Even a Scoundrel Gets Tired

62 – Relics

“Welcome back, Young Master!”

“Yes.”

With the affairs of the Order concluded, I returned to my normal life.

Of course, it wasn’t a return to the Duke’s mansion,

but to the academy-provided lodging.

Regardless, I’d secured the Order’s support, and

after that incident, I had no desire to linger.

“Young Master! Dinner—”

“Later, Ella.”

“..Yes.”

Naturally, there was no time to rest after returning.

I felt sorry for Ella, who had been waiting for me,

but I had more pressing matters at hand.

News reached my ears the moment I returned to the academy.

The results of the academy’s mid-term evaluation were out.

Having subdued an intermediate-grade mana beast, I was, of course, in the upper ranks,

which meant there was nothing hindering me now.

[The Cursed Clockwork], to use this artifact.

A magical tool said to manipulate souls.

Just holding it seemed to gather a chilling energy in my hand.

Of course, I hadn’t yet undergone the trial.

Even if I conquered the trial, if I couldn’t use it, it would all be for naught,

so I hadn’t attempted it.

But now, it didn’t matter.

There was no one to stop me from using it as I pleased.

If I could manipulate souls after overcoming the trial…

There was also something I needed to do immediately.

There was no reason to remain stagnant any longer.

*

The moment the conjuration takes hold, everything around me darkens.

After a moment, the shadowy space splits horizontally,

allowing light to enter as if from the inside of a darkened box.

What catches my eye first is an old, wrinkled hand.

And magical circuits that move at the touch of that hand.

Judging by the white lab coat alone,

it was clearly the figure of someone engaged in research.

And as I raise my head, I see

a massive glass cylinder filled with a suspicious liquid.

And a girl who looked to be no older than seven.

Attached to the girl’s right arm was a strange mass of flesh,

a single mass with dozens of mouths,

wriggling like slugs as it clung to the glass.

I widened my eyes at the sight, wondering if they were playing tricks on me,

Fragments of memories, not my own, slot themselves into my mind.

The owner of this body was a scientist, engaged in bio-experiments.

His objective: the domestication of monsters.

And to fuel these experiments, children were being abducted from all corners of the country.

This had been ongoing for three, maybe four years now.

Naturally, the spectacles this body had witnessed as the experiments progressed also flooded my awareness.

Tendrils inserted into bodies birthing offspring, erupting from a boy’s eyes.

A brother’s brain, extracted to protect his sibling, then implanted into a beast-type monster to observe if it would devour her.

Scenes of testing if monsters, gifted with human genitalia, would succumb to carnal desires for humans.

Children, barely more than his grandchildren, screaming behind glass, yet not a flicker of emotion crossed his face.

This man, committing acts too foul to name, held firm to a belief in saving humanity.

Where a normal person would choke back bile and flee, this man stood, impassive.

I wanted to curse, but the words wouldn’t come.

My lips were sealed as if locked shut, and at that moment, I felt a presence behind me.

“Doctor, Subject 572 has been terminated.”

“Reason?”

Another researcher delivered the news, and finally, my mouth opened of its own volition.

Even then, the voice was devoid of warmth, a cold, mechanical drone, completely uninterested.

“Upon implantation, the monster triggered an immediate rejection.

It invaded the bloodstream, causing a backflow.”

“Death by embolism, then?”

“Yes, Doctor.”

“Unfortunate. Securing subjects has become so problematic these days.”

“…”

“Is this one the only somewhat successful case?”

A child he abducted had died, yet instead of remorse, he lamented the difficulty of securing more victims.

Besides, this feeling I’m getting right now.

It hits me that this one truly believes what he’s saying.

Disgusting.

His convictions, his mindset, and his thoughts,

they crash into my mind just as they are.

Just when I’m on the verge of oblivion, struck by a colossal wave

of information that makes me almost forget who I even am,

the red warning light on the ceiling blares in that instant.

And the moment it sounds, another researcher comes rushing from behind.

The doctor notices the oddness in how he sprints, practically throwing away the papers in his hands.

“What is it?”

“D-Doctor!! The…the test subjects—”

His words hung in the air.

Because his head was just crushed into a massive lump of flesh.

And that mass of flesh, now crimson instead of scarlet,

twisted in this direction,

an eyeball sprouting from its tip.

“D-Doctor, th-that thing…!”

“So…it really succeeded…?”

“Huh…?”

Even as the researcher who spoke to me first trembles,

this body of mine moves towards that lump of flesh.

There isn’t an ounce of fear.

Only elation fills me.

“Finally…my experiment succeeded…!

Humans can control monsters…ha…hahaha!!”

“Y-you crazy ba—”

The earlier scene replays itself.

The researcher’s body falters and collapses, headless,

and the single eye still stares at me.

