Chapter 111
Chapter: 111
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>Translator: penny
>Chapter: 111
>Chapter Title: Monster Subjugation Squad (4)
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>“Thinking back to when you two were little and bickering over who got to be the big brother makes me all nostalgic, but this time, your argument is just utterly baffling. What is this, some kind of game?”
At Masain’s words, Seongjin narrowed his eyes and shot Logan a glare.
*Acting all grown-up by yourself while picking fights with little Mores like that?*
Logan’s face flushed slightly.
“Why on earth are you two fighting over who gets to be Jibril’s grandfather? You do realize that both of you are actually younger than her, right? Even if she looks that way, Jibril is already an adult who’s graduated from the Academy.”
“No, that’s, um...”
“I never imagined I’d be the one telling Prince Logan to act his age.”
Logan hung his head and fell silent for a moment. Seongjin watched him with a smug expression, but suddenly, a strange feeling came over him.
*Sir Masain, why are you only calling out Logan?*
Masain replied with a bored look.
“Well, I never expected Your Highness to do anything too demanding anyway.”
“...?”
“You’ve hardly ever acted your age.”
Seongjin’s jaw dropped.
*Sir Masain, hanging around with Francis must’ve rubbed off on you!*
The carriage proceeded quietly toward the outskirts of the imperial palace in silence.
* * *
The place where Ashley Becher and Jonathan McCallen were receiving treatment was an imperial medical facility run by the palace. The two were isolated in a remote room deep in the corner of the large building.
They were still technically prisoners, so guards stood at the entrance, but since they were just young students, it wasn’t as if the surveillance was overly intense.
The guard was standing there listlessly in a bored manner when Seongjin’s group approached. He straightened up and opened the door to the room.
“...Your Highness! I can’t tell you how happy I am to see you again!”
As they entered, a boy spotted Seongjin’s face and shouted with a beaming smile. He had a slightly round, clever-looking face, but Seongjin was certain he’d never seen him before.
*Who are you?*
As the boy rose unsteadily from his bed and approached, Seongjin flinched in surprise and stepped back out of the room, only to return. This was definitely the right place, wasn’t it?
The boy’s joyful expression quickly turned crestfallen, his eyebrows drooping.
“It’s me, Jonathan. Didn’t Your Highness call me an old friend not long ago?”
What?
“...Jonathan? Jonathan McCallen?”
“Yes, Your Highness.”
Jonathan McCallen. The link between Mores and the Black Prophet gatherings.
And possibly, an accomplice who might have quietly supported Mores’s secret organization.
Just a few days ago in the tribunal prison, he’d been groaning in pain with a plump, fleshy build. What on earth had happened to him in such a short time?
Even if he’d been tormented by plague doctors drawing his blood, was it possible for a person to slim down this drastically in days? It was like chunks of his body had been carved away, his volume reduced entirely.
“...Isn’t that a bit rich coming from you?”
Logan remarked from behind in a slightly incredulous tone.
No, well. I got caught in an aura storm and had all sorts of circumstances!
Seongjin tried to mask his flustered expression with an awkward smile.
“Wow, Jonathan. You look so different I didn’t recognize you. I was worried when I heard you’d been sick for so long, but now I see it was all for nothing.”
“It’s all thanks to Your Highness. You’re the one who found that parasite, right? Because of you, I was spared that horrific bloodletting treatment.”
Jonathan shuddered.
*This guy’s more relieved about escaping the bloodletting than recovering from the Gray Plague. Liora Plague Society, what the hell did you do?*
“Yeah. At least you look okay now, so that’s a relief.”
“Haha, honestly, I feel lighter than before the plague hit. I wonder if I’m actually healthier now.”
Jonathan scratched his cheek with a sheepish look.
“The problem is Ashley, though...”
Jonathan turned his head toward one corner of the room, and the group’s gazes followed.
Ashley Becher.
The other victim of the Gray Plague sat on a small bed in the corner of the room.
Unlike the lively Jonathan, his condition was markedly different. He sat there staring blankly into space like a soulless doll. In just a few short days, he had wasted away so much that his bones seemed visible beneath his skin.
“Why’s he like that?”
“Ever since he regained consciousness, he’s been that way. He won’t even open his mouth. We can barely get him to eat by spoon-feeding him.”
“Is it because he hasn’t fully recovered yet?”
At Masain’s question, Jonathan shook his head with a darkened expression.
“The doctors say it’s a lingering aftereffect that won’t go away. Apparently, as the Gray Plague progresses, it irreversibly damages the brain.”
Irreversible aftereffects.
*[Inflammation crystals, Yi Seongjin.]*
*‘Yeah, I figured as much.’*
Even just looking at Bruno the captain, after the egg extraction, hadn’t more inflammation crystals formed for a while? They’d said regaining consciousness was delayed, and sure enough, these two hadn’t completely avoided crystal formation either.
Seongjin soon received a detailed explanation from the Demon King about the pair’s conditions.
A few small inflammation crystals were visible in Jonathan’s brain, but luckily, they’d avoided any fatal spots. Ashley’s case, however, involved quite a few spread primarily across the frontal lobe.
“Actually, that guy got interrogated before me. I’m guessing he was exposed to the parasite longer because of it.”
Seongjin approached Ashley slowly, half-listening to Jonathan’s explanation.
Even as someone drew near, he showed no awareness, just sitting there with hollow eyes fixed on the corner.
“...Ashley.”
“......”
He wasn’t even registering being called.
Seongjin felt a pang of regret recalling the sharp, passionate young man from the Black Prophet gatherings who had railed against the empire’s injustices. Such a promising talent, lost.
Considering that everyone who contracted the Gray Plague eventually died, saving his life—even late—by extracting the egg was something. But was merely breathing like this really living?
