The morning sun shone through the rotting roof of the broken down cottage in the middle of the woods. It illuminated a ruined bedroom, a chamber that would have felt right at home in a haunted house. Considering the cottage's residents, however, this might as well be a haunted house.
The rays poking through the disintegrating bricks of the roof landed on the young girl's eyes, and she awoke. Mary Kozakura opened her red, lifeless eyes, and turned to her side. "Good morning, Mother," she spoke in a monotone, greeting the sleeping woman sharing a bed with her.
No. Not sleeping. Rotting would be more accurate.
She had once been Shion Kozakura. She was Mary's mother. But that didn't matter now; she was dead. The neighborhood children had caused her death. Mary finished the job.
The quarter medusa sat up and quietly got out of bed. She drew the blankets back over the corpse of her mother, showing a gentleness reminiscent of an archeologist brushing dust off an ancient skull.
"Sleep well, mother. I love you." She whispered to the cadaver, showing respect to the woman who gave Mary life twice. The fact that the second time was against her will was a minor detail.
Mary walked over to the cracked hand mirror nailed to the wall and studied her reflection. Dirty, white hair. Soulless red eyes. Blood splatters all over her expressionless face, torn blue dress, and calloused bare feet. Seeing her frightening appearance, Mary could not help but have flashbacks to the day that caused her to be like this.
目を合わせないで！
"Don't make eye contact!" Shion had often told her daughter. What a hypocrite. If she had followed her own advice, maybe she'd still be alive. But no; the instant she ran outside her forest cottage and saw the village boys beating the lifeless corpse of her daughter, she turned every single one of them to cold dead rock, causing her own death in the process. Her mother, Azami, had her snakes bring their spirits into her neverending world, where she commanded one of her snakes to possess Shion and let her live again.
That's how it would have happened, of course, had Mary not intervened. Seeing a chance to live again slithering down her mother's throat…
The little girl's naïve, innocent mind…
Snapped. Cracked. Broke completely and irreparably.
Showing strength beyond her years, young Mary Kozakura pushed her mother to the ground, shoved her tiny hand into her mouth, and grabbed onto the snake before it could disappear into Shion. Mary's mother looked up at her daughter, pleading silently with her as she started pulling on the snake. The last things Shion Kozakura saw were the empty eyes of her daughter, showing neither pity or cruelty, when she placed her little foot on her mother's neck and stepped down to gain more leverage in pulling the snake out, breaking the woman's neck.
The elder medusa gave a muffled yelp of pain, and died again. Her spirit disappeared and ceased existing. Mary, having achieved her prize, quietly ate the writhing snake whole.
And that was it. The deed was done. Mary sat back up in the real world, her body healthy and repaired. She didn't shed even a single tear. She stood up, whispered thanks to her mother's corpse, and walked back inside the cottage.
That was one hundred years ago.
Immortality had been kind to the quarter Medusa; ruffled and terrifying as her appearance was, she still appeared to be a normal, pretty, 17 year old girl, even if her white hair was a little abnormal. She had taught herself how to hunt; she'd freeze a deer with her eyes and stab it in the neck with a kitchen knife. She didn't mind that the blood would splatter all over her dress. In fact, she liked it, because somewhere in her deadened mind, she thought it was nice how the blood matched her eyes.
Inside, though, she was dead and insane, as evidenced by the fact that she had just spent five hours reminiscing in front of a hand mirror nailed to the wall. The only thing that pulled her away was the rumbling of her stomach; she was hungry.
I should still have some deer meat downstairs, she thought to herself, and stepped down the splintered and moldy steps leading to the kitchen. Her mind was so far gone that she ignored the wood piercing her bare feet; she removed the splinters at night before going to bed anyway.
As she stepped down into the kitchen, she paused to stare at the motionless youth bound to a rotting chair at the table. A wide smile split her face caked with dirt and dried blood as she looked upon the one person that could ever make her feel emotion.
"Seto!" she cried, giggling and running to wrap her arms around the boy. She covered him in kisses and held him tightly, resting her head on his shoulder. The boy did not wake.
"I hope you're having pleasant dreams, my love." she whispered in his ear. She remembered the day he first stumbled into her door, wondering what a crumbling ruin was doing in the middle of the woods. Mary had been in the kitchen, skinning a deer, when she felt his presence behind him.
"H-hello?" he called out to her.
Like a bell tolling, she suddenly remembered the words her mother had told her a century ago.
目を合わせないで！
She spun round, pointing the knife at him with one hand and covering her eyes with the other, struggling to find words she hadn't spoken since before this boy was born.
"D-don't… If I look you in the eye... turn to stone…" she stammered out, trying to spare the boy out of respect for her dead mother.
Any other person would have backed out of the cottage and fled for their lives at the sight of the girl and her bloodied white hair, ruined home, and deadly butcher's knife that had obviously seen a lot of use.
The boy was not afraid, however. His beloved big sister had always told him,
"Kousuke, always be kind to others. Be a hero to everyone you meet. Please, make people happy, because happiness is a word that everyone should cherish."
He smiled, recalling those words, and approached the feral looking girl, despite the wicked looking knife pointed at his chest.
"I've been living afraid as well, afraid I'd turn to stone... but wouldn't the world be so much better without that fear? My name is Seto… would you please tell me your name?"
"N-no! You d-don't…. understand!" she cried out, removing her hand from her eyes. She looked at his face. It was love at first sight. She instantly felt so much affection for the young man that any thought of her mother's words instantly vanished from her mind.
"I…if we're both a-afraid then…. Would you…. Stay by my s-side?" she stammered, hopefully looking into his eyes.
The boy seized up, unable to move a muscle. He could not respond. Mary had not been kidding. He felt like he was turning to stone.
The quarter medusa, broken as she was, needed no answer. She had already decided that they would fall madly in love with each other, and they'd be together forever.
And she made sure that he would never hate her.
She felt herself smiling like an old lady telling the story of how she had first met her husband whenever she thought of that day, a trickle of emotion invading her otherwise lifeless eyes.
She sat in the still motionless boy's lap and wrapped her arms around his neck.
"I know you haven't told me you love me yet, but I know it's a matter of time. I can wait all eternity, and you can't hide your emotions from me forever, my love!" she whispered to him, giggling and planting a kiss on his dry lips.
"Oops, let me get that for you, sweetie," she said, as she picked a maggot out of the gaping knife wound in his chest. She stood up, smiled back at the rotting corpse of Seto Kousuke, and went to prepare their lunches.