Chapter 358: Chapter 357.

Chapter 357. Forming a Strategic Alliance. (9/10)

“No good? Why do you think you’re no good? There must be something pretty good about you if you’ve got six girlfriends at once.”

“They all have something wrong with their heads. Their eyes aren’t working properly. Or they’ve just got really poor taste in men.”

“Girls don’t like self-deprecating guys, you’re right that there must be something wrong with their heads. Guys should be cool like my Uncle.”

“Oh, did you have a crush on that Uncle of yours?”

“Mmm… I… probably did. But, he just treated me like a kid all the time.”

“Before... when we first met... you said you killed someone...” Her grip on my hands tightened up which made me hesitate to continue.

“What’s wrong? Afraid to ask me anything more when you remember I’ve killed someone and I’m a murderer?”

“I overheard when the Swastika gang leader showed up-”

“About how I killed Uncle with my own hands?”

“Yeah. What exactly does that mean?”

“It’s exactly what it sounds like. I… with my own two hands… plunged a knife through his neck to end his life.”

She clenched her teeth as a gravely pained expression formed on her face.

“What led up to it?”

“Why do you care?”

“I suppose curiosity got the best of me.”

“Should I kill the cat or skin it alive?”

“I’d rather you did neither of those things.”

She tucked her chin in and lowered her head at a slight angle until her forehead touched the back of my right palm. Whenever she blinked her eyelashes lightly brushed against my right-hand knuckle.

“It happened a bit over a year ago. In my third year of high school, on Valentine’s Day… I was careless one day on my way back home after classes, a war abruptly broke out between Faceless and Swastika. We’d always been at odds with each other, tensions were high, but it had never reached this stage before.”

“Uncle, up until then, had always kept things from crossing that final line. He was smart, wise, and cunning. He was the founder of Faceless. Uncle picked me up off the streets after he found me cradled in my mother’s arms on the side of the street soon after she died of starvation. The others in Faceless, similar to me, were also picked up by Uncle off the streets. They’re a bunch of unwanted and abandoned or orphaned kids like me.”

“To us, Uncle was a father. He raised us. He taught us the skills we needed to survive. He gave us a home. A chance to live a somewhat normal life. A chance to attend school like other kids. We aren’t the smartest bunch though, none of us did particularly well in school. Uncle handled all the complicated stuff that was way over our heads.”

“He taught us how to work on motorcycles and cars. He was a mechanic and he owned this shop. To others, it might look like he was using us for cheap labor, but we don’t think that way at all. Uncle was our savior. It wasn’t all clean business though. He knew he couldn’t support all of us through the normal way though. So… he started a gang and taught us methods of extortion. He never targeted the poor and only ever went after rich people who had more than enough breathing room.”

“What the hell? Is he trying to be Robin Hood or something?”

“Haha, I did ask him that too one time. He just laughed and said he was. ‘There are no heroes who rob from the rich and redistribute the wealth to the poor these days. Since the government is corrupt and won’t do it, I figured I’d take it upon myself.’”

“But… when I was captured and taken as a hostage. Uncle… traded his own life for mine. During the trade, when we met halfway, that bastard went and shot him in the chest right before my eyes, then and there. Everyone was about to lose it and willing to fight to the death, but Uncle stopped everyone and said the war was over and to fall back. That bastard wanted war though. He wanted to see us suffer for his own twisted amusement.”

“He walked up to me from behind, threw a knife onto the ground beside me, and said, ‘The war only ends if I say so. Girl, if you kill your Uncle with your own hands and show me a good sight, only then will I accept such a boring end to this war.’”

“Furious, filled with nothing but hatred, I grabbed the knife ready to turn around and stab him with everything I had, but Uncle grabbed me and prevented me from doing as I wished. By the time I turned around, a gun was already pointed at my head. I’d have died then and there.”

“Between his sporadic breaths, back then, he weakly told me, ‘Lea… please… I’m about to die... anyway. It’s too late... to save me.’”

