Inside a long alley, a man moved while carrying 100 gold coins, appearing indifferent to the presence of criminals and thieves eyeing him.
'Another useless task,' he thought. Wearing a blue flowered robe, he made his way toward the slave auction house, which he visited weekly whenever new slaves were brought in.
'I'll just use 50 coins and keep the rest on ,' he mused, bringing the blue pouch forward. His eyes glead with greed as he clenched the tal coins within the packet, forming a smile.
Whistling, he turned towards one of the alleys lined with shops displaying cages containing beasts and animals imported illegally.
So of them appeared dead, but they could still be sold at a discount for those who wanted to synthesize pills from them.
The man's eyes road around, seeking sothing that could be sold at a higher price to earn more money. Suddenly, he collided with soone in his path.
"Damn it, are you idio—?!" He lifted his gaze, and his eyes t a very fat woman. She wore deep orange lipstick, a big orange straw hat, and clothes stretched tight over her chubby body, which appeared to weigh no less than 200 kilograms.
In that fleeting mont, a deep-rooted mory resurfaced in the man's mind.
His body loosened and began to sweat, a chill running down his spine before reaching his mind and bombarding it with a traumatic mory from twelve years ago.
Flashback starts /////// { Chapter 15 for reference }
"AAaaaGggggHHhhh!"
A man writhed on the ground, crying his lungs out, his eyes blurred but still reflecting the image of soone through his falling tears.
The image was of a five-year-old child seated on a white chair inside a black do, sipping tea. The child's clothes were black, and his deep amber eyes seed to etch the mories of suffering within the man's body.
"Y-yyour.... Agaghh.... Highn--" Even in his pain, the man tried to plead for rcy, struggling to maintain his fading consciousness and losing his sense of ti.
His mind was losing its rationality, with his last mories being of adding pleasantries to Lady Carlien, and then the prince of Selvius Kingdom isolating him inside a black do.
"Didn't Lady Carlien purchase a slave?" Ryuk's eyes, holding a subtle coldness, turned down towards the screaming man, whose body seed on the verge of breaking from the pain.
"Y...kugh." Though wanting to answer the question, the pain coursing through him suppressed his voice, which slowly faded away.
"After you leave, allow her to enter this place." Ryuk had already anticipated that Jenny's status as nothing more than a re slave would prevent her from eting soone like him, prompting him to order the man.
"Haa.... Haaa." The man felt like killing himself under the assault of pain that pierced his mind's every nerve, burning them along with sending a chilling sensation, his heart seeming to be on the verge of exploding.
"I-I understand," the man said, his face stained with tears, his body trembling, having lost every bit of energy as his eyes slowly lifted to et the child who was nothing but a monster.
"Also, keep helping her in a tily manner, in a harsh way." Ryuk, knowing well about Carlien's teachings, realized they would eventually break Jenny's body, but it was possible for them to break her ntality too.
Understanding her behavior, molded due to his humane treatnt, would cause her to have weak ntal defenses when treated harshly by Carlien, he needed soone to give her a drop of water after she got beaten for a week or two, in a way that wouldn't make him appear like a savior.
"I-I understand," the man shivered as he nodded, his body filled with nothing but marks of pain.
SWOOSH
[Deactivating Space]
The black do started to dissipate, revealing Ryuk, who was cleaning his hands with a tissue paper, while the man stood there with sweat and tear stains, having heard Ryuk's instructions before bowing and leaving the place.
"R-Ryuk!"
Flashback ends ///////
"No, No, NOOO!!" The man cried out, causing onlookers to turn their gazes towards him, their squinted eyes observing his broken state. Tears fell from his eyes, and snot dripped from his nose.
His face was completely contorted, his eyes trembling rapidly due to the mories of that day still lingering in his mind. Suddenly, a jade pendant on his neck started to glow intensely.
At a visible pace, the man's contorted face, affected by PTSD, slowly soothed. His mind cald down, and his lips curled into a smile. "HahaHAHAHA, he is dead, he is dead, hee... is dead."
Everyone observed the man crying like a madman, making them think he had ingested so kind of expired wine. They soon ignored him, accustod to seeing mad people in their daily lives.
