The Price of the Contract (1)
The door that had successfully spat us out onto the far side slammed shut with a solitary bang, then seeped into the wall and vanished without a trace.
We had come tumbling out all tangled together in a heap, yet the tension that had gripped us without pause—from the moment we entered the escape room, through our descent into 666 Village, and finally back out to this place—snapped all at once. Not one of us could muster the will to move.
I, who had ended up on top of the pile, rolled myself with difficulty alone onto the corridor floor. Lying face-up toward the ceiling, I rolled my eyes and took in the long, surreal hallway: countless doors and lights studding the walls in every direction.
We were back.
Back in the escape-room corridor.
The instant I confirmed we had returned to the place where it all began, I saw a figure far down the hallway, its head occasionally convulsing and jerking this way and that as if in a seizure.
Under the pale lighting, as the head turned, the shadow that had blanketed everything beneath the fedora moved like undulating tar and revealed the true form it had been hiding. Like cracks racing across a pure-white plaster wall, black lines scored mercilessly across skin so white it was alien. Every thin, elongated line split open with a sharp crack—exactly the way old, worn tiles shatter when they hit the floor—and the countless mouths that covered the face came into view.
Some were smiling. Some gaped wide. Each was different, yet every single one contained endless thin, needle-like teeth that spun and writhed without rest inside a black vortex whose depths could never be measured.
No longer bothering to hide itself, the Guide strode toward us from the far end of the corridor. With every step the surroundings seemed to darken, but a closer look showed the undulating shadows swelling and shrinking in endless repetition. The shadow at his back writhed grotesquely; within it one could glimpse the thrashing of countless tentacles that called to mind some nightmare from the abyssal deep.
Even I, who knew full well the display was pure bluster, found myself speechless before the evil aura the Guide radiated.
He came at us without the slightest attempt to conceal his hostility—yet he never reached us.
When perhaps ten paces remained, the endless lights of the corridor began to flicker of their own accord, dimming and flaring. A violent tremor followed, and from behind the countless doors came knocking, screams laced with despair, and howls no human throat should make. Then, as if a giant had seized the entire hallway in one fist and begun to shake it, the corridor itself started to heave.
Walls here and there, unable to bear the strain, let out creaking screams. Ominous cracks raced across the ceiling like spiderwebs blooming in an instant, and sharp, thin shards of plaster rained down.
……rustle…rustle..rustle.rustle.rustlerustlerustlerustle
From somewhere the sound of insect wings began to circle my ears. What had been a distant, faint drone closed the distance in a heartbeat and filled the corridor completely.
Then, as if every horror had been a lie, all the phenomena stopped at once.
—Bang!
A deafening blast that left the ears ringing exploded through the space; the entire corridor plunged into darkness while a harsh, scratching roar flooded every direction. No—it was neither darkness nor the beat of insect wings.
It was the sound of endlessly swirling sand.
Countless grains of black, unpleasant desert sand whipped through the air. They floated and scoured, clawing and tearing at walls and ceiling alike. The whole corridor seemed caught inside an infinitely vast sandstorm. Black sand now dominated every inch of space until the hallway itself could no longer be seen. Only around the members, myself, and the Guide did a small pocket remain—like the eye of a typhoon.
In this place where madness beyond human comprehension seethed, the only ones still conscious were the Guide and me.
And then… an indescribable being revealed itself.
Strand after strand of the black sand floating in the air gathered, weaving a bizarre, gigantic form. Merely by existing it generated endless dread. A strange existence that spun, divided, spread, and merged without end in geometric shapes that whirled in configurations understanding was never meant to grasp.
The being tilted its massive bulk as though regarding the Guide. A blasphemous sound—something like a hissing, unholy melody—sliced through the air.
Desperate, the Guide dropped to his knees and cried out in answer.
At that frantic cry the sand hanging in the air trembled and undulated as though it found the plea amusing. A bizarre exchange of question and answer then passed through the empty air…
And I understood every word they spoke.
It was the same language written on the contract. The forbidden book I had read in the mansion—the one that had forcibly crammed unpermitted wisdom into my skull—now helped me grasp the tongue.
The answer left the Guide looking as though his mind might shatter on the spot. He whipped his head around in frantic search, then spotted us. His gaze locked on, and he cried out as if he had found a loophole.
The instant the words left him, the sound of enormous wings flapping came from somewhere above, and the two members who had been seized by the crow merchant in the village and later escaped tumbled out of the empty air as if dropped. From the floor rose a sinister, watery slap that echoed as though from the deep, and then the chairman suddenly thrust upward—half-grown scales and fins already sprouting across his body, blood streaming from his head, completely unconscious.
…He must have smashed his skull hard against the stairs. Still… better that he stay unconscious right now. Maybe that was a mercy.
Even the Guide looked momentarily dumbfounded at the newcomers. His eyes traveled over me—one leg bent the wrong way, black sand packed into wounds all over my body, one arm gone, one eye and part of my face blackened by a clump of the same sand—then settled on the half-monstrous chairman and grew even more incredulous.
As if to say: That’s an escape? Seriously?
Yet every single person who had signed the contract had escaped the village and reached this place. That was why the indescribable, ominous being of black sand could appear at all—an unchangeable fact no amount of denial could erase.
The Guide, who had refused to the last to accept that truth, began to tremble madly. He kicked at the slippery floor, trying somehow to flee. With each frantic kick the black sand lying across the ground drew slow, lazy semicircles in the air, embroidering patterns. But before he could take a second step, the sand stretched long, took on the shape of serpents, and bit into his legs, his arms, his head one by one, slowly coiling around his torso.
He screamed and stretched a hand toward us. In those eyes that had once seemed so powerful and bizarre, only pure terror remained. After a brief standoff a single howl tore free, and his body was sucked into the black sand, vanishing in an instant amid a dry rustling.
The being that had paused to undulate and watch the spectacle now wriggled the sand that composed it. A gaze turned toward me—felt rather than seen. The gaze of that indescribable existence occupied me like violence itself. Its mere presence, a single sidelong glance, was enough to send cold sweat pouring and make madness feel ready to burst.
Had I still been fully human I would have lost my mind on the spot. Had I completely abandoned human form and become a strange being through and through, the infinitely swelling awe toward that existence would have left me unable to think at all. But the midway state I now occupied—half this strange being, half still human—together with the dull, continuous pain from the broken leg and the wounds everywhere else, surprisingly kept me sane.
[…]
The indescribable, ominous being undulated as though about to speak, then drew back and settled its sand. It looked for all the world as if it were choosing its words—considering how best to communicate with me.
I cleared my throat. The sensation of vomiting that ominously glowing black ore and sand from my throat in the first round still lingered. Awakening the endless thirst that rose with it, I rolled a few pronunciations around inside my mouth and finally forced out a handful of words.
The being undulated as though startled, then spread its sand and set the very air vibrating.