"What… is happening…?" Jack muttered in a hoarse voice as he collapsed to the ground. He could see the rainbow colors distorting around Alice's body as she stared at him. What seemed to be steam was rising.
"Alice… is that you…?"
… No…
No.
… Wrong?
Wrong!
The letters that instinctively emerged in his head were disorienting him.
"That" is different.
It's not Alice.
It's something more sinister…
Something darker…
Even though he had never laid eyes on it before, an instinctive part of Jack shuddered.
Frightening.
Terrifying…
When he saw "that", which appeared to be no more than a tiny girl, Jack was overcome with a feeling that sent chills throughout his body.
◇
Raffi, who stood on the ground a short distance away, gritted his teeth when he observed Alice, who stepped out waveringly, emitting a bizarre atmosphere.
"Alice… you have finally woken up… But something's not right…"
The Hatter, whose right shoulder had been severed by something, was cowering on the ground, heaving and crying. The black liquid was still flowing and soaking the area. He caught his rolling right arm with his left arm and looked at Alice with a messed up sobbing face.
"Hehe… hahahahaha… ahhhh!"
He was laughing. Screeching out in tears and laughter, he brought the severed surface of his arm and right shoulder together with a splat. The flesh of his body swelled momentarily, pulsating and joining his arm and shoulder as if it were being sewn back into place. After a few seconds, the Hatter regained his original body and opened his mouth, tears sloshing down his face.
"It hurts… It hurts so much! Alice! Nice! That's good! More of that! Let's have some more fun!"
Pointing at Alice, who was slowly pacing towards him, he let out a snapping noise. The surrounding crowd of rabbits shrieked and leaped up, brandishing their sickles. And then they pounced on Alice like a rainstorm.
Casting her bright red, blood-colored eyes at her surroundings, Alice curled her body as if she were a different person, with an expressionless face reminiscent of a Noh mask. And in the next moment… She opened her mouth wide and let out a "scream".
That was not a voice. Nor was it a word with any approximate meaning.
The "thing" that emanated from Alice's mouth, without any audible sound, instantly spread across the surrounding space like a beam of light. Nobody could even see it. Neither could they feel it.
The rabbits that had leaped into the air were all stationary on the spot. There was a high-pitched squeak… that reverberated through the air, like some kind of metal scraping at high speed.
Soon after, all the rabbits that had been leaping at Alice exploded in midair.
No, it didn't explode. All of them were reduced to minced meat, as if they had been subjected to a shredder, and burst apart in the air.
With a thud, chunks of flesh rained down on the ground. Alice looked up, her body smeared with crimson-black liquid.
There was an overwhelming blank expression on her face. Her pupils were dilated and her eyes were glowing red. So to speak, that was her.
A void.
Absent of anything. A face where fear, hesitancy, and all other emotions were nonexistent.
With white smoke escaping from her mouth, Alice swayed upright. She crushed the head of a mangled rabbit that was lying at her feet and continued on her way as if nothing had occurred.
"Gah-ha-ha! AHHHHHHHHH!"
There was a roar of laughter. The Hatter, witnessing the bloody scene, jumped back, shouting merrily. He then popped the heads of the citizens slumped on the ground.
"Well, how about this one!"
With a childlike excitement in his voice, he held the suspended citizens with both hands. He then flung them into the air with great force.
One after another, the humans were directed at Alice like a cannonball shot. Alice watched with a blank expression and then turned to… the flying humans in a parabola line.
"Something" issued from her lips.
The "something" that was neither a scream nor a shriek, but was infused with enormous despair, reaped the flying humans mercilessly with ease. The figures halted briefly in midair, and… On the spot, an explosion of flames spurted out.
As the ground was gouged out, the flames spread to the trees, creating a cloud of dust and smoke all around. The Hatter had his eyes closed, protecting his face from the heated wind, but he swiftly wiped his face, drew a small breath, and smiled.
"You seem to be suddenly motivated… but if you weren't, I wouldn't be able to tell them about this for the tea party souvenir story…"
Having said that much, he dropped his words. At his feet, he spotted a small girl… Alice looking up at him.
"Ah…"
The Hatter stared down at it and came to a halt with a dumb voice. Alice's piercing red eyes. Because he had viewed them head-on.
There was nothing reflected there. Neither himself nor the rabbits that had collapsed into tiny fragments. Not even the citizens who were reduced to dust in the air.
This was not a matter of being focused or anything like that.
A hollow.
A hole.
The Nightmare had ceased their movements when the bottomless void of nothingness loomed near them. Alice, her body drenched in blood, slowly opened her mouth. From there, "something" crawled out.
Cannot be seen.
Cannot be heard.
Not even able to feel it.
Not only that but "that" which had no scent was slowly wriggling.
The next thing the Hatter knew, he reflexively attempted to retreat and kick the ground. The air rumbled. There was a high-pitched squeal of… kii…n sound. All around, a tremor in the air resounded like a ringing in the ears.
A step or two later, the Hatter backed away.
"Alice… ah, Alice…"
His body shuddered uncontrollably. From his nose and mouth, black liquid poured out in a gush.
"I must make it to the tea party… everyone is waiting for me… so I have to go quickly…"
Then something sloshed out of his neck. The very next second, the Hatter's head slipped off.
With a heavy bass sound, a bizarre raw head rolled on the ground.
The kneeling Hatter's body… splashed black liquid from its severed neck like a fountain. Alice gazed around expressionlessly as she was bathed in it head-on.
Over the head of the Hatter, who was sticking out his tongue, the surviving rabbits could be seen disintegrating into a soggy, filthy sludge and drifting to the ground. Alice's eyes slowly drained of their brightness. Eventually, she closed her eyes and collapsed in the hatter's pool of blood, creating a murky watery sound.
The flames that had swept through the trees were extinguished before long. A hellish scene of dead bodies was unfolding. Droplets of water fell from the sky. It was black rain.
Jet black as the Hatter's blood, it swiftly turned into a heavy rain that began to pound Alice and the corpses in the surrounding area. Nobody uttered a word.