Nightmare

A mastermind.

A wicked inner working that never shows its face, and yet governs an entire story.

In this story, Babylonia, the head of the Black Wolf — the man called Black Wolf — was the one who fit that word better than anyone. His name alone set the world trembling. His subordinates were nightmares, and on the rare occasion he appeared in person, he paralyzed the lands around him with terror.

Once more: Black Wolf was the man best suited to the word mastermind.

But Nahan had possessed him.

Nahan, an ordinary young man of twenty-five who had lived on a planet called Earth, had taken the body of a secretive man who shared his name. And so he brooded.

Who am I?

Is my Black Wolf a complete Black Wolf?

Can the Nahan who came from Earth become an overwhelming mastermind, the way Babylonia's Nahan was?

The answer to that question was—

No? Absolutely not.

Impossible.

I only act the part of Black Wolf. My feelings and his are separate things.

He could imitate. He could never pour those feelings out while remaining Black Wolf.

And yet he wondered.

...What if.

Truly — what if.

What if he, possessing Black Wolf, underwent a violent change of emotion in that very state?

Could I draw out his power in full, the way an enraged Black Wolf would?

The answer to this question was...

He could draw it out.

From the heart of a killing intent that raged pitch-black, the awakened Black Wolf gave his warning.

"Get away from Luna. Now."

Before he tore her apart.

The Troupe — Loss.

Beneath a torn tent that was now nothing but a shape, three shadows moved.

"...Ah, my lady..."

Hanryang — a huge bulk of a man, groping at empty air as if to catch hold of someone.

"...Why? What did we even do wrong...!"

Ruby, huddled in the farthest corner among the flesh-dolls, shaking so hard her teeth chattered.

"...Rose."

Dalan, standing straight with only his head bowed, silent as a man paying his respects at a grave.

Had they been caught by something of Luna's — no, of Mother's?

"...Ah, my lady..."

"...What did we even do wrong..."

"...Rose."

The three of them only repeated the same words, wandering the dust-choked tent like skeletons that had lost their heads.

Then—

...a soft click.

Luna, her mask removed and her face hidden in shadow, came toward the three of them.

Step. Step. Step...

Her gait, the interval of her ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠breath, the air she gave off — none of it belonged to Luna anymore. All of it had drawn close to Mother.

With careful steps she gathered the three who had lost their way, and stood them in a row beneath the moonlight leaking in.

The more she repeated the words, the stronger the compulsion laid over them by the mask became. They could tell that drowsiness was pouring down on them. They would fall asleep all the same.

Even the faint consciousness left in the troupe members guttered out, following that murmuring loop.

Utterly defenseless.

"......"

Mother looked down at the three fallen members, and the moment she stepped boldly into the moonlight, the face she had kept hidden all the while was laid bare. Stiffened corners of a mouth. Grotesquely twisted corners of a mouth — as if the ends had been tied off with thread and hauled upward. Even the dust drifting in the air shrank away from that skin-crawling, artificial smile.

Even so, Mother whispered.

"Smile."

She caught the corners of the three fallen mouths and kept drawing them up.

"Otherwise you'll die before long. ...No. I'll kill you."

Now and then her brow crumpled with rage. She went on murmuring like that for a long while, stroking the cheeks of the three who had fallen — but there was no way the three who had fallen could smile.

"...I said you'll die."

At last, just as she was about to work her fingers into their mouths and tear them long to either side—

A violent heave.

"...!!!"

Something twisted horribly inside her. She could not even scream before she collapsed.

"Uup— hueeeek!!"

Splat.

With the dark crimson blood came a gush of some dreadful, unidentifiable black energy.

"......!"

Mother thrashed for a time, then realized that something had gone wrong in her mindscape. At once she split a crack through reality.

Crack—!

Like a fracture racing across glass, the real world — one of two worlds laid over each other — shattered, and the mindscape overlapped beneath it showed itself.

The instant she pulled back even the influence she had led out into the real world, and returned here—

"Get away from Luna. Now."

A horrific hostility, as if it meant to carve the flesh from her, bound Mother's body.

"...!!"

She tried to retreat at once, but she could not move, as if she had sunk into a swamp.

Mother took in the situation. In her left hand, a sack of money. In her right, Luna's ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠soul. One was a phantom from a memory on endless repeat. The other was the truth, wearing a phantom's mask. The fury of the man before her was not over the phantom. It was over the treatment of the truth.

Luna. Danger. The man.

From the words that fit the moment, Mother drew a single conclusion.

Death.

If she kept hold of Luna like this, she herself would die before long.

Influence. Further retrieval. ...Still death.

She tried to think of some way to thrash free, and understood that no thrashing would matter — a human standing before a natural disaster.

...Her grip tightened.

Mother clutched the money sack and Luna hard once more, lifted her head, and was about to ask—

"What you want — what—"

"Shut up."

Crunch!

The killing intent that had been raking only her mind seemed to take on weight and become real, crushing her body down.

Step. Step. Step.

Within those unhesitating strides, Black Wolf looked at Mother and thought.

I have to kill her.

Because the woman who had driven so many children to their deaths was trying to kill Luna.

Step. Step. Step.

...He stopped.

In the gaze that halted and looked down, Nahan went to one knee and thought.

Whose feelings are these, exactly?

