Chapter 611: Left Outside The Cage
For a long moment, Marcus just stood there. His face cycled through disbelief, confusion, and then—pure rage.
“NO.” His voice was barely a whisper. “NO, NO, NO!”
He spun around and swept his arm across the tray of instruments, sending scalpels and pliers and drills clattering to the floor.
He grabbed a bookshelf and hurled it across the room. He punched the wall, leaving a bloody dent in the wood paneling.
“HOW DARE YOU!” He screamed. “How dare you take what’s mine! Everything—EVERYTHING in my life has been given to me! I’ve never been denied anything! And you—you stupid, insignificant BRAT—you think you can steal from ME?!”
He was throwing a tantrum. A full-blown, childish tantrum. The most powerful mind-controller in the world, the man who had tortured countless victims in his nightmare domain, was acting like a spoiled child who had been told he couldn’t have a toy.
Charlotte watched him rage with a mixture of awe and relief.
Mika had done it. Even in this impossible situation, Mika had found a way to protect her.
“Mika.” She whispered, turning back to him. “You…You saved me.”
She reached out and touched his cheek. He was here, and she was safe, and—
“Hahahahahahaha—!”
Her celebration was cut short by a sound that made her blood run cold.
Laughter.
Not the manic, frustrated laughter of a man who had lost his prize.
No, this was the laughter of someone who had just realized something important. Something terrible.
Charlotte turned around.
Marcus had stopped his rampage. He stood in the center of the destroyed library, his shoulders heaving, his golden eyes fixed on Mika with an expression that was equal parts fury and…triumph.
“You idiot.” He repeated Mika’s exact same words.
Charlotte stepped in front of Mika. “Stay away from him!”
“You absolute idiot.” Marcus ignored her and approached slowly, his footsteps echoing in the sudden silence.
“I can’t believe you did something like this!? How can you possibly be so stupid!?”
“Don’t call him stupid!” Charlotte shouted. “He outsmarted you! He saved me! You’re the stupid one!”
But Marcus just shook his head, a cruel smile spreading across his face.
“You still don’t understand, do you, Lady Charlotte?”
He stopped in front of her, and even though she knew he couldn’t touch her, she still flinched at his proximity.
“Think about what your precious Mika has actually done.”
“I know what he did. He protected me. He—”
“He protected you, yes. But did he protect himself?”
The words hit Charlotte like a physical blow. Her eyes widened. Her mouth opened, but no sound came out.
“Ah. I see you’re beginning to understand.”
Marcus’s smile widened.
“Your consciousness is in his domain. Safe. Untouchable. But his consciousness on the other hand…”
He reached out and ran a finger down Mika’s cheek.
“His consciousness is still right here. In my domain. Where I can do whatever I want with it.”
“No..” Charlotte whispered.
“Yes!” Marcus’s golden eyes blazed with renewed excitement. “Oh, yes! Absolutely yes!”
He grabbed Mika’s chin and forced the boy to look up at him.
“No matter how much I torment him—no matter how much I cut him, burn him, break him—he can’t do anything about it!”
“He can’t fight back!”
“He can’t escape.”
“And as long as I don’t pletely shatter his consciousness…”
His voice dropped to a terrifying whisper.
” ..the cage holding you will remain intact.”
“But the moment his consciousness breaks, that same cage will shatter too. And you’ll be released as well.”
He turned toward Charlotte, his expression one of absolute, predatory delight.
“Right back into my waiting arms.”
“No.” Charlotte breathed. “No, no, no—”
“It’s perfect.” Marcus straightened up, spreading his arms wide. “Absolutely perfect! I’ll simply treat this as a small appetizer before the main course!”
“Breaking this boy—making him suffer—and then, when he finally shatters, I’ll have you as my reward!”
He laughed—a full, genuine laugh of pure joy.
“All my life, everything has e easily to me. I’ve never faced a real challenge! But this—this is something new! Something exciting! The boy has actually made things interesting!”
Charlotte rushed to Mika’s side.
“Mika, tell me he’s lying! Tell me you have a way out! Tell me you can protect yourself too!”
She grabbed his restrained hand, squeezing it desperately.
“Y-You’re Mika. You’re the smartest person I know! You wouldn’t make a mistake like that! You have something else—some other trick—please, Mika, please—”
Mika looked up at her. His eyes were tired. So tired.
But there was no fear in them. Only a quiet, resigned acceptance.
“I’m sorry, Charlotte.” He said softly. “Saving you was as far as I could go.”
The world tilted around her. “No. No, that can’t be—”
“I can’t protect myself. I knew that when I made this plan. My consciousness has to stay here, in his domain, to keep yours safe. As long as I’m here, he can hurt me.”
“But…” He squeezed her hand gently. “…he can’t hurt you. That’s what matters.”
“As for me…” He chuckled, a dry, humorless sound. “I just have to endure whatever es next.”
Charlotte broke.
“NOOOO!” She screamed, grabbing his shoulders and shaking him.
