Chapter 75: Flexing in the Last Chapter, Getting Beat Down in This One

Bad premonition or not, the die was cast. Once you started flexing this hard, you absolutely couldn’t hit the brakes just because of a nagging chill in your gut. The momentum of a perfect bluff was a delicate thing, after all.

“That’s all I have to say,” you declared, your voice echoing with a chilling calm. “So, do you still intend to stand before me?”

Honestly, by this point, you felt like you were completely breaking character. That eerie, oppressive mastermind vibe really didn’t fit a sunny, cheerful gamer like yourself. Who in their right mind could be so polite and empathetic to the enemy while metaphorically flying straight into their faces? Did the old Doctor really treat everyone in Terra as his personal property? The fact that you could feel out of character while literally roleplaying as yourself made you deeply suspicious of your own mental state.

By the time the words left your mouth, you had already braced yourself for a brutal fight. Your mental cooldowns were prepped. But who could have predicted that after a suffocating moment of silence from the armored Pegasi opposite you, the crisp, heavy sound of a weapon hitting the dirt would ring out?

Clang! Clang!

Where there was one, there were two. The elite Silverlance Pegasi—the absolute pride of Kazimierz—were actually dropping their weapons. They surrendered over a single sentence.

“You… won’t harm innocent Kazimierz civilians, will you?” the lead captain asked. His voice was completely drained of strength, hollowed out by an unseen terror, as if he were desperately grasping for any moral justification to lay down his arms and put his mind at ease.

“Of course,” you replied smoothly, keeping the mask perfectly intact. “I will bring a better future to everyone.”

Internally, you were screaming. They just surrendered?! Just like that?!

The captain offered a bitter, self-deprecating smile and was the first to raise his hands in total submission. “Then we surrender. I recall you don’t have the habit of killing prisoners.”

He had long anticipated this exact outcome the moment he realized who stood before him. Every Pegasus who had ever dared to raise a lance against the Ghost of Babel during the peak of their most insane expansion had been left behind in the dirt. It had nothing to do with right or wrong, nobility or insignificance; it was simply the cold, mechanical reality of what happened when someone blocked his path or offended his ‘ideals.’

A better future… The Pegasus closed his eyes wearily. For the Sarkaz who followed under his command back then, it was indeed a tangible, bloody revolution. But for everyone else in their way? It certainly wasn’t.

Fortunately, the terrifying figure before him didn’t seem interested in dwelling on the philosophy of it. “Then, stand down. As for how you will be dealt with, specialized operators will come to notify you.”

You patted Patriot on his massive, armored shoulder. The towering Wendigo turned slowly. With one massive hand carefully shielding the Ghost of Babel perched upon his arm, he marched away without so much as a backward glance.

Wis’adel hesitated for a fraction of a second, her crimson eyes flickering with complex emotions, before quickening her pace to catch up.

Mephisto, ever the opportunistic sycophant, had already smartly fallen into step behind them. The Herd—his grotesque, shambling infected—slowly retreated under his silent command, melting away into the shadows.

Along the desolate path back, the Doctor said absolutely nothing. Wis’adel, for all her explosive bravado, couldn’t find a single word to break the suffocating silence.

She had once sworn to herself that if the Doctor ever regained his memories, she would press a primed explosive blade to his throat without a second of hesitation. She would carve the answers out of him. But now, walking in his shadow, she realized a pathetic truth: she didn’t even dare to ask.

She had dreamed countless times of this exact reunion. Dreams where the Doctor apologized, where Her Highness Theresa returned, where the golden days of Babel were rebuilt from the ashes. But without fail, every single one of those dreams ended drowning in a pool of blood.

Countless times in her nightmares, the Doctor would look at her with that same infuriating, gentle smile and say: ‘Kill me. I have no regrets.’

She was terrified of hearing those words. She was terrified of that absolute, unfeeling resolve.

In the first year following the internal strife that tore Babel apart, she had hunted down everyone involved in the betrayal. When she wiped the hot blood from her blade onto her coat, her mind wasn’t on the traitor dying at her feet. She was thinking about breaking the Doctor’s limbs. She wanted to cripple him, trap him in the palm of her hand forever, keeping him as a silent, twisted souvenir of her most beautiful past, left silently by her side forever.

By the second year, the madness cooled into a hollow ache. She realized she couldn’t do it. Being caged would be a torment worse than death for a man like him. Even at the bitter end, he deserved a release.

By the fourth year, as Wis’adel dragged herself out of yet another life-threatening mercenary mission, she stared back at the exploding base and the roaring flames. Death is too easy for him, she had thought, spitting blood into the dirt. He has to live. He has to live as painfully and powerlessly as I do!

But now? Now that he was right here, commanding Wendigos and breaking elite knights with a single whisper? She didn’t even dare to open her mouth.

