A Villain's Will to Survive novel Chapter 76

Chapter 76: Incident (3)

As I read the thesis aloud, I eventually fell silent, though I didn't stop making corrections.

There are numerous incorrect and inefficient sections. Although the core idea is sound...

Despite the unfortunate incident Drent caused at the Thesis Colloquium, his talent was exceptional, almost unattainable for someone like the original Deculein. For me, who had only expected Epherene to join, Drent was an unexpected gain.

Talking to myself was a sign of my unexpectedly good mood, which was unusual. Then again, I wasn’t sure what being myself meant anymore.

“... Hmm.”

Deculein's personality trait was Authoritative. The more capable someone was, the more he expected them to lower themselves before him. When they did, he felt a certain joy.

Yet now, I was filled with unease. The unfamiliarity stemmed from the way the car cornered. My entire body, sensitively attuned by the Iron Man attribute, detected it. The one holding the wheel was not Jeff.

However, I couldn’t act hastily. I scanned the car with a meticulous eye. Villain’s Fate detected no immediate dangers. If boarding this car had been risky, the attribute's radar would have flagged it. Perhaps this was a gap in its function, as it only flagged variables directly linked to my death.

I rolled down the window. The ordinary scenery slid by, but as the wind rushed in, the entire road was bathed in a vivid red aura.

"... This is unprecedented," I remarked.

The outside was a danger zone. Inside the car, however, was the safest place in the area. As I realized the situation, a new quest notification appeared.

[Surprise Quest: Encounter]

◆ Store Currency +1

I pondered for a moment and then said, “An encounter... I shall regard it as an invitation.”

A smile crept onto my face. I didn't know who had arranged such an absurd meeting, but thinking of it as an invitation made it easier to accept. I glanced at the driver in the rearview mirror. Our eyes met, and he gripped the steering wheel tighter, his palms sweating.

"Rest assured, I will not act in an ungentlemanly manner. After all, you are not the real one."

The driver remained silent, and there was still time. I resumed editing the thesis.

***

Vroom—

Gerek glared at Deculein’s car in the distance. Although he was maintaining a reasonable distance, the bloodthirsty Gerek found the pace unbearably frustrating.

“Why can’t we simply kill him?” Gerek demanded.

Arlos, who was behind the wheel, responded calmly, “Is that you, Gerek?”

“Yeah, it’s me. Just like you, the real Arlos right now.”

Arlos pressed the accelerator without a word. The puppet driving Deculein’s car contained about ten percent of her own soul, making it less intelligent and more unsophisticated than she was.

However, everything the puppet saw, heard, and felt was fully transmitted to the original, and the puppet acted as if it were the original. This method of puppetry only worked perfectly under these conditions. A puppet aware of its nature could not move with vitality.

To be precise, a puppet aware of its true nature lacked motivation, often failing to perform tasks properly and sometimes even refusing commands from the original. Fully infusing a puppet with one's soul resulted in severe penalties of Soul Separation, so Arlos had developed this method with great care.

Gerek muttered, "So, does the soul in that puppet die upon returning to you, never realizing it was a puppet?"

"More or less," Arlos replied.

“You’re so cruel~ Don’t your puppets have personalities?”

“They fulfill their roles through sacrifice.”

Gerek glanced at her and inquired, “What do you mean by sacrifice?”

Arlos bitterly smiled and replied, “The sacrifice is never knowing whether I am the puppet or the original.”

Even Arlos, who believed herself to be the original, might only be a soul fragment of her true self hiding somewhere. Her memories could be fabrications of the original. This was the price of creating the perfect puppet, one indistinguishable from a human. Consequently, Arlos would always live in doubt of her own reality.

“I really admire that about you, sis,” Gerek said with a bright smile.

“... I told you not to fool me,” Arlos snapped, her frown deepening at the word, sis.

“Sis~” Gerek said, laughing creepily, lunging at Arlos.

She pushed away the man who had adopted the persona of a younger sister.

“Sis~ I love you~”

"Stop clinging to me. I'm trying to drive."

Thankfully, Gerek was somewhat handsome. If he had looked like a bearded bandit, she would have killed him already.

“Siiiis~”

“Quiet down, Jelin.”

This was Jelin, not Gerek. Among Gerek’s multiple personas, Jelin was the easiest to handle.

