A Formal Party
“Aaaaah…….”
Sky took one look at the women blocking his path and collapsed right where he stood.
More than four gun barrels were trained on him, yet he only swallowed dryly and stared past them toward the bathroom.
A middle-aged woman with hair gone mostly white fixed him with a cold gaze and spoke.
“This is our bathroom. If you want a drink of water, you’ll pay a fair price.”
“W-what kind of price?”
“Items, Blood Crystals—whatever you’ve got. Hand it over. I’ll decide what it’s worth.”
In other words, empty your pockets. The sneer on the middle-aged woman’s face made no effort to hide her real intent.
Sky mumbled in a voice thick with despair.
“I-I’ll give you everything I have. Please, just one mouthful of water…… please…….”
The woman studied him a moment, then jerked her chin toward one side. At the signal a younger woman lowered her gun, produced a small water pouch from her jacket, and stepped up to Sky.
“Open your mouth.”
Sky shut his eyes and obeyed. The woman let a few drops fall from the pouch. While the water dribbled out, Sky thrust out his tongue like a dog and lapped at it. Mocking smiles spread across the women’s faces.
Then she snatched the pouch away.
Sky cried out as if he were dying.
“J-just a little…… a little more!”
The middle-aged woman kicked him hard. Sky tumbled backward, clutching the arm that had taken the blow and screaming.
“Hmph. Feeling better? Time to pay for that water. Open your inventory and dump everything out.”
Sky writhed in pain and began to stammer.
“I-inventory?”
“You don’t even know what an inventory is? How long have you been here?”
“A-about a week…… I haven’t eaten anything the whole time.”
The woman’s eyelids drooped halfway. She spat the next words like something foul.
“I thought we’d finally caught some decent prey. Complete bust.”
She gave a small nod. Another middle-aged woman stepped forward, seized Sky by the scruff of the neck, and hauled him upright. Sky half-hung from her grip as she snarled,
“Come with me. Unless you want to die.”
“Ah…… yes.”
Sky shuffled after her into a dark corner. That corner was, in fact, their execution ground; the next room was stacked high with the bodies of everyone they had already killed.
A short while later a red flash bloomed in the darkness, followed by a heavy impact. The aura that rolled out was nothing like the usual.
“What was that?”
“What’s going on?”
“Something’s off.”
The white-haired woman narrowed her eyes and flicked a glance at another of her people. The woman who received the order raised her gun and slipped quietly toward the sound.
Then it happened again.
Another red flash. Another violent crash.
The middle-aged woman felt it in her bones: something had gone badly wrong. The young woman still with her felt the same unease.
“I’ll go too. Cover the rear.”
“Got it.”
The younger woman set her jaw and walked into the dark. Her face still held absolute trust in the older woman. The older woman had no intention of living up to that trust. Long survival had etched an instinct into her bones, and that instinct was screaming at her to run—right now.
She turned without hesitation.
In that instant the world went black.
Thud—!
The flat of Silence’s blade smashed into her face. Blood erupted from her nose. The droplets met the freezing air and froze solid before they ever reached the floor.
Before she could recover, a bone-chilling cold settled against the nape of her neck. It was not imagination. The skin there literally frosted over with frostbite, sending a sharp, stinging pain through her.
“Hina? You okay?”
As if answering Minel’s question, Hina stepped slowly out of the darkness. In front of her walked the younger woman, both hands raised high above her head, eyes squeezed shut in resignation. Behind them Sky cautiously poked his head out of the shadows—then bolted straight toward Minel.
“I knew it! I knew it! I knew it! Thank you so much! I knew you’d protect me!”
“That’s far enough. Don’t come any closer.”
“Ah, okay…….”
They herded the two of them into one spot and kept watch. After that they took turns washing themselves. Until now they had only cleaned their clothes through the inventory; they had never actually washed their bodies. A single rinse with real water felt as though every accumulated stress simply melted away.
Even Hina, who rarely smiled, emerged wearing a wide, radiant grin. Her beauty seemed restored, as if a celebrity photoshoot had come to life.
