Chapter 3

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Translator: penny

Chapter: 3

Chapter Title: Why Isn't the Status Window Showing?

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Why isn't the status window showing?

"What the hell is this disaster..."

Instead of coolly accepting what I couldn't avoid, I should've tried to find a way out somehow. But no, you dumbass Stay. You quitter who gives up without even trying. A goddamn addiction to surrender.

Cursing myself for climbing onto the guillotine of my own accord, I had no choice but to open the door to the VVIP room.

"Whoa..."

What I saw was undeniably worthy of the VVIP nameplate—a room so stunning it made me forget my desperate situation for a moment.

"This is on a whole other level from the emergency room break room."

In truth, us grunts just called it a break room, but there was no actual lounge in the ER.

It was just a dusty storage room we barely used. When we were so exhausted we felt like dying, we'd collapse in there for 10 or 20 minutes and call it our "break room."

Compared to that, this room was luxuriously extravagant for someone like me who only knew that filthy, dust-covered storage as a lounge.

"Whoa... how does it even have an ocean view? I'd only heard rumors, but a room like this really exists."

Designed purely for patient comfort, the room had everything anyone could need.

Ultra-precise scanners you'd only see in the ICU, a dedicated fridge for recovery potions, and leisure items for mental care—not to mention every gadget imaginable.

If it weren't for the medical equipment, you couldn't tell if this was a seven-star hotel or a hospital room.

"But the patients stuck in here probably can't use any of this stuff anyway. Just for show, huh?"

This perfect room was equipped with everything truly necessary, but the patient occupying it was in a vegetative state, unlikely to ever make use of it.

"Yeah, vegetative patients... Enough sightseeing. Time to check them out."

The word "patient" reminded me why I'd been reassigned here.

That's right—from today, I was no longer an ER grunt. I was now the full-time caretaker for these vegetative women, whom even the Papal Court had deemed beyond recovery.

They call it caretaker, but it's basically gravekeeper duty. Guarding people who'll never wake up.

Even in their vegetative state, that didn't change the fact that these three were the world's top heroes.

What I mean is, their bodies were incomparably tougher than some small-time unlucky nobody like me.

Even if they aged to death, I'd croak first while they stayed perfectly preserved.

This luxurious room might as well be the prison I'd rot in for life.

For someone who'd dreamed of paying off his debts, opening a cozy café, and leisurely brewing coffee, this was a bitter pill.

"Haaah... Tch. Fine. Let's go take a look at the faces of the veggies I'll be guarding forever."

Denial wouldn't change reality, so with a deep sigh and a click of my tongue, I opened the door to the room with the most familiar name among the three firmly shut ones.

Click.

The door opened smoothly without a creak, revealing a woman lying on the bed. Her beautiful silver hair shimmered brilliantly in the sunlight.

Known to the world as the Light of Humanity, Savior, Saintess—a woman whose feats and powers more than justified those titles: May Luina.

Kind, polite, bestowing blessings on everyone she touched. She was a true saintess descended upon this era.

"Ugh... just looking at her face gives me massive PTSD."

But to me, May Luina was just a psycho bitch in a mask with a rotten personality.

Not just bad—she was downright vile, knowing exactly how to torment someone to maximize their suffering.

Even seeing her like this, her beauty praised as god's own handiwork, only gave me chills.

Back in May Luina's early awakening days, when she was just starting out as a hero, she didn't have her perfect healing abilities yet.

That's why she got hit with a special poison that was hard to detox with her powers at the time and ended up in the ER. While being treated, she went around asking everyone who the youngest here was.

No one knew why the promising saintess candidate—hailed as the talent to save the world, worthy of the saintess title after centuries—was looking for the ER rookie. But the staff casually brought her the newbie anyway.

Yeah, me—the second-year ER grunt at the time.

Exhausted to my core, I met a smiling May Luina. She took me to her private room where she was getting her antidote and asked me a few questions.

My age, what I did here, why I was working here, how long I'd keep at it.

Basic stuff you'd ask a stranger.

Up until then, I thought she was as wonderful as her "top saintess candidate" title suggested.

So without a hint of suspicion, I spilled everything: how I ended up in debt, that I had about eight years ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠left to pay it off, and that quitting would get me beaten to a pulp by loan sharks.

I had no idea that would be the key to stripping off her mask.

Two years later, it still feels like yesterday. That psycho bitch dragged me into her private room, locked the door, and said...!

Just imagining it sends shivers down my spine—that psycho bitch dropping her mask and declaring she'd use me as her Emotional Trash Can.

From that day until ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠May Luina transferred from the ER to a regular ward and was discharged, I was summoned... not just daily, but almost hourly to play her Emotional Trash Can.

Refuse? Not an option.

The gap between a top saintess candidate and an F-rank grunt drowning in debt was beyond heaven and earth.

"If pretending to be nice is so exhausting, just stop. Why dump her bullshit on innocent me?"

It happened years ago, but just thinking about it pisses me off.

Not that it was years ago—she kept coming to me even after gaining perfect healing that kept her out of the ER, whenever she was bored or pent-up.

What a total bitch.

May Luina kept her mask on for everyone else but dropped it with me because I was the lowest person she knew.

No one would believe her true nature if exposed, she said.

The fact that even I bought that excuse just makes me angrier.

"Well, at least I won't have to be her Emotional Trash Can anymore."

Recalling those bittersweet—no, just plain bitter—days with May Luina, and now seeing her lying motionless on the bed with her eyes closed, a strange feeling washed over me.

The May Luina I knew was the type to work herself to death, then order someone to fetch a slice of cake from her favorite bakery when they could barely stomach a bite of instant ramen—then complain it was tasteless after eating it all, dragging them back endlessly to bitch about it.

"Never seen her this quiet before."

The current May Luina just looked... like a doll, somehow.

She doesn't move on her own anymore, so doll isn't wrong.

That noisy woman showing such silence... it felt off. Like something was missing.

"Not that I miss it or anything."

As if I'd miss it. Being her Emotional Trash Can ranks top three in my ER shitshows.

Thinking that her vegetative state was actually better—and that voicing it would get me stoned, magicked, and stabbed to death—I suddenly noticed something odd.

"Huh? What's that? Who clipped it on so sloppily?"

The ECG clip monitoring May Luina's heart was poorly attached to her finger.

Did it slip when they moved her here? It needs to be secure.

As her future caretaker for this vegetative heroine, any anomaly in her condition could be life-threatening.

So I spread the clip that looked ready to fall off and grabbed her slender finger to reattach it properly.

That moment.

May Luina's status window—which shouldn't have been visible—floated across my retina.

"W-What is this..."

The first other person's status window since gaining the ability.

As I reeled from this unfamiliar sight, ding, a new notification appeared on my retina.