Dusk gathered in, and the setting sun—molten gold—washed New Eridu's industrial wasteland in a weary, dim haze.
The earth stretched out under the fading light, desolate and silent, like the bones of some forgotten giant beast. Against that bleak backdrop, inside an unnamed Hollow, the Baiqi Heavy Industries crew finally cornered the pile driver famous for its "escape arts"—
Friday—and drove it into a dead end.
"Hey! Give it up, Friday! You've got nowhere left to run!"
"..."
A soft exhale—like someone setting down a thousand-pound burden.
Seeing the steel giant finally trapped, everyone from Baiqi Heavy Industries loosened up. Even Belle, who was piloting Eous, lifted its chubby little hands and theatrically wiped away sweat that wasn't even there.
Then Eous was promptly scooped up by a pair of gentle hands.
"Mm! It's sooo cute! This little thing… I really want to take it home and study it properly."
"Hey! Sis! Don't you dare!" Koleda cut in immediately, as the mood began sliding toward a very dangerous kind of "weird." She rescued the round little Eous from Grace's arms.
Meanwhile, Anton kept his eyes locked on the silent pile driver. It stood perfectly still—tense, wary—like a statue frozen mid-guard, ignoring every shout around it.
"This guy hasn't made a peep for a while," Anton muttered. "Did its language module break?"
"No way," Koleda replied. "It obviously understands us."
Friday remained stubbornly mute. Koleda rubbed her temple, sighed with a mix of impatience and resignation, and finally laid it out:
"Alright, quit playing deaf. Let's talk. The other two machines that ran off with you—one's a tough-guy chasing self-actualization, and the other's a girl who fell headfirst into romance."
Her gaze sharpened like a blade. She lifted a finger and pointed straight at the steel hulk in the amber light.
"And you? What are you supposed to be? What's your goal?"
A brief dead silence spread, as if even the wind stopped breathing.
Then the pile driver let out a deliberately drawn-out, "cool-guy" snort.
"Hmph."
Still no real words.
Koleda's patience snapped another notch.
"What? Don't tell me you didn't add some weird extra setting to yourself?"
The phrase hit like a needle popping a balloon.
The silent steel monster jerked—as if she'd stabbed it directly in the core code.
A passionate, dramatically theatrical voice exploded out of it:
"Hold—! How DARE you!"
"Huh?" Koleda blinked.
"'Setting'?! Absurd!" The pile driver's voice shot up, brimming with offended rage. "You ignorant mortals dare speak so disrespectfully and defile my grand mission?! Listen well—! I am the Dawn's Punisher, acting under my Mentor's command to stabilize the seal and guard this place! Withdraw at once!"
The sudden, archaic, epic-style declaration turned the whole scene instantly ridiculous.
Even Anton—pure hot-blooded as he was—failed to control his face for a split second. His chin lifted, his mouth twitched, and a bizarre expression halfway between shock and laughter froze on him like a glitch.
"Pfft… 'Dawn's Punisher,' stabilizing seals and all that…" Anton forced down the laughter clawing at his throat, slammed his focus back into seriousness, and barked, "That's enough already! Do you even realize how dangerous it is to run around in a Hollow?!"
"You are the ones who cannot see right from wrong! The seal grows weak—if it breaks, living things here will be doomed! Words are pointless—do not blame me for forcing my way through!"
Before anyone could react, the pile driver's massive body coiled—power surging into its frame.
"Don't you MOVE!" Anton roared, swinging up his trusted "partner"—the powered impact hammer.
But he underestimated what "Dawn's Punisher" could do when it went all-in.
The heavy hammer whooshed through empty air, stirring only stagnant dust. And the pile driver—despite its bulky build—sprang with a movement nearly nimble, vaulting cleanly over what should have been a tight encirclement, landing behind them.
"Mentor! I come!" it crowed, its steel voice suddenly light and gleeful with smug victory.
Only—Baiqi Heavy Industries' determination to retrieve it was even stronger than its escape fantasy.
