Hoarding In Hell [EN]: Chapter 340

Extracurricular 2.

From Beast to Human (2)

“…Is that the thing we’re supposed to identify?”

Maria asked, seemingly in disbelief.

Though the blue night sky still lingered, the moonlight was quite bright.

Even from a glimpse of the silhouette, one could see human limbs, crushed and crumpled firearms, and clumps of hair messily gathered together.

It was a nauseating sight that made one feel strange just by looking at it. However, Samuel said with a bitter smile,

“That’s just a *jackstone*. The ‘real’ thing will be visible further inside.”

“Jackstone?”

Maria asked back, as if she couldn’t understand.

“You’ll see plenty of things like that as you go in.”

‘Plenty’ indeed.

Maria closed her mouth and followed Samuel.

She now understood why he had such a hard time explaining things when they first met.

And as Samuel said, the further they went into the canyon, the more appalling the sight became.

Not as large as the giant ‘jackstone’ they saw at first, but there were large and small masses clumped together here and there.

Some were dozens of people mashed together, while others were made of just one person.

Some were flowing down the walls.

There were Soviets and Arabs.

There were also clumps of beasts, rocks, firearms, and even tanks.

It was definitely not a natural phenomenon. It was clearly related to the dungeon.

But Maria had never seen such a sight, even though she had been in and out of dungeons countless times.

Perhaps a monster with bizarre tastes had leaked out, or a strange phenomenon that she had never known about had appeared outside the dungeon.

After all, many things inside dungeons are not scientifically explained.

“Stop.”

Samuel suddenly stopped Maria, who was walking half out of her mind.

Maria quickly raised her head and looked straight ahead. At the end of the canyon, there was a particularly open space.

In the place where the moonlight shone, there was something foreign.

A girl was visible.

The girl was adorned with flowers rare in this area, carefully woven cloth, and rare gold and silver jewelry.

She was lying face down on a pillow quilted with silk and decorated with gold thread.

Several candles were placed around her, but most of them were extinguished.

“Is that… an altar?”

Maria recognized that the candles and gold thread patterns around the girl were similar to the forms of worship in this area. Food and fruit were also commonly used as offerings.

The girl was being worshiped. Probably by the locals in this area.

And around her, the ‘jackstones’ they had seen so far were slowly spinning around.

The fluid left by the jackstones on the floor created a circular trajectory.

Maria stared at the girl and cautiously tried to take a step. At that moment, Samuel quickly grabbed her.

“Are you crazy!”

“Huh? What? Why?”

“Don’t you feel anything after seeing those corpses? You could end up like that too.”

Samuel’s pale face showed that he had already seen someone become ‘like that’.

Samuel nervously scratched a line on the floor with his foot.

“If you go inside this line, ‘that’ will react. Stay inside here if you don’t want to die.”

The ‘lines’ were not just one.

Dozens of dark, murky trajectories were drawn, as if someone had experimented.

They were trajectories made of blood, flesh, and pieces of organs.

Maria recalled the memory of killing ants on her desk when she was young.

It was unpleasant to crush the ants to death, so she would put her fingertip on them and rub them wildly. Then the ants would be crushed in an instant.

That was what had happened to humans in this canyon.

“But why do you call them jackstones?”

“…That’s the name the locals gave them. When the girl is awake, she plays with those lumps.”

Maria imagined the sight of these corpse lumps bouncing in the air like jackstones. (Jackstones are a children’s game involving tossing and catching small objects.)

It was a bizarre and surreal sight.

She felt sick, but at the same time, she felt a dry thirst. Her desire was craving knowledge.

“Let’s go a little closer. Huh? She’s sleeping.”

“Sleep time doesn’t matter. ‘That’ crushed people even while sleeping. I don’t even know if she’s sleeping in the first place.”

“No, damn it. Why did you bring me here if you’re not going to let me get close whether she’s asleep or awake? Just to show me something amazing?”

