WE TRIED TRANSLATIONS

Translator/Editor: Coughing Baby

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◈ I Returned as a God ◈

Chapter 96: And Yet, Onward (1)

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Click, click.

The sound of heels came from the direction of the study.

Rizu appeared, wearing a red dress.

Moonlight through the window lit up both of us.

Rizu pressed a black-painted fingernail to her cheek.

"That."

Her gaze landed on Faillia Duke, who I'd kicked to the floor and left slumped there.

I folded down two fingers, one at a time, as I spoke.

"First, I already knew you were in the study."

"And second... damn it, when the duke grabbed my hand."

The duke's hand had been cold enough to raise goosebumps, and no blood had been flowing through it.

"Did you kill him?"

Faillia Duke was practically a living puppet at that point.

"Father's alive."

"Who said anything about someone dying? I asked if you killed him."

"Strange, isn't it? If I'd killed Father, Father would have to be dead."

"Maybe he came back."

Rizu lowered her hand from her cheek and burst out laughing, the corners of her mouth stretching wide.

"If you'd pretended not to know, we could've let this pass quietly."

"No reason to bother with that anymore."

I pulled off the eyepatch and threw it to the floor.

Mission or not, hating something was hating something.

Rizu took a step closer.

A small dog with brown fur sat cradled in her arms.

"At first it was a puppy. A very small, very cute puppy."

"A puppy?"

"Yeah. Blind in one eye, and it limped a little. But it was cute."

"So you killed it."

Rizu let go, and the puppy dropped to all fours on the floor.

"It was going to die soon anyway, even if I didn't kill it. If that's the case, isn't it better that I kill it and keep it with me forever?"

"Is that also why you killed the village you were born in, and your family?"

"That time was the happiest period of my life. So I killed it."

Muels only received treatment as a privileged class for one reason.

The divine spark.

Mana mattered, sure, but they also carried unique abilities all their own.

Just like how Dead could die eight times and still come back.

The shapes of villagers appeared behind Rizu's back.

Ordinary village people, the kind you'd see anywhere.

Rizu snapped her fingers and the villagers dissolved away.

This time, an unfamiliar man stepped out from deeper inside the study.

"Kale. Someone's come looking for you."

The man called Kale turned his head and looked at me.

Rizu picked up the letter sitting on the table and handed it to him.

Kale tore it open and showed Rizu the blank paper inside.

"Oh my. Not a single word written. How cruel."

Rizu dropped the paper to the floor and turned her body away.

Why the hurt look on your face.

"You can summon people you've killed. Is that your ability?"

"Kale isn't dead. Neither is Father."

"Faillia Duke looked pretty gone to me."

No matter how hard I'd kicked him, Faillia Duke had been staring up at the ceiling with glazed eyes, like a man whose soul had checked out.

"It's because it's twelve o'clock."

"Are you Cinderella or something?"

"I'm serious. Father can only be Father for twelve hours."

Rizu laid a hand on Faillia Duke's cheek and poured mana into him.

He rose to his feet and turned into the same state as Kale.

Rizu touched her red lips with a fingertip and licked them.

"At some point, I started feeling thirsty. A thick thirst that wouldn't go away no matter what I did. I thought I'd go insane."

"So you broke your taboo because of it?"

Putting together the corpse I'd seen in the dungeon cells, Faillia Duke's condition, and the vitality tonic she supposedly drank every night, there was a strong chance Rizu's taboo was vampirism.

"That's right. When I drink blood, the thirst disappears, just for that moment."

Rizu answered with a smile, and she genuinely looked happy doing it.

"Your eyes, I knew they weren't actually hurt. It's better this way."

"Why did you break your taboo?"

"What even is a taboo?"

"Why is it forbidden? Why? Don't you think that's wrong?"

Rizu's hand crept up my chest and closed around my throat.

Her nail scratched lightly against my skin.

Red blood ran down through the split in my flesh.

Her tongue licked the blood off my neck.

"I'm happy right now. And I think I'd be even happier if you stayed with me."

I shoved her back with one hand.

Kale, standing behind her, caught Rizu as she lost her balance and stumbled.

She licked her lips.

"Delicious."

"Blood is blood."

"A Muel your caliber would be up and moving again in no time."

"You're telling me to become Cinderella?"

"It's fine. You wouldn't even realize you'd become a doll. It'd just feel like a single moment's dream."

I'd already figured she wasn't right in the head, but this was a whole other level of insane.

"Why did you break your taboo?"

"I told you. The thirst was driving me insane. And then, in the middle of all that, I met that person."

"You wouldn't understand even if I told you. Well, it's late. Time to end this conversation."

Rizu pressed her fingers together and smiled.

I gripped my sword and settled into a stance.

"You don't know me."

"You know something?"

"You don't know me either."

"Those honest eyes of yours. I don't dislike them. Still, you can't kill me."

Rizu snapped her fingers lightly.

The window outside turned red, and the faint smell of blood that had been lingering grew thick.

Wind tore through the room without letup, like a hurricane had blown in.

Something landed on my cheek.

I stepped back and swung my sword, cutting through what looked like thin threads.

"Thread?"

Part of a thread touched the back of my hand and sank in.

Save me.

A voice brushed through my mind.

I found myself looking up, without meaning to.

"Hey! Wh, why are you up there!"

Lee Eunyheui was caught, tangled in thousands of strands of thread.

Damn it, I thought she'd gotten out clean.

"Did you really think you could dodge my sight inside this mansion?"

Dozens of flames, big and small, sprang up around Rizu.

