A Stuffed Cheonma in my Head - Chapter 161



Only Noblemtl

Episode 161. Come to your senses

Linda ran through the crowd and hugged me tightly.

“Hehehe. Devil, did you find me?”

I stared blankly at Linda’s face for a moment.

Behind her, men were seen writhing in agony and dying.

Linda’s bright, cheerful face contrasted with the men’s suffering faces.

What is this gap? It was a heterogeneous landscape.

How can you be so innocent after killing people like that?

It was no different from the expression on a child’s face when he runs to his parents’ call while playing house.

“……away.”

I pulled Linda away, then immediately used the flag to send a gust of wind through my entire body.

Wheezing!

Then he gathered the wind with his right foot and struck down.

Phew!

The wind spread across the floor.

“Ugh!”

Then he raised his hands from bottom to top, and forcefully stirred up the wind that had accumulated on the floor.

Phew!

A swirling updraft blew the dokdomo up the alley.

The green dove flew across the dark night sky and soon dispersed, mixing with the air.

Beyond the scattered clouds, stars twinkled.

Linda clapped her hands.

“Wow! That’s amazing!”

I spoke in a somewhat subdued tone.

“Linda.”

“huh?”

“Shut up.”

Only then did Linda notice that my tone was unusual. Her eyes widened and she covered my mouth with both hands.

I looked at the people who had fallen in the alley.

A total of six people. Men in their early to mid twenties.

Judging by their appearance and attire, they were not much different from the men who had beaten up Linda in the village before. In particular, they were each holding a short weapon in one hand.

The difference was that while those guys were running away in fear, these guys didn’t even run away, they didn’t move anymore.

They were all foaming at the mouth with expressions on their faces as if they had been wandering through hell.

In the meantime, they were all poisoned.

“ha…….”

I clutched my forehead.

If we do this, the coast guard will come after us.

The place where I am is, once again, one of the vassal states of the Holy Empire Hilka.

In the worst case, the Empire’s Paladins may be dispatched.

Of course, the possibility of that happening is extremely low.

There’s no way the imperial knights would be dispatched just because of a few dead bastards.

But anyway, since there were six casualties, the Coast Guard will begin an investigation.

I have no choice but to leave this place as quickly as possible… … .

As I was organizing my thoughts, Linda timidly grabbed my arm and pulled it hard.

“Devil. Are you angry? Why?”

“Why? Even after doing this-”

The moment when the heat spreads and you are about to shoot it out.

The words I was trying to say got lost when I looked at Linda’s face.

Linda looked up at me with a tearful expression.

“What did I do wrong? I just did what the devil told me… … .”

“… … .”

This guy. He’s serious.

This guy honestly didn’t know what he did wrong.

“……under.”

I laughed hollowly.

Because this is a fucking psychopath.

* * *

First, I went back to the inn, woke up Neiman who was sleeping, and immediately left the village.

It is better to run away in the middle of the night than to waste time by getting involved in a useless incident.

Various various – Charrrrrr –

We rode in a carriage in the middle of the night.

Fortunately, it was a bright moonday, so I was able to pick up the pace.

Neiman asked, still looking half-asleep.

“What the hell is going on? I was sleeping well, so why are you suddenly running away in the middle of the night?”

I answered his question simply.

“By killing people.”

Neiman’s expression hardened.

“How many?”

“six.”

Neiman snorted.

“How did that happen?”

“I wonder that too.”

I tapped Daryl on the shoulder as he drove the carriage.

“Let me explain. Why were you suddenly looking around the village when you were supposed to be going to the stable right next door?”

Neiman and I turned our gazes toward Daryl.

But Daryl still seemed to be in shock, with a blank expression on his face.

Neiman shook his shoulder.

“Hey, are you out of your mind?”

“Huh? Oh, right. What did you say?”

“How did it turn out like that?”

Daryl swallowed hard and explained the situation.

“Linda, you say? As I said during dinner, I showed her how to put on and take off the harness in the stable. She did it better than I expected. So I finished quickly and left the stable… and she suddenly ran out into the street saying she needed to buy some jerky. She said she was in charge of the food or something… … .”

