The Mother with Two Faces
She was a forgotten deity of ancient times—now buried in memory—an evil god symbolizing pain and life.
She responded to Anna’s call.
‘Who… are you?’
[My child. How much pain can you show me?]
‘How much pain can I show you? My entire life has been nothing but pain. And you think that’s not enough?’
[I have seen your pain. It was truly fascinating. But it’s still not enough. Not enough to quench my thirst.]
Anna scoffed. It was practically a sneer.
‘Not enough? Ha! Fine. If that’s what you want, I’ll give you as much pain as you like. I’ll paint this entire world in agony. So what can you give me in return?’
[I shall grant you eternal life. Become my servant, and offer me unending, eternal torment.]
‘If that’s what you want.’
The words slipped out in anger.
What she truly felt was that she didn’t want to die—not like this.
Wasn’t it unfair?
To live a life of suffering, and die without even taking revenge? It was too pitiful, too foolish. That’s why she said it.
At the time, Anna hadn’t even realized what kind of being she was speaking to.
She didn’t believe gods existed in this world.
She was simply ranting at a hallucination of her own making.
Fueled by rage and resentment. Fueled by hatred of injustice.
But she never imagined those words would become shackles for life.
[Very well, Anna. My child. From this moment on, you shall be reborn. Become my apostle, and scatter endless pain upon this world.]
‘What a load of crap.’
The mysterious voice ringing in her head faded. Then Anna slowly opened her eyes.
Her once pitch-black vision lit up. Still confused, she clumsily felt around her body.
Her body was frozen solid, like a fish in a deep freezer—but she could move just fine.
“…What the hell. What happened to me?”
She placed her hand over her heart.
Her heart, which should’ve been beating rhythmically, had stopped. No pulse.
It had completely ceased functioning.
Death. It was the inevitable end all living things must face.
“My heart’s not beating? Am I… dead?”
But Anna was still thinking. She could still move. She had become a being that defied the laws of nature, that even denied death itself. She accepted the phenomenon as it was.
“No. I’m still alive.”
What the hell had happened?
What was the thing that spoke to her?
She didn’t know a thing—but this, she was sure of:
“I’ve been reborn.”
She had been given a second chance. She’d clawed her way back from the edge of death.
Her heart didn’t beat?
Her body was cold?
Her face pale?
Who gives a damn.
“…What matters is that it’s not over yet.”
Anna thought,
It didn’t matter if the being who gave her this new life was a god of evil, or a demon, or something worse—
If she had been given this chance in the same circumstances a hundred times, a thousand times, she would’ve taken it every single time.
“Yeah. Fuck. Dying like that? No way I could accept it.
Whoever you are… thanks.”
—I shall grant you eternal life. Become my servant, and offer me unending, eternal torment.—
“You gave me a new life. So I’ll do what you want.”
Anna stood up, brushed the snow from her clothes, and began heading home.
Ecstasy began to rise within her.
Unidentifiable energy twisted and pulsed inside her body.
In her current state, it felt like she could do anything.
‘At this rate… maybe I could crush the skull of that garbage bastard who tormented me every single day.’
That thought made her smile.
When she reached the old, rundown shack, she opened the door and stepped inside.
“Grandma, I’m ho—…”
She stopped mid-sentence, freezing in place.
“G-Grandma?”
Anna’s grandmother lay collapsed on the floor, her body cold and stiff, her eyes unable to fully close. Panicked, Anna rushed over and lifted her grandmother’s upper body.
“Grandma! Grandma! I’m home. Your granddaughter is here! Please, wake up!”
But her body had already gone rigid. When Anna saw her grandmother’s pale face, she realized what had happened—but still, she tried to deny it.
“I said I’m here! Grandma? Huh? Say something! Say something, please!”
Even now, Anna desperately shook her grandmother’s body, calling out to her again and again.
Of course, there was no response.
The dead do not speak.
Unbeknownst to Anna, her grandmother had passed away less than an hour after Anna left the house.
The cause of death…
“Fuckin’ hell. I was sleeping just fine, what the hell’s all this noise in the middle of the night? So goddamn loud. Huh? What the—did that old hag croak? No wonder she kept coughing earlier… god, that’s nasty. Hey, someone clean that up.”
Choking.
She had died while eating, with food lodged in her throat.
But German—having witnessed the scene—did nothing, simply because it was too much of a bother. And so, Anna’s grandmother died struggling alone, without anyone to help her.
“…”
“You deaf or what? I said get rid of that corpse already! I’m sick of looking at it, for fuck’s sake! And how much money did you bring back today? If it’s less than 100 silver, you’re gonna regret it. Got it?”