Lee Eunyheui, hearing the exchange between me and Rizu, came to her senses.

"Ugh... what's going on... huh? What is this?"

"You idiot! How could you let yourself get caught like that!"

I swung my sword around in irritation, and Lee Eunyheui rolled her eyes back and forth trying to make sense of the situation.

"Seems like you two have a special relationship. No?"

"Who knows?"

"If you want, I'll let her live."

Rizu grabbed Lee Eunyheui's chin, lifting it, and turned her head to look at her.

"I'm fine, so don't worry about..."

"Kill her."

"I'll figure out a way out of this myself... wait. What did you just say?"

I watched Lee Eunyheui's face go slack with shock, scratched my head, and sighed.

"If we're talking cause here, it's the one who got caught that messed up. Just kill her. And I'm not even that close with her, you know."

"You two met every single night."

"Sleeping in the same building doesn't mean we're close."

"Y, you crazy bastard!! Wh, what are you even saying right now!! We're not like that!!"

I set my sword down and offered a moment of mourning for Lee Eunyheui.

"It was a short time, but it was fun. Rest in peace."

Rizu looked down at Lee Eunyheui with an expression of deep, deep pity.

Lee Eunyheui's face went bright red, and her fingertips twitched.

She pulled a dagger from her item window and quickly cut through the threads binding her body.

Spinning lightly through the air, she came flying straight at me.

"Diiiie!"

"Whoa there."

I twisted my body and dodged the kick flying at me.

Lee Eunyheui landed on the floor and grabbed my collar, shaking me.

"What? Sleeping in the same building? I never gave you my body or my heart, you know!!"

"That's what you get for letting yourself get caught."

Lee Eunyheui grabbed the hem of my clothes and ducked slightly behind my back.

"I, I thought it was a ghost."

"Pfft. A woman who kills people herself is scared of ghosts?"

"Sh, shut up!! It's scary because she's dead!! Dead but still alive!!"

"Dead but still alive is just a zombie."

"Ah, zombies I'm fine with."

Lee Eunyheui let go like nothing had happened and calmly brushed the dust off her clothes.

Dead people and zombies were fine, but ghosts weren't. Quite the entertaining woman.

"So what did you mean, dead but alive?"

"I saw Luria."

Lee Eunyheui had followed the spirit of Luria that Rizu had conjured, and walked straight into a trap.

"That can happen."

"That woman, she can hold onto the souls of the people she's killed."

Lee Eunyheui shivered again and hid behind me.

This woman is seriously exhausting.

"That's horrifying."

"You're more horrifying to me. You're supposed to be useful here!"

"Sh, shut up! Y, you, you shouldn't be doing this to me! You know that, right?"

Anyone watching would think we were a couple!

Lee Eunyheui stepped back, sighed, and pulled out her bow.

I stared quietly at the threads gathered around Rizu.

"Don't touch that thread."

At the word thread, Lee Eunyheui's fingers trembled as she aimed the bowstring.

While cutting herself free with the dagger, I'd seen a few strands of thread sink into her body.

"What the hell does that even mean?"

"How would I know?"

"What, you're telling me not to touch it and you don't even know why?"

Lee Eunyheui pouted, lips jutting out.

I swung my sword in a wide arc overhead and used Wind Fang.

Rough wind tore through the inside of the study.

The windows shattered, and books tumbled off the shelves onto the floor.

Die die die die.

No, save me, die, no.

I don't want to die like this!!

Countless voices poured through the skin that had touched the threads.

The voices of everyone Rizu had killed.

I stepped back, and Lee Eunyheui drew her bowstring.

KABOOOOM.

Hm, isn't that a little too much firepower for indoor use?

A single arrow produced an explosion big enough to rival a thrown grenade.

I barely made it out of the study with Lee Eunyheui, and we ran down the corridor.

"Cough, cough! You woman! I almost died!! You did that on purpose, didn't you?"

"No way I'd do that!"

"Learn some power control!"

Instead of just putting an arrow through Rizu's chest, she'd caused an explosion. Clearly out of her mind.

Lee Eunyheui chewed on a peppermint and pouted.

"Can't."

"You mean you can't even if you wanted to! Power control!"

Lee Eunyheui looked genuinely wronged.

"If one arrow causes an explosion like that, how's that any different from a cannon!"

"Cannons are big and heavy! My bow's not that heavy!"

"That's a fair point... no wait, that's not it, just, try haaarder!"

"Shut up! Try-hard-shamer!"

I turned and swung my sword in a wide arc.

A straight beam of light sliced through the air and stopped dead in the middle of the corridor.

Around Rizu stood a thick barrier made from souls.

Souls or not, they were all just extensions of her own mana in the end.

Rizu walked forward, her long hair fluttering.

"That explosion was way too much."

"Yeah, I genuinely think that was wrong too."

"Whose side are you even on!"

From the moment that explosion went off, I gave up on expecting Lee Eunyheui to fight like any kind of normal archer.

We're at a disadvantage indoors.

The main residence held other servants besides Rizu and Faillia Duke.

"Wh, what's going on?"

"Fire! Fire!!"

"Aaaah! Young lady! Are you all right?"

"Get more people! Guards!"

The servants, unable to make sense of the situation, scrambled around in a panic.

A maid with some rank to her, dressed in a nightgown, approached Rizu.

"Young lady, first let's get you outside..."

Slice.

The approaching maid's head fell to the floor, cut clean off.

Kale, already killed once by Rizu.

"Lee Eunyheui, get outside right now."

"Seems like that's something I have to handle myself."

Footnotes:

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