Chapter 282: Labyrinth of Change: Labyrinthos (11)
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 282: Labyrinth of Change: Labyrinthos (11)
Ordinary people lie, of course.
If someone were a pathological liar, the frequency of those lies would increase exponentially.
However, this guy was a truly insane liar who existed far beyond the boundaries of ‘normal.’
— I specialize in close-quarters combat. If you don’t maintain your distance, you’ll die.
…Literally every word out of his mouth was a lie.
It was as if he were under a curse that prevented him from speaking anything but falsehoods; not a shred of truth ever crossed his lips.
When he laughed while claiming to be a melee specialist only to hurl hidden weapons, then immediately pulled out a crossbow to fire bolts, I really wanted to kill him.
Regrettably, while he and I were fighting, someone appeared and interrupted our battle.
I suppose it was a stroke of heavenly luck for him and a bout of misfortune for me.
Because the number of ‘Wax Wings’ he and I possessed exceeded a certain amount and met specific conditions, Icarus suddenly appeared in the middle of our fight.
…Thinking back on it now, I wonder if that bastard planned even that.
* * *
“Ha, haha. Look, I don’t know what you’re thinking, but are you really not going to save me?”
“Yeah, I’m not saving you.”
The bastard who claimed to be weak had been wrestling with a Mimic for over ten minutes now, yet he showed no signs of exhaustion.
If anything, it looked like the Mimic was the one losing strength.
“…If you’re not going to save me, why don’t you just go on your way? Why are you just standing there watching?”
“I’m waiting to see when you’ll get eaten. Who knows? You might have some decent artifacts on you.”
“Wow, your personality…”
“Seeing as you’re in here, you must be a villain too.”
“Hey, that’s not true. How do you know I don’t have some heartbreaking backstory? For example, I…”
“What, does your younger sister have some disease? Did your parents die trying to find a cure?”
“…Huh? Have we met before?”
— You’re really too much. For example, if my sister is sick, and I’m following the dying wishes of my parents who died trying to get her medicine, and I was forced to stain my hands with crime… what would you do then? Ah, sorry. I think I’m a bit drunk.
Son of a bitch. A real son of a bitch. He had looked more depressed than usual, drinking booze and pretending it wasn’t a joke, so I actually believed him back then.
But that was a lie too, you know? I even ended up paying for the drinks that night, and I hadn’t even touched a drop.
“…Cadet Kang So-hyun. That was a bit much, even for you.”
…Of course, to others, it probably looked like I was just insulting his dead parents, but it wouldn’t feel that way to him.
That bastard has a specific repertoire for his lies.
Since I hit the nail right on the head with one of them, well, he must be feeling something.
“Sigh, I was trying to test something out.”
After patting the weakened Mimic as if apologizing, the guy set it down gently in a corner.
“See? You’re perfectly fine. How could a ‘weak’ guy stay so calm while being attacked by a Mimic?”
“Ah, just because of that? You’re a really harsh person. What if I just had a sudden surge of superhuman strength because I was in a crisis?”
“Then you should have escaped before that superhuman strength ran out.”
“That’s a fair point. Up we go.”
Getting to his feet, the guy flashed a smile and held out a hand toward me.
“You’re an interesting person. I like you.”
…He really never changes.
After we had teamed up to take down Icarus—an amorphous monster and a ‘High-Rank Species’ stronger than even high-tier species—he had smiled and held out his hand to me.
He said the exact same thing back then.
— Wow, you won’t even shake my hand?
— Stop playing tricks and keep moving.
— Tricks? We just took down a mid-boss together. Since things turned out like this, why don’t we cooperate?
— Cooperate…?
— Yeah. I don’t know what your goal is, but I’ll help you.
— Really? Whenever I say I need to get out of this dungeon, everyone laughs their asses off. Oh, and I split the skulls of everyone who laughed, so feel free to laugh if you want to join them.
Ironically, it was only then that the smile vanished from his face, and he withdrew the hand he had offered.
— Ah, don’t misunderstand. I just genuinely wanted to cooperate. Fine needles coated in a mix of anesthetics and poison come out of my fingertips, you see.
