Shelter (4)
What did it feel like, seeing a monster?
Through a screen, my impression had been that they looked sort of weird. Up close, though, they were grotesque beyond anything I could have imagined.
Grrrrrk—
"I-it broke through...!"
"Holy shit...!"
"What do we do now? There's nowhere left to run...!"
The space that should have erupted into pandemonium the moment the monster appeared was instead steeped in a strange, heavy silence.
Move, and you die. Stay still, and you die anyway.
It was the look of prey that had already been fixed in a predator's gaze—surrendering its fate to the heavens while stringing together meaningless words. That was all the people in the Shelter looked like to me.
Speaking of which… is it ignoring me?
The monster didn't seem to have eyes, exactly, but wherever its attention fell, I wasn't there. It felt deliberate—as if it were choosing not to see me.
Thud— thud-thud— thud—
Grrrrrrrrrrr—
"I-it's coming closer...!"
Barely a single step. That was all it took for everyone inside the Shelter to surge backward in a wave, pressing toward the far wall. The Despair Energy that bloomed the instant the rearmost person's back hit solid concrete was quite the delicacy.
Feels like drinking a carbonated soda.
Hope curdling into despair was already a fine meal, but it couldn't compare to despair sinking into something even deeper. That thrill of a creature born to live casting its entire life away—there was nothing quite like it.
No. Not the point. Ahem.
Grrrk—
The monster was horrific enough on its own, but the clots of blood painting its body red made it worse still. The kind of visual you'd only expect out of a hard-R slasher film.
Whether anyone could stay calm with a face like that in front of them was another question entirely.
"This is insane..."
"Kid, it's dangerous—get over here!"
"M-maybe we can run while that student's holding its attention? The monster's moved away from the door!"
Because it had come in close and was staring down at me, the exit behind it stood wide open. There was room enough for anyone with the guts to bolt past and escape—though I had my doubts anyone here actually possessed that kind of courage.
Running all the way over there with this thing right in front of you? Yeah, no chance.
The thought that escape might be possible sparked a little hope—and the monster in front of them crushed it right back into despair.
Huh. Leave things like this and isn't it infinite despair generation?
I might have just cracked the secret to perpetual motion. A whole constellation of lightbulbs went off over my head.
Ah. Someone's trying to sneak out.
I held the monster's non-gaze in silence for a while. Then one human, squeezing out every last drop of courage they had, began edging toward the monster's back. From their perspective, they were probably pouring a lifetime's worth of bravery into this single moment.
But—
Grrrrrrrk—
"...Ah."
As if it knew exactly which despair tasted best, the monster only turned its head once the human had reached the doorway. Just the head—rotating a full hundred and eighty degrees.
GRRRAAAAAAAAGH!!!!
"HYAAAAAAAGH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"
Crunch— crack— snap-snap— chomp-chomp— thuk.
The sight of the monster unhinging its maw and chewing through a human skull was… something I had no words for. I could only shake my head inwardly. A person without a head was not a pleasant sight.
"I-I knew it! I knew this would happen! We should've run outside even if it meant dying out there! Damn it—damn iiiit!!!!"
"Sh-shut up! Why are you provoking it?!"
You're the ones provoking it right now, though.
The screaming didn't help, sure—but the fierce despair boiling up from inside them was what truly baited the monster. Of course, how many people could look at something like this and not despair was another matter.
Grrk, grrrrk, grrk!
"...Hm?"
Lost in that thought, I tilted my head at the monster's odd behavior. It lifted its chin slightly toward me, almost as if it were laughing. More precisely—it looked like it was showing off.
As if to say, This is how you extract despair, rookie. I had to fight back a laugh on reflex.
So even looking like that, it still recognizes another monster.
If it could talk, it might have said something like, Hey, newbie! Come have a drink of despair~ Right now, of course, everyone was too terrified to notice how strangely the monster was acting.
"Waaaaah, Mommyyyyy..."
A child's crying was a rich sauce poured over already thick despair. Most ordinary people found a child's sobs deeply upsetting, after all.
"Shh, Aya. It's okay. It's going to be okay. A magical girl will be here soon, alright?"
Grrk?
But only for a moment. At the mother's words, a tiny spark of hope began to rise among the gathered misery. It was so small next to the mass of despair that it barely registered—and yet it was unmistakably there.
If I had to put it into words—yeah.
Like watching a fly land on a premium steak.
Grrrrrk...
Watching the monster scrape its claws across the floor and let out a cry thick with rage, it seemed to share my assessment. The look of something thinking, Do I eat this or not~
I considered just cutting off the fly-touched bit and eating the rest, but even a well-made dish gets pretty unappetizing the second a fly lands on it.
"Th-that's right! Once a magical girl gets here, a monster like that is finished—finished!"
"...Is there even a magical girl in this city who can handle a Gamma Class monster?"
"P-Peridot will do it. Peridot will!"
Having hope was fine. What they had, though, was closer to a hollow fantasy. Even if a magical girl did come, these lives would crumble under a single flick of the monster's hand.
...More importantly, something's coming.
Perhaps it had sensed their hope. An unpleasant sensation was drawing closer, and I turned my head toward it.
Not from the ground—from the air. Judging by the speed, it was flying—
A magical girl, then.
To think I'd get to see both a monster and a magical girl in a single day. Common as they supposedly were in this world, the gap between fiction and the real thing was still considerable.
Grrrrrk—
"D-did a magical girl arrive...?"
"I-it's gone...! W-we're alive! We're going to make it...!"
The monster must have felt that same approaching unease; it turned and headed for the door. Maybe these humans were already caught fish as far as it was concerned. Or maybe it figured I'd keep them penned in myself.
I was a monster too, after all—for whatever that was worth.
"Even a Gamma Class monster can't do much against a magical gi—"
Crunch—
"KYAAAAAAA!!!!!!!"
...Seriously. What a nasty hobby.
Just as the humans began to exhale in relief and cheer, a black shadow unfurled from the darkness beyond the door. Far too fast for ordinary people to react. The iron mace that shot out crushed a hope-filled human skull in less than a second.
"..."
"..."
"Hic, hhk..."
Clearly meant as an example—so the hopeful ones wouldn't try to flee so easily. And it worked. Even after the monster left, no one dared take a step.
For something called a monster, that was a meticulous, clever calculation.
"...Let's wait until the magical girl arrives."
"P-Peridot is an undefeated magical girl! Sh-she'll pull it off for sure."
They spoke hope with their mouths, but their hearts were packed full of despair. What if Peridot lost? What if she lost, and none of them survived?
Those ugly feelings, swinging between hope and despair and falling deeper with every swing, set my heart pounding.
Thump—
Come to think of it, my heart's been stopped this whole time.
People say you don't usually notice your own heartbeat—but feeling it now made it painfully clear it had been silent until a moment ago. How does a living thing keep moving with a stopped heart, anyway?
I started to admire the Doctor's skill for building a body like this, then remembered she was just a deranged monster and shut the admiration down immediately.
I feel like my sensibilities are getting more and more monster-like.
Admiring a mad scientist's handiwork, of all things. Well—I could trash-talk the Doctor later.
I slipped sideways.
"U-Unnie... where are you going?"
"Just to the bathroom for a second."
Come to think of it, I'd said I was going to the bathroom ages ago. A normal human would have wet themselves by now in a situation like this, so it made for a decent excuse. No matter how deep the despair, nobody wanted to piss themselves in front of a crowd.
"I'll be right back."
"U-Unnie...!"
I lightly sidestepped the small hand reaching out to stop me and offered a soft smile.
I'll be right back.