3 bar menu

Chapter 73 Part 3 – The Tragic Caterpillar Doll Room

The one who completely changed the atmosphere was the white-bearded Brian, the leader of the group.
With his strong arm, he struck the stone wall with all his strength.
The sudden impact shook the floor and all of them forgot their rage and stopped moving for a moment.
Seizing the opportunity, Whitebeard solemnly said.

「It’s true that Ronny did a bad thing. But I think he did so because he is a good person. For example, maybe they took an important person to him hostage, which made him have no choice but to reluctantly follow their orders.」

「Hmm, that is possible if it’s『that guy』. Come to think of it, Ronny has a twin brother named Teddy.」

Said the brown-bearded Bill as his eyes glinted sharply.

The brown-bearded Bill went with Rona to pick up her younger brothers and saw Rona’s expression full of hope and excitement from up close. He also saw her disappointment when she was not able to meet them. He had always felt a sense of shame and wondered why he had not noticed the anomaly and searched for them more thoroughly at that time. That’s why he didn’t miss the slight reaction of the frightened official by the wall.

「…… Hey, why is your gaze wandering around? What are you hiding?」

The brown-bearded Bill’s expression immediately changed as he followed his gaze.

「…… A hidden room!? Bobby, please!!」

「This part right? I’m on it!!」

The black-bearded Bobby pressed his ear against the part of the stone wall pointed out by the brown-bearded Bill and checked it. His expression became more and more serious.

「…… I can hear the sound of a child’s cry.」

The three old warriors glared at the officials.
There’s no way that a child would just be locked up in a place like this.
They must have tortured the child as much as they had tortured the adults.

「How dare you try to deceive us. You will pay for your evil deeds. Die.」

All three of them took a step forward simultaneously.
Realizing that they were serious, the officials forgot their status and honor and let out a pitiful scream.
Even the guys that are in charge of fighting were brutally slaughtered without being able to do anything.
For these monstrous old men, it’s probably easier to kill their weak self than to twist a baby’s hand.

「No!! We don’t know anything about what’s in that hidden room!! We have nothing to do with it!!」

「That’s the private room of John, a member of the Inquisition’s inner circle!! He sometimes brings children there ……!! We were concerned about it as well, so we tried to check it out.」

「But just touching that wall made him mad as hell. He beat me up ruthlessly. John is a terrible sadist. He must be doing something terrible in there ……!!」

When they shouted that, the officials whose face was swollen black broke down in tears.

In other words, now that the Inquisition and John were not present, they were afraid that the old warriors’ anger would be directed at them, so they kept their mouths shut.

「You big-headed fools!! Even if it’s just a cover, on the surface, you are affiliated with the church, shouldn’t you at least try to show a little compassion!! Hurry up and open the door!! Or else I’ll seriously kill you!!」

The white-bearded Brian yelled at them. Then an official with a bunch of keys stumbled forward. After dropping the bundle of keys three times from his trembling hands, he finally succeeded in unlocking the cleverly hidden keyhole.

The hidden room was at the end of a short passageway that curved several times so that even if the door was opened, the state inside could not be seen. The dark, humid air eerily brushed over their cheeks.

「…… What is this ……? A clown …… doll?」

The three old warriors that stepped into the room were perplexed by the scene dimly illuminated by the lights.

There were clown dolls everywhere in the dreary room with brick walls.
It was as if they were the only decorations needed.

The clown-faced dolls had the body of a caterpillar.
The color was awfully black and their bodies were rather small but wide around.
Six pointed legs came out from its chest and its belly was bumpy and full of warts.
Because they are shorter-bodied than the actual ratio of a caterpillars’ body, the distance between their legs is closely spaced.

It was a form that instinctively made people feel uncomfortable.
Real caterpillars may be ugly, but they are rooted in the beauty of natural form.
But these caterpillar dolls did not have a shred of that beauty.
It deviates way too much from the human sense of beauty that it’s hard to accept.

And they were all placed in an awfully terrible manner.

One doll was crushed into a large vase with its back bent and its mouth gaping open. Another doll was hanging upside down and writhing in agony. The strings spewing from its mouth were tangled together in an absurd manner, creating the illusion of it being so foolish that it was caught in its own trap. Some of them overlapped each other in an obscene manner reminiscent of copulation. And several others had their upper bodies stuck in a wooden box with their asses sticking out of it.

It’s like a caricature intended to make a fool of themselves.

The dolls’ faces were strangely large and realistic.

The hairline could easily be mistaken for the real thing. It was uniformly thickly painted in a tasteless white color. The lipstick was deliberately drawn until outside of the lips. Lines were roughly drawn on the nose and eyes. It was a sign that they are a cripple.

It was an atrocious clown make-up.

