From the Tip of the Tongue of the Lowliest Maid - Chapter 114

This work contains scenes of sadistic coercion and hardcore depictions of BDSM. Reader discretion is advised.

The man, having released Arzeletta’s face, turned directly around. Arzeletta watched Ragnar’s receding back.

As he finally vanished completely into the darkness, Arzeletta raised her hand and pressed it to her heart.

Slowly, the trembling grew.

‘Kill him for me.’

Theogrim’s command echoed in her ears.

Arzeletta had finally gained Ragnar’s side.

She had found an opportunity to delve into the side of the man she thought she could never reach.

At the end of where the magical power that moved her, the continuously linked dreams, pointed.

‘Kill him for me. Save me from this suffering.’

“Ah.”

Arzeletta pressed her heart.

At that end, her master’s categorical imperative remained.

…Perhaps fate was, after all, driving her somewhere.

“…Arzeletta.”

As Arzeletta opened the door and entered, someone called her. Arzeletta started in surprise and took a step back.

“Ah… Yoseph.”

It was Yoseph. Arzeletta calmed her startled heart and approached him.

“…Were you waiting for me?”

Yoseph’s tears were clear in the moonlight filtering through the small window. Arzeletta wiped his tears away. Yoseph’s tears made her sad. There had never been a moment when Yoseph’s sorrow didn’t affect her.

“…I thought you wouldn’t come.”

Arzeletta silently shook her head. Behind the man, who was weeping with his head bowed like a child, his hunched back was visible. Arzeletta felt her wound ache anew.

“You must have been in a lot of pain…”

She whispered softly. She overlapped his voice, which had whispered to her, with her own words. She recalled the sensation of the hot and cold water that had drenched her body.

***

Evening sunlight streamed through the wide window.

Theogrim’s long, delicate hand, which had been turning a page, suddenly stiffened and stopped.

He didn’t need to check the clock to know. He knew the texture of the air changing at the moment evening began. The moment when the rose hues of the sunset mixed with the sunlight, and the shadows of all things began to stretch strangely long.

“……”

The page caught between Theogrim’s fingertips trembled subtly. The sentences of political philosophy written in ancient script, their thunderous knowledge and truths, were, at this moment, crumbling like dust within Theogrim’s violet pupils.

Soon, the priests would knock on that door and seek him.

With faces showing no problems whatsoever, with those sanctimonious expressions that condemned everyone else, they would inform him to hasten the preparations for the ritual.

They would watch his suffering and revel in spiritual elation.

Hoping that their prepared sacrifice would please God, that he, the sacrifice, would suffer sufficiently to bring satisfaction to their God.

And desiring that Theogrim’s blood would cleanse them of all their sins of lust, vanity, corruption, and pride.

So that tomorrow, too, they could live with their chins held high as the holy sons and daughters of the great Impellias, as if they were without sin.

“……”

He clenched his hand without realizing it. The precious page crumpled. It was a valuable book, with only twelve copies remaining on the continent.

But at this moment, all such facts vanished from Theogrim’s mind. He crumpled the sentences of the great philosopher’s wisdom as if crushing garbage.

Theogrim hated them.

He did not want to atone for their sins.

He recalled the pain he had not been able to avoid for a single day over the past 10 years. Theogrim tightly closed his eyes.

Just recalling it, the familiar, bone-crushing pain revived completely.

It was something he would have to endure again in a few hours. Just as he had every single day.

Why did the pain never become familiar? Under the harsh lashings, Theogrim had asked God thousands of times. It was the only question Theogrim, who sought no answers from God, had ever truly asked Him.