Chapter 84
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 84
To me, several dozen meters was nothing. Given a running start, I could clear it in a few leaps.
But right now, a crowd blocked my path. I shoved my way through the throng, never once taking my eyes off Barbara.
Barbara, who had been staring at the Arachne, spun around and suddenly bolted. Her stride was strangely unsteady.
Damn it, this is in the way.
My long skirt snagged and caught underfoot as the crowd trampled it. I wanted nothing more than to rip this uncomfortable scrap of cloth to shreds and toss it aside.
With her small frame, Barbara slipped through the crush of bodies and made straight for the visitor lounge. Lounge was a modest word for it—the place was a sizable five-story building, packed with everything from restrooms and restaurants to rest areas.
What is she planning?
The moment I broke free of the crowd, I picked up my pace.
Barbara went in first. The interior would be all but empty. The demonstration run had only just begun, and everyone was too absorbed in watching the Arachne to bother heading inside. Only a trickle of people came and went, using the restrooms.
"Haha, young lady, in a hurry to reach the restroom—hey, wait!"
A middle-aged nobleman who'd just stepped out of the entrance called after me. He was shaking the water from his hands, apparently having just finished his business.
I tried to ignore him and brush past, but that only offended him, and he grabbed my shoulder.
Whoosh!
I reacted on reflex. I seized the nobleman's wrist and twisted it behind his back, pinning him in place. Wasting time on something so trivial was infuriating.
"If you want to keep your limbs attached, mind your own business and keep walking. Nod twice if you understand."
I bore down harder, and the sound of components crunching cracked out from his elbow.
"Ugh—I get it, I get it!"
Only then did I release him and step into the building. As the doors swung shut behind me, the man's warning drifted after me.
"I'll find out which family you serve and teach you a lesson! How dare you!"
I tuned him out completely.
Where did Barbara go?
The hallway stretching from the entrance was dead silent. There was no visible trace of where she'd disappeared.
Trust my senses. Trust my instincts.
I closed my eyes and pressed my hand flat against the floor. Then I listened.
Tap, tap, click.
I had to pick out the sound I wanted from the faint hum of noise.
Good thing I've been steadily drilling auditory enhancement lately.
Auditory enhancement had been my personal focus of late. I wanted to master echolocation—the ability to map and perceive my surroundings through sound reflections. Naturally, it wasn't the kind of skill you mastered overnight.
Patter, tap.
I opened my eyes. Direction pinpointed, I moved toward the trail of sound.
Crisp footsteps echoed from the stairwell between the second and third floors. I vaulted between the banisters, clearing the flights in a single burst.
"Haa, haa."
There, in the middle of the hallway, Barbara stood gasping for breath. The instant she spotted me, she ran as if wringing out her last drop of strength. Her footing looked dangerously unsteady.
A trap?
I'd caught up to her far too easily. That alone put me on edge, and I sharpened my senses to their limit.
The Barbara I knew was a girl who was bizarre—grotesque, even. Her darkness ran so deep that even I found her unsettling.
And yet, there was nothing wrong with the surroundings, nothing out of place. The only thing that felt off was 'Barbara' herself.
"Haa, haa... Ugh!"
Mid-stride, Barbara tripped and sprawled flat on her face. When she turned her head toward me, her pupils were quivering with terror.
Right now, I was nothing but a maid. She had no reason to be afraid. Even if she'd somehow seen through my disguise, Barbara wasn't the type to fear me.
"Are you really that Barbara?"
I asked, looking down at the fallen girl. Even analyzing her iris patterns up close, this was Barbara.
And yet my instincts screamed: That girl is not Barbara.
"I—I am... Ba—Barbara."
There was no time for a drawn-out interrogation. So I reached for the dark cravings buried inside me.
...For a long, long time, I'd wanted to beat Barbara half to death.
Crack!
I grabbed Barbara's ring finger and snapped it. I didn't even break it cleanly—the jagged bone tore through her skin and jutted outward.
"Agh—ah—aaaah!"
Yes. If this girl were truly Barbara, she'd never scream so pathetically. She'd have laughed in my face for stooping to torture and violence.
"You're not Barbara. Talk. I've been dying to smash that face flat anyway."
"Ugh, uuu, uuuugh, please..."
Her mental fortitude didn't seem strong. But she stubbornly kept her mouth clamped shut.
As I said—I didn't have time. If there was a trap, I had to know now.
Crack. Snap.
I snapped and twisted two more of her fingers. Flesh and muscle wrung and tangled together.
With the output of my prosthetic arm, I could crush a body of flesh and blood like a toy. A natural body was so terribly fragile.
Crunch!
I closed my fist around her mangled fingers and squeezed. Thick, sap-like blood oozed between my knuckles.
Just as a horrific scream was about to tear loose from her throat—
Slap!
I struck her across the cheek, dragging my palm against her face. Her skin peeled away, hanging in ragged tatters.
"Answer me. Don't scream. Who are you, and where is Barbara?"
"My name is Baba..."
Well. That's enough of that.
Swish.
I swept my skirt aside and drew the dagger—Grakken Boot. Without pause, I pressed the tip beneath the girl's eye and flicked.
Plop!
