, but now it seemed she was simply annoyed by the smell.
“So, they’re just mindless, are they? Even after seeing their own kind get killed, they’re still not afraid.”
I trusted Jenny to protect us, and I took the opportunity to observe them.
Decaying muscles and fat,
Exposed organs,
Melted eyeballs.
“…Ugh.”
The grotesque sight, combined with the nauseating stench, made my stomach churn. I suspected Nefer and Jenny felt the same.
“Nefer! What are these things?”
“I’ve never seen anything like this…”
Even Nefer, who had lived in the desert her entire life, had never encountered these creatures. Amidst the confusion, only Jenny continued to growl and snarl, her aggression a stark contrast to our bewilderment.
“They shouldn't be able to walk, not in this state of decay…”
They resembled zombies.
I remembered a heated debate I had with my colleagues about why such creatures couldn't exist in reality, and now, faced with them, I was speechless.
“…Wait a minute.”
But as I examined their wounds, I noticed a familiar pattern.
The trajectory of the cuts, the size of the wounds, the clean, precise incisions…
“Jenny, did you and Amy do this?”
“Yes. Jenny killed lots of them! Not so many this time.”
I didn't need to look any further. As Jenny said, she had encountered these creatures before.
“They’re not that decomposed. They must have been alive when you met them.”
A chilling thought.
The walking corpses continued to circle our tent,
But they didn't do anything else. I didn't understand their purpose.
“When those smelly things came, the buzzers came too. And then they kept poking me.”
“Buzzers?”
I still didn't understand Jenny’s explanation, but,
If the “buzzers” were flying creatures…
“Perhaps she is referring to the succubi?”
“Probably.”
I had a bad feeling. I had initially dismissed them as a mere annoyance, but seeing these corpses, I changed my mind.
“I knew they looked familiar.”
They resembled the Blood Beasts, Jenny’s kin.
The grotesque flesh-lumps those monsters had controlled.
“It’s the same here.”
The moon’s followers all seemed to engage in this kind of… necromancy. I didn't understand why.
And I learned something else about these unknown creatures.
I didn't know how they were created, but they all had one thing in common.
“…”
They were all male.
Every single one of them.
Weren't there a shortage of males in the desert? And yet, the succubi were turning them into their personal army of walking corpses?
“Hello there.”
A soft, feminine voice reached me from the distance, a beautiful voice that could make any man’s heart skip a beat.
A familiar silhouette stood there. Small, delicate wings and a thin, elegant tail swayed gently in the moonlight.
“…Succubus.”
Perhaps because of the dream, she seemed more familiar now. My mind, still a little fuzzy, saw her as an old childhood friend.
But my body knew better. I still remembered the horrifying images she had shown me.
So, I kept my distance, my hand on my knife. Jenny, on the other hand, bravely stood before me, growling at the succubus.
“I came to tell you something. In private.”
“What is it?”
I decided to hear her out.
While I didn't trust her, avoiding a fight was always preferable.
“You don’t know this desert, Juho. Neither does the little black-haired girl, nor the priestess of Aaptukemen.”
She wrung her hands nervously as she spoke, revealing her information.
I didn't understand. Had something happened to change her mind?
“This place is more hostile than you think. But it’s not just a barren wasteland. The desert is teeming with life.”
The succubus gestured, and the zombies retreated, their movements slow and obedient.
“It’s dangerous. If I can’t… deal with you, my sister will come. And she’s… even more dangerous.”
“So, you’re our enemy?”
“No. I can protect you.”
She spoke only in human language. Nefer, unable to understand, looked at her with suspicion, while Jenny listened intently, her tail wagging.
“And the girl. I’ll protect her too. She lived in a different land, but she’s still a child of the moon. I can persuade my kin.”
“Then the priestess dies.”
“That’s unavoidable. We need a sacrifice to justify our actions.”
An unacceptable offer. I shook my head, my refusal clear.
“No.”
“I see.”
The succubus seemed genuinely disappointed. Her eyes were filled with a strange sadness.
“…Yes, I thought you would say that. The Juho I saw was… like that.”
“It’s strange, hearing that from a monster who invaded my memories and manipulated my mind.”
“Hmm, well, good luck.”
The succubus fell silent, then turned and vanished into the darkness.
She only added one more thing.
“There are creatures in the desert that you would find… interesting. Your dreams will come true.”
The zombies, now without their master, returned, their empty eyes fixed on us, their moans a low, guttural sound.
“Gaaagh-”
Jenny wasn't one to stand idly by.
She swung her tail, striking one of them in the head,
And its head exploded. It didn't just fly off. It exploded.
“Elder, please step back.”
Slice-
Nefer’s tail whipped through the air like a whip, and her daggers flashed, severing the heads of the other zombies with a graceful, almost dance-like movement.
But Jenny and Nefer both paused, their expressions a mixture of surprise and confusion.
They had witnessed something unsettling.
“Huh?”
“They’re not dying.”
The zombies, their heads blown to bits by Jenny’s tail,
Or their heads severed by Nefer’s daggers,
Were still moving, their bodies twitching and convulsing, strange, tentacle-like appendages emerging from their wounds, searching for their severed heads.
A familiar sight.
I felt a strange stirring within my own body.
“…”
While I coexisted with Alraune,
These creatures seemed to have been completely consumed by the tentacles, their minds and bodies no longer their own.
“Wait, let’s just run.”
And then, it got even worse.
The headless zombies, unable to find their heads, grabbed their fallen comrades, their tentacles weaving and knitting their rotting flesh together,
Creating a new, larger, more grotesque being.
“Jenny! Don’t eat that! You’ll get sick!”
“Huh…?”
“Spit it out!”
The massive, grotesque creature, dripping with a foul-smelling ichor, stumbled towards us,
And, stepping onto the sanctified ground Nefer had consecrated,
“Мәрхәмәтле Остаз, мин һине яратам! (Merciful master, I loved you!)”
It screamed, its voice a mangled, distorted cry.
Boom-!
And then, it exploded, showering us with rotten flesh and fluids.
“Elder!”
Nefer quickly covered us with the tent cloth, shielding us from the blast.
“I-I’m okay… it’ll take more than that to kill me.”
But my unease intensified. The stench of rotting flesh was overwhelming.
“So, I was just thinking…”
“Yes?”
“Is there… is there a creature in the desert that feeds on carrion?”
We looked at each other, our faces pale beneath the tent cloth.
And then,
Nefer, after blinking several times, her eyes wide with a dawning horror,
“…Good heavens.”
Her tanned skin turned a deathly pale.
“I-it is only a legend, but… there is a giant worm that lives beneath the sand… it is said to have appeared after the great war, and devoured all the fallen…”
I finally understood why the zombies had gathered here,
Why Jenny had said there were fewer of them than before.
Half of them were here to contaminate us with their stench,
And the other half, to lure something else.
Rumble rumble rumble-
The ground began to shake.
The sand, like water, rippled and swayed.
“But… it’s just a legend… right?”