Chapter 60
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Translator: MadScientist
Chapter: 60
Chapter Title: Threat
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.....
"......What are you talking about?"
"Come on, no need to play dumb."
Ellen smiled with her eyes and sat back down.
"That lump right below your navel. That tiny, cute little thing wriggling away."
"......"
"I've already checked your pulse several times... You think I wouldn't know?"
Her gaze persistently scanned the area below my navel, right at my dantian.
"I was shocked, you know? A slave who can use aura is surprising enough...
But not in the heart—it's all balled up down there. I've never seen anything like it."
"......Hah."
She could see right through everything.
No point in bullshitting her.
Fine, then.
"I taught myself."
"......Huh?"
Reveal the source? No way.
Now that she knew I was different from the other slaves,
what happened to this body from here on out was anyone's guess.
But if I sold out that old man's name right here?
Bishop. The overseer who'd been groveling like a dog just moments ago,
and he probably had plenty of underlings.
If she used her power, her connections to track him down?
Whether Kain, Baekrin, or Noy—they'd find them,
and just like they'd done to me, slice open their guts to take a peek.
I couldn't let that happen.
"I just flailed around trying to survive, and figured it out naturally."
I shrugged, feigning nonchalance.
At my brazen response, Ellen blinked blankly for a moment.
"......Self-taught?"
"That's what I'm saying."
"Pfft."
She let out a disbelieving chuckle.
"Lies."
"......"
"You expect me to believe you created it on your own, without anyone teaching you?
And not in your heart, but below your navel? Come on, White Wolf, that doesn't make sense."
Ellen's voice began to deepen, growing low and menacing.
"I don't like liars."
She set her teacup down on the table.
The light clink crushed the air in the room, making it heavy.
"And... I have a hard time holding back my curiosity."
Slowly.
Her perpetually squinted eyes cracked open just a sliver.
The murky pupils peeking through pinned me with a chilling stare.
"If White Wolf keeps his mouth shut..."
She wagged her finger and whispered.
"I could always find out myself?"
Yeah, I figured.
Bam!
I launched myself across the table.
The teacup tipped over, hot tea splashing everywhere.
Crash!
I slammed into her torso, knocking her chair—and her—backward.
With a heavy thud, her back hit the floor.
"Ugh......!"
I didn't give the bitch a moment to recover from the impact.
I mounted her immediately.
Pinned her solar plexus with my knee and reached out with my right hand to clamp her slender throat.
Squish.
"......!!"
I dug in my nails.
My fingertips pierced her neck flesh.
Drip.
Red blood trickled from her throat, slowly staining her white clothes.
"Gack, ugh......!"
Ellen gagged as if she couldn't breathe.
Her eyes, filled with pain and shock, looked up at me.
I met that gaze head-on and said,
"I don't know if you're a bishop or whatever, or how great and high up you are."
I drove my fingers deeper.
Just a bit more pressure, and I could snap her carotid artery.
"But you're human in the end. Pierce you like this, and you'll bleed out and die just the same, right?"
"Hahk, urk......!"
"So don't pry."
I leaned in closer, nipping her ear before whispering,
"End your interest in me right here. Dig any deeper......
and it's you die, me die. You fucking bitch."
Haah, goddamn it.
How the hell did it come to this?
What the fuck did I do wrong for these shitheads to lose their minds over me?
Even when you bastards fucked with me this much,
I stayed quiet.
Fucking hell, I played along.
Why? Because I could wait it out. Hold on a bit longer and I'd get out.
Scared that if I pushed back even a little, it'd piss them off and extend my sentence.
Wanting to get out quick and grab Baekrin's perky tits just once more.
No matter how dogshit painful it got, I endured, endured, kept enduring,
cursing only in my head, playing dead like a rat...
"Aah... fuck fuck dogfuck fuuuck!! Seriously...! Aaargh!!"
Heat rushed to my head,
and I felt like I had to scream obscenities or explode.
I was done now.
Take her hostage, or if she wouldn't listen, just kill her and run like a rabbit.
