Chapter: 70
Turning her body to face Angsho directly, Iris slowly began walking towards him.
“Hic..!”
Angsho let out a scream-like sound as he finally snapped out of his daze and staggered back.
A creepy, black energy was undulating from Iris, and with her inhuman gaze fixated on him, Angsho’s legs gave way.
Thud!
Just like the slaves who had clung to him and wailed, Angsho dropped to the floor, pushing himself backward as he started to flee.
“D-Don’t come! How dare a mere slave!”
He raised his ringed hand and flicked his finger.
Ttak, ttak!
No matter how much he flicked, nothing happened, and Angsho’s face turned as pale as a ghost.
“Th-That’s impossible! If you try to break that collar directly, it’s supposed to explode! A collar like that can’t just shatter without doing anything!”
In his sheer panic, he blurted out thoughts he normally would have kept to himself.
Iris raised her sword, her expression blank. However, her eyes were swirling with a terrifying murky rage.
“W-Wait! Okay, I’ll apologize now! I’ll make it up to you! You want to be free from being a slave, right? If that’s the case, I can…!”
Puhuk!
Iris’s sword lightly pierced Angsho’s shoulder.
“Gah!”
Angsho screamed and rolled on the floor. Iris pulled out the sword and swung it again.
“W-Whoah! Save me, save meeeek!”
The slaves who had been strategically absent to suppress rumors about him were all out of the house. There was no one around to save him.
Kwajik, crunch!
Iris swung the sword several times, avoiding the vital areas. Angsho was left to slowly die, choking on his screams as his body was slashed.
“…”
Once Angsho’s breath completely ceased, Iris silently walked towards the entrance with the sword in hand.
‘I will kill, I will kill them all.’
Even though Angsho, the source of all trouble, was dead, her rage showed no signs of fading.
She wouldn’t stop until everything that had pushed him to his death was gone.
Leaving Angsho’s quarters, Iris walked down the corridor, the blood-dripping sword in hand. Just then, Ottugi came running from a distance, gasping for air.
Noticing through the signal that one of the slave collars had broken on the upper floor, Ottugi assumed it had blown up when the collar snapped.
Normally, he wouldn’t have given it a second thought, just figuring that a dumb slave had bit the dust, but being that this collar had popped in a VIP guest’s room? That was a whole other story. If the guest had been near the slave, they could’ve been seriously hurt.
Even if no one was injured, they definitely would have felt 100% displeased. Ottugi, who had rushed out without even putting on his outer clothes for damage control, found Iris standing there, blank-faced and armed with a blood-dripping sword.
The moment he spotted Iris, a chill ran down his spine. It was partly due to the eerie energy radiating from her, but also—
The fact she was standing in front of the important guest’s room where the collar signal had vanished, and the now bare neck where the collar used to be, combined with the sword dripping with blood, painted a picture that stirred all sorts of nightmarish scenarios.
“Y-You didn’t…!”
In a fit of madness, Ottugi called out to Iris, who was clearly out of her mind, in a trembling voice.
Swish.
As Iris pivoted towards Ottugi, he trembled and grabbed the whip tied to his waist.
Crack!
As the whip hit the ground with a harsh slap, Ottugi hastily summoned the muscle-bound henchmen with a pager.
Iris’s gaze fell on the whip that had struck the floor, and the image of Ottugi striking her brother flashed vividly in her mind.
Thud!
While Iris was distracted by the whip, skilled fighters who had been lurking around gathered around Ottugi. He spoke, backing up a little.
“Capture her!”
Ottugi’s eyes glimmered with danger. Initially, he’d been scared of Iris, the guest-slayer, but now?
‘It’s best to make an example out of her. In the most horrific way possible!’
Slaves killing guests wasn’t unheard of. Usually, those who met such fates became targets for ridicule, not sympathy.
In fact, a slave who killed a guest would draw even more attention. A slave foolish enough to attack people above their station would meet a gruesome end, writhing on the ground.
It was just another one of the arena’s entertaining pastimes.
As Ottugi was busy dreaming up how he’d execute Iris—
Pat.
Iris swiftly kicked the ground and closed the distance between herself and Ottugi.
“Urk…?”
