1786: Chapter 1782: Purgatory 1786: Chapter 1782: Purgatory Majira is fifteen this year, his birthday is next month, but he reckons he won’t live to see adulthood.
“…The gangs on Rust Street are done for.
Next, it might be our turn.
Should we flee again?
But leaving this area is even more dangerous—there’s fighting everywhere…”
Ordinary people during warti are like rabbits in a forest ablaze.
With flas raging in every direction, fleeing often ans death, and staying put ans death too.
Majira simply has no choice.
The food supply, or the expired cans he painstakingly scavenged earlier, is almost depleted.
The collapse of the entire country goes far beyond the destruction of administrative systems.
Without systemic agricultural and industrial production—and with war everywhere—everyone’s food relies solely on reserves from the bygone era.
But after so many years of war, no household has any surplus left.
“We have to leave.
Old Ruan next door has been looking at my sister in a way that’s… off.”
Don’t misunderstand, these days surviving is hard enough.
Add to that famine turning his sister into a gaunt shadow, skin clinging to bone—there’s no charm left to speak of… The neighbor?
He’s just interested in the scant two ounces of flesh she has.
Majira knows the atmosphere around him is growing ever darker.
He has witnessed more than once the predation—or outright hunting—of the weaker by the strong.
He still has a scavenged pistol, though it has only a few bullets left, and even so he may not be the weakest…
But he also has an immobile mother and his sister to contend with.
Three defenseless people, low-cost targets, plus the dwindling presence of won.
“…If they…”
Every night, the boy… no, the man guards behind the door cautiously, terrified that hunger and fear will drive the beasts into his ho.
During the day, he deliberately walks around holding the gun… But everyone knows a few adult n could easily overpower him.
“It’s happening again…”
As nightfall approaches and torches light up the alleys and pathways, the agonizingly long night returns.
Majira once again blocks the back of the door, clutching his pistol tightly under the worried gaze of his family.
He dares not sleep, though he spends his days searching for food—and inevitably succumbs to a drowsy haze.
“Ahhhhhh!”
A sudden scream jolts Majira awake.
He snaps his head up, fearing the worst—that his family’s lives have been taken—but instead…
“It’s next door—Old Ruan’s house!”
His sister Mara grabs her brother in panic, afraid the perpetrators will grow unsatisfied and turn their attention to their ho.
Majira cautiously peers through the window, catching sight of the neighboring house silhouetted with shadows.
The bloodshot eyes of the man who had often leered at their ho remain fixed outside… The severed head is locked in an unblinking death stare toward them, as if accusatorily asking why no one ca to save him.
“Tomorrow morning.
Tomorrow morning we leave!”
Once again, Majira tells his sister and himself.
But he knows it’s likely aningless.
Even if he leaves, where could they escape to?
The areas with any semblance of order are controlled by gangs.
The big crush the small, the many crush the few… But join them, and they could survive, and the gang-controlled territories have at least a modicum of order—not like this “savage zone,” where the day is spent in wary standoff and the night becos a jungle.
Leaving the city at all… would an facing Demons, Sea Beasts, or Aliens, who kill with even greater brutality.
Even the so-called gang Big Shots live day-to-day, unsure whether tomorrow they’ll die in mutual vendettas or be targeted by larger Warlords—a convoy of full-ard Soldiers arriving in trucks, hauling them off as cannon fodder.
In a sense, to certain Warlords, those living on the “periphery” are no longer considered people—they’re rely feral livestock left to their own devices.
When needed, they’ll simply co to “harvest” so.
If they die, it’s no loss—there are plenty more in other regions to gather.
When the most powerful in a system have no intentions or requirents to serve the base level, that system has no bottom line to speak of.
This is the grim reality of what once was the prosperous Hass Islands.
Now, this small Island Country and the surrounding forr nations have beco physical extensions of warzones.
Perhaps soday a single Overlord Warlord will rise from them, but few survivors will remain on the periphery.
“What if I join the army too…”
Majira feels both despair and numbness.
He knows just what those so-called “soldiers” are—they kill Refugees for sport.
Once, he fled the “city center” to escape them.
Now, perhaps in these tis, only becoming a villain can ensure survival…
“Tomorrow, I’ll try.
I’ve handled a gun before, I have my own, and I’m still young—they should take …”
Looking at his trembling, fear-stricken sister huddling in the corner, Majira makes up his mind.
If he must beco an Evil Spirit, then so be it—for his family to live.
At least, they could eat at for a few days…
“Boom!”
A sudden noise shatters the night’s fragile quiet.
The shaking wooden door heralds the seemingly fated disaster for this household.
“Clang!”
Another strike—this seemingly simple crowbar landing on the door reverberates onto the lifeline of this family.
“Don’t co in!
I’ve got a gun!”
Majira shouts in a warning, and the outside briefly falls silent.
It seems the threat worked.
“Ahhhhhh!”
A sudden scream steals Majira’s focus.
He spins around to find that the reinforced window has been torn open.
While he was distracted by the pounding door, a man had already crept inside unnoticed.
He’s stamping on Majira’s mother, grabbing his sister.
“Drop the gun… Give the gun, and I’ll let your family live.”
Facing the trembling barrel leveled at him, the skeletal man speaks.
But Majira doesn’t comply… He knows this man—”Poison Dog” keeps no promises; he’s here solely for the gun!
Majira’s trembling hand suddenly steadies.
He knows this is the mont—the mont of life and death for his family.
The words of beasts an nothing.
All their apparent language is rely a predator’s mask.
Seeing Majira’s resolved gaze, Poison Dog begins to panic.
“You… don’t do anything… Your sister…”
“Boom!”
Just as Majira prepares to pull the trigger, risking everything on a single shot.
The back door—already unsteady—suddenly crashes open.
This ti, Majira isn’t so lucky; he’s knocked to the floor, the gun slipping from his grasp.
“You bastard kid!
How dare you scare !”
With the Human World’s beasts closing in, Majira is now utterly hopeless.
“At least… as a family, we’re together in death…”
Majira tries to struggle but is overwheld by a group.
The predators laugh gleefully as they gesture toward his sister.
“…Don’t touch her!
Even in Hell, I won’t let you go!”
But his final roar brings only mockery.
“Purgatory?
Hell?
Isn’t this what that is…?”
The voice cos from behind him—a familiar sound, though tinged now with apathy and despair.
Majira turns sharply, disbelieving.
The fish vendor, Uncle Liao, who once saved him during the onset of disaster… is now one of the predators.
“The Human World is already Hell.
Only Evil Spirits can survive here.
Don’t bla us…”
As the raised fire axe draws closer, Majira feels dazed.
What he sees last are his crying sister… and the red glow behind him.
“The red glow…”
“Bang, bang, bang!”
Sudden machine gun fire, a storm of rubber bullets drives the mob away.
Next, the red glow becos clear—a beautiful, pristine drone painted with a striking Red Cross insignia.
“This is the Eastern Country’s Proper God, the God of Redemption, under the Life Protection Battle Group, conducting humanitarian rescue…
Warning shots have concluded.
If you do not leave the hoowner’s premises, the next round will consist of live ammunition.”
“You foreigners…”
“Bang!”
A sudden burst silences all debate—the fire now, not rubber at all.
Soone starts, and soon the mob flees in panic, each desperate to escape first.
Watching the Red Cross-painted drone ascend to intervene at the next “incident,” the narrowly saved Majira collapses, mumbling to himself.
“Eastern Country… God of Redemption… Life Protection… Do we really still have hope…”
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