3 bar menu

The Ghost Ship Queen Berry – Part 02

---

Translator: Kell

---

We went back down the corridor. All eleven of us this time, heading to the opposite direction from before.

The uneasiness almost brought my headache back. I held my head and groaned. Noticing my discomposure, Lee stopped.

“Alex…”

Lee pointed to the heart-shaped pendant around her neck. It was pink and shiny, coated in enamel. She grabbed my hand and made me touch it. She then closed her eyes, gesturing me to calm down.

The pendant seemed to be her lucky charm. It was like she was saying, “With this, we’ll both be all right.”

Her big black eyes were filled with a gentle glow. A kind girl, I thought. I nodded in appreciation and resumed walking with everyone else.

Huey and Yang, who were leading the way, suddenly gave surprised grunts. Startled, we all stopped in our tracks.

“It’s blocked,” Huey muttered.

“What do you mean?!” The Hungarian girl made her way to the front. We were split into two groups; even from way back, what blocked the way was clearly visible.

A wall.

The corridor was blocked by a black wall that reached the ceiling.

“We can’t pass through here!” Yang turned around with an ashen face, and started running down the corridor.

“Yang!” I called.

He looked over his shoulder. “This can’t be the only hallway on this floor. We have to check if there’s one that can take us to the bow!”

Everybody nodded and followed Yang. But the corridors were all blocked by the same black wall. The Hungarian girl began sobbing. Some of the kids started crying along with her.

Huey and Yang were discussing things in whispers, then lifted their heads.

“Let’s go find an elevator!”

Everyone raised their heads.

“We’re going downstairs,” Huey said firmly. “It might not be blocked. Got it? Let’s go look for an elevator.”

Yang pointed to the other end of the hallway. “It’s over there.”

The two boys led the way.

In a particularly bright corner was an elevator, its eerie iron cage gleaming darkly. There was also a staircase with shining white tiles next to it, but for some reason its lights were off. It was as if darkness veiled it.

Huey looked over at the kids. “There’s stairs as well. What’re you gonna do?”

They all looked at each other. Afraid of the dark stairs, they quickly scrambled into the elevator. Huey watched the crammed kids with mouth open.

“A couple more should be fine,” he said, pulling himself together. “Yang, Alex, take them to the floor below.”

“What about you?”

He pulled on Lee’s hand and started walking toward the stairs. “Lee and I will take the stairs. We’ll meet down there.”

Lee looked back and waved her hand. It was a cute gesture. Yang signaled with his eyes, and we boarded the elevator.

The bars closed with metallic clanks. Slowly, the elevator descended.

Everyone was tense and silent under the white glare of the lamp.

Suddenly, a girl’s scream rang out. It was Lee’s voice.

Yang rushed to open the elevator. The elevator rattled to a stop a floor below, then the bars slowly opened. Everyone scurried out of the lift.

“Lee!”

“Huey! What happened?!”

I took a step toward the dark stairs. The thick darkness was overwhelming, so I could only manage to call for them. I could hear faint sobbing from above.

“Lee!”

As I started running up the stairs, Yang spotted a small emergency flashlight in the elevator, picked it up, and followed me. He switched it on and illuminated the darkness at the top of the stairs.

The white, round, dim light of the flashlight illuminated a body.

Letting out shrieks, we all froze in place.

Huey had collapsed, lying on the landing of the stairs like a broken marionette. He was face-down, his left hand hidden under his body and his right hand stuck closely against his lower back.

Lee was crouched down beside him.

“What happened?!” the German boy yelled at Lee. He was large and intimidating, with a build much more closer to an adult than a fourteen-year-old boy.

Lee couldn’t explain it well. She gestured that she had followed Huey down the stairs and found him lying there.

The German boy shouted in English with a thick German accent. “I can’t understand a thing!”

I ran over to Huey to get a pulse. I took his exposed right hand and pressed my finger against the wrist.

His pulse had completely stopped.

“How did he even die?”

Lee shook her head to say she didn’t know.

The only thing glowing on the pitch black stairs was the round light of Yang’s flashlight. The shock made him drop it, and it rolled down the stairs, leaving the stairs dark once more.

The silence lay as thick as death.

Suddenly, someone let out a sharp scream.

“No! I’ve had enough! I’m going home!”

It was the Hungarian girl with the injured cheek. It was followed by the sound of someone running down the stairs. I quickly followed her.

Yang swallowed. “Hey, where are you going?! Stay close!” There was no reply. “It’s dangerous. We have to stay together!”

I reached the hallway one floor below. Looking around, I saw the back of a girl running away in the dark. She turned the corner before disappearing.

“Hey…!”

The boys who followed me exchanged glances.

We couldn’t just leave her alone. After designating the elevator as a rendezvous point, we all started looking for her.

---

The hallway seemed a little dark, despite being only a floor below.

The lighting was a little dimmer than in the hallway where the lounge was located, and the wood had more knots in them. The darker spots on the deep-red carpet suggested it was old, and the middle area where people often walked had become shaggy, the fabric thinner.

Cabins flanked the unchanging corridor. It almost felt like going around the same place.

As I walked alone on the incredibly soft carpet, I grew increasingly anxious.

A knot formed in my gut. My heart drummed in my chest.

For some reason, I didn’t want to turn the next corner. My feet felt like stopping on their own. Mustering up some courage, I forced myself to turn the corner, slowly.

And then…

The Hungarian girl we were looking for was standing there. Alone. Her eyes were wide and stiff, as if in shock. Our eyes met. I tried to move away, but I couldn’t.

She was dead.

My mouth dropped open and a scream so loud I couldn’t believe it was mine ripped through my throat.

She wasn’t standing there. She was skewered against the wall with a knife through her throat. I wobbled closer and reached out, hoping to do something.

The moment I touched her with my trembling hand, the knife that had been wedged into the wall came off and her body fell into my arms.

It was heavy. There was substantial weight.

Hearing my scream, the kids came one by one. As soon as they appeared around the corner, they screamed at the sight of the body.

Yang approached gingerly. “Alex… you okay?”

I responded with a weak nod. The kids could only shiver as they looked at each other. Eventually, the huge German boy raised his voice in rage.

“Who killed her?!”

“I don’t know,” Yang answered.

“You don’t know?!” The answer made him furious.

“None of us had a knife. We were all dragged into this ship empty-handed. And I have no idea what a military knife is doing in a passenger ship.”

“What are you saying…?”

We exchanged looks. Lee also appeared, and when she saw the girl’s body, she swallowed, covering his mouth with her hand.

Holding a dead body amid the silence, there was one thing I could not tell anyone.

The drawer of an antique shelf at the end of the hallway was slightly open. From where I was standing, I could see into its contents.

Inside was a small gun, its barrel gleaming an ominous black.

There were weapons on the ship.

But why?

---

---