Question Rose and Melancholy Rose Devourer - Chapter 5
Translator: MadHatter Editor: MadHatter
A being that should not have existed distorted its limbs by disregarding the movement of its joints and twisted its upper body for a volume that defied its range of motion.
“…You…!”
Seth could see where the head of the red rose was heading right away.
Seth twisted his body against his will. He spread out his arms without even bothering to rise.
“Get down!”
Grasping the high-heeled leg of the person he had just shoved into the passenger room, Seth yanked on one of Crimson’s legs with sheer force.
“?Wah!”
A short cry erupted. Crimson’s long coat fluttered, followed by the tremor of a single person collapsing.
It leaped over the fallen Crimson and plunged into the window pane without breaking its momentum in a bestial maneuver.
Shattering the double-paned window with ease, the red petal vanished into the night.
“Wait!”
Seth promptly sprang to his feet and jumped over the groaning Crimson and onto the table with a speed surpassing a leaping cat.
He took a gander outside upon stepping on a jewel-like scattering of radiant hue glass fragments.
The presence of snow was still lingering around.
The chilly night air skimmed across his skin.
The railway track that had been erected through the forest was enveloped by tranquility. Only the inside of this train that stood there was raucous.
“Where…”
Seth glared at the forest, which was dominated by silence.
The red rose that devours people – the bizarre disease Cannibal Bouquet.
It existed in the actual world.
Seth had personally witnessed the dubious rumor he had snickered at only moments before.
The dull pain coursing through his body told him that what he had encountered was reality.
Neither was it a dream nor an illusion.
“That was…”
Seth turned around at the sound of the wavering voice.
He scratched the back of his head and found that Crimson had raised his upper body. Apparently, like Seth, the other party caught a glimpse of what was hidden in the cloth.
“It couldn’t be… the Cannibal Bouquet?”
Seth couldn’t answer.
“…Excuse me for being so rough with you.”
While getting off the table, Seth apologized, saying merely that he had yanked his foot.
“No. If you hadn’t helped me, I wouldn’t have been able to react… Thank you.”
Although the other person’s countenance softened, there was something odd about his demeanor.
He seemed to be concerned about the shattered windowpane behind Seth’s back.
However, Seth did not have the luxury of asking why and paying attention to calm the other party down. He was apologetic, but he didn’t have time to worry about Crimson in front of him any longer.
“It’s dangerous, so please stay still until someone arrives…”
When Seth announced, he passed next to the other person with a broad step and went out into the corridor.
An impersonal voice descended from the loudspeakers installed near the ceiling of each car’s corridor, hidden among the decorations, and utilized for in-train announcements. The conductor’s voice instructed the first and second-class passengers to remain in their cabins, while the third-class passengers were advised to remain where they were.
“Wait! What are you planning to do?”
Ignoring the conductor’s broadcast and Crimson’s question, Seth entered his cabin. He looked around the interior and picked up only lapis lazuli cane, which had fallen to the floor.
He gripped it with his right hand, then switched it to his left to check its condition. There was no distortion.
“…Alright.”
His late master, who had a bad walking habit, had given him this lovely cane.
Despite the fact that this object had a particular worth and nothing could easily go awry, a shiver crept down his spine as he thought about what if something were to happen to it.
Seth let out a breath. Facing forward, he stamped on the clean table with the sole of his shoe without hesitation and opened the double-paned glass.
The piercing night air invaded the room.
“You couldn’t be serious, are you going after Cannibal Bouquet!”
When Seth’s right foot landed on the window frame, Crimson seemed to have figured out the meaning of Seth’s action.
“They said that is the curse of the witch Boojum.”
“No,” Seth answered. “That… isn’t the curse of the witch Boojum.”
“How can you be so sure? Because witches perished a long time ago? You can’t possibly tell if that’s true, right? Just now ? that was.”
“That’s not what I meant.”
Seth looked back.
“To put it simply, the witch Boojum would never do such a thing. It goes against her aesthetics…”
“Aesthetics? What… are you talking about?”