The Nachzehrers seemed to rustle in the unseen shadows behind her, their very presence mocking her incompetence, ridiculing her pathetic hesitation. Wis’adel bit her lower lip so hard she tasted copper. Her nails dug deeply into her palms, piercing the skin.

Finally, she made up her mind. She stepped forward.

Perhaps he’ll just kill me? she thought.

Honestly, that was the most relieving ending she could imagine.

“Doctor.” She deliberately kept a few paces back, a calculated distance ensuring that if he ordered a sudden strike, her own reflexive resistance wouldn’t accidentally harm him.

“What are you thinking about right now?”

You suddenly felt a violent chill crawl up your back, a sudden spike of murderous tension in the air. But because your brain was currently overflowing with dopamine, you immediately dismissed it as the wind.

“Holy crap! We’re rich!” you suddenly shrieked, shattering the grim, dramatic atmosphere into a million pieces.

Wis’adel blinked, completely derailed. “…?”

You spun around, your eyes practically sparkling with LMD symbols as you gestured wildly at the retreating knights. “Was the old me really that scary?! Look at all those Silverlance Pegasi! Just by negotiating, I secured an absolute fortune! Do you know how much ransom we can extort for elite Kazimierz knights?!”

You grabbed your head, pacing frantically on Patriot’s arm. “If I pull off this mastermind act just two more times, I’ll achieve total financial freedom in LMD! Heck, I can remodel Amiya’s office three times a day! I can Elite 2 Swire just to keep her around as a shiny mascot! We hit the absolute jackpot!”

You beamed at the dumbfounded Sarkaz mercenary. “Little Wis, is there anything you want? Name it! I’ll just buy it all in one go—”

WHAM.

A heavy, violently propelled fist slammed directly into your eye socket.

“Ahhhhhh! I’m going to blow you to pieces!!!” Wis’adel shrieked hysterically, her emotional turmoil instantly converting into pure, unadulterated rage.

“What the hell! No! Why are you hitting me?!” you wailed, clutching your rapidly swelling eye. “I called you Little Wis earlier and you didn’t even react! Stop hitting me! Stop it, or I swear I’m going to fight back!”

Smack! Pow!

“Ahhh, you’re still hitting me?! Old man, hurry up and beat her up! Help!”

Patriot stared in utter silence at the frantic aura of the young Sarkaz girl, who looked like she was half a second away from pulling out a heavy grenade launcher and leveling the entire continent. Acting exactly like an honest, conflict-avoidant grandfather watching his grandkid get rightfully disciplined, the Wendigo didn’t dare make a single sound. He simply pretended to look at the scenery, casually tucking the Doctor deeper into the crook of his massive arm, subtly adjusting his grip to make it slightly less convenient for Wis’adel to land headshots.

“No! Why is no one stopping her?!” you sobbed. “Where is your sense of justice?!”

“No! Why is no one stopping him?! Where are your principles?!”

Miles away in Kazimierz, Maria Nearl, who had just finished a grueling training session, slammed her hands on the tavern table, complaining indignantly to her aunt.

Maria launched into an exaggerated, highly emotional recounting of the Doctor’s various domestic crimes: stealing the family’s official household registration book, shamelessly freeloading off their wealth, and not even sparing the premium Sumpter Beast milk her uncle drank before bed. To top it all off, he had provoked her uncle right to his face, a stunt that had indirectly caused Maria to get beaten up in the arena twice.

This time, she made sure to heavily emphasize her older sister Margaret’s extreme, blinding favoritism toward the man. Exhausted and seeking validation, Maria looked expectantly at Sophia—the only supposedly normal person left in the Nearl household.

Sophia listened patiently, sipping her drink with elegant grace. Finally, she offered the exact words Maria had been dying to hear: “You have indeed been wronged, Maria.”

Maria’s eyes welled up with tears of vindication. I knew it! she thought. Aunt Whislash is the only one who will stand on my side!

Then, Sophia set her glass down and sighed softly. “However… actually, regarding the household registration book, none of them are as qualified to hold onto it as I am. The Doctor is young, after all. Having just woken up from his amnesia, he is still unfamiliar with many of our customs. He needs guidance.”

She paused, a slight, dreamy blush dusting her cheeks. “Also, I checked the nutritional label on that Sumpter Beast milk. The fat content is a bit too high for him. Go tell Margaret they stock a low-fat brand in the commercial district. Buy him that one instead.”

Maria: “…?!”

Her jaw hit the floor.

No way. Has my entire family been bewitched by this guy?!

As she stared at her aunt’s fond expression, a deep and horrifying realization finally crashed down upon Maria Nearl.

Do we all actually have the exact same taste in men?!

[Rhodes’s Note:

Enjoying the operation so far, Doctor?

(This daily grind literally pays the landship’s rent! 🙇‍♂️):

Massive thanks for reading and supporting the operation!]