Chapter Ninety-Five: Another Self

A bitter wind came howling in with a human voice, stabbing into Frost Cliff’s ears. The words were blurred by the gale, yet the accent still revealed the speaker to be some middle-aged man.

“Heh heh, little girl, from today on you’re my daughter. I’ll be your foster father from now on. Come on, call me dad.”

“”

“What, you won’t say it? If you don’t, I’ll make sure you can’t get out of bed tomorrow.”

“”

“Well, well, still silent? Don’t forget, I’m your first man!”

“”

“Fine, fine! Stubborn little thing, aren’t you? Your mother sold you to me for five hundred thousand anyway. Let’s have some fun here first, and I’ve got plenty of time to teach you a lesson later.”

The lewd, nauseating filth of the middle-aged man blended with the wind. Frost Cliff felt something inside him crack apart. His lungs, which had nearly burst from rage, suddenly grew eerily calm instead. Every cell in his body seemed to tremble with excitement, as though welcoming something’s arrival.

“I’ll kill you.”

His voice was as cold as ice, his teeth grinding. Every word was forced through the narrow gap between them. Fury filled his mind entirely, yet now his mind felt chillingly clear. All that anger fused into a strange, merciless coldness, and every nerve in his head could think only one thing: Kill him. Get out there and kill him. Make him feel the terror of hell.

Frost Cliff let out a slow breath. A strange change seemed to pass through his body. He stepped out of the shadows one pace at a time, and with each step he took, his body seemed to grow, as though each stride added a year to his life. After eight steps, he had already returned to his original form, only now his face no longer wore its usual warm, sunny smile. In its place was a coldness so complete it no longer seemed human.

Hearing the sound of footsteps ascending the stairs below, a faint, sinister smile appeared on Frost Cliff’s face. Silently, he took out a pair of large black tailoring shears and walked downstairs step by step.

“Who are you? How did you get here?”

When Frost Cliff reached the second floor, a man was coming toward him with a little girl in hand, the snow outside the window casting pale light over them. The man looked to be around fifty, fat-faced and potbellied, with a greasy, lecherous smile. In his left hand he was dragging a little girl of about ten. Seeing Frost Cliff come down the stairs in a black tracksuit that was clearly too small for him, the middle-aged man asked in surprise.

“Heh. Who am I? Don’t you know?”

Frost Cliff still wore that faint smile, approaching the man step by step.

“You’ve been here before? Why haven’t I seen you?”

The middle-aged man seemed to relax, asking in confusion, completely unaware of the shears clenched in Frost Cliff’s right hand.

“I’m the one who came to kill you. Of course you’ve never seen me.”

Reaching the man’s side, Frost Cliff drove the shears straight into his chest without the slightest hesitation.

The blades pierced through flesh. On the way back out, they spattered blood all over Frost Cliff’s body, yet that seemingly brutal strike had narrowly missed the man’s vital organs, tearing only skin and muscle. Frost Cliff wiped some of the blood from himself with his left hand, that gentle smile still on his face. With his right hand, he lightly patted the middle-aged man’s pig-like cheek, leaving one bloody handprint after another. Then he gave a courteous bow and asked with elegant politeness, “Do you recognize me now?”

“You—” The middle-aged man stared in terror at Frost Cliff’s still-warm smile, as though he were looking at a bloodthirsty demon. His legs shook uncontrollably; he could no longer even stand, and he plopped to the ground, clutching his chest as he howled in pain.

“Me? What about me?”

Frost Cliff’s smile grew even brighter. He opened the shears and, with a single snip at the man’s left hand, the sound of metal crossing sounded only a fraction of a second before three fingers were severed cleanly from the man’s hand.

“Ahhhh!”

“Heh heh heh. Say it. What about me?”

Still smiling happily, Frost Cliff casually clipped off the man’s right thumb.

“Ah—no! Nothing! Nothing at all! Sir! Sir, I was wrong!”

The middle-aged man’s shriek rose like that of a slaughtered pig.

Amused by the man’s pitiful state, Frost Cliff doubled over, laughing so hard tears spilled from his eyes. The middle-aged man took this as a sign that his begging had worked and quickly ingratiated himself. “Sir, please, show some mercy and spare me. Since you came to a place like this, you must be here for that reason too. I brought a fine one today. I’ll give her to you. Sir, just spare my worthless life.”

“Talk? Who told you to talk?”

One moment Frost Cliff had been laughing himself breathless; the next, his expression twisted into something ferocious. In the time between words, he had already clipped off the remaining four fingers of the man’s right hand.

“Ahhh! Sir, spare me!”

Frost Cliff flicked the now half-red shears in his hand, gazing at the man’s mangled right hand as though admiring a work of art, and praised softly, “A masterpiece of God.”

The middle-aged man seemed to have seen the most terrifying thing in the world. His chest rose and fell in a fit of grotesque spasms; foam spilled from his mouth; his whole body jerked violently for a dozen seconds or more. Then his head tilted to one side, as if he had been scared to death.

“That’s it? Scared to death just like that?”

Frost Cliff looked disdainfully at the heap on the floor and said with a kind of manic glee, “You think this is over? It’s only just beginning!”

Ten minutes later, on the second floor of the abandoned building, the middle-aged man who had once lain in a heap on the ground was gone without a trace. All that remained was a pile of broken flesh and severed limbs, every piece shriveled and withered as though it had been trampled by something.

“Are you feeling better?”

Snow Grain looked at the young man beside her, whose face alternated between ghastly pallor and a gentle smile, and asked with concern.

“I’m fine. Absolutely fine. Where’s your home? I’ll take you back.”

Frost Cliff awkwardly put on an act as though he did not know Snow Grain, and asked her in a tender voice.

“I-I don’t have a home anymore. I stopped knowing what a home even was a long time ago.”

“Fool. Idiot. Where did your brains go? Get back here! Useless thing! Let me take control of this body!”

A rough voice rang out inside Frost Cliff’s heart.

“You? What exactly are you?”

Frost Cliff asked in confusion.

“Has the corpse you planted in your garden seven years ago sprouted? Will it bloom this year?”

“It sprouts in the dark and blooms in blood.”