“My master doesn’t resort to such a roundabout way of cursing.”
Seth did not hear the end of Crimson’s views and strongly painted his opinions with the truth he held.
“If the witch Boojum comes across someone she dislikes, she will trample them down with her own hands… or even her own feet until they are utterly crushed… She relishes the sensation of inflicting pain on them with her own feet, condescendingly jabbing them with her words, and then sneering at them for succumbing.”
The general population had no notion what kind of witch Boojum was, and only the stereotyped falsehoods had propagated simply due to her being called the ?Rose Blooming Witch?. Seth despised that.
“Boojum is that kind of ill-natured witch… Cannibal Bouquet and her are completely in the wrong direction…”
Seth was aware of it.
His master was dead.
His master has not been resurrected.
His master was nowhere to be found.
After all, Seth had indeed witnessed the end of his master.
The witch undoubtedly died.
His master, Seth’s nurturer and mentor, died while laughing, gleefully belittling the world until the end of her life, on the dirty sofa, her fixed position.
Seth was aware of it.
He will never meet his master again.
Regardless of how much he wished for it, it will absolutely not happen.
She will not be resurrected.
“Besides…”
It was impossible for the witch Boojum to bring forth a red rose.
“My master never produces red roses.”
Seth understood his master more than anyone else.
He was more familiar than anyone else with the beauty of the lucid blue that bloomed from her body.
“The Witch Boojum’s rose is blue…”
Seth refuted the baseless claims that circulated about her.
The witch Boojum was indeed arrogant, tyrannical, and diabolical.
Therefore, it was her nature to feel compelled to crush, trample, and laugh at others herself. He did not even want to recall how many times he was kicked to the ground out of her outburst.
Even after realizing that she was about to die, the witch with the bad walking habit showed no sign of slowing down.
With her proud legs, she kicked down everything and carried on laughing.
The witch kept on laughing and mocking the world and then died.
Laughing at the insignificance of everything in the world.
She died rejoicing to the very end.
She died with laughter.
She died with a contented smile on her face.
“The witch Boojum never created anything like that…”
Seth, who had been by the witch Boojum’s side for a long time, could understand.
The witch Boojum had mocked, ridiculed, trampled on, and loved this world.
There was no reason for her to put on a curse.
There was no way she would cast a curse.
Quite on the contrary, the witch Boojum surely would have abhorred Cannibal Boojum.
“You are…”
In the midst of a half-strangled, almost soliloquy, Seth answered his question.
“I’m the last remnant of Boojum, the ?Rose Blooming Witch??”
He answered confidently.
“?The Witch of the Rose Devourer?.”
Seth shifted his both eyes back to the deep night.
“That had nothing to do with my master…”
Seth adamantly denied that the witch Boojam and Cannibal Bouquet were related.
He must deny it.
“As a disciple myself, I can vouch for that.”
As the disciple and the only family member of the witch Boojum, Seth had faith in her.
He tightened his grip on the lapis lazuli cane he had inherited from his master, who had a poor habit of walking.
“The master’s disgrace will be cleared by me, her apprentice…!”
As he glared at the forest where the Cannibal Bouquet had disappeared, Seth didn’t hesitate to kick the window frame.
“Wait!” “Ngga?!”
His black cloak was seized.
Seth’s balance was thrown off drastically when he was pulled backward by the powerful yank while leaning forward.
“Aah! I’m sorry!”
The other party seemed to be in a panic to let go of the cloak.
His body, which was originally trying to get out of the train, lost its support and simply fell.
It was a raucous but fleeting occurrence that came completely out of nowhere.
Seth was thrown off his position and fell awkwardly to the ground, which was covered with a thin layer of snow. No, he was compelled to fall.
“….Ha?”
This was an irrational occurrence, which could have been called an incident if taken the wrong way.
Seth blinked three times, experiencing the cool air of the stone, which had a temperature not much different from the ice on his side.
Then, like a creaking puppet, he raised his body awkwardly and slowly.
“…”
Crimson flew to Seth’s side as a little piece of gravel fell off his cheeks.