Then... Grab the Other Side Too
Then… I should tell him to grab the other side too.
Thud.
The door shut, and a silence like severance from the world settled over the hotel suite.
But Ruby Scarlet’s ears were still ringing.
A stubborn high-pitched whine scraped at her eardrums without mercy.
“……Yeah. I burned his palm. That’s enough. That insolent habit of his should be fixed now.”
Ruby forced the corner of her mouth up into a twist.
It was supposed to be a victor’s smile, yet the face in the mirror warped like a loser’s excuse.
Despite her words, her gaze clung stubbornly to her own left arm.
Throb.
With every beat of her heart, the five finger marks left on her wrist pulsed of their own accord.
It was bizarre.
The one whose flesh had been seared by fire was clearly that man.
So why did her uninjured wrist feel hotter than anything else?
“……Ha.”
As if entranced, Ruby seized her flushed left wrist with her right hand.
As though trying to recreate the mad grip strength he had shown her.
Squeeze.
No matter how hard she clenched it herself, the sensation from that moment refused to return.
That overwhelming force that had pinned her down without so much as a flinch while taking her flames head-on.
The cold, rough texture of his palm.
And the dry voice that had hammered into her eardrums.
— It’s not hot. Not even a little.
“……Lying bastard.”
Ruby threw herself onto the bed.
Crimson hair spilled across the pure white sheets like scattered blood.
She lifted her wrist before her eyes and stared blankly at the brand.
She had spent her entire life burning others.
For the first time in three hundred seventy years, it felt as though someone had carved an indelible mark into her body.
A trace hotter and more vicious than fire itself.
“……This is pissing me off.”
Ruby chewed on her damp lower lip.
Rage should have been the normal response.
She should have wanted to tear apart the bastard who had dared lay hands on her.
Yet strangely, a tingling heat coiled low in her belly, and her wrist burned so fiercely she could barely stand it.
As if his hand still shackled her wrist even now.
And that sense of restraint, far from disgusting her…
Felt piercingly, unshakably stable.
Because he was the first person who had approached without fearing her, and stopped her.
“Ugh…….”
Ruby buried her face in the pillow and let out a bestial groan.
She couldn’t tell whether her wrist hurt or whether some corner of her chest was simply itching.
Only the man’s bluffing voice kept circling inside her ears.
My flames aren’t hot?
That calamity that turns people into charcoal?
“For a little shit who only knows how to bluff…….”
She muttered it, yet the air floating through the room still carried the scent of that “little shit.”
The unfamiliar body heat that had cut through the acrid smell of scorched flesh.
She did not want to admit that the scent was quietly calming her.
Thump, thump, thump.
A heartbeat far too regular and damp to dismiss as mere anger.
She sat bolt upright.
She couldn’t sleep like this.
She had to confirm it. Whether that man was truly a monster who swallowed fire, or just a fraud bloated with empty bravado.
She approached the spot where he had been sitting only moments ago.
The faint remaining scent of soot and his body odor pricked her nose.
“……Next time he comes.”
Her pupils had gone hazy and unfocused.
“Then… I should tell him to grab the other side too.”
She giggled like someone who had lost her mind and pressed her lips firmly against her own bruised red wrist.
A thirst that felt like it was burning her from the inside had begun.
At this point he got turned into a well-done steak and bought a one-way ticket across the River Styx, right?
Somebody go collect the bone dust. I’m prepping the incense.
……These bastards are already boiling spicy beef soup and throwing a funeral.
I pressed an ice pack hard against my palm, enduring the pain that scraped at my nerves, and hammered out a reply with one struggling hand.
Kid’s a bit wild, but once I grabbed her hard she calmed right down.
Next time I’m packing fireproof gear. Taking questions.
The second I hit enter, the comment section exploded.
My deadpan reply flipped the entire gallery’s opinion on its head.
They were right, of course.
According to Aris Mardia’s setting book, Ruby’s symptoms were classic intermittent explosive disorder.
The moment I forcibly stopped her, she should have gone even more berserk and tried to kill me. That was the normal outcome.
So why did she calm down?
Even I was starting to wonder when one comment drove the nail home.
“……These lunatics are writing fanfiction.”
I let out a hollow laugh.
I had nearly died from burns, and somehow I had become the peerless stud who overpowered Ruby Scarlet with raw strength and spent a steamy night with her.
But I had no intention of clarifying.
Truth didn’t matter to these guys anyway. They just needed something to chew on and tear apart.
I smirked and left one last comment before closing the window.
“Hoo, fucking hot…….”
Gallery shitposting was gallery shitposting, but recovering my hand came first.
I opened the point shop and checked the goods.
Fortunately I had plenty of points right now, so there were things I could buy.
Effect: Accelerates treatment of burns and lacerations (Recovery rate 100%)
Penalty: Must be worn for 3 days. Heightened pain sensitivity while worn.
Price: 1500 PT
There’s always a reason cheap things are cheap. Heightened pain sensitivity, huh.
But this wasn’t the time to be picky about cold rice or hot rice.
I bought the bandage and wrapped it around my trembling hand.
In the deep hours of the night, staring at the darkness beyond the window, I collapsed into sleep.
