Chapter 113
Chapter 113
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Translator: crow
Chapter Title: EP.28 – I Am the Sinner Ri Han (5)
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A skirmish had broken out, but surprisingly, there was zero interest in it.
The soldiers were just standing guard outside the tunnel and never approached inside, so they couldn't care less whether these men fought or died.
As for the prisoners, most had collapsed from exhaustion, so it didn't spark much talk—and above all, the fight hadn't lasted more than two minutes.
However, no one present dared to underestimate the opponent or dismiss the duel simply because it ended in under two minutes.
"Impressive technique. Suspicious or not, he's clearly a knight from a renowned house with rock-solid skills."
"I agree with you, senior. He was the real deal—gave me chills down my spine. ...It figures the senior who took him down like that is on another level."
"...What a monster."
Roy Bant's skills were the 'real deal.'
Compared to the half-baked lot infesting the White Silver Lion Knights, he was at least twice as strong.
To the point where none of them believed they could subdue him that easily.
However.
"Ro-Roy! Wh-what do you think you're doing...! What barbaric outrage against such a weak knight like Roy! Even if the kingdom has fallen, as knights of Briton, how can you stoop to such cowardice...! Have you no shame?!"
"...How the hell did you even become a general?"
The former general hadn't even caught their exchange, let alone the skill of the man beside him.
They shot him cold, jaded looks, and Mustang was about to bellow even louder in outrage.
"You bastards..."
Smack!
"Guh...?!"
Thud.
"Too noisy."
A casual strike to the back of the head knocked Mustang out cold, and the area finally fell silent.
It was Yord's perfectly timed remedy. Jake shook his head.
"You picking up his habits?"
"Haha, just seemed like the quickest way."
"...Sigh, you're copying all the wrong things."
"Nah, he's growing up fine."
"......Any injuries?"
"None. Heh."
"...Good."
Lee Han, who had approached unnoticed, was utterly unscathed.
As if he hadn't fought at all, but merely taken a short stroll.
Even a powerhouse like that couldn't land a single scratch?
'I had a hunch, but this guy's grown way beyond what he was half a year ago.'
He'd guessed as much from watching him effortlessly take down 135 White Silver Lion Knights, but the real thing was leagues apart.
Half a year ago, he was already troll-tier, but now...
'Even an ogre would have to yield a step.'
Jake clicked his tongue, figuring that aside from Knight Commander Baltar, there was no one in the White Silver Lions who could stand against that monster.
Fortunately, Roy Bant hadn't died.
A knight worth his salt had exceptional physical prowess to begin with.
His skull was cracked and the concussion severe enough to worry about partial memory loss, but that was no major issue.
'Alive' was all that mattered.
Thud!
Lee Han dragged him to a dark corner where no one would come, dropped Roy Bant, and pulled a vial from his pocket.
Hiss.
He poured the contents directly onto the wounds, and they began to knit closed.
"A potion? Not like you're the one who gave him the injury..."
"Gotta keep him alive if we want answers."
"...He really was on death's door, huh."
With his head bashed in like that, it'd have been weirder if he wasn't.
"Senior. This guy's really with that Blood Cross Corps?"
"Even if not, he's suspicious as hell."
"Fair enough..."
He was undeniably shady.
For a guy in the tunnel, his fighting aura wasn't sealed. And trying to sneak up on them...
And...
"I bet he sent that useless general our way too."
To test the waters.
Mustang wouldn't have approached them on his own.
Probably Roy egged him on from behind the scenes to create a pretext for talking to them.
"Likely figured since we're Briton knights, he could use us somehow."
Most of the recent prisoners crammed into this tunnel were from Briton.
Soldiers to knights—anyone with real fighting chops had been herded here. He must've thought he'd buddy up quick.
"Friendships in a tunnel like this mean anything?"
"Who knows."
"Don't overthink it. Humans faction up by blood ties, hometown, school connections no matter where they go. That's just him. Keep it simple."
"...Fair."
"Does it even matter in a hellhole like this?"
"Over there—you know, the type still yapping about status even in prison."
"Ah."
"...Why're you looking at me?"
"You pretending?"
"......"
Ignoring Aren's souring face, Lee Han quietly did what needed doing.
Checking Roy Bant's clothes for anything hidden before he woke.
'Guys like this always stash something.'
And sure enough.
"What's this?"
For some reason, unlike their prison rags, Roy had an inner pocket—and out came about five suspicious items.
Torn paper, three vials reeking oddly, and an inverted cross.
Obvious from a glance they weren't anything good. The inverted cross especially.
"Can't be anything but a heretic's tool blaspheming the divine."
It offended any true believer.
The three excluding Lee Han crossed themselves with their hands and recited scripture.
As if proving their piety.
"Hmm..."
Lee Han left the devout ones be and simply inspected the inverted cross.
He didn't debate the blasphemy against faith.
He just felt an odd incongruity watching it, nothing more.
Then suddenly.
Crack.
"Not like it's candy..."
"Candy wouldn't snap that easy, senior."
"Freakin' monster...!"
He snapped the inverted cross clean in half.
Like breaking a cookie. Lee Han peered inside.
"This... a magic stone?"
"What?"
"Looks mixed with actual magic stone."
"...No way?!"
Tiny grains sparkling faintly in the break.
The eye-beguiling aura was unmistakably from a monster's magic stone.
However.
"Use a magic stone just to make one inverted cross? It's not like money grows on trees..."
