A Trivial, Embarrassing, and Personal Sin (1)
Raindrops struck the mansion walls, creating an inscrutable rhythm.
“He’s taking forever.”
Benny muttered, tapping the railing with a wrench to mimic the beat.
Santra had teleported the Peres siblings and Benny back to Benny’s mansion. Yet time dragged on with no sign of Nathan’s return. What if she had used the transition gate to drop him outside the Heavens— Benny shuddered violently and shook the thought away. No way. If that had been her plan, she would have done it long ago. She probably wouldn’t harm Nathan. After all, she had allowed him to tend to Aspen for nearly a week.
“...It’ll be all right, won’t it?”
“What’s taking so long? Did someone claim the bathroom?”
Kilika, who had kicked the workshop door open, shattered Benny’s reverie.
“Weird. With this many bathrooms in the house, it’s hard to even form a line.”
“What are you even saying? The first thing out of your mouth when you walk in—”
Benny let out a joyful cry at the sight of what the Niko twins had carried in on the stretcher.
“Our Sweetie! Where have you been!”
But Sweetie could not answer. Even if it could speak, the result would have been the same. Benny’s guardian and companion beast had not returned whole. The monstrous creature—teeth shattered, body smashed to ruin—lay completely still.
Hodrick hunched his shoulders as the cheerfully approaching Benny drew near. Kilika, shedding her raincoat and shaking out her soaked hair, wore a regretful expression.
“It was pinned under the building. I snuck it out during the chaos of the cleanup.”
“Thank you so much. In that case, I’ll forgive you.”
“Forgive me? What did I do wrong?”
The former executioner, now simply unemployed, spoke with perfect nonchalance. It seemed she meant to brush off their old, deep-rooted conflict—the one that had once led to an outright severance of ties.
From Benny’s perspective, it was something to feel sorry about. When she had told them to quit the arena job that didn’t even value their lives, she hadn’t been denying the Niko siblings’ existence; she had been denouncing Kada Sakano. Kilika, who had stormed off in a rage that day and stayed away for a long time, was now smiling as if nothing had happened. Benny couldn’t tell whether this was an attempt to mend their friendship or the result of a newfound interest in the new prosthetic arm after the fight with Nathan. Still, she chose not to press the matter.
“What did I do wrong, you ask?” Benny said instead, lips pursed in a pout. “You’re drying your hair with the blueprint.”
When still-damp ink trickled down her face, Kilika recoiled in horror.
----------
“What does this look like to you?”
“A damn wench who makes a prosthetic for the Sapiens that nearly ate me alive but refuses to finish mine?”
“Wrong.”
“A mentally disturbed friend who’s grinning ear to ear even though her pet just died?”
“...Not me. This.”
Kilika stared suspiciously at the object she had pulled from inside Sweetie’s skull.
“A red bulb wrapped in an iron plate.”
Benny turned to Hodrick. He nodded, then waved a hand through the air with great confidence.
Whatever it is, at least it’s smarter than Kilika.
“This little guy, though.”
Benny rummaged through a drawer, suppressing a laugh, and produced a small metal puppy figurine. She inserted the fist-sized, glowing red object into the empty slot in its head. The hexagonal frame fit the space perfectly. The doll immediately stirred to life.
When the energetic mechanical puppy lifted its head and bounded toward Benny, Kilika—who had been pinching her brother’s side—screamed. Benny caught the puppy in her arms.
“Welcome back, our Sweetie. I’m sorry I left you behind.”
“What is that?”
“Now that I think about it, this is the first time I’ve shown you. This core is Sweetie. There’s a soul inside—”
“Cool. Can I touch it?”
The voice did not belong to Kilika. Benny, who had been hugging the puppy tightly and rubbing her cheek against it, spun around in alarm. Aspen stood in the doorway, shrugging. He had opened the door far more politely than Kilika, so she hadn’t noticed him enter.
Kilika, still clinging to Hodrick after being startled by the revived doll, watched the pair with keen interest from that same position. There was a scent that sharply pricked a woman’s intuition—the scent of a strange tension that rarely arose in ordinary relationships. A taut silence, thin as a pulled thread.
Yet Aspen seemed oblivious to it. He walked in casually and snapped the tension like a twig. Benny, who had been avoiding his gaze, hiccupped. Aspen stopped right beside her and leaned against the railing, frowning slightly as if his body still troubled him. Then he crunched into the corn he was holding.
Kilika’s eyes sparkled. The right hand gripping the corn was a mechanical prosthetic. Its refined elegance could only have been crafted by Benny.