“Ha…ha…hahaha!! Magnificent, truly magnificent!!”

“…”

“Who… who should I tell this to?

Who should know so they’ll look up to me again…”

Before the words can even finish, a tentacle brushes past his cheek.

That was enough to shut his mouth,

and another scarlet tentacle whips past him.

And as if revering, as if worshipping something,

It settles delicately beneath him, toward his back.

A single, small, fragile foot treads upon that tendril.

“Y-you…”

“….”

“You…you were a success, after all!”

The owner of that foot, the girl he had first seen.

The girl with that fleshy mass clinging to her right arm.

She looks around once, then

forces her delicate, pretty lips apart.

“Why…?”

“Hmm?”

“Why…why did you do this to us, no, to me?”

Her lips held the question,

her bright eyes, a deep resentment.

With a trembling left hand, she embraces the area that could hardly be called her right arm, a vivid crimson, and asks me.

Soon, her emotions flood into me as well.

A viscous feeling, even resentment feels too weak a word.

Could this resentment be expressed in words alone?

The emotions of the body’s owner, in response…

Were astonishingly indifferent.

“What are you talking about?”

“….?”

“If not for me, you would have been nothing but societal refuse,

yet I have made you useful to humanity…?”

“..Ha.”

He bore a question in his expression,

and his heart mirrored it.

Astonishingly, he truly seemed to not know

what he had done wrong.

As if he hadn’t the slightest inkling.

Hearing those words, the girl’s resentment grows stronger.

A placid emotion claiming his innocence,

and a viscous emotion overflowing with resentment, combine.

Her mind swirls, confused.

An endlessly burning inferno meets an unbearable chill.

They mingle together,

seeming to utterly destroy my mind,

and to add to it all, a sharp pain shoots through my right arm.

A sharp pain, the feeling of something being torn apart.

A voice trailed in alongside him.

“Uh…?”

“First, my right arm…”

“Ggh…Gghaaack!!!”

The girl’s right arm twitched, and the crimson

mass of flesh behind him seized this body’s right arm.

No, to be precise, devoured it.

“Veron… Two irises, wasn’t it…?”

“Gh…Gghaaack!!”

The girl didn’t stop there.

Uttering someone’s name, she plucks out this body’s eyes.

“I wonder if you even know who Verne is?”

“N…No, why… Ggueorrck…”

“Because of you, hundreds of tentacles sprouted

from his eyes, killing my friend.”

“A…aaack!!”

Saying so, she pressed the fleshy mass

into the doctor’s gaping eye sockets,

and before long, flowers bloomed from his eyes.

A horrific flower, writhing, begging for life.

His agony resonates even in my eyes.

A sensation of something taking root inside my eyes.

Simultaneously, though somewhat muted,

I could still feel her burning, all-consuming rage.

“Why…why are you doing this?”

“…Why?”

“B…But, at least give me a reason—”

That mouth wouldn’t open again.

Because something slipped in, *whoosh,* into that opened mouth.

“Why, why, why, WHY?!!!!”

“Ggueo…rrck…”

What followed was ordinary.

I just had to endure the pain.

The girl was too enraged even to feel emotion,

and the man was so consumed by pain that he had no room for it.

I thought this was better than having my mind

jumbled like before.

His abdomen was slit, his organs were hung out,

something squirmed in his entrails, but eventually, it ended.

After a long struggle, the man’s breath finally gave out.

And at that very moment, the light around me vanished.

Then, before me materialized a crimson, almost blood-red, cube.

Instinctively, I knew.

That *it* was the core of this relic.

“Is it over?”

[..Yes.]

I rose from where I was and prepared to leave.

But another voice echoed from *it*.

[..Do.. you also think I’m in the wrong?]

“…”

[I..I!!]

“Enough. Just get me out of here.”

I cut off the babbling, the pathetic attempt at emotional manipulation.

I felt his convictions, his resolve, clearly enough.

But that didn’t absolve him of all his sins.

Compared to the number of children he killed, he had, in fact,

died softly.

At least he could die as a human.

The instant I spoke, his form dissipated.

And simultaneously, a pure white light enveloped me.

Escaping from the darkness, and then from the light,

I saw myself standing back in reality.

*

≪Cursed Clockwork Mechanism≫

Status: Usable by the user.

This relic contains the accumulated resentments of countless children.

Resentment and bitterness have formed a thick, viscous wall.

The children, even pleading to entities that didn’t exist,

hoped to escape this hell.

They yearned for an adult they could trust.

And the resentments, watching the horrors, enduring such pain,

suppressing their emotions, have acknowledged you.

Borrowing the power of these resentments, you can see and manipulate ghosts.

You can hear the voices of the ghosts you control,

and you can exert physical force through them.