The Boss Wants to Die - Chapter 71

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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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The boss wants to die.
Episode 71
I covered my mouth with the back of my hand and glanced around.
Buildings burned, acrid smoke clawed upward like a demon’s talons, and the Water Ruins descended into chaos.
“Kyaaaaaaagh―!”
A scream from somewhere distant snapped me back to focus.
I unfurled the black wings at once.
Aktr and Aerial had to be protected first.
[Demon God Helrod has deployed Evil Wings!]
After spreading the jet-black wings to their fullest, I curved gently around them, cradling both Aktr and Aerial.
The wings were promptly absorbed into their bodies, fading to transparency.
[Evil Wings shields party members!
While Evil Wings is active, all damage taken by party members is redirected to Demon God Helrod!]
“This way you’ll……!”
“Hush.”
I silenced Aerial and concealed both of us among the rubble of the shattered building.
“Aktr! Look after Aerial!”
“Demon God!”
Aerial struggled desperately to follow me.
That stubbornness of hers.
I clicked my tongue, about to say something, when my eyes went wide.
Thud!
“Ugh!”
Aktr had brought down a fist the size of a boulder, slamming it square on the top of Aerial’s head.
“If you get hurt, I get hurt too.”
Aktr spoke with cold intent lacing his words.
“So stay put while I’m being nice.”
He looked ready to throttle her neck himself if she so much as got a scratch because of her recklessness.
I stood there dumbfounded, staring at them. When Aktr felt my gaze, he turned his head.
“Did I do good?”
He flashed a bright smile, as if his expression hadn’t just been murderous moments before.
“Uh… what?”
“Did I do good?”
A strange pressure settled over me.
“Y-yes. Yes, you… you did very well.”
“Great! I’ll be careful out there!”
Was this even right?
Wasn’t I teaching him the wrong lessons?
Cold sweat trickled down my spine.
But in a situation this urgent, I couldn’t afford to bicker with Aktr.
As I moved forward, a chill crept through my chest.
‘I really shouldn’t have praised him like that.’
The boy kept going off the rails.
Telling him to stop wouldn’t work anyway, but……
I hid myself behind the ruins, poking just my head out to survey the half-destroyed buildings beyond.
‘Focus.’
Rough-faced pirates roamed freely across the grounds.
When I called up their information, I froze in shock at what I read.
Men who had massacred the Water Tribe.
I’d naturally assumed……
‘They were NPCs? This wasn’t some tragedy event?’
But it wasn’t.
The pirates were all Players.
Checking their levels, they came in at 121.
The way they swung massive axes—heads large as boulders—was thoroughly menacing.
‘At that level, even a glancing blow would kill Aktr, whose level isn’t even half that.’
And their numbers were overwhelming.
I couldn’t unleash my full power here.
The Water Tribe members were packed in densely among them, and one careless move risked slaughtering them.
If that happened, it would be a Reset—back to the beginning.
‘How am I supposed to wipe out all these on my own?’
True, exterminating Level 121 pirates was easy enough.
Like crushing ants underfoot.
The problem was having to kill over a hundred of them one at a time, staying hidden from the Water Deity.
And if they all charged at once, even I would have my hands full.
Imagine thousands of ants crawling into your ears.
Ugh.
‘No choice. I’ll have to wander the ruins and pick them off bit by bit.’
A sigh escaped.
It slipped out unbidden.
‘Finesse with power was never my style. This is going to be tedious.’
I clicked my tongue and crept further forward.
I needed to hear what the pirates were saying.
“Don’t kill him yet! Tear out his eyes first!”
“P-please, spare me, please, ahhhhh!”
A pirate swung an axe and severed one arm of the man he’d been trampling.
My brow furrowed at the brutality.
Blood sprayed. The man, whose head and eyes had turned a vivid blue, rolled in his own gore, wracked with agony.
The pirate seized the man’s cheek in a brutal grip, glanced about, and smiled with naked greed.
“So these are the tears the Water Deity sheds before death! Premium pearls!”
“Kill all the ones whose pearls we’ve harvested!”
A command to accelerate the slaughter echoed from the distance.
That’s when the full massacre began in earnest.
Screams and groans erupted from all directions.
“Shrieeeek!”
“Mother, Mother―!”
I checked with a glance to make sure Aktr and Aerial were well hidden, then waited for my moment.
‘Now.’
I slipped into the dwelling like water.
I wanted to deal with the pirate who was about to kill the mother and child first.
“What the—!”
The pirate startled and drew a Shamshir-style Crescent Blade.
I didn’t need to use a Skill.
I simply sharpened my nails and drove them straight through the pirate’s abdomen.
“Ahhhhh!”
