Vicious Darling

Chapter 3. Diamond Dust

[12]

His head was foggy.

It was hard to tell if it was due to the constant sound of helicopter propellers or because he had been starving until he was dragged out of the basement.

‘The wind is cold.’

“Damn winter continent. It chills me to the bone every time I come here.”

One of the soldiers surrounding him muttered.

‘Have we already crossed the sea?’

Yuri’s sense of time had been somewhat distorted since his confinement.

“Such a pretty thing, what a waste.”

One of the soldiers surrounding him said, peering at Yuri’s face.

“A Guide, they say? But it looks like he’ll be thrown as food for monsters before we can even use him properly.”

The soldier’s eyes gleamed with baseness, but he was visibly tense.

He was so scared that he needed to find comfort in the fear of the forcibly dragged sacrifice.

‘What are they so afraid of?’

Yuri maintained an expressionless face.

Their leader struck one of his subordinates on the head with the butt of his rifle.

“Shut up.”

“I’m sorry.”

The one who apologized quickly seemed accustomed to violence.

Yuri closed his eyes.

It wasn’t difficult to guess that he was being dragged to what would now become his grave.

However, Yuri wasn’t afraid of death.

What he feared was not being able to take revenge on his godfather, the cursed Rosenhauser.

‘I should have killed him.’

Yuri recalled the events that had occurred before he was moved to this winter land.

His father had been murdered. His mother was dead too.

The murder case was closed without finding the culprit, and all that was left for Yuri was his godfather, Rosenhauser.

Only Yuri suspected the man of integrity who had been a long-time friend of his parents and had established the Esper Union with them.

Due to strict restrictions on going out and homeschooling, the only human Yuri could meet was his godfather. All the servants who had been taking care of the mansion since his childhood were fired.

“This is all to protect you, the Guide.”

The touch of hands on his shoulders and the breath on his nape made him shudder.

As Yuri grew older, he dug into the deaths of his father and mother.

Yuri, who had found decisive evidence that his godfather was the culprit, was caught just before he could expose it.

“What a truly bad child.”

Rosenhauser tried to use his godson like a breeding horse. However, this plan fell through when Yuri attempted self-harm.

Soon after being dragged out of the basement, Yuri realized that he had been given a new purpose.

He was being used as bait to capture a rampaging Esper.

‘Quite a brutal way to tame one’s only godson.’

With his eyes covered and body bound, Yuri was dragged somewhere.

He could vaguely guess that he was being transported by helicopter due to the noisy wind sound.

Amidst the loud propeller noise of the helicopter, he could hear a voice shouting the distance to the destination.

“Honey trap within 10 miles… falling back…”

Rosenhauser ordered them to get closer over the radio.

The leader of the soldiers expressed reluctance, saying they would be swept into the rampage’s influence zone if they did.

Rosenhauser eventually pushed through with his opinion.

The faces of the soldiers, who ended up throwing the ‘honey trap’ within 5 miles of the target, were terrible. Even though they were covered with masks, the downcast atmosphere revealed the disappointment they must have been feeling.

But Yuri didn’t sympathize with Rosenhauser’s subordinates.

These were people who were trying to throw him in front of a rampaging Esper, knowing full well that he was a minor and a Guide.

Who would pity whom when about to become a living sacrifice?

As they approached their destination, it was quiet except for the sound of the propellers.

Such a noisy silence.

Yuri was transferred to a ladder while still tied up.

The soldier carrying Yuri down like a package shouted into the radio.

“Target approaching! Target approaching!”

It was a voice gripped by fear.

Creak- Squeak, Squeak!

Yuri fell onto the poorly piled snow.

Crunch, Crack.

At the eerily loud sound, Yuri hastily raised his head.

The helicopter he had been riding in was now crumpled like play dough and flying far away.

The atmosphere changed suddenly.

Even now, it was difficult to explain what that sensation was like.

The wind that had been endlessly blowing and scratching his cheeks stopped.

The snow rises up to the sky. As if returning to where it came from.

He was unknowingly overwhelmed by this phenomenon impossible under the laws of this world.

Yuri looked around for the Esper who had wielded this power.

And Yuri witnessed a man who had suddenly appeared in the middle of the snow field.

The one who appeared suddenly as the wind stopped was a young man, seemingly around Yuri’s age.

Wearing a white gown that looked like something one would wear in a laboratory, he was strangely inhuman.

Like an ancient relic statue that now only exists in records.

‘Is this the beast that godfather is so desperate to capture?’

And the creature was looking at Yuri.

“…Esper?”

