WeTried Translations
Translator: Goku
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
◈ I Became a Villain Perfect for Leveling Up
Chapter 037
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37. Rusty Clock Tower (5)
There were no conflicts with the high-floor hunters.
They either completely hid themselves, or those who did appear quickly vanished.
Due to an atmosphere that seemed to avoid fighting me, there was no bloodbath, unlike on the 3rd floor.
“You. We meet again.”
…Of course, there wasn’t absolutely no fight.
This was because the hunter I had seen in the 2nd-floor jazz bar was firmly blocking the door leading to the top floor.
He, with a cigar clamped in his mouth, exhaled smoke and lifted the double-barrel shotgun from his back.
“Didn’t you vomit black worms when you entered this place?”
“......”
“…It seems that trace was indeed yours.”
A weapon of a different caliber than a musket was aimed precisely at my head.
If the gun fired even once, my head would be shattered by the flying iron ball.
The moment I started a battle of wills with the hunter, with the hammer shouldered.
Tick-tock.
The sound of clock hands turning was heard.
The sound of pinky-finger-sized gears meshing together, turning without a 0.01-second error.
Just as the excruciating pain in my heart intensified from the echoing noise of the clock hands moving subtly one notch at a time.
- - - - - - -
All scenery was dyed like a blank white sheet.
As I focused my blurry vision, I saw a child toying with a toy grandfather clock in an empty space.
Jet-black eyes and hair.
Her appearance, exuding the haughtiness of a kitten, was like….
“Maeve…?”
The child, hearing my murmur, tilted her head and looked at me.
Unlike her, who had spent countless hours with an immortal body and developed dead eyes, young Maeve had sparkling eyes.
“……Oppa?”
“Uh…. This is….”
Just as I wondered what was going on, young Maeve approached me with quick steps and handed me the grandfather clock.
“Oppa, are you lonely too?”
“What do you mean by that…?”
I, having instinctively taken the grandfather clock, asked back on impulse.
I wondered why she thought I was lonely.
I wasn't alone anymore.
I had a place to return to…….
My place to return to was….
…….
“See? You are lonely.”
Young Maeve giggled and shot me with a finger gun, “Bang!”
Then, a tiny door on the grandfather clock opened, and an even smaller cuckoo popped out, making noise.
Cuckoo-Cuckoo-
Maeve, having snatched the grandfather clock back from me, spread her small fingers and counted numbers with an inaudible murmur.
“…What are you counting?”
When I questioned her sudden, incomprehensible antics, Maeve made a cute expression and exclaimed.
“Oppa! Don’t bother Maeve anymore and leave!”
“…Huh?”
“Healing the Abyss is a service, a service! I’m letting it go because Oppa shared his soul with me!”
“……Shared your soul? Wait a minute? That’s….”
Just as I questioned the words about sharing a soul, the pain enveloping my entire body completely vanished.
- - - - - - -
With the sensation of my heart suddenly contracting, I vomited black worms from my mouth.
Before I knew it, the blank white space had returned to the colossal lobby.
The hunter, who had been aiming his double-barrel shotgun in front of me, lowered his gun and let out a hollow breath.
“…To directly vomit the Abyss. I’ve never seen such a thing in my life.”
“Cough…. Please explain what the Abyss is first….”
After crushing the wriggling worms on the floor with my foot, I asked the hunter.
“Do you know the commonness between the undead at the Clock Tower entrance, and the mechanical creatures spread out after the 3rd floor of the Clock Tower?”
“......”
“They are all creatures consumed by the Abyss.”
He slowly approached me and pulled out a transparent glass bottle from his pocket, showing it to me.
“This fellow here is the Abyss.”
Black eggs floating in the murky water inside the glass bottle.
“It’s a parasite that reacts to the emotion of despair and turns infected targets into undead. Your infection route would be the lead bullets shot by the defeated on the 3rd floor.”
I alternated my gaze between the glass bottle and the crushed worms at my feet.
That thing, inside a thumb-sized glass bottle…, changes that much in a short time?
“Normally, its incubation period is extremely long. This is the first time I’ve seen the Abyss grow this rapidly.”