“Wow, even a total stranger gets something better than me now. Hey, Benny. At this rate you might as well make mine—”
Aspen, who had been gazing at the floor below the railing, froze mid-bite. Kilika, who had been tapping Benny’s shoulder with the back of her hand while complaining, fell silent at the inexplicable chill that suddenly filled the air.
Only then did Aspen bring the corn back to his mouth. The only sound in the silence was his chewing. It continued until he spoke again.
“The kernels here are rather thin.”
“...It’s difficult for them to grow properly at this altitude. Large-scale farming is hard in the Heavens.”
Benny answered simply because she felt she had to say something. Yet even that somehow sounded like an excuse. She wanted to slap the back of her own head.
“Why are you so scared? Isn’t this your house?”
Exactly. Why was she? Because of what she had done? Or because she feared getting stabbed? Because the moment their eyes had met inside the collapsing building—when she had thought it was the end—still burned so clearly in her memory?
The shrinking Benny spoke in a thin voice.
“Sorry.”
“For our first meeting?”
There was nothing aggressive in his tone. Yet something about it made her choose her words carefully. Benny corrected herself cautiously.
“I’m sorry.”
It was about what she had said regarding Nathan. When they had met at the courthouse, Aspen had clearly seemed bothered by it. But Benny soon regretted offering the apology first. It appeared to have reached Aspen’s ears with a slightly different meaning.
“Sorry, you say. This must be the first time we’ve actually spoken, yet you begin by apologizing. After feeding me, letting me sleep, hiding me, even giving up your own bed. You’re making me suspect something strange.”
Aspen’s voice remained calm.
“My arm. Are you certain it could not be healed?”
Benny froze. Sensing the unusual tension, Hodrick carefully stepped in front of Aspen. Every motion only inflated the misunderstanding. Aspen set the corn down on the edge of the table.
“Look, I don’t know what you’re thinking, but calm—”
The instant Kilika’s hand touched the handle of her scythe, Aspen seized her index finger and twisted it.
“Aaaagh—! Wait! I surrender!”
Caught completely off guard, Kilika dropped to her knees with a groan. Hodrick, who had been rushing to save his sister, stopped dead when his eyes met Aspen’s. The murderous intent clinging to the stranger’s gaze was eerily similar to Nathan’s. Hodrick was certain: one more step and it would be a fight to the death.
Pushing the hesitant, flustered Hodrick aside, Benny cried out in panic.
“Wait, wait! Stop—! It’s not that! It’s not!”
“What isn’t?”
Benny opened and closed her mouth, unable to find an easy answer. Convincing a patient who had lost a body part was difficult even on ordinary days. ‘There was a problem with your leg, Teacher, so while you were sleeping I replaced it with a metal one. You didn’t notice until I told you? You’re walking fine. Please leave so I can see the next patient.’ ‘What? Give me my leg back.’ No matter how much prior consent or careful explanation she gave, sometimes that was all the patient heard. Losing a part of one’s body was simply not an easy thing to accept. Such circumstances had also helped the strange rumors about the Graveyard House spread. Of course, she had never removed limbs that still had a chance of healing.
Stumbling through her excuses, Benny regretted everything deeply. Was the karma of her illegal procedures finally catching up with her today—
“Main point only. You didn’t cut it on purpose?”
“Absolutely not! No matter what! I swear on the Heavenly God!”
“Then we’re good.”
Aspen pulled Kilika to her feet and patted her shoulder.
“Sorry.”
“If you’re sorry— Never mind, it’s fine.”
Kilika stood up quickly, looking annoyed, but her expression soon went slack. The prosthetic arm she had tried to clench into a fist now dangled limply.
“I’m starting to hate the species called Sapiens.”
While reinserting the spring that had popped out of Kilika’s arm, Benny asked carefully.
“Why would you suspect something like that…?”
“You said something similar to Nathan. That you fixed his mechanical arm for free because you wanted to ‘get close.’”
Aspen’s speculation was chilling.
“So I wondered. Maybe you were working with the ones who cut off Nathan’s wrists.”
“No. Never!”
“Really?”
What do I look like to him? She did not associate with scum like Kada. The only connection she had was with the now-dead Northern Prince. She had absolutely nothing to do with Galarhorn Corporation. If there was any link at all, it was merely that even his bathroom probably had a Galarhorn bidet installed—
Aspen let the stream of excuses wash over him with one ear while he looked around the workshop in open admiration. Every kind of metal creation packed the ceiling and outer walls.
“Impressive. You made all of this yourself?”
“Y-yes.”
After desperately defending herself, the sudden praise made her answer with genuine pride—then Benny felt something odd. Why is he speaking so casually…?