Surprisingly, that was the first truth he had told since we met.
— Is that so? So what?
Of course, I had grabbed his withdrawn hand anyway and squeezed, breaking it right then and there.
— Aaaagh…!!?!!
— Due to certain circumstances, my body is currently almost entirely immune to poisons. And hey, you bastard. Who said I’d let you cooperate just because you asked?
— I surrender…! I surrender…!
Well, now isn’t the time to be reminiscing about that. What I’m trying to say is…
That son of a bitch is wearing the exact same gloves he was wearing back then.
“…Uh, crap. Do you happen to know about these gloves too?”
“For a guy with such quick wits, why did you only realize it now? You should’ve noticed sooner.”
“Ah, I’m really screwed.”
“Don’t worry. I don’t have that much of a grudge against you.”
“That sounds like you have a small grudge, doesn’t it?”
“You really do have quick wits.”
The guy tried to make a run for it, but the moment he turned around, he realized it was futile. He raised both hands and surrendered obediently.
Just because I wasn’t saying anything didn’t mean my companions were doing nothing.
The four of them had already blocked his path of retreat.
Since he was fairly skilled himself, he wouldn’t try to force a breakthrough without knowing the capabilities of the other four.
“…Seriously, I just wanted to check because it felt like my lover was about to cheat on me, and now look at this mess.”
I was planning to beat him up a bit more and take his artifacts, but I suddenly remembered that he had been approaching us.
“Hey, why were you looking for us anyway?”
Of course, there was a chance he was just heading this way by coincidence, but judging by what he just said, I had a feeling he was looking for us just as I was looking for him.
Because when this guy talks about a ‘lover,’ he’s usually referring to an artifact, not a person.
“…What do you mean by that?”
But the bastard started playing dumb again.
He probably wants to change the subject because it’s something disadvantageous to him.
I smiled at the guy who was clearly feigning ignorance.
I’ve known him for quite a while, so I know all too well—to a sickening degree—how to get a truthful answer out of him.
If it’s something he doesn’t want to talk about, he’ll talk after two broken fingers. If he insists he absolutely can’t say anything, he usually spills after about seven.
“Wait a second. Now that I think about it, I understand what you mean. Could you give me just one chance?”
“…I don’t think so. I think I can kindly help you understand better.”
“No, I definitely remember now! One of the artifacts I have was reacting and being drawn to you all, so I was going to deal with it… no, I mean, I was going to meet you.”
Ah, why are this guy’s wits so sharp? I smiled very kindly so he wouldn’t catch on.
“…Can Cadet Kang So-hyun even make a face like that?”
“Oh, Junior, did you know you looked like a real villain just now? That was impressive.”
“…Wow, usually when he smiles at me, he at least looks human, but this is a bit much.”
“For a moment there, my disciple felt like a member of the Wicked Faction.”
Why is everyone reacting like this? I thought I smiled the same as always…?
* * *
Um, this is bad. What should I do?
The person Kang So-hyun evaluated as a ‘scammer and a bum.’
Licht—his real name—was regretting his hasty approach toward the boy and his party.
To be honest, he was confident in his skills, and he thought he could at least escape even if things went wrong.
But it wasn’t a matter of skill, nor was it a matter of artifacts.
It was the gap in information.
In the most crucial area, he was completely outmatched by the boy before him.
He knew nothing about them, but the other side seemed to know him far too well. He couldn’t afford to be blindly hostile in this situation.
If there was one hopeful thing to be found in this predicament, it was that the boy didn’t seem particularly hostile toward him…?
But why?
It was one thing to have no hard feelings about being deceived by lies and traps.
The boy hadn’t fallen for his lies in the first place, and he seemed to already know what kind of person Licht was.
The fact that the boy seemed to be looking for him? He didn’t know the reason, but that was possible too.
After all, wasn’t he looking for the boy because his artifacts had reacted to him and his companions?
The boy might have his own reasons.
However, there was one thing he simply could not understand.