Birdsong from somewhere.
Chirp, chirp.
Morning sunlight stabbed through the curtains and pierced my eyelids.
“……Ugh.”
The moment I opened my eyes, what dominated my senses was a searing pain that felt like it was gnawing my right hand.
Whether from the bandage’s penalty or not, the agony flooding in was even more horrific than yesterday.
I frowned and lifted my hand.
Red pus had soaked through, turning the bandage into a mess.
One hundred percent recovery, my ass. The pain was being delivered at two hundred percent.
Filthy painful, seriously.
“First things first… I have to do the counseling…….”
Honestly I wanted to run. It would be a lie to say I felt no terror at the thought of becoming roast meat again.
But the penalty for counseling failure was death. Choice had never been on the table to begin with.
Besides, I had broken her momentum once yesterday. Today might go a little smoother.
I clutched my throbbing hand and stepped out into the living room.
Click.
“Hey, little shit…… up early, huh?”
The instant I opened the door I froze.
“Ruby……?”
Right in the middle of the living room sofa, Ruby Scarlet sat with her legs crossed like a queen.
Yesterday’s disheveled appearance was nowhere to be found.
Perfectly set crimson hair. A red tank top that laid her figure bare and ripped jeans.
When my eyes fell on the blatantly visible cleavage, her cold, smooth white skin radiated a strange sense of pressure.
The moment she saw me, her brow furrowed hard.
“What the hell. That look……?”
“……A counselor’s allowed to sleep in a little, you know.”
“Not the sleeping in. That hand.”
Ruby jerked her chin toward my right hand.
The hand wrapped tight in a bandage clotted with blood and pus.
A normal person would ask if I was okay, or at least make a pained expression.
But Ruby Scarlet was different.
She set down her teacup and twisted her face as if looking at rotting garbage.
“……Ha, seriously kills the appetite.”
“Excuse me?”
“Get rid of that. It’s disgusting.”
She whipped her head away.
As expected, her personality was world-class.
Apology? Concern? I hadn’t expected any of that from the start.
If anything, she was brazen.
“That’s what happens when you charge in without fear while wearing such weak, flimsy skin.”
“Ah, is that so……?”
“Didn’t I warn you? Getting hurt is entirely your responsibility. I clearly told you to let go, and you didn’t. I did nothing wrong.”
Perfect self-defense mechanism.
Someone got injured by her flames, and she dumped the cause onto the victim’s weakness with that shamelessness.
This was exactly the nature of a terrorist… no, the nature of the Witch of Calamity.
A hollow laugh escaped me.
Yeah. She needs to be this twisted for counseling to be interesting.
I deliberately plopped down on the sofa opposite her and set my bandaged hand on the table with a solid thud.
“Morning blessings already this generous.”
“……I told you to put it away.”
“Ah, so this is a bit disgusting to look at?”
I deliberately slid the pus-soaked bandage a little closer toward her.
“Since someone caused this, mind taking a look?”
“……You son of a—”
Ruby recoiled in disgust, leaning her upper body back.
But her pupils, as if pulled by a magnet, refused to leave my hand.
Eyes full of revulsion. Yet deep in that abyss, a minute tremor of the pupils was captured.
— Zzzzt.
Psychological Insight
A ringing filled my ears. Emotional turbulence.
The closer I brought my hand, the sharper the sound became.
The red aura rising around Ruby wavered uneasily.
“So damn irritating…….”
Irritating?
That wasn’t simple disgust.
The evidence that had taken her flames barehanded kept stimulating her unconscious.
A reality she didn’t want to acknowledge. The fact that a mere human man had endured her fire.
And the uncomfortable truth that the wound had been created solely because of her.
“……Hey.”
Ruby snappishly snatched the gold pouch that had been sitting on the table.
The pouch she flung struck my chest with a dull impact.
Not a simple toss—nearly a full swing closer to assault with a deadly weapon.
Thwack!
The heavy pouch hit my chest and dropped.
“Go get it fixed right now.”
Give the disease and then the medicine?
I let out a snort of laughter.
“Is this treatment money?”
“I just don’t want to look at it. Don’t want to look at it!”
She barked, her voice trembling ever so slightly.
“Get that hideous bandage out of my sight! It’s killing my appetite, so go get it cleaned up properly!”
“Are you worried about me?”
“Don’t talk bullshit! Why would I worry about you? It’s because it’s filthy, filthy!”
Ruby huffed and shot up from her seat.
“Don’t show your face until it’s done. If you don’t come back with that hand completely fixed…… I’ll really burn the other side too.”
Bang!
She fled into her room and slammed the door.
I picked up the gold pouch left sitting alone.
“……Ha.”
A laugh leaked out.
For someone telling me to get rid of it because it was filthy, the weight on my wrist was an excessively large sum.
That compulsive order to come back completely clean.
She was desperately rationalizing right now.
Not because she was worried about me, but because she had to erase the trace she left behind if she wanted to escape the guilt.
She probably didn’t even realize it was a twisted form of guilt.
“She’s got a cute side.”
I shoved my throbbing hand into my pocket and stood.
“Still, she paid for the medicine.”