She was having a hard time recounting his words and constantly pausing. “‘I don’t want... the precious family... I worked so hard for… to all die.’”

“‘Please… do as he says…’”

“‘Kill me… so you can… all live.’ Sorry… for placing… this burden on you. I’d rather die… by your hands… than his… and for only hatred… toward him… be what fuels... the rest… of your lives.’”

“‘I just want… everyone to live happy... honest lives…’” 

“‘... one day.’”

“‘That… was the dream... I had… for all of you kids…’”

“After that… with my hand shaking… I picked up… knife… plunged… it… into his neck… his warm blood… on my hands… I… killed… him…”

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Her grip on my hand was tight to the point it hurt, but I didn’t say anything. Her entire body trembled in her seat out of her control. A river of tears flowed down her cheeks. I could feel each and every one of her teardrops as they landed on the ends of my fingertips. She sniffled and did her best to fight back the desire to wail out at the top of her lungs.

She’d taken up the role of gang leader right after that experience. To keep everyone together the way her Uncle wanted. She was the first person he’d picked up off the streets, and he entrusted the future of everyone he cared about to her. It was pretty heavy. The weight I felt on my hand right now.

Perhaps it was because her soul belonged to me now, but somehow, I felt like I understood her pain. Just a little though.

She raised her head up a bit, biting her lower lip with her gaze still low, she said painfully, “Haha… back then… you know… I never... even had the chance to tell him... those three simple words… ‘I love you.’”

I felt a piercing pain from the back of my left hand. I didn’t make a sound, but my hand still tensed up. 

When I looked down at the back of my left hand there was a second heart. The two points of each heart touched along the vertical axis in line with my middle finger.

“What the hell? Is the phrase you chose ‘I love you?’”

“It… really appeared…”

“Yeah, it did.”

“You’re… really a devil?”

“Yeah.”

“If you’re a devil... can you bring someone back... from beyond the grave?”

“No. Nobody can bring the dead back. Once you’re dead, that’s the end.” I wouldn’t lie to her here to give her some false sense of hope.

“Haha… I figured… that’d be impossible.” She hadn’t stopped crying the entire time.

She released my hands and placed the palms of her hands over her eyes as tears silently continued to flow out. I couldn’t see her lips beneath her face mask, but I’m sure there wasn’t anything close to a smile behind it.

“Just for the record, I don’t offer free hugs in case you want one. I’m not running a charity after all. If you want one, you’re going to have to pay.”

“How much?”

“A $1 should do.”

“How much time do I get?”

“As long as it takes for your tears to stop I guess.”

“Haha… that’s a better deal… than the last person who sold me a hug.”

“Is it?”

“Yeah.”

“Did you want to buy one?”

“I… do. Is it fine… if I pay later?”

“Normally I don’t accept IOUs, but just this once I’ll make an exception.”

“I’ll take one then.”

I was about to stand up and get closer to her, but she jumped out of her seat between my arms and wrapped her arms around my back. Her momentum tipped over the chair I was on and the two of us fell to the ground. I ended up sandwiched between her and the chair.

Her face, buried in my chest, clutching onto my shirt. Her body bent over the edge of the seat at hip level. Her hips were positioned directly between my knees, legs dangling over the edge of the seat. All in all, it was a rather awkward position to be in.

Feeling the wet sensation on my chest, I couldn’t bring it up.

Haaaaah. A dollar was a dollar.

I placed my left hand on her curved back, and my right hand on the back of her head. I brushed my hand through her hair to try and console her.

For the next hour, she let out all the tears she’d kept bottled up from that day. I could do nothing except patiently wait in silence for her to finish. Taking up the role as the gang leader for Faceless all of a sudden taking her Uncle's place, I could only imagine how hard she tried to keep herself together.

Her Uncle didn’t sound like a bad guy despite what crimes he may have committed. It had all been to raise this group of castaways and misfits without anywhere to go, belong, or call home. He gave them that place. They were his pride and joy in life, the people near and dear to his heart who he wanted to protect even at the cost of his own life.

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