Either way, I knew staying put wouldn't keep me or the ones outside safe,
so extreme measures were all I had left.
From here on,
"Hic......"
maximum threats...
"Hic... heeng.... Sorryyy... st-stop, don't squeeze......"
"......?"
She's bawling. Like a damn kid.
Flailing her limbs, face a mess of tears and snot.
"Sob, hik.... It hurts, ah... bloood.... Pleeease......"
"......"
What the...
Some kind of fresh retard bitch?
.....
"......"
A bizarre silence hung in the room.
I slumped back in my chair, staring blankly ahead.
Across from me sat that woman I'd just been choking and threatening.
Ellen, rubbing the hole in her neck with her own hand, pouting.
"Light, heal."
Sizzle.
Light bloomed from her fingertips, enveloping the wound.
The torn flesh knit back together in seconds, the scab flaking off.
"It hurts...... It really hurt."
She puffed out her cheeks and glared at me.
"What if you just lunge like that! And my clothes...... Do you know how hard it is to get red stains out?"
Sniffling voice.
Where'd that chilling gaze from earlier go?
Now she's whining like some worthless shut-in little sister.
Brain freeze incoming.
"......No, you threatened me first."
"Threatened? When did I?"
"Just now, you said if I didn't talk, you'd find out yourself, you crazy bitch.
Dragging in people around me, slicing bellies, ripping guts, cutting brains—that's not a threat?"
"I was just asking! I was curious!"
Ellen hopped up, looking wronged.
"And... I said I'd find out, but I didn't say I'd do anything specific!
And slicing bellies, cutting brains...... How can you say something so cruel?"
Wow, check out this shamelessness.
If this isn't acting,
this fucking Ellen needs to ditch this place and head to Chungmuro right now.
"No, are you insane? That's what you do every workday."
"Me? When did I!"
She widened her small eyes in protest.
"That's unfair! I only healed them! I just fixed them up!"
"......"
Unbelievable.
So her logic is this: She never held the knife, so she's innocent?
While the butcher boys sliced and stabbed,
she just watched from the side and healed at the end, so she's clean?
"When I see wounded people, healing them is my job.
That's why the great father, 'Luminosus,' bestowed holy power in my body."
"......Hah."
I snorted.
"That doesn't add up. If you have such a noble mission,
why the hell are you doing this shit here?"
I crossed my arms and shot back.
"You say healing people is your job. That grand holy whatever is for that."
"Yeah, exactly!"
Her eyes sparkled as she nodded proudly.
"That's what the church taught me.
'In any situation, never let the flame of life extinguish.' That's a priest's duty."
"......"
"No matter how broken or shattered the body, stitch it back, patch it up...
Make the heart beat again, the lungs breathe somehow.
That's my mission, and what I'm practicing here."
Not a shred of shame,
convinced she hadn't done anything wrong—the fanatic's signature confidence.
"So I'm doing my job perfectly!
Since I got here, way fewer kids are dying!"
Whether they flay skin, shatter bones, or guts spill out,
as long as you keep them breathing at the end, that's salvation and healing.
Doesn't matter if the perps enjoy the process.
Damn. So profound,
it's making me nauseous to my throat.
"So because of you patching them up, the bastards go even wilder slicing flesh and chopping bones, and you don't care?"
"......"
"You fix them, so they think, 'Oh, won't die from this?' and go harder without worry.
In the end, you're right there supplying life support like 'Let's enjoy infinitely together'—and you call that helping?"
This fucking bitch is the one making the greatest contribution to this meat slave hellhole.
If she knows, she's shameless; if not, retarded.
So on behalf of my slave comrades, time to speak up.
No Coca-Cola.
At my refreshing fact-bomb, Ellen pursed her lips.
"Why say it like that? 'Enjoy infinitely' what?"
"It's not wrong."
"No. Because of me, fewer slaves are dying."
She murmured softly.
"Five years ago... slaves who tried to run or rebel? Most died.
The masters wouldn't allow it. Had to make examples for the others."
She looked up at me.
No hesitation or guilt in her eyes.
