Episode 98 – After the Play (1)

After the Play (1)

[Cleaning]

: The act of sweeping and wiping something dirty or messy to make it clean.

[Cleaner]

: A person whose job is to clean.

In general perception, a ‘cleaner’ is someone who cleans dirty houses, picks up trash from the floor, or sweeps with a broom. However, in the underworld, it’s a bit different.

A cleaner in the underworld usually refers to ‘someone who cleans up corpses’.

Born in the underworld and even expanded to the surface, it’s a professional job in its own right. Without cleaners, the underworld would rot with corpses.

They kill tremendously there, but they don’t think about cleaning up.

Of course, the cleaning targets are not only human corpses. Beasts, monsters, wild animals, or even the corpses of strange creatures are willingly cleaned up.

As long as they’re paid.

Even in the underworld, the cleaner plays a vital role in aesthetics, so even nasty monsters don’t pick fights or try to kill without reason.

“How many did you kill?”

I was such a cleaner. A quite capable and savvy cleaner.

“Let’s see…….”

Jade seemed to have killed roughly thirty people, but fortunately, it was done within the Barrier, so the range was limited.

“……They really got crushed.”

Instead, the corpses were gruesome.

They were crushed to the point where they didn’t even look like corpses. If I had to make a comparison, it would be like this if a truck weighing tens of tons hit a person at a speed exceeding Mach.

“It would be perfect if we had a Corpse Eater.”

「Corpse Eater」. It’s a Magic Spell that creates artificial life that eats away corpses using flesh and mana stones as a medium. There’s no better creature for cleaning up unidentifiable corpses.

The principle is similar to a golem, but it probably has yet to be invented in the current time…

Wait a minute.

“No.”

Of course, this 「Corpse Eater」 is a Magic Spell of the future. It’s a cutting-edge technique that will be invented at least 3-4 years later.

However, the Memory of using that Magic Spell is clear in my head.

If I have the Memory, as always, I should be able to call it up.

“…….”

I closed my eyes. Like searching for a file with 「Notepad」, I searched up the memories related to 「Corpse Eater」.

[……Magic Spell: Corpse Eater User Manual]

[It’s a disposable Magic Spell. The circuit setting is already complete, so just stick it to the corpse, and ignite it with a mana stone.]

Corpse Eater is not a difficult Magic Spell for the user. It’s actually close to a finished product.

The already set Magic Spell is like a talisman. When you stick it to a corpse and ignite it with a mana stone, the 「Corpse Eater」 immediately rises.

─Oh. Oh. It’s getting up. Hey, this is amazing, right? Master. Theia. Look at this. It’s eating the corpse, right? Where did you get this? Oh, oh. It’s eating!

─From a nearby Magic Spell shop. Can you stop making a fuss?

Not this Memory.

I recalled the Magic Spell of the Corpse Eater.

The spell that was full in the palm-sized talisman at that time, and the order of the mana circulating in the spell── I recalled the circuit diagram and brought it into my grasp.

Zzzzzz…….

The sound of skin burning echoed. It sucked up nearly 30% of my mana and took up 5 units of storage, but the Magic Spell of Corpse Eater rose like a tattoo on my palm.

It was a success.

Now, I needed a corpse.

I found a relatively large chunk with the SZX-9500.

This seems to be a Berhalsi corpse, is it a liver? Or lungs?

I casually stuck the Corpse Eater on it. I took out ‘1’ mana core from the ‘Notepad’ as a substitute for the mana stone and shoved it into the flesh.

Kuduk- Kuddudduk-!

The flesh moved on its own and tore apart, hatching into a Corpse Eater.

Its appearance is a bit disgusting, like a turtle. The word ‘Eater’ itself means turtle.

The creature busily moved around, nibbling at the corpses it found.

“……This person is a problem.”

Suddenly, the driver’s corpse caught my eye. Unlike other monsters, his body was relatively intact, making it all the more gruesome.

“Hey, hey. Don’t eat that person.”

I stopped the Corpse Eater from attaching itself to the driver. It glanced at me and then focused again on the blood clots on the pavement.

Crunch crunch- Crunch crunch-

It’s eating the corpses like some kind of snack. It’s a familiar sight, so it’s somewhat comforting.

“It does work.”

A future Magic Spell called into the present.

It worked properly as if my Memory was not false, and rather, it seemed to eat faster and better than before, no, in the future, ah, what to say.

Anyway, it seemed to eat faster and better than before.

______________________________________________________________________

1 hour after the incident.

“……We’ve arrived.”

One of the members of 「The Spectres」, ‘Inri’, arrived at the scene.

─Check. What’s the status of Berhalsi?

Berhalsi, whose pocket was seriously depleted, had come up with a crazy plan to kidnap a direct descendant of Libra, and asked The Spectres for cooperation.

Of course, Noah refused flatly.

No matter how much of a fool Libra’s Jade is, Libra is still Libra. There’s no good in stirring up a hornet’s nest for no reason.

「The Spectres」 deliberately stayed away from the vicinity of the incident scene to avoid even the slightest suspicion.

However, about 5 minutes ago, they received intelligence that Jade had safely arrived at the Aerial Garden, and Noah sent a member out of simple curiosity.

That was ‘Inri’.

“……It’s clean.”

The space itself is a mess. The asphalt is crumbling, the ground is sinking, there are many traces of battle, but there is only one corpse.

Jade’s driver.

That’s why it’s clean.

“Jade doesn’t seem to have evacuated… and Berhalsi is presumed to be dead.”

Since there is no corpse, death cannot be confirmed, but there are no signs of Berhalsi’s life within a radius of 1 km.

─Oh. Got it.

As Inri, the situation was still not understood.

Jade had only one driver as an escort, but he was dead, and there was a senior from Endex left.

