Chapter 181 - [Tower of Lust, Floor 46] Enter the Knights of the Gold Sun, NTR, and Hypnosis!

The two brothers went for my right arm and my left. The moment I funneled aura into both hands to block them, a blade came thrusting in at my navel — and this time there would be no stopping it with my feet. I could see it plain as day: they would wreck my stance and skewer me, all three at once.

These bastards — spouting idiotic nonsense one second, picking my body apart target by target the next-!

Which is why, instead of my feet, I sent the Knight of the Gold Sun — charging me head-on — flying with an [Eye Beam].

"Guhooook~!?"

"Boss!"

"…I knew it. You're no ordinary man!"

Right. What hunter who climbed this high would be ordinary? If I'd been one, that moronic combination would have actually landed.

"Shall I help~?"

"Hey, damn it! Something about that DID feel off! Why weren't you helping — why were you just standing there watching!?"

"You four gentlemen looked like you were having plenty of fun without me. Aren't you all actually quite close?"

""""Where the hell did you even get that idea!!""""

When the four of us roared at her in unison, she snickered and aimed a finger gun at me.

"Loading! [Wind Blaster (D)] ×20! Fire—!!"

"Uook!?"

One wind stream, two, three, four — in an instant, twenty layers wove together into a tornado of a gale that swept the entire front, myself included.

What the hell, team kill!?

"""————!!!!"""

—It wasn't.

She left me standing, perfectly unharmed, at the exact center of the storm's eye, and blew away nothing but the three knights.

Clowns they may have been, but a Constellation was still a Constellation. Unlike every enemy I'd felled so far, they drove their swords into the ground and held on. They even had a counterattack left in them: the leader, the Knight of the Gold Sun, kindled a crimson glow in his eyes and made a great show of reaching his hand toward Ian.

"Kuk kuk! So that's how you come out, is it? Lovingly dating your way up the Tower… It was already an eyesore, so this works out nicely… I absolutely LOOOVE tearing couples like you apart!!"

A snap of released energy — a bolt of golden aura lanced through Ian.

"Huh?"

The aura had struck her square in the chest and wrapped itself around her body, yet dealt no real damage. Instead it just kept squirming, trying to accomplish something, and looked — bizarrely enough — completely useless.

"What did you just do to me?"

"Euhahaha!! I am the Knight of the Gold Sun! My skill, Splitting Hearts, strips the rose-tinted haze from every lover you have now or had in the past — anyone your heart ever fluttered for — and inverts that love, flipping it over into thick, heavy hatred!!"

He cackled, keha-ha-ha. The man was a third-rate villain in the flesh.

"Even so, I'm not dating Changki. What would be the point of using that skill?"

"Kuk kuk! Maybe for now — but that composure won't last! You've been struck by my skill! Before long, you'll awaken to the truth: 'every man I've ever met was trash!'"

"…And?"

"Aha. No need to make it complicated. Simply put — the more men I've dated, the deeper I loved them, the harder those feelings invert. Which means even men I'm not involved with, any man at all, becomes someone I despise. That about right?"

"Exactly so!"

Hahahahaha!!

Bellowing with laughter, he yanked at the aura clinging to Ian's body, straining to drag the negative emotions out of her — but neither a Constellation's aura nor his skill lasted long.

Pop—!

"…Whuh?"

The skill latched onto Ian deflated like a balloon under a needle. He made a boneheaded sound, and the small fry standing behind him reeled in horror.

"B-but Boss — the skill that's shredded countless couples — it doesn't work~!?"

"The skill that turned a happy couple with dinner plans for tomorrow into lovers staring at each other like they'd just watched their partner crap his pants mid-date!!!"

They gaped, unable to grasp why it hadn't taken, and I turned to look at Ian as well. Our Great Witch spread the five fingers of one hand and smiled as she loaded a skill onto each — fire, water, earth, wind, and lightning, one for every element.

"I get it. It converts the 'love' I felt for every man I've dated into 'hatred,' and makes me see the men around me as trash. But flip that around — if I've never once had a good man in my life, there's no love to invert. And if I hated them from the very start, the whole thing fizzles out. It's a garbage skill, isn't it~?"

"W-wait a moment! Not that I mean to flatter you, but that part of you is actually rather adorable! And yet — you've truly never dated anyone, never once had a lover!?"

"Something close, once. Something close."

"Something close!?"

Ian spread her other hand. On those five fingers, too, skills bloomed — ice, plants, poison, light, and darkness, five more attributes lined up in a row. Anyone could see she was preparing something ominous, and she chuckled heh-heh-heh the whole while. Not a laugh of joy — the smile of a fury at a slow boil.

"You didn't even need to remind me of all things~! Every man who's ever come near me has been trash, every last one of them~! Even my own biological father was really, really, really, REALLY trash~! The only men around me who even pass for normal are one bald geezer who stubbornly refuses to give up his sunglasses~! and this idiot right here, who asked me point-blank whether he could fuck my mom!!!"

Crackle! Crackle-crackle-crackle!

Ten attribute skills condensed ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠into one, and a black orb — ominous at a single glance — neared completion. This was dangerous. The Constellation had evidently reached the same conclusion, because he shouted over at me.

"H-Hong Changki! What in the world happened to this woman!?"

The tone of a man begging for help. The sheer gall — not one minute ago he'd been trying to skewer me dead.

