From the open passage immediately smelled of a disgusting mixture of chlorine and sweat. In the semi-darkness, on the floor, a girl of about twenty was lying in a crouch. Her clothes were torn, bruises and scratches were visible here and there on her body, and there were already dried traces of blood on her thighs.

  “In principle, I thought so,” Belyana commented on what she saw, after which she turned to Fox. “You seem to know this place, how much did you spend here?”

  “Your jokes sometimes go beyond all boundaries,” she answered with a sigh. “I thought they were fucking a corpse here. It’s awkward.”

  “Yeeep,” Belyana drawled. “As if one warrior of justice is not enough here. First of all, it was because of her that people gone ape.

  And why are you just hanging around?” she asked Karina. “Get inside.”

  “I’m going, I’m going,” Karina muttered. "Though I'll probably regret it."

  Trying not to breathe, she repeated her ritual.

  She found herself in the middle of a world that seemed to be painted in pastel - delicate strokes of light-green grass and a hastily drawn sky, through which pink clouds slowly floated.

  There was a muffled clatter of hooves. Turning to its source, Karina found a unicorn, happily chewing on local grass. Every step he took created iridescent sparks, and around his horn butterflies circled in a small whirlwind.

  “Such nonsense,” said Karina aloud. “Horsy, horsy, where’s your owner?”

  The frightened fairy-tale beast took off, galloping off wherever his eyes looked. Karina did not find anything better than to follow the rainbow trail after him. The pastel world was replaced by watercolor, and then it completely became like the drawings of small children, in which it was difficult to find at least some familiar image.

  Finally, the puzzled Karina stopped. She probably thought the direction was wrong.

  “Hellooo!” she listened in the direction where the rainbow trails led, but the sound still did not return. “Such. Non. Sense.”

  She stamped her foot on the ground, causing it to tremble. One more time, one more time, one more time. Sky and earth parted in half, a wide crack from which liquid blackness flowed. Karina, having warmed up, as if before a swim, jumped into it.

  In the next second, a huge toad eye was already looking at her. She backed away slowly, trying not to startle the amphibian. From a short distance, Karina managed to make out the growths on the skin of the toad - these were gems of various colors, because of which even the toad shimmered like a rainbow in the light.

  “What the hell you looking at?” the monster asked lazily in a vibrating voice. “Disappear somewhere, you interfere with admiring the sunset.”

  Karina automatically turned her head and saw, instead of the sun, swarming luminous larvae, which took the form of a circle. Instead of clouds, snails crawled across the brown sky.

  “Your sunset is cree–” she didn’t have time to finish, as the toad simply ate her.

  Karina fell on the bed. In the stomach of the toad, surprisingly, there was a small room, lit only by a working monitor. The light snatched garbage bags from the floor, and all sorts of candy wrappers, which no longer found a place in the bags. The mountain of dishes on the table was about to fall, but a little girl, sitting in an armchair and clapping on the keyboard, managed to coexist peacefully with this design. She giggled in a whisper.

  “What's there?” Karina asked.

  “I wrote to the fat pig that she should eat less, and in the end other fat pigs came running to protect her,” at first the girl answered without a second thought, and then she got scared. “Who is there?!”

  She flipped on a light switch that was on the wall next to the table and turned abruptly. Pus was slowly dripping from her eyes, and her face was covered with warts. Karina flinched in surprise.

  “Why write nasty things to people?” asked, coming to her senses, Karina.

  “Not nasty things, but the truth!” the girl frowned. “If not me, then who? They live in their own fantasy world, they eat for three, and they justify themselves with any kind of heresy.”

  “Really?” Karina asked sarcastically, in whose hands a large mirror appeared. “What do you see here?”

  “Myself and thin!” she answered fairly. “What's up? Maybe you will forbid me to talk at all - will we return to the Middle Ages?”

  The mirror shattered into glittering sparks.

  “Well, then I'll tell you straight out that you're as ugly as a war. You even shouldn’t show yourself to people with such a face.”

