The Uninvited Guest Of The Haunted Mansion (29)

When she turned her gaze toward the source of the sound, she saw that the canvas… whole just moments ago… had been ripped straight down the middle.

From the torn fabric, paint that hadn’t even dried began to drip in thick, slow drops.

The unpleasant, clotted masses splattered onto the floor and gradually lost their shape, spreading like decay.

Serenity stood frozen, staring blankly at the sudden, violent scene.

It took several seconds for her mind to catch up with what had just happened.

The boy who had been standing in front of the canvas, paint knife in hand, suddenly began tearing at his own hair.

“N-no, someone like me could never do this! Someone like me…! This isn’t a painting!”

…Can someone’s mood really flip like that without warning?

Worried about upsetting the delicate artist, Serenity had barely spoken since they began, save for polite compliments.

Maybe that was the problem. Maybe she should have said something else.

She tried to reason through it, but there was no clear answer… because the cause didn’t lie with her.

The painter’s breakdown wasn’t an emotional shift with logic or reason. It was like a natural disaster erupting out of nowhere.

‘He said just be kind…!’

Serenity wanted to cry.

The painter’s chest began heaving rapidly, unnaturally.

It wasn’t the quickened heartbeat she’d seen earlier when he’d been shy under her praise. This was… different. It felt wrong.

“We have to destroy all paintings like this! I’m not qualified to paint! With trash like me… what masterpiece could I ever create?!”

He clawed at his scalp as if trying to tear it off, stomping and shouting so violently that the Great Hall itself seemed to tremble.

The shrill, distorted screams pierced the air, so high and sharp that Serenity nearly blacked out.

Why do Anomalous beings always scream at the slightest thing?

Serenity squeezed her eyes shut, then forced them open again, speaking carefully.

“Um… please, calm down a little… “

“Aaaah! Aaah!”

It was useless.

Before she could finish, the boy dropped to his knees, clutching his head.

Tears streamed down his pale cheeks… except these tears were anything but normal.

As they fell and hit his collar, the fabric sizzled, melting away like wax under acid.

The cloth collapsed, a hole opening where each tear fell.

And beneath, the exposed skin suffered the same fate.

Each teardrop hissed on contact, burning into his flesh until it crumbled away.

Even from where Serenity sat, far across the room, the stench of scorched meat hit her nose.

‘What the hell…’

She struggled not to flinch or cover her face.

‘No wonder his skin looked like that before.’

Chunks of raw, half-melted flesh on his chest and arms… it all made sense now. That’s why they called him the sad painter.

Realizing that his body was literally melting from his own tears left Serenity unsure how to even react.

The smell worsened with every second, the thick, acrid scent filling the air and stabbing at her senses.

It was unbearable.

She flinched and instinctively slid back in her chair.

“Are you leaving because you think my paintings are worthless, milady?”

“Huh… “

She hadn’t even noticed him move, but suddenly the boy was right beside her, tears still streaming.

A second ago, he’d been twenty steps away. She hadn’t seen him cross the space at all.

“Yes? Milady?”

Thin wisps of smoke rose from where his tears had splattered onto the hem of her skirt.

The burning fabric, the reek of scorched flesh… it felt like a thousand needles pricking through her skull.

If one of those tears touched her, she knew… without question… her flesh would melt instantly. Faster and more completely than his.

When Serenity didn’t answer, his face twisted into something even more terrible.

“See? You’re looking down on me too! You think I’m worthless, don’t you? Because my skill is pathetic!”

“No… it’s not like that…”

In truth, the despair in his voice hurt her more than the stench.

She racked her brain desperately, searching for any way to be kind to him now, but nothing came.

She was at a loss.

The boy dropped to his knees again, weeping as he began scraping up the melted flesh from the floor with trembling hands.

“Why is this happening? I give everything… my blood, my flesh… to paint. Why does everyone say my work has no soul? What is it missing?”

He staggered to his feet, scooping the mess into his palette.