“But sis, I can’t hold back for long. I want to kill Deculein as much as my brother does. You remember how I died, right?”

“I’ve heard it countless times from Gerek,” Arlos replied.

“Hmph. That stupid brother of mine takes all the attention. Even the topics I come up with, he takes all the credit for...”

Jelin, who had been grumbling, suddenly fell silent and tightly gripped his pants leg.

In a lowered voice, he asked, “Sis.”

“What?”

“I’m real, right?”

Arlos turned to look at Jelin, an eighteen-year-old girl trapped in a grown man’s body.

"Who knows? There's no need to find out.”

As both a puppeteer and a soul master, Arlos had not teamed up with Gerek by coincidence. The numerous personas within Gerek might be remnants of a mental illness, while she herself might only be a soul fragment of her true self.

“Just don't think about it too deeply, and you'll be fine."

The commonality was their identity crisis. Living without knowing if they were real or fake made life uncertain, often dragging their emotions into a depressive abyss, like an anchor weighing down their heart.

"Everything in the world is like that. If you don’t think too deeply, you’ll be fine. Trust in the resilience of your identity and live lightly."

“... Sis~” Jelin said, looking moved. He lunged at her again, but Arlos elbowed him in the jaw.

“Get off, Gerek.”

“Tch. How did you figure it out?” Gerek muttered.

Jelin was skilled at acting, but Gerek was not.

Arlos clicked her tongue in annoyance and said, "We don't have time for this nonsense."

Through her puppet, Arlos heard Deculein’s voice saying, “An encounter... I shall regard it as an invitation.”

“Hmm.”

The professor’s damn remarkable intuition had made her consider abandoning the plan when he noticed the puppet. However, doing so would have meant Gerek acting on his own, which would have been worse.

"Deculein sees this as an invitation. He’s clearly confident," Arlos remarked.

"Interesting. He did hold his own against Rohakan, after all. I couldn’t even kill that old man. When did Deculein become so strong?” Gerek wondered aloud.

At that moment, a shiver ran down Arlos’s spine. Deculein had said something deeply significant.

"Rest assured, I will not act in an ungentlemanly manner. After all, you are not the real one."

Though he might just mean the puppet, Arlos couldn’t shake the feeling that he was referring to her very soul.

“Arlos, what’s wrong?” Gerek asked.

"... Nothing," Arlos replied.

It couldn't be true. No one could determine the authenticity of a human soul—unless they were God.

“We're nearly at the destination,” Arlos said.

They finally arrived at their destination, a deserted underground area far from the city's bustling center, marked for future development.

"Roar~ I'm getting excited. Roar~" Gerek said, pretending to be an animal.

“Do you have an animal persona?”

“Absolutely! I even raised it myself. I’ve got a cowboy persona who wields a shotgun too. Roar~! Hahaha,” Gerek laughed, his innocent smile sharply contrasting with his words.

***

The car moved forward slowly. The buildings and streetlights gradually disappeared as the vehicle descended into an underground, empty lot. Darkness filled the view beyond the windows. The car rattled forward and eventually came to a stop in the middle of the area.

Deculein looked at the driver's seat. Jeff had turned into a mannequin. It must have been Arlos. He turned his gaze back to the window. There was no immediate danger according to Villain’s Fate. Deculein stepped out of the car. It was an underground space resembling a parking lot.

Click,clack—

The sound of Deculein footsteps echoed through the empty space.

"Welcome," a voice called out from his right.

Deculein looked in that direction. He didn’t bother with a defensive stance, as there were no indicating death variables. He simply stood calmly.

“It’s been a while~”

A man cloaked in darkness emerged, and Deculein recognized him instantly. It was Jukaken, a named character from the underworld.

"Ah, stop right there. Don't take another step."

Deculein had barely moved when Jukaken reacted dramatically, waving his hands in an exaggerated gesture.

"Don't move another inch. Stay exactly where you are."

Deculein scrutinized him using his Character Magnifying Lens.

A robed figure stood behind Jukaken. As anticipated, this encounter was merely a side quest within the main quest. _{ƒгeewebnovёl.com}

“... Tsk,” Jukaken clicked his tongue, brushing his long hair aside.

Snap—!

“Hmph. If I wanted you dead, I would have done it already. But I respect the power and wealth you've demonstrated in the underworld. I seek a peaceful resolution.”