Sweet, Sweet Escape

Thump, crack.

Crunch.

Chop, squelch, clank, jab, scrape, saw…….

"Aaaaagh!"

The preceding scenes, which may be deemed moderately repulsive, have been substituted with onomatopoeia. What's that? You're not disgusted and want to see everything? Geez, only total perverts get off on that kind of stuff……!

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"I finally finished you! Wilson!"

Ahhh. That was exhausting.

Crafting Wilson's limbs had been the easy part. All I had to do was chop off my own arms and legs. The real problem was fashioning the torso. How the hell was I supposed to cut my own torso off?

So, after deep contemplation, I whittled myself down bit by bit and reassembled the pieces. Specific methodology has been redacted to prevent copycat crimes.

"Wilson. Care to say a few words?"

"Kkigik."

A grating, metallic screech scraped out of Wilson's throat.

Huh. Did I wire the vocal cords wrong? Whatever, I can always take him apart and rebuild him later. In any case, a fully functional marionette was complete.

Sniff. The long, lonely, desolate days were finally over. I had a friend now too……!

Ah, for the record, Wilson didn't possess an independent soul or anything. He was simply linked to my consciousness, allowing me to manipulate him like an auxiliary body. Not that it mattered, since Wilson lived inside my heart anyway. Ahhh. Wilson. I finally gave you a body!

"Kkik. Kkigik. Kkigi-gik."

"Yeah, yeah. I think I'm gorgeous too."

"Kkigik."

"What?! How could you say something so cruel……?!"

Wilson seemed deeply dissatisfied with the slapdash, cobbled-together state of his new vessel.

Fuck off. I have way more complaints than you do. You don't even have to eat, you lucky bastard.

Oh. And there was one peculiar anomaly.

"Wilson's Status Window!"

Wilson actually got his very own status window! On top of that, he had inherited one of my skills. If only Healing Factor had copied over too, I could have duplicated endless meat. Damn it all. My infinite meat buffet, ruined!

Well, Wilson wouldn't die just from missing a heart or two, so he probably didn't need regeneration anyway. Come to think of it, I deliberately stuffed two of my own hearts inside him. Kind of like Three-Lungs Park, right?

Wilson, the man with two hearts……. Wait, is he even a man? I forgot to attach a dick.

"Kkigik."

"What? Your gender identity is an attack helicopter?!"

Welp. Looks like I just unlocked another mental disorder.

Before my insanity spiraled any further, I needed to finish what I came here to do.

"All right, Wilson."

A milky-white bone implement. Wilson gripped the dagger carved from my own skeleton. The sensory feedback transmitted straight into my brain. Corpse Marionette was practically violating my cerebral cortex!

Ah. Bone is…… rather cold to the touch. Is it because it's a cold weapon?

The surface was awfully rough. I had tried smoothing it down, but that turned out to be a total failure.

Moreover, it was light. So feather-light that if I squeezed too hard, it felt like it would shatter into chalky powder. In exact proportion to the brittleness of my bones, this bone blade was equally brittle. Even after desiccating the moisture out to harden it, its fundamental nature remained unchanged.

Me.

This blade was me. It was every bit as fragile and pathetic as I was.

And so.

"With that blade held in your hand──."

In the end, it seemed this was what I did best.

"Kill me!"

Shhhk. The sound of dry leather shearing apart. Skrrk. The blade caught against spinal bone, shrieking in protest. It wasn't enough. It wasn't cutting through.

It had to be sawed.

Kkik, kkigik, kkigi-gik. The exact same metallic grinding rasp leaking from Wilson's throat began pouring out of mine.

Oh! Wilson! We really were twins after all!

A hole in your throat, a hole in mine. If we tied a piece of string between them like a tin-can telephone, I could talk just like you anytime!

Ah, damn it. Why hadn't I prepared a sharper blade? Why hadn't I cured my bones harder, honed the edge keener, and practiced hacking through dense bone every single day?

Aaargh! Being sawed apart alive hurts like a motherfucker────!!!!

'Aaaaargh! Good heavens above!'

Ah. Come to think of it, maybe the Fairy was actually a deeply compassionate soul. She always slaughtered me painlessly!

Ahhh, Fairy-father. Only now do I understand your grace. How did you bear such burdens? Now I truly yearn for the disciplining rod of your love. Wait, who the hell are you? You're not my dad.

"……."

Thud. Splat.

My head fell, tumbling right into a pool of fresh blood. I watched it happen through Wilson's eyes. It was…… a rather surreal sensation. My head had dropped off plenty of times, but this was the first time I had ever watched my own head tumble down in real time.

Before, I had only ever looked after the head was already on the ground, or stared down at a decapitated neck.

'It's smiling.'

It was grinning. My severed head was looking right up at me, wearing a smile. I stared back at my own face. What could possibly be so funny that it was laughing through such agonizing torment?

I was jealous. I envied that smile. I envied it so fiercely that the dagger in my hand snapped with a sharp crack.

Wait a minute. Hold on. That's me, isn't it?

This is wrong. Strange, strange, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong. Why are you laughing, me? Doesn't it hurt? Did the pain break your mind so badly you went insane?