Magic stones were rare drops—one in every twenty monsters.
Like gallstones in humans: a genuinely hard-to-get item.
Mages and alchemists went nuts for them, and they fetched absurd prices. Waste one on an inverted cross?
No one, no matter how loaded, throws money away like that.
"...Means they're insane."
"Hmm."
"Or maybe they're so filthy rich magic stones are pocket change. ...So which is it?"
"Lee Han?"
His out-of-left-field remark puzzled them for a moment.
They soon realized he was addressing the prone Roy Bant and narrowed their eyes.
"......"
But despite their surging killing intent, Roy Bant lay utterly still.
Looked fully unconscious.
Then.
Whoosh!
Without hesitation, Lee Han raised his leg and took dead aim at Roy Bant's head.
Boom!
A vertigo-inducing stomp.
The ground cratered, with enough force to smash a human skull like a watermelon.
Fortunately.
"...No different from a killer. How can a knight be so vicious...?"
He'd barely dodged, now gasping in the corner.
Any slower, and he'd be dead without doubt.
One botched fake-out unconscious act away from the afterlife.
Lee Han just snorted at the gripe.
As if the faker had any room to complain.
"Sly bastards like you need the real deal. Want me to force more corpse-play? No promises you'll wake up."
"......"
"Talk. Don't just glare."
"...Guh."
Roar!
Roy Bant flinched under Lee Han's piercing gaze.
The aura was like roaring flames, and the moment the heat washed over him, he felt an unprecedented scorching.
The delusion of his body cooking alive.
Roy Bant admitted it.
His opponent was a powerhouse he couldn't possibly face.
At the very least.
'A champion. One fit to represent the kingdom...'
Knight whose fame thundered across the realm, beyond mere regional tyrants.
Rare even in Briton.
Drip.
Roy Bant sweated like mad, eyes darting frantically.
Racking his brain to survive this. And so...
"...I'll hand over half the intel I know. Guarantee my survival and safety in return. Help me escape too, and I'll spill everything without holding back. For reference, my info's top-shelf."
"......"
"You lot are Pendragon knights, right? Britons with skin that fair scream Pendragon. Well, except you."
"......"
"Anyway, it'd be gold for Pendragon. Shakes the kingdom's economy to its core. So you have to..."
"-This bastard's lost the plot?"
Tap.
Crunch!
"Arrrgh!"
Lee Han pulverized his collarbone outright.
As if done hearing the nonsense.
"Guhhh!"
"Shut your mouth."
The brutally firm grip clamped over his face next.
A palm twice the size of a grown man's engulfed Roy Bant's face completely, then.
Crunch!
"!!!"
Delivered crushing pressure across his entire face.
But with his mouth sealed, Roy couldn't even scream properly—and the agony dragged on for three full minutes.
Three minutes. An eternity to some, a blink to others.
"Hahk! Heok! Khek! Keheok...!"
Roy Bant's face looked like it'd been punched full-force by Father Time.
Haggard in an instant.
He'd tasted pure terror in pain where three minutes felt like three years.
"You think you—no, your lot—have the right to negotiate?"
Lee Han's low voice carried the savage growl of a beast.
Rage.
He was seething with it.
Probably hadn't burned this hot since catching that spellcaster.
Right then, he was dead certain this scum was with the Blood Cross Corps or whatever—and uncontrollable fury erupted.
Because the capital got hit?
No. He wasn't some dutiful, righteous knight.
The reason he raged so fiercely was.
"You thought you could threaten my people and walk away scot-free?"
His people.
Could be the academy disciples. Or the owner of his favorite bakery.
Maybe the butcher who tossed in extra cheap meat as a bonus.
The folks woven into his daily life.
Yet these bastards dared try to wreck his normalcy.
If that didn't piss him off, what would?
And they wanted to negotiate?
...Like pouring oil on an open flame.
Poke! Poke!
Lee Han lightly tapped Roy Bant's body three times with his fist.
Not punches—just casual taps.
Seemed like play, but Lee Han's face was colder than ever. No hint of joking.
Crackle!!
"!!!?"
Suddenly, a grotesque resonance echoed from Roy Bant's body.
The internal vibration so violent it rang out externally—hinting at unimaginable agony.
Roy drooled helplessly, unable to even pass out from the onslaught, but Lee Han didn't stop the 'torture'.
"Probably your first taste of this. Flowed my power through the meridians in your muscles and bones."
Yesterday teaching his disciples at Vulcan, he'd transmitted the [meridians] technique by directly injecting power into their bodies.
An advanced feat only Lee Han, with his deep understanding of the flesh, could pull off. Anyone else trying? Nine in ten crippled for life.
And that meant.
"Hurts like hell. A lot..."
Infusing power could artificially cripple someone.
-Severing Sinews, Dislocating Bones.
Lee Han's original vicious torture method.
Don't worry—he'd suffer crippling pain without actually becoming crippled.
However.
"Who knows. Drag it out, and he might turn into an idiot."
"!!...?!!"
"Ready to talk? Say so. I'll stop then."
"...!!!!"
"Gonna tough it out more? Fine. Give it your all."
"!!?!!!"
"Stubborn bastard. Let's see who breaks first."
Roy Bant looked desperate to spill everything right then—but he couldn't open his mouth.
─Because Lee Han's palm still sealed it.
Even facing Roy's pained, desperate, frantic eyes.
"-Tough bastard. Why won't you talk?"
He just repeated himself.