TWLPOD 2

At this rate, I might as well go back inside and get some more sleep, Aran thought, finding he couldn’t understand Corps Commander Teito’s insistence on his attendance at every induction ceremony. Then, a sense of foreboding made him lift his head. Something—call it intuition, a premonition, or a human’s sixth sense—was definitely sending him a signal.

A pain like a hand twisting his heart, an unidentifiable tension, dug into his skin. There was no time to ponder the reason or the cause.

Because along with a colossal, ear-splitting crash, a whole building was being demolished right before his eyes.

*

Inside a steel cage filled with damp humidity and a cold chill, a man bound in a straitjacket and chains hung suspended.

Except for the area around his gagged mouth, the visible parts of his cheeks and neck were covered in dark blue bruises, and blood dripped steadily from torn skin alongside veins that stood out as if they would burst.

“You stubborn bastard. Not even a single scream.”

“……”

“Let’s see how long you can hold out.”

Inside the body that writhed in agony yet clenched its teeth to suppress any groans, was the hand of Charles, the Esper with the <Penetration> ability in charge of the torture.

For three days now, with his hand inside the bound body, he had repeatedly inflicted shocks like grabbing and twisting the stomach, breaking ribs, and severing muscles, but… the one being tortured was resisting with silence, as if he had lost his voice, without even letting out a groans.

“Sir Charles. He needs to be conscious for the mental manipulation…”

“Not yet. He’s not some praiseworthy guy who would pass out from this.”

Once again, he put his hand into the man’s abdomen and rummaged around, and the sound of chains rang out along with the flailing. Amidst the silent screams, a calm voice flowed into the prison cell.

“That’s enough, Charles.”

As a woman who had entered the cage with the light clicking of her military boots elegantly restrained him, Charles pulled his hand out of the young man’s body.

“Good work.”

After Charles bowed like a gentleman and stepped back, the woman raised a hand and removed the young man’s blindfold.

“Kay. This is our last request. We don’t want to go as far as brainwashing you either.”

“……”

“You may not be able to speak, but you should be able to make a sound. If you understand, open your mouth.”

Her hand grabbed the young man’s chin.

“Answer me!”

When she pressed on his bruised blue chin and cheek, the bone was crushed, making a coarse, grinding sound. Nevertheless, the young man did not flinch.

“…It can’t be helped.”

She gestured to the Esper who had accompanied her.

The Esper, who specialized in mental manipulation, stepped into the prison, thick with the smell of blood. And he faced the young man the officer was pointing to.

“Can you do it?”

“At this level… it should be possible.”

The order given to him was generally to inject perfect loyalty to Lympus as a soldier into a mind and body weakened by torture. Just as they say the body is a vessel for the mind, the more cracks there were in the body, the easier it was to penetrate the mind. The body before him was in such a mess it was hard to believe it was still rational, and it was obvious that the unseen insides were even more of a pulp.

‘It’s for the sake of humanity.’

Though he had become more desensitized than when he first started, the only thing that moved him, who still felt guilty about interfering with someone’s mind, was the greater cause of having to win this war for everyone’s sake.

The Esper stood before the young man who was on the verge of fainting. When Charles grabbed him by the hair, the young man, his neck twisted, gasped for breath and slowly opened his eyes.

The eyes revealed beneath the jet-black eyelashes were uncannily red.

Despite three days of torture, which must have caused severe external and internal injuries, his anger alone was vivid. As if to represent a mind that was not mixed with even a hint of impurity.

“Hoo.”

The Esper took a deep breath and activated his ability. From the eyes to the brain. He moved his consciousness along the nervous system. The process would be complete once he carved out the ‘most precious thing’ embedded deep in the mind through the hippocampus, which governs memory, and the amygdala, which governs emotion, and replaced it with ‘Lympus’.

‘The most precious thing… is a person, I see.’

Perhaps his mother… no, more like a guardian figure.

A relationship where no blood was shared.

He caught a glimpse of someone who had spent a long time holding hands in the vast desert of Willamere.

A warm, comforting memory that was as strongly seated in his mind as their tightly held hands.

