Chapter 5
Chapter 5
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 5
Chapter Title: Lady of Revelry Ellis - 2
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Five minutes. Ten minutes. Roughly that much time had passed.
"Urgh..."
Winter Dormouse groaned in agony.
Even with both his shoulders smashed to pieces, the way he struggled to piece together what had happened was downright comical.
I slouched back into the chair in a more relaxed position.
"What can you do? Your boss doesn't care if you die."
"Shu... t... up..."
Splat!
I hurled a slice of pizza right at his face.
"Mmph!"
They say a three-year-old's habits last until eighty, and sure enough, this guy's habit of lacing every word with curses wasn't going away even in death.
Anyway, with things turning out like this, I'd have no choice but to kill Winter Dormouse.
I had no interest in being treated like some loudmouth who only talks big. Kill this guy, then go outside and handle the rest myself.
Bang!
The moment I picked up the pizza knife, the door flew open with a loud crash.
Why was there never anyone in this mansion who knew how to open a door quietly?
The first thing that caught my eye was the Mad Hatter. Behind him stood Ellis, wearing a rabbit headband.
"Greetings end here~"
Winter Dormouse, with the dagger pulled from his shoulder, staggered out of the parlor. The Mad Hatter and Ellis took seats across from me.
Nice to see you. Hate to see you. None of those sentiments crossed my mind as I looked at Ellis.
Just... it had been a damn long time.
There was a time when hearing the name Ellis made my legs shake.
A time when anything rabbit-related had me trembling and vomiting blood.
'She looks kinda cute now, though.'
Before joining Elfriede as a shadow, I'd passed through the hands of all sorts of trash noble ladies across this continent and beyond.
So now, she just seemed like a frog in a well. A rabbit? Might as well treat her like the rabbit from a fairy tale.
Tohihi. Ellis burst into laughter first, breaking the silence.
"What brings you here?"
She beamed with a smile, but underneath it lurked unmistakable irritation.
Her bunny girl outfit and rabbit headband might look like mere male-baiting attire, but I figured plenty of hidden weapons were tucked between her skin and the fabric.
An intruder showing up at her drug factory would piss anyone off, naturally.
But that wasn't my problem.
"Curiosity got the better of me. Wanted to see how you peddle your drugs."
"You could've just bought some yourself to find out~"
Tap, tap, tap. Ellis drummed her fingernails on the table.
"Why go beating up people in someone else's mansion? Ah, sure, I'll give you credit for beating Winter Dormouse. But the folks here have some very important work to do~"
"So?"
"If you mess up their work, should I be the only one resenting you? Everyone involved will ha~te~ you too~"
"So."
"The people involved are all very important folks~ Think you can handle that? You can't, right?"
Splat!
I chucked the remaining pizza slice at Ellis's face with all my might.
The Mad Hatter blocked it with his hand, but cheese splattered everywhere regardless.
"Get to the point. No more beating around the bush."
Ellis held up three fingers.
"Pay up for three Spade Aces, and I'll send you off nicely. I'll cover the medical bills—consider it my subordinates' shortcomings~"
Her eyes curved into crescent moons.
"How's that? For someone without any backing, isn't it a sweet deal? You wouldn't have the guts for all-out war with me, would you?"
A chuckle escaped me before I could stop it.
Beating Winter Dormouse made her wary of charging in blindly, so she was pretending to cut a deal with gold to coax me out.
And if she had any conscience, she'd naturally demand just the value of three Spade Aces. I'd brought her three Aces instead of one each of King, Queen, and Jack. As if.
"Ellis."
I murmured her name softly. The name of the woman who still hadn't grasped her place.
"That's why you're going to die. Just do your job faithfully, but no—you're scheming here and there."
"......?"
I had no intention of provoking her.
I was simply stating plainly everything I'd observed.
"Know your place, Ellis. Even if you run your business with everything you've got, no holding back, you're barely scraping by in this underworld."
Snap. The fingernail tapping the table broke.
The smiling facade vanished in an instant. One blink, and she was dead serious.
"This underworld? You think you know it?"
"I do."
I nodded and continued.
