Chapter 58
#058
1.
I used to try all sorts of things to make a new seed every loop.
But after getting isekai-possessed, my portfolio feels even fatter.
I've added human-trash cleaner, hitman, and triad underboss to my resume.
Now I'm even a treasure hunter.
“Still, Treasure Hunter is an S-rank job.”
And I don't have to beat some innocent homeless guy to death.
Nor will low-rank troubleshooters band together and come for revenge.
All I have to do is skim off the True Ancestor's forgotten slush fund.
It couldn't fit a second-run sleight-of-hand strategy any better.
“But if you think that means this is free money, you're wrong.”
To summarize once more.
1) This is Necropolis.
2) There is nothing in Necropolis you can take for free.
3) If something seems like it can be taken for free, immediately recall rule 2.
That's what I mean.
.
.
.
Five days had passed since the treasure hunt began.
This is an abandoned shrine in Sector C.
At the end of an alley where green smog pools like fog stands a hideous wooden building.
The red pillars have peeled bare, and the incense burner is gone.
A place once meant to honor noble souls has become practically a toilet reserved for the homeless.
What am I even doing in this strangely sacrilegious place?
First, I hoist Shion up.
“Fuck! Hurry up and find it, Boksoon!”
“Don't rush me! Move a little to the side, human!”
“This way? This way?”
Carefully, making sure not to step in the poop, I moved sideways.
Perched on my shoulders, Shion kept reaching out and feeling around beneath the rafters.
“No! A little more to the left…!”
“Left? Ah.............”
“What is it?”
“Fuck……… I stepped in it.”
“Y-you human! Put this concubine down at once! Filthy human! Get away from this concubine right now!”
About ten minutes later.
We searched hard, even after stepping in poop, but all we found were mummified rat corpses.
“Nothing? Again?”
“Ugh… i-it should definitely have been here….”
“Did you forget because you're a dumbass?”
“No way!”
I set the shrieking Shion down on the ground.
“Ha, fuck.”
Well, that figures.
It's been 200 years. Two hundred years.
Ten years can change the mountains and rivers.
Maybe even Faker wouldn't win Worlds in 200 years.
I'm not such a soft newbie that I'd expect unclaimed slush money buried 200 years ago to still be sitting there untouched.
In fact, before reaching this shrine.
I'd already spent five days investigating all over Sector C.
But I hadn't gotten any special results.
Either someone had already taken it.
Or the search itself had become impossible to begin with.
Or the surroundings had changed so much I couldn't pinpoint the exact location. One of those three.
Some lucky bastard probably snatched this shrine's treasure too.
“Why the hell are you taking that!”
Fuck, I'm pissed.
I need to vent.
“You, come here.”
I beckoned to Shion, who had already taken refuge far away, apparently expecting sparks to fly.
“This isn't this concubine's fault, is it?!”
“You have three seconds. Three, two, one….”
“A-alright! I'll go! I'll go!”
Shion came rushing over and squeezed her eyes shut.
“Didn't find it again? We've searched all of Sector C now, haven't we?”
“So this isn't this concubine's fault….”
“Why is your tongue so long? So you're saying you won't take your punishment?”
At my threat, Shion lowered her head heavily and opened her mouth.
“I-I'll take it. I'll take it….”
“Roll up your shirt.”
“Uuuuh…. G-gently, please….”
Shion carefully rolled her top up to her sternum.
Shion's pale belly and long navel were revealed.
Until now, Shion's punishment had been a headlock, but the same stimulation eventually gets familiar.
To keep Shion, who kept crawling whenever she found a chance, under control, I needed a different kind of punishment.
“Huuup…!!!!”
So I went wild giving Shion's pale belly a barrage of belly raspberries.
“Kya-hahah! Kya-hahahaha!!!! Stop! Stop it, human!”
Even Shion, who was terribly ticklish, laughed until tears welled up.
About three minutes later.
“Phew, that relieved some stress.”
“Human… just how far are you planning to make this concubine look like a fool….”
“You're having fun too.”
“It is not fun.”
With Shion's hair tousled and looking a little haggard, she grumbled.