"It got past us! Ben—stop it!" Koleda's order snapped out, short and urgent.
High above in the shadow, Ben, who'd stayed quiet until now, looked down at the pile driver preparing to bolt and let out a heavy sigh—like someone swallowing an unavoidable decision.
"…Sigh. If I could, I'd really prefer solving this peacefully. But now…"
His eyes hardened.
"Sorry. Forgive me. HRAH!"
It's common knowledge that history's dust buries countless misunderstandings about "paper-pushers" and combat power. Since ancient times, civil officials were never as weak as stereotypes claim—some of the best among them were frankly overclocked.
And the one controlling Baiqi Heavy Industries' financial lifeline—
Ben—
was the living proof.
Sweat beaded at his temple, his breathing grew heavier, but the hands pressing on the control terminal were rock-steady.
An invisible force field—like countless alloy chains—erupted from the void and wrapped, bound.
The pile driver, mid-escape, slammed to a halt as if it had stepped into the stickiest asphalt swamp. Its treads spun uselessly, kicking up dust, but it couldn't budge even an inch.
It was "poured" into place by overwhelming force—locked down completely.
"Nice one, Ben!" Anton shouted.
Ben didn't have the spare breath to answer. Holding the pressure, he called over his shoulder to Grace, voice taut with focus:
"Grace! Now—take the opening!"
"Coming, coming~ Leave it to me," Grace replied in her usual airy, cheerful tone.
Like a swift, she flipped up onto the violently trembling machine's back. Feeling the steel creature shake harder—fear and anger magnifying the vibration—Grace smiled.
A smile that mixed curiosity, indulgence… and absolute control.
"Big sis actually likes kids with rich imaginations, you know? But we'll talk after we get back."
As she spoke soothingly, she opened her toolkit with practiced speed. Precision instruments flashed cold light as they moved toward the pile driver's core interface.
And she even hummed a happy little tune—completely off-key.
"Stop! STOP!" The pile driver's manufactured "majestic" voice fully collapsed into raw panic and desperation. "The seal is on the verge of failure! Do not ruin my great plan! W-wait—! Don't come any closer—AAAAAA—!"
Watching the so-called "Dawn's Punisher" wail and thrash, Koleda clasped both hands behind her head, lips curling into open mockery.
"Tch. So it can talk properly."
The tension finally eased. With their overdramatic problem child firmly under control, everyone's nerves loosened in turn.
Eous, exhausted from running, plopped down on the ground with a "thunk," little stubby legs tucked in as it gave off a faint cooling hum. Anton and Koleda moved closer too, faces carrying the relaxed brightness that comes after a win.
Now that they knew they were safe, Friday's ridiculous struggling and desperate screams became free entertainment. Laughter burst out—big, uncontrollable—and the lively air cut through the wasteland's oppressive dullness.
But that relief—
like red-hot glass plunged into ice water—
shattered, froze, and died in the very next moment.
Because the machine—pinned down, seemingly out of options—finally felt the ultimate threat: its core about to be breached.
And it tore off every theatrical mask, screaming in the most urgent, most honest electronic voice it had:
"Listen to me! I'm not lying! I heard Mentor Hors's summons! I can't betray his expectations!!"
"—?!"
"Hors!"
That name hit like a silent thunderbolt—carrying soul-freezing cold—slamming down on everyone's heads at once.
The laughter that had been echoing only a heartbeat ago was strangled mid-breath, cut off by an invisible hand.
The air seemed to turn into vacuum.
A heavy, absolute silence dropped like a guillotine and nailed everyone in place.
All four from Baiqi Heavy Industries watched the ease, the smiles, the fatigue peel off their faces like cheap paint—revealing shock, confusion, disbelief… and something darker beneath it, like an old wound being ripped open.
And at the center of that sudden shift—
the president's reaction was the most violent.
Koleda's head dipped sharply. Her crimson hair fell forward, casting deep shadow over her face—almost completely hiding her expression.
