How To Survive A Cute Ghost Yandere
Chapter 36: Sanity

Chapter 36: Chapter 36: Sanity

What Eiros saw in the hallucination caused by the liquid wasn’t Erness killing him, nor was it his past life, filled with pressure.

It was more terrifying than any of the countless things Eiros feared.

He was in a dark room, alone, with nothing else there. Kneeling, his stomach churning.

Slowly, the darkness began to tremble, and the world seemed to shift, revealing its colors.

Thrum...

Whatever the liquid had prepared was destroying him.

He looked around. He found himself surrounded by webtoon characters he recognized. Their faces were twisted with disgust.

They looked at him as if he weren’t human at all, but merely an abomination that had to be destroyed.

Then Eiros lowered his head slightly. He looked down at his own body, and found it had turned into a mass of darkness, black slime stretching out as extensions of every part of him.

"A-ah."

His voice trembled.

Losing his humanity, the one thing he had left, left him feeling shattered.

A peaceful life, happiness, or anything else meant nothing if he was going to lose his sanity too, turning into a creature hated by the entire world.

"Hgk...!?"

Eiros choked.

He felt his roiling stomach surge up into his throat. Reflexively, he vomited, and watched sticky black slime pour out of his mouth like a snake.

Splurch!

His mouth was open wide, with no way to close it. Eiros tried to scream, but with the slime filling his mouth, he couldn’t make a single sound.

Next, his breathing through his nose choked off as he realized the slime had begun spilling from his nostrils too. Then his ears, and his hearing grew muffled.

And finally, his eyes.

Every part of his body released long, snake-like black slime, branching out and thrashing wildly in the air.

Eiros couldn’t draw breath, scream, or cry. All that remained was his awareness, slowly fading, followed by his vision going dark, leaving only a sliver of sight that was almost useless.

"Ugh...! Argh...! Hnngh...!"

For an unknown stretch of time, Eiros kept feeling every part of his body being reconstructed, filled with unbearable pain.

Then, just as he became aware of it, it all stopped.

The Saintess stood before him, blonde hair spilling down her back, golden eyes reminiscent of dawn.

The next moment, the Saintess looked at him with cold disgust, reaching out and pressing down on Eiros’s throat.

Eiros tried to say something, but no voice would come out.

The pain in his throat, the realization that he might die right then and there. Then, the Saintess’s voice made his heart feel like it was sinking to the bottom of the ocean:

"Die, you disgusting creature. You don’t deserve to live in this world."

Eiros slowly lost hope. His pale face grew grimmer as his resistance gradually faded.

He died.

And came back to life.

He went through the same process, feeling the pain of the transformation wrought by the seed of corruption. But this time, a different figure stood before him.

It was Alen.

"...There’s no place in this world for an abomination like you."

He died, came back to life, and next was Valkas.

"Horrifying. You’re absolutely horrifying. I don’t understand why this world would even have a creature like you. It would be better if you didn’t exist in it at all."

The cycle kept repeating.

Eiros died and lived again, meeting a different executioner each time. The pain was real, and his sanity eroded, little by little.

Then...

"My darling."

This time, it was Erness.

Erness walked toward him, her face full of smiles. It was the horror Eiros had been avoiding ever since he’d arrived in this world.

And if it was Erness, it would surely be done with utter madness. But what could he possibly do, in the state he was in?

Eiros stared, powerless. He no longer complained, but his mind and body said otherwise, screaming their desire to live.

He watched Erness’s eyes swirl with madness, her wide smile and flushed cheeks brimming with excessive obsession, and finally, the razor-sharp claws at the tips of her fingers.

They plunged into the flesh of his neck. Blood sprayed and spilled, and once again, Eiros felt the darkness creeping up on him.

Schlick!

He died again.

The next repetition was bound to come.

Eiros waited. But the next one never came. He lay there, helpless, in a room so dark, his face deathly pale and drained with exhaustion.

A pale blue screen appeared beside him, but he was too exhausted to notice. He simply lay there in silence, calming his taut, frayed nerves, telling himself that everything would be fine.

Until finally...

[Host has not responded for ten seconds.]

[Automatic response selected.]

[Beginning host revival.]

He woke.

His body came back to life, but Eiros couldn’t find his own consciousness. The moment he woke, he immediately collapsed from exhaustion, with no idea what had actually happened.

Thud!

The seed inside his body had been advancing at an alarming rate.

***

A great deal had happened.

The academy had suffered tremendous losses. The death toll was far from small, turning it into a tragedy that cast a grim shadow over the entire academy.

Among the hundreds of first-year students, nearly fifteen were found dead, along with two proctors, and in the end, the perpetrator was never caught.

Every surviving student had been secured, including the Saintess and the imperial children, who had suffered severe injuries.

The professors who had fought against Cray had also been caught up in the disaster, leaving them injured in several places.

Estiel, the sole tower keeper on duty at the academy, wasn’t in good condition either.

Three days had passed since the tragedy. The forest behind the academy had been sealed off along with the laboratory, while the area where Estiel had fought was left in ruins, impossible to repair anytime soon.

The nobles who caught wind of the news quickly demanded accountability, appalled at how negligent the academy had been to let something like this happen.

At the same time, several students had earned themselves a reputation for their heroic actions.

They were: Alen, Erness, Valkas, Lovia, Godon, and Eiros.

Yes, Eiros Clair was the student who had accomplished the most during that time. Not only had he saved the Saintess candidate, but he’d also saved the imperial children, which sent his reputation soaring even higher.

Many first-year students had never even spoken to him before. But now, the name Eiros Clair had become one of the most talked-about names in the entire academy.

But not all the news ended well. Eiros himself was believed to still be unconscious, suffering from severe exhaustion and mental collapse.

In the academy’s medical ward, surrounded by all manner of medical equipment crafted with the aid of magic, Eiros lay on the bed, showing not the slightest sign of waking.

His face remained pale, never improving.

The table beside his bed could no longer hold all the gifts sent to him. There were letters of thanks that had never been read. Some of the gifts had simply been left on the floor in the end.

No one knew when Eiros would wake up, but just then, his fingers gave a light twitch.

Twitch...

***