Her eyeball caught on the blade and popped free. A biological eye—it was soft and squishy against the metal.
I stopped asking questions. I meant to carve up the girl's body with silent, merciless violence, and simply repeat it until she talked on her own.
There was a limit to the pain an untrained civilian could bear. The girl seemed to grasp my resolve.
"Agh, aaaah, aaah! I—I'll talk, ah, ah, my eye, it hurts, it hurts, aaaah..."
"No. I don't care whether you answer anymore. I'm going to peel your skin off, nice and slow. Until you beg me to kill you. Because you annoyed me."
Her remaining eye went wide. Her terrified tongue scrambled to spit out the truth.
"M—my name is Nether—Nether Along! Please! Stop, it hurts too much, I can't bear it, I'm begging you—" She dissolved into sobs.
"Nether... Along?"
Even I froze. What kind of bullshit was this?
Nether Along was, at this very moment, the bodyguard stationed at Enrico Lagan's side. And the full-body prosthetic registration number matched, too. If this girl before me—the one wearing Barbara's exact face—was Nether Along...
Then who was the Nether Along standing beside Enrico Lagan?
Don't tell me... Barbara—
...If my theory was right, Barbara was a genuinely, monstrously insane woman.
Yank!
I grabbed the hair of the girl claiming to be Nether Along and wrenched her head back. My horrific suspicion was confirmed.
A faint surgical scar traced the edge of her forehead—the telltale mark of a skull opened and sealed shut again.
"That crazy bitch...!"
The curse slipped out. I looked down at 'him.' Pity and disgust warred inside me for the man trapped in this girl's body.
Barbara transplanted her own brain into Nether Along's full-body prosthetic, and stuffed Nether Along's brain into her original body. Just to use it as a decoy... she threw away her natural body!
A natural body is like a set of baby teeth. Wear it down, break it, and you simply discard it. Even so, no one treated their entire flesh-and-blood body this carelessly—no one burned through it like this. Some people kept their natural bodies cryogenically preserved even long after switching to a full-body prosthetic.
Barbara had swapped Nether Along's full-body prosthetic for her own body. And a full-body prosthetic that isn't custom-fitted to its user comes with severe side effects. It would wreak havoc on the mind, too.
Barbara had undergone a transformation so sickening it turned my stomach. My cross-dressing was downright charming by comparison.
"So the full-body prosthetic beside Enrico Lagan—that's Barbara?"
"Sh—she said if I just did what she wanted, she'd g—give me my original body back..."
Nether Along whimpered. I flung him aside and drew a deep breath to steady myself.
Right now, out there, Giselle, Ilay, Enrico, and Barbara are all riding the Arachne.
Enrico would maneuver his Arachne to draw close to Giselle. And even if he did, Giselle wouldn't find it the least bit strange. Given Enrico's obsession and his character, it would look perfectly natural.
Just as we'd arranged everything to lure Barbara in naturally—Barbara made her own revolting sacrifice to close in on Giselle just as naturally.
I reached for my ear and tried to open a channel. Neither Ilay nor Giselle answered.
It's already happened.
There'd been more than enough time for Enrico's Arachne to reach Giselle's. And out here, there was no way for anyone to know what was unfolding within the rocky terrain.
Strangely, though, my anxiety wasn't all that great.
The one at Giselle's side right now is none other than Ilay.
No matter what Barbara had prepared, Ilay would display skill far beyond her calculations. Barbara could never hope to measure his true strength—because right now, Ilay was growing faster than anyone alive.
"Barbara is never going to give your body back. If you want to live, sit here quietly."
I said it flatly and headed down through the building.
Murmurs. Whispers.
Outside was in an uproar. No one seemed to have even noticed the commotion I'd stirred up inside the lounge.
"D—did they crash? Wasn't the Custoria family's young lady riding that one?"
"A mechanical malfunction?"
"What happened?"
Thick gray smoke was billowing up from the rocky terrain.
Autonovas employees rushed about in a frenzy, operating drones with pale, stricken faces. An accident, right in the middle of the exhibition. And in the worst case, the young lady of the Custoria family could be injured—or dead.
Autonovas's recon drones streaked across the rocky terrain. An aerial vehicle loaded with paramedics was just about to lift off.
Screeech!
I grabbed the closing door of the medical vehicle and wrenched it open. The motor driving the mechanism howled as if it might tear itself apart.
"What in the world do you think you're doing?! This is an emergency!"
The paramedics shouted at me.
"I am an employee of the Custoria family. My lady has been in an accident, so I have every right to board."
I spoke calmly. At the name Custoria, the paramedics grudgingly made room.
"How is a maid that strong...?"
They muttered among themselves, throwing wary glances my way. The vehicle's door was caved in, stamped with the clear imprint of my hand.
The aerial vehicle soared out over the rocky terrain. The paramedics were reviewing the accident site through the feeds of the recon drones.
Anxiety hung thick in the cabin. If this went badly, everyone tied to the exhibition would face severe consequences.
– Luka, just finished cleaning up on my end. Giselle's safe.
A message from Ilay bloomed across my retinal display.
Yeah. I knew he would.
I let out a shallow breath, and the tension drained out of me.