Only her shoulders, trembling faintly, betrayed the storm inside.
After a short, suffocating pause, a voice—suppressed as hard as possible, but still shaking—seeped out from the darkness like water pushing through ice:
"…What is this?"
"Why… would that bastard's name show up here…"
"Why? Because those big shots never stop dreaming of pulling the whole world into the palm of their hand."
"And honestly—if one day they didn't think like that anymore, I'd be genuinely shocked."
Hugo's voice carried its usual elegant cynicism—like velvet wrapped around ice.
His long fingers, in black half-gloves, idly played with a silver fork. The tines tapped lightly against a decorative little cream cake on fine bone china.
"Of course, what happens to that traitor has nothing to do with me."
His lips curled into something nearly cruel. His heterochromatic eyes—left like congealed blood amber, right like polar ice—flickered with deep cold.
"Still… the fact he ended up as a watchdog fits his nature perfectly."
Afternoon inside a private gallery in New Eridu: the light had been tuned soft and lazy on purpose. The air carried paint, turpentine, and the faint trace of expensive incense.
Across from Hugo, Vivian frowned slightly, lost in thought, pale fingers unconsciously winding around a lock of hair streaked with white.
Hugo chuckled, breaking the silence.
He cut off a small piece of cake with knife and fork, but didn't eat it. Instead, he lifted the entire plate and offered it toward Vivian—smooth and refined, like a gentleman inviting someone to dance.
"Speaking of which… you've been tired too, haven't you? Want to try some? They say sweets soothe even the most restless soul."
"Mm, true," Vivian nodded, her ruby slit-pupils brightening. "Sugar intake can make the mind and body feel happier."
Then—like a nimble, sly cat—she stepped up and, without warning, snatched the whole plate out of his hands.
"Then I'll take all of it!"
"..."
"Hmph. Don't think I don't know," Vivian said smugly, wrinkling her little nose as she scooped up a bite with a silver spoon and popped it into her mouth.
Cream and jam melted on her tongue. She narrowed her beautiful red eyes in satisfaction, letting out a tiny, catlike sigh.
"You don't even eat this brand, do you? You only put it out for display."
"Tell me, Hugo—where do you buy the one you actually like? I've searched every dessert shop in New Eridu and couldn't find even a trace!"
"Ah… that," Hugo said, hands folding elegantly beneath his chin, his unnervingly handsome face wearing a mysterious smile.
But though his mismatched eyes still rested on Vivian, the focus seemed to pass through her, through the gallery's refined walls—drifting toward some faraway, cold crack in time soaked with pain and darkness.
"Allow me to keep that as a secret."
His voice stayed steady, but there was a faint rasp of memory underneath.
"The pastry chef who can make that flavor… has his own incomprehensible eccentricities."
"He's like a nightingale in the shadows—he doesn't like strangers knowing where his nest is."
And the moment those words fell—
it was as if someone yanked down the world's curtain.
The warm yellow gallery lights. The sweet cream scent in the air. Vivian's faint violet fragrance. Her bright, curious red eyes—
everything that made this moment feel "safe" and "ordinary"—
shattered like colored glass struck by a sledgehammer, collapsing and vanishing into nothing.
Memories floated up. The past flashed back in fragments:
A mother's disgust.
The suffering in Ravenlock.
Old Jack taking him in.
Meeting Lei… the traitor.
Founding the Mockingbirds…
And then—
meeting him.
Cold, sticky darkness—reeking of rust and rot—flooded in like ink.
Pain.
Not a sensation—an entity.
A living thing that swallowed his entire existence in an instant.
It was as if countless red-hot irons stabbed into his abdomen and chest simultaneously, brutally stirring his organs, tearing muscle and nerve apart.
Every weak heartbeat pumped not blood, but molten lava, scorching every vessel on the verge of rupture.
Cold sweat soaked his expensive custom suit, mixing with the warm, thick liquid pouring out of him—smearing his skin with a nauseating, slick cling.