"That bastard is definitely dead, right?" Although he trusted the woman's words, his heart still beat anxiously. He rembered the devilish smile on that five-year-old boy whose orange eyes had looked down on him while he writhed on the ground.
"Haah, I'm not even in that shitty place now, why fear?" The man finally stood up, dusting off his clothes.
The jade pendant, given to him by a particular woman who had promised him a good life in the Jade Dominion, felt satisfying. He then made his way toward the auction house.
Unbeknownst to him, he was nothing but prey laid by the hunter to catch a predator.
Now, it depended on the predator whether he would realize that this plot was only made to catch him.
----
"Senior, please allow us to carry your money," Bone Breaker said, rubbing his hands as he walked beside the man wearing a black robe with orange stripes. Four others trailed behind Ryuk, while two cleared the path ahead by kicking aside pedestrians for their senior brother.
"Yes, Senior Brother, don't burden yourself; your number 2 sidekick will assist you." The man beside Ryuk bestowed a title upon himself from his newly acknowledged senior brother, without even waiting for acknowledgnt, while scanning around for any coin-filled pouches.
All four of them had concluded from their years of experience that if this black-masked man possessed such strength without carrying a large pouch, it ant he likely held money of higher value, such as gold or even the legendary platinum coins used exclusively in the royal capital of Manarch.
After all, soone as strong as the man in front of them couldn't possibly be broke, could he?
'...System, do you have any money?' Ryuk asked the system for financial support, well-aware of the necessity of coins in an auction house, while walking with his hands folded behind him.
[Host, I'm even more broke than the person reading this.]
'....' Ryuk understood that the system was claiming to be poorer than him, causing him to pause in his tracks and tense up, which caught the attention of all four of his followers.
From their perspective, the imnsely strong man had abruptly stopped, focusing his gaze in a particular direction, prompting them to follow suit.
'How many coins do I have in my inventory?' Unbeknownst to Ryuk, who had just inquired about the number of coins he possessed, his sidekicks had also followed his gaze and set their sights on a target without his knowledge.
Although Ryuk's senses were sharp, the crowded environnt made it difficult for him to pay attention to every detail, causing him to keep his eyes only on a few people who appeared as potential threats.
[Host, you have zero...]
"Kyyaaah~!"
Suddenly, a cry of pain caught Ryuk's attention causing his eyes to turn towards the source of the woman's voice and saw his Number 2 sidekick holding a woman by her hair, proclaiming,"Shut up! My young master has set his eyes on you! Consider it an honor to serve him!"
'What?' Ryuk understood the gist of the situation and felt his mouth twitch montarily. He intended to teach his sidekick for his wrong actions when another voice, belonging to a young man beside the woman, interrupted.
"Release Zhen'er imdiately, you bastard!" the young man cried out before delivering a kick to the man clutching the woman's hair, sending him crashing into a nearby wall.
THUD
"Kughh?!" Number 2 collapsed on the ground, coughing up blood, his eyes wide with shock. He struggled to regain his footing, staring at the young man and threatening, "My young master will definitely kill you and take that woman!"
'What nonsense—' Ryuk couldn't comprehend the turn of events, where the perpetrator of a cri was now attempting to shield himself by using Ryuk as a shield. Before he could complete his thoughts, a notification flashed in his mind.
DING!
━─━───────༺༻───────━─━
𝙳𝚎𝚜𝚝𝚛𝚘𝚢 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚜𝚘𝚗 𝚘𝚏 𝚑𝚎𝚊𝚟𝚎𝚗 𝚠𝚑𝚘 𝚒𝚜 𝚝𝚛𝚢𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚝𝚘 𝚙𝚛𝚘𝚝𝚎𝚌𝚝 𝚑𝚒𝚜 𝚌𝚑𝚒𝚕𝚍𝚑𝚘𝚘𝚍 𝚏𝚛𝚒𝚎𝚗𝚍
━─━───────༺༻───────━─━
'What is this now?' Ryuk suddenly inquired, his eyes narrowing in confusion as he waited for the system to clarify the appearance of a window infront of him.
[....Oopsie...I seem to have forgotten to tell you sothing, Host (〒﹏〒) ]
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