Chapter 231: Bullying
Lia leaned against the stone wall at the corner, her eyes closed.
The rhythmic thrum of her own heartbeat told her that Amy was late. Exactly
forty-three minutes late.
This was an anomaly. The girl's arrival typically fluctuated by no more than ten
minutes. A broken rhythm meant a new variable had entered the equation.
Lia opened her eyes. The surrounding slimes, sensing her shift in posture,
undulated away to clear a path.
Lia stood up. Her physical condition was significantly better than it had been
three days ago; the vertigo brought on by starvation had receded. The bread Amy
delivered daily had provided enough Od for basic motor functions. However, Lia's
Mana remained in a state of self-imposed depletion. As long as she didn't
actively draw energy from the atmosphere, her "signature" remained invisible to
the Empire's detection arrays.
She moved toward the sewer exit. Her footsteps echoed through the vaulted
tunnel, though the slimes instinctively parted before her boots.
As she neared the surface, the light intensified. Lia slowed her pace,
instinctively lowering her center of gravity to dampen the sound of her
movement.
Voices began to drift down the shaft. Children's laughter—but it was laced with
a raw, unadulterated malice.
"Finally caught the Slime-Girl!"
"Hey, Slime-Girl! Going for a crawl in the filth again today?"
"Look at her! Spending every day in this stinking ditch... I bet you've turned
into a slime yourself!"
"Is she sticky under that dress? I bet she's all slimy and gross!"
"Hahaha! Look at her clothes! Absolutely filthy!"
Lia halted ten meters from the exit, remaining merged with the deep shadows. Her
gaze pierced through the gloom, locking onto the scene just beyond the tunnel's
mouth.
It was Amy.
The girl was crouched on the dirt, hugging her knees. Her small shoulders shook
with the weight of her silent sobs. She didn't wail; she simply buried her face,
trying to disappear. Her reed basket lay overturned nearby. The kitchen scraps
she had painstakingly gathered—the cabbage leaves and bread crusts meant for her
harvest—were being ground into the mud under the boots of three boys.
A tall, thin boy in a clean shirt ground his heel into a pile of breadcrumbs,
his voice a sneer of petty vengeance. "That's for telling! That's for telling
the teacher we didn't do our homework! This is what happens to snitches!"
Another boy, wearing a cap, kicked Amy's small oil lantern. The glass casing
shattered, and the oil spilled across the dirt, soaking into the soil. "Serves
you right! Tattletale! Teacher's pet!"
The third boy, a heavy-set youth, knelt down and scooped up a massive clod of
mud soaked in the spilled lamp oil. He stood, weighing the sludge in his hand
like a pitcher preparing for a strike. He aimed directly for Amy's exposed head.
Amy braced herself, her eyes squeezed shut, tears tracking through the grime on
her cheeks. she could hear the boy's heavy breathing. She could smell the
pungent, oily stench of the mud. She wanted to shriek, but her throat felt
constricted by ice. She wanted to run, but her legs felt as heavy as leaden
shackles.
She could only wait for the impact.
Time seemed to stretch, thin and agonizing. One second. Two.
The impact never came. The jeering laughter died abruptly, replaced by a sudden,
heavy silence.
Trembling, Amy cautiously peeked through the gap in her arms.
A silhouette stood before her. A straight, unyielding back—not particularly
tall, yet substantial enough to block out every shred of malice directed her
way. Silver-white hair swayed gently in the evening breeze.
the oily clod of mud hadn't hit Amy. It had struck Lia squarely in the chest.
Black sludge dripped down the grey fabric of her new dress, staining the stones
at her feet.
Lia's expression didn't flicker. Her gaze didn't even shift.
The three boys froze. The sight of the jagged, crisscrossing scars on Lia's face
caused them to collectively take a half-step back.
"W-Who are you?" the tall boy stammered, his bravado evaporating.
Lia didn't answer. She didn't even grant them a glance. She merely tilted her
head slightly, her voice falling over her shoulder toward the shivering child
behind her.
"Stand up."
Amy blinked through her tears, staring at the scene in a daze. She wanted to
obey. She wanted to respond to her "Big Sister." But her legs refused to
cooperate, remaining as weak as water.
"I... I..." Amy's voice was thick, her chest heaving with suppressed sobs.
Lia didn't turn back to offer comfort. She maintained her focus on the
perimeter, her voice flat and repetitive.
"Stand up. Under no circumstances are you to let your enemy leave your sight."
Amy bit her lip, drawing a sharp breath. She pressed her hands into the mud to
push herself up. She failed on the first attempt, her body swaying before she
collapsed back down.
Seeing this, the boys regained a sliver of their courage. The tall one took a
tentative step forward.
"Hey! Mind your own business!" he barked. "This is between us and the
Slime-Girl!"
The boy in the cap chimed in. "Yeah! She deserves it! Nobody likes a snitch!"
The heavy-set boy scooped up another handful of mud. "If you don't move, you're
next, scar-face!"
He didn't get to finish.
Lia moved.
It was a slight shift of her weight, a soundless half-step forward. It was a
minimal expenditure of energy, yet the voices of the three boys were cut short
as if by a blade.
Lia's eyes were locked onto them. Those violet eyes held no anger, no threats,
and zero emotion.
It was the look of a predator observing three corpses.
The mud slipped from the heavy boy's hand, splatting uselessly on the ground.
The tall boy's knees began to tremble. The boy in the cap stumbled backward,
nearly tripping over his own feet.
"R-Run! Run away!"
The tall boy broke first. The three of them turned and bolted, scrambling and
tripping as they sprinted away from the sewer entrance.
"Don't you dare tell!" one of them shrieked from the distance. "If you tell,
we'll... we'll..."
The voices faded into the turn of the street, leaving the area in silence.
Lia withdrew her gaze. She looked down at the sludge on her chest, casually
wiping away the worst of it with her hand before flicking the filth aside.
A rustling sound came from behind her. Amy had finally managed to scramble to
her feet. Her blue dress was a ruin of mud and water; her knees were barked and
bleeding, and her palms were raw.
But she was standing.
"Big Sister Lia..." Amy's voice hitched, a fresh wave of tears spilling down her
cheeks.
Lia turned around. she looked at the child for several seconds.
"Why are you weeping?"
"They... they were mean to me. They bullied me."
"And?" Lia's tone was clinical. "Does your weeping cause them to cease?"
Amy opened her mouth, but the words failed her.
Lia knelt, bringing herself level with the girl. "Tears only serve to advertise
your weakness."
Amy bit her lip hard, fighting back the sobs.
Lia reached out, her hand clumsy as she wiped the muddy water from Amy's face.
"The next time you encounter such a variable, your role is not to crouch in the
dirt and await your fate."
"You stand. You look them in the eyes."
"Analyze their movements. Gauge their strength. Formulate a counter-attack."
Amy nodded, her breath still hitching. "But... but I can't beat them. They're
bigger."
"Then you run," Lia said, standing back up. "If you cannot win, you run. If you
cannot run, you hide. If you cannot hide, you stall for time."
"There is always a tactical option. But never—never—crouch in the dirt with your
eyes closed, waiting for the blow."
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