## Chapter 249 – An Evening With a Beautiful Sunset (2)
As the tentacle squeezed her neck, a sickening crack echoed, and her heart followed her consciousness into oblivion.
‘May you find peace.’
The tentacle released her lifeless body to the floor, where the roots swarmed over her.
As the roots began to return her to the earth in more ways than one, something slowly began to flow into my consciousness.
‘Ugh… this memory is intense…! It might be hard to digest…’
It was good to confirm the hypothesis that absorbing memories with an activated brain would result in clearer recollections.
But now that it was a reality, why did I feel like crying, contrary to what I expected?
As much as I had found the memory I wanted within her, the unwanted memories that surfaced alongside it only intensified the torment inside me.
‘Ugh… pure memories… might be dangerous after all…!!’
It felt as if I was becoming that person entirely.
From the knowledge in the woman’s mind that I had devoured, to her thoughts, her joys and sorrows.
My tentacle, struggling to digest all of it, trembled like an aspen leaf.
Just then, Vivian, who had been organizing the documents and items she had brought from upstairs, came down.
She looked around, and when she didn’t see the woman she had brought, she lowered her eyes slightly, as if trying to gauge my mood.
“Well… I’ve finished organizing what I brought…
I just… I’ll just go back up to talk about that…”
She probably knew this would happen to some extent, but now that I had actually devoured a person, she couldn’t help but feel a little complicated.
‘Don’t go… stay here…’
A tentacle wrapped tightly around her wrist as she turned away, and Vivian forced a smile, though she was startled.
“There’s still work upstairs…
Okay… you…
You need me now, right?”
The tentacle climbed up her wrist, gradually wrapping around her neck like an embrace, and eventually began to envelop her entire body.
Even so, Vivian simply wore a lonely smile and wordlessly stroked the tentacle that was binding her.
“It’s okay with me.
You… can do anything to me.
So… just do as you please.”
Was it just my imagination, or was the amount of fluid coming from the tentacle increasing?
I wished it were tears, so I could feel a little relief after shedding them.
“It’s okay… it’s okay… ugh…
I’ll be with you… with you…
I don’t know how you feel right now, but…
I… I’ll try my best to understand someday…”
Warmth radiated from Vivian’s body as she whispered comforting and heartwarming words.
Proof that I was at least human once.
A sensation that proved I was still me, even though I might have changed a little with the newly mixed memories.
The warmth I received from her made the tentacle that embraced her tremble even more.
‘Can you do as I say?’
“Hmm…? What… oh…”
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“I’m home!! Mom!! Mom!!
Do you know what happened to me today?
I thought I was really going to die!
Uh… Mom…? Who are you…?”
A girl entered her home with a light heart filled with excitement and relief.
Passing the faded family photo on the shoe rack next to the hallway as she entered the house, the girl rushed inside, making a fuss.
Her neat school uniform skirt, slightly dusty, fluttered as she bustled about.
The girl was looking for her mother, wanting to tell her about what had happened today, and she wandered around the house, calling out for her mom…
Suddenly, the girl noticed someone sitting on the living room sofa and warily eyed the stranger.
A beautiful brown-haired woman in a black dress, who shouldn’t be in this house.
She didn’t seem much older than herself, but her attire and demeanor exuded maturity, and the girl’s face was filled with suspicion as much as wariness.
The woman, with a slightly sorrowful expression, turned her head to look at the girl and began to speak softly.
The girl took the small bundle that she took out of her small bag and handed over, alternating her gaze between the bundle and the unidentified woman.
“Are you Linda?
Your mother is at work, isn’t she?
I have a personal connection with her.
That’s why I came all the way here…”
“Uh… she works… at the market…”
“Actually, there was an unexpected accident…
I’m sorry to bring you such unfortunate news.”
“What… what are you talking about…?
An accident…? I don’t understand, it’s so sudden…!!
What is it…? Did something happen to my mom?!”
“She was working in the commercial district.
She said she had to do hard work…
To pay for her daughter’s tuition…
It was a terrible accident…
I’m so sorry… what I just gave you…”
She herself had almost died today.
And now, thankfully having survived and returned home happily, a strange woman was saying strange things.
The girl’s voice began to tremble, and she shouted at the woman in an increasingly aggressive tone.
As she carelessly placed the bundle she had just received on the table, she seemed cautious, as if a part of her still hoped.
“Lies… it’s a lie…!!
What accident are you talking about…!?
