The Loathsome Scapegoat C10

Chapter 10

On the following holiday, with a steady drizzle falling from the gray sky, Terren left the Academy once again.

This time, he intended to carry out his first proper massacre.

One of the few advantages of the Academy was that students were free to leave campus on holidays. Pulling his freshly washed black robe over his head, he walked through the damp streets with practiced familiarity.

The jingling of metal came from his pocket.

Every coin he had painstakingly saved from the allowance provided by the royal family—or more accurately, from the money Leopold sponsored him with—had been emptied into his pocket today.

Even as he counted the coins, he couldn’t help laughing bitterly at how pitifully small his savings were.

His schedule was already packed, and now he had to worry about earning money as well. The thought alone made his head throb.

With the handful of coins he possessed, Terren Meyer bought several loaves of white bread.

Near the slums stood a bridge that crossed the lakeside.

Beneath it was a place that was dark, damp, and perpetually cold—so unpleasant that no ordinary person ever ventured there.

Walking through the slums as though he knew every corner of them, Terren slipped beneath the bridge.

The stench hit him immediately.

Countless insects and rats scattered across the ground at the sound of his footsteps.

A filthy child glanced cautiously in his direction.

The boy was painfully thin, his belly swollen from malnutrition. His clothes were little more than tattered rags, and he sat sucking on his fingers as if trying to fool his empty stomach.

His eyes shifted from Terren…

To the sack in his hand.

Terren smiled.

“It’s white bread.”

The child’s eyes widened.

He looked ready to throw himself at the bag like a rabid dog.

Terren raised a hand.

“Go bring your friends.”

“There’s plenty.”

“A good child shares with everyone.”

“The more people you bring, the more bread you’ll receive.”

Drool gathered at the corner of the child’s mouth.

He nodded frantically before scrambling out from beneath the bridge.

He stumbled more than once, nearly collapsing onto the muddy ground, but each time he forced himself back to his feet and continued running.

Terren quietly sat down on the damp, foul-smelling earth.

Street children.

Perfect sacrifices.

No one searched for them.

Many of them didn’t even have names.

Most survived by begging from one day to the next before eventually starving to death or freezing in the streets long before reaching adulthood.

They were no different from the vermin crawling beneath the bridge.

Gather them together…

Kill them all at once…

Simple.

Clean.

If he butchered them with a knife, there would be blood everywhere and far too much evidence to dispose of.

Using dark magic would leave almost nothing behind.

He felt no guilt over killing children.

If he had to choose between murdering adults and murdering children…

He preferred the latter.

Their sense of self had barely formed.

They scarcely understood what suffering truly was.

They were little different from animals.

Killing them gave him the same strange sense of calm as putting down a small creature.

Besides…

If left alive, they would either starve…

Freeze to death…

Or somehow survive only to become another broken adult in the slums.

Lives filled with nothing but suffering.

He had long convinced himself that ending such lives wasn’t truly a sin.

What value does your life even have?

That child is so hungry he can barely walk.

That one will probably die tomorrow if he fails to beg for food again.

If one walked slowly through the slums…

One could see their lives plainly.

Lives more wretched than death itself.

If Terren had been born in their place…

He would have driven a knife into his own heart without hesitation.

So this…

Among all sins…

Was the lightest one.

Gradually, more children arrived.

Dirty.

Filthy.

Reeking of rot.

One after another they rushed beneath the bridge as though possessed.

Soon the dark space was filled with small bodies.

“Quiet.”

“Only those who stay silent will receive bread.”

There were around twenty of them.

Terren gathered them into a single group and looked at them with emotionless eyes.

“…Do you want it?”

Twenty small heads nodded eagerly.

A faint smile appeared on Terren’s lips.

With one hand, he reached into the sack for the bread.

With the other…

Mana slowly gathered.

A black, tingling aura coiled around his fingertips.

I’m sorry.

The apology held no sincerity.

Terren Meyer would never change.

Even in this life…

He remained the greatest of monsters.

A devil who deserved to die.

He had never once believed he would escape hell.

If hell truly existed…

He had always assumed it was waiting for him.

Even so…

Their sacrifice would become nourishment for the future.

That alone was enough.

The children gazed up at him with bright, innocent eyes.

He had to kill them.

