Episode 85
Translator: RaidenTL
Episode 85
[error; logout failed]
♥ error; logout failed ♥
It was a strange sensation, as if her body were a stone sinking down, down, down, while her spirit floated upward.
The status windows that had been persistently attempting to log out all flickered and died, displaying failure messages. Elysia smiled bitterly. Of course. How many years has it been since I was trapped? At this point, even the game couldn't forcibly disconnect her.
“Truth? Cough, ha… You call this… this fucking drug… ‘Truth’? Cough!”
She saw pity in Alma’s eyes as she looked down at her, and fury erupted within her. Fucking psycho. You’re the one who drugged me, so don’t you dare look at me like that…
Alma, who had rung a bell to summon someone, yawned and kicked Elysia with her foot, pushing her off the bed as if clearing away trash.
“Throw her in the basement.”
“Wait…”
Alma’s eye twitched as Elysia desperately clung to the hem of her skirt. She sighed.
What now? Elysia clung to Alma, who had muttered in annoyance. She was disoriented, but there was still something she had to focus on.
“The will… What about the will? How did you forge it…?”
“Haha… Hahahaha!!! You really are insane!”
Alma burst out laughing as if she couldn't believe it, then shot up from her seat. She was almost impressed by this madness, this desperate attempt to uncover the truth.
So, is it true that a crazy bastard always falls for an equally crazy woman? Barely suppressing her cackles, Alma said,
“Hertz believed until the very end that he had a major stake in this business. The fool.”
“He wrote it… himself…?”
“It was my suggestion. I told him the Hertz family would surely come after you, and that such a tail would interfere with the business. So I proposed he leave a will, find a corpse of a similar build, and dump it in the river. After being submerged for a while, no one would be able to tell if the facial features were different.”
“You murderous bastard…”
“Oh my? I only struck his head. The one who finished him off by snapping his neck died tonight, all because he had the audacity to injure you… Such a waste.”
Elysia’s face grew confused as she recalled the large man she had fought with.
Why? Why would he die for the absurd reason of having injured me? Alma’s face was even twisted in what looked like frustration.
Elysia knew it instinctively. Someone else is involved… But who?
Barely managing to wipe the displeasure from her face, Alma sneered.
“So, little miss detective, consider your revenge complete and just disappear.”
With that, she kicked Elysia, who was still clutching her skirt, her head hanging low.
She must have passed out, unable to withstand the drug. Is she finally going crazy too? Alma thought, staring down blankly. But then, the gray eyes flashed, curved into a crescent, and let out a laugh.
She hadn't gone mad from exhaustion, nor had she given up. It was simply because, with a dull thud, a familiar, crudely designed system window had popped up.
SYSTEM: Item usage conditions met. Executing Errorcheck_Program.
……checking ‘Alma Heron’ ###
completed. ###
Motive for crime: Pursuit of Desire
Item usage conditions met. Use the item! Terminating Errorcheck_Program. ###
“Haha, puhahaha! What the hell is this…? Interesting.”
Staring at the gleaming potion bottle in her inventory, Elysia began to chuckle. As if unable to contain the surging euphoria, her shoulders shook with laughter as she muttered through parched lips.
“Ah… there’s a mountain of things to find out. This is exciting.”
Faced with such unhinged obsession, Alma unknowingly took a step back. With those final words, the woman was dragged away limply. Alma shivered and muttered to herself.
“How unpleasant.”
*
Elysia awoke to the squeaking of rats. The moment she opened her eyes, a status window greeted her, displaying nothing but bad news.
SYSTEM: HP -20 (980 / 4800)
Your body’s immunity is dropping due to the ‘Cold’. Please move to a warm place.
SYSTEM: ‘Hypothermia’ has occurred.
You will accumulate -10 damage per minute. Please move to a warm place.
Elysia was sprawled out on the rough, straw-covered floor of the basement, staring blankly at the black ceiling. She was too exhausted to even think.
She wanted to close her eyes and fall into a hellish sleep, but she felt that if she lost consciousness again, she might never wake up. So she fought to stay awake.
Colorful fireworks exploded across her vision, which had been painted in darkness. The logout windows no longer appeared, but the aftereffects of the drug remained.
She muttered a curse and twitched her hand. Goddammit… The hallucinations danced on, showing no signs of disappearing.
She forced her disobedient arm to move, veins popping with the effort. Her arm haltingly gathered straw, burying her body beneath it. Useless piece of junk, this body. It was a basement, sure, but to think she could freeze to death on a summer day.
“Cold…”
Perhaps because of the drug, the rustling of rats walking through the straw was so clear it made her head ache. Elysia shook her head irritably, trying to get away from the sound, but eventually gave up and muttered.
“Lucky bastards…”
Wouldn’t it be nice if I could scurry around like that too. Elysia let out a hollow laugh and stared blankly into the air.
What do I do now?
It wasn’t that she was scared enough to cry, or that she regretted chasing that man from the plaza.
Even if she could go back, she would have tracked him just the same. She would have just been more careful about it. She would have kept her distance, wary of his enormous frame, and…
“I should have… told him…”
Regret seeped through her gasping breaths. She had regretted many things, but this was the first time she regretted not relying on someone else more.
I should have moved faster. I should have put him on the list of suspects. I should have killed that bastard sooner. Other people were never part of these regrets. She had always been alone, and she had to be, to face the constant threats.
Unable to break that habit, she had come here alone without even telling Evan. What if I never see him again? When her worries reached that point, she found it so absurd that she laughed.
