Crushing Those Who Recite Sins (2)

I caught my breath and looked down at myself. A faint silver light flowed across my entire body.

As long as I had this, I should be fine.

I headed for the manor and came to a stop ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠out front. Peary was already waiting to receive me.

Good. Looks like nothing happened.

So far, everything was going according to plan. Right on cue, Peary approached with that cold expression of hers. I confirmed she was still playing her usual act. Her plump lips parted.

"Hero, you've arrived?"

"Have you been well?"

"I was so scared I thought I was going to lose my mind."

"You didn't, like... wet yourself out of fear, did you?"

She was a beauty with a bedwetter attribute. At my sly little question, Peary's face went from cold straight to murderous.

"Shut up. I knew you'd say that, so I emptied it out beforehand."

A light chuckle slipped out of me. So she had emptied it out in advance.

Even as I grinned like an idiot, I found her entertaining. I had no idea how she'd ended up in a place like this, but the urge to protect her only grew stronger.

"Where's the lord?"

"He's inside, as it happens. Haa, just looking at his face makes me want to throw up."

"You hate him now?"

"What?"

"Before, you were afraid of him. Honestly, this is the right way. It's a good sign."

Turning fear into hatred. It sounds easy, but it's actually hard. It's the same reason people who got bullied all through school end up living timidly once they enter society. They never overcame the fear. At the very least, Peary was someone who knew how to turn that into anger or hatred.

"I don't really know myself. Well, he was grinning ear to ear when he heard a famous masseuse was coming."

I summoned Dinora through the ring. When she suddenly materialized right in front of her, Peary nearly jumped out of her skin.

"Wha—!"

I'd already given her a heads-up, but surprising was still surprising. Dinora was equally startled to find Peary standing right in her face.

"Ah! Lashu, is it time?"

"Yeah. Peary, I'm leaving Lady Dinora in your hands. Dinora will massage him and get the cult leader to drop his guard, and Peary, you watch over her."

"Got it. Masseuse, please follow me."

"Hehe, just call me Dinora."

The two women headed into the manor together, a pleasant atmosphere between them.

This far was fine. Everything according to plan.

The problem was what came next.

I need to time this carefully.

Once ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠Dinora approached the cult leader and got him to let his guard down, Peary would report it, and I'd charge in and kill him.

As if to hype the moment, a quest even popped up.

"Ah, Hero!"

I was still looking over the quest when the guards on patrol called out a greeting.

"What are you doing out here?"

One of them asked with a smile. Yeah, leaving these guys here would be a problem. If things went south, the cult leader might use them as human shields.

"This is bad. Look over there! Don't you see that?!"

I pointed somewhere at random and made a huge fuss. The guards turned their heads.

"Huh? See what?"

Thud! Crack!

I chopped them both across the back of the skull and knocked them out cold, then hurriedly dragged them somewhere out of the way. I scanned the area just in case there were any witnesses, but luckily there didn't seem to be any. I was just about to breathe a sigh of relief when—

Crash!

"Kyaaaaah!"

The signal had come. It wasn't the one I'd wanted.

Now.

I kicked the door in and sprinted straight for the cult leader's chambers. I ran at a speed that defied reason and arrived in an instant. I was faster than a bullet right now.

I tried the door. Locked.

"Fuck!"

Thud! Crunch, smash!

I kicked it in and burst inside. The cult leader had been about to throw himself on Dinora, and I caught him whipping his head around.

"What? The hero, Lashu Leonhart?"

"Hey, Lao Weverpool. No, wait — you're not even a real lord, so I should just call you Lao, right?"

"How did you...?"

"This is why you don't try to reform people. Even a fake lord is still a lord, and you go and show your true colors this fast? You piece of shit."

The cult leader scrambled sideways, putting distance between us, eyes wary.

"You little shit, what the hell are you?"

"What do you think? Your Beastly Hero, here to wreck your ass!"

I drew my sword and sucked in a breath.

Crackle, snap! Zzzzt!

I activated my coat's ability — Lightning Aura — and closed the gap in a single burst. Lao, the cult leader, stumbled backward in a panic, throwing on a coat of his own as he shouted.

"I don't care what you are. You, these bitches — you're all my slaves!"

He clasped a silver necklace shaped like a bird around his neck and pointed it straight at me.

"Even you can't do a damn thing! You're mine! Hahaha!"

The necklace began to glow. Something like energy bloomed from it, spreading like perfume, and washed over me in an instant.

That'd be it. The item that lends the cult leader his brainwashing power.

I stood still. Lao grinned and swayed his body from side to side.

"I have no interest in a dick like you. Hurt yourself, Lashu."

I drew my sword. Just as the blade started toward my own throat, Dinora and Peary cried out in desperation.

"Don't, Lashu! Stop!"

"Hero, don't do it! Aaaaah!"

"Ah, right."

I answered immediately and lunged at the cult leader. The moment ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠I swung, his eyes bulged like they were about to pop out of his skull.

"Why...?"

Whoosh!

Lao ducked, barely avoiding the blade, and shook his head.

"What? Why isn't it working?!"

"See the silver on my body? That shit doesn't work on me, asshole!"

Lao started looking me up and down in detail. Having some guy eye-fuck me like that was disgusting.

"How the hell?"

"Got blessed by a cathedral nun. Can't quite remember the god's name, but anyway — I'm invincible."

Technically it was only good for an hour. But that was more than enough time to finish this fight.

"Lao. You murdered the lord of Weverpool, had him drawn and quartered, posed as a fake lord, and deceived everyone in the territory. You played the hypocrite in public while doing every filthy thing imaginable behind closed doors. You deserve to die, you fucking bastard."