“Do you have to put your hand in the fire to know it’s hot?”

Samuel said with a stiff expression.

At Samuel’s fingertips were lumps of corpses clumped together.

Maria stared at the corpses for a long time with a look that seemed to ask what he wanted, but she couldn’t understand what Samuel was saying.

“Oh, well. It must be dangerous. But do you think I came to the border where the Soviet army and Afghan rebels are fighting fiercely to protect myself? What are you trying to do? Hey, Victor. Say something.”

Instead of answering, Samuel frowned and turned his gaze to Victor. Maria couldn’t understand that expression either.

Victor was just her bodyguard and guide. If she gave him a little more authority, he could be the chief of security in an emergency, but he was still just a bodyguard. She thought he wouldn’t stop her from researching, let alone encourage her.

Then Victor smiled awkwardly and said,

“What do you think, Maria? Is that child a type of monster from the dungeon? Or is it a special phenomenon we didn’t know about?”

“How would I know that…?”

At that moment, Maria felt a chill run down her spine. It wasn’t based on evidence, but rather a kind of intuition.

Victor is not a typical soldier.

The conclusion drawn from the fact that there were no CIA agents visible, armed guerrillas were in control of the canyon, and the Soviet army was crushed into jackstones was only one thing.

“You didn’t call me in for an investigation.”

“You’re right, I called you in for an investigation.”

Victor immediately corrected Maria’s words. His gaze swept around the canyon.

Maria quickly noticed where Victor’s gaze was lingering.

The armed guerrillas who were ambushing somewhere here.

The situation was easy to understand. But it didn’t seem as simple as Victor had initially explained.

***

“Damn bastards.”

Maria, Victor, and Samuel returned to the dugout outside the canyon with the help of the guerrillas. It was the dugout where Samuel was staying.

Maria paced back and forth nervously, recalling the situation from earlier. Samuel muttered with a tired expression.

“Maria, I think you know what’s going on. It’s not something to think about for so long.”

“The CIA and those extremist bastards, and even the Soviet guys. They all want that girl. So they’re trying to see if we can tame her!”

The locals were the first to discover the girl.

The locals must have felt fear when they saw the girl with god-like powers, and then awe.

As a result, they began to worship her.

And then the Soviet army must have discovered the girl. The Soviet army was shocked by the girl and tried to eliminate her or take her away.

In the process, they used the locals. As a result, their end was not good.

And perhaps the next to come was the CIA, who was commanding the armed rebels here.

But judging from the situation, the CIA’s situation didn’t seem good either.

Samuel, the only one who knew the situation, quietly opened his mouth.

“The guerrilla group that dominates this place is called Al-Qaeda. That old man from earlier is a wealthy man from Saudi Arabia, and he’s completely insane. If the CIA continues to empower extremist forces like this, it will be a big problem later on.”

“That’s for the higher-ups in Langley [CIA headquarters] to decide.”

Victor replied with a grin.

Samuel distorted his face as if he was dumbfounded.

“The CIA agents who were dispatched have all disappeared. They said they went back, but they must have been killed. The moment they saw ‘that’ annihilate the Soviet army, even these desert fanatics went crazy. With that tremendous power! The person who has that power will rule the world!”

Samuel stood up from his seat in anger and shouted.

Victor did not answer.

Certainly, if you imagine getting your hands on that, you would completely forget about diplomacy and debt.

The reason why Maria and Samuel were left behind was that they still couldn’t do anything about ‘that’, so they were entrusting it to the hands of experts.

Instead of persuading Victor, Samuel pleaded with Maria, who was no different from the real decision-maker.

“Maria, you are a wise person. But these idiots aren’t. They believe they can use ‘that’!”

“You believe that it should be eliminated.”

“Imagine that getting into the hands of those fundamentalist fanatics!”

A Soviet army battalion.

No, judging from the traces left in the canyon, the actual force deployed was more than that.