"You don't need to ask her. I'll tell you myself. Me — every man I've ever dated has been a lunatic! I'd welcome them sweetly, thinking they'd come to me because they liked me, and somewhere along the line they'd start angling to get inside my house! So I'd invite them over, and naturally they'd trade numbers with my mom! And once their texts got sparse, I'd catch them sneaking off for secret little meetings with her~! Ah-ha! Ahahaha! You have no idea how absurd it was — I spent my days remotely monitoring my mom's chat app~~??"

Ahahahahaha!!! Ahahahahahaha!!!!

Years of bottled-up resentment had finally burst. And at last, the dark, brooding orb was complete — it looked like one of those cursed gem-orbs an evil sorcerer would keep rattling on his staff.

"Waitwaitwaitwait!!! What is this!? You're telling me every man you've ever been with was making a play for your mother~!?"

"Correct! Which is exactly why~! I know better than anyone that 'there is not one decent man around me,' no skill required!! I know it! And you dared — you DARED — hit me with that skill? Ahahahaha!!! I was going to let it slide with a laugh, but I don't think I will~~???"

Crackle! Crackle! Crack-crack-crack—!

The condensed mass of skills began to give off light. I had no idea how many attack skills she'd fused into it, but the remaining two knights must have judged that letting her fire would end everything — they hastily threw themselves forward.

"What a pitiful creature you are — a monster who knows nothing of looove!!"

"Dyuhooo~! Receive it! The strongest hypnosiiiiis!!!"

Two skills, ridiculous and dangerous in equal measure. The aura the knights stretched out shot straight for Ian — but our Great Witch only sneered, as if they weren't worth her time.

"Ohh~? So that's the kind of thing you're into~?"

First, one small matter.

"[Skill Card Reveal]."

She drew a skill of the very same color from inside her coat and held it out before her.

"Uooooh! To think you'd deliberately put a trash skill on the line!?"

"I've got at least 900 shit-tier skills on hand alone. Getting a few of those pinched off me at this point neither hurts nor itches."

At her snickering, the fat knight played his next card.

"…Dyuhu! Then how do you like this!?"

"Hyuuk~♡"

A moan slipped out of her, and the output of the fusion skill she'd been about to unleash plunged. Afraid she'd actually been hit, I moved to step in — but the witch laughed again.

"…Word is, this genre is all the rage among men these days?"

"That is NOT how you enjoy that genre~~!?!!!"

"B-Boss! This woman is a genuine monster!!!"

I could relate.

Ridiculous as they were, every one of those skills had come fast and hard — and Ian had blocked them all while laughing.

"Done? Nothing else? Then I'll start wrapping this up."

"Waaaait!!! We finally made our entrance — grant us just a little more leeway—!?"

"Nope. We've got plenty on our plate. No time to dawdle here~!"

"—Uooohk!?"

She thrust the black orb forward and, with the tip of the broom her skill had conjured, gave it a light tap.

"Fly. [Magical Explosion]—!"

Violence, unleashed.

What followed was a calamity that slipped past the edges of human perception. The instant the orb released everything it had condensed and went off, a black, murky tide spread wide enough to swallow my entire field of vision and crashed down over the enemy.

"""AAAAAAAAAHHHHH!!!!!!!"""

The storm raged, gouging ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠a narrow canal through the bare earth and carving out a road. The black beam scoured away everything before it and shoved them all the way to the floor's far edge. Even the screams didn't last long; they dissolved into fading death-wails.

By any sane standard, a righteous heroine does not fire beams of black annihilation — and yet it was, all the same, a final trump card that summoned exactly that image.

"…"

When it was over, nothing remained before us. No enemies, no screams, no grass roots, not even the clouds they'd posed against — all of it wiped clean away.

The star of this extra-large act of violence wiped her brow and beamed, thoroughly refreshed.

"Phew. The second the talk turned to men, I just couldn't help flooring it~!"

She had proven through sheer violence that for Ian, anything involving men and her mother was sacred, untouchable ground.

Watching it all in a daze, I felt my forehead begin to throb.

Seres, Brigitte… why is it that every woman around me has suffered at some man's hands?

I hadn't noticed it at first, but by now the pattern was unmistakable.

So the "mark of a man fated to suffer through women" really did exist.

That son of a bitch at the top of this Tower….

"Why are you just standing there?"

"You're her daughter, and you're this ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠strong. Just imagining how strong your mother must be is giving me a headache already…."

"Ah, that? That's an ultimate. The charge-up window is enormous, and it's not something I can fire whenever I like — you'd best not use it as your yardstick."

"…Really? What happens if you charge that up and fire it at Lee Soyeon?"

"My mom reflects skills, too — I can't throw something that big at her."

"Fuck, don't tell me that. That gives me a goddamn migraine."

I looked around. Aside from the three black bastard brothers, there had been a forward base guarding the 46th floor — that, too, was simply gone. The locomotive that had ground to a halt tried to flee without us. Fat chance of that; we clambered aboard on the spot.

"On the way, let's at least talk through how we're going to handle your mother."

"Hearing you talk about 'conquering' my mom has me feeling weirdly antsy, you know?"

"That's not what I meant, so loosen up that neck."

"I'm kidding."

Was she, though?

I shot her a look of suspicion, and the witch turned her head away — awkwardly, just a beat too late.

It had been the same with Nayami. The women around me, bright as they seemed on the outside, carried darkness banked up inside them that ran far, far too deep.