Chapter 27
Jin was weak to three things.
First, hunger.
Second, money.
And last, affection.
If he had to rank them, hunger was in a league of its own.
Still, affection probably stood about half a step ahead of money.
In other words, his two greatest weaknesses were hunger and affection.
And the church had quietly wormed its way into both.
Go there, and they fed you too—an important point—and spoke warmly to you.
That alone filled both body and heart with a sense of abundance he had never once felt in Downtown.
And since he got a free meal out of it, he could even save money.
That was precisely why Jin kept attending a church that did not suit him in the slightest.
Nefetra? Netflix?
He honestly had little interest in the goddess whose name he could not even remember properly.
He had only vaguely learned that she was one of the Twelve Gods who represented the Age of Light and Roses—the glorious olden days—and that she symbolized mercy.
And for good reason.
The doctrine of mercy that the priest preached so fervently, spraying spit everywhere, was far too disconnected from the realities of the current age.
No matter how open-mindedly Jin tried to listen, it was difficult to sympathize with any of it, so much of the sermon simply went in one ear and out the other.
Thus, to Jin, the Church of Mercy was merely a place where he could eat good food and mingle with people without possessing even the faintest shred of faith.
Nothing more, nothing less.
So waking up in a pitch-dark basement came as quite a shock.
“...What the hell?”
Wondering why he had his arms raised in surrender, he looked up and saw that both wrists had been bound in chains hanging from the ceiling.
Did the exalted Goddess of Mercy enjoy bondage play?
Sorry, but I’m not into that sort of thing.
After committing blasphemy as naturally as breathing, Jin began assessing the situation.
Let’s see.
He had visited the church around early evening—
As usual, he had first filled his stomach, then hidden behind the backs of everyone else in the last row of the prayer hall and listened to the boring sermon.
But for some reason, sleep had come easily that day. His eyelids had grown heavy.
Had he eaten too many fries?
But that could not have been it.
Even the believers who normally listened to the sermons with fervent enthusiasm had been nodding off, as though the entire congregation had been invited to dreamland together.
Did they put sleeping pills in the food?
That had been his final thought.
Then he had opened his eyes here.
“This is ridiculous.”
Jin let out a hollow laugh.
Judging by the situation, they really had done something to him.
There was no other explanation.
As if agreeing with his conclusion, a neat rectangular window appeared before him.
『(Sudden!) Nothing Is Free』
Escape the factory.
- Reward: 5,000 Perk XP
Jin frowned.
As if seeing that unwelcome face was not unpleasant enough, the bastard had decided to hit him with the brutal truth today too.
At first, Jin glared at the status window with narrowed eyes.
But after a moment, his expression gradually settled.
“...Yeah. Nothing is free.”
He knew.
He knew such things did not exist.
He had merely wanted to believe in it once, even if that meant allowing himself to be deceived.
That was why he felt far more empty than betrayed.
Of course.
Of course it had turned out this way.
“What a shitty world.”
Muttering under his breath, Jin swept his gaze around the room.
The homeless people he had gotten to know over the past few days were dangling like cuts of meat in a butcher shop.
Among them, he spotted Jeff’s face beneath those bizarre, multicolored rags of his.
Like everyone else, Jeff’s head hung limp.
He was completely unconscious.
Hmm. So he got caught too. That’s a relief.
For a brief moment, Jin had suspected that Jeff might have approached him from the beginning for the sole purpose of luring him here.
Just as he felt relieved that the last scraps of his faith in humanity had been preserved—
“Hey.”
An unfamiliar voice brushed past his ear.
Jin turned toward the source.
“Yeah. Over here.”
About ten meters away at a diagonal angle, a middle-aged man lightly swayed his body to make his presence known.
He had a somewhat broad frame, but even so, his body was gaunt and unimpressive. His loose, filthy clothes were caked with grime.
He looked every bit as homeless as the others, yet Jin did not recognize him at all.
Was he not from the church?
Jin voiced his question.
“Who are you?”
“Me? Your senior.”
“...What are you talking about?”
“I was brought here before you lot. That makes me your senior.”
Huh?
Jin narrowed his eyes and tilted his head.
He knew even cold water had an order of seniority.
But talking about seniors and juniors after being kidnapped was like arguing over rank while drowning in sewage.
This guy isn’t sane either.
Finding the situation strangely amusing, Jin snickered.
“Then don’t just brag about being my senior. Explain what’s going on in a way your junior can understand.”
The middle-aged man blinked before answering.
“Well, I don’t know either.”
“You just said you were my senior.”
“I am. By about an hour...?”
Damn it. I knew this would happen.
Jin let out a deep sigh.
What had he expected from a man who looked like he had several screws loose?
The thought suddenly made him feel unfairly treated.
Normally, in situations like this, there was supposed to be some haggard-looking man who explained where they were and what terrible things were happening before dramatically breathing his last.
Couldn’t things be convenient for him just once?
Then I could cradle his corpse in my arms and swear that I’d avenge him!
What? Is that really too much to ask?
After grumbling inwardly for a moment, Jin decided he had no choice but to figure things out himself.
“Hey, mister. Mister? Senior?”
“Huh? What?”
“Did you get dragged here after mooching off their free meals too?”
“Me? I just woke up here while I was sleeping.”
No wonder Jin did not recognize him.
Apparently, they did not always use the same method to abduct people.
Jin nodded and asked another question.
“You do live in Downtown, right?”
“...Downtown? Isn’t that District 47? I’m from District 43. Regitown.”
Hold on.
That complicated things.
He was from another district?
Were these guys some kind of nationwide kidnapping ring?