What could have happened…!!
Don’t lie!! Where’s my mom!?”
“I came to tell you one thing.
I waited until you came home on purpose.
Would you pull that drawer out completely?”
“Screw you!! Give me back my mom!!
Did you kill her!? Aaaargh!! Give her back now!!”
The girl grabbed the brown-haired woman by the collar, half out of her mind, but she didn’t even bat an eye and simply uttered one word calmly.
“Do it.”
“Sob… sob… sniff…
Why the drawer…!! Uh…? Uh-oh…?”
The girl, sobbing with a mixture of annoyance, sadness, and anguish, stomped her feet in frustration and pulled out the drawer she had pointed to.
But perhaps she had misjudged her strength.
The drawer fell out, and something that had been piled up in the space behind it sparkled in the dim light, and the girl bent down and put her hand inside.
What the girl grabbed was a single silver coin.
The small empty space in the drawer was filled with such silver coins.
Watching the girl’s dazed eyes fill with tears, the brown-haired woman, who had approached from behind, gently placed her hand on the girl’s shoulder.
“She left this in case something happened to her daughter.
We… our ‘members’ also added a little something.
It should be enough to cover your studies and living expenses for a while.”
“How could… Mom…
This… this kind of thing…!! What’s the point of leaving it!!
I… I only needed Mom… I didn’t need anything else…!!
Why… why…!! Sniff…”
“I’m sorry I couldn’t be of more help.
But… would you take this for now…?”
“Sob… sniff… Flora… Raz…?
D-don’t tell me… are you…?”
“No, I’m just doing this job.
You’ll probably never see that person in your life.
But even so, if you ever need something…
I might be able to help you.
You know what I mean, right?”
“Hic… sniff… Mom…”
“Don’t be too heartbroken. Be strong.
Your mother loved you very much.
Well then, I’ll take my leave…”
“Moooom…!!”
The brown-haired woman walked past the girl, who had collapsed to the ground and burst into tears, and opened the door of the house.
For a moment, she stared at the sky with a sad expression, but then she looked up at the sky with a bright smile, as if the gloomy expression she had just had was a lie, and let out a small sigh.
As she finally began to walk down the street, someone who had been following her and walking alongside her spoke to her.
“Did you talk to her okay?”
“I don’t know if I did well.
Lying is my specialty, but I’m not completely without a conscience.”
“It was his request.
She may have been an enemy to us, but…
That girl lost her mother today…”
What irony could there be?
The masked woman Vivian had brought was working for Laratina, but it was only for her daughter, who was attending the academy.
In the end, the price for following Laratina for the sake of protecting and making her daughter happy had returned as sadness for her precious daughter.
She had helped to attack her daughter’s alma mater for her daughter’s sake.
What meaning could there have been in her end?
“Still… it’s better than waiting forever, not knowing where she went…
So… what department is she in?”
Was it because she had experienced losing a beloved mother who cherished her?
At Vivian’s words, which changed the subject for no reason, Aurora took out her thoughts with a small chuckle.
“Judging from what I saw, it seems like she’s in the medical department?
She had white gloves in her uniform pocket.
She probably brought them with her in the chaos today.
But… I don’t know if I should call this kindness…
Or malice.”
“Let’s think of it as kindness.”
Was it because the atmosphere was getting heavy for no reason?
“Kindness… huh…
Master is…
Quite ‘human’…”
At Aurora’s words, which she said in a joking manner with a bright expression as she gently tucked her hair behind her ear, Vivian’s mouth snapped shut.
“Well, it’s a world where humans are like monsters.
Just kidding? Our master is amazing, right…?”
But it wasn’t because she didn’t have anything to say in response.
It was just that she wanted to keep a word that was too embarrassing to say easily in her heart.
This moment, when they were finally finishing the day despite the many things that had happened.
At least on a day like today, she didn’t want to bring up that story easily.
‘So… is that why I came to like him…?’
Because he was the one who taught her about humans, when she had been less human than anyone else.
Because he was the one who kept giving her the chance to stand up again and learn about it, when she was about to fall and disappear, only just beginning to learn about humans.
Vivian’s lips were tightly closed, and her awkward gaze continued to look down at the ground.
Now, having taken a step that might be a little too far to return, in order to fulfill his request.
On a street where the sun was almost setting and the beautiful red sunset of the evening sky was spread out.
The two girls, walking side by side and returning to where they belonged, looked back for a moment and then walked forward, as they always did.
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