When the fox-man assassin woke up, he had been placed on a stool and the severed stumps were bandaged. Arthur put a muzzle on the assassin's mouth, allowing him to barely speak while speaking.
Unable to bite my tongue and kill myself.
"Are you awake?" Arthur sat aside and asked, "Now, how should I torture you to make you spit out all the secrets in your stomach?"
"kali'gugalu'mas, va, dahagon'dara..." The fox man murmured a few words in a language that no one could understand.
"What is this?" Arthur asked Bedivere, "The language of the fox tribe?"
"No, this is not a language, this is a spell!" Ryder, the bunnyman on the side, shouted.
The fox-man's body began to glow and swell, and even Arthur knew something was wrong. He instantly thought of a countermeasure, aimed at the fox-man and kicked him hard, kicking the assassin out of the house!
The assassin smashed the glass of the window like a football, flew out of the house, and exploded before flying very far.
The glass fragments that were originally flying outside were picked up by the blast wind and flew into the room again! Torvill, who happened to be sitting near the window, was about to be injured by the fragments! Arthur had no choice but to rush over and block the Leopard.
In front of the young man!
"Woo!" Arthur grunted, and countless broken glass had already penetrated into the parts of his body that were not protected by armor. Especially his left arm, which was covered with glass shards and was bloody.
Tovel looked at the injured Arthur and was stunned.
"Tsk, these fox lunatics, have they even thought of a countermeasure for this situation in advance?!" Arthur suppressed his anger while reaching out to pull out the glass shards on his left arm.
Torvir quietly helped Arthur without saying anything.
"It seems that it is almost impossible to get information from those fox people." Tristan said, "Even if it is hypnosis, it must be done while they are awake. Maybe it is not possible.
They are so strong-willed that they don't even want to use hypnosis."
"We'll find a way," Arthur said.
"No, I don't know what you are talking about!" Ryder, who was hiding under the table and shaking, said, "It's so scary! I'm just here to make a living. If I had known how dangerous your place is, I wouldn't have come even if you killed me!"
"I'm sorry, Ryder." Bedivere said apologetically, "I never thought of putting you in danger... It's up to you to decide whether you want to stay here or not. I won't let you leave."
If you stop me, I can also lend you a sum of money to cover your travel expenses..."
"Are you crazy, you are driving me away now?!" Rabbit said angrily, "Those fox people might have thought that you and I are accomplices, and driving me away now is equivalent to asking me to die!"
Bedivere was stunned for a moment, as if he was deeply stung and speechless.
"I know, you just stay here, your personal safety will be protected by Bedi, is that okay?" Arthur said.
"I still have to do business in the city!? Are you going to put me under house arrest here?"
"It's really troublesome... Just let Bedi be your bodyguard when you go out. Bedi, do you have any objections?"
"No..." Bedivere replied feebly like a deflated balloon, "I was the one who involved Ryder, and I will ensure his personal safety. I'm sorry, Ryder."
Germany."
"Hey, it's okay," Tristan said while dragging the rabbit out from under the table and holding Ryder in his arms, "Your personal safety will be guaranteed by my brother, you little cutie."
"Is the effect of the medicine still lasting?" Bediwell said helplessly.
"It has nothing to do with drugs!" Ryder said while struggling, "His thoughts are deeply ingrained and it will be impossible to correct them within a short period of time."
By this time, the glass on Arthur's arm had been cleaned, although it was still bloody.
Without thinking too much, Tovel leaned over and licked the wound on Arthur's arm with his tongue.
"Wow, what are you doing?!" Arthur said in surprise, especially when he saw Toviel crying while licking, and suddenly felt a strange feeling.
"In the cat people's race, it is very common to lick the wounds of others," Ryder said, "although they will only lick the wounds of their relatives or the people they trust most."
"Really?" Arthur said. Although it felt strange, he still touched Tovir's head. "Weird custom, isn't it?"
After treating the wound, Arthur quickly bandaged it with a bandage. Since the wounds had healed very quickly recently, he didn't pay much attention to it.
On the other hand, Torvill had been staring at Arthur's injured arm all day long.
