Chapter 1921 – 1921. Dark Moon
Flames roared within the cell, fueled by the oil.
Startled, the inmates desperately tried to extinguish the fire. They stomped on it, flapped their prison uniforms to cut off the air, anything to put it out.
If it were a normal fire, it would have gone out. But this was a fire fueled by oil.
“Aaaaargh!”
“The fire won’t go out!”
“Shit! Help me! Help me!!”
“What are you just watching for?! Guard! Guard! Come here and put out the fire!”
The prisoners burned alive along with the prison. I watched the scene with a blank expression.
“Heh, heh heh. Heh heh heh….”
The low laughter came from An-che. She was laughing. She held her body as if restraining herself, laughing in ecstasy. Her body was trembling, and my eyes kept being drawn to the voluptuous breasts that protruded from between her arms. I tried hard not to be conscious of her.
“Oh… I’ve… gotten wet.”
“……”
What could have gotten wet from seeing the fire? I swallowed the question of what was wet and looked at the boss of Cabrahim.
The guy who had been acting all high and mighty just a moment ago was nowhere to be seen. Now, he was desperately trying to put out the fire to survive. He was trying to cut off the air with a blanket, or using toilet water to put out the fire. All useless attempts.
‘If only they could use mana.’
The prisoners of Rumen Prison cannot use mana.
Prisoners are basically given mana removal surgery before coming to prison. A mana removal magic circle is engraved on their liver.
He, who was sweating profusely, looked at me and shouted.
“Stop it right now! You must want something?! If this goes on, all the prisoners in the prison will burn to death! Is that what you want?!”
“Only you guys will die. The cells in Rumen Prison are special. They don’t burn easily, and the fire doesn’t spread.”
That’s why there were no sprinklers to put out the fire.
“Tch. Tell me! What do you want?!”
“Prisoners must be punished.”
“That’s right. You are absolutely right.”
An-che chimed in from the side.
Thud. Thud. One by one, the prisoners in the cell collapsed. They didn’t die from the fire, but from suffocation. I watched the boss of Cabrahim, who was holding out until the end.
“You bastard…!”
Clang!
He grabbed the iron bars, heated by the fire, with both hands. Sizzle! Regardless of the burns on his hands, he shook the bars and glared at me as if he would kill me.
“Do you think you’ll be safe after doing this?! I’m not alone! Even if I die, Cabrahim is eternal! Cabrahim will tear your throat out!”
A voice full of murderous intent and hatred poured out of his mouth and onto me. I stared at him indifferently.
It was familiar. Back in the military, I had carried out all sorts of dirty missions. Of course, that included torturing the enemy. The enemy, right before being tortured and disposed of, would spew all sorts of curses at me. Because that was all they could do.
“Another curse added to the list. But you know what? None of those curses ever worked.”
Some of my comrades were tormented by those spiteful curses. Did they appear in their dreams? But the guys who died never appeared in my dreams. I did have quite a few wet dreams though.
“You son of a bitch!! Aren’t you afraid of Cabrahim?!!”
“I want to ask you the opposite. Aren’t you afraid of me?”
“Cabrahim will kill you!”
“I think you’ll die before that.”
“I will find your friends and family and kill them! Cabrahim’s revenge cannot be avoided by anyone! Hear me, Cabrahim!!”
He shouted. So that all the prisoners in the prison could hear. He was giving orders to the gang members mixed among the prisoners.
“This guy dared to ignore and look down on Cabrahim! Cabrahim does not yield to anyone! Tear apart Cabrahim’s enemies with your fangs and claws!!”
“Ah. How scary.”
I said. I even made my body tremble on purpose. He looked at me. His face contorted, thinking it was mockery.
“I’m too scared to kill you.”
[Material Conversion]
I changed the oil into fire extinguisher powder. The flames inside the cell instantly died down. He was flustered when the fire went out. I smiled once and inserted the key into the cell door and turned it. Click! The cell door opened.
He hesitated, seemingly bewildered by the sudden situation, but soon let out a scream and rushed at me.
‘He’s not moving recklessly. I don’t know what it is, but he learned martial arts.’
As a battle mage, I had naturally learned martial arts. I didn’t have much talent for using my body, so it was difficult to see the effects in actual combat, but I steadily practiced it in the sense of training my body.
‘Even if he’s a gang boss, he can’t use mana, and he’s already on the verge of death. There’s no reason to avoid him.’
I grabbed the fist that was coming at me and pulled it down. At the same time, I kicked him in the shin. He fell to the floor as easily as a straw doll.
“So he’s a gang boss. How scary. He’s so scary that I have to make him not scary.”
[Material Conversion]
I turned the blood still flowing from my palm into a long blade. I swung my palm. The blade cut his thigh. He screamed, having lost both legs.
“Kaaaaaah!”
An echoing scream.
“It’s noisy. You’re disturbing the other prisoners.”
