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*****
The reality for a girl like her was brutal. If either of her parents were to fall ill and lose the ability to work, the family's income would instantly fail to cover the rent, let alone their food and clothing. To maintain their current existence, they had to work without pause—day after day, hour after hour.
In the slums, one could find countless vagrants who had frozen or starved to death. Most had started as hard-working people until a single illness severed their source of income, forcing them to rely on meager relief rations. Those rations were designed only to keep one from the immediate brink of starvation; they provided no strength to seek new employment. Thus, they would fall into a vicious cycle, eventually perishing on a park bench when the relief failed to appear.
"Thank you for saving me! Thank you for your generosity!"
Overcome with emotion, the girl knelt upon the cold ground, offering silent, fervent gratitude to the strange infant who had appeared from nowhere. To her, he was surely the incarnation of a deity. After a moment, she rose and carefully tucked the gold pounds into an inner pocket of her clothes, sprinting toward her home.
With this small fortune, they could finally leave the slums behind and rent a proper room. Her father could rest his weary body and find a steady job in a factory instead of taking exhausting, low-paying day labor. Her mother could set aside the back-breaking laundry work, buy a sewing machine, and earn several times more by tailoring and mending clothes.
As for herself, she would no longer be tethered to the washbasin. She could study during the day, strive to enter a university, and fundamentally rewrite the destiny of her entire family.
In the Cherwood District, near the border of the West District, stood a grand villa on Iris Street. It was a sprawling estate boasting vast lawns, a wide garden, a small plaza centered around a fountain, and numerous marble statues. High above this luxury, George hovered.
He activated his Eye of Detection, peeling back the layers of the villa to peer into every corner. Inside the magnificent, gilded hall, young and beautiful girls were being subjected to horrific abuse. Those perpetrating these atrocities were high-ranking officials whose faces appeared frequently in the daily newspapers. Malicious maids and attendants stood by, watching over the scene.
If any of the girls resisted or showed a lack of enthusiasm, they were met with the cruel bite of a whip. If they displeased an official, they were dragged away by their hair, destined for a fate far worse than the hall itself.
Though the hall lacked the sigils of a dark ritual to summon an evil god, the depravity occurring within its walls was no less foul than any sacrificial ceremony. At the highest seat of the hall sat several Beyonders, led by the Sequence 6 Hurras. Opposite them were members of the House of Commons, a Deputy Director of the Police Department, and a Deputy Director of the City Hall.
The obese Capim scurried between them, obsequiously fawning over the guests and directing servants to ensure the most "satisfactory" service was provided to these powerful men. Beneath the hall lay a hidden underground prison, larger than the villa itself. It was packed with youthful girls; some were undergoing various forms of "training," while others were being subjected to punishment.
"Truly... Hell is empty, and the devils are all here," George sighed, his eyes taking in the entirety of the horror.
Sometimes, these aristocrats and officials—men who lacked any moral baseline in their pursuit of money, power, and interest—were more monstrous than any cultist. Lifting his right hand, George pointed his index finger at an MP who was currently closing his eyes in sickening enjoyment. A cold smile touched George's lips.
"Bang!"
An Air Bullet hissed from his fingertip, piercing through the villa's roof and detonating the MP's head like a ripe melon. He was using the ability of a Magician. Under normal circumstances, an Air Bullet from a Sequence 7—even enhanced at Sequence 5—was only slightly stronger than a common revolver. It would never have the power to punch through a reinforced roof, let alone kill a target instantly under the nose of a Sequence 6.
However, George's version was no ordinary bullet. He had modified the ability, infusing it with the Laws of Space. To his projectiles, the villa's roof was no sturdier than a sheet of paper; he could have punched through a hundred layers of steel plate as easily as cutting through tofu.
"Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!"
George's finger flicked rapidly, and a hail of air bullets erupted like fire from a machine gun. With surgical precision, he burst the heads of every single abuser in the hall. He knew he only needed to leave the Beyonders alive to find out who was pulling the strings. As for these corrupt officials and nobles, death was the only fitting end.
If he handed them over to the Church, their family backgrounds and influence might protect them. They might escape the gallows by spending enough gold, perhaps emerging from prison after a few years of light sentencing. Even in the relatively just societies of the modern world, the powerful found ways to evade the ultimate penalty. In this feudal society, where the power of the nobility and officials was near-absolute, justice would be even harder to find.
Within a few breaths, the entire villa was silent, save for the terrified sobs of the girls. Aside from the victims, only the three Beyonders—Hurras, Katy, and Parker—remained breathing. Even Capim lay dead on the floor, his face frozen in a mask of utter disbelief.
"Run!"
Hurras snapped out of his shock, his face pale with terror. He let out a sharp roar, signaling Katy and Parker to flee the villa immediately. Any enemy who could slaughter so many people in seconds was undoubtedly a High-Sequence Beyonder—a demigod.
But as he scrambled to his feet, he saw a small infant manifest directly in their path.
"It's you!" Hurras gasped.
"So, it seems you recognize me?" George replied. He knew his intuition was correct; these three had to be connected to the military or the high nobility. Aside from the two Great Churches, George had only publicly revealed his strength at Duke Negan's banquet, an event attended exclusively by the kingdom's elite.
"Imprisonment!" "Whip of Pain!" "Psychic Piercing!"
The three offered no answer, launching a desperate, simultaneous assault. They knew the intelligence reports: George had easily killed Qilangos, a Sequence 5. The military had classified George as a Sequence 4 demigod. To escape a demigod without fighting for their lives was an impossibility.
"How pathetic," George remarked.
Ignoring their attacks as if they were mere tickles, he fired three precise shots. In an instant, the limbs of the three Beyonders were severed from their bodies. They collapsed onto the floor as helpless, limbless torsos.
"Don't kill us! We are on a secret mission! We are military Beyonders—this is all a misunderstanding!" Hurras screamed in a panic. Seeing his combat effectiveness stripped away in a single move, the fear of death stripped him of his resolve.
He wasn't lying. They were indeed Beyonders from the military, acting under superior orders to facilitate Capim's human trafficking ring. It was a top-secret operation, never to be disclosed. But with death staring him in the face, he used the secret as a shield, hoping to stall for time until military reinforcements could arrive.
"A misunderstanding? I'll know if it's a misunderstanding soon enough."
George stepped forward. With a palm to each of their foreheads, he first extracted their Beyonder characteristics, then began to sift through their memories. A moment later, a look of confusion crossed his face.
"Why would the military need so many slaves?"
He hadn't been wrong; these three were indeed part of the military, reporting directly to a demigod within the ranks. Three years ago, they had been ordered to help Capim establish this massive underground network. On the surface, it was a profit-making venture. In reality, it was a system to mass-purchase slaves and collect "population" through maritime channels. As for where those people were sent or what purpose they served, the trio remained in the dark.
"I'll let the Church deal with this headache," George muttered.
He staunched their bleeding just enough to keep them alive, then conjured a massive, brilliant fireball in the sky above the villa. It served as a beacon that could be seen across half of Backlund.
Very quickly, two figures streaked through the night toward the estate. They were demigods from the Church of the Evernight Goddess and the Church of the Lord of Storms—George's old acquaintances: Crysta and Randal-Amyris.
(End of Chapter)