บท 6: Chapter 6: Only the sweetness permeates the dream

[You met a new friend, she is a lovely girl named Elysia]

　　[You seriously advised this lovely girl to stay away from here, and the girl listened to your advice... maybe?]

　　[As a child who can travel long distances alone, Elysia possesses abilities that do not match her age and have a strong body. The priest's inducement to her is also blocked by her clever way of dealing with things, so that this church has really become just an ordinary place for her to stay.]

　　[This troubled the priest, especially after someone above him took a fancy to Elysia, the priest became even more irritated - As for how did you know? Of course, you knew it from the scars that appeared every night and the priest's whispers when applying medicine.]

　　[What bothers you is that Elysia doesn't seem to have any intention of leaving for the time being. Although she goes out every morning and no one knows where she goes, she comes back in the afternoon and comes to chat with you. Although she mostly talks to herself, you can't help but talk a lot and for a long time. Whether it's out of politeness or she wants to persuade her to leave, you always have to respond with a few words.]

　　[Every time she gets a response from you, she seems very happy, and then she changes the subject and continues talking, which makes you feel helpless, and you can only persuade her to leave again and again]

　　[Sometimes you want to get angry and emphasize your words with a stern and serious tone. After all, if you continue, you can't guarantee whether Elysia will fall into the trap of the priest, just like you did in the past.]

　　[But every time this happens, Elysia will just change the subject with a smile, and stuff a small star-shaped hard candy into the remaining gap, saying "I'm sorry for making you angry~ This is my apology~" while assuring you "I'm very powerful! Nothing will happen~"]

　　[Once you heard her say that, you couldn't say anything to her anymore. The sweetness of the sugar soothed your mood, and you also knew that she was really powerful, because the priest had become more and more anxious recently. He must have used some means, but they were all blocked by Elysia, and the higher-ups might have urged him]

　　[In the end, you even suspected that the priest was planning to kidnap her. Although this was not in line with the priest's behavior, it must meet the above requirements... But in the end, you didn't know whether the priest used this method. After all, Elysia still came to chat with you every afternoon.]

　　[ you don't know why, but when you think of the priest's anxious look, you feel much better inside, so much so that you don't feel the pain of the torture at night.]

　　['You have come to this day!' You think so]

　　[Unconsciously, your affection for Elysia has improved. As time goes by, you feel that she is more powerful. You even occasionally fantasize that she can save you - even if you think this idea is too ridiculous.]

　　[You have become more "cheerful" than before. Even if this feeling is only for Elysia, the time you spend chatting with her every day is the time you cherish the most, although most of the time she is talking and you are listening.]

　　[Elysia also seems to have endless things to say, and she will bring you some small sweets from time to time, saying "No one will refuse sweet things!", and these small gifts are also cherished by you, both in practical and emotional terms.]

　　[You didn't even realize it yourself, but you already regarded Elysia as your pillar, your hope, a pillar that could support the thought that "you will be saved", a hope that "you can regain your freedom"]

　　[Like a life-saving straw, you want to hold on to her tightly, hoping that she can "save" you]

　　[Today, you are waiting for Elysia's arrival as usual. Although you don't show it, your heart is full of anticipation. Even if you experience pain at night and even if you can't leave this prison, at least when you chat with her, you are free. Through her description, you can imagine the scenery all over the world.]

　　[Unconsciously, you have been changed a lot by her]

　　[However, when the sky gradually darkened, when night fell, when the priest pushed the door open, when the night fell when the dawn came when the sunlight that came through the window slits dimmed again, Elysia still did not come.]

　　[Your heart also changes from expectation, anxiety, and irritability to silence. Your eyes, which originally had a little hope, gradually return to their former calmness like dead water.]

　　['Maybe she left. That would be the best thing. Leave this terrible place.']

　　['She may have been caught. This is probably the worst outcome. Another child is trapped.']

