Judgment. Rest. And Aftermath (4)
"Hey, fuck... fuck...! Are you serious? You're really gonna kill me? You there, hey! Hey, you bastard! Listen to me for a second. No, just fucking listen! Uh... Jeong Hoon? That's right, your name's Jeong Hoon! You're there, aren't you? You are, right? Hey, Hoon, just hear me out! Take this thing off my eyes and listen to what I'm saying, you son of a bitch!"
He thrashed and writhed...!
"Hey, Hoon! No — Lord Hoon! No, fuck... this is murder! Huh? What right do any of you have to put me on trial? Where do you get the right to arrest me and lock me up? Who the hell are you to sentence me to death and carry it out? Weren't we people living in a democratic country? You're not a politician, or a, uh, a real judge from the judiciary...! So by what right are you going to—!"
Thrash, thrash, thrash...!
"Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck! Motherfuckeeeeer! You fucking bastard! Stop standing there with your mouth shut and answer me! I know you're there, you piece of shit! Why do I have to die because of your little make-believe game? Lords this, territories that — what the fuck are medieval concepts doing in modern civilization, you asshole!"
Thrash thrash thrash thrash...!
Han Daegeon, bound tight with rope and a black cloth pulled over his face, screamed and struggled with everything he had.
Of course, not a single person present felt any sympathy for the man's thrashing.
I had successfully converted one of the unused rooms in my castle — the former National Assembly Building — into something purpose-built. Its primary function was execution. Specifically, hanging.
Park Seeun had suggested we just hang him out on the lawn in broad daylight, medieval-style... but Kim Seyeon and I had both opposed it.
We can't do that. You need to remember there are two kids among our residents, Seeun. No matter how harsh and brutal the world gets... at least this place has to remain a sanctuary where adults show consideration — something we leave for the children. No matter what comes down the road ahead of us.
Ah, okay! I was just... just throwing it out there!
Park Seeun had been taking one humiliation after another for two days straight, so the way she protested with her face flushed red was... honestly pretty cute.
She looked far better like this — less the composed, always-stepping-up adult and more like a spirited girl her actual age.
Even while discussing something as heavy as an execution, the faces of the people talking about it carried a certain ease. It was in small moments like these that I could feel how much the work my women and I had accomplished had brought a measure of peace to people who had once trembled in fear and anxiety.
Ah, why was I drifting into warm memories right now? From this point on I had to carry out the execution of this goddamn pretty-boy parasite... and end his life with my own hands.
Well — not with my own hands, exactly. Indirectly.
The advantage of the Blacksmith class was that as long as you had a proper blueprint, you could fabricate matching equipment or construction in an instant.
In particular, the Blacksmith-class holders from (the former) Seo Hyejin's guild, Hope's Wings, were extremely skilled at this kind of work.
Why am I explaining all this? Because right in front of my eyes, in the center of this room, stood the gallows they had prepared — superbly crafted — with Han Daegeon already positioned on it, waiting only for the switch to be pulled.
In truth, it was a device built by reversing the principle of a well winch, but the sheer speed with which they knocked it together the moment I said, "I need an apparatus for carrying out an execution," still left me speechless.
I felt gratitude. Genuine thanks. Because the main reason those people had built this device was precisely this—
"May 8th, 11:50 a.m. The hanging of the condemned, Han Daegeon, shall now be carried out. The executioner is Jeong Hoon, the rightful lord of this domain. That is all."
—to reduce my guilt through an indirect killing, ending a life through a machine rather than my bare hands. It was consideration for me.
"You son of a bitch! I knew you were there! You fucking bastard! What kind of lord are you supposed to be? A bastard who kills people however he damn well pleases — how the hell does that make you a lord? You fucking piece of shit! Weren't we a democratic country? Who the fuck do you think you are, dragging women around and playing lord? You fucking bastard!"
Han Daegeon did not stop thrashing until the very last moment. He did not hesitate to hurl curses at the man about to kill him. Plenty of people would wonder why he was still carrying on like that. But I knew.
That bastard still couldn't believe I would actually kill someone. Even now, with the noose already around his neck on the gallows, he still refused to accept it.
Of course this bastard wouldn't know. That I had killed people before.
And that those had been people who left me drowning in enormous hesitation and guilt. The polar opposite of what I felt toward this piece of trash right now — where even a speck of pity had already vanished. This idiot would go to his grave without ever knowing that moment.
