SMACK!
I hit his face hard once more, and he spat out more blood than before, his mouth likely having burst.
Even so, I didn’t stop and swung my hand repeatedly.
Uncontrollable rage surged within me at the thought that Salim might have been treated just like this man.
Considering his actions until now, the man would never have spared a child.
“Are you deaf? Did you hit him or not?”
“Huff, what is this…”
Ilya, with his messed-up face, gasped for breath and suddenly raised one arm.
He seemed to have activated a skill, intending to throw me off.
However, the arm, wrapped in sharp wind, was soon helplessly seized in my hand.
‘Whoo-ing—! CRASH!’
The spiraling wind lost its direction and slammed into the ceiling.
Part of the wall was destroyed by the impact, and powdery fragments rained down onto the floor.
“Don’t play dirty tricks.”
I snarled and savagely grabbed Ilya by the collar.
I was irritated by his struggling, even though I hadn’t properly started yet.
I felt like I wouldn’t be satisfied until I gave him back at least as much as the people had suffered.
‘How long has he been doing such things? Three years? Five years?’
Just as he had approached me at the mansion, this bastard must have certainly contributed to kidnapping people.
Unless he was being blackmailed by Igor, I had no intention of letting him off lightly, as he had willingly participated.
“Salim!”
But the moment I clenched my fist again, Mateo’s urgent shout came from behind me.
I reflexively turned around and saw Salim crawling out through the iron door, which was crumpled like a piece of paper.
The door I had casually slammed Ilya’s head into turned out to be Salim’s room.
Since Salim was smaller than average for a 10-year-old, he was easily squeezing out of the narrow gap.
‘It’s dangerous if he moves alone.’
I first kept Ilya subdued and took out several bottles of antidote from my item pouch.
I didn’t have the luxury of counting the number, so I grabbed roughly the number of people there.
The people who saw this let out gasps of surprise.
They seemed not to have truly believed that I would bring back the antidote, apart from the fact that my ability had returned.
“This is the antidote, so drink this first. And can you please let the others out?”
At my words, Salim, who was standing awkwardly, nodded.
I only checked that he had opened the lid with his tiny hands and then turned my attention back to Ilya.
I could feel the man’s body trembling like a leaf under my cold gaze.
He had almost beaten a person to a bloody pulp a moment ago, but he seemed terrified of dying himself.
I wanted to choke him to death immediately out of disgust, but strangely, I couldn’t bring myself to do it.
Unlike Igor, about whom I was certain, it was difficult to make a resolute decision on how to deal with Ilya.
It was an undeniable fact that the man had committed horrific acts.
But did I truly have the right to take his life?
For me, who had lived a normal life in the real world, deciding someone’s life and death was never a light matter.
“Ugh, this is impossible. How did you get the antidote…”
“That’s none of your business. Swallow this instead.”
In the end, instead of choking him, I shoved the poisonous grass deep into his mouth.
I had packed it just in case, but I didn’t expect to use it right away.
For Ilya, who was already consumed by inferiority, losing his ability would be utterly devastating.
“Ugh!”
Of course, I didn’t intend to end his atonement with just this much.
I pressed down on his shoulder as he roughly resisted and instantly plunged the S-Rank dagger I took out into his wrist.
If the only thing his hands were used for was hitting people, then there was no need for them to move.
“Aaaargh!”
“Live the rest of your life regretting this.”
Ilya writhed in pain, clutching his pierced wrist.
Given his status, it would probably be difficult for him to obtain an S-Rank antidote throughout his life.
Since even Do Soohyuk kept it secretly, it meant it held an immensely high value.
No matter how abundant his wealth, Igor, who had more than ten bottles, was a special case.
It was obvious that he had obtained them through illegal channels while committing these acts for a long time.
“You should be beaten to death too!”
“You son of a bitch!”
It was just as I was slowly getting up.
The scene that suddenly unfolded before my eyes made me instinctively stagger and step back.
The people who had escaped from their rooms started lunging at Ilya, one by one.
They kicked his abdomen hard and punched him, mixing it with all sorts of curses.
I noticed the empty potion bottles rolling on the floor and realized their strength was unusually high, unlike their previous listless appearance.
Ilya was curled up, unable to let out a single scream under the torrent of people’s rage.
It was the horrific price for his actions, returned manifold.
