Heroes to Hunted

After deciding to breach the room, I backtracked and hid Agawa out of sight. The hiding spot was a deep alcove filled with numerous crates. I couldn't be sure of the contents, but I maneuvered the boxes so that Agawa was hidden from any hallway creepers that might pass by.

Then, with her safety secured, I returned to the macabre operating room.

I peeked inside to see the crazed girl still gleefully waving the violet heart back and forth above her head.

'She's distracted; If I breach the room now, I can just knock her out.' Despite her apparent insanity, I wanted to avoid killing if I could help it, especially when the target was clearly a civilian. I might be in a new…wherever I was, but the rules of engagement were ingrained deeply into my skull.

'Though I think I broke that code when I killed the guard earlier,' I felt a tinge of regret forming in my gut.

I couldn't dwell on that thought for long, so I brandished one of the two worn daggers I looted from the guards and readied myself to attack.

The blade was nearly worthless, but the hilt was thick and sturdy. With this level of heft, dealing a decisive blow would be child's play. It could render those with even the toughest skulls unconscious.

The girl turned away from the doorway, giving me a brief opening to exploit.

I made a wild rush inside and, once upon her, I struck her skull's temple with the hilt.

The blow landed dead on her skull's temple with a loud thud, and the girl's light body fell to the ground with force akin to a feather.

Her grip loosened as she lost consciousness, dropping the organ she previously cradled with zeal to the operating room floor. It grotesquely splattered across the ground before settling in a small pool of blood.

Seeing my success, I released a sigh of relief. "Thank god... I avoided killing one, at least."

I couldn't relish in my victory for long, though. I had to keep moving. So I turned her over to check for anything useful.

Despite the girl's demented behavior, her appearance was quite ordinary. Her black hair was arranged in a medium-length bob cut. Unlike Malgam, she hadn't had on a bloodied lab coat or tattered trousers. Instead, she wore pristine black jeans with overalls clipping over a pure white, buttoned blouse.

The cleanliness of her appearance was remarkable, considering the surgery she had conducted just moments ago.

"The mark of a pro," I muttered.

There was a fact about her that eluded me until now. I must've missed it due to her disturbing activities. The fact that this girl was exactly that, a young girl.

She couldn't have been any older than the age of ten, and yet she happily killed and carved up another person.

"What the hell kind of parents would let their kid do something like this?" I grimaced.

An impulsive thought of taking her with me did pass my mind. I was always an avid supporter of the nurture argument when rearing children. Though I was a killer, I figured I could help bring her to normalcy.

However, I put that idea to rest.

Caring for such an unknown variable was beyond me. Besides, I was in no position to try raising a kid. Especially not while I was in the process of escaping death.

I apologized to the girl and hoped she would improve her mental state from here. But, even if she tried, the road to recovery after taking a life was long. The source on that was me.

I stepped away from her after searching her pockets. 'I can't believe that I just looted a child...' A distinct feeling of shame formed a pit in my stomach.

My only solace was that the situation made it a necessary action. Not only that, but my effort wasn't fruitless, which justified it a bit more.

While pilfering her pockets, I heard frantic footsteps fast approaching me. So I ducked behind the operating table away from sight and peered out while waiting for them to pass.

"O-Oh no! This wasn't part of the plan! They'll kill me if I mess up! Just like the others! I can't die! I have to find him! I'll just find him and everything will work out! Yeah, it will!" While his words did stir my curiosity, what I was most concerned about was Agawa.

'Could he have found her? If he did, I'll have to confront him…' I tightened my grip on my knives.

However, luckily, the one thing I feared hadn't come to pass. Though it was dark, so I couldn't make out much, I could tell his arms were swaying freely while running.If he'd found her, I imagine he'd have her in chains already.

'It doesn't look like he found Agawa; that's good.' Knowing that I allowed him to pass without confrontation.

Once his footsteps receded into the darkness, I returned to my task at hand and found a small, folded map of the mansion's floor plan.

"Ughh..." I grunted in disgust. I was irritated that even the residents needed a map to navigate this place.

After stuffing the paper into one of my two holsters, I searched the rest of the room for anything useful.

There were various carving utensils, but I had enough weapons. The only other thing was a familiar but unused trough for collecting blood.

'Which reminds me….' I glanced at the fresh corpse on the center table. A tinge of regret seized my chest when I realized who lay there.

