I Opened an Illegal Animal Hospital in Another World - Chapter 119

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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119

Medical Chart 7. The Name of the Heart (1)

Maria thought this was finally the end.

‘What a damn dog’s life!’

Sorry to dogs, but she meant no offense.

Where did it all go wrong? She had been confident that the goddess of fortune always followed her around in life, but looking back now, that wasn’t the case at all.

Once her luck turned bad, it had been all downhill from there.

When did it start?

From when her master became jealous of her? From when she was caught treating beastfolk? Or maybe…

‘It all went wrong from the moment I met that bastard, that damn quack! How could he sell out his own disciple!’

When she was first dragged to this manor, Maria had been confident she could escape quickly. If they wanted to kill her, they would have done so already, so if she was prepared for some injuries, how hard could it be to get herself out?

Besides, this manor only had a few frail mages.

Unless they were monsters like the Wentworth Countess, mages generally took time to cast, and all you had to do was knock them down before they could chant spells or raise their staffs. Maria was a martial artist who specialized in hand-to-hand combat, and she was particularly confident in her speed.

However, contrary to her expectations, Maria had already been imprisoned in this manor for over a year without being able to leave.

The mage she thought was weak turned out to be much stronger than expected, and no matter what she tried, she couldn’t break the barrier. Even when she managed to escape from her locked room, she couldn’t get outside the manor.

With her long mercenary experience, Maria realized this was something she couldn’t accomplish with her abilities alone. But she wasn’t in a position to wait for rescue either.

She wasn’t afraid of death from lack of skill, but.

‘This is so frustrating, really…’

If they were going to kill her, they should just kill her, but keeping her alive while showing her nothing but horrible sights was hard to endure.

The sight of them selecting the beastfolk Maria had saved and torturing them before her eyes was not something she could watch with a sound mind.

If Maria hadn’t had strong mental fortitude, she would have already collapsed from guilt and regret.

“I shouldn’t have used potions…”

What was the point of regretting it now? It was all in the past.

She had earnestly warned Bailey and Ella to never get involved just in case, but Maria had trusted the beastfolk’s discretion. In reality, beastfolk didn’t trust people easily, so there was no chance of rumors spreading. They had been safe for several years like that.

‘Besides, people wouldn’t believe anything beastfolk said anyway, thinking it was all boasting.’

When she started helping with the hospital work, Maria took the lead in the conflict with the Apothecary Guild in place of Shana.

She hadn’t been particularly positive about human beings to begin with, but she felt disgusted every time she faced certain groups that became more despicable when they banded together. Maria thought she wasn’t a good person herself, but she wasn’t as bad as them.

The main customers of the ‘hospital’ were beastfolk, not humans. It didn’t harm the Apothecary Guild’s ‘territory.’

Nevertheless, just the fact that there was a place where treatment was possible and medicine was provided was enough for the Apothecary Guild to cause all sorts of trouble and carry out sabotage operations behind the scenes.

If it hadn’t been for Maria, Ella, and the twins, they would have already been harmed and things would have gone wrong.

Ella said to just let it slide, but Maria and the twins couldn’t do that. The twins at least had the excuse of being young, but Maria had no way to vent her frustration. As time passed, her anger only steadily accumulated.

What they always took issue with was the ‘illegal’ aspect. It was really dirty and petty, but it was the right argument, so she couldn’t refute it.

‘Ah, I can just go learn it! Just go learn!’

As a price for not being able to contain her anger and blurting out those words, Maria ended up leaving the Wentworth Estate. She told Shana she wanted to study, but that wasn’t actually her real intention. Though she was interested.

However, surprisingly, Maria found that studying suited her aptitude. She just hadn’t known because she’d never tried it in her entire life. She had naturally good concentration.

If she had just focused on studying diligently, nothing would have happened, but the problem was the beastfolk she encountered while accompanying her master.

Especially whenever she saw young children, Shana would come to mind and she couldn’t pretend not to notice. She occasionally treated beastfolk little by little with potions she received when contacting the estate, and this ended up spreading as rumors.

While rumors on Liarem City streets were controlled and protected by Ron and Renate, Maria’s rumors were different. Even her master, who had initially been kind to her, started spreading malicious gossip mixed with jealousy, making the situation worse.

This was the result.

‘If I escape, I’ll kill them. If I can’t escape, I’ll still kill them…’

With this much resentment, it seemed like she could easily kill at least one person even if she died and had no body. Even if it was impossible, she would make it possible.