The hunter, who was a head taller than me, who was on the taller side, looked down at me, inhaled cigar smoke, and then punched me in the solar plexus.
The physical force, enough to cave in my abdomen, made me roll across the floor.
I hastily tried to counterattack by swinging Freud’s Fang, but the hunter stomped on my hand first.
“You have carved a new path in the history of hunters.”
“…Kuhaaak!!!”
A scream instinctively burst out due to the precarious power control, almost crushing my fingers.
“You’ve faced the outcome of not becoming undead from Abyss infection for the second time. And you’re the first hunter to insult the Primeval Hunter.”
“I’m… not a hunter…!”
“As long as you intended to climb the Clock Tower, you are a hunter.”
My abdomen, which had been kicked by a boot, was kicked again, making me roll across the floor.
“Tell me. Why did you insult the Primeval Hunter?”
“……Who is that, anyway….”
As gastric acid flowed up due to the pain, I asked who the Primeval Hunter was.
There was no reason to insult a Primeval Hunter I didn't even know.
“You truly don’t know? You damaged the portrait, didn’t you?”
“Mae…ve…?”
A shocking truth instantly made all the hairs on my body stand on end.
Maeve, depicted in the portrait, was… the Primeval Hunter?
Then the owner of this Clock Tower was also….
The hunter thrust the shotgun's muzzle at me as I lay fallen.
Soon, he pulled the trigger, spewing flames.
“…Why do I have to.”
“To dodge a bullet at this distance,”
“Why do I have to keep suffering because of that bitch.”
…Maeve. Maeve, Maeve, that damned Maeve.
I don't know why she, whom I tried to forget, keeps flickering in my mind from the moment I came here.
She was the one who, instead of an unnecessary death, plunged me into an even more desperate situation, leading me to my death.
Such a woman…. Is the owner of the Clock Tower?
Moreover…, she's the Primeval Hunter, respected by all.
“Haa…. Hahaha….”
Barely dodging the bullet and leaving my torn side behind, I thrust my head into the shotgun's muzzle.
Even the nonchalant hunter broke out in a cold sweat at the sight, adjusted his cigar, and placed his hand on the trigger.
“Get out of the way. I have something to say to Maeve.”
“…I cannot let you pass.”
“Then shoot.”
The hunter, about to pull the trigger with force in his index finger, then read the resentment entwined in my eyes and struck my shoulder with the buttstock.
“Kugh!!”
“If you wish to pass. Follow the hunters’ law.”
“....”
The hunters’ law.
Survival of the fittest, contempt for the weak.
Meaning, I, being weak, cannot be let through.
“…Thanks for the fucking consideration.”
To clear my head, I deliberately bit my lip, drawing blood, then picked up Freud’s Fang, which had fallen to the floor.
Then I fed Freud’s Fang blood, transforming it into its whip-sword form.
“…A peculiar weapon. Were the countless sword marks on the 3rd floor because of that?”
Before the hunter finished speaking, I swung the weapon.
The blade, lashing out like a whip, moved as if of its own will, coiling around the shotgun.
I tried to pull it directly and snatch the shotgun, but the cigar-smoking hunter's strength was greater.
Ultimately judging it impossible to win with brute force, I released the shotgun and began to run directly at him, who wasn't pulling the trigger.
“I’ll send you off with as little pain as possible.”
He, mistaking my intention as suicide, aimed the shotgun precisely and pulled the trigger.
I simultaneously shot the blade at his side.
“Kugh!”
As fierce flames spewed forth, the Beast’s Hammer, dragged by Freud’s Fang, struck the hunter’s side.
The muzzle narrowly missed, so my head being shattered did not happen.
“…Crazy bastard… Cough….”
The fallen hunter, having dropped his cigar, chuckled mockingly on the floor.
He mixed admiration and contempt for a strategy no one would attempt.
“Aren’t you… afraid of dying?”
“....”
“…Go. Because I’m afraid of dying.”
When I aimed the Beast’s Hammer at his fallen head, he closed his eyes and gestured with his chin as if to let me pass.
My vision blurred by blood flowing from my torn side, I moved towards the tightly closed door.
If I pass this, I can reach the top floor.