As Seongjin watched him silently, Logan stepped forward.
“Alright, Jonathan, was it? I’m sorry about your friend, but now that things are like this, I need to ask you some questions. Will you cooperate with the subjugation squad’s investigation?”
“P-Prince Logan? Why are the two of you together...”
Only then did Jonathan recognize Logan. Forgetting proper etiquette, he gawked back and forth between Seongjin and Logan with wide eyes.
His face blatantly screamed the question of why they were together. The infamous feud between the Second and Third Princes must have been well-known.
“We’re on the same Monster Subjugation Squad.”
“Ah, yes...”
Seongjin shrugged as he answered, and Jonathan nodded with a puzzled expression.
And so, they finally heard a relatively detailed account from Jonathan about what had happened in the Heresy Tribunal.
“We got beaten senseless. The scariest part was that the interrogators started hitting us without even asking anything first.”
Jonathan’s face still paled at the memory, the terror of the interrogation lingering.
From his explanation, it seemed Ashley and Jonathan had been prime targets of the Heresy Tribunal from the start. Kenneth Digory, the ringleader, had been severely injured and under treatment, while the other three had powerful backers in high positions.
The two were thrown into a prison cell packed with other inmates.
It was mainly filled with prisoners accused of devil worship, already mangled from brutal torture.
And all of them stared into space with vacant expressions, drooling as if their minds were gone.
“Looking back now, they all must have had the Gray Plague. It was a dark prison, but their complexions weren’t normal at all, and above all, none of them seemed sane.”
At the time, Jonathan had assumed it was all from the interrogators’ torture and was terrified just imagining what awaited him, feeling like he’d lose his mind from fear alone.
Then Ashley Becher was dragged out, followed soon after by his screams.
Jonathan paused there, glancing pityingly at Ashley huddled in the corner.
“A long time passed, and he was dragged back to the cell completely unconscious. I think that’s when the parasite was implanted, but I got hauled off right after, so I didn’t have a chance to check on him closely.”
Jonathan, too, was beaten with clubs the moment he arrived before the interrogators.
They asked nothing, but before long, he was sobbing and spilling everything he knew.
“And in that process... what Your Highness did for us... that support...”
Jonathan trailed off suddenly, sneaking a glance at Seongjin.
“No, about that help... I think I spilled everything.”
“......”
“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, Your Highness! I knew I had to keep quiet, but back then I...”
Seeing him bow his head with even a hint of tears, Seongjin couldn’t bring himself to blame him.
No, this insane Heresy Tribunal. How brutally must they have beaten him for a fresh young student to end up this broken?
“I... I never want to go back there. So when I heard about that incident, I can’t tell you how relieved I was.”
Jonathan lifted his head, drawing a shaky breath after shedding a single tear.
“That’s why I’m even more grateful to Prince Mores. He saved my life even after I betrayed your trust. And above all, you completely smashed that Heresy Tribunal while taking down the monster. How can I ever repay this grace...”
“...Huh?”
Seongjin felt Logan and Masain’s gazes from the side.
*What? Why? What?*
Wait, misunderstanding. That wasn’t me who smashed it!
No, why’s even Sir Masain looking at me like that? You were right there that day!
It was right then. A strange voice echoed from behind them.
“Prince Mores...”
A raspy voice, yet one that oddly drew in those around it.
Seongjin and the group turned to see Ashley Becher, who had been sitting blankly moments ago, now facing them.
His unfocused eyes now glared at Seongjin with clear malice.
“Ashley! You’re back to your senses?”
Jonathan lit up and moved to approach, but Seongjin quickly raised a hand to stop him.
They hadn’t known each other long, but Seongjin’s senses picked up a distinct wrongness from Ashley.
*Those eyes absolutely aren’t Ashley Becher’s!*
Logan sensed something too, hand going to Arjuna at his waist as he blocked the group.
Ashley flicked a glance at Logan before fixing his glare back on Seongjin.
“So, you’re the one who did that to the Heresy Tribunal...”
The room’s atmosphere grew heavy in an instant, thick with the intense malice pouring from Ashley. For a split second, a strange yellow glint even flashed in his eyes.
*What the hell is happening right now?*
That was when the Demon King urgently spoke up.
*[It’s a channel, Yi Seongjin! It’s unstable, but someone’s using that kid as a medium to open a channel!]*
‘...A channel?’
Seongjin’s expression hardened.
It didn’t feel like Arenza. They’d cautiously conveyed their intentions through Bruno the captain but hadn’t approached him directly yet.
But knowing inflammation crystals form in Gray Plague patients and using that for channeling?
Then.
‘The culprit behind the Gray Plague outbreak—or possibly the one who lured the monster to Delcross!’
Ashley watched silently with his eyes as Seongjin stiffly reached for his walnut snack. Then, in a sinister voice, he spoke again.
“You ruined everything. Just what are you?”
“...Me?”
“Yes, new vessel of the Guardian. Do you even know whose stage you’re on, whose hands are playing you?”
“......”
“Fool!”
Ashley twisted his lips into a bizarre smirk.
Then, suddenly.
He jerked as if electrocuted.
And just like that, he started yelling at thin air.
“How annoyingly persistent you are! You tiny pests!”
“...?”
“You’re no different! Do you even know who you’re helping right now!”
As Seongjin’s group stared in bewilderment, Ashley staggered up from the bed and began jabbing his finger at empty space!
“Get lost!”
“Don’t interfere!”
“Get lost!”
“You bastards!”
It was like he was fighting himself—shouting alone, answering alone, utterly mad.
“How long do you plan to keep this up!”
“Get out of the palace, you wretched thing!”
“Vanish far from the palace, you vile thing!”
“...?”
Seongjin blinked.
Huh?
This oddly repetitive phrasing, it felt strangely familiar somewhere.