I Thought It Was the Monster Duke's Fake Sedative - Chapter 96

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 96
The noblewoman watched the scene unfold.
And so the Duchess, who had been the Duke’s wife at that time, finally lost her temper.
“Do as that filthy wretch says! Just experiment on him! You’ve always done it before!”
Edward had been subjected to experiments in place of dying rats for far longer than a day or two.
The relationship between the substitute rats they’d brought in and Edward had long since reversed.
Yet the men sweated profusely.
“That… that won’t work today.”
“This creature’s body is already reaching its limits. If we experiment on him today, he’ll die!”
“How many have died already? What’s one more?”
The men rarely contradicted her.
“But this one is different! He’s the only one who’s endured so many experiments!”
“If he dies, it’ll be hard to find another like him! If we inject magical power now, it’ll be a catastrophe!”
Crack!
As if to say they would do anything except inject magical power—
They didn’t stop beating him just to make him release the cage. It was absurd.
Edward, still prone and exhaling breath tinged with blood, thought to himself.
‘Then why not just skip the experiment today?’
Don’t touch me or the rats.
‘Stop killing them.’
Stop touching them….
But the men didn’t give up.
“The Duke will be here soon! Release the cage!”
The Duke was expected to return before long from his business trip to procure new experimental subjects.
If they didn’t compile a new report to present to him by then, they too would face punishment.
It was at that moment, as the men grunted and held Edward down while swinging their clubs, that—
“…Move aside! You incompetent fools!”
Unable to bear her frustration any longer, the Duchess reached out through the opening where Edward was being held.
“Your—your Grace!”
The men holding Edward gasped.
They had never expected the Duchess, who merely watched them and occasionally wielded a whip on a whim, to reach out with her own hands.
The Duchess herself seemed startled by her own instinctive action.
“…Ugh! Disgusting!”
Immediately after seeing what she had instinctively grasped, the Duchess let out a shriek.
The cage full of terrified rats flew through the air.
Clang!
Squeak, squeak!
The rats cried out from within the cage as it was hurled into the corner.
‘No.’
The rats were already weakened.
He couldn’t know what injuries they’d sustained from that impact.
Edward, seized by urgency, wrenched free from the men and lunged toward the cage.
Or rather, he tried to.
“How unfortunate.”
Creak.
The door opened, and a cool voice pierced his ears—had it not—
“Gasp….”
The men who had been trying to restrain Edward immediately lowered their heads and prostrated themselves.
The Duchess too turned to face the man who had entered, her expression startled.
“…My lord.”
She offered a curtsy.
“You’re back early. Sooner than expected.”
“Ah. I couldn’t find any sturdy ones, you see.”
The only one in the room who remained frozen and didn’t lower his head was Edward.
The Duke surveyed the chaos of the chamber.
And his gaze met Edward’s.
“Ha.”
A low sigh escaped, and the prostrate men flinched again.
“How much longer will you keep wavering?”
“Well, that is….”
“I suppose I haven’t given a proper demonstration after all.”
The words sent a chill racing through Edward’s entire body, as if his blood had turned to ice.
The Duke picked up the cage that had rolled to his feet as casually as if it were nothing.
“So, were these creatures not as precious as I thought?”
What followed was a thin smile.
“How fortunate.”
……
“Then the lesson should prove most effective.”
At those words, Edward…
“…please.”
“What?”
“Don’t do it.”
For the first time in his life, he forced out the words meekly.
Even knowing the man would never listen to his pleas.
And then he begged.
“Please, don’t do it….”
With his gaunt, small frame pressed flat against the floor.
“Hmm. Is that so?”
……
“Shall I spare them?”
“Yes, please….”
Words he never wanted to speak, to a man he’d never wanted to beg, tumbled from his lips.
But…
“I don’t like that.”
The response was a cold, cutting laugh.
No. No, not this.
The thought bore down on Edward’s mind like a weight.
A low hum.
The cage flew through the air once more.
With far more force than the Duchess had thrown it.
And then—
Crash!
“……!”
It shattered the window and fell outside.
Squeak, squeak-squeak…
Edward couldn’t even scream.
Squeak, squeak…
The last cries of the rats echoed in his ears, loud enough to split his skull.
“Take him away.”
“Y-yes, Duke.”
“Put him to use in the experiments.”
“But if he dies….”
“Then adjust the dosage so he doesn’t.”