　　[You prayed in your heart that she left instead of being caught, and gradually let go of your expectations that you shouldn't have had in the first place]

　　[That's it - you think, it's nothing more than going back to the old days, and you feel better because she came. After all, she always brings you some small candies, and you secretly keep a lot of them.]

　　[At night, the priest came as usual. He seemed to have encountered something good, which made his movements slower and more graceful - although the pain he brought to you was also longer.]

　　[You are not interested in this, but you feel more relaxed - after all, your own sense of "pain" has been dulled.]

　　[Another stage of torture has ended. The priest sits aside and rests while watching you being tortured to the point of bleeding once again - your hands are tied up and hung in the air, and there is also a rope around your neck. If you lower your head slightly, you can feel the rope pressing on your respiratory tract. You can only rely on your toes to step on the legless bench below to give yourself a support point to avoid being suffocated by the rope around your neck. The bright red blood flows down from your hung hands, accumulating more and more along the way, flowing faster and faster, and finally flowing into the basin at the bottom.]

　　[This scene always reminds you of the animals being bled in the butcher shop]

　　["It's surprising that you could hold on for so long." He looked at you with admiration in his eyes]

　　["Sure enough, you're a great kid." Immediately following, his gaze was filled with aggression, but soon, his gaze became gentle again. Perhaps he felt that if he continued, you would bleed to death, so he took out a medical kit and began to stop the bleeding and bandage you.]

　　["Don't worry, I won't do anything to you." His tone softened. "After all, we still have a lot of time."]

　　[You know, he's expecting you to beg for mercy, to make that "awful request" to him, to give in to him]

　　[He is not in a hurry, he has plenty of time, just like a cat and mouse, he can play with you slowly]

　　[If it were you before, you would probably nod and agree, after all, you have had enough of all this]

　　[But after spending some time with Elysia, you feel that you can persist, or rather, you should continue to persist.]

　　['Hold on a little longer, hold on a little longer... You will always be saved']

　　['Wait and hope']

　　["Come to think of it, you had a very happy chat with that girl before, didn't you?" The priest suddenly said, "I'm glad you have a new friend."]

　　[Noticing your sudden stiffness, the priest smiled with satisfaction. After bandaging your bleeding wound, he pulled the rope roughly, dragged you to a corner of the room, and then hung the rope on a hook high up.]

　　["But unfortunately, you probably won't be able to see her again." He walked back to his original position leisurely, looking at you who was unable to move due to hunger and blood loss, he spoke softly with an undisguised smile in his words]

　　["As you know, someone up there wants her… Well, even though that girl is very smart, I didn't get the chance, and instead, she caused me a lot of trouble. Plus, the people up there are pushing me too hard, which makes me very distressed." He sighed, and then looked at you again, meeting your gaze as you raised your head with great effort. "Of course, I can understand the greed of those people up there. They're always like this. When they see something they like, they're anxious to get it, so they always come to urge me… Of course, these are not the reasons for my distress."]

　　["What bothers me is that the kid tried to take my things... This makes me a little annoyed." He said slowly, leaning back, reaching his hand into the tattered mattress and groping around, and soon he took out some candy from the dark red cotton pile.]

　　["So I'm a little fed up." He glanced at you who were struggling and saw the ripples in your pupils. He smiled with satisfaction, and then slowly unwrapped the candies one by one and put them in his palm.]

　　[His movements were very slow, as if he wanted you to see his every move. In the end, he held all the peeled candies in his palms, and then spread them out for you to see, as if he was showing off his achievements.]

　　["So I decided to use some quicker methods to solve this problem… Of course, I prefer to call it efficient." He smiled with satisfaction as he watched you try your best to get closer to him, looked at the stretched rope, and watched you not give up walking towards him even when you were strangled to death by the rope.]