"Condemned. Any last words?"
"Hey, fuck... fuuuck! Wait, just wait a second! I— I've got intel... I've got information! Really good information, I swear! Don't you want to hear it? When I was under that vampire bastard I heard a ton of shit! High-level intel! Aren't you curious? Huh? Just spare me, just spare me and I'll spill everything! Please, please, you fucking bastaaaaard!"
"..."
There was no need to listen. It was a bluff that didn't even deserve a moment's hesitation.
This bastard had already run his mouth plenty. To whom? To the person who had served as his defense counsel — Yun Mina. He'd spilled everything to her.
The moment she dangled a few sweet promises — reduced sentence, maybe even just secure confinement if he cooperated — he'd started babbling away, delighted with himself. Mina had already tipped me off that she'd pass it all along later.
In other words, everything this guy was saying right now was nothing but empty noise.
Han Daegeon's utility value had converged infinitely close to zero.
"Carry out the sentence."
Without hesitation, I pulled down on the rope hanging beside me.
Clunk!
A hole opened beneath Han Daegeon's feet.
"Y— khuhk!?"
A man's throat was wrenched tight in an instant, his feet kicking and trembling in empty air.
"Ghk... uhhh... uhh...!?"
He shuddered, thrashed — then went limp. Even so, his body kept twitching for a while before finally going still.
And just like that, another life vanished from this domain.
The man named Han Daegeon had deceived people over and over, and even at the very end he could not cast aside his pride.
And so he died by my hand.
"..."
And much to his misfortune, nothing appeared before my eyes. No notification of any kind.
"So this kind of indirect killing... doesn't count as murder."
It judged that the rope and the opened floor had done the killing — not me.
Useful information. And rather chilling.
Perhaps that was the full extent of Han Daegeon's remaining value.
I took charge of cremating the body myself.
There was no reason to foist such filthy work on anyone else. A few residents had even volunteered... I turned them all down.
"Even if it was indirect, the one who ended this bastard's life was me. Taking responsibility through to the end is the right thing to do."
Leaving only those words behind, I slung the corpse — wrapped tight in rough cloth and rope — over my shoulder and left the castle. I headed for the open ground behind it, near the Han River.
...Someone was trailing after me with little pattering steps. I deliberately ignored them and kept walking.
Behind the castle, past the athletic field and across the empty parking lot, I arrived at what had once been a yacht marina. I took a moment to look at the enormous cruise ships, yachts, and luxurious passenger vessels still moored at the docks with no owners, then made my way to a nearby stretch of grass.
Thud, thud!
I dug a shallow pit with the shovel I'd brought along. Once the hole was ready, I dumped Han Daegeon's body into it.
Thump!
Then I poured a generous amount of gasoline from the small bottle I'd carried in my coat, struck a match, and tossed it in.
Whoosh...!
Thanks to the fuel, the flames roared up instantly. The acrid stench of burning cloth and gasoline hit my nose — along with the smell of a human body on fire.
But even that was soon carried far away by the wind blowing along the river's current.
It was a wretched end. And yet...
In that he met his death by my hand and was burned afterward...
This bastard's final moments were, astonishingly, similar enough to Seo Hyejin's last moments to set my teeth on edge.
A clear judgment had been delivered. So why did this hollow feeling still fill my chest?
The reality that Seo Hyejin — who had given her life in devotion to us — and this piece of garbage — who had put us in danger and thrashed only to save himself — had met such similar ends kept jabbing at whatever part of me still went by the name of conscience.
I could have made it worse. I could have made him suffer more before I killed him.
That dark, impulsive feeling rose all the way to my throat. My fists clenched tight without my meaning to.
Politics. Governance. Power.
Those concepts for building a stable society had moved me to set aside my rage, make a rational decision, and put it into action.
And before my eyes, it had become reality.
"...What a miserable end."
The voice that broke into my brooding — thick with anger and regret — belonged to a woman. Ah. The one who had been carefully following me this whole time. I almost wondered how she'd managed to trail after me without anyone stopping her.
Without deliberately turning around, I answered.
"But a fortunate one, in its way. For all the sins he committed, two whole people have come to attend his funeral."
"...Can you really call something like this 'attending,' Orabeoni?"
The owner of the voice was the woman who had defended the dead man burning before us.
"...You followed me all the way out here. Didn't Sora or Seyeon try to stop you?"