I placed my hand on the heavy door. And pushed it forward with force.
Screeeech-
The door opened with an intense vibration.
《 Do you wish to challenge the Boss ‘Primeval Hunter, Maeve of the Clock Tower’?
[YES] / [NO] 》
Conversely to when I entered to die by Freud.
Now, to live, I pressed the [YES] button.
It was the moment the end of a short but horribly entangled relationship of resentment approached.
“…As with everyone, there are stories one wishes to hide.”
A woman with a voice like the dying softly recited a poem.
“As he told me, I am alone again. Just like back then.”
In the grand space where gigantic clock mechanisms meshed, the woman, who had been sitting on a shabby chair, eventually rose from her seat.
“Memento mori, Memento te hominem esse, Respice post te, hominem te esse memento”
The woman, who recited the famous phrase Memento Mori, meaning "remember death," looked at the unfamiliar outsider who had entered the space.
“…Am I seeing things.”
She blinked a couple of times, and even pinched her cheek.
“It seems the phantom of longing has come.”
“…Maeve.”
The woman slowly took off the hat she was wearing.
Then, with an emotionless expression, she spread both hands.
In her left hand, a knife, in her right, a musket with a blade.
“Eternal, unending suffering is always followed by anguish.”
“You… built this Clock Tower?”
“Vanitas vanitatum, Yes. That’s right. I built it.”
“…You also created the hunters’ law.”
“Living for hundreds of years. I wanted to feel the fierce will of humans. Because I could no longer find meaning in my life.”
At Maeve’s words, the female hunter I had put an end to with my own hands flashed through my mind.
Gnash- My teeth ground.
When I swung the Beast’s Hammer at her, she lightly leaped up to dodge the attack and threw a knife at my feet.
“Don’t ruin my memories. You Abyss.”
“……Memories? Cutting off my arm?”
“I regret that. For atonement, I even obtained Freud’s Fang as a burial item and placed it in your hand.”
As expected, it was Maeve who had subdued the Giant Serpent Freud.
“You think that’s atonement?”
“No. That’s why I was trapped at the top of the Clock Tower, as if dead.”
Maeve grabbed the blades of numerous knives stored in her coat and held them like a fan.
As if planning to throw them if I took one step closer. She emitted a menacing killing intent.
“…Ugh.”
“…!? You, your stomach…?!”
“That’s not for you to worry about….”
Blood flowed wildly from my severed abdomen.
I struggled to regain control of my legs, which were about to give out, then once again lifted the Beast’s Hammer.
Doubt momentarily flickered in Maeve’s gaze, as she mistook me for a phantom, but she soon regained her composure and threw a knife.
As I quickly dodged, several knives pierced the marble floor.
“Dean couldn’t possibly be this strong…. Is this real? Or….”
“Don’t look away!”
I charged at Maeve and powerfully slammed the hammer down. She blocked the colossal hammer with one hand.
Thwooong-!!!
An intense vibration enveloped the entire Clock Tower, making the gigantic bell hanging from the ceiling sway.
“The Beast’s Golem…. I left it alone because it was a nuisance.”
Perhaps judging my voice itself as a phantom’s enchantment, Maeve muttered to herself, swung a knife, and fired her musket.
My skin, grazed by the knife, was cut as if bursting.
My left wrist, hit by a lead bullet, burst open, leaving an empty space.
“......”
At the sight of my hand flying off, Maeve stopped her attack and her eyes trembled.
I, not missing the opening, immediately swung Freud’s Fang, which had returned to its dagger form, at Maeve.
She belatedly blocked the attack with the musket’s blade.
Then, pushed back in the struggle of strength, she began to falter in her breathing, which had never wavered.
“It’s really… Dean? Not a phantom created by the Abyss?”
It seemed only then she realized I wasn't a fake, but real.
With my powerless hand, I aimed Freud’s Fang at her.
“I thought you were dead…. I clearly saw you die with my own eyes! Liar…! Because of you…! Because of you!!”
Maeve’s eyes regained their vitality, and she shrieked like a child.
“Get out of my sight!! You…! You’re a liar!!”
“You’re the liar, Maeve. I tried to trust you.”
