The Cruel Truth of the Astra Lineage
"Guh... Aaaargh!"
The agony was so intense it felt as if his vision were flickering out, and a scream of pure torment tore from Luke's throat. As his body went limp, drained of all strength, he saw a flash of red flame erupt from Scarlet's body, only to be instantly sucked away into the void. Sator, watching this with a delighted smile, tapped Luke on the head and spoke.
"Luke, do you see? Every time you scream, the intensity of the flames grows, as if Number 10 is feeling your rage. This seems like a much better method than inflicting pain directly. But it's still not enough. You're capable of producing flames strong enough to burn an entire laboratory to the ground, aren't you? You should at least show me that much."
At Sator's words, Luke looked at Scarlet. Flames, visibly more potent than before, were surging from her body in rapid succession. Was the intensity of the fire truly tied to her anger, just as Sator claimed? If so, when her emotions reached a breaking point, her powers might spiral out of control, just as they had on the day the lab burned.
Luke recalled the look in Scarlet's eyes when she had been engulfed in those flames—the look that had been screaming for his help. She had seemed to be in agony, struggling against a power she couldn't control. He couldn't let her suffer that pain again. Careful not to let Sator notice, he slowly mouthed the words, one syllable at a time, to reassure her.
"It's... all... right."
Whether she understood or not, he saw her pupils tremble as she bit her lip hard. I am truly fine, so please, don't be so angry. He wanted to tell her that, seeing how much she struggled to contain her rage, but he saw Sator moving the electric rod toward his body once more.
"-!! -!"
Terrible pain surged through him, but Luke gritted his teeth, suppressing the sound that clawed at his throat. Seeing this, Sator scratched his neck and shouted in dissatisfaction.
"If it hurts, don't hold it in—scream louder! You need to help your precious Number 10 find more strength!"
Luke studied the man shouting before him. No matter how he looked at it, this didn't seem like the person he once knew. Even if he had been a man filled with a sense of superiority, Luke hadn't thought him capable of such acts. Realizing that both of them would face a horrific fate if things continued this way, Luke opened his mouth, searching for a way to ensure Scarlet remained untouched.
"...Sator, you said the family ordered the project to be halted, didn't you? Then there's no more support from the family. Kidnapping us to continue your experiments must be your own reckless, unilateral decision."
There was no verbal response, but Sator's expression twisted, which was answer enough. Luke sneered, intentionally trying to provoke him.
"...If Scarlet happens to die, your experiment will be a failure."
It must have hit home, for Sator's face contorted. Despite being the one tortured, Luke felt a surge of certainty. Sator was torturing him in front of Scarlet to incite her rage because he could no longer perform the experiments that would directly damage her body. Without the family's support, he couldn't create another test subject. If he did something reckless to Scarlet as he had in the past, and she died because Luke refused to treat her, that would be the end of it. Of course, Luke couldn't just stand by and watch her die, but since Sator couldn't be sure of that, he had no choice but to target Luke instead of her. Ultimately, it meant that as long as Luke held on, Scarlet was safe.
Luke glanced at Scarlet. She had bitten her lips so hard they were bleeding. She was holding back a rage so intense that it was hard to reconcile with her usual expressionless face. Even in the days when she suffered pain far worse than what he was experiencing now, she had never shown such a drastic change in expression. She was a kind child who could feel such anger on behalf of another's pain. For such a kind soul, the pain she had endured because of them must have been incomparable to this. Therefore, he could easily endure this pain for her sake. It was the least he could do as atonement. With that thought, Luke steeled his heart. He continued to mouth to Scarlet that he was fine, and he endured the relentless torture that followed.
Perhaps it was because he had gained experience through the experiments until now. Or perhaps it was because Sator was carefully regulating the intensity of the torture to ensure it wouldn't be fatal, but Luke managed to hold on desperately. The intensity of the flames didn't seem to be increasing noticeably compared to the beginning. And Sator was not pleased with this.
"Luke, you keep holding back, so there are no results. If this continues, I have no choice but to bring out something I've been saving."
Muttering to himself, Sator pulled out a container from somewhere and scratched his neck. He extracted a small amount of the substance inside with a syringe-like tool and waved it in front of Luke, who was bound to the chair and struggling. Luke gasped as he witnessed the ominous black energy shimmering inside. It was a dangerous substance that had no business being in a place like this.
