"So hungry. I want to eat him — eat all of them. Turn them into food in my belly, turn them into my nourishment."
The man gazed up at the sky, at the pairs of crimson eyes hiding in the shadows.
"You're watching me too, aren't you? Stop hiding — I've already seen you. You're all around me, staring at my body, wanting to devour me. You want to eat me as well. So why don't you act on your instincts? What are you afraid of? Come out! Come out! All of you, come out!"
His voice grew louder and louder, filling the entire street with his screaming. He feared nothing — it seemed as though the very emotion of fear simply didn't exist within him.
The red street. Blood dripping onto the ground, drop by drop.
In the alleys piled with rotting flesh and moss, in the sewer pipes concealing red eyeballs, and in the shadows at every corner where no light could reach.
Bizarre, terrifying things emerged one after another.
They could no longer be described with a simple word like "horrifying" or "terrifying." This wasn't the kind of presence born from bloodshed, or from having killed many people, or from having slaughtered countless things.
They were not human — they could never have been transformed from humans. They must have lived behind the door all along.
They were life forms from the other side of the door — monsters that dwelled within nightmares, feasting on negative energy, consuming the negative emotions of the living.
They had no fixed shape. Unlike humans, their bodies and limbs were twisted at impossible angles. If one had to describe them, they were like corpses at the scene of a car accident — crushed beneath a vehicle and dragged for dozens of meters.
They could not be called human. Or rather, they had simply devoured so much of the negative emotions left behind by the living that they had taken on a human shape — gained human-like thoughts, and fallen in love with humans as a delicacy.
"Were you waiting for me? Did you plan this all along — putting me on tonight's dinner table, making me your main course? I can see the knives and forks you've prepared. I can see the greed in your eyes. I can see you swallowing, see your Adam's apples trembling with excitement."
The man screamed and shouted like a madman, making no attempt to dodge, simply standing in place as those things closed in around him.
"Do you think I'm afraid?" The man gently cradled his lover's head, his expression one of intoxicated bliss.
"I love this feeling. I'm obsessed with death, I worship madness — between the hysterics, I cry out, I roar. Every thing I never dared say when I was alive, I can shout them all out here. Here, I can do anything I want. No more disguises, no more hiding. I can use the limbs of the living as toys. I can pry open my own skull and gaze upon my soul. Then I can gift who I used to be to who I am now."
"A lot of people think I'm crazy. But whether I'm crazy or not — what does that have to do with them?"
"I used to be a doctor. But what use is a doctor who can't even heal himself?"
He slowly lowered the head in his hands. The man's eyes became shot through with blood. He stared at the approaching monsters, the smile on his face no longer containable — the corners of his mouth split open to both sides, flesh tearing apart, revealing a smile of absolute horror.
"The me of now — I suppose you could call me a gourmet. My greatest passion is eating. Tasting everything I see, stuffing every last delicacy into my stomach."
A laugh that made one's scalp go numb poured from the man's mouth.
He was surrounded by every last monster, yet he showed not a hint of panic. It was as though it wasn't him who was surrounded — but the monsters.
"Favorite time of day again — mealtime. Hmm, given what I look like now, is 'eating a meal' the more appropriate term, or should I say 'feeding'? Never mind. Either way, the result is the same — they all become part of my body."