Chapter 394: Deathbed Echoes

Countless tiny insects were ravaging Betty’s body.

For these greedy creatures—capable of hollowing out an entire building—devouring a weakened body of flesh and blood was hardly a challenge.

Especially now, with their victim so terribly frail.

The insects were attacking her most vulnerable places.

They seemed to know exactly which spots would break first.

They tore frantically at her eyelids, trying to peel back that thin layer of skin and expose the moist eyes beneath.

They gnawed at her eardrums, and the fine, scraping sound traveled through the bones of her skull, resonating inside her head like someone dragging the finest rasp across her inner ear.

They seemed to understand that once they opened a passage through these places, they could reach the warm, tender brain beyond.

Damn it!

Betty fought with everything she had, but all she could manage was to swipe weakly at the insects around her eyes, mouth, and nose.

Her trembling fingers slid across her face, and the moment her fingertips touched those tiny bodies, a wave of nausea surged up from the pit of her stomach.

But the insects were relentless. They would not stop.

Once wasn’t enough, so they came again...

Ten times wasn’t enough, so they came twenty...

Until she was utterly spent.

By now, the pain had spread through every part of her body.

There was not a single place that did not ache.

From her scalp to her toes, from her skin to her marrow, every inch cried out at the edge of endurance.

Was she going to die?

Here?

In this corner no one knew?

Devoured bit by bit by insects she couldn’t even name?

She didn’t want to die...

Betty’s mind was growing hazy. The boundary between reality and illusion was beginning to crumble.

The pain was no longer pain—it had become something deeper, more distant, like an echo rising from far beneath a vast, deep water.

In her daze, she thought she heard a gentle voice whispering in her ear.

It was a familiar voice, so familiar it made her want to cry.

“Long, long ago... in an ancient bell tower, there lived a princess.”

“Ooh, ooh, I know! Her name is Betty too!”

Another young voice shouted eagerly, filled with undisguised joy.

“Yes, my little Betty, her name is the same as yours—Betty. Her cheeks were rosy, like two ripe apples.”

The voice spoke as if painting a picture, every stroke tender, every stroke warm.

“She was the most innocent princess, but the evil dragon imprisoned her. Thorns surrounded her on all sides, and she could not escape. Oh, let me guess—who knows what happens next?”

“Me! Me! Me! Me! I know! The hero appears next! He’ll cut through the thorns, slay the dragon, and rescue the princess!”

The young voice was nearly shouting now, brimming with innocent confidence.

In a child’s world, the princess was destined to be saved. The hero was destined to appear.

That was the law of stories—an unbreakable rule.

“Yes, don’t worry. This is a story where the princess is destined to be saved...”

“Mother, hurry, hurry! I want to hear the ending!”

“All right, my little Betty. And at the end of the story...”

Pages turn with a soft rustling.

That sound mingles with the rustling of the insects gnawing at her ears, until she can no longer tell which is memory and which is reality.

By all rights, golden light should flood the forest.

The thorns should recede. The dragon should fall. The hero should ride in on his horse and rescue the princess from the bell tower.

But.

This page is blank.

The brush seems to have stopped here.

The hero who should ride in on a white horse, sword raised to break through the thorns, does not appear.

Where the golden light should be, there is only a blinding void.

The princess in the picture book still sits in her high tower.

The flush in her cheeks begins to fade, as if being erased by an eraser.

First the apple-red in her cheeks, then the cherry-pink of her lips, and finally even the light in her eyes dims, little by little.

The thorns begin to grow wild.

They are no longer green plants, but have become dense, tangled black lines, swallowing the surrounding scenery like corrupted code.

The trees vanish. The flowers vanish. The sky vanishes. Even the outline of the bell tower blurs and warps under the erosion of those black lines.

“Mother? Where’s the hero?”

“The hero... got lost.”

“Then who will save the princess?”

“The... the... no one will save the princess.”

As the gentle voice speaks those last words, it suddenly grows distant and warped, as if rising from far beneath deep water...

“That’s wrong! The storybook doesn’t say that!”

“Yes, it’s wrong... but this is reality.”

“My little Betty, look—the princess is crying, but the brush is too small to paint your tears.”

Snap.

The storybook closes.

On its black cover, there is only an ant chewing at the pages, waving its antennae at the world outside the book.

Betty is left forgotten inside the closed pages.

In that eternal darkness, there is no hero, no light.

Her chaotic thoughts flickered again.

This time, Betty felt herself drifting back to the past.

It was a long time ago.

So long ago that it felt like a life belonging to someone else, pulled from the depths of memory by some invisible hand and laid out before her.

In the kitchen of the Douglas Estate.

Late at night, the stove held nothing but dark red embers. The faint glow couldn’t illuminate the whole kitchen—it could only cast a small, warm patch of light upon the counter.

Young and small, she huddled in a corner, the corners of her mouth still smeared with grease from stolen food.

It had been a stolen honey cake, cloyingly sweet, yet it filled her with a satisfaction that made her want to sing.

She should have been happy. That was the sweet dream.

Stealing food in the Douglas Estate kitchen, being chased and scolded by the plump auntie, then having her mother gently tap her on the head and call her “little glutton.”

It had been one of the happiest things in her life.

But at some point, her eyelids began to feel as if they were filled with lead.

The heaviness came without warning.

Her throat began to itch, then tighten, as though something had clogged her airway.

She tried to stand, but like a doll with its stuffing pulled out, she slipped limply to the cold tile floor.

The chill of the tiles seeped through her back, mingling with the lingering warmth from the hearth in a strange, absurd blend of hot and cold.

Her throat felt packed with soaked cotton.

Every breath became a luxury.

When she inhaled, only a thin thread of air would enter. When she exhaled, more than half would be blocked.

Thud. Thud. Thud.

She heard footsteps in the corridor outside.

Someone was passing by, accompanied by laughter and cheerful voices.

The laughter filtered through the heavy wooden door, muffled and distant, as if from another world.

“Help... help...”

She reached out with all her strength, her fingers scratching faintly against the door.

But on that cold winter night, the sound was too faint.

Too faint to carry through the noise just beyond the door.