Sky swaggered over carrying a full water jug. He set it down with a flourish for everyone to see and announced in a loud voice,
“Heh heh heh. Finally I get to show you how useful I am.”
He flashed an oily smile, rested both hands on the water’s surface, closed his eyes, and concentrated. The water inside the jug suddenly flared with brilliant light, then transformed into ordinary convenience-store bread.
Sky looked at the two of them with open pride. It wasn’t as flashy as a combat skill, but the sight was still impressive enough.
“Nice.”
“It really is. That’s an amazing skill.”
Sky’s expression suddenly fell. In a low, sullen mutter he said,
“You two aren’t even surprised…….”
He upended the jug, dumped the bread out, and started eating. The gloom of a moment earlier vanished; a bright smile bloomed on his face. Watching him eat, it seemed safe enough—no poison, at least.
Hina picked one up, sniffed it, took a bite, and held another out to Minel.
“If you ignore the fact it was made from bathroom water, it’s actually really good. Instantly makes you feel better.”
“…….”
Minel stuffed dozens of the loaves into his inventory. He had no intention of putting any in his mouth until he had checked them with the Backrooms Compendium.
Afterward he walked over to the younger woman. She spoke quietly.
“Are you going to kill us?”
“You already know you deserve it, don’t you?”
She watched his face carefully and answered in a low voice.
“I’ll give you everything I own. Just spare my life.”
“Take it out first.”
Beside her the middle-aged woman ground her teeth so hard they creaked. With Hina’s gun trained on them there was nothing they could do.
The younger woman opened her inventory. A few Blood Crystals, some bullets, and one each of the thirst- and hunger-immunity drinks came out. Among them, one item stood out.
A cell phone.
“It doesn’t work. I just kept it on the off chance.”
In a place as bizarre as the Backrooms, there was no telling when or how something might suddenly function. Minel collected every item, then turned his head toward the middle-aged woman.
“And you?”
She glanced at Minel and Hina. Reluctantly she opened her inventory and laid out what she had: a few Blood Crystals, bullets, a matching pair of thirst- and hunger-immunity drinks—and a throwing jar.
“You bastards…… all of you can die!”
The instant it was free she yanked the fuse. She clearly meant to take them all with her if it came to that.
A red flash cracked the air and a hole punched clean through her wrist. The jar slipped from her fingers. Minel’s hand shot out and snatched it mid-fall. Unfortunately more than half the fuse was already gone. He hurled the jar with all his strength into a far corner of the room. Thanks to his exceptional physique it landed exactly where he aimed—but the brief motion left him open.
The middle-aged woman immediately drew a knife with her free hand and, ignoring the agony in her wrist, lunged.
Minel felt no concern at all.
Clang—!
In that split second a barrier blossomed in front of him and the blade bounced away. A second red flash followed.
A neat hole appeared dead-center between the middle-aged woman’s eyebrows.
BOOM—!
In the distant room the jar detonated. The roar made a clean, final punctuation mark to the short battle.
As people who had held a bathroom, they were a cut above the ones Minel had faced before. To keep attacking so calmly even while trying to self-destruct…… without Hina, finishing this cleanly would have been difficult.
Minel looked away from the woman with the hole in her forehead and turned to Hina. Her eyes were wide and shaken, yet the hands gripping the gun did not tremble in the slightest. A faint yellow light glowed in her irises.
“You okay?”
Hina managed a nod.
“I’m fine.”
“…….”
“Really, I’m fine.”
She had grown decisively bolder. Even in the heat of the moment, she hadn’t hesitated to kill.
Minel turned back to the younger woman. Having just watched her party leader die in front of her, she was paralyzed by pure terror.
“The other two are unconscious over there.”
“…….”
“Forget revenge.”
Minel rose and walked away. Sky mouthed a stream of silent curses at the younger woman, then stuck close to Minel’s heels. Hina holstered her gun and added one more line.
“There were probably parts you couldn’t help because of your party leader. I used to look the other way for a long time myself when people did evil things.”