Before Ottugi’s bulging eyes could process what was happening, she was right in front of him.
Clang, swish!
“Aaaaaah!”
A slave trying to protect Ottugi with a sword was cut cleanly in half, armor and all.
Thud.
“Grrr…”
Only after the falling slave did Ottugi snap back to reality. Iris swung her sword casually in the air, her expression unfazed.
Swish.
Blood sprayed across Ottugi’s face and the bodies of other nearby slaves.
Faced with death’s chilling grip, Ottugi felt a slight wetness in his pants, abandoning any thoughts of using Iris as a sacrificial tool to regain control of the situation.
He stumbled back, conserving whatever shaky composure he had left, pointing a trembling finger at Iris as he yelled, “K-Kill her! Kill her now!”
The slaves, whose collars were rigged to explode for disobeying, gritted their teeth and charged at Iris. Iris casually cut through the slaves like they were made of paper.
The slaves who had followed Ottugi around like flies, basking in every luxury, fell lifelessly to the ground.
“Oh no!”
Ottugi screamed and turned tail, running for his life. He madly used every slave he passed as a distraction. Thankfully, he knew a secret passage where he could slip away from Iris.
“D-Damn it! Damn it!”
Ottugi, drenched in a panicked sweat, finally reached his office.
“I-I need to contact L-Lord Jiso!”
Muttering his way through panic, he fumbled for paper with trembling hands and hastily wrote a short note to Jiso.
It detailed that a slave had gone berserk, causing chaos in the arena. Surely, for someone who lived for fun, Jiso would come to the rescue!
‘If that works out, maybe I can finally kill that wretched girl!’
As he thought of Jiso, his trembling body began to settle. He tied the letter to a crow’s leg and sent it off.
‘Huuh, huu… Finally getting my wits about me.’
After sending the letter, his mind, which had been half-crazed, came back to focus. Rubbing his forehead, he suddenly realized something and exclaimed.
“Right, the champions!”
The strongest warriors who were much more powerful than Iris’s carcasses were currently lounging about on the top floor. With their help, they could easily bring Iris down.
‘It’ll cost a pretty penny for their services… but if I tell them it’s an opportunity to impress Lord Jiso, they’ll absolutely bite!’
He rushed towards the top floor via the secret passage.
“Gah, ugh… Seriously, I’m going to need an elevator installed here someday.”
The secret passage was built entirely of stairs as a precaution for unexpected circumstances. Ottugi kept wiping the sweat off his brow as he climbed.
Thud.
Four floors beneath where Ottugi was busy ascending, Iris ascended the stairs, her face as emotionless as ever. The secret passage was no longer a safe haven.
*
“Could you do me this favor?”
“That’s not nearly enough to make this worthwhile.”
“Ugh, isn’t this a chance to shine in front of Lord Jiso?!”
“That bit is tempting, but… Is that all you have? This is a critical task that affects the credibility of the arena, and you think you can brush it off that easily?”
A handsome, golden-haired man lounged lazily on a sofa, speaking with a casual drawl, causing Ottugi to tremble and grit his teeth.
“W-Well, what do you want?”
“Hmmm… First—”
The champion, about to list his demands, suddenly trailed off, shot up from his seat, and seized the sword that had been resting against the wall.
“Hah! You set a trap during negotiations!”
“What? What do you mean…?”
“Or are you just that dense?”
Crack.
Before the champion could finish, the previously sealed door to the quarters began to split apart as if sliced by something sharp.
Thud, thud!
The now shattered door crumbled away, and Iris emerged on the other side.
“Hi, hyeeek! H-How did you get here?!”
Ottugi screamed in disbelief and hurriedly retreated. The champion casually drew his sword.
“You know that the price goes up for post-payment, right?”
“What? No matter how you slice it—”
“If you don’t like it, I’m leaving.”
“N-No! Fine, you can charge whatever you want, just take that girl down!”
“Understood.”
The champion drew his sword with a serious expression. As he muttered some incantation, crackling electronic spheres began swirling around him.
“Would you kindly die? My going rate is pretty steep, you know.”
A wicked grin stretched across his previously gentle face. The crazed sword master, a magic-wielding nut with delusions of grandeur, eagerly lunged at Iris.
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