Rayna was in a bad mood.
She had to leave her muse! All because of some shitty system and emo bastard!
Seriously!
The Duke reached out a hand to hold Rayna’s, but she ruthlessly evaded his extended limb with the determination of a martyr to die, and threateningly held up her middle finger with disgust written on her face.
He sighed a long-suffering sigh. “Rayna, really… Why must you —”
She snorted, “Yeah, I’m good, dipshit.”
Like a true gentleman, the Duke didn’t show any frustration, patiently pulling out a thick, white fox fur coat to tuck around Rayna’s thin, bruised shoulders, her browned rags swaying in the frigid wind. As the fabric around her neck ruffled, it lifted to reveal a scrap of red velvet firmly tied around Rayna’s throat.
“Get that away from me.”
“You should stay warm.”
“You’ll regret this. Get that oooooffff — bleuuargh.” With great, swaggering fanfare Rayna vomited over the coat, the clear bile mixed in with a tinge of red blood. Shamelessly using the priceless snow-white coat to wipe her red mouth, she continued snarkily, “Told you, idiot.”
The Duke cared not for the stinking and ruined coat; instead he fussed and panicked, the picture of a mother hen, trying to bundle Rayna into another coat he somehow magically pulled out of the air.
He tried to persuade her, “Look, Rayna. Just agree, and we could leave this cycle of entering fallen secondary worlds. I'll show you what the main world looks like — it's much more advanced than your original world.”
Rayna stubbornly stayed quiet, ignoring him.
“Besides, aren't I a good man? I've stayed single for you for thousands of years, endured your rather ruthless beatings, and am considered the top bachelor in every world, including the main dimension.”
Rayna shrewdly ran her eyes up and down his body with a tinge of fermented disgust. “Stayed single for me? Hello, Mr. I'm So Cool, I don’t give a shit. I'll even pay the five yuan for your marriage certificate1From my memory (though I may be wrong), there was once a fee for getting a marriage certificate, being around five yuan (one aud dollar)., alright? Ruthless beatings? I define your actions as sexual harassment and stalking. Whoever named you 'Best Bachelor' must've been blind. So, fuck off.”
“Rayna…”
“I'm a bona-fide lesbian, Gaytime. Wear some boobs and maybe I'll give you a candy wrapper.”
Having heard this one too many times, the Duke calmly ignored the first two parts of her dialogue and asked her, “Why a candy wrapper?”
With a dreamy expression of bliss on her face, Rayna recounted lovingly, “My beautiful muse once threw me a wrapper from which she directly ate from with her lips. It was the most heartfelt, moving, beautiful and touching gift I'd ever received.”
The Duke’s face made an imperceptible change. “Oh… so you have that inclination, I… Why am I not surprised. How touching, indeed. But I could do much better, I'm sure.”
Only Rayna and Ava understood what this wrapper meant.
It was the best present Ava could give, the best present Ava could make, and the best meaning Ava could convey.
It was the sweetest present.
Something that only they with their past could know.
And…
Rayna smiled.
Back then, and even until now, Ava had counted the days to Rayna's birthday, despite every changing day and time difference the two spent in hopping between worlds, celebrating it in the most innocent, unique and loving way.
It was something that no-one else could replicate.
Not even the Duke, who had the support of the system.
The few remaining servants were utterly perplexed and at a loss.
Despite Rayna and the other rebels’ escape, Her Majesty the Queen didn’t seem to care at all, as calm, ruthless and cruel as ever. It was just that the time she spent interrogating the rebels had turned into the extra time she spent killing in her dungeons.
Ava had been a colourful yet pale mix of strange feelings when the system had informed her that every crime that could possibly be committed would merit a death penalty; it was only the day before that she had languidly daydreamed and wilfully remarked that true tyrants would do the same. Now, all such individuals would appear in the dungeon for Her Majesty to play with.
[Why are you surprised? This is what you, as a tyrant, implemented yourself. You threw this decree's paper to the officials to sign a week ago.]
Ava really wished for the system to shut up.
[Now, please go and fulfil your duties, Miss Tyrant.]
Such was the habit of the system; it would only give her just enough to work with, only when it was absolutely needed to help her perform her role…
Or to help her “become” her role.
This world was more ruthless compared to her past ones; though she might have become numbed to killing and the pushing of buttons for bombs, it was the first time she was made to kill and torture such a great number with but her blade alone.
She wasn't allowed to express herself, either.
She couldn't cry, weep, scream or be sad anymore.
Those negative emotions were all bottled up, with nowhere to vent but through cruelty, blood and madness.
Like a bloodstain that couldn’t be washed off with just water or bleach.
A stain that needed to be washed off with acid, regardless of the damage to the worn, fabric shirt.
Day in, day out every moment of her survival was the same. She only kept count of the numbers, not recognizing the difference between the value of a second or a week. Did a million dollars or a billion dollars have a difference to those trapped in the wild? At the end of the day, it was just paper.
Her days were mostly a blur of red; blood dripped from the walls, her sometimes crazed, sometimes elegant, sometimes skilful paintings of red filling the castle.
Her days were really too boring.
Rifling through some papers, she picked up a stack of documents and asked her new butler, “What’s this for?”
The butler now was new; the last — as in, the fifth after the poisoning incident — had been killed by Ava in one of her mad blood-painting episodes. He trembled in fear; he had to take a shaky, staggered breath before informing her, “That, that was the request from the Duke in the North for refugee funds… Apparently, the winter monster storms are worsening, and supplies are drying up.”
Monster storms…
Ava didn’t know what those were. She would have to dig out the information herself later; the system most certainly wouldn’t give her the knowledge on a silver platter. But she probably couldn’t enter the library.
The butler shivered in fear; Her Majesty’s mood seemed to have plummeted.
His great fear stemmed from his master’s painting event; he was the one who’d cleaned up and disposed of the skinned corpse. The exposed muscles, sinew and fat of his superior haunted his every step and shadow, like a monstrous abomination stalking every breath he made, counting the fortune he made from his friend’s death.
Ava said slowly, “In that case…”
The system pulled up a speech for her, [Please say the following: That’s their own issue. Discard this request, I don’t care for it. Instead, I want that dessert from before. Get it.]
“…That’s their own issue. Discard this request, I don’t care for it. I want that dessert from before… Get it for me.”
The butler asked, “The… Fortress, uh, Fortress Stilt Fisherman In-In-Indulgence?”
“Yes, yes, just bring it here.”
“Understood, Your Majesty.”
The dessert she was handed was ugly and gaudy to her eyes. Chocolate, cream, sugar, fruit… it was all unappetizing and crude. The large blue gemstone, she thought, was a cheap way to raise the price of sugar and cream.
Lifting up the plate it sat on, she pinched the gemstone, and lifted it up to her eyes.
Hmm. Ugly.
Digging her dessert fork into the chocolate stilt, she speared the man sitting on top through the head, the brown orbs shattering into shards and broken rubble.
She gouged out a fleshy chunk of the white, creamy tower, and placed the sweet cream into her mouth.
Hmm?
Ava found it rather bitter, and bad tasting, despite her food-taster’s face full of flavourful pleasure.