“There is only one senior from Endex at the scene.”

─Really? Then it must be his doing.

“…What.”

Inri frowned.

─He told me he was going to clean up.

“By himself?”

Inri asked in a whisper, quietly observing the ground.

Just then, Libra’s attendants arrived beside Endex Senior.

─I also think it’s impossible for Shion Ascal alone… Maybe he handled it with Jade?

The men in suits conversed with the Senior, and Inri caught their words.

──I took care of it… No, I drove them away.

“He claims he did it himself.”

─Oh really?

Shion Ascal just said so.

‘He drove them away’ by himself.

─Interesting. That kid seems to have a lot of secrets. You better come back now. No need to get involved unnecessarily.

Nodding, Inri immediately concealed himself.

______________________________________________________________________

“It will be treated as a line-of-duty death.”

Six men in suits were dispatched from Libra’s strategic planning room. They were dealing with the driver’s corpse.

I nodded calmly.

The man who seemed to be in charge asked,

“But what exactly happened?”

“…Didn’t Lord Jade tell you?”

“Lord Jade is at the Aerial Garden.”

Meaning they had come to understand the situation and respond voluntarily, without Jade’s orders.

After all, Jade wouldn’t send people just to clean up a corpse. Whether the driver lived or died, his own dignity was more important.

He asked,

“Was there an attack?”

“Well, yes…”

I hesitated.

They still didn’t know Jade’s strength. You could tell just by their clothes. Suits with sky-blue ties.

They were still at the bottom.

“There was an attack. But it was light.”

Jade dislikes his strength being highlighted. Probably because his fighting style is brawling.

So, even Libra’s direct subordinates and core executives only ‘roughly’ know about Jade’s strength.

Roughly a second-ranked knight, or if a bit higher, a first-ranked knight…

Both are wrong.

Even if 100 first-ranked knights attacked him at once, he could beat them all to death.

“I took care of it… No, I drove them away.”

I changed ‘took care of it’ to ‘drove them away’ as it sounded too aggressive.

The employees looked at me with a strange expression, but soon nodded.

“Yes.”

They put the driver’s corpse in a coffin and left.

Now, all that was left for me was a pair of gloves. The gloves Jade had left behind.

Could this be the cleaning fee?

“…Must be a luxury item.”

I’ll have it appraised later.

I carefully put the gloves in my back pocket.

______________________________________________________________________

…Friday night, 11:55 PM.

‘Clemen Hall’, temporarily transformed into a private room.

The place where the college board always took place was now bustling with a ball to mark the end of the festival.

However, only the invited upper class could enter, so it wasn’t crowded like outside. Rather, it was peaceful.

“….”

In a corner of the ballroom, Elise stood alone, leaning against a window without uttering a word.

Of course, many people approached her. Dozens of men came up to her, spitting saliva as they praised the play, but they all fled without daring to ask her to dance when Elise showed no reaction.

All of them.

“Elly~”

Layla, who had just finished a waltz with some man, approached with a beaming smile.

“Sorry! The kids just won’t leave me alone! Ah~ I must have done really well in the play, right?”

Whenever Layla made eye contact with people, she went around saying, “I’m the heroine~ I’m the heroine~” referring to herself as the heroine.

“That’s right.”

By the way, the entire drama team attended this ball. Thanks to Elise’s special invitation, it was essentially an after-party for the drama team.

“But didn’t you say you were going to the tower, Elly?”

“…I postponed it because I’m tired. Just for a day.”

Elise took a sip of the coffee in her champagne glass.

“Wow. Can’t believe it. Elly postponed going to the tower?”

She was supposed to leave today, but she wasn’t sure.

Elise herself didn’t know why.

Why, exactly, she was wasting a day here.

“But where did Shion go? The kids were talking a lot about the Duke. Oh right, Elly, did you see Asher getting jealous? He was fuming, saying the Duke is nothing special!!!”

As Layla said, Shion Ascal was nowhere to be found.

He had disappeared like the wind.

Elise had a vague idea why.

Heartbreak.

Probably, because of me.

“…Excuse me for a moment.”

“Oh, okay~”

Elise left her spot. She disliked the noisy atmosphere, and her head was slightly aching. So, she went up to the rooftop of the hall.

The view was wide open. Her hair fluttered in the wind that rushed in.

Bang—! Bang—! Fireworks were coloring the sky.

Elise folded her arms on the railing of the rooftop. She bent her waist and rested her face on them.

“…”

She quietly thought about Shion Ascal.

He is, first of all, a strange person.

A madman.

─Shut up before I rip your mouth open.

Sometimes, the abusive language that he had hurled at her at the beginning of the semester still comes to mind.

Heat rises to her forehead, and she wants to rip his mouth open and kill him first.

─I hate you. More than you think.

The same goes for his appearance in Recordark, conveying pure malice.

Elise hates Shion Ascal, and Shion Ascal hates her.

But that’s what makes it even stranger.

Despite claiming to hate her, he saved her, worried about her, and even today, the atmosphere was as if he was about to confess.

“…Did he really get special training during the winter break?”

Elise still finds his change unfamiliar.

The small guy who was being pushed around by Kain, Asher, and other guys, suddenly changed at some point, making her angry, annoying her, and also—

Hating her while liking her.

“It’s a strange thing to say, but if he ended up hating me because he liked me too much, I understand.

Because Elise had been through that too.

A person she liked so much, who didn’t like her back, turned into a dark history of hatred.

Was it when she was six?

Her younger self was pathetic.

Therefore, Shion Ascal is pathetic. His intellectual and empathetic abilities are exactly at the level of her six-year-old self.

“……Pfft.”

Thinking this way, Elise unknowingly let out a laugh.”