Right now, you’re more afraid of that than of dying? What the hell is wrong with you? Why have you been acting so strange?
“You should be by my side. Of course.”
You have to be by my side. We were each other’s light, and at the same time, the shadow that knew the other’s darkness best. We can’t be separated…
It was an abnormal obsession, yet a premise she had accepted so comfortably. Only now did she decide to admit it. She had been terribly selfish with Evan.
She had taken his hand because she was afraid of being alone, yet she maintained a careful distance, knowing full well his feelings, simply because she liked the comfort of their current relationship.
She lived a life known only to herself. Her unilateral decisions were less a personality trait and more a habit. That was why she kept holding his hand with her eyes closed, even knowing that being near her could get him killed.
But people change according to their environment. Around the time the consideration she’d picked up from Evan began to whisper that she should distance herself for his own good, he had answered.
“Yeah, of course I’ll be by your side.”
Senior, don’t rush me. My nature is selfish. When you say that, it makes me want to cling to you again.
It becomes a cruel demand for you to follow me without me having to say a word, to follow me even if your whole body breaks. To stay by my side, to never let me go, even if my very existence kills you.
“Why do I treat you like such trash, Senior?”
As she gave a bitter smile, her dry lips cracked and bled.
The moment she winced at the stinging pain, the sound of a poorly oiled hinge creaked, and someone was shoved into the basement.
“You crazy monster bastard. How many did you cut down…!”
The jangling of a key ring followed the guard’s disgusted voice. A moment later, the door slammed shut again and was locked with a clang.
Elysia remained silent, unable to even speak easily. It was better to conserve as much energy as possible if she wanted to survive.
The person pushed into the room was a man of sturdy build. He sat down, calmly trying to assess his surroundings, waiting for his eyes to adjust to the darkness. He then cut his restraints with something he held in his hand and slowly walked over to stand before her.
Elysia’s eyes widened as she recognized the familiar face.
“……Sen…”
“Shh.”
His green eyes, now confirming her condition, were twisted in a deep scowl. It was quite strange, she thought, that she could make out their color in the pitch-black darkness.
Even submerged in black, she could clearly see the man’s dark hair swaying. Even his split lip, as if he’d taken a few punches.
Evan urgently knelt in front of her.
“El, are you okay? No, no… don’t answer. You’re in bad shape.”
He quickly lifted Elysia from the cold floor and into his arms. Elysia instinctively burrowed into his embrace. In the face of the biting cold, shame was a luxury.
The moment his warmth—scorching compared to her own—touched her, her consciousness plummeted toward oblivion. Elysia rested her head on the arm of the man holding her tight and mumbled.
“Thought it was… a hallucination…”
“A hallucination?”
“They injected me… with some weird drug.”
“Your body temperature is too low.”
The man took off his coat and pulled her closer. The coat pockets were stuffed with something, but Elysia wasn’t lucid enough to notice.
With urgent hands, he pulled out various medicines from the pockets, draped the coat over Elysia’s shoulders, and held something out to her.
“Drink this.”
The strong scent of alcohol wafted from the small bottle. The man held her chin with his fingers and poured the liquid into her mouth. Elysia couldn’t swallow it and spat it all out. She stared blankly up at the man’s face, right in front of her own.
His expression was so blank it was hard to believe he was looking at someone on the verge of death.
But Elysia knew that this was when Evan was at his most emotional. He’s angry… that I’m in this state.
After glaring for a moment at the firmly locked door with a cool gaze, he realized Elysia was watching him and immediately softened his expression.
“Sorry, forgive me.”
“For what…”
He tipped the alcohol from the bottle into his own mouth and, without hesitation, pressed his lips to hers.
As their warm lips met, Elysia closed her eyes without thinking. She drank the alcohol that flowed down her throat, and a heat rose from where the liquid touched. It was beyond warm; it was hot.
Not fully aware of what she was doing, she clung to Evan as he tried to pull away after giving her all the alcohol.
She opened her lips to get even a speck more of the warmth lingering in his mouth. As their tongues tangled, a heat rose to the tips of her ears, perhaps from the alcohol. His lips, which she lightly licked, tasted of liquor.
In that instant, he seemed to lose his reason, tilting his head to deepen the kiss. A low groan, as if he were suppressing something, caught in his throat.
As Elysia cupped his cheek, he seemed to grow more excited, pressing her harder against him, before he belatedly came to his senses, flinched, and pulled back.
“You, why all of a sudden…”
His face was burning. He noticed that Elysia’s parched lips were now moist and quickly turned his head away. This wasn’t why he’d done it, but he had almost lost control.
SYSTEM: ‘Hypothermia’ symptoms have been alleviated.
Damage per minute has changed from -10 to -5. Please move to a warm place.
The situation was far too urgent for her to ask why he had suddenly kissed her. Evan postponed any questions and gently cupped her dazed face to check her temperature.
As soon as he confirmed her temperature had risen, however slightly, he pulled her into his arms again. Elysia buried her lips in the crook of Evan’s neck and mumbled.
“You came… to rescue me? Why, why alone…? Are you… crazy…? You should have just left me…”
At Elysia’s worried tone, Evan hesitated for a moment. How should I put this? In the end, he decided to be direct.
“No, I got caught too.”
“Haha, fucking hell…”
Clutching his shirt until the fabric wrinkled, Elysia laughed weakly. The fear that she might die had long since faded. Just having him by her side was enough.