Oh, right. Oops. I was already completely out of my fucking mind.

"Kkigik."

Ahaha.

"Kkik."

Haha.

"Kkik, khe-heck, pffft, ahaha, gahaha, AHAHAHAHAHA────!!!"

Ah. There must have been some gunk caught in Wilson's vocal cords. After letting out a roaring belly laugh, an actual human voice burst cleanly from his throat.

"Pwahaha! Kang Seonwoo, you lunatic bastard……!"

My original plan had been to generate more corpses and mass-produce Wilsons. One Wilson for every severed head of mine. Wouldn't that have been a pretty sweet bargain?! Human transmutation is real!

I thought if I churned out a whole army of Wilsons and we swarmed that Fairy all at once, we might at least land a single punch. That was the idiotic notion I'd had. Blinded by rage, I had brushed aside the pain and carried out the butchery.

Ahaha. Truly a creatively deranged lunatic.

"What a colossal load of bullshit. Seriously."

Just a moment ago, the very instant my neck was severed and my breath ceased, I realized an interesting fact.

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Thinking back, something had been fishy from the very beginning. I clearly did all my thinking with my head right up until I croaked……, so why was it that whenever I resurrected, I always revived from my torso?

If my head died, why did my body bring me back? Isn't that deeply fucked up?

Seriously. Why does the headless torso resurrect when the noggin gets crushed? Why do my memories carry over uninterrupted? Why…… don't I ever revive from the severed head?

Correct answer: How the fuck should I know? The guy who coded the skill must have designed it that way. Healing Factor is a supernatural ability to begin with, so quit looking for common sense.

……That was the conclusion I had settled on.

"Status Window!"

And now, the moment my head had been sliced clean off, the secret had unraveled. The second my head dropped…… I became 'Wilson.' Or rather, to be precise, Wilson's vessel became 'my body.'

Wow. This really is pants-on-head retarded.

"So all that mattered was having the larger biological volume?!"

This skill recognized whatever chunk had the greater physical mass as 'my body.' Even ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠if that chunk was a grotesque, shredded rag of flesh. Even if it was riddle-stitched with needle marks, covered in crude patches of tanned hide, stuffed with haphazardly crammed organs, and powered by two redundant hearts.

And right now, this monstrosity was regenerating.

"Ah."

One of the hearts melted into crimson slurry and was absorbed into the other. The puncture wounds and stitch lines faded into smooth skin. My bleached, monochrome vision blossomed back into vivid color. The finger I had accidentally sewn on backwards snapped around with a sharp twist, welding seamlessly into place.

Whoa!

"Fucking hurts like shit!"

Resurrection turned out to be just as agonizing as dying. Knowledge gained.

O Jesus! How on earth did you endure this agony for three days straight? I bear a cross as well—the steadfast faith within my heart. What? You thought I was a Buddhist? If you have a problem with it, you should have dropped me a hamburger from heaven, you prick.

'Haha.'

A delightfully wicked idea just struck me.

There was no need to build any more Wilsons. After all, churning out a bunch of puppets would only leave a pile of decapitated carcasses on the floor. Just one was plenty. One alone was more than enough to shove a massive middle finger right into that Fairy's face.

Hey, little Fairy.

U up?

I miss you.

I'm sorry.

I found myself thinking about you today.

I'll be waiting for you in that white room where we first met.

A forest. It was a real forest.

Trees. Sunlight. Soil. The chirping of insects. The breeze. The scent of wild grass. It had been so damn long since I had seen…… an actual natural landscape that wasn't that godforsaken white room.

Overcome with profound emotion, I popped an instant erection.

"Holy shit. It actually worked."

Finally! Finally, finally, finally! I escaped the white room! Seonwoo is free! Master has given Dobby a sock!

"Bwaaaagh!"

Weeping tears of joy, I threw myself flat against the dirt. Then, without a second thought, I scooped up a fistful of soil and shoved it into my mouth. Mmm! The gritty astringency is so juicy! How long has it been since I tasted something that wasn't human flesh?!

Mommy! Look, that mister is eating dirt!

Study hard, sweetie, so you can grow up to be just like him, okay?

Okay!

Ah. I missed this so goddamn much, fuck me.

"Kheheheh."

I've eaten enough dirt, so time to slice open my gut. Oh wait, Wilson has the bone dagger. Right.

"Wilson, come in."

"Wilson here."

"How is it?"

"Fucking white, asshole."

"Ahahaha!"

Borrowing Wilson's senses, I gazed through his eyes. That familiar, suffocatingly familiar pristine white waiting room greeted my gaze. Ugh! Gives me the creeps! Anyone who stays in a room like that is bound to lose their mind!

"Having fun out there?"

"Fun as fuck."

"Right. Enjoy yourself to the fullest before coming back."

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"Will do!"

The master plan I concocted to screw over that Fairy was simple: leave Wilson behind in the white room.

As for how I managed it──.

"Oho! That green thing over there! Isn't that an Orc?! Whoa! First time seeing an Orc in my life!"

Wait.

"That looks delicious!"

I'll go eat that thing first, then explain the rest.