"I went to great lengths to acquire this, thinking it might help draw out the witch's power. As a doctor, you know what this is, don't you? Since you aren't fulfilling your role, I have no choice but to go this far."
Luke, who had seen several people die because of that substance, trembled. It was Mana—a dangerous energy that could give birth to monsters, but at such a visible concentration, it was a poison that acted quite lethally on humans. Even the amount in that syringe was enough to kill a person. Despite knowing the danger, Sator moved the syringe toward Scarlet, and Luke asked.
"What are you planning to do with that..."
"I thought about using it on you first, but... Witch's power and Mana. If you think about it, doesn't it feel like a plausible relationship? If I use this, I will surely reap the fruits after a long wait. My researcher's intuition tells me this will succeed. I should have tried this from the beginning. Then you could have watched the completion of the project with a healthy body."
"If Scarlet dies, the project is over! Sator, you'll remain a failure for the rest of your life!"
Luke shouted, hoping to stop him—words that a germaphobe and perfectionist like Sator would have to take seriously. But Luke fell into despair as he looked at Sator, who was scratching his neck and wearing a twisted smile. His white gloves, which he always wore due to his germaphobia, were stained red with blood droplets from his neck, and his eyes shone with a sinister light; there was no trace of reason left. Only a madman, consumed by insanity, stood before him.
"Hahaha, Luke. You're saying foolish things."
Sator laughed maniacally and pulled on a gas mask.
"I, I could never fail! Sleep for a while. When you wake up, you'll see the finished result!"
As the sleeping gas spread, Luke felt his consciousness fading. Seeing Sator press the syringe toward the neck of Scarlet, who was also going limp from the gas, he pleaded desperately.
Please, someone, stop him.
At that moment,
"Take your hands off my friend right now!"
Beyond his blurring vision, starlight shimmered.
Following the guidance of Yoon Siwoo, who had run tirelessly across countless gates to reach this remote building.
"There's no one here!"
"It's in the basement!"
Yoon Siwoo, who had sliced through the locked door in a single strike, pointed downward the moment he entered the building that appeared empty. At Yoon Siwoo's words, Sylvia immediately prepared a spell and fired it toward the floor.
"-Alf Ad Astra-!!"
A large hole was punched into the floor, and the smoke that had been thick below surged upward through the hole in the wake of the collapse. The moment he realized it wasn't ordinary smoke, Yoon Siwoo, who had already switched his weapon to the Holy Sword of Protection, created a barrier to block it and jumped down with Sylvia.
Sylvia used a spell to disperse the air in the basement, which had turned hazy with swirling dust and smoke. Beyond it, she saw a middle-aged man tied to a chair, appearing to have been tortured. And in a cage, Scarlet hung limp, with a man in a gas mask holding a syringe to her neck.
She didn't know what was in the syringe, but if it was something dangerous, it was a hair-trigger situation.
"Take your hands off my friend right now!"
As Sylvia shouted at the top of her lungs, the hand of the man in the gas mask came to a dead stop.
"My, my... Isn't that Miss Sylvia? This has become quite troublesome."
At the sound of the voice calling her name, Sylvia was startled and studied the man's appearance. Silver hair peeking out from under the gas mask, the gloves on his hands, and a voice that was slightly muffled by the mask but somehow familiar. She thought, No way, but since everything pointed to a person she knew, Sylvia asked in a trembling voice.
"...Uncle Sator?"
"Yes, it is I, young lady."
The man answered her question and removed the gas mask. Sylvia couldn't close her mouth at the familiar face revealed beneath.
"Do you know him?"
At Yoon Siwoo's question, as he suppressed the urge to charge forward, Sylvia nodded with difficulty. Shocked to the core that the person who had kidnapped her friend was one of her own family members, she bit her lip and asked.
"...Why on earth did you kidnap my friend?"
To that question, Sator smiled and answered.
"Your friend? Ah, you mean this?"
Pointing to the friend who was more precious to her than anyone else.
"You wouldn't have known, young lady. This is not something you should be making friends with."
And that answer was:
"This girl is a weapon created by Astra, made from the heart fragment of the Witch of Wrath, the enemy of the Astra family."
It was an answer more than sufficient to deliver an overwhelming shock to Sylvia, making the feeling she had just received seem laughable.