Though I never liked him much, a loss of life was always something to lament. Overflowing blood soaked into his hair, making it even redder than it was naturally. It was the one who'd been the most excited of all of us...

'Kids killing kids?... What the hell is wrong with the world?' I swore under my breath, clenched my aching fists, and cursed reality.

I was used to corpses by now; I'd seen enough to fill up a thousand morgues. That was why I trained myself to accept that there are just some people you can't save, no matter the effort you put in.

I said this, but the frustration I felt… 'It's... suffocating.'

"I'm sorry, Tachibana… If only I got here sooner, you'd still be alive."

There was no point in dwelling on things for long, so I moved away from Tachibana's corpse to scavenge the room.

While rummaging, I discovered a few prisoner's shirts in a drawer and draped them over Tachibana's body. It was the best I could do in place of burial.

I said some words of prayer and began leaving the room.

My body became heavy, and my vision blurred when I reached the doorway. My head spun with dizziness, causing me to stumble forward. I managed to catch myself on the wall to stop from falling entirely.

"No time for rest," I groaned. The light-headedness lasted only for a moment, so I wrote it off as fatigue.

When I fully recovered, I began my trek to Agawa. I hadn't hidden her very far away, so it was just a little jog before I returned to where I'd left her.

After seeing that she hadn't moved, I couldn't help but be relieved. "Good, she's still unconscious." It was an alarming thing to say out of context, but I didn't want to subject her to another knockout strike.

I fished out the map from where I stored it before grabbing her by the hand. The process took a bit longer because of my wounds, but I eventually hoisted her onto my back.

I shuffled and maneuvered Agawa's body until she took an awkward angle on my back. Though it made her uncomfortable to carry, it was necessary to read the map in my hand.

Once everything was in place, I continued my jog down the hall with Agawa in tow. A frustrating detail glared back at me from the scribbled blueprints in my hand.

"How is this supposed to be useful to anyone?" I grumbled, remembering this was the map of a ludicrously symmetrical horror house.

After some time running, I approached a split in the hallway. It went in four directions, and, as usual, they were all symmetrical in appearance.

"What do you think, Agawa? Left, right, or straight?" I rhetorically questioned, knowing there'd be no reply.

I scoffed at the useless piece of paper in my hand and resolved to pick one randomly. Everything looked the same, so no amount of strategy would've helped.

By chance and impulse, I landed on the left hall. Then, nodding to myself, I continued my advance in that direction.

There weren't any cells lining the walls, oddly enough. Instead, there were open rooms illuminated by sparse candlelight. I peeked inside a few to see they all had luxurious bedspreads and well-crafted furniture, such as dressers, desks, and elaborate tables.

"At least they treat some of us 'cattle' well," I joked under my breath. Then, after sighing to myself, I left the room and continued ever onward.

However, I only managed a dozen steps before dizziness again assailed my body. I barely managed to support myself against the wall before I collapsed.

"That was close…" I said, resting my head against the rough stone. I found relief from my mind's fever with the wall's freezing touch. Then, I lightly bashed my head into the wall to keep myself lucid. "C'mon, keep going... You need to keep going."

My pep session was interrupted by a group of rapidly approaching voices and footsteps.

I took refuge in a nearby room and dove out of sight with Agawa. We sat in silence as I waited for the group to pass us. Then, posting myself against the door, I placed my ear on it to listen as they traveled by.

"Goddammit, who let this guy out of his cell!" complained one guard.

"I heard he just broke out and beat the shit out of his guards!" responded another.

"What?! Didn't you fools collar him?!"

Between the clattering footsteps and shuffled voices, I could guess maybe a group of four to seven guards was passing by. Their exact number was difficult to discern during their hysteria. Still, I gleaned a tidbit of helpful information from them.

"We did collar him!" Another man exclaimed. "But his kicks and punches are inhuman! It's like he's a wild beast!"

From their conversation, one of the other captives must've broken free and was running amok. They undoubtedly had some skill if they were causing this much of a ruckus.

'Having an ally wouldn't hurt,' I thought, figuring we had better odds of escaping if we teamed up.

The stampede of footsteps eventually faded, prompting me to exit the room and follow. The guards were flinging insults and accusations of blame toward each other the entire way.

"Camaraderie sure is different here," I muttered.

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