Please Forget Me - Chapter 182

‧₊˚ ☁️⋅♡𓂃 ࣪ ִֶָ☾.

“Major, what exactly are you planning to do here? If there are charges, you should arrest her properly and interrogate her.”

The principal, likely having the same uneasy feeling as I did, stopped the major, his face pale as he tried to reason with him. The moment he drew the major’s attention, I ran.

“Where do you think you’re going…?”

The major started to chase me but stopped and sneered. It was because I hadn’t run outside, but instead up the stairs.

“Foolish.”

But running outside would have been even more foolish. At my speed, I wouldn’t have gotten far before being caught.

Thinking of me as a rat cornered with nowhere to go, the major slowly walked after me. I rushed into our bedroom, locked the door, and immediately began locking all the other locks the man had set up.

Click. Click, click, click.

As I finished locking everything, I sank down to the spot where I had just prepared myself for death, reaching for the gun once more. There was no hesitation as I put the barrel to my mouth.

If I was going to die anyway, I wanted to die easily. I’d rather face the worst and die painfully than die in agony…

But I couldn’t pull the hammer back.

“Ugh…”

Do I really have to die without even knowing my name? I was destined to die, but I didn’t want to die without ever knowing how I got here. So, as I hesitated and couldn’t pull the hammer, I heard the major shouting outside, struggling to break the door down with his foot.

“Bring the axe! Now!”

It seemed the principal hadn’t listened. Hearing this threat, it was clear.

“Hey! Don’t you remember what I promised? That I’d get your son out if you follow my orders?”

My gut feeling from earlier about the suspicious conversation turned out to be correct. The principal had been watching us under the major’s orders all along.

‘…So, the major knew I’d be alone when I went to the edge of Eschbron Village this morning.’

When I received those instructions, the principal was there too.

We had thought the principal was a good person, never suspecting that we had been walking right into the watchful eyes of a spy.

“Here, here.”

The principal, though he had been complicit, couldn’t stand seeing someone suffer like this. He tried to stop the major, but in the end, he succumbed to the major’s promise to remove his son from the front lines.

“Tell the women to go to the basement and not come out, no matter what sounds they hear. You go and tell the soldiers watching the house at the end of the road. They’re to hide at the entrance and arrest anyone who comes, especially a man named Johann Renner.”

“Understood.”

“Make sure no one comes up to the second floor. You go down now.”

While I heard the major giving orders to the principal outside the door, I looked out the window. The man wasn’t visible on the road leading down the hill, and I felt a mix of relief and despair.

Thud!

The major’s axe started to chop.

At first, the door only shook violently, but then it began to splinter. I thought about opening the window and jumping, but the ground below was solid stone.

‘If I land down there, I’ll break something—if not worse.’

While I hesitated, the locks behind me shattered one by one, and a fist-sized hole burst through the door. Through the gap, the major suddenly shoved his hand inside, trying to undo the remaining lock.

Bang!

“Gah, you damn rat!”

The bullet I fired grazed his hand, tearing off a chunk of flesh. He yanked his hand back, grinding his teeth at me from behind the door.

Thud!

A mere graze wasn’t enough to stop him—the axe strikes resumed from outside. I aimed my gun at where his heart should be, waiting for him to break through. The man who came to kill me had just made up my mind for me: I’d kill him first.

Crash!

The final lock gave way, and the door swung inward—

Bang!

I fired at the bastard standing in front of me.

Pang!

But the bullet struck the blade of the axe he’d thrown at that exact moment and ricocheted away. I ducked desperately to avoid the axe now flying toward my head, and my sweat-slick revolver slipped from my grip. It clattered to the floor, bouncing under the bed. I reached for it, but—

“Ugh!”

A sharp kick to my solar plexus from the Major, who had already stormed inside, knocked the air from my lungs.

“Who the hell do you think you are, shooting at me in this damned house?”

Blood dripped from his wounded hand as he grabbed me by the hair, dragging me up from where I lay gasping and forcing me to kneel. Then, with his free hand, he began unbuckling his belt.

“Tell me your name. I’ll call it out while I f**k you.”

“…I don’t know.”

“Then I’ll just call you b***h.”

He forced my head up, making me look at him—and when he saw the glare in my eyes, he snorted in amusement.

“Falklanders are the bastard offspring of demons f*****g pigs. Did you forget those words already? The ones you said?”

I’d only parroted that nonsense because he’d forced me to, branding me a traitor over some petty dispute.

“Say it again. You had no problem calling me trash back then.”

Because I didn’t know any better. But even if I had, what choice did I have?

“You’re the real trash here. Who the hell do you think you’ve been looking down on all this time?”

He tugged open his pants, pulling out his hardened length and shoving it toward my face.

“Suck it.”

“……”

“Just like the other b***h I killed taught you.”

I glared at him for a moment before reaching out obediently toward that revolting flesh. A fragment of memory floated through my mind—the moment right after I’d slapped the soldier who had grabbed my wrist.