“NO, MIKA, YOU CAN’T! YOU CAN’T SACRIFICE YOURSELF FOR ME! THAT’S NOT FAIR! THAT’S NOT—THAT’S CHEATING, MIKA! THAT’S HORRIBLE!”
“Charlotte—”
“LET ME GO! RELEASE ME FROM YOUR DOMAIN! PUT ME BACK IN HIS SO HE CAN HURT ME INSTEAD!”
She was sobbing now, her words tumbling out in a desperate flood.
“I-I don’t care what he does to me! I don’t care if I die! Just save yourself! Please, Mika! Please!”
“Charlotte, stop—”
“No! I won’t stop! I won’t let you do this! Your whole life you’ve been sacrificing yourself for everyone else!”
“For Astrid when she got kidnapped!”
“For Anya in the cave!”
“For me in that nightmare! For the whole family, every single day! When is it going to be enough?! When do you get to be the one who’s saved?!”
She pounded her fists against his chest, but there was no strength behind the blows.
Just grief. Just despair. Just the unbearable weight of watching the person she loved most condemn himself to torture for her sake.
“Please…” She whispered, her voice cracking. “Please, Mika. I-I’m not worth this. I’m not worth your suffering…Just let me go.”
Mika looked at her for a long moment. Then, very gently, he said,
“Your whole life, you’ve done whatever you wanted. You’ve been selfish. You’ve acted on your whims and dragged everyone else along for the ride.”
Charlotte flinched as if he’d struck her. Each word felt like a knife in her heart.
“But right now.” Mika continued with a gentle tone. “Let me be selfish. Let me do what I want for once.”
He met her eyes, and his gaze was steady despite everything.
“What I want is to save you. To protect you. To take the pain so you don’t have to. That’s my desire. My choice. My selfish wish.”
“So, please.” He said softly. “Let me have this.”
Charlotte stared at him. The tears wouldn’t stop. Her heart felt like it was being torn in two.
She had thought he was angry at her. She had thought he had abandoned her.
But he had never stopped caring. He had never stopped loving her.
He had thrown himself into the grasp of a psychopath all for the sake of protecting her.
“Don’t worry, Lady Charlotte.”
Marcus’s voice slithered through the room. He had posed himself now, his earlier rage replaced by that cold, predatory calm.
“Even if the boy is reluctant to release you, I’ll take responsibility for getting you out myself.”
He walked over to his table of instruments and began examining them one by one.
“Once I break him down—once his consciousness scatters into pieces like all my other victims—you’ll be released automatically. And then…”
He picked up a butcher’s knife, its blade gleaming in the firelight.
“Then we can finally have our fun.”
Charlotte threw herself in front of Mika, spreading her arms wide.
“I WON’T LET YOU TOUCH HIM!”
Marcus walked straight through her.
“STOP IT!” She screamed, trying to grab his arm, his shoulder, anything.
But her hands passed through him like smoke, just as his had passed through her.
“STOP! I’LL KILL YOU! I’LL FIND A WAY TO KILL YOU! DON’T YOU DARE TOUCH HIM!”
But Marcus ignored her pletely. He stopped in front of Mika, the butcher’s knife glinting in his hand.
“Such a brave little boy.” He murmured with plain sarcasm. “Sacrificing yourself for the girl you love. It’s almost noble. Almost heroic.”
He pressed the flat of the blade against Mika’s cheek.
“But heroism always es with a price. And I’m afraid yours is about to be very, very steep.”
“MIKA!”
Charlotte’s scream echoed through the library, but it didn’t matter. Nothing she did mattered. She could only watch—helpless, invisible, utterly powerless—as Marcus raised the knife.
And Mika, strapped to that cold metal chair, looked back at her with those calm, steady eyes.
“Close your eyes, Charlotte.” He said quietly. “You don’t need to watch this.”
Before Charlotte could even open her mouth to scream, the knife in Marcus’s hand swept down in a gleaming silver arc.
Thud!
The sound was nothing like she had imagined. It wasn’t a wet, squelching noise or a dramatic slice like in the movies.
It was just a dull, heavy thud—the sound of sharpened steel meeting the metallic floor beneath Mika’s leg.
For one frozen moment, nothing happened.
Charlotte stared at the place where the knife had passed through, her mind refusing to process what her eyes were seeing.
Then, slowly, almost lazily, a thin line of crimson began to bloom along Mika’s thigh, just above his knee.
Then the line widened. The blood began to flow—first a trickle, then a stream, then a gushing torrent that sprayed across the floor in a hot, arterial rush.
And then Mika’s leg fell away from his body.
Thud!
It toppled to the side with a wet, meaty sound, the severed end revealing the clean white cross-section of bone surrounded by the dark red of muscle and the pale gleam of severed tendons.
Blood pooled beneath the chair, spreading outward in an ever-widening circle. The leg lay on the floor, still and pale and horribly, impossibly separate.
And finally, Charlotte’s scream tore through the library.
“MIKAAAAAA! NOOOOOOOO!”
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