"Hey."

AHHHHH! Whose voice was that!? I nearly breathed out my soul! I turn around but don't see anyone. Wait, don't tell me...

"Yes, it's me, the creepy doll."

 Oh, so you have self-awareness of the fact that you're a creepy doll. That doesn't help me at all! Why can you talk? Are you actually a human who looks like a doll?

"Can you give me some blood?" Nopenopenopenopenope! That's the prelude to a curse! "But preferably not yours, I don't think I'd like what will happen to me if I ingested your blood..."

"Hey, that's rude." But I can understand where she's coming from. Wait, if you're a human, why aren't you going mad at seeing me? Don't tell me you really are a ghost possessing this body? "What are you?"

"That's rude, too. I'm a proper human, you know? Well, maybe not anymore, but I used to be." The doll responds without moving. Is that voice really coming from her? And didn't she basically just admit that she's a ghost? "I'm just... out of juice. Give me the guy with the club's blood. I need someone who's still alive."

"How do you know he's still alive? I ate him, you know?" He is alive, though. I want to try the experiment about keeping something alive inside me again - this time with two separate test subjects.

"Because you're a Crawling Chaos, and your kind prefers to make them suffer as long as possible." She states in a matter of fact tone. Is that how it is? I didn't know. I'm kind of a newborn, you know? But she knows what I am and she's not afraid. "So, give me some of his blood, and I'll be able to move again."

"And what makes you think I want you to be able to move?"

"Because I can give you a lot of information you might want to know. You're not the first of your kind I'm meeting in this world." In this world? Don't tell me you're also from my world? "Ah, this is so difficult... it was much easier when it was a third-person omniscient narrator..."

You what?

"Anyways, give me some blood, and I'll tell you something good." Consider me interested. She just used a term I'm sure nobody in this world should know about. Furthermore, wasn't that fourth wall breaking? I look around, but I don't see anything like text bubbles. I'm not in a comic, am I? In either case, I make the hand of the thug peek out from my stomach, turn one of my tentacles into a blade and make a cut. I let the blood flow into the cleanest container I can find and put it to the doll's mouth. For a moment, I don't feel any response.

Then the thug inside me dies.

"Hey, what did you do?" I'm not really angry, just surprised. She must have done something, because the brainiac is still alive, and they should have the same conditions within my body.

"I just took his life force." She slides from the chair and stretches. I hear creaking in her joints. She's properly using her lips to speak now. That's much better than her unmoving self from before.

"Oh, is it like a voodoo curse?"

"I wish... I'm sure you will understand if I tell you it's a certain Ninja technique that shares your wounds with someone you are connected to through the ingested blood. And yes, that's how lame my setting is." She rolls her eyes while explaining. I understand, but I also don't really. "But in this world, it changed a little to be more convenient for the plot."

Please don't break my fourth wall any more than that...

"My name is Ootsuki Senka. I'm the cheap knockoff of a Kuchisake-onna."

That's a Japanese name! And the Kuchisake-onna is a Japanese urban legend about a vengeful ghost-

"Ahhhh, you're a ghost after all!?"

"That's what you have a problem with? And you're a Cosmic Horror. How can you be afraid of ghosts?"

"I'm bad with horror stuff..."

"So, what's your name?" She dismisses my worries and continues the conversation.

"I'm Kuroe Makoto. My name is Chaos here."

"Chaos... how original." She looks away from me and seems to speak to somebody invisible. "What if I told her that her name isn't based on the concept but on the amoeba of the same name?"

Wait, my name comes from an amoeba?

"Uhm, who're you talking to?"

"Not important. What will you do about this situation? I'm sure you don't want that girl to know about your identity. I mean, this is a human nation after all."

"If I make her disappear, it's going to cause a commotion... any idea?" Somehow I can talk to this doll-like girl so openly. She's not afraid of my appearance and doesn't care about me practically just killing three people. Well, two. She killed one of them. Oh, we're partners in crime, then.

"How about this..."

Luna wakes up moments later, and I'm back in my human appearance. I hope I'm making a slightly concerned face; I can't tell. She looks up at me, then realizes the situation and sits up abruptly. Luckily I wasn't leaning over her since that would have been a head butt.

"Where are the three men?" She's panicked, but when she doesn't see them in the store, a questioning look appears on her face. "Huh?"

"I do not understand either, but that doll over there went off and scared them away. They ran out of the store." When I think about it, this excuse is so lame... I glance at the doll in question.

"The doll?" Luna stands up and walks towards it. "What do you mean, went off?"

Ah, at least this part is going to be fun.

Senka snaps her head towards the mage, eyes wide open and staring just past her, a creaking sound emerging from her neck in the process. Then she starts to laugh mechanically.

"Kyaaaaah!!!"

Bonk!

Luna just hit Senka over the head with her staff, causing her to fall from the chair. Wow, you're even worse with horror than I am. And now, as agreed...

"I want to keep her." I'll bring her along, as requested. She'll keep acting like an automaton for the time being, until we're in a place where her appearance, coupled with her talking and moving about naturally, will no longer be considered the work of demons. She did say her body requires a lot of energy to stay active, so she prefers to remain unmoving unless absolutely necessary. There are also supposedly no detectable bodily functions in her. Her breathing and her heart are completely stopped. I wonder how she's alive, but I guess that's more like a zombie. Oh, and she did say she was immortal.

"Why do you want to keep this creepy thing?" Luna moves to step on Senka's face. Uh-oh. I quickly pull her away and into my embrace. Ah, she's so light and soft, and kind of smells sweet, too. In this room of mold and decay, she's the only good-smelling thing. I hug her closely.

"I like this design." I do, indeed. Call me crazy.

"You must be crazy!"

Ouch.

- Cursed Creepy Doll has joined the party -