Dark magic blossomed from his fingertips.

The sticky black aura slid through the air, reaching toward the nearest child’s throat.

Then—

“Terren.”

His entire body froze.

No voice that gentle…

That calm…

That unwavering…

Should ever have echoed beneath this damp, forgotten bridge where only abandoned children wandered.

Slowly…

Terren turned around.

And saw something he wished with all his heart he hadn’t.

Damn it.

…What the hell is that doing here?

Throughout his previous life…

In fact, throughout his entire existence…

Terren could count on one hand the number of times he had ever spoken face-to-face with Leopold Delua at the age of sixteen.

Which meant…

The prince had absolutely no reason to be standing here.

Everything was becoming more tangled by the minute.

A crushing despair settled over him.

Unable to say a single word, Terren simply stared blankly at the blond-haired boy.

Leopold, sounding as though he’d unexpectedly run into an old friend, spoke cheerfully.

“So it was you.”

“I wondered who had been handing out bread to the children here.”

“I never imagined it would be you.”

“How long have you been doing this?”

The dark magic had vanished without a trace.

Terren Meyer remained rooted to the spot, his mind completely blank.

By the time he came back to his senses, Leopold had already walked over and was studying him with open surprise.

“I never imagined you were the type to do something like this.”

“I’m impressed.”

“But where did you get the money…?”

Then he smiled.

A genuine, cheerful smile.

A small dimple appeared beside the corner of his mouth.

Terren stared mutely at the ground.

Growing impatient, the children turned their attention to Leopold.

“What are you waiting for?”

“You bought the bread to give them, didn’t you?”

Terren watched numbly as Leopold took the sack from his hands and began distributing the loaves.

The children devoured the soft white bread like starving animals.

“They’re going to choke.”

Leopold looked at them with obvious concern.

“We should get them some water.”

“Maybe I should fetch some from a well.”

Idiot.

There’s a river right beside us.

The water was filthy, polluted with sewage.

But to these children…

It was life itself.

Terren silently mocked him.

He still couldn’t understand why Leopold was here.

Nor why he himself had ended up in this absurd situation.

The bread disappearing into the children’s mouths had been Terren’s food for the coming days.

He had intended to avoid the Academy cafeteria, where all he’d receive were hostile stares, and instead spend his time shut away in his room eating bread while researching magical formulas.

Of course…

He had also planned to lure these children here and kill them.

Every encounter with Leopold triggered the same old illness.

A pounding headache.

A churning stomach.

Terren fixed him with a murderous glare.

As astonishingly perceptive as ever, the Prince of Delua noticed it immediately and merely shrugged.

“What brings Your Highness here?”

Terren kept his eyes lowered.

Silently counting to himself, he forced each word through clenched teeth.

Leopold answered casually.

“I happened to see one of the children gathering everyone together.”

“I overheard him saying that a volunteer was handing out bread.”

“I became curious.”

“I thought perhaps I should reward such a generous person.”

“So I followed him.”

“And then I found you.”

“…Why were you walking through the slums?”

“That’s the question I should be asking.”

“What are you doing here?”

“…That isn’t Your Highness’s concern.”

“The important question is why the First Prince of Delua personally came to a place like the slums.”

Leopold narrowed his eyes.

A hint of amusement entered his voice.

“You refuse to answer.”

“So why should I?”

Damn it.

Terren felt his vision blur with anger.

The man was infuriating.

The slums were already lawless enough.

What was the prince thinking, wandering around a place like this?

And to appear at the exact moment Terren was about to slaughter twenty children…

It wasn’t merely bad timing.

It felt as though fate itself had decided to ruin his life.

Does this mean I’ll have to watch out for him even outside the Academy now?

The truth was…

Terren knew almost nothing about Leopold Delua.

He had no idea how the prince spent his days.

Which meant he could never predict when Leopold might suddenly appear.

Just like today.

If Leopold had arrived even a minute later…

Terren would already have been exposed as a mass murderer.

His head would likely have rolled.

Later…

I need to think.

Grinding his teeth, Terren lowered his head.

Leopold quietly watched him.

Hidden beneath the hood of his robe, Terren’s face had gone deathly pale.

Unbidden, an unpleasant thought crossed Leopold’s mind.

…Does he really hate me that much?