He was slumped against a cold, damp wall coated in grime and moss. The rough grit bit through thin fabric into his flesh. Beneath him: filthy stone pavement. Dirty water and nameless waste seeped into his trouser legs, and bone-deep cold raced up his spine.
This was the dirtiest fold beneath New Eridu's glamorous skin:
A narrow back alley that stank of rotting garbage and cheap alcohol.
Overhead, a warped, flickering neon sign threw down distorted, dancing shadows—like the last chaotic sparks on a dying retina.
Every inhale tasted of thick blood and years of mold. Every exhale broke into fractured groans he couldn't suppress. Every tiny movement yanked pain hard enough to black him out.
Life was draining from deep inside him in warm streams, soaking into the cold ground. The chill spread like needles from his fingertips and toes, swallowing what little warmth remained.
"Heh… didn't expect that. I underestimated them."
"They actually paid a price this big… just to make sure I die…"
His vision rocked violently through darkness and fractured neon, blurring and bleaching out.
His consciousness was a candle in a gale—struggling, sinking, about to go out in a swamp of pain and cold.
His eyelids grew heavy as lead. Exhaustion ran into the marrow. It felt like an invisible hand was slowly pulling his soul out of the ruined shell.
At this moment, Hugo felt like a broken doll tossed beside a garbage heap.
All the plotting, deception, elegant masks, glamorous adventures…
everything was rapidly slipping away.
Only death's cold current remained—absolute silence and eternal darkness—wrapping around him with gentle cruelty.
So… is this how it ends?
A fuzzy thought slid along the edge of his unraveling mind, carrying a strange, absurd relief.
I don't want it… but… it's not so bad.
At least… it's quiet…
The last fragment of light in his heterochromatic pupils was about to vanish completely—falling into an endless night beyond salvation.
And then—at the final moment, when the thread of consciousness was about to snap and drop into eternal void—
a voice pierced the thick, suffocating darkness.
Pierced the deafening, near-death ringing in his ears.
Like lightning ripping open the night—burning with undeniable vitality—it struck cleanly into the core of his fading awareness:
"Now's not the time to sleep!"
"If you really fall asleep, you'll never wake up again!"
"Mm… looks like the new medicine I just developed finally gets to prove itself."
"At the very least—at the very least—I can't let a life die right in front of me!"
Ah… a voice.
So… I met a good person.
That thought landed—
and then, finally, he couldn't hold on.
Consciousness scattered into the night.
Join here to read ahead.
In Star Rail, Ultra-Beast Armored — Have I Caught "Equilibrium"? l (Chapter 80)
Uma Musume, But I Only Have Five Years Left to Live (Chapter 175)
Zenless Zone Zero: I'm a Doctor, Not a Bangboo (Chapter 115)
Ben Tennyson Wants to Join the Justice League (Chapter 126)
TYPE-MOON: Redemption Beginning with the Holy Grail War (Chapter105)
Yu-Gi-Oh! — Transmigrated into the White Dragon Girl (Chapter100)
"Is this chat group even serious?" (Chapter82)
I, Lord Ravager, Utterly Loyal! (Chapter134)
Can Playing Games Save the World? 65
Crossover Anime Multiverse: The Demon Hunter of an Unnatural World 70
From Junkman to Wasteland 66
Weekly Refresh of Overpowered 31
I'm Grinding Proficiency Like 46
From Kiana, Lord Ravager, Onwa 87
Honkai: Is This Still the Prev 42
Elf: My Starter Pokémon Is Inc 65
Warhammer: My Primarch Is Remi 79
From Demon Slayer to Grand Ass 64
The Way the Umamusume Look at 68
Uma Musume, but My Cheat Power 73
Naruto: Weaving the Future, Be 45
Zenless Zone Zero, but Kamen R 49
Multiverse Crossover: The Perf 45
My Cyberpsycho Girlfriend 45
Uma Musume: The Dark Trainer 31
Uma Musume: A Calamity Born fr 27
I, a Reincarnation-Loop Player 26
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