Yuri muttered unknowingly and then closed his mouth.

But it was already too late.

Blue eyes like well-tempered ice turned towards Yuri.

Eyes that showed no sign of reason indicated that he was in a rampaging state.

Yuri, who had been calmly observing the whole process, could easily guess his fate.

‘To be the prey of a beast in human form.’

A bitter laugh escaped involuntarily.

It was already too late to run away.

The entire range where those eyes could make snow rise to the sky must be within that man’s ability.

The one who seemed about to come this way had stopped right in front of Yuri in an instant.

Platinum blonde hair that seemed almost white, surrounded by the snowy landscape, sparkled.

The inorganic feeling he had felt from afar remained the same.

However, eyes holding a dull light like unpolished lapis lazuli were strangely fixed only on Yuri.

The Esper’s face was expressionless.

He seemed unaffected even though he had just crushed a helicopter full of soldiers.

A face that seemed to be just doing what needed to be done, without curiosity or cruelty.

He wanted to run away. He had to escape. His instincts screamed so.

Isn’t the fate of a Guide thrown before an insane Esper already decided?

But cold reason whispered. That he could never escape.

Because the other was an Esper, and he was just a Guide.

Even if he escaped from here, what then?

‘I’d have to live my whole life avoiding Rosenhauser’s grasp.’

The pathetic excuse of the man he had considered his godfather echoed in his mind.

“It’s all for your sake.”

What bullshit.

Even now, if he submitted, he could at least save his life. Rosenhauser had attached a pager to his body for this purpose.

However, Yuri knew well that for the rest of his life, he would be used to produce Guides as Rosenhauser’s breeding horse. If he refused this, he would become Rosenhauser’s plaything.

Hadn’t his disgustingly repulsive godfather whispered it personally into his ear?

‘I’ll die either way.’

It felt like invisible iron bars were closing in from all sides.

‘How, how should I…’

How could he escape from this snow-covered ruin with nothing left but his eyes, away from the beast chasing him?

And after that?

Rosenhauser would be waiting.

Even if he was lucky enough to catch them off guard, what then?

No matter how much he ran and ran, Yuri’s reality would be right behind him.

Just like that Esper.

As he turned his head, he saw the platinum-haired man who seemed to shine even in this darkness.

Despite running so far, he was close enough to reach with just a few steps.

The platinum-haired Esper, standing barefoot on the thickly piled snow, was looking at Yuri.

Yuri deliberately didn’t look down at the ground. There were humans thrown about at bizarre angles.

The fallen utility poles on either side of the Esper caught his eye. The lights that once illuminated this street were now crumpled as if a giant had squeezed them.

‘Probably telekinesis.’

Seeing how everything around was completely squeezed and twisted, it’s no ordinary power. Maybe he’s even one of the rare S-class among Espers.

His arm reached out towards Yuri. Even before his wrist was grabbed, an unimaginable pressure crushed his body. Yuri felt his arm being smashed.

It felt like his bones would break if he moved even slightly wrong.

But it was already too late to run away. That beast was staring at him with thoroughly enchanted eyes.

‘If I can’t escape no matter how much I run, then…’

Yuri didn’t back away, but rather leaned his body forward.

With eyes full of pain, he whispered towards the one yearning for the only salvation.

“You’re the same as me.”

Just a piece on Rosenhauser’s chessboard.

“Aren’t you?”

He asked as if to confirm, but the blonde beast only faced him with empty eyes.

Looking into eyes that had lost all reason and were left with only instinct, Yuri reached out his hand.

Offering his bare skin, Yuri gritted his teeth. The very act of touching an Esper made his skin crawl.

But.

But if he could live to take revenge, he could endure this much.

If the gamble failed, Yuri would be torn to shreds by those hands.

Deplorably, all he had to rely on was the nonsense his godfather Rosenhauser habitually muttered.

“Espers have no choice but to obey the commands of a Guide. It’s truly an unreasonable thing.”

Yuri desperately hoped that the thirst that must have become a habit until that Esper reached the point of rampage would serve as reins.

The one who had been pursuing Yuri broke the handcuffs binding his wrists and pressed his face against him, whimpering.

Yuri slowly lowered his bloodshot eyes from tension and looked down at the blonde man intoxicated with ecstasy as he commanded.

A single tear that rolled down his cheek quickly froze. It fell, shining brilliantly like a diamond, almost like a shard of a mirror.

“Take me… out of here.”

Between gasping breaths, he gave his first order.

The golden beast that had been rampaging without knowing what reins were bowed its head for the first time.

It was the moment Chris Danil, his dog, was born.