“Boksoon, if you weren't cute at least a little, you'd be kicked out of our team right away. Got it?”
“Ghk….”
“If you get it, accept it.”
“…A-alright.”
Well, enough messing around.
It wasn't an unexpected event to begin with.
Even in a European café, leave your phone on the table and it's gone in ten seconds; let alone in Necropolis.
I took out the map I'd folded away carefully.
The dozens of slush-fund hiding spots Shion had painstakingly dredged up from her hazy memories were marked on the map.
Of course, not all of them were actually buried there; I'd only marked the places with the highest likelihood.
“If that's the case, Sector C is a total bust. Dammit, fuck.”
I marked Xs all over the map.
Another total bust today.
Looks like I'll have to start combing Sector E tomorrow.
2.
For now, I headed home.
I still have 14 premium days left.
I'm full of impatience, but managing my condition is essential.
If I get sick even for a day, that whole day is gone.
After boiling water and taking a squeaky-clean shower.
“Boksoon, you wash up too. I left some hot water.”
I immediately dove into bed.
“Haaah….”
A sigh escaped me.
My mind isn't at ease, and the anxious pressure isn't pleasant either, but the instant I lie down in bed is still paradise.
“Arbel… I stepped in poop today…. I almost broke, but I held on and fought through it.”
“…….”
“You'll praise me, right? Mwah!”
“Ugh… ugh….”
While Shion was washing up, I hugged the squeaky Arbel and told it about my day.
-Bang
The door opened; apparently Shion had finished washing up.
Shion now slipped into the blanket with practiced ease.
Warm in front and back; feels nice.
“Sleep well.”
Since tonight was a night to sleep hugging Arbel, I greeted fake Jo with my back turned.
“Master.”
Then Shion suddenly spoke to me.
“Why?”
“…….”
“Why? If you called me, say something.”
“…….”
“Are you hungry again?”
“…….”
“There’s a blood pack over there. Eat it, then brush your teeth and go to sleep.”
Then.
A rustling sound, and a hand slipping under my armpit.
At the same time, Shion pressed herself tightly against me.
I was slightly flustered.
Because the warmth of Shion pressed against my back was too vividly real.
The feel of that soft, squishy body against my back was just as vivid as mochi.
The only thing between us was the pajamas I had on.
Why is she suddenly acting like this?
Just as I was getting flustered.
“I-is this concubine… useless?”
A weak voice spilled into my ear.
Shion, who would still demand mochi after seven headlocks, saying something this weak?
At least as far as I could tell, this was the first time.
“What, why are you all damp?”
As I tried to look back, Shion clamped her arms around my waist and pressed herself even closer.
“I-I know that Master is showing me mercy. I also know that I haven't been able to live up to that expectation.”
As if she didn't want me to turn around.
Or as if she were clinging to me.
“B-b-but do you know? This concubine… is very useful.”
“What are you saying all of a sudden?”
“You too… if you're a man… you know what I'm talking about, don't you?”
Shion continued, stammering.
“I don't dislike my master. I like him. My feelings of affection… aren't entirely absent either.”
Her awkwardly sweet voice brushed against my collar.
“…Will you hold this concubine?”
Ah.
Only then did I go over the situation again from Shion's point of view.
Shion and I had made a contract.
I would hide Shion and send her to Aden.
Shion would turn Arbel into a retainer.
From my perspective, this contract was plenty of a fair exchange.
I was desperate in my own way, too.
But what about from Shion's perspective?
To her, Arbel's retainerization was nothing more than my bizarre whim.
An expensive whim at that, costing 125 million Bios.
What she'd think rational would be to give up on the retainer plan and heal Arbel cheaply with a single all-purpose item.
And then she'd probably be sold off to Twilight Resource Development or the Geumri family.
Well, that's true.
That's Necropolism for you.
So.
‘I-I know that my master is showing me mercy.’
That's what she was saying.
Let's think back on her past.
The Twilight Resource Development laboratory.
Torture masquerading as experiments, drug injections, and the verdict: disposal put on hold.
For Shion, being useless is practically the same as death.
And yet the treasure hunt had already been a bust for five days straight.