The clotted flesh blended seamlessly into the paints already spread there, as if it belonged.

That was when Serenity finally understood what the stench was.

Her stomach turned violently; she covered her mouth to keep from retching.

So that’s what sacrificing blood and flesh meant. The paint itself…

“They say art burns the soul… but all I can offer is my blood and flesh. Does that mean I’ll never create true art? I don’t know anymore.”

His tone softened, almost mournful now, but his tears didn’t stop.

Each drop burned through the carpet, hissing, eating into the marble beneath.

‘Should I really run?’

The thought came sharp and instinctive… but she pushed it down.

After what she’d seen, there was no way she’d get far. The boy was faster than he looked.

Even if she managed to escape, she’d probably meet a worse fate at the hands of the Countess.

‘I’m the one who wants to cry…’

She watched him, half afraid and half pitying, wondering if he truly meant her no harm.

Then, after long moments of sobbing, he suddenly stilled.

His head snapped up. His tear-streaked eyes locked onto hers.

“I’m not enough, am I?”

“…Huh?”

“They say a painting is a window to the heart. But if mine can’t be fulfilled, it’s because I’m incomplete. The painting can’t be perfect.”

…Why are you looking at me like that?

His blue eyes gleamed strangely now… wet, but not just with tears. There was a new light in them, something glossy and dreadful.

Serenity’s heart sank.

The boy rose and took a slow step toward her, his tear-slick face warped with longing.

“Perhaps a subject’s soul must go into the painting after all.”

“What?”

“Because it’s a painting of you. It needs your soul… not my blood or flesh.”

He smiled faintly, voice trembling with a twisted excitement.

“So could you give a little of yourself? If I melt you down and use you as paint, the portrait will be perfect.

If I could apply a subject as beautiful as you directly to the canvas… there’d be nothing more magnificent.“

Serenity instantly regretted her earlier thought. Expecting an Anomalous being not to be dangerous was pure foolishness.

Goosebumps crawled up her arms, and her hands shook uncontrollably.

‘What do I do… can I run? Is there anything I can throw… ’

All she could grab was the chair beneath her.

“It’s alright, milady. Just a little will do. A fingertip, a bit of thigh… I’ll make a masterpiece for you.”

Pure terror rooted Serenity to the spot.

The foul smell, the oozing flesh, the sweetly murderous tone… it all pressed in at once, paralyzing her.

Then, in the midst of her panic, a memory flashed.

“Did you know that in the past people sometimes offered parts of their body to gods instead of life?”

The Duke’s words. The gentle way his gloved hand had brushed through her hair.

“The brush!”

She shouted the words before she could think.

“What if you changed the brush instead of the paint?”

The boy froze mid-step.

“…The brush?”

He tilted his head.

“What do you mean by that?”

“I mean, um…”

Serenity’s mind raced. She recalled an old lesson… how people once believed hair could hold a person’s soul.

In ancient Greece, offering hair was a symbolic act, a substitute for human sacrifice.

‘Hair is part of the body too.’

Suddenly, the Duke’s cryptic advice made perfect sense.

Before the boy could take another step, Serenity hurriedly pulled a small sewing kit from her pocket.

She snipped off a handful of hair with the tiny scissors and held it out to him with trembling hands.

The sewing kit had proven its worth more than once… and for that, she silently thanked the laundry maid who’d given it to her.

“H-hair is said to hold a person’s soul,” she stammered. “Instead of using a piece of my body in the paint, what if you completed the portrait with a brush made from my hair? Wouldn’t that be even more meaningful?”

Please let it work. Please.

The boy stared at her, expression unreadable, his tears beginning to slow.

“…Milady, you are truly wonderful. You’re right. The brush is just as important as the paint…”

Murmuring as though struck by revelation, he gently took the hair with his half-melted hand.

Then he turned back toward the ruined canvas.

As the burning stench slowly faded from the air, Serenity swayed, exhaling shakily as relief washed through her.

‘…I’m alive.’