  “Fuck yourself,” the girl replied. “I have a boyfriend, when you can only dream to get one, because, unlike you, I'm just beautiful.”

  “Don’t you think it’s at least hypocritical?” Karina asked with a sigh. “You don’t care for freedom, but for elementary impunity. The judge of all judges, while anyone but you are pieces of shit that should serve you. I know one such ideology - it has nothing to do with freedom. Who is stronger is righter, yeah.”

  “It’s like I’m forcing someone to read, let alone react,” she answered irritably. “I am free to speak, they are free not to listen.”

  “I am free to beat you, you are free to endure,” Karina immediately retorted. “Where is the difference?”

  With a crash of glass shards, the toad's paw broke through the curtained window, grabbed Karina, and threw her out of his stomach.

  Having flown from a dozen meters, Karina landed on the ground squishing under her. Under her feet was a shiny pink soft surface, covered with thin red streaks.

  “Maybe we can ta–” she didn’t have time to finish, as the toad butted her with head at a breakneck speed.

  “All the same dance,” she said to herself under her breath, flying in the air and seeing the toad chasing her, obviously going to butt forever.

  Karina slightly shook her hands, from which rainbow droplets fell. She managed to catch one of the droplets and, folding it between her fingers, she slowly stretched it until it turned into a kind of whistle.

  The toad prevented Karina from landing, hitting her with his forehead like a ball.

  Karina whistled almost like an ultrasound, which even hurt her ears.

  This only pissed off the toad more. Instead of catching up, he just jumped. In the blink of an eye, having overcome a small distance between him and the intruder, he was over Karina, in an unknown way pressed her with his paws and flew down like a bomb.

  They landed rather softly, but the satisfied toad that sat on Karina did not leave her any more chance to do anything.

  From all sides there was a clatter of hooves. An entire army of unicorns ran towards their landing site. Iridescent puffs of dust rose behind them, and the pink earth, which somehow allowed for clattering at all, turned into pastel grass behind them.

  The contented face of the toad was again replaced by furious. He angrily stomped on the ground, every now and then, hitting Karina, but he did not even think of moving anywhere.

  The brave unicorns charged at him, using their horns as the only weapon they had. Butterflies tried to suck out the toad's eyes, but, unfortunately, their proboscis was not capable of this.

  The toad, with some kind of guttural cries, writhed, scattered enemies, grabbed with its tongue and devoured those it could reach, but the army only arrived and arrived. Eventually, strung on a thousand horns, after a few mournful sobs, he calmed down in death.

  “Well, you had a face,” the first thing Fox said when Karina returned. “If someone warned me that it will be so nauseating, I would at least take a paper bag with me, to put it on your head.”

  Karina looked inquiringly at Belyana.

  “Didn’t I already say that not everything is worth knowing?” she giggled.

  “Yah you. Am I supposed to take two of you now?”

  “Why why,” mockingly replied Fox. “You should actually thank me. Knowing her,” she pointed to Belyana, “you always do everything, and she only scoffs and walks like a turkey, as if she had at least some relation to your work. Help for you, fun for me - kind of fair deal.”

  “At least she finally confessed,” said Belyana. “‘Where is my money’, yeeep. You just love beating people. And when they can't answer, your tummy gets warmer too.”

  “Miss Turkey is back in business, she will measure everyone with her snobbishness,” Fox answered only.

  The girl, who until that moment had shown no signs of life, began to sob. Karina, choosing between her and the unhealthy squabbling of two strange women, leaned towards the first option.

  “What's happened?” Karina asked her.

  “Why do I even live?” sob, “What's the meaning?”

  “Fuck your mother!” Fox exclaimed. “You can do whatever and however you want. If you want, you can even declare war on some country and perfectly deal with it alone. You're a goddamn witch! Just don't be obsessed with anything.”

  “Actually,” said Belyana, “I agree with her on that.”

  “How about,” Karina said angrily, “That you both get the fuck out of here?”

  “All right, all right,” Belyana capitulated, after which she turned to Fox. “Treat me with some tea, will you? Called yourself a witch - arrange tea parties. She's here for the long haul.”