It was true that rage had surged up in him at the sight of the trash who sold children and killed them. It was true that he had grown fond of Luna, and that the rage had burned hotter for it. But was he — not Black Wolf, but he — the sort of man who would conclude that he ought to punish them with his own hands?

Perhaps Method had swallowed him.

...Am I Black Wolf right now?

Or was he still Nahan?

His mind was overheating. The action that showed on the outside was very simple.

A smooth reach.

Black Wolf brought himself level with Mother's eyes and, as if drawn, stretched out a hand and seized her by the throat.

"Kkeuh...!!"

Like the children a moment ago, she rose into the empty air with her neck crushed — and still Mother was smiling.

Clank!

He hauled her up with force enough to break her, and all she dropped was the money sack. Her other hand still gripped Luna's wrist.

"Kkeueup...!!!"

Mother's eyes, flooding red with blood, turned toward the fallen Luna. Golden hair. A face full of scars. An expression that had found peace only after she fainted. What did she think, looking at those things?

"...!!!"

The gaze of Mother, dying by inches, wrenched violently toward Black Wolf, and—

With a strength risen by several stages she tried something, anything, to slip free of the grip—

"Solar Annihilation."

KRAAAAAK!!

"!!"

A radiant golden blow erased the space itself, and her attempt failed.

"......!"

She was split along a single ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠line ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠from the right of her waist to her left shoulder, and in the aftermath that followed, the mask Mother wore was destroyed as well.

Splat.

Like tar that had melted into a slick, Mother's lower body — cut in half — dissolved and dropped away.

"...!!"

Her mouth gaped, as if there were something she wanted to say. But she made no sound, and so Black Wolf simply let the upper body he was holding fall.

A smooth motion.

Only then did Black Wolf take the fallen Luna — the child Luna — fully into his arms, and whisper at her ear.

"Wake up, Luna."

In that instant—

"......?"

Luna's eyes opened under the aura of the mastermind. She stared blankly at Black Wolf and murmured.

"...Big brother? The one who held my hand?"

Black Wolf nodded.

Reassured by that solemn nod, Luna slowly looked around. The tent. The stage. The seats. She was still up on the stage.

"Ah...!!"

She startled and tried to push herself up, but Black Wolf stopped her, and added—

"It's over."

"Huh...? What do you mean, over?"

"The auction. The trash. All of it is gone."

"Oh... so I'm still dreaming...?"

Perhaps because she was still hazy.

Click.

Luna smiled, small and bright, as if she had decided it was a dream, and Black Wolf picked something up and held it out to her.

"It's over."

What he held out was Mother's mask. The thing that had made Luna into this — and, at the same time, the thing worn by the woman who had oppressed her.

Like a sky clearing after cloud, her emerald eyes grew clear, and the moment that mask was caught in them—

"...Mom?"

Luna's face crumpled all at once.

"Where are you?"

"...? What do you mean, where?"

"Where is Mom?!"

Luna thrashed like a beast driven into a corner.

For a moment Nahan was thrown, and he pointed toward where Mother's corpse lay while he thought.

...What?

He had killed Mother. He had woken Luna.

Sub Quest 2: understand Luna completely. Sub Quest 3: Mother's rest. I definitely fulfilled both.

Why wasn't the quest completion coming up?

The questions chased one another, tail to tail, and then a system window rose in red light.

What?

Wondering what on earth that was supposed to mean, he jerked his head toward Luna—

"...That's too cruel."

She had pulled Mother's upper body into her arms, and she turned her head toward Nahan as she murmured.

"...I believed in you."

These grimy, filthy hands of mine, that had only ever longed for the warmth of another person—

—and you, who caught them without a second's hesitation.

"I really did believe in you."

Tears spilled.

"...Right. This has to be a nightmare. Something like this couldn't be real."

In the end Luna wiped the smile from her face, and the moment she set Mother's mask over her own—

Watching what he had seen on the roof of the Gardner estate reproduce itself before his eyes, he understood.

Something has gone badly wrong.

But understanding it late changed nothing.

Nothing changed.

Nahan let out a breath, looked at the members, and murmured—

"...Must be the mask that's in fashion these days."

The moment he said it—

"...Ah, my lady...!!"

"...No— don't— come...!!"

"......"

The three members seized by their masks sprinted at Nahan with everything they had.

Meanwhile, at the rear of the battle.

"...Khck!"

Luna, who had burned through most of her life force in the throes of extreme mana depletion, vomited blood. Even so she wiped it away as if it were nothing, and carefully lowered her head.

"...Mom."

What she cradled in her arms was Mother, left by Nahan as nothing but an upper body. To Nahan's eyes it had been only a black mass. In Luna's eyes, it was only Mother, fatally wounded.

"...Lu... na."

"No. Don't talk. All right?"

Luna's small hands closed tight around the hand that trembled and trembled. She endured the pain twisting her up from the inside and wrung out her life force to stanch the wound.

Khck! Khck, khck!! Blood welled up and burst out of her in a rush. Agony raked through the inside of her body — and even so, Mother's shape went on dying, little by little.

"Please... please..."

Luna's eyes, deadened to a murky green, begged the woman whose face was draining of color.

"Please don't die alone, Mom."

If she was going to die like this—

"Then kill me first. Kill me, and then die..."

...Please, Mom.