Thud!
I stepped on his head with my combat boots.
Thud thud thud thud!
I stepped on him repeatedly with moderate force. I twisted my foot while stepping on him. His head was crushed.
“Lieutenant.”
I called the lieutenant who was watching me and the guy with sparkling eyes.
“Yes, Warden. Is there anything you want to order?”
Was it just my imagination? Her voice sounded sweet.
“…Call a doctor. And bring a high-grade potion. Otherwise, he won’t last long and die.”
“Ah. You’re really not going to kill him? Even though he looks like this, he’s the boss of Cabrahim. Personally, I think it would be cleaner to kill him.”
“He’s going to be the new mascot of our Rumen Prison… We can’t kill him. Oh, right. I want to entrust the interrogation of the Cabrahim gang members in the prison to you, Lieutenant.”
“Interrogation?”
“You don’t want to?”
“Of course not. Interrogation is my specialty. Just leave it to me. But can you handle it?”
“Well. I haven’t thought about that.”
“Ah ha ha ha ha ha!”
She laughed, leaning back. Her voluptuous breasts shook. The prisoners locked in their cells were silent even at the provocative sight. They just looked at us with fear in their eyes.
• • •
Rumen Prison.
It was a place that had a bad reputation from the start.
It was a place where all sorts of vicious criminals were imprisoned, such as gangsters, mafia members, traitors, and smugglers.
Rumen Prison was the empire’s garbage dump. All sorts of garbage that couldn’t be recycled was thrown into this prison. And then they ignored it. Then, when they occasionally remembered, they would incinerate the garbage. That was the cycle. The worst prison in the empire, with no dreams or hope.
It was a well-known demotion area for imperial soldiers, and they called it a hellish place. It was natural for guards to get caught up in gang fights, and the prisoners who lived only for today were difficult to manage because they were tyrannical. Most of the prison wardens who were appointed here died and were carried out.
The prisoners killed the prison wardens for all sorts of reasons. The influence of the gangs, the rights of the prisoners, simply because they didn’t like them, and so on.
The guards of Rumen Prison were on high alert and treated the prisoners with caution. They tried not to be looked down upon, but they also compromised with the prisoners’ demands to coexist. That was the way to maintain peace between prisoners and guards.
But everything changed when a new prison warden was appointed to Rumen Prison.
The hellish place became hell.
In particular, the prisoners fell from heaven to the deepest part of hell.
5 AM. A broadcast rang out in the prison.
-Wake up.
The voice of the newly appointed prison warden, Leon Schneider, echoed throughout the prison.
The prisoners jumped out of their cells. They looked at the CCTV cameras on the ceiling with fear and began to tidy up their cells.
It was something that would have been impossible a week ago. The prisoners of Rumen Prison slept when they wanted to sleep and woke up when they wanted to wake up.
-Morning roll call.
The guards standing in the hallway outside the cells conducted the roll call.
“Cell 1.”
“Cell 1, six total! All present!”
“Cell 2, seven total! All present!”
“Cell 3, six total! All present!”
The morning roll call continued without incident. The highest-ranking prisoners in the cells, the cell leaders, were sweating as they participated in the morning roll call. Because the moment they made even a small mistake during the morning roll call, their toes would be cut off. If they didn’t have toes, their fingers would be cut off.
“Is there anyone who is sick?”
“No.”
Even if there was, they had to say no.
There was a prisoner who had a fever from a cold last time. The new, crazy prison warden said that if you had a fever, you had to cool down, so he shoved the prisoner into ice water. And so, one prisoner froze to death in the middle of summer.
The prison warden’s words at the time were a sight to behold.
‘Oh dear. He died because his cold was too severe.’
Logically, if you had a cold, you should prescribe cold medicine, right? Even the prisoners who had never stepped foot inside a school gate knew that common sense, but only the prison warden didn’t know.
Some prisoners and guards knew the reason for his actions. It was because he thought it was a waste to use cold medicine on a prisoner.
“There are no issues today either. We will begin the morning meal distribution.”
The guard spoke into the radio.
Soon, the guards distributed the morning meal. One container per cell. As soon as the container came in, a terrible smell filled the prison. It was definitely the smell of fish.
When the lid was opened, a terrible soup was revealed. Roughly chopped fish, withered vegetables, and a muddy, sticky broth.
It was the worst meal again today. Even the dinner would be similar. If you had to say something good, there was no lunch.
‘Damn it. Before, at least they gave us edible bread and soup….’
‘My sentence is 20 years… I have 15 years and 7 months left, and I have to eat this kind of food twice a day every day?’
‘Someone… someone please kill the prison warden. Please…!’
The prisoners had to force themselves to eat. They couldn’t leave it because it was bad. If they left it, they would have to eat rotten food with maggots.
-I know you have a lot of complaints about the food. But there is no choice because the budget is insufficient. Be grateful that you are even being given food and eat it.
