Chapter Fifty-Six: Truth Behind Hatred

Five hours later, Clone!Horse stopped moving. I announced we’d walk from here, so I cut the manufactured equestrian loose and told it to run away until it was out of sight, at which it would leave behind the wagon and turn into a bird. Its next mission was to fly into Ria, take the form of someone inconspicuous, and get rid of Niva’s wanted posters on the path we would take to get to the shop.

There was 30 minutes of walking before we reached the city, and Niva walked all of it with help from Erin and Primrose’s wooden staff. The spirit was quiet, though. She avoided Sekh and me and focused on her Master while peering out at the lovely glow of a morning sunrise. Experiencing the night falling victim to the sun, casting rays of orange and yellow before revealing the blue sky, was breathtaking to those that cared about nature. I wasn’t the biggest fan, but it was beautiful. Maybe worthy of a painting?

Regardless, it was a pleasant way to pass by the time, but I had to do something with Erin. The Catfolk was known in the city, and I wanted to be careful no one recognized her. If word got back to Karen, that trouble was the last thing I needed.

My lord, your clone is nearly finished with its task. There were less than expected, and there were none of Erin.

Great. With that, we had little to worry about. We still had to be careful, though, and not do anything outright stupid to get caught.

Luckily, the guard watching the entrance was the same one we’d met the first day I showed up with Sekh and Tilde. Since he knew us, none of us had to show any documents, but I doubt Erin even had hers. The spear-wielding Lizardfolk asked about her and told her to put the hood down, but I used [Lying] to develop an excuse of how vulnerable she was after spending two weeks in the forest. The story had holes, but the Lizardfolk believed us well enough. He also asked Niva about her prosthetics and wooden walking staff. It was just out of curiosity with no harm behind it, so she just said she was returning from seeing a blacksmith that made them. The Lizardfolk heard the rumors of Enap in Aetos Village, so he asked us a few curious questions about him.

Then the slime popped out from under her hood, which frightened the guard. However, it wiggled affectionately before hopping to Primrose’s arms. To my surprise, the guard didn’t question the woodland spirit. He made a small comment about how most spirits would rather stay in their crystal to lessen the impact on their summoner. Primrose held herself together and spoke regally, then thanked the man for not turning his weapon upon their little pet, Lei.

Thanks to these distractions and stroking his ego a little bit, he waved us in, and we finally entered the city.

Gloria and Arella left four days ago, but she left orders to keep the dungeon closed until someone spoke up about the Dark Mana fragments being found in the mines. Sekh using [Tyranny Control] must’ve left small fragments behind that we couldn’t sense or detect.

From talking with Irisa and her family two nights ago, many nearby villages were still sending what supplies they could spare. That lessened the pressure a bit. But even if the economy had severely dripped, food was easy, thanks to the ocean nearby.

Eating fish non-stop was better than starving. Drinking water wasn’t an issue, either, due to the deep underground wells and literal ocean about 1,000 feet away. It just took a bit of filtering and boiling to make it potable, so things were going as well as they could once the initial fear died down.

Still, people had bills and debts to pay, and they needed money that wasn’t changing hands fast enough. The guild''s stockpile reached dangerous levels, meaning they couldn''t pay the full reward on completed missions. Quests were piling up, and only those adventurers that couldn’t pack up and head for greener pastures were even in Ria. It was almost like a ghost town if I was being honest. The city was nothing like it was when I arrived with Sekh and Tilde all those many nights ago.

While walking towards home, it felt like tension was building. It was 7AM, and already there were ravenous people out walking around with fishing poles. The scowls marked on everyone’s faces led to frequent fights, broken up by the increased guard patrols.

“Man, that bitch fucked it all up,” Tilde said. “We stayed here for months, but the moment we leave for a week, it all goes to shit. There’s trash piling up, you got buildings with broken windows for days, and that spot over there used to have like 10 stores. Now? It’s nothing but regretful dreams of ever moving here in the first place.”

“Think it’ll recover?”

“Maybe?” Tilde answered Sekh. “Once you have a certain reputation, it’s a bitch to get rid of it. Give it a few more months without the situation changing, and this’ll place be a haven for bandits. Something’s gotta give. Irisa and her family won’t have to worry. Remember, you’re sitting on a literal gold mine. The problem is just how to sell them,” she said, talking about Amos’s clothes.

“Yeah... I doubt we''ll sell them anytime soon.”

The moment I used my key to enter the locked shop, Irisa was waiting behind the counter with a giant smile. The tips of her horns were bright red, and I missed this green-skinned woman. She bounced on her feet so fast I thought she was a rabbit, and her parents, who appeared from the backroom, looked just as happy. They started to say something, but I held up my hands, moved to the side, and allowed a woodland spirit, who let a yellow slime rest on her shoulder, to enter as she pushed Niva’s wheelchair. She pulled down her hood to reveal a face with scales.