“hmm.”

I praised him for buying jerky the day before, so I guess that’s why.

“So I quickly chased after it, but it was too fast, so I lost track of it. I had no choice but to call its name and search for it, but when I heard a strange sound, I went to see it in that state.

“… … .”

Of course, there’s no way they’d sell beef jerky at a time like this. They would’ve all closed down and withdrawn a long time ago.

So, the image of Linda wandering around looking for beef jerky and then entering an alley and innocently asking, “Hey, do you sell beef jerky?” came to mind.

Of course, the guys hanging around the alleys at this hour can’t be honest guys.

Daryl glanced at me and asked.

“That guy. What is his identity?”

“I don’t know either.”

I tapped Daryl on the shoulder and walked over to Linda, who was crouching in the corner of the carriage with her knees hugged.

At that moment, Shushuruta was nagging Linda with his hands on her waist.

“Why would you do something so stupid! If you’re going to kill someone, you should do it in a place where sight and sound are blocked, not in such a reckless way!”

“Ugh… … .”

“This is the most basic of basics. If poisoning can be done so covertly, why did you foolishly spread it so conspicuously?”

“Mia Neng… … .”

“What’s there to brag about if you killed him with poison? If you were going to use poison, you could have just put a little bit on the tip of a needle and used it to quietly kill him. What on earth were you thinking? You idiot. I can’t live like this, I can’t live like this.”

… … What is he talking about now?

Of course, what Shushuruta said is not wrong, but now we need to think about it from a slightly different perspective.

We need to focus on ‘why’ rather than ‘how’.

Linda, who had been completely exhausted from Shushuruta’s constant nagging, raised her head and looked at me as I approached.

“Devil. I was wrong. Don’t hate me… Don’t leave me alone… … .”

I couldn’t help but sigh as I watched Linda sobbing.

When I told them not to kill them, they got beaten up so badly, and when I told them to use poison instead of getting beaten up, they created a poison dance and killed them all.

How is there no middle ground?

Of course, I have no regrets about their deaths.

Those who continue to do such petty things even after they are over 20 years old deserve to die.

Even if that’s true when you’re young, once you become an adult you need to think for yourself.

Those who live only by inertia. Those scumbags who don’t know how to prolong their lives only by harassing others.

What I’m trying to say is something a little more fundamental.

It’s about ‘선’.

There are good people in this world.

Even if they are not good people, there are those who try not to cross the line.

How about Linda compared to that?

There is no such thing as a line. I just kill impulsively, as the feeling takes me.

This guy just says he’s sorry for making me mad.

… … Where should I start talking about this?

I had an intuition that this wasn’t something that could be done by simply yelling or beating someone up.

Actually, this is something I should have talked about a long time ago, but I kept putting it off and ended up in this situation.

It means that I am also responsible for this situation.

Even if it wasn’t now, it would have exploded someday, somehow.

We can’t allow such a dangerous person into our mercenary group.

I sat down across from Linda and said,

“Linda.”

“Yeah.”

“Let me tell you a story.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Your past story.”

Linda scratched her head.

“… … I don’t remember very well.”

“Just tell me what you remember.”

“Yeah… Okay, I understand.”

Linda thought deeply for a moment.

Various various – Charrrrrr –

Late at night.

The horse and carriage ran, and the cool night breeze ruffled my hair.

I waited patiently for Linda to gather her thoughts without rushing her.

That night the wind scattered Linda’s green hair many times.

Linda’s mouth opened.

“It was a dark room.”

It was a very calm and composed voice, unusual for her.

For a moment, I thought it was Shushuruta who spoke, and I made eye contact with her.

Shushuruta’s eyes were also round.

“I was locked up. The teacher tied us to a chair and then fed us poison or injected us with it. It hurt so much.”

“… …Teacher? Who are you, teacher?”

Linda shook her head slowly.

“I don’t know. We just called him teacher.”

“hmm.”

“The teacher said that poison and medicine are only a little different. That’s why we have to take poison. In order to make medicine. He said that if we can overcome the poison, it will become medicine. If we make medicine, he’ll give us a sweet cake.”

I had a lot of questions, but I just listened in silence.