At least a regiment. If an existence that can annihilate such a force without a single scratch, in the form of a seemingly harmless girl, falls in the middle of the enemy’s capital?

The world would be greatly changed by the very fact that such a thing could happen.

But Maria wasn’t that surprised by it all.

‘It was something that could have happened someday.’

Maria had already predicted such a situation from the moment dungeons and ability users appeared. Perhaps that’s why the shock wasn’t so great.

However, the world is not yet ready to accept the appearance of such an existence.

Victor spoke to Maria so that Samuel’s opinion would not be given too much weight.

“Professor Maria, your mission remains unchanged. All you have to do is determine what ‘that’ is and whether it is dangerous.”

“But the next ‘cleanup’ will be up to you. While gauging what to do with that girl. Are there bombers still waiting in the sky? Carrying bombs that can wipe out this canyon at any time.”

Victor did not answer and only smiled.

It was enough of an answer for Maria.

America is not stupid.

It had already been confirmed that ‘that’ was a very dangerous existence, and if they couldn’t have it, they had a way to destroy it.

However, they had entrusted the final trigger to Maria.

“Maria. That is an uncontrollable power. Even if it can be controlled, it is too dangerous for anyone to hold! It must be eliminated!”

“Don’t feel pressured, and tell us what you think. There are still many things we don’t know. If you say that you don’t need to take on the risk, we can leave here right away. Then the higher-ups will take care of everything.”

Samuel pleaded as if begging. On the other hand, Victor advised a more calm decision, but he also seemed to be leaning towards Samuel’s judgment.

That girl would be an unacceptable existence for him, a soldier by nature.

He, as a soldier, knows how to distinguish between weapons and destruction. And Victor seemed to define ‘that’ as ‘destruction’ that cannot be handled.

Maria couldn’t understand.

“I don’t understand what you guys are talking about at all.”

“Yes?”

“Does that look like someone who can be swayed by other guys? Do you guys see that as a gun in the hands of a madman or a bomb that could explode at any moment?”

Samuel looked at Maria as if he didn’t know what she was saying.

Maria didn’t like those eyes full of fear and stubbornness.

And Victor’s arrogance, disguised as peace, as well.

Victor asked Maria.

“Then what do you see, Professor?”

“A brat.”

Maria said sharply.

“I see a brat who hasn’t become human yet. But that’s how kids that age are.”

“Can you just call that a child?”

“I’m not married, but I have a nephew. The way the corpses are crushed is exactly what kids that age would do. Doesn’t everyone play with crushing ants at that age?”

“The dead people are not ants, but humans…!”

“It’s not much different to that kid. And it’s the same to me.”

Samuel couldn’t continue speaking with his mouth open.

“Some guys try to get rid of kids in front of their eyes just because they’re uncomfortable. It’s a very unsightly and grotesque thing. If adults don’t teach children, who will? It’s not the job of adults to kill or get rid of a brat just because they haven’t learned manners.”

Maria muttered with a face full of combative curiosity.

“A child needs an adult to teach them manners. I will turn that beast-like brat into a human.”

***

The sky was turning blue.

The blue light dyed the canyon, creating a pale color. The canyon, which was originally white, looked like a child’s sketchbook.

It was because of the blood that was scattered in a mess.

As the vision began to brighten, the scenery of the canyon became even more nauseating. And the smell seemed to get worse.

Maria took a long, deep breath.

She knew she was doing something crazy. But she liked that fact quite a bit.

‘I’m sorry to Samuel, though.’

Maria had no intention of simply teaching the girl.

To raise an existence with such power as a human with intelligence and free will?

That is irresponsible to both the girl and humanity.

A leash is needed for a fierce dog. If not, euthanasia.

Maria’s spine tingled.

She liked the plan to put a leash on an existence treated as a god, monster, or demon for the sake of humans.

Maria stepped over the line that Samuel had drawn.

And the girl opened her eyes.