"Ha, and who made you the judge?"

"Dumbass. What, should I take you to court? Slip some cash to an expensive lawyer and get it certified? Those people are on the perpetrator's side. Not happening. So we do it the local way — you die by my hand."

Something a half-assed nation of laws like Korea could never pull off. Punishing a vicious perpetrator. The fact that I could do it here was the greatest stroke of luck I had.

"Don't make me laugh, you two-bit hero!"

"I'm not trying to be funny. I am a hero. I'm more than qualified."

I stepped closer. Lao's eyes darted around with nowhere to land, pupils shaking — and then he suddenly folded at the waist and burst out laughing.

"Heh-hahahaha, a nobody like you is going to punish me? Hic-hahaha! I possess a Hawkdia!"

"Hawkdia...?"

What the hell was that? What kind of lore drop was this?

Lao was already rattling on like he'd won.

"That's right, a Hawkdia! The wondrous artifacts Sir Grant left behind in this world! And I happen to have one of them!"

"...No way."

"And right now, you've already lost to me. Guards, kill that bastard!"

Thud, thud! Whoosh!

Before I knew it, vacant-eyed guards had appeared behind me. They all swung their spears at once.

I flung myself backward and barked an order at the women.

"Both of you, hide somewhere safe!"

I sheathed my sword and charged Lao. Thanks to the Lightning Aura, my effective speed was even faster than usual.

Tat-tat-tat-tat! Crack, snap!

"If you're a man, fight me one-on-one, you spineless little shit."

"What? Ghk...!"

I tackled him. I locked my arms around his waist and drove us both toward the window.

Whoom, crash!

We went airborne together, smashed through the glass, and plummeted. I shoved Lao off first and barely managed to levitate thanks to the coat's effect.

Lao fell too, then somehow summoned a power of his own and just barely stuck the landing.

Damn it. That artifact really was the real deal.

I faced him and drew my sword.

"Lashu, you miserable bastard."

"I'm not miserable. I'm going to keep thriving. Give up while you still can."

"Bullshit. Do you have any idea how much time I poured into taking this one place?!"

"Why do you even live like this?"

"Ha?"

"From what I can see, you've got a hell of a brain. Try using it for something good, you idiot."

I could never understand villains like this. Their heads work great, so why do they only use them for shitty things? Well. That's why they're villains, I guess.

Lao sneered at me with everything he had.

"Idiot. You think society just hires you if you're smart? If you're talented? I wanted to be a civil servant at first too. An inspector, even!"

"This is an empire, sure, but civil service is one of the paths open to anyone regardless of status, isn't it?"

Unless you were born into the commoner track as a merchant house heir from the start, the only real ways for people below that to turn their lives around were becoming an Awakened like a hero, or becoming a civil servant loyal to the imperial palace. Lao had probably aimed for that once.

"Naive. Pathetically naive. I believed that too. But it wasn't true."

His eyes narrowed to slits as he chewed over the words.

"It was different from the interview onward. I talked about my abilities and my resolve. But the guys who came with me? They recited who their mother was, their father, their uncle — they had the whole family tree memorized."

"Huh..."

"Who do you think got the job? Yeah. The guy who memorized the family tree. I failed! They said I didn't show enough passion!"

Lao gripped the necklace. He was trembling, the rage of that day still raw in him.

"I found this by chance. I was so desperate I was about to kill myself, and this thing gave me a new life! Call me a villain all you want. Sorry, but I'm going to keep living like this. I refuse to be sacrificed for this fucked-up society, you know?"

He finished with a crooked grin.

In the end, it was the same everywhere. Somewhere, a guy brown-nosed the admins and became prime minister. Somewhere else, if your dad was a professor, you could just clippity-clop around on a horse and still walk out of a prestigious university with a diploma.

This place was no different. People lived here too. And they were twisted in all the same ways.

"Lao. I get your situation."

"What...?"

"But just because you had it rough doesn't mean you get to hurt a bunch of people — and what you did to Peary especially crossed the line. Murdering a lord is a capital crime, obviously."

"This little brat... she was a girl with nowhere to go, wasn't she? A maid should act like a maid and just wait on people."

"Yeah. That answer right there is how I know you're no different from those interviewers."

I drove the point home without mercy. But I couldn't say I felt good about it.

In the end, people break.

Could I swear I wouldn't have broken in Lao's situation? No chance.

People are all the same. If someone turns out different, they're either a born psychopath or a hero. One or the other.

"I'm... the same as those bastards...?"

Lao trembled. I could hear his teeth grinding from here. Bloodshot eyes locked onto me as he howled like a man begging the world to listen.

"What the hell would a nobody like you know?! Just die alreadyyyyyyy!"

Mana began gathering in the necklace. Then it fired like a beam.

Shiiiiing!

I threw myself sideways and dodged, then immediately lined up my angle and ran. I caught his flank and drove a front kick into him. I'd thought it was an opening. It wasn't.

Clang! Shiiiiing!

Lao had the necklace up as if he'd known all along. My blade caught on it, and mana gathered in the gap between them. The beam swelled even larger than before, like it had been charged to maximum.

"Shit...!"

I reflexively tried to split it with my sword and cancel it out. It wasn't enough.

Shriiiiiing! Fwoosh!

The Goddess's scream. The beam fired, I failed to block it properly, and I was blasted backward.

And as I hung there in the air, I heard Lao's voice, already declaring victory.

"Hahaha, I've finally got the hang of it. Lashu, I can read your thoughts!"

My vision washed out white — and then my consciousness went dark.