“…….”
“But from now on every choice is yours alone. So don’t do anything stupid.”
It was not a lecture. It was a clear warning: if she tried anything again, Hina would eliminate her without hesitation.
The younger woman glanced once at the dead middle-aged woman, then answered quietly.
“I’ll remember that.”
Hina gave a small nod and followed Minel. Meanwhile Sky was making enough noise to wake the entire Backrooms.
“I knew it! I knew it! You had a plan all along! From the first second I saw you I could tell this guy wasn’t normal! That was so cool! And that last line—just one sharp word—goddamn!”
“…….”
“You remember my skill, right? Do you have any idea how precious a food-creation skill is in this place? There are people who eat human meat, you know! My skill isn’t just some cooking skill. It’s a great skill that protects human dignity!”
“…….”
“If you stick with me from now on I can make whatever food you want—not just bread. Eat something tasty and you get the strength to survive another day…….”
Minel stopped dead and raised a hand.
“Be quiet.”
“Ah, okay…….”
“It’s time to sleep. Let’s find a place to rest.”
In the Backrooms, securing a safe place to sleep was directly tied to survival. Minel and Hina searched the surroundings for a room where they could rest. Sky tried to sleep in the same room, but one sharp look from Minel sent him meekly into another.
Minel lay down beside Hina and tried to think of something to say. She spoke first.
“I’m really fine. You don’t have to worry about me.”
If she said so, believing her was the polite thing to do.
“If you ever need to talk, just say so. All right?”
“More importantly, I think I’ve figured something out about Wildness.”
Minel turned his head. Hina was already looking at him.
“What is it?”
“I don’t think Wildness builds up just from killing people.”
“Then what?”
“Everything we’ve done so far has been self-defense. Because I believed my actions were justified, that drunk-on-Wildness feeling went away.”
It made perfect sense. Minel turned her words over carefully.
“So as long as you have a moral standard?”
“Basically, as long as you don’t get swept away by instinct or emotion. On the flip side, if you do get swept away and kill indiscriminately, Wildness piles up.”
“…….”
“We’ll have to be careful from now on.”
After that Minel stayed quietly beside her until she fell asleep. She never quite managed it. She spoke clearly enough, but the anxiety that came from having taken a life was apparently harder to shake. She would need sleep if they were going to move tomorrow.
Minel let out a soft sigh, then made up his mind.
“Let’s form a party. Officially.”
Hina’s eyes went as round as a full moon. A second later something seemed to occur to her and her lids lowered halfway.
“Was this so you could confirm that I was willing to kill people?”
“No.”
“Then what?”
Minel turned his face toward the ceiling. The fluorescent light hanging by a thread looked pitiful.
“Your revenge is over.”
Hina finally understood what he meant.
“You thought the only reason I wanted to party with you was so I could use you for revenge?”
“Yeah.”
“You really thought I would…….”
She started to protest at once, then realized it was pointless and let the sentence trail off. When she looked at Minel his eyes were completely still. Through that gaze she understood something she had never admitted to herself: she really had used him that way.
He was asking her what she intended to do from now on.
Hina was silent for a moment, then lowered her head a fraction.
“If you’ll form a party with me, from now on I’ll follow you no matter what.”
“Good. That’s enough.”
Once Minel confirmed it, Hina fell asleep within five minutes. Only soft, even breathing filled the room—like a child sleeping. Satisfied, Minel tried to sleep as well. Tonight, however, sleep refused to come.
A thought struck him and he pulled the Backrooms Compendium and the phone from his inventory.
A common means of long-distance communication within the Backrooms. Dial a number with your fingers to contact that number. If the number is correct, it is even possible to reach across dimensions. Breaks extremely easily—handle with care.
Minel wrestled with the phone for a while, but the already-broken device gave no response at all. In the end he returned both the Backrooms Compendium and the phone to his inventory, thought about tomorrow’s tasks, and forced himself back toward sleep.
For the first time in a long while, Suye appeared in his dreams.