"For the first three months or so, you'll test how well your customers can tell the drugs apart, crunching the numbers. Once you're confident you can fool them, you start passing off low-grade stuff as top-shelf... and keep doing it..."
Ellis's expression hardened, turning to stone.
"Eventually, you're charging top prices for the lowest-grade crap. By then, the customers are so hooked they don't care about quality anymore."
"How... do you..."
"That's all fine and dandy, but your problem is using the same tricks on people above you."
Ha. Ellis let out a disbelieving laugh.
Her fingertips trembled.
"Where'd you hear that crap?"
"It's written all over your face."
Now her whole body was shaking.
"I was trying to settle this nicely, but good thing I didn't. Looks like you're the type I absolutely have to kill."
About time she realized.
The territory under Wonderfentanyl's influence was one big drug farm and factory.
To trim Elfriede's influence even a little later on, I had to prune things like this first.
I never planned to settle things amicably with Ellis from the start.
"Ellis."
I said her name once more.
She glared at me with blood-red eyes brimming with killing intent.
And to her, I said:
"You're better suited to whoring than dealing drugs."
Boom!
At the same moment, Ellis slammed her fist down on the table.
"Mad Hatterrrrrr!"
And with that shout, the Mad Hatter unleashed mana bullets at me like gunfire.
Dodge, block, or counter.
Those were my three options, and fortunately, there was a way to do all three at once.
Crack!
I kicked the table over. A bit of mana to boost my leg strength made it a breeze.
Bang! Bang! Boom!
The mana bullets collided with the table, making vicious noises. The fact that it didn't shatter outright meant they'd put some real effort into the parlor's decor.
Bang!
I front-kicked the airborne table again, shoving it forward.
Priority one: take out the Mad Hatter before Ellis.
Thud!
The Mad Hatter was pinned to the wall by the table. I kept kicking it with all my strength, unrelenting.
"Gack! Cough! Hack!"
Every kick drew a agonized cry from him. His nose was probably smashed flat by now.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
"S-Stop! Ack! Cough... hack!"
Bang! Bang!
"......!"
Only when no more screams came from the other side of the table did I finally stop.
"Hoo."
Pushing the table aside revealed quite the sight: the Mad Hatter's face pulped, the table soaked in blood.
Amid the blood-splattered mess, I remained spotless thanks to the table.
"Ellis."
I wiped the sweat from my forehead and called her name. She sat slumped in the corner, hands clamped over her mouth.
Her jewel-like red eyes shook like there was an earthquake. The Mad Hatter's one-sided defeat must have hit her hard.
"Ellis. Answer me."
"Wh... what?"
Ellis stared at the Mad Hatter in disbelief.
Truth be told, if we compared combat prowess in detail, Ellis was the strongest.
She came from a decent family line with real talent for handling mana, and she hadn't slacked on training either.
"Huh...?"
But she'd already lost the will to fight.
Her instincts must have told her: no matter how hard she tried here, she'd end up just like the Mad Hatter.
To her, I tossed one more line.
"Don't worry too much. The Mad Hatter's still alive."
For real. Even with his face a total mess, he was barely clinging to life, breathing raggedly.
And this wasn't some comforting lie. I strode toward Ellis.
"Tohihi."
This time, I let out that laugh.
"W-Wait a sec."
"Why aren't you laughing? That's your thing."
"Stay back. I said stay away."
I approached, then knelt to meet her eye level.
Those eyes, stripped of all fighting spirit, reflected me back like a mirror—pristine, without a scratch.
"What do you want to do? Live?"
Ellis nodded quietly. The killing intent toward me had vanished completely.
I nodded back.
"I see."
I picked up the fallen pizza knife from the floor.
Winter Dormouse's dagger was still there, but for this situation, the pizza knife fit better.
I gripped the blade, offering her the handle for an easy grab.
As I placed the dull-edged pizza knife in her hand, I nodded toward the Mad Hatter.
"Kill the Mad Hatter with your own hands. Do that, and I'll let you live."
"N-No! I can't! I can't do it!"
She shook her head tearfully. For someone who wanted to live, she was awfully cheeky.
"Oh?"
But I gave her a bright smile—the same one she always wore.
"Then how far are you willing to go?"