The artificial eyes, which should have been the life of the doll, were replaced by white clay that was placed over the eye sockets. The pupils were painted in blue or black with a brush. It made others think that any doll made of beautiful materials would be turned into garbage if the finishing touches were done in such a way. The dolls had their mouths half open and their teeth could be seen.

Their distorted white faces and wrinkled black bodies shimmered forlornly in the light.

The room was filled with the smell of spices, bitumen, and various other odors.

Deep wrinkles formed between the brows of the old warriors as they smelled the odor and touched the doll’s cheeks with their fingertips.

The town mayor, the other influential people, and the officials who have stepped in after the three old warriors are overwhelmed by the smell and the dense, humid air that attacked them.

「What is this? These creepy clown dolls and the awful smell ……」

The person that asked the question was so overwhelmed by the bloodlust unleashed by the old warriors that he swallowed back the rest of the words.

The old warriors’ hairs stood on end.
Their eyes burned ablaze as if lit by hellfire.
All of the people in the room unconsciously leaned against the wall due to the intimidating air that they emitted.
The three old warriors looked as if their bodies had swelled to twice the size.
When these warriors become enraged, they emit the atmosphere of tigers.
All of them turned pale as they realized that the strange sound they heard was actually the angry gnashing of the old men’s teeth.

「…… It would have been nice if it was a doll ……!! How dare those damned bastards do this ……」

Said the black-bearded Bobby with a small voice and furious tone.

「This is ……!!」

As he was about to explain, they heard a faint breath.

The three old warriors looked up with a start.

The sound leaked out from under a pile of clown caterpillar dolls.
The sound was so weak and faint that it was inaudible to the others, but the old warriors did not miss it.
The three old warriors rushed over and rummaged through the pile of dolls.
One doll was pushed to the bottom of the pile as if to hide it.

The black-bearded Bobby got down on one knee in front of the doll that was hidden underneath the pile.

「…… Would you like me to remove that awful make-up?」

Asked the black-bearded Bobby with a sorrowful look.

Everyone that had been watching their actions were startled.
They saw that the doll nodded slightly.

The black-bearded Bobby pulled a handkerchief out of his pocket.
He supported the doll with one hand so that its shoulder would not shake, then he wiped off the clown makeup with his clumsy hand.

All of them gasped.

Because the face of a boy about ten years old appeared from underneath the clown make-up.
He was very weak, but he was certainly a living human being.

The people in the room felt dizzy as if they had wandered into a nightmare.
Even if the boy was stuffed into the body of a fake caterpillar …… the size would not fit. No matter how his body is folded, there was no way his arms and legs would fit in there.

The detestable answer to that was immediately shown by the black-bearded Bobby.

「…… I’ll get you out of there now. Please hold on for a little bit longer.」

After muttering quietly, the black-bearded Bobby put both of his hands on the boy’s collar.

A terrible sound resounded.
The people who were watching nearly screamed involuntarily.
It looked as if the black-bearded Bobby had ripped the boy apart with his bare hands.

But it was the body of the caterpillar doll that was ripped open.
The boy was still completely enclosed inside the hollow caterpillar, with only his face exposed.
When the black-bearded Bobby gently lifted him up, blood and pus fell to the floor.
Like a chrysalis cracking open to reveal its insides, the boy’s entire body was revealed.

The influential people of the town stood petrified.
The complaints and dissatisfaction they had until just now had disappeared from their minds.
The officials of the Inquisition let out a gasp.

The boy’s limbs had been amputated.
Only his face and torso were left. He looked like a daruma doll.
That’s why he was able to fit inside the body of a small caterpillar.

「…… All the dolls here are stuffed with humans. With young children. This child is the only one still alive.」

Said the white-bearded Brian with an abhorrent tone as he turned to look around the room.

「Look at this horror. The room is filled with bloodstains. The children must have been pushed into the bodies of caterpillars while still alive and writhed around for a long time.」

Some of them couldn’t stand it anymore and vomited.

「Why would they do such a terrible thing …… Is it some kind of ritual?」

Asked the mayor with a furious expression. The white-bearded Brian answered with a pained expression on his face.

「They did this just for fun. For them, the children are a plaything …… They enjoy ridiculing them. There is no deeper meaning to it. In the battlefields and slums, there are stupid idiots who take great pleasure in drawing scribbles on corpses and messing around with them. They are the kind of bastards who make living people the target of their arrows and gamble on them. The one that did this is the same kind of lowlife.」

All of them stood frozen in shock.

For such a vile reason, these children were forced to have horrendous makeup put on their faces, were not allowed to rest after death, and were displayed as clown caterpillars? It was unacceptable to any sane adult. If the parents of these children found out about this, their hearts would have felt as if it was ripped out of their chests.

There was not a shred of human dignity left for the children.
Exactly how many horrifying acts did this pervert commit against these young children while they are still alive? They can’t even bear to imagine it anymore. They became nauseous from the disgust and the hair on their spine stood on end.