"But I came here, and slaves who pass through now don't die easily after leaving.
They stop doing things that put their lives at risk."
Just pure conviction that her actions were right.
"Better to live in fear forever...
than die, right? As long as you're alive, there's a chance. Isn't there?"
"......"
Life matters most, regardless of how broken the mind or soul gets.
A perfect example of that proverb about preferring to roll in shit than die.
People's standards differ, sure,
but I'd rather die clean than live like less than a beast.
Not some defeatist bullshit like 'Poor and hard, so suicide~'—fuck that wrist-slitter crap.
If so, since birth in this shithole slum,
I'd have bitten my tongue hundreds of times before age five, not just as a baby.
Re-trying roulette like 'Next time rich family, S-rank.'
But I didn't.
Why? Not just 'cause breathing feels good, like she says. No.
I had ambition for a better life,
and the grit of that woman spreading her mangled legs, fantasizing a better life for her bastard kid.
That's why I lived.
Without it, you're not living—you're livestock.
The sub-beast life I mean
is when all human pride, goals get neutered,
living forever on master's scraps, fearing the whip.
The lives of the psychos locked here.
And yet, fucking chance?
"......Bullshit."
I growled low.
"You think you saved their lives, but to me, you just neutered them and locked them in this pit forever."
"......"
"Living's great. Hate dying running or rebelling.
To satisfy your selfish whims, you smash their heads so they can't even try?
You crazy psycho bitch. I don't know the dead ones' stories, but for them, that was their 'chance'."
A tiny chance for a better life.
1% or 0.1%, at least it existed.
The fanatic bitch right here personally shoveled dirt over that pinhole.
Maybe even blocked their last escape: death, the one choice they could make.
"......"
Ellen didn't respond to my words.
Just fiddled with her teacup, face unreadable.
Couldn't understand? Didn't want to?
Anyway, it was her version of conviction.
A mere slave brat vs. church bishop.
Different positions, different thoughts.
No point in ego-battling further.
No need for me to accept or her to be convinced.
But.
'......That doesn't explain one other thing.'
I narrowed my eyes and glared at her.
"Fine, whatever. Say your noble intent is right a hundred times over."
"......Huh?"
"Then quit the excuses."
I leaned forward.
"How do you explain being a pervert who gets wet watching people get tortured?"
"Wh-what are you saying? Stop twisting things!"
Ellen feigned indifference, lifting her teacup to her lips.
But her fingers trembled faintly.
She's trying to hide her expression.
"Don't play innocent. I don't like lying bitches."
Throwing her words back at her,
"You say it's noble saving lives, so why do you climax every heal?
Looking like you're in ecstasy, damn near pissing yourself on the floor."
I nailed the coffin shut.
Try denying this.
Not once or twice—daily incontinence orgasms.
"......!"
Clink.
The teacup slipped from Ellen's hand, spilling on the table.
Her face flushed tomato-red.
"Ah... that's......"
"......"
"That's... I, um...... a bit......"
She floundered, glancing around.
Obviously just us two, but acting like someone's listening.
"It's... a secret......"
Ellen covered her mouth and leaned toward me.
Her herbal tea scent mixed with faint floral notes hit me.
"When I use it... my body heats up...... itches and all......"
"So?"
"Once is fine, but multiple times in a row... using it...... that's how it gets."
She trailed off, head bowed. Ears bright red.
"......"
I was speechless for a moment.
So.
Overusing holy power
causes sexual arousal as a side effect?
"......Then your reason for being here."
"......"
"Noble spirit to save lives... or"
"just to get off?"
"......!"
Ellen flinched, snapping her head up.
Cold sweat beaded on her forehead.
"Of... of course to keep people from dying!"
Her eyes darted wildly.
Voice shaking, face exploding red.
Anyone could see.
'......Fuck.'
I rubbed my forehead with a deep sigh.
Deflated.
"Just an irredeemable pervert after all."
"Uwoot...! I'm not...!
So I was scared shitless of this bitch...
[A bishop is one of only five positions in the church...]
Lol fuck.