　　["After all, it's much easier to deal with one person than to deal with a bunch of problems caused by that person." He smiled, stuffed all the candies in his hand into his mouth, chewed them twice with exaggerated movements, letting you hear a crisp "crunch" sound, and then swallowed them directly, and deliberately opened his mouth to prove to you that he had indeed finished eating.]

　　[You don't know what to do, you don't know how to think. When you heard the news about her, when the candy she left behind was chewed up and eaten in front of you, you felt that something in your cognition, something you had finally picked up again and decided to hold on to - was shattered, along with the candy, chewed up by him]

　　["Hahaha—you know what, kid? You now! Only you now make me most satisfied!" He seemed to have finally seen what he had been looking forward to, and he laughed excitedly. He walked closer again, pinched your face, and said in a gentle tone, "Okay, kid~ Don't expect anyone to take you out anymore, okay? Be a good child, be a good child"]

　　[Looking at you who had no reaction at all and looked like you were dead, he narrowed his eyes, approached you, and said to you in a gentle voice, "I hope you can understand one thing: you belong here, you belong to - me"]

　　["What's wrong with being here? You know, you didn't have to endure this kind of torture. You could have played outside like other children. You didn't have to suffer from hunger. I can even provide you with better food and treatment. After all, you are so well-behaved and lovable."]

　　[His words were very soft, and because he had just eaten candy, there was a hint of sweetness in his words]

　　[But he doesn't know that his behavior is undoubtedly dancing on your minefield - maybe he knows? ]

　　["…Okay, it seems that the negotiation has failed. I was thinking of using a gentler method, but now it seems that punishment is better." Seeing that you did not move, he seemed to give up on persuading you. "After all, you are a bad kid~"]

　　["Bang!", accompanied by a dull sound and a huge impact, he was knocked into a corner in shock and confusion, and the back of his head hit the wall. He could only fall into a coma in a daze]

　　[Before his vision fell into darkness, he only saw your eyes that were filled with gold. The pupils that were originally as bright as water and the night sky had long been filled with anger and hatred. The crazy sight confused him.]

　　[You know nothing about all this. You don't know what state you are in. You don't know why your body suddenly has strength. You don't know why you can suddenly tear the rope apart. You don't care about these abnormalities. You just want to take back what's yours, the thing that was taken away, bitten to pieces, and given to you by her.]

　　[You pick up the knife that you have used to cut yourself countless times, stab it into his throat, and cut it vertically]

　　[Perhaps it was the intense pain that woke him up, or perhaps it was his body's survival instinct that took over. His body moved around unconsciously. He wanted to reach out and cover the cut wound to stop the bleeding, wanted to twist his body away from the danger, and wanted to kick away the threat pressing on him.]

　　[You are annoyed by this obstruction, so you pierce the joints of the limbs without hesitation, causing them to hang down limply - you know very well how to make people lose the feeling of their limbs, after all, you have experienced it yourself.]

　　[You cut open his body, ripped out his internal organs and flesh and threw them randomly onto the ground. You went down his throat and esophagus, removed his stomach, and cut it open. Stomach acid and undigested food mixed with blood flowed out, bringing with it a pungent smell that made people feel sick.]

　　[But you didn't care, you just searched carefully and cautiously among the mosaic-like things, and finally, you found what you wanted from the pile of half-digested things]

　　[He carefully took out the candy, washed it with the blood flowing out of his body, and then stuffed it into his mouth, as if he was afraid that someone else would snatch it away.]

　　[You searched very carefully, even cutting open his esophagus to search for him, just to make sure you didn't miss anything. This also made his body even more terrifying and creepy - but you didn't care, even less.]

　　[Putting the last piece of candy you could find into your mouth, you finally breathed a sigh of relief, leaning against the wall, closing your eyes peacefully, all kinds of strange and bloody smells spreading in your mouth, but the tiny and faint sweetness in it was not covered up, penetrating straight into your heart, causing the corners of your mouth to raise a faint arc]

　　[Tonight, there is no more pain in your dream, only sweetness]