The slush fund Shion had been bragging about so confidently had vanished.
The moment her worthlessness was proven, Shion must have felt fear instinctively.
That's why she's like this.
Stripping naked and swallowing her pride.
To avoid being thrown away somehow.
Hmph, troublesome.
What do I do about this?
Is this the time to shut my eyes and ride this misunderstanding all the way to a mochi feast?
Honestly, Shion had steeled herself too, so later she wouldn't hold a grudge and turn Arbel into an undead, would she?
Besides, she said she had feelings for me.
And even leaving aside the bad blood from the previous loop, it's true that I'm showing Shion unconditional love.
I feed her, put her to bed, bathe her, and don't touch a single hair on her head.
Isn't that right? It is!
I'm Cedric.
I've lived by the belief that you don't turn away women who come to you.
Sniffle… sniffle….
Then I heard a sniffing sound all of a sudden.
No. No!!!
Fuck, I haven't done anything yet!
Boksoon.
Sniffle… sniffle…. I-I was prepared. But… sniffle… what am I supposed to do now….
After a very long deliberation, I finally spoke.
Go to sleep.
Huh...?
Go to sleep, I said.
Ugh, fuck.
If you were just a little less pitiful, I'd have gone for it right away.
Put your clothes on and sleep, you brat.
3.
Since the moment I opened my eyes.
The memories of the past were always blurry, as if noise had been overlaid on them.
The only memories that remained sharp without the slightest fading were the cold feel of the operating table.
The pain of needles boring into my veins.
And the eyes of emotionless researchers looking down at me beyond the glass wall.
The reason those memories hurt is probably because all of it was, in the end, the memory of a ‘fake’.
This Shion Tsukimiya is not the True Ancestor.
Shabby magic.
Shabby abilities.
A failure whose only trick is making retainers by bypassing the precepts at enormous cost.
Just a doll whose workmanship was too poor to avoid being discarded.
The slur 'fake Jo' might well be a label that coldly points out the truth rather than an insult.
I knew that.
It wasn't something new.
Life had always been cruel.
Even while I drifted through a long sleep, not knowing how much time had passed since disposal was decided.
Even when I was saved by the hand of a stranger.
Even when I deceived him, pretended to be the True Ancestor, and tried to bide my time for a chance.
Even when my identity was eventually exposed and this powerless body ended up being used.
I didn't despair anew.
Because life had always been harsh.
The man I first formed a bond with after waking from my long sleep.
Cedric Montreven was a madman.
A bastard who lusted after his own biological sister.
A bastard who whispered his daily routine every night into the ear of an unconscious vegetable and rambled about apple-mango bingsu and the like.
A nasty bastard who forced weird clothes on me, bullied me whenever he could, worked me like a slave, and stole my mochi.
A weird bastard who never looks normal, no matter how you look at him.
That wasn't all.
Even though he lusted after his own sister so openly, Cedric never laid a hand on her.
He willingly took the life-threatening risk of hiding the 'fake' under the excuse of saving his sister.
Even while dressing me in a bizarre bunny-girl outfit and hugging me to bed every night, he never once brought up the common demand to surrender my chastity.
In this cruel world where exploitation and abuse are common sense.
The only predator who made room at his side without making any proper demands.
Shion thought that was achingly strange.
And today.
‘Boksoon, if you weren't cute at least a little, you'd be kicked out of our team right away. Got it?’
This man had, for the first time, uttered the words 'I'll throw you away'.
I was abruptly frightened.
The fate of a tool that fails to prove its value was obvious.
Once it becomes unnecessary, it is discarded.
That the brief respite I had finally grasped for the first time in my life depended solely on this man's whim.
I understood that clearly.
And.
‘…Will you hold this concubine?’
And that was the only value the 'fake' could offer him in exchange for this respite, too.
The silence was long.
The answer was short.
Go to sleep.
Huh...?
Go to sleep, I said.
The pajamas that slapped onto my face.
Put your clothes on and sleep, you brat.
A broad back turned away as if telling me to sleep instead of doing pointless things.
Shion stared blankly at that back for a long while.
“…….”
As expected, this Cedric….
was a weird guy.