“That…!”
Maeve, who had been spewing anger like a flowing river, was struck speechless.
Having no means to defend her past actions, only a whistling sound came from her mouth.
“Reminds you of a pet dog? Ha…. What bullshit. I’m a human. Not a dog.”
At words that clearly confronted her with the past, Maeve’s eyes reddened.
Then, as Maeve dropped her weapons one by one.
I approached her. And stabbed Freud’s Fang into her chest.
“....”
“If you hadn’t betrayed me…. I wouldn’t be like this.”
“......”
“Because of you……! Because of you…!! Because of you!!!!”
Even as her heart was pierced again and again, and blood flowed back from her mouth, Maeve stared intently into my eyes without moving.
I thrust Freud’s Fang into her chest, roaring desperately.
“If it weren’t for you!! I wouldn’t have become this ugly!!!”
I poured all the rage accumulated from repeating death countless times onto Maeve.
When her heart regenerated, I severed her life again. And finding that insufficient, I tackled her and strangled her.
The fiercely burning rage, having lost its destination, wandered in the air.
Since I couldn’t reset an irreversible past, all I could do was mimic hatred.
Eirene, Carmen, Maeve.
I forgave Eirene, and I forgave Carmen. Yet,
Why only Maeve?
My action of returning the accumulated hatred for all three solely to Maeve was utterly ugly.
Thud!!
At that moment, my body fell backward.
“You only…. You only think of yourself….”
“Kugh…”
Because Maeve had kicked my abdomen and pushed me away.
“Dean, you’re…. A coward…!!”
“Coward…?! Don’t talk bullshit. What do you know, you who killed me?!”
“I tried to save you!!”
“Cutting off my wrist tendons and turning me into a human specimen? Ha! Bullshit!”
“Who drove out the Abyss in your dream?! I did it!! I did it!!”
“Well, thanks a fucking lot-! Kugh!”
Maeve punched me in the face, then climbed on top and began to beat me.
“Dean, you know nothing!!”
Maeve swung her fist at my face. And I stabbed Freud’s Fang into Maeve’s body.
Like two children fighting with all their might. From afar, it was a very childish scene.
“Idiot!! Dean is an idiot!!”
“Don’t talk shit!! You’re more idiotic!!”
“Rotten dead eyes!!!”
“You have dead eyes too! Kugh!?”
Immortal Maeve.
And just me.
The outcome of a childish fight was all too obvious.
Because my body, beaten to a bloody pulp by overwhelming strength, sagged.
Maeve pulled out Freud’s Fang, which was stuck in her left chest, and casually threw it on the floor.
Suddenly, she caressed my cheek and cried profusely.
“Can we…. Start over?”
As if wanting to correct a wrong ending. She whispered a quiet wish.
I moved my trembling lips to convey my refusal.
“If you had treated me well from the start…. Haa… Never mind.”
I no longer want to eat the grapes hanging on the tree.
Whether they are sour grapes or sweet grapes, whatever.
Only then did I push away Maeve, whose body had stiffened from the paralyzing venom, and moved my staggering body to gather my weapons.
I saw the elevator leaving the dreadful underground city. And placed my trembling feet on it.
Maeve, in a ludicrously fallen posture, somehow managed to turn her eyes to look at me.
It’s a complete farewell. Now, I will give her no reason to think of me.
“Find an opponent with a higher level than you……. Or commit suicide after Level 666. …Then you can die.”
After finishing the explanation of the death method she so desired, I raised the middle finger of my right hand. Then pressed the elevator button and headed for the surface.
“Don’t…go…. Don’t…go…!”
Perhaps the paralysis effect had worn off, as Maeve twisted her body and hurriedly ran towards me.
But the elevator was already at a height she couldn't reach.
It was the moment of… perfect escape, which I had dreamed of so much.
“……I’m going to die.”
I lay sprawled on the elevator, fully realizing that death was upon me.
If I die like this and return to the checkpoint, all my actions until now will be in vain.
There would be nothing uglier than climbing the Clock Tower again.
I tore my clothes to staunch the bleeding from my wound, desperately trying to keep my wits about me so as not to die.
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