Chapter 113 - Ghostbuster 2 (3)
10 min read ·
'Help me.'
A flustered plea, blurted out in a jumble.
"Ah... that is... I mean...."
And then, in Emily's trembling ear, Yo-han's calm voice rang out without a moment's hesitation.
[Got it. I'll help you.]
Emily's eyes went wide.
".........!"
It wasn't as if the situation had improved in the slightest.
From outside the room, she could still hear the skin-crawling sounds of the monster ransacking the kitchen.
Creak- creak- thud.
[Emily, I know everything's a blur right now, but can you tell me what's happening?]
But at that unshakable voice, Emily's trembling settled a little.
She held her breath and whispered.
"Okay... I'm hiding in my room right now. And there's a m-monster wandering around the house."
[So it's an Anomaly Incident. What does the monster look like? Is it the kind that makes your head swim just from looking at it? If so, don't bother picturing it.]
Over the phone, Yo-han's words came fast, but every syllable was crisp and clear.
[Rattle- clunk-.]
The sound of tools being gathered up carried through.
"No, it looks grotesque, but... my head didn't swim. It's a t-twisted Mona Lisa, with its mouth torn into this long slit."
[The Mona Lisa?]
"Oh, yes. See, there's this painting Grandpa's friend gave him, and it's actually...."
Emily rambled, and Yo-han cut in at just the right moment.
[So it's an Anomaly that came out of a painting. What about Smith-ssi, or anyone else?]
"...He's all right, thankfully. I'm the only one home."
Yo-han responded at once.
[Emily, don't hang up. Text the police. Listen while you type.]
"O-okay!"
With shaking hands, Emily sent a message to the police.
[From what you've told me, this is the type of Anomaly that targets people who are alone. I can't say for certain, but if anyone else were in the house, it would likely stay hidden.]
Creak- thud- creak- thud!
Just then, the sounds of the monster rampaging outside drew closer and closer.
"Eeek!"
Huddled against the door, Emily flinched hard.
".........."
She had called Yo-han out of sheer terror, but....
Realistically, there was no way for Yo-han, in Korea, to help Emily, in America.
And then.
[Emily. Emily.]
Yo-han called her name in a soft, low voice.
[Can you switch us to a video call?]
"...What?"
At the unexpected request, Emily's tear-wet eyes turned to her phone.
[Common sense says I can't get from Korea to America this very second, and I can't guarantee you'll stay safe until the police arrive.]
Crash! Craaash!
From beyond the room came the sound of furniture being hurled and smashed in a frenzy.
But Emily paid it no mind. Yo-han's words rang through.
[So.]
On the screen, now switched to video, she saw Yo-han's composed face.
[Starting now, I'm going to cast a spell.]
Yo-han turned his phone around.
Unlike the dark night sky over America, the time difference meant the sun was still up beneath the sky of Korea.
In what looked like a garden, a scene unfolded of tiny Gnomes in pointed red caps drawing a Magic Circle into the ground.
[Heave-ho~ heave-ho~!]
"Huh?"
The surreal, storybook sight, enough to drive out even her terror for a moment, left Emily dazed.
"Huhh?"
Coming back to her senses, and knowing full well this was no time for such questions, she asked anyway.
"Um, excuse me... are those Gnomes? I mean, not the little statues people put in their gardens, but real Gnomes?"
[That's right. Real Gnomes.]
"...They're cuter than I imagined."
The situation was no better, and the monster might burst in and kill her at any moment, but somehow, a laugh escaped Emily.
"You really are a wizard, Yo-han-ssi."
[Though I can't conjure glass slippers or a pumpkin carriage.]
Yo-han joked to loosen Emily's nerves, then went straight to the point.
[Emily, first I need to check something. Is the moon out?]
From beyond the room came the sound of doors being wrenched open, slammed, and smashed.
Thud! Crash! Craaash!
[Crescent or full, it doesn't matter. It just has to be visible, not covered.]
Emily combed through her memory. She hadn't consciously looked at the sky, but....
Thinking back to when Smith was loaded into the ambulance, the moon had been out.