While Jin was still trying to make sense of it, the middle-aged man began muttering to himself that he needed to urinate. Bodily functions at a time like this—well, fear could do that to a person.
Jin was just about to suggest that he relieve himself little by little and let it dry when—
His senses caught something.
“Shh!”
Jin hissed sharply and immediately closed his eyes.
Step.
Footsteps that had drawn close without him noticing.
Someone approached from beyond the closed iron door. A cold metallic scraping followed as something was undone and slid across the floor with a clatter.
Then the door opened with the creak of rusted hinges.
Three people entered.
All of them wore robes so long that the hems dragged across the floor. Their hoods were pulled low, completely concealing their faces.
Their clothing looked as though it belonged to another era entirely.
To Jin, who watched through narrowed eyes, they looked like cosplayers pretending to be medieval monks.
A low voice came from among them.
“How many are there?”
“Thirty-two.”
“...Thirty-two. That is hardly sufficient.”
“My apologies. This was the best we could manage for now.”
One man asked the questions while the other two took turns answering.
The apologetic voice sounded familiar.
May the Mother’s embrace enfold you.
The warmly smiling face of the priest surfaced in Jin’s mind, causing his brow to twitch involuntarily.
The men failed to notice and continued approaching him little by little.
“Less than ten days remain until the transaction. There can be no shortage whatsoever. Hurry.”
“Yes.”
The reply came from directly in front of him.
The next instant, Jin’s eyes snapped open.
Whoosh!
With monstrous core strength anchoring him in midair, his legs shot upward and wrapped around the neck of the monk walking at the rear like a pair of snakes.
“...!”
It happened with lightning speed.
Calling it a snatch would have been more accurate than calling it a grab.
Crrrk!
The man’s face flushed crimson as he was forced onto his toes.
His hands clawed desperately at the thighs crushing his throat, struggling to pry them apart, but all resistance was futile.
Crack—
Cr-crunch—
Feeling the man’s breath cut off between his crossed thighs, Jin released the pressure.
The chains rattled loudly.
The two men in front spun around.
“H-How?!”
“O dense spawn of darkness—!”
Their dear priest panicked.
The superior behind him immediately began chanting a spell.
So that’s why he gets treated like the senior one!
With that thought, Jin slammed both his bound arms downward with all his strength.
BOOM!
The chains tore free from the ceiling, stakes and all.
At the same time, Jin focused his mind.
His consciousness paid mana as a toll and was pulled toward the location he had selected—
Then his vision shifted.
Jin appeared behind the chanting monk, still in the same posture, arms swinging down toward the ground.
WHAM!
The chain lashed across the man’s skull like a whip.
It might not have broken the sound barrier, but the destructive force behind it was more than enough to crush a human skull like tofu.
Stagger...
Thud!
The monk collapsed face-first onto the floor.
At the same moment, the bubbling red pool beneath his feet went still as though it had never existed, returning to ordinary solid concrete.
Jin had no particular desire to learn what that had been.
He immediately stirred his mana and twisted the chains loose from around his wrists.
Now only their dear priest remained.
The priest flinched, caught between corpses in front of and behind him.
His exposed lower face moved beneath the hood as he belatedly tried to speak.
Jin kicked him in the shin.
There was no need to use Blink.
Why bother against someone standing right in front of him?
“Aaagh!”
As the priest collapsed, Jin seized the back of his hooded head with one hand and smashed his other palm into the man’s face.
Smack!
It was a palm strike delivered with superhuman strength.
To an ordinary person, it was no different from the Buddha’s Palm.
Sure enough—
The priest’s entire face caved inward, and blood and yellowed teeth scattered across the floor.
“Hey, Priest. Wake up. Come on, stay with me.”
Feigning alarm, Jin slammed his palm down again.
Smack!
Fight fire with fire.
The consciousness that had been knocked away by the first palm strike returned after the second.
The priest gurgled and spat up blood.
“...K-Kegh...”
“Oh, you’re awake.”
“Y-You...”
“‘You’? What happened to ‘Brother’? You used to call me that with such a big smile. You’re hurting my feelings.”
As he spoke, Jin squatted on the floor.
Naturally bringing himself level with the priest’s eyes, he pulled the man’s head back by the hair he still held tightly and asked,
“Where are we?”
It was an ordinary question, devoid of any obvious agitation.
But terror filled the priest’s eyes.
The fact that Jin still wore the same needlessly handsome face that had always smiled foolishly while devouring free meals only made him more terrifying.
“Damn, I’ve gotten too used to speaking politely...”
Jin clicked his tongue at himself and changed the question.
“Forget it. Why are you kidnapping people and bringing them to a factory?”
“How... do you know... it’s a factory...?”
Even through his fading consciousness, the priest could not suppress his confusion.
The exact same question was driven into his ears again.
“What do you do here?”
“...Mutants... mutant specimens...”
The fake priest muttered with his mind already half gone, then sagged limply.
His entire face had been turned to pulp by the first blow.
It was impressive that he had remained conscious this long.
Only then did Jin release his grip and stand.
He paid no attention to the middle-aged man staring at him in astonishment.
Jin patted down the inside of his clothes, then reached toward his waist.
His hand swept forlornly through empty air, and his nose wrinkled.
“...Damn it.”
As though it had been waiting, the status window appeared at the edge of his vision.
Jin growled at it.
“Quit telling me to escape. I have to find Gravis and recover my money too.”
He rolled his neck until it cracked.
“I’m going to turn this whole place upside down, so either raise the reward or get lost.”
A faint gleam of madness shimmered in Jin’s eyes.