“We promised to endure and overcome and eat the cake together. So it hurt so much, it hurt so much, it felt like we were going to die, but we endured it. But the other kids couldn’t. They screamed and writhed and trembled, and then suddenly became quiet. We promised… … .”

Linda’s voice trailed off.

“Every time that happened, the teacher would sigh and drag the quiet kids out. Every time our friends died, new kids would come into the room. They were crying so I consoled them. The teacher didn’t like crying. I consoled them by saying that if they drank the poison and fought well, the teacher would give them cake, and that we would all win and eat cake. We held on while thinking about the cake. Even when we were tied to chairs, swallowing the poison, and getting injected, and it hurt so much and our vision was blurry, we thought about the cake.”

“… … .”

“One day, the teacher gathered us together while drinking and complained. He said he had a daughter just like us. She was very sick and we had to get through it. I wondered if her sickness had anything to do with us, but the teacher looked so sad that he just said okay. I think the other kids said okay because they were scared.”

Linda continued her story with her gaze down.

“As time went by, the poison got stronger and more painful. Even the friends who were left started acting strange. Some would just stare into empty space and chatter, others would suddenly bang their heads against the wall, and there was even one kid who scratched his face because he couldn’t take his mask off while bugs were crawling under it. Of course, he wasn’t wearing a mask.”

The voice gradually became smaller.

“That’s right, one by one… It became quiet. Eventually, they all died. Now, no more friends came. Did the teacher know? Even if I brought them, they wouldn’t last long and they’d all die anyway. We were supposed to eat cake together… … .”

Linda shut her mouth.

For a while, the only sound was the carriage hurtling through the darkness.

There was a brief silence, and Linda spoke again.

“… … Too weak. They’ll all die. I was left alone. I was tied to a chair and kept drinking poison. At some point, the poison didn’t hurt anymore. I was left alone and drank all the poison that the other kids were drinking. But it didn’t matter. Because I was alone. When will I get cake?”

Linda muttered as if talking to herself.

“The teacher sighed a lot. One day, the teacher got angry and cried a lot. She said her daughter died. She said it was because of me. She kicked and beat me. When I asked when I would get the cake, she screamed and beat me harder. She said there was no cake. She said the cake was a lie from the beginning. Then why did my friends die like that?”

Linda laughed.

“I killed the teacher. It was funny. He kept giving us such strong poison, but he only ate a little bit and started shivering and dying. Hehe. It was really funny.”

Linda laughed, shrugging her shoulders for a moment.

Her laughter was laced with self-mockery.

“After my teacher died, I was hungry, so I drank the poison in the room. You know how poison that used to taste so bad now tastes good? It tasted even better when I mixed it with other things. My vision would blur for a moment and I would feel dizzy, but I liked it whenever that happened. I had a dream. I wasn’t alone there. My teacher smiled and gave me a pretty cake, and I ate it with my friends. … … It was sweet.”

Linda looked up and stared into space.

Tears were flowing from the corners of his eyes.

“I mixed the poison in the room and ate it… Since I had nothing left to eat, I opened the door and came out. It was originally locked, but I found the key in the teacher’s clothes and opened it after he became quiet. I don’t know why I didn’t do this before. If I had, my dead friends would have been alive and could have eaten cake together. Right?”

“… … .”

“I went up the stairs. It was very blinding. We were in the basement. The teacher’s house was above. I was walking around the house looking for something to eat… There was a room where the sunlight was particularly bright. There was a girl lying straight on the bed. Was she the teacher’s daughter? Maybe so.”

“… … .”

“I approached her cautiously and spoke to her. Hello, I am Linda. Are you asleep? No answer. Did you die because of me? Or did my friends die because of you? No answer.”

“… … .”

“So I put my ear to my chest.”

Linda chuckled.

“… …It was quiet.”

“… … .”

“Hehehe… Hehehe… Hehehehe.”

I looked at Linda for a moment, who was smiling with tear stains on her face… … .

match!

He slapped her across the face.

Linda, who had been slapped in the face, looked at me with wide eyes.

I said in a calm voice.

“Wake up, you crazy bitch.”