‘If I carefully carve out these parts…’

The moment the Esper, trying to replace that spot with Lympus, cautiously touched his memories.

“Ugh…”

For the first time in three days, a sound escaped the young man’s mouth.

Then he squeezed his eyes shut and shook his head, but it was not easy to shake off a nervous system ability that was already connected.

“Ugh, heup!”

Watching him twist his entire body as if all the physical pain until now had been nothing, Charles showed a twisted smile. His lower body swelled, as if he felt a thrill at the sight of the young man even convulsing, looking as if he would cough up blood at any moment if not for the gag.

Charles, who was enjoying the sight of the young man suffering while bound, soon discovered that the Esper was shaking his shoulders as if the young man’s trembling had transferred to him.

“Keoheo… heok, keok!”

His standing body instantly tilted and collapsed to the floor.

“What is this…?”

When the guard ran to the fallen Esper and turned his body over, everyone in the prison covered their noses and mouths. His eyes, nose, and mouth—the insides were like they had been burned jet black, leaving only empty, black holes.

There was no need to check for a pulse. Even to the naked eye, he was not a living being.

The guard who had ripped the gag from Kay’s mouth asked, his voice trembling with anger.

“How did you do it. What are you?”

“Ha, haha… ahaha!”

Even though he was limp like a corpse, only his red eyes were blazing, and the discrepancy was so great it felt terrifying. The shock of losing a precious A-class Esper of the mental manipulation type was greater than any pure admiration for the willpower that protected the mind while the body was shattered.

“Lieutenant General. What will you do?”

Charles brought the frozen Lieutenant General back to reality.

“It can’t be helped. If even brainwashing doesn’t work, we have no choice but to threaten him.”

“That’s Plan C. Is it alright to kill?”

“Since we’ve suffered a loss, I will take responsibility for that much.”

As the Lieutenant General nodded, Charles’s smile deepened, and she had the guard carry the corpse and exited the prison with unsteady steps.

The iron door closed heavily, and the only ones left were Charles and Kay. Just the two of them.

“I told you. We wanted you to cooperate voluntarily.”

“I… also said it clearly. To get lost. For years.”

“Right. This is why you shouldn’t try to persuade a son of a bitch with human words. You have to put a leash on him. Watch closely.”

Charles manipulated a bracelet on his own wrist and projected a screen into the air.

Kay’s red eyes slowly looked at the screen. A familiar scene was revealed. Bright-faced children were talking about something to their orphanage teacher. It was a very peaceful scene, a stark contrast to his own situation.

“Watch until the end.”

Charles pulled a pistol from his thigh.

His hand, having finished loading, passed through the empty air and disappeared somewhere.

When Kay frowned and showed a reaction, Charles bared his teeth and smiled.

“You know it with your body, right? My ability.”

Charles had the ability to make his own hands pass through things as he wished if certain conditions were met, and those hands, which could either heal or break someone’s body, were now gone from the air, holding a gun.

The vanished hand appeared in the orphanage within the screen he had projected.

[“Teacher. There’s something strange here. Is this a gun… and a person’s hand?”]

At the voice coming from the screen, Kay’s voice grew louder.

“Don’t… Don’t do it, don’t!”

The moment he realized what he was about to do.

Bang!

Along with a sharp sound, a bullet lodged itself in the body of the child on the screen.

[“Huh?”]

The screen clearly showed the blood seeping from the child’s body, who hadn’t even registered what had happened, soaking their clothes.

*

It took only a moment for the 100-year-old building, made from a proper mix of marble and new materials, to collapse. The wall, where vines had been entwined, burst open and melted, and the attendees of the induction ceremony stepped back, feeling as if their skin would not just crack but burn from the searing heat.

Screams continued from the smoke inside the building, and from the middle of it all, Charles came running out, terrified.

“Aaargh! My arm! My head!!!”

The flames clinging to his body devoured the fabric and inflicted burns, and Iris, spotting him, created water in her hand to extinguish the fire, but Aran, who had approached at some point, stopped her.

“Aran? What’s wrong. We have to put it out quickly…!”

“Someone else will do it.”

Even if it wasn’t her, even if it wasn’t an Esper, the fire could be put out.