"I told them that as his counsel I at least wanted to see him through to the end, and to please leave me be — and they didn't stop me. Well, Senior Sora did look a little displeased."
Yun Mina had drawn up beside me at some point, and I wrapped an arm around her shoulders and pulled her close as naturally as breathing.
A man and a woman clinging to each other while watching a corpse burn. There were limits to how unromantic a moment could get. The irony of the scene was hard to miss.
Then again... in a reality that was growing more unhinged by the day, I felt a flicker of unease that a sight like this might eventually pass for ordinary.
"...Thank you for taking on such a difficult job, Mina."
"It's nothing, Orabeoni. It's not really something worth praising..."
"It is worth praising. You volunteered to take the lead on a role that could easily have gotten you pointed at and condemned. And there's one thing I want to say for certain."
I tore my eyes away from the former Han Daegeon, burning down to ash before us, and fixed my gaze on Yun Mina as she watched the flames beside me.
"I believe that anyone who steps up to do the dirty work must receive a reward that matches it. Without fail. If people like that go unrewarded, this world will only spiral further into something even more terrible. So at the very least, on this land I've come to rule... I want to create a place where people like that can fulfill their roles with peace of mind."
I chose my words carefully, packing as much sincerity into them as I could, and whispered them gently. And as if those words had loosened something she'd been keeping tightly wrapped—
Yun Mina, far more reserved than usual, buried her head against my chest and spoke.
"The truth is... I was only repaying an old debt. I owed Han Daegeon something from our university days."
Ah. So this continued from the circumstances I'd heard about before. The story from when she'd said she turned down Han Daegeon's offer and waited for us instead.
Back then I'd been told that Han Daegeon had been pestering her out of "personal" interest—
As expected, that had been a cover. Mina had been hiding her real feelings.
"Honestly... I have this twisted personality, so even after starting university I barely had any friends. I made enemies every day, if anything. I'd expose people's true intentions right to their faces and casually jab at their sore spots... And even so, Han Daegeon was — even if his motives were a little impure — the only person I could call an 'acquaintance.' Ah, not just Daegeon. Yun-unnie, too... and even that irritating Yeon Ju-hui. At least during university, they were the ones who treated me with something close to goodwill."
Almost without thinking, I moved my free left hand and set it on top of Yun Mina's head, where a forlorn atmosphere clung to her.
Very slowly, carefully... I stroked her hair as if to comfort her.
"...Of course, that didn't mean I had any intention of accepting that idiot Han Daegeon's idiot proposal. Even so... I think a little affection remained for the guy who, in his own way, had tried to look after me. So I'd resolved that if he was still alive — if he'd failed spectacularly and somehow still survived — I would at least see him through to the end and offer a small helping hand. And that feeling... flowed in a far more ideal direction than I'd expected... which left me feeling strangely conflicted."
Perhaps what Yun Mina felt could fairly be called lingering attachment. She wouldn't have had much room to argue.
"Orabeoni. Jeong Hoon Orabeoni."
Having emptied out the sincerity she'd been holding back, Yun Mina carefully squirmed in my arms, then looked straight into my eyes. Her gaze was subdued — but it held unmistakable gratitude.
"Thank you, Jeong Hoon Orabeoni. I've always felt this way, but... right now I wanted to tell you even more. For putting up with all my unreasonable demands, and more than anything... for letting a bothersome, strange girl like me stay by your side without ever once getting annoyed. Truly, truly — thank you."
And then she smiled. It was completely different from the smiles Yun Mina usually wore — a smile touched only by pure gratitude.
"What I just said is my honest heart. I've always wrapped everything in pretense and lies, but... this time there's none of that at all. To you, Orabeoni, I really wanted to convey this sincerity."
Thump...!
At those sincere eyes, at that voice expressing her thanks...
My heart pounded with a strangely irregular rhythm.
No — that was—
Desire, stirring.
Whoosh...!
"Ah...?"
On impulse, I pulled the woman before me into my arms as if trapping her between both limbs.
Faced with Yun Mina's genuine self — this woman who always dressed in outfits that left so little to the imagination—
It was the moment the self-restraint that Lawful Good had so solidly built up came crashing down completely.
"If you wish to express your gratitude, Mina."
My tongue and the vocal cords in my throat were no longer under the goddamn interference of Lawful Good.
And so, without holding anything back... I could whisper my dark desire.
"I would like to receive that grateful heart of yours by making love with you."