He would know better than anyone that an ordinary person’s body wouldn’t last long.
“…”
I thought I had done enough retribution, but it seemed it was still far from enough for them.
Naturally, I had no authority to intervene here.
There was no reason to either.
I looked down at the empty potion bottles rolling on the floor and then looked around with a start.
I had belatedly thought of Salim.
But no matter how thoroughly I searched among the people, the child was nowhere to be seen.
“Mateo, where is Salim?”
“Pardon? Oh, he was here just now…”
Mateo was also flustered, looking completely bewildered.
I couldn’t take my eyes off the child for a second, but he had vanished without a trace in that short time. It was utterly uncanny.
‘Where did he go, for goodness sake?’
As I inspected every corner of the room with a serious expression, an ominous thought suddenly crossed my mind.
My eyes, looking toward the entrance, shook with unease.
‘No way.’
How did Salim process his brother’s last moments?
A tragic death? Or…
When the thought reached that point, my legs moved instinctively first.
As I quickly left the room and ran toward the entrance, Mateo also followed me hurriedly.
“W-wait for me!”
I hoped it was an over-exaggeration, but I had a bad feeling.
The look in Salim’s eyes that I had seen contained both emptiness and deep-seated rage.
And there was no need to explain who that rage was directed at.
‘Should I go to his room first?’
Since the mansion was large, the possibility of the two encountering each other was very low.
Igor, who would have noticed my disappearance, might still be wandering around the mansion.
Salim, unaware of this, would have headed straight for his room first, and thus, the two would have missed each other.
‘Yes, that must be it.’
“Huff, where are you going in such a rush… Ugh!”
“…”
When I suddenly stopped in the second-floor corridor, Mateo, who had been chasing me, gasping for breath, bumped his face into my back, unable to stop in time.
However, I didn’t have time to worry about that.
As I had feared, Igor and Salim were together in the second-floor corridor.
However, Igor was lying on the floor, bleeding, and Salim was frozen stiff, completely panicked.
Ultimately, the situation I hadn’t wanted had occurred.
“Damn it…”
A utility knife, which I didn’t know where he got it from, was grasped in the child’s small hand.
Just by looking at the scene, I could tell what had happened moments ago.
Igor was dead, his eyes wide open, wearing only a shower gown.
His body, completely stained red with blood, was covered with chaotic, irregular stab wounds.
Given the multiple fatal wounds, he seemed to have died instantly.
He was killed without being able to put up any resistance to the sudden attack.
At this rate, he might have met his end without even realizing he was dying.
There was a stark physical difference between an adult and a child, but more importantly, there was an insurmountable barrier between an Awakener and an ordinary person.
No matter how great Igor’s physique and strength were, he had no means of stopping the attack of an Awakener like Salim.
“Ha…”
I put a hand to my forehead and let out a small sigh at the miserable scene.
The end of Igor, who had tortured and killed countless Awakeners, ironically came at the hands of a child.
Someone might see it as a cathartic ending, but the reality was far from it.
Salim, who had committed the act, seemed deeply shocked by his own actions.
That was precisely why I was worried.
Although he had done it with the sole intention of avenging his brother, it was too much for a 10-year-old child to bear.
These memories would probably follow Salim for the rest of his life.
He would undoubtedly have nightmares and might even struggle to fall asleep for a while.
That was why this situation was even more heartbreaking.
It felt like the major hurdle in his life had come too early.
All I could do right now was to alleviate his guilt, even slightly, from the trauma.
“It’s okay, you did the right thing.”
I approached Salim, who was huddled and trembling.
I carefully took the knife from his hand, lowered myself, and met the child’s eyes.
“Are you hurt anywhere?”
Only then did the child’s golden eyes become wet with tears.
I would have felt somewhat relieved if he cried out loud, but Salim just sobbed and burrowed into my arms.
The time he had spent suppressing his emotions was too long for him to suddenly burst into tears now.
‘What should I do now, anyway?’
Leaving the body here and escaping the mansion was also a problem.
It was a scene that might cause unnecessary misunderstandings for people who discovered this place someday.
No matter how much evidence there was that Igor had tortured and killed people, it was still unknown whether the Russian government would admit that fact.
To them, Igor was a great philanthropist himself.
“I… I can make it disappear.”
It was just then. Mateo, who had been hiding behind the dresser with an extremely tense expression, slowly raised his hand.