“As expected, trying to set the mood and intimidate people doesn’t suit my personality,” Aspen said with a shrug.
Kilika muttered under her breath.
“Doesn’t suit? You were damn good at it.”
“True. Instead of wasting time, let’s speak plainly.”
Aspen extended his hand toward Benny. Thinking the moment had finally arrived, she recoiled in fright until her back hit the railing. But what Aspen offered was not a blade.
“Want to be friends?”
Seeing the offered palm, Benny tried to steady her pounding heart and slowly reached out. Yet she hesitated before taking it. If she grasped his hand, would he suddenly snap her fingers?
Aspen’s metal right hand twitched its fingers as if asking what she was waiting for, then snatched her hovering hand out of the air. Fortunately, he did not break anything. He shook her hand firmly.
“Thank you.”
“Pardon?”
“I will never forget the kindness you showed me. Including how you protected Nathan. The Peres family remembers favors as much as it remembers grudges.”
The phrase as much as grudges stuck in her mind. Benny tried to force an awkward smile.
“Of course, unfortunate things did happen in the process.”
The awkward smile vanished.
“Nathan is young. When you consider the past that made it difficult for him to learn right from wrong, he’s much younger than his age. So I’d appreciate it if you stopped there.”
“...That doesn’t sound like how you speak to a friend.”
Benny’s breathing gradually steadied.
“What are you trying to say?”
“It’s a request. To be honest, because I promised to overlook it, I’m asking you not to touch a guy naïve enough to say outright, ‘I’m sorry for sleeping with consent.’”
Still lightly holding her hand, Aspen spoke gently.
“It makes me angry, but I understand. For fourteen years all he learned was weapon techniques, and he crammed how to converse like a person into the remaining three. Still, I’d rather you didn’t confuse a child like that.”
Benny slowly withdrew her hand. Aspen raised an eyebrow.
“He’s not a child. A human who is eighteen is old enough to know what he’s doing.”
“Not a child? Compared to you, we might as well have been born yesterday.”
Hodrick clapped a hand over his mouth in shock. Benny’s eyebrows twitched.
“Am I an old woman?”
“No. It means that with power and experience accumulated over dozens of times our lifespans, if you deliberately shook him, Nathan would have had no other choice.”
“Do you know about Hedonic?”
“I’ve heard the basics. A group that believes anything is acceptable if it brings them pleasure. There was an elder in our family who committed similar misconduct.”
Benny sometimes resented the Heavenly God’s pattern that erased language barriers. It made her understand even the hidden implications behind words. A consumption group of adulterers often found in noble society. That was the context Aspen was subtly drawing.
“Even if it sounds unpleasant, save such slander for places where it cannot be heard. Santra is the one who founded Hedonic.”
“I didn’t say it was bad. It just feels uneasy when the person in question is right in front of me. Out of curiosity, exactly how far does the freedom that philosophy defines actually extend?”
Rubbing the railing oil from his steel fingers, Aspen whispered pointedly.
“How do you even know that Nathan has turned eighteen?”
Benny made the mistake of closing her mouth. And regretted it again.
“Your personality isn’t as sinister as your age, I see. Your reactions are always honest. You could have claimed you heard it from him. You’ve been watching us for a very long time, haven’t you?”
“I…”
“I read my father’s notes. It said Somnus was the one who passed Nathan’s information to Santra. A full two and a half years’ worth. After reviewing your data, Santra discovered something special in Nathan and planned the kidnapping. Correct?”
Benny lowered her gaze. It was the fact that had tormented her all this time—the realization that she bore some responsibility for Nathan’s kidnapping to the Heavens and every hardship that followed.
“...I received a request once. They said a certain human was suspicious and wanted observation equipment. So I lent it, but even if it hadn’t been me, Santra would have eventually—”
“I know. That’s what was written. ‘There are many ways to spy on the Lower World besides Galarhorn’s optical equipment. Galarhorn’s is the most excellent, however.’ Therefore we won’t blame you for the time we nearly died. How could we, when we should be grateful instead? If anyone must be the first target of criticism, it would be Santra, who set everything in motion.”
Aspen stepped closer. He lowered his head to match the eye level of the slightly shorter Benny.
“But continuously stealing glances at every single move is another matter.”
“What did I steal—”
“Your voice is trembling. It was personal observation, wasn’t it?”
Benny, who had been looking down, glared at Aspen with renewed courage a moment later.
“Hodrick, Kilika. Haven’t you eavesdropped enough?”
Hodrick signed something, but Benny ignored it.
“Could you step outside for a moment?”