Chapter 155
Chapter 155
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Translator: penny
Chapter: 155
Chapter Title: Shadow of In-su Village (4)
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Hundreds, thousands of fish corpses stare up at me all at once from the horrifying pit at the riverbed.
[After wandering the outskirts of In-su Village, you have arrived at a place where horrors await. This should have been a river, but there is no water. Your magical talent quickly discerns what happened here. Some surreal effect must have made all the water vanish. But that fact is no longer important. The countless corpses before you stir your fear.]
Stop it, don't look! You monsters! Don't look at me! Stay away! I don't know anything! I'm not like you! I didn't kill you!
[System: Attempting resistance to delirium via Mental Fortitude stat. Mental Fortitude check....... Failure.]
My skin itches underneath. It feels like my skin is tearing, scales sprouting forth. My vision shakes. It itches. My skin itches. I rake my nails across my skin. Ah, it itches. A fishy stench. My body is full of something unnatural.
Aaaaaaah—
I scream, but foam bubbles from my mouth. I can't see. I'm dizzy. My legs move. Where am I going? Where should I go now? It bubbles. My legs give out.
The world spins. Wet mud seeps into the mask. Did I fall? I'm crawling through the mud.
It itches. My arms itch. Skin peels away, revealing scales hidden beneath. Ah. The world spins round and round. That bizarre elder appears in my mind, along with the villagers.
The words they spoke spill from my mouth.
“Ph'nglui Mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh Wgah'nagl Fhtagn.”
[System: 'Madness - Ichthyophobia' triggers 'Abnormal Status - Memory Loss.']
* * *
I awoke in a strange place.
My body was curled up in an awkward knot. My neck and back ached.
“Where...... is this?”
The feel of stone against my back.
An unfamiliar building before my eyes.
‘This doesn't look like the elder's house.’
The yard of some other house?
My memories are hazy.
‘Did I lose my memory again?’
Torn hemp clothes. The tears aren't the problem. The clothes are a mess, soaked in mud and blood.
And the intense pain and wounds on both arms. What are these injuries?
Ugh, one of my nails is missing?
It's a small mercy, but this time I vaguely remember what I saw just before the memory loss.
“Ugh....... Not that it's much help.”
It seems I clawed at myself and wandered the village.
“If this keeps up, the next bout of madness might actually kill me.”
Great job. What priceless fame and fortune were you chasing that made you stick your head under the riverbed?
But it was such a sudden turn.
Damn. I screwed everything up by jumping to the wrong conclusions.
[! Time Limit: Village feast begins in (2) days. !]
A message window pops up, urging me on.
At least a full day hasn't passed yet.
The fog makes it hard to gauge time, but it doesn't feel like I've been out that long.
Fwoosh—
“Huh?”
A grotesquely shaped, bright red creature flies to my shoulder.
A round, orb-like body crossed by a large maw and a pair of wings.
“Reddie.”
The one I ordered to follow the villagers.
“Why'd you come back?”
“Kiiiii......”
Reddie responds with a small, sobbing sound.
“What did I do? No, don't just whine—share your memories.”
Honestly, it's not the smartest thing I ever made. Reddie perches on my shoulder and brings its mouth to my ear.
Churrrr—
Three tentacles spill from Reddie's mouth.
They burrow into my ear.
“Hmm. Not a pleasant feeling.”
As Reddie's consciousness connects, a metallic taste fills my mouth.
Muscles twitch like I've been shocked, a strange euphoria hits, vision spins.
I see what Reddie saw.
Villagers climbing the mountain, making eerie sobbing noises.
Monsters that look like they've draped human skin over themselves.
A completely different breed from the mud-piling folk around here.
“So where did they go?”
They entered a wooden house deep in the mountains.
Not an ordinary building. It's huge, with many rooms. And around the house are grotesque decorations and otherworldly glyphs. A structure designed with ritual effects in mind.
This is the shrine.
“You did well not losing them. And then?”
There was a prison inside the shrine.
Straw piled in the prison, and a human bound in iron chains. Seven humans total in the prison.
Two異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異異