And those lips were pursed into a smile.

“Niva...?” Irisa gasped, her hands covering her mouth. She instantly became overwhelmed in a good way after seeing her so healthy.

“Thank you.... Thank you for taking care of me. Irisa, Kokan... Ichiha... I’m only alive...thanks to you... You cared for me with Mistress, Sekh, and Tilde when no one else...” Niva shed a tear, her face scrunched in so much emotion. She took the staff she held and stood up, then walked to the counter.

She walked all by herself.

And just like that, one moment of action caused a family of three to dissolve into a happy mess. They ran towards Niva and hugged her, crying together in pure joy to see someone they cared about having recovered from her heinous injuries. I thought the whole eye illusion thing would’ve caused even an iota of hesitation, but I was wrong.

They just accepted it without question, offering even more hugs and tears.

But why did I feel...so upset at seeing something beautiful... I searched my mind as Sekh and Primrose passed me to join the hugging session.

“Tilde...” I said, forcing what I wanted to say through clenched teeth. “Let me ask you something. Is it wrong...for me to feel... envy?”

“Ah, I get it,” Tilde said, crossing her legs and sitting on my shoulder. “Envy is a fine thing to feel. Even a perfect specimen like myself used to be jaundiced. I still am, sometimes. The question is this: how do you act on it? You won’t treat Niva like shit from now on, would you? She knows your past, so you can bet she wished she was there to save you.”

“No, I’m not going to be ugly to her. That wouldn’t be right.”

“Good. What happened to you happened to you, and what Niva went through was what she went through. Tomato tamato potato patato. Quod erat demonstrandum. But seriously, Master, it’s going to be hard not to be jealous because you’re proof that life for someone like Niva can be turned around. But don’t let what you didn''t experience cloud your judgement of the life you’re living now. Fuck your parents, fuck Mekka Academy, fuck Meruria, and fuck those shitty ‘defenders’ that were too chicken shit to stand up.”

I deeply sighed and rubbed my hair. “I won’t lie. It hurts... Seeing what could have—what should have been done to me? The help I should have received. The love I should have received. The care. The tenderness... The respect... God, it hurts so fucking bad... I wanted to be something...not nothing.”

“Master...” Tilde stood up, hugged my face the best she could, and used her little hands to wipe away my jealousy. “You’ll realize it sooner than later. Just wait and stay strong, okay? I love you, you know.”

“I love you too, Tilde...” She slapped me in the ear and told me to get involved in that hug. I looked up and saw all the friends I’d come to love and care about look at me with open arms. I rushed forward with my arms wide and bared my heart with the rest.

When Kokan regained consciousness, he was alone and dressed inside an empty bar. With just a gap in his memory, he prayed nothing wrong had happened and returned to his family, thinking nothing of it.

Four months passed in the blink of an eye, but it was not without worry.

Kokan received a letter from Karen, and he wanted to make sure she was okay because she had vanished after that night. After returning to that same bar, his eyes nearly fell from his sockets when he saw her belly.

It was carrying life. When asked who the father was, his heart nearly stopped when she caressed her stomach and pointed to the only other person in the bar.

“That night... It was magical... I love you, Mr. Kokan... You were there for me... You helped me... You believed me... And we were meant for each other... I want to be your wife... I love—” Her warped mind angered Kokan. It was rare that he felt genuine rage, but he formed a fist and punched her across the cheek. She was thrown to the ground, hitting her head on the barstool, but Kokan’s wrath was too great. He kicked, stomped, threw, and smacked Karen until she was a bloody, broken mess of a woman with shattered bones. His sharp eyes locked onto that disgusting belly, and as he raised his foot high to destroy that child inside...

Irisa’s face flashed through his mind.

He was at a crossroads. In his mind, Karen deserved to die. Yet the life in her womb was innocent. It had done nothing wrong. And at that moment, he made a choice. He couldn’t even begin to know how it would affect him and his family.

In the following weeks, he requested an emergency transfer to a new town that had started to show promise. Ria only had about 6,000 people, but the guild was serious about putting in an academy. At least a small one, and Kokan leapt at the chance to get away. Luckily, his family liked that idea. Getting a start in a new city? Having a new customer base?

For the next 10 years, things were going great. The name Karen Barclay had abandoned his mind, and even if it hurt him to keep it a secret from the two women he loved most in his life, he thought it was for the best.

But all changed on the first day of a new semester. He read Erin Barclay on his roster.

The nightmare he wanted to escape had followed him. What came after this was a series of harassment targeted at both him and his family. When that didn’t work, Karen, who had not given up on making Kokan hers, used her last resort.