It was because he felt a type of emotion from the boy’s gaze that he had rarely received in his entire life.
His instincts, honed over a lifetime as an adventurer, were telling him:
This guy likes me.
But why?
They were clearly meeting for the first time, and he had no memory of ever swindling this person. So why did he feel friendship… well, not quite friendship, but a sense of familiarity from him?
And if it was familiarity, why did he also harbor a strange mix of regret and anger at the same time?
“Hey, as I said before, I don’t have a huge grudge against you. Got it, you scammer?”
“I’m not a scammer, I’m an adventurer. Would you like to hear one of my tales? My adventures are…”
“I’m not interested in your shitty adventure stories that are thoroughly beautified from your perspective. Just do me a few favors, and I’ll let you go.”
“…And if I refuse?”
“For the first time in a long time—ah, no, not a long time. For the first time in your life, you’ll personally realize how many bones in your body need to break before a refusal turns into an acceptance.”
That meant he was going to beat him half to death.
Still, the fact that he didn’t say he’d take his head meant it wasn’t entirely bad.
He might be able to escape by taking advantage of the boy’s goodwill, and depending on what the favors were, he could just comply and leave.
Perhaps the favors would be more reasonable than he expected.
“Let me have a few of your artifacts and those Wax Wings.”
“…If you’re going to lust after my lovers, you might as well kill me. You crazy devil.”
“Sure.”
The boy in front of him smiled—a smile that was different from the twisted one from before, looking genuinely, truly happy.
“I knew you’d answer like that, you psycho.”
And without a moment’s hesitation, the boy grabbed his finger.
“Aaaaagh…!!!!”
And snapped it in an impossible direction.
“Why are you screaming? You’re being noisy, bastard.”
* * *
Ah, it was a nostalgic sound and sight.
Snap, crack, crunch, pop. A human body could make such sounds. I remembered how, once you really started breaking someone, they eventually reached a point where they couldn’t even scream anymore. Those past memories came flooding back.
The fact that I became accustomed to torture was half thanks to those ‘hero’ bastards and half thanks to this guy.
As a side note, when the Chairperson tried to stop me, saying it was too cruel and unbefitting of a hero cadet, I told her, “This guy has an Elf treasure and some kind of diary.” Upon hearing that, the Chairperson acknowledged that my actions were for the sake of world justice.
“Harder! Stronger! Ahem! Cadet Kang So-hyun! Do you think he’ll feel like talking if you break them so half-heartedly? Move…! I’ll do it myself!”
“No, let me do it a bit more. How often do I get a chance for practical training like this?”
“…Um, So-hyun is one thing, but Chairperson. Didn’t you just say it was ‘unbefitting of a hero cadet’?”
“I’m not a cadet, so it’s fine. Adults sometimes have to do things they don’t want to do…!”
Just what is in that diary that she’s so angry?
I’m curious, but I feel like if I ask to see it, I’ll end up in a similar state.
“Heh… hehe…”
“You’re laughing? It doesn’t hurt much?”
“Seeing as you’re torturing me like this but not killing me, you seem to know that I don’t usually carry my artifacts on me, don’t you?”
…Ah, he caught on?
“And you call this torture, yet you haven’t touched my tongue or teeth. You’re avoiding the mistake of slurring my speech.”
…This guy strangely becomes a different person whenever artifacts are involved.
“If you go any further, I might die. Can you handle that?”
This jerk. He’s playing the “I’ll just die then~” card. How cowardly.
As expected, even if I don’t plan on meeting him again after we leave this place, I need to re-establish our relationship step by step.
This is your fault now, okay? You should’ve listened when I was trying to be nice.
“It doesn’t look like you have a way, so why don’t you just let me go? Hmm?”
“Who says I don’t have a way? I haven’t even officially started yet.”
“…Huh?”
From now on, very slowly. Taking my time. I’ll make you remember why you used to be so afraid of me.
You scammer bastard.
“You brought this on yourself, you know?”
“Is there still a chance for me to reverse my decision?”
“Hand over the artifacts.”
The guy closed his eyes.
I decided to give him a smile.