"If you really care that much, thank him properly." Bedivere leaned over and whispered to Tovel.
Tovel looked at Bedi and said nothing.
At noon, while Bedivere and Tristan were practicing swordsmanship outside the house, Ryder was busy organizing props outside the door, and Arthur was lying in the bedroom recovering from his injuries, Torvill walked over and pulled the corner of Arthur's clothes.
"Huh? What's wrong?" Arthur lazily opened his eyes and looked at the leopard boy.
"...Wash...take a bath, meow." Tovel said with a red face.
"What? It's only noon... Can I wash it for you in the evening?" Arthur said impatiently.
Torvill shook his head, pointed to Arthur's injured arm, and then repeated, "Give Arthur...a bath, meow."
Arthur finally understood. What Torvill meant was that it was inconvenient for the injured Arthur to bathe himself, so he wanted to help Arthur wash it------This kid's idea is really strange.
After a fight in the morning, Arthur, who was covered in the stench of sweat and blood, thought that this was not bad, so he did not refuse.
Torvill rubbed Arthur's back and massaged Arthur's shoulders at the same time. His technique was so skillful that it could be seen that he had been a slave for who knows how many years.
After finishing it, he motioned Arthur to soak in the bathtub. It seemed that he was going to let Arthur soak in the bath while continuing to massage Arthur.
"No need, you should also wash yourself up and come over to the bar together." Arthur said.
Tovel knelt aside and whispered: "I don't have the qualifications..."
"Idiot, wash up quickly and soak in. You don't want me to repeat it a third time," Arthur said.
After a while, Tovel climbed into the bath shyly.
"Looking at you like this, do you have anything to say?" Arthur asked, "Since you have made up your mind to say it, why don't you say it quickly?"
The leopard boy huddled up, as if the heat of the hot water could not drive away the chill on his body. He trembled and whispered: "You all call me Tovir, right? Meow? But I don't have a name, I just
Experimental Subject No. 107 Meow."
Experimental subject?
Arthur waited in silence for Tor'vir to continue his words.
"That's the foxes' plan to strengthen warriors, meow. A baby is selected from each village of the allied clan, brought to their research institute, and injected with special drugs every day to control their growth, meow."
"They did this to create two things: a powerful legion of warriors, and the master key to the wall of the world, meow."
Arthur's heart felt as if it had been hit by a heavy hammer, and he paused for several seconds.
"Shi, the master key to the wall of the world? What you just said is the master key to the wall of the world?" he asked.
The cold chill made the Leopard Man boy shrink into a ball even more. He shivered and whispered, "Yes, it's the [Master Key] Meow. I heard those foxes say that it's not wrong Meow. They need someone with a very strong vitality."
The body can bear all the [key fragments] they have obtained, and let those fragments merge into a complete [master key] in that body. Then you can use this [master key] to open the wall of the world."
"What will happen to the person who becomes the [Master Key]?" Arthur asked again, he had a bad feeling.
"The key fragments are engraved in the body in the form of a spell," Tovel cried, "Just one fragment engraved in the body will cause a great burden on the body. If you put all six key fragments,
If you go in... your internal organs will rupture, your thinking will stop... you will die, nya. No matter how good your physique is, it is just a sacrifice that will die after one use, nya."
"A useless guy like me can't become a good warrior, so I was assigned to the key test team, meow. I watched the children who grew up with me being killed one by one, just to test whether I could get the key."
Put them into the body, meow." Tovel cried excitedly, "They expanded and exploded one by one, and the bodies were scattered everywhere. That scene is really terrible, meow!"
"Okay, okay." Arthur stroked Torvill's head and comforted, "That's it. If you don't want to say it, just stop."
"No...let me finish, Meow." Torvill whispered, "That test only ended after the sixtieth test subject died. I saved one life Meow. But that's not it yet."
Finally, the foxes thought that we couldn’t withstand the power of the key because our insides were too fragile. So, they started to transform our internal organs.”
"Those days were simply days in hell, meow. The body was taken apart and played with at will, making it into tatters, just for them to study how to modify the internal organs, meow." Tovel whispered, "Even now, it can still be done."
Feel that pain, nya..."
