Chapter 1
"Why...? Why... me?"
Kurayami trembled, feeling his fingernails being ripped out one by one. The pain burned through him like liquid fire, and between muffled whimpers, he could only curse under his breath.
"It hurts... it hurts... it hurts..."
He thrashed against the ropes binding his hands and legs, the chair rattling with brief, useless spasms.
"Stop it already, please! Enough!" he begged through tears, his voice cracked, on the verge of breaking.
In front of him, the woman smiled, unmoved.
"Calm down... just a little more. Stay still."
Without changing her expression, she tightened the pliers and tore off one of his fingers with chilling precision. She then placed it in a wooden box, alongside other bloody fragments of Kurayami. Teeth, nails, phalanges... all lined up like grotesque trophies.
"Please... mom... mother... help me..."
Lost in his thoughts, Kurayami tried to escape from the present, but the woman's voice dragged him back to reality.
"We're done for today, Kurayami. Until tomorrow."
Hearing this, he lifted his head and saw his ruined body. No fingers, no nails, no peace. Yet within minutes, the wounds sealed, and the torn parts grew back as if nothing had happened.
And so the days went on. Torture after torture. Regeneration after regeneration. His body healed... but his mind began to fracture.
Until one night, the woman descended the dungeon stairs with a wide, almost maternal smile.
"Ku-ra-ya-mi... are you hungry? Thirsty, maybe? It's been five days without food."
Kurayami, nervous, avoided her gaze. He sweated cold and trembled.
"Y-yes... I'm hungry... and very thirsty..."
"Ahhh... that's good."
With a false sweetness, the woman revealed what she had been hiding behind her back: a small knife, bright and sharp. Kurayami's smile vanished instantly.
She began to play with the blade between her fingers as she slowly drew closer.
"Don't worry," she whispered, "this will only take a moment."
She placed a glass beneath his arm and cut him with surgical precision. Hot blood gushed out, filling the cup. Once it was full, she set it aside, satisfied.
"You know? I'm getting better at this," she said cheerfully, as if speaking of a homemade recipe.
Kurayami could barely breathe.
The woman took the knife again and leaned closer. She looked at him with feigned tenderness, and he returned a hollow, mechanical, broken smile.
With a sudden movement, she plunged the blade into his eye and extracted it with macabre precision. She then placed it on a plate, along with one of his fingers taken from the wooden box.
Finally, with the cup of blood in one hand and the plate of flesh in the other, she offered it to Kurayami.
"Dinnertime."
"Stop! I don't want to! I don't want to!"
"Come now... eat, eat, eat..."
She forced his mouth open and shoved a piece of his own body inside, making him swallow. Then she tilted the glass, forcing him to drink his blood.
Tears streamed endlessly down Kurayami's face. It wasn't pain. It was horror. Pure, raw despair.
And somewhere deep in his mind, the last barrier began to break. Silent. Irreversible.