"Y-yes! It's out!"
[Good. Emily, this next part matters. I know you're scared, but I need you to be strong.]
"Okay...?"
[Get past the Anomaly and out to somewhere you can see the moon. I know it's a lot to ask. Even so, after that-]
The words that rang in Emily's ear steadied her.
[I'll handle the rest, no matter what.]
".........."
Emily's legs, which had given out beneath her in fear, trembled as she rose.
"...All right. I'll try."
[Emily, Anomalies sometimes follow certain rules or patterns of behavior. Is there anything the painting monster keeps doing, over and over? We might buy some time with it.]
"Something it does over and over?"
Her eyes trembling, Emily called up the image of the grotesque, twisted Mona Lisa monster.
The torn mouth, the body like a mass of black tar, the elongated arms and razor claws.
...No, its looks weren't what she needed to think about.
It was what the scenes all had in common.
And then it came to her.
".........!"
The mangled, shredded paintings strewn about the hallway; Drake's remark that every painting in the studio of the French painter, the very first victim, had been torn apart.
For some reason, that Anomaly wearing the Mona Lisa's face tore other paintings to pieces. It would not abide them.
Emily scanned the room for any drawings she could grab.
Something plentiful, something easy to scatter....
It was sitting right there on her desk.
'Emily's sketchbook.'
For an instant, Emily's eyes wavered....
But in the next moment, she snatched the sketchbook up in one hand and eased the door open.
".........?"
The hallway was a wreck, but mercifully, the monster was nowhere in sight.
"Whew...."
And the very moment Emily let out a quiet breath and stepped fully into the hallway.
Creeeak-.
A gaze froze her body solid.
The room beside Emily's.
Out of So-ra's room, its door smashed in, the Mona Lisa's face came stretching, long and unnatural.
It stared at Emily.
Its mouth split into a long tear, as if smiling, baring the teeth of a beast.
And the moment her eyes met the monster's.
Emily made up her mind, her face flushing red.
".........!"
Embarrassment won out over terror. Emily clenched the sketchbook tight, then flung it wide.
"Aaah!"
In one motion, she tore out the drawings she had sworn the world would never see, and scattered them into the air.
'Artwork - Yo-han Holding Emily's Leash.'
'Artwork – Yo-han Forcibly Gripping Emily's Chin and Touching Her Lips.'
'Artwork – Yo-han Hugging Her from Behind and Never Letting Go.'
The full range of Emily's naked desires fluttered down across the hallway.
She seriously wanted to cry.
".........."
The Mona Lisa Anomaly froze at the sight of Emily's drawings drifting through the air.
Whether it was an Anomaly's instinct, or a simple, heartfelt wish not to be shown such weird things.
"Aaaaaaaagh!"
It roared, arms sweeping out to shred Emily's drawings.
Shrrip- shrrrrrip!
"—!"
Emily seized the opening, spun, and ran.
However engrossed in the drawings the monster might be, heading for the hallway exit where it had planted itself would only end with her caught, or killed by a swing of those claws.
So not the front door of the house.
"Hah! Hah!"
Breath ragged, she climbed the spiral staircase, up toward the rooftop.
Thud! Thud! Thud!
Ignoring the violent pounding against floor and wall coming up behind her, she climbed.
Clunk- she threw open the rooftop door.
"Haah-!"
The cool night wind swept past Emily's face.
Emily immediately lifted her head.
Checking the sky, she ran for the rooftop railing.
Eyes on the moon hanging in the dark night sky, she shouted into her phone.
"Hah! Y-Yo-han-ssi! I'm out!"
[A king riding a doe, a boy, a huntress, a cow, a doe, a duck.]
And.
Thud- thud-.
The Mona Lisa Anomaly, too, wedged itself through the door and crawled up onto the roof.
".........."
In the shape of a deformed, twisted masterpiece, it gazed at Emily, who had nowhere left to run.
The monster's claws scraped across the floor.
...But.
Monster or no monster, the incantation went on.
[Spirit of the moon, answer my call.]
The Mona Lisa Anomaly let out a horrible shriek and lunged at Emily.