"Did they succeed in transforming you?" Arthur asked.
"They didn't transform me," Tovel cried. "I was just an early experimental subject. I was made into tatters and was deemed unsuitable for transformation. I was no longer of use to them, so they just treated me."
Brainwashing me, trying to turn me into an idiot, and then dispose of me like garbage, nya. After that... that's what happens after I become a slave, nya."
"Wait a minute. Did they brainwash you?" Arthur said, "Since they brainwashed you before, why can you still have a normal mind like you do now? As far as I know, the fox-man's brainwashing technique is very rough.
.....＂
"Because they are not washing my [brain]," Tovel said, "They don't know that although they cannot use other orcs' 'madness', I do have a special talent, meow.---
---I can reverse the positions of the internal organs in my body."
Arthur was not particularly surprised. This was not far different from his original imagination, but he did not know that Torvir's brain could be replaced with other organs.
Indeed, this can be regarded as a kind of space magic. If you just temporarily exchange the spaces of two organs in your own body, it is possible. This seemingly useless and extremely risky technique can save lives.
Save Tovir's life and prevent him from turning into an idiot who can't think.
"They disposed of me like rubbish and sold me along with the slaves transported to the Glorious Region. They had no idea that I still had my own consciousness. But just in case, they still placed a trace on me.
Magic cat. Magic will detect my emotions. If my emotions fluctuate abnormally, they will think that I am still potentially dangerous and send killers to eliminate me and the people I have come into contact with."
Arthur looked at the tearful Leopard Man boy: "So, just to save your life, you have been keeping your feelings closed. Even if you become a slave and are abused in all kinds of ways, you are still indifferent?"
Tovel was stunned for a moment, then continued: "No, it's not Meow."
When my body was mutilated by the foxes, I could no longer feel anything.
After that, no matter whether I was cut open for research, whipped, punched or kicked, or hung upside down and used as a punching bag... I just couldn't feel the pain...
." Torvill said that he was crying so much that he couldn't stop crying.
"...I just...can't feel the pain!"
No matter how painful your body is, if your mind is numb, you won't feel anything.
Living, but living like a zombie. A life that is not even allowed to die.
------How unbearable that is.
"Is this the reason why you cried out about pain last night?" Arthur gently stroked Tovill's head and asked, "Can you feel the pain now?"
"Yes, meow." Torvill looked at Arthur, crying and laughing at the same time, "I feel pain, and I know what pain means."
"That's good." Arthur said.
"One more thing, meow." Torvill said, "I think that Chetovia Corvis you are talking about... he may be my father."
"What?!"
"I was taken away when I was born. I shouldn't know about my parents. But I have peeked at the information in the research institute. It is possible that I was not snatched away from the village by foxes, but
Yes...it was my parents who took the initiative to send me to the institute, nya. Because my [Use Rights Transfer Document] has the signature of Cetovia Kovis.
"
Arthur looked at Toviel again without saying a word.
"My father abandoned me like trash, meow. Maybe it was from the moment I realized this that I started to feel nothing, meow."
"I am... a child who was thrown away like garbage from the very beginning, nya. I was always treated like garbage in the research institute, and even when I was sold to the human world as a slave, I was treated as such."
Dispose of me like garbage, meow." Torvill held Arthur's hand tightly and cried, "You are the only one who doesn't treat me like garbage, meow."
Arthur sighed, said nothing, and waited for Torvir to finish crying.
"It's decided." He said as he helped the Leopard Man boy dry himself, "Next time I see that guy Corvis, I will give him a fist for you. If you want me to punch him in the face, I'd rather hit him.
How's your belly?"
"...I'm sorry." After crying, Tovir seemed to be in a much better mood, and he smiled at Arthur.
In fact, Arthur didn't notice that there were several unnatural things in Tovill's lame lies.
However, he could clearly feel that Tovel's crying was real. Without experiencing those tragic things, it would be impossible to have such real crying, nor to have those kinds of sad tears.
Therefore, Arthur would rather believe Tovill than expose him. He would rather not pursue the part of the truth that Toviel concealed.
He just hopes that Tovir will no longer be disturbed by his past.