Chapter 86: A Headless Cockroach’s Week
Why was she the only one who had to bear the weight of this disgusting guilt, this nausea that threatened to make her vomit?
She wanted to grab God by the shoulders and scream all day.
Why did she have to be sixteen-year-old Sue Byron?
“Haha… Hahaha…! Right… After Sue Byron, it’s Lopetrefer’s turn.”
Damon’s crazed laughter pierced her ears like a pterodactyl’s shriek, hammering at her mind.
Sue, her eyes still closed, spat out the foreign substance in her mouth. She could no longer tell if it was saliva, stomach acid, or blood. She couldn’t stop coughing, and she gasped for air, forcing down the stale basement air.
“Lopetrefer… Right, and Vava too. I’ll kill all three of them. Don’t worry, I can do it. I’ll… avenge my family…”
Suddenly, the ground shook violently, as if an earthquake had struck. Dust and debris rained down from the ceiling.
Damon stopped what he was doing and held his breath, startled. He heard a crashing sound from above, as if something was being destroyed.
BOOOOM!
Another deafening sound, and the basement shook violently. Damon looked around frantically.
“What, what’s going on?!”
But they both instinctively knew what that sound was.
“What… What is that…!”
Damon, his previous confidence gone, stumbled back in panic.
‘It’s over.’
The thought drained all the strength from her body. Sue slumped to the floor, her hair, which had come undone, sprawling around her, waiting for the thick metal door of the basement to open.
Another crash. Sue forced open her eyes. One of them was swollen shut, so she could only open the other.
The first thing she saw in her limited vision was Damon’s worn shoe, the one that had been stomping on her. And then, she saw Raines’s sword.
Damon was looking around frantically, as if he didn’t know what to do, backing away from her. Sue coughed and looked up. Her eyes met Damon Keron’s.
“…Ugh…”
His cloudy eyes, wide with panic, suddenly blazed with anger as he saw her vacant gaze.
“You, you called them!”
Sue forced out a reply, her voice hoarse and raspy.
“No way.”
But Damon Keron, who had been out of his mind from the beginning, wouldn’t believe her. He stared at her, his hands trembling, his face filled with disbelief.
“You… You came all the way here… You…”
No, it’s your fault.
Your brain could only come up with a plan this simple.
Sue spat out the blood that had pooled in her mouth.
“Let me ask you one last thing.”
Sue took a deep breath and asked in a low voice.
“Why did you do it this way?”
“…What do you mean?”
“Why did you choose this method for your revenge?”
She waited for an answer. But his twisted lips didn’t move. Sue exhaled and continued,
“…What you did, it was so roundabout and foolish and stupid. If I had that kind of power, I would have just wiped out this entire area. Or I would have kidnapped the target when they were alone.”
“……”
“You didn’t have to find accomplices, pretend to be friends with the target, send letters… and all that.”
“……”
“…Ahaha, I get it.”
A hollow laugh echoed through the basement.
“You were craving human connection too.”
Sue calmly exposed the true nature of Damon Keron.
“You craved human connection, you longed for kindness… and like you said, I was the first person who was ever truly kind to you.”
He had dragged the Noel family into this because of his desire to be accepted, and he had chosen to carry out his revenge in the glass garden of Full Bloom, even though he could have done it anywhere else, just because it was where he had been wronged.
He must have been so excited about his ‘brilliant idea’, hoping for some sympathy.
“Anyone would have done. Even the people who sent you to the Wastelands.”
Sue scoffed softly. Because his thought process was so similar to hers.
“Damon Keron. Leo Noel.”
The metal door of the basement started to rattle. It would open soon. All she had to do was wait. Sue finally spoke the words she had been wanting to say ever since she had woken up in the basement.
“You know, they say a headless cockroach can live for another week.”
“…What are you talking about?”
Damon Keron was consumed by fear, imagining the future that awaited him, his muddy brown eyes pleading with her for help.
Seeing him like that, Sue felt strangely calm.
She recalled the story she had heard that day. She couldn’t remember much, but she wanted to imitate his emotionless, yet seemingly kind smile.
Sue thought of all the smiles she had seen from Woo Acrea, then smiled brightly.
“It seems like your week is over.”
“…Damn it!”
Raines’s sword finally emerged from its scabbard. Sue winced at the sight of the gleaming silver blade.
“Dieeee!”
But the blade couldn’t pierce her.
“Sue Byron!”
The moment the metal door opened, a gust of cold wind, carrying snowflakes, swept into the basement. It seemed like they had destroyed the entire glass garden.
“Sue! Are you okay?!”
She heard Melaine’s voice.
Quite a few people had entered the basement. Teachers, people in Imperial uniforms, priests from the Grand Temple, knights in armor, and even Vercia was among them.
“Seize him!”
Yuna Vava, the Captain of the First Knights Division, ordered.
“Ugh… Ugh! Why won’t it move?!”
Damon stood frozen, his sword raised. Several knights rushed at him and restrained him.
“Let me go! I’m the victim! I was framed!”
No one listened to his cries.
Damon, his mouth gagged, his eyes filled with tears, looked at her pleadingly. But she ignored him and averted her gaze.
“Byron!”
Among those who had rushed down to the basement, there was someone she didn’t want to see. A clear voice, eyes that held the sea. She couldn’t see his face, but she knew who he was. And she didn’t understand why he was here.
He started running towards her.
“Stay back.”
But his footsteps stopped abruptly at the sound of a sweet, delicate voice. Sue chuckled. She knew the owner of that voice, the one who was walking towards her with graceful steps, her voice calm and composed.
She just hadn’t imagined that she would come here.
“Sue.”
The shadow of Enzhe Lopetrefer, the owner of the voice, gently fell upon Sue’s slumped body.
“You’ve… been through a lot.”
Her master, the lovely Lady Enzhe Lopetrefer, embraced her gently, her dignity intact. She placed her hand on the black rings that bound Sue, and they vanished.
Sue, held in Enzhe’s arms, looked directly at her beautiful face.
Her flawless white skin, her large, black eyes, swirling like a black hole, her rosy lips curved into a faint smile. And her black hair, swaying in the wind, made her look like an angel.
“How… could someone be so cruel?”
Enzhe cupped Sue’s bruised face in her warm hands. Tears streamed down her cheeks, falling onto Sue’s face. She was crying, her emotions genuine.
To an outsider, it would look like a saint shedding tears for ‘friendship’.
“Sue, there’s a rotten smell here.”
She glared at Damon, her deep eyes filled with hatred, her gaze fixed on his disfigured face.
“It’s the smell of… a rotten, filthy insect.”
Damon, his body bound, his eyes fixed on Enzhe, started to cry uncontrollably. It wasn’t anger or resentment. His tears were born out of fear of Lopetrefer.
Damon, swallowed whole by Enzhe, wanted to give up. He thought it would be better to die.
But then, his father’s last words, a desperate cry, echoed in his ears, a shimmering mirage.
‘Avenge us. Use that power to avenge our deaths, Damon!’
His family, who had been reduced to dust.
…Right, he couldn’t give up, for their sake.
“Huh? …What is this?! Get away from me! All of you!”
It happened in an instant.
A black fog erupted around Damon. It started melting the armor and skin of the knights who were holding him. They stepped back. Damon, now free, pointed a finger at Sue and Enzhe and shouted,
“Sue Byron! Enzhe Lopetrefer! You’re the rotten insects!”