Thud- thud- thud-!
"Aaaaaagh-!" "Hiik!"
Just as Yo-han had told her beforehand, Emily thrust her phone screen out toward the Anomaly.
Strictly speaking, it was only a video.
But at the picture on that small rectangular screen, the Anomaly's movements stopped dead for an instant.
".........?"
On the screen unfolded the sight of Yo-han, draped in a white coat, standing atop a Magic Circle with a Pentacle wrought of silver in his grip.
And with one more line added, the incantation was complete.
[Angel Iakaidel, answer Solomon's Contract.]
"Khaaak-."
The Mona Lisa Anomaly raised its arm to shred Emily to ribbons, phone and all.
Bang-.
And just like that, its arm burst apart.
"......!?"
Starting from the arm, the Anomaly's tar-lump head and body were skewered through by something, bursting apart piece by piece.
"A-aaaaagh-!"
Startled, Emily stared blankly at the spectacle...
'...What on earth is doing that?'
She looked up at the sky. And she understood what the force piercing the monster was.
Blue moonlight shimmered in Emily's green eyes.
".........!"
...It was moonlight.
Moonlight poured down, punching through the Anomaly and bursting it apart.
[Fifth Pentacle of the Moon]
'A spell that pierces enemies with the power of Iakaidel, the angel who governs the moon.'
On a rooftop laid open to a sky with nothing to bar the way.
"Keeeeeagh-!"
The Mona Lisa Anomaly screamed in agony as its body burst apart without mercy.
Inside Emily's phone screen.
I watched the scene unfold and let out a small breath.
"Whew...."
A spell that pierced enemies through an angel of the moon, mystically akin to Artemis, the Greek goddess of the moon.
Magic that drew on the power of the angel who governs the moon, though.
The moon absolutely had to be out, and if bad weather covered it, the spell was off the table.
And since it was a matter of shooting to hit, the enemy had to be visible in my line of sight, but....
Through the screen, I watched the twisted Mona Lisa Anomaly burst under the moonlight, crumbling to powder and scattering away.
...In that it made long-range bombardment possible through a communication device like this, it was a fine spell.
At any rate.
For starters, on my end as the caster, it was Monday, which made the Pentacle of the Moon magic available.
And on Emily's end in America, it was night, so the moon was out.
I'd half wondered if it would work at all; good thing it went off without a hitch.
On the rooftop, watching the Mona Lisa Anomaly pierced by moonlight and fading away, Emily sank to the ground as the tension drained out of her, and spoke into the phone.
"Y-Yo-han-ssi... I-I'm alive... Thank you so much."
[Emily, that was your own courage. You did well.]
And at the sound of Yo-han's gentle voice in her ear, the tension holding Emily together snapped all at once, and her true feelings slipped right out.
"More...."
[Hm?]
"C-could you... praise me a little more? I-I was so scared, I'm still shaking...."
Later, once she came to her senses, she would be screaming inside, wondering what on earth had possessed her. But right now, she wanted to hear more of Yo-han's voice.
I nodded.
'Sure. It's not like it's hard.'
For the sake of customer satisfaction, I put on my gentlest voice and spoke.
[There's nothing to be embarrassed about. You genuinely did handle it calmly and well.]
Emily gave herself over to the sound of Yo-han's voice in her ear and settled down.
And then.
[For someone so young, you really did wonderfully, all on your own.]
"...What?"
Emily paused.
"Y-Yo-han-ssi, I'm not that young."
She said it in a slightly sulky voice.
"...I'm eighteen."
That caught me a little off guard.
Had she looked younger than her age when I saw her before because she'd been so ill?
Well, she was still young either way, just not as young as I'd thought.
At any rate, young or not, she'd asked for praise. So the praise continued.
[It's impressive all the same. You did well, Emily.]
"You're not teasing me, are you?"
[Not at all.]
"...Yo-han-ssi, I think you have a more mischievous streak than I expected."
And so, until the police arrived at the rooftop, I chatted lightly with Emily over the phone.
One way or another, that was another case closed.