The group that kidnapped her persistently tortured her to find out who she had obtained the potions from that worked on beastfolk as well. Of course, Maria absolutely refused to speak. They seemed to have tried mental magic as well, but apparently failed because they couldn’t overcome the Wentworth Countess’s protective magic.

Torture didn’t work either. Though she got injured each time, the wounds healed quickly.

‘Miss must have done something…’

Maria swallowed her tears as she recalled Shana’s face when she had seen her off.

The young child who tried to act mature, saying how could she stop her from doing what she wanted, even though her reluctance was obvious. Maria found that childish behavior endearing. She had wanted to playfully stretch those dishonest cheeks, but held back because of the words she had spoken.

‘I shouldn’t have left. I shouldn’t have kept my word…’

She should have just stayed by their young miss’s side, living leisurely. Instead of pursuing qualifications the way the Apothecary Guild wanted, she should have punished those who acted despicably in her own way…

‘What wealth and glory was I trying to achieve!’

How prettily must she have grown by now? Every time she received letters from Ella, Bailey, and the twins that made her envious, Maria was seized by the impulse to return immediately.

Now I regretted not giving in to that impulse back then. This is why people shouldn’t live holding back. Life is uncertain—you never know when you’ll die, so you should live eating what you want and doing what you want to do…

‘If I survive, I’ll first kill that bastard who was my master, and then I’ll live a life where I don’t hold back anything.’

Maria repeated this murderous resolution for a year. Because she couldn’t endure it otherwise.

When physical torture didn’t work and confession magic didn’t work either, all that remained was psychological torture.

“Those damn perverted bastards, I’m going to kill them all. Or I’ll bite my tongue and die myself. Damn it.”

They would shove kidnapped beastfolk into the same room as Maria, then take them away one by one to kill them. The monkey tribe cried so pitifully. Maria was tormented because there was nothing she could do to help them.

The peak of it all was today.

Today she really wanted to bite her tongue and die. Maria couldn’t bear to look at what was beneath her feet and banged her head against the wall. She had caused such a ruckus that they had tied both her hands to shackles attached to the prison wall.

“Treating a person like some wild beast… Just wait and see, really just wait and see… Even after I die, I won’t forgive you…”

She bit her lips with resentment. For the first time, tears came.

Just when she was thinking she’d rather give up, the door burst open.

‘Again.’

Who is it this time? She just hoped it wasn’t one of the beastfolk she had met before. If she had to go through that one more time, she didn’t have the confidence to endure it. The mage she wanted to kill second-most dragged in some woman and threw her onto the floor. It made quite a loud sound, but the woman didn’t even make a sound of pain.

“Nothing Seth brings could be intact.”

“What?!”

Yet despite that, she jumped up as if ready to pounce at the insulting words. Maria was used to even that. At first they would resist as if they’d never be broken, but that too wouldn’t last long.

‘She’s got spirit…’

When the prison door closed, the woman huffed as if she couldn’t contain her anger. She stamped her feet as if extremely frustrated, and she was so strong that the vibrations traveled through the stone prison floor.

“How is this consideration for me? What kind of kindness is this! I’m going to pull out every hair. Not shave it off, but pull it out. I’ll pull out every eyebrow hair too…”

And she muttered trivial curses. Maria felt a strange sense of déjà vu.

Her young lady, whose face she hadn’t seen in so long, used to mutter just like that. Her threats were so ridiculous and cute that whenever she grumbled seriously, Maria would exchange glances with Ella and Bailey and smile.

The last time she had seen her was when she was 9 years old. Maria thought that before she died, she would like to meet Bailey’s son Aile and Shana just once, even if only once.

Surely she hadn’t forgotten already. She wouldn’t have. Shana was smart.

…Right?

Actually, enough time had passed that it would be understandable if she had forgotten.

“…Who?”

She asked in a hoarse voice. The woman turned around in surprise to look at Maria.

Maria narrowed her eyes and observed the woman.

The woman with long black hair and black eyes was tall and slender. If Evelyn had grown up well, she would be similar. However, perhaps because she was angry, her expression stained with fury was more intense than Evelyn’s.

And the woman, who had opened her eyes wide as if startled, spoke.

“…Maria?”

Again. Again!

Maria couldn’t hold back and let loose a string of profanity.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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