……
“He’ll have to survive the experiments and become an Awakened One eventually anyway. Better him than these useless rats….”
Crunch.
As the Duke turned to leave, his expression darkened.
A gloved hand’s flesh was torn away with a sharp sound.
Edward had lunged forward and bitten the Duke’s hand with all his strength.
“Good heavens, Duke!”
“My lord!”
The men cried out in alarm and rushed over, beating Edward savagely.
Once he was subdued and pressed flat against the ground, the Duke—watching blood drip from his wounded hand—brought his boot down hard on Edward’s body.
“Ungrateful wretch.”
……
“If you hated this so much, you should have grown stronger.”
……
“You should have become an Awakened One.”
Isn’t that so?
As the whisper reached his ears, Edward stared out through the shattered window.
The sound of rats faded away.
A pain like his insides were being torn swept through the boy’s entire being.
‘I will too.’
I’ll disappear just like that.
‘Was I born for this?’
Even such thoughts crumbled into fragments and vanished beneath the deluge of agony, and just as his mind teetered on the edge of ruin from the endless experiments—
Edward became an Awakened One.
And before a delighted Duke, he obediently followed his teachings.
As if his squalid, wretched past had simply ceased to exist—meekly, docilely.
* * *
“Ugh, nngh…!”
More than a decade later.
The voices of dying men filled the Laboratory.
Duke Thesseron surveyed his surroundings with bloodshot eyes.
“How… how could this…!”
This was not the sight he had come to inspect!
Once Edward had matured and proven himself a reliable Awakened One, the Duke had set his sights on a new objective.
Creating a Divine Incarnation for the next generation.
He had expanded the Orphanages throughout his territory, procuring children for experimental subjects.
The Laboratory itself had been remade elsewhere—larger, more elaborate.
To forge a stronger Awakened One, the risk level of the experiments had escalated, and in selecting the site he had labored long to find a place rumored to hold an ancient Monster in slumber, a location suffused with dormant Magical Power.
It was worth the effort.
With the Magical Power of a land where Monsters slept, he could birth a far mightier Awakened One.
So he needed only to begin the experiments.
Yet it was not the children meant for experimentation who now convulsed in agony and perished—but rather the Laboratory’s researchers and himself, who had come to observe the work.
His guards, selected from the mightiest men available, trembled and collapsed upon the floor, their limbs shaking uncontrollably.
“Cough, gasp…!”
“The… the Experimental Toxin… is l-leaking…!”
One researcher muttered those words before his breathing ceased.
‘The toxin leaked?’
The Experimental Toxin, concocted from Monster blood and Magical Power, was itself a poison.
‘How on earth…?’
Crack.
Immediately after, something shattered before his very eyes.
The sound of glass shards scattered around the Duke being crushed beneath a firm boot sole.
“…You, wh…!”
The Duke looked up toward the source of the sound and gasped, about to cry out.
For standing alone amid the fallen masses, radiant with golden light, was Edward, gazing down at him.
“How… are you here…!”
But that was not what mattered.
“You, take… gl…!”
Take me out of here at once.
He tried to shout thus, but his throat constricted with poison.
Edward, looking down at the Duke’s writhing form, smiled like an angel.
“H-huck, gasp…!”
“How unfortunate.”
And then, slowly, he bent his knees and bowed his head toward the Duke.
“This toxin is far too potent for our father.”
“H-huck!”
“I’ve been experimented on with this toxin so often that I’ve built immunity… so it doesn’t affect me at all.”
Edward shrugged slightly, then rolled his eyes in a leisurely manner.
And directed a cold smile toward the Duke.
“Shall I save you?”
At those words whispered so sweetly, the Duke found himself nodding unconsciously.
He wanted to live. There was still so much to do. He had to survive…!
“I don’t want to.”
Thud.
Words dropped so casually filled the Duke’s ears completely.
And then the massive hand that approached pressed his still-raised head down against the floor.
…When had this creature grown so large?
The thought didn’t linger long.
“If you’d hated this so much, you should have grown stronger.”
“…Ugh, ah….”
“Of all the things you taught me, that lesson alone—I’m grateful for it.”
“Uh, uhh….”
Because of it, I became strong.
As the whisper faded, Edward listened for a long time to the final, desperate breath—gasping and ragged.
“Hck, uh, gasp, wheeze, gag….”
The squeaking cries that had rung in his ears gave way to broken, labored breathing.
“Gag….”
For a very long time.

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