The room was silent after the truth was out because no one knew what to think about the bomb Kokan dropped. I had my own theories on why Karen hated him so much, but I never even fathomed the thought it was misguided obsession that corrupted itself a dozen times over.

But I knew what I had to do. As I left the shop, no one tried to stop me. With just me, my thoughts, and a waypoint on Karen, who was at her shop, I walked the slightly more dangerous streets. In my mind, I just kept replaying the story Kokan told us. I looked up to the man. He was the first male figure I had any respect for. He took Sekh, Tilde, and me in without question, then worked hard to nurse Niva back to health. He was my teacher...and he was abused like I was.

Just imagining someone like him looking like I once hurt my heart so much I just wanted to lie down and cry.

But I held back that sadness. It wasn’t channeled into anger, but I used it to fuel my determination.

Once I reached the city square, I was slightly taken aback by how empty it was. I zoomed out my map and realized a lot of people were fishing. If not to sell, then to certainly to eat. But without that many people here, it was child’s play to sleuth around to the back. There were various cracks in the walls, but nothing a small spider clone couldn''t handle. I found a path to the first floor, so I infiltrated the building after turning into slime.

But I remained the jelly-like creature as I headed for a door with a thick lock. I could probably break it, but I squeezed through the gap between the floor and the bottom of the door to emerge into a living room. It was fancy, sure, but I returned to my humanoid form and put my clothes back on. The doorway to my right led to a stairwell, and I went up all six flights to find a door with three locks. I bypassed that, then had to slip under the following three gates that also had an overabundance of deterrence until I finally arrived at my destination. My map said that vile bitch was right on the other side, and when I tried the handle, it freely turned.

“What...is this...? I said, completely out of my goddamn mind. Everywhere I looked... I saw Kokan. Portraits and paintings of him lined the entire wall. Life-sized statues littered the room, and they were possibly anatomically correct. It was the very example of what a fanatic’s room would look like.

“Ahhh... Ahhh... Ahhhh. My dear...husband... Ahhh... I’m... Almost... AAAhhhhhh~~~~” From the bed covered in sheets also covered with Kokan’s likeness, Karen Barclay was furiously humping one of those statues. She was naked with a thick film of sweat that almost made it seem like rain was pouring on her. She threw her hands up and moved her hips like no tomorrow, stopping when her body quivered and trembled from climaxing.

She looked very sickly, with pale, thin skin that seemed to stretch over her bones. If I had to guess, her last meal was a week ago, and she was in the final stages of starvation and dehydration. Even her moans sounded like groaned death cries.

When I walked towards her, she became aware of my presence, yet she just turned back to her doll and continued to fuck it. She pletely gone. Mentally, that was, and almost physically. Even when I held a gun to her head, she only had eyes for what she probably saw as her husband.

So, I pulled the trigger, putting her out of her misery and splattering her brains against the wall. Her life ended without even realizing I was there. It was a shame the fear of death didn’t scourge her heart. I honestly didn’t want to assimilate her, but like hell would I allow her corpse to remain with the person of her desire.

You’ve assimilated Karen Barclay and acquired 57 SP.

Karen had noble-esque skills, such as [Dancing], [Singing], [Piano], and [Etiquette], amongst others. As a merchant? She didn’t have any skills a trader would’ve had, which led credence she used her wealth, not experience, to grow her business.

I ignored the activity log while storing the nearby bookshelf full of diaries. Now that the AI was more intelligent, it took only seconds to devour the content, and then it linked my mind to its information bank as per my request.

If only to try it out. It worked for a handful of minutes before the strain grew too great. The AI cut the connection to spare me the mental stress.

Suddenly, it was all so clear. Karen wanted to replace Ichiha, and she wanted Erin to take Irisa''s spot. She constantly wrote about the future the three of them would have even before she was sure she was pregnant. And the hate she felt from Kokan’s brutal attack was directed towards his family, not him because she believed Ichiha was behind it. It was an obsession in a corrupted form...

And these books told the truth... The horrible, horrible truth, and as much as I wanted to burn everything...

I couldn’t.

Instead, I went floor by floor and stole what the AI recommended, including jewels, clothes, more herbs, utility items like rope, oil, matches, soap, perfume, and other toiletries like towels. The safe was next, but the code was changed. And it was too heavy for me to stash away since I had that 900-pound enchanting table. My current weapons couldn''t pierce the inches of reinforced steel and mythril.

You know, I don''t care about the safe that much anymore.

As I left the way I entered, I left behind a handful of clones to completely trash the entire fucking store because I was sure I wouldn’t need anything at all. I only told them not to destroy the room I killed Karen in because I didn’t know if Kokan and his family wanted to see proof of a woman who hadn’t had a single unobstructed thought in her entire life.

I could order my clones to thrash it afterwards. Maybe even burn it all down.