I withdrew my hand and kicked him in the chest, pinning him to the ground like a rug.
The pirate clutched his belly, breathing in ragged gasps.
I asked in a flat voice.
“Why did you invade the Water Ruins?”
“G-gah, who are you?!”
I sliced off his right ear with a single gesture.
Unable to process the unhesitating assault, the pirate only screamed when he felt the blood pouring from where his ear had been.
“Ahhhhhhh!”
I crushed his mouth under my heel, then explained again, methodically.
“The human body has dozens of protruding parts. Would you like them cut off slowly, one by one, or would you prefer a clean death?”
The pirate was merely an illusion created by the Water Deity, but his foundation was that of a Player.
He’d tried to bluff because death held no terror for him—but before pain, that bravado crumbled instantly into submission.
“I-I’ll talk! I’ll tell you everything, just no more torture!”
“Why did you invade the Water Ruins?”
“B-because of the Water Deity!”
I already knew that much.
My irritation deepened, and the pirate flinched, quickly adding more.
“The tears the Water Deity sheds before death become the jewels of the sea—premium pearls, they call them Blue Pearls, and they’re worth their weight in gold! Incredibly rare!”
If tears shed at the moment of death meant each pearl was one life from the Water Deity, then these creatures were paying with their existence.
No matter how beautiful, could anyone truly want to wear a pearl made from someone’s death around their neck?
Their inhumane greed was incomprehensible to me.
“And?”
“A-and……”
The pirate hesitated.
To spare him further anguish, I pressed my heel into his punctured abdomen.
The pirate spilled his guts, cursing beneath his breath.
“The eyes of the Water-dwelling race sell for tens of millions of gold as elixirs!”
“…What did you just say?”
I couldn’t believe his words, so I asked again.
The pirate groaned and writhed, his face drained white, but when he saw I wasn’t going to back down easily, he stopped whimpering and spoke.
“T-the eyes! If you pluck out the eyes and sell them, you become filthy rich! W-with that money and a Player’s strength, you could live your whole life in leisure!”
I didn’t want to hear another word.
‘These bastards aren’t even human.’
I severed his throat and ended it, then dragged whatever cloth lay nearby and covered the corpse.
My heart pounded like it was possessed.
‘Did Aerial lose everyone she held dear to monsters like these?’
I turned away with a furrowed brow.
The woman was in the corner, shielding her child’s eyes, trembling.
I gazed at the brilliant blue hair they bore, and thinking of Aerial, my mood darkened.
“Th-thank you…….”
“Don’t leave the building.”
What was the point of saying such things?
‘These people are already dead anyway…….’
I clenched my blood-stained fists.
‘This mother and child, everyone outside……. They said not a single one was spared, so what’s the use of me saving them?’
A phantom that existed only in the Water Deity’s memory.
This was merely a nightmare.
One that repeated endlessly.
A nightmare where no matter how hard I struggled, I couldn’t save anyone.
‘It’s sickening.’
I wanted to clear the Quest quickly.
I wrapped my aura tightly around the dwelling where Aktr and Aerial were hiding.
With this, no one would be able to approach.
‘Now I can move more freely.’
I set upon every pirate I encountered and crushed them.
“Gah, gahhh―!”
“Mercy……!”
The way they thrashed about desperately trying to live was infuriating—I had to hold back my strength.
Most of them were holding the Water-dwelling race hostage, which made it worse.
‘The Water Ruins border the Sea Cliff, which opens onto the sea. If I wanted to, they could escape into the water.’
Yet for some reason, the Water-dwelling race couldn’t throw themselves into the sea.
The reason became clear soon enough.
Each time a member of the Water-dwelling race hurled themselves toward the Sea Cliff that led to the sea, they bounced back off an invisible Barrier Field.
“Hehehehe, got ’em! A big catch!”
Then the pirates would flip the people over like fishermen hauling in a haul on the Beach, squeeze out their tears, and pluck out their eyes when they died.
It was nauseating work.
Watching such repellent cruelty made my desire to kill them grow fiercer.
I swept through the pirates like a whirlwind.
I couldn’t bear to watch another member of the Water-dwelling race fall victim in their hands.
They were already dead, but even in this phantom, I wanted them to escape the pirates.
[Pirate Extermination completion rate 70%!]
[Pirate Extermination completion rate 80%!]
It was around the time I’d swept away more than half the pirates with satisfaction.
“Ugh!”
Suddenly my right cheek throbbed with pain.
I flinched at the sharp sting of a cut, my brow creasing.
I lifted my hand to touch my cheek and felt something slick.
I brought my fingers before my eyes, and a reddish tint came into view.
‘Blood?’

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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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