Winter Rabbit in Wonderland

Chapter 76

The three men, sensing her angry tone, benignly listened to her. Twins sat in the armchair, and the other two sat on each of the long sofas. Heart patted the seat next to him as he sat comfortably as if it was his house. Mad Hatter was smiling at her with his head tilted to one side. SoYoon went back and forth, looking between the two, then sat in the armchair opposite Twins.

“Why did you come here?” she asked.

“To come to get you,” Heart said.

“Because I missed you,” Mad Hatter said.

As much as they knew her, she knew that much about them. She may have been able to believe Mad Hatter, but Heart’s words probably meant more than what he actually said.

If she had stayed even a day after the one week, then it might have been the truth, but given that this was not the case, there was something else that triggered him to come here. Heart pretended to be busy with something else then said one sentence.

“The people from the research facility came by.”

SoYoon felt the world around her go black. On the outside, she wore an emotionless expression and crossed her arms tightly. Heart and Mad Hatter signaled to each other and went outside. Seeing that she was lost in thought, Twins also followed them. The two men looked at Twins with unwelcoming eyes.

“What?”

“Nothing. I was just thinking how nice it would be to be oblivious to everything.”

“That reckless and stupid...oh, excuse me. I didn’t realize I was repeating out loud my thoughts. Anyways, I’ll applaud you on your courage.”

Mad Hatter’s words were full of thorns as Twins had previously interrupted his confession.

If it had been Dee in front of him, then he would have blatantly gotten mad, but it was Dum. Having realized that they had barged into the house, he had swapped places with Dee in time. He smiled. Now he realized why she had such a weird reaction to his confession.

“Why? Do you think it’s unfair? Are you afraid I’ll take her away from you?”Heart asked.

“Arguing against you is not even worth my time.”

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“You must be kidding me. Do you think that just because you blabbed a few words that my Whitey will budge one inch? Besides, that is not the important thing right now.”

The research facility’s position was firm. If they had mentioned the upper echelons and the government, then they were set on finding any way to take her in.

“I’ve made it look like the ones who came today got lost and met an unfortunate fate in the slums, but there’s no guarantee that they will alert me the second time around.”

“She is already prepared for the possibility of being captured and taken back to the research facility.”

“That’s very unlike her.”

“Knowing her enemy, she said that she wanted to prepare for what she could because they will be unpredictable.”

“But why are those people after her?”

Twins, who had been listening to them, interrupted. From what Twins knew, it had been four years since SoYoon had escaped from the research facility. They couldn’t understand why, after being quiet for that long, they had suddenly come barging in to find her.

Heart glanced over at Mad Hatter as he explained to Twins about the patch and brand. If Mad Hatter had found out that they were after the ability to block the brand’s signal, then he knew for certain that Mad Hatter would create havoc in his own way.

And if Mad Hatter ended up in danger, SoYoon would not just stand around watching. She would barge into the place to save him. Heart, not wanting ever to see that again, kept his mouth shut.

Then, both Heart and Mad Hatter’s smartphones alerted them to incoming messages. They checked them simultaneously and hurried inside the house. The house was empty.

/[I received a work request, so I’m leaving.]/

And so, the two men who had come to pick her up and the one man who couldn’t persuade her to stay lost her right under their noses.

***

Alice saw an unbelievable sight when she went to Central. Next to March and Dor, whom she had not seen for a long time, was another girl. She was a pretty girl with short black hair. In the story “Wonderland,” there was no such character like her around March.

Feeling threatened and an instinctive dread, she quietly followed them. They all went into March’s house. A few moments later, when March came outside, Alice headed to the front door.

“Whatever happens, you cannot come inside,” she told Jeremy as she knocked on the door. Dor answered, and finding Alice there, her smile changed to a pout.

“It’s been a while, Dor. May I go inside?”

When Alice had come inside, Li was doing the dishes. She was stepping out into the living room, wiping her wet hands on her apron, when she saw an extremely familiar face—a face that was now her nightmare.

The first thing Li did was look for Dor. She was not far away from where Alice was standing. Li grabbed Dor’s arm and pulled her away.

“Huh? What’s wrong, Li?”

“Whatever you do, don’t come out.”