“…”
Anna stood still, blankly staring at her grandmother’s corpse. And then, in a low voice, she muttered,
“…Fucking bastard.”
“What?”
“You deserve to die.”
“This bitch lost her goddamn mind or what?”
Red tears began to stream down Anna’s cheeks. And from her lips, a curse born of pure hatred spilled forth.
“Filthy bastard. Hell-bound bastard. Damn bastard. You filthy maggot. A scum like you should have your flesh ripped off piece by piece and fed to livestock. I’ll stir your brain with a spike and shove it down your throat. I’ll rip your guts apart and strangle your neck with them. I’ll curse you for eternity—make sure you suffer forever, unable to die even in death.”
Anna’s curses burst forth like a rapid-fire barrage.
German, who had been listening in silence, sprang up from the bed in shock. He grabbed a metal skewer lying beside him.
He had sensed something ominous from Anna.
“That’s it. You’re going to join your old hag of a grandma. I never liked any of you filthy whores from the moment I laid eyes on you.”
And then it happened.
Crunch. Crackle.
Anna’s grandmother—who had clearly met her end—suddenly rose and began twisting her joints back into place at bizarre angles. It looked almost like a grotesque dance.
“W-what the hell! Shit!”
German shrieked in terror and charged at Anna.
“Die, you fucking bastard.”
But Anna’s grandmother moved faster.
She grabbed both of German’s hands, and when she applied pressure, German let out a pained scream.
“Gaaaargh!”
He thrashed with all his might, but the old woman’s strength was immense. He couldn’t even budge. The more he struggled, the worse the pain grew, radiating from where she held his wrists.
“Let go! You filthy bitch! You should’ve just died quietly like a proper old hag! What the fuck is this even after death?!”
With one more squeeze, the grandmother crushed his wrists like tofu.
Flesh tore, and bone burst through.
“AAAAAARGH! IT HURTS! IT HUUUUURTS!”
Watching the scene unfold with a calm expression, Anna muttered, almost mockingly:
“It hurts? Even a maggot like you can feel pain? How fortunate. I’m sure the one who gifted me this new life would be very pleased. Ah, now I understand. Why I was chosen by Her.”
The grandmother buried her face into German’s neck and began tearing into his flesh.
Crunch! Crunch! Rip! Tear!
Chew. Chomp.
The shack filled with a grotesque harmony.
The sound of human flesh being torn apart blended with screams soaked in agony.
Anna smiled with genuine joy.
Every time she saw his pain, a rush of delight surged through her.
“Does it hurt? Does it? Does it? Does it? Does it? Does it? Does it? Does it? Does it? Does it? Does it? Does it? Does it? Does it? Does it? Does it? Does it? Does it? Does it?”
Necromancer.
Or perhaps, a death mage.
Anna, reborn by the grace of the Mother of Two Faces, now wielded the power to command the dead.
She could read their memories, enslave them, and even transform them into her own legion.
But her power was not yet complete.
To master it, she needed more corpses—and more pain to offer.
How much time had passed?
“Uuuuuh… uuuuugh…”
German, now reborn, no longer resembled a human.
If one were to give a name to what he had become, it would be something like a corpse golem—stitched together from scraps of flesh and mismatched body parts.
His mind, however, was intact.
Anna had made sure his soul remained tethered.
Until Anna herself perished, he would live on eternally as her slave.
“This is my gift to you… father.”
What’s more, she had altered his pain perception—he now felt pain several times, perhaps dozens of times more intense than when he was alive.
This was the revenge Anna had crafted for Germann.
“I’m sorry, Grandma.”
Without delay, Anna left the house and headed to the graveyard. She carefully dug a grave and laid her grandmother to rest.
She wrote her name on a makeshift tombstone and planted a marker.
After that, she began to travel the country selling corpses.
Gone was the powerless girl who used to sell matches.
“Selling corpses! Corpses for sale! Cheap, fresh corpses—well, cold ones! Hey there, little one. What’s wrong? Don’t want to go home? Perfect timing. I have just the right corpse for you. Want to take a look?”
To children who were weak and powerless—especially those dreaming of revenge—she sold the corpses she’d collected for next to nothing.
Humming cheerfully, she traveled across the land, killing filth in each village she visited and turning them into corpses.
“Corpse for sale! Corpse here! Freshly… no, cold off the press!”
With those corpses, she killed the strong, turning them into more corpses, which in turn were used to kill even stronger ones and form a legion.
As time passed, many began to follow her trail.
The Holy Order, which declared her a public enemy, pursued her for extermination.
Eventually, she gained many titles.
Master of the Walking Corpse Legion.
Witch of Agony.
And—Anna Kreuzen, the Corpse-Peddling Saint.
Leave a Reply