“Li?”

Li shoved Dor into the room and closed the door. Alice smiled with her arms crossed as she looked at the two of them. On the surface, the smile looked gentle, but Li didn’t fall for it.

“Why are you acting like that? I’ve only come to meet my friend...”

Alice stepped nearer to Li. Li clenched her fists instinctively. The white and horrifying face leaned closer. It was the face of the crazy girl who had killed her. Remembering the fear she had felt before, Li trembled. It seemed as if Alice would stab her with a knife at this very moment.

“How strange. I’ve seen you for the first time today, but somehow, I feel like I know you. Do you know me?”

Her lovely voice flowed out of her like a chirping bird.

“Go—go away...” Li barely got up the courage to mumble.

Alice snorted. “That’s not an answer to what I asked. Should I change the question then? Who are you?”

Alice examined Li’s face. Li screamed quietly and scurried away from her, but Alice soon caught her by the shoulder. The neatly manicured fingernails stabbed menacingly into her arm.

“I’ve never seen anything like you before. What are you? Are you a regular here? What are you planning to do? I don’t know how you came to know March, but that’s all useless because March fell for me at first sight.”

Li had seen March once when she had still been in that body. At that time, she had heard Alice’s thoughts and had found out that March liked her. That thought now left Li feeling raw.

How could March like that crazy girl? If it was love at first sight, was it because of her face? But that face originally belonged to Li—which meant that the person who should be receiving love from March was Li, not Alice.

So everything was that girl’s fault. Li instinctively reached out her hand and grabbed at Alice’s blond hair. She heard Alice scream but continued to pull hard at it.

“Ah! It hurts! You crazy bitch! Let go! Ack!”

“The crazy one is you!”

Li clenched her teeth and shook Alice by her hair. Through the golden strands of hair, Alice’s eyes turned red and glared at Li. Then the white hands grabbed Li’s black hair.

“Ack!”

It hurt so much there were tears in her eyes, but Li mustered all her strength and pulled as hard as she could at the blond hair. As she did, Alice sank her teeth into Li’s arm.

In immense pain, Li used a move that March had taught her and kicked Alice hard in the stomach.

“Ah!”

She must have made good contact because the teeth and hands that held on to her released. Li used that moment to hit Alice with all she had. Winded from pain, Alice tried to grab Li again when...

“You! What are you guys doing!” came the astonished voice of March, who had returned from the mart.

March ran over to them and pulled them away from each other. Then he checked over Li. When she had still been asleep, he had secretly felt her smooth black hair, but now it was messed up and tousled. Her white face was streaked with tears, and her arm had red teeth marks on it.

“Alice—you!”

March yelled at Alice in anger. Alice was actually in a worse state than Li by far. Li had beaten her face, her cheekbones were swollen, and she had a black eye. March tried desperately not to laugh.

“Hey, Alice. You okay?” March asked bluntly.

Alice had still healed Dor—although he knew that the motive for that was to get at him and that she had not necessarily done it from the goodness of her heart.

Alice started to tear up out of the blue as she looked at March. “I only came because I wanted to see you and Dor, but this girl suddenly started to attack...”

“Really? That’s strange. Li’s not the type to attack just anyone.”

Alice observed March as if unable to believe what she was seeing. However, March’s eyes were cold as he stared at the person threatening an important person to him in his own house.

“If she is getting this mad at you, then you must have done something to warrant it. What did you do to her?”

“I—I...”

“Forget it. Get out of my house now.”

When Alice didn’t move, March led Li inside and came back outside. He spotted Jeremy a few steps away and explained the situation to him. Jeremy listened with a strange expression on his face and fake coughed. March thought he heard laughter mixed in with the cough but convinced himself that it was just his imagination.

“Will Heart be very angry?”

Currently, Alice was known to be favored by Heart. March looked nervously at Jeremy. Jeremy patted March on the shoulder.

“You’re the guy working under White Rabbit, right?”

“Yes, I am, but...”

“Then it’s fine. I’ll handle it, so you don’t have to worry.”

Jeremy went inside and brought Alice out with him. Her hair was a mess, her clothes were ripped in places, and she wore an expression of severe annoyance as they returned to Heart’s place.