CAR 11

To Dennis, Vittorio momentarily felt like a butcher. In fact, he looked very skilled. Vittorio poked at the corpse that, until just a moment ago, had been called ‘Laurent’ with the tip of his foot. Kicks that were no different from venting anger followed.

Even after Laurent’s limbs had gone completely limp, he did not stop the assault. Laurent, tumbling on the floor, was a pitiful sight. Without taking his eyes off Laurent’s body, Vittorio asked Dennis.

“Why didn’t you resist?”

Dennis twisted his shoulders and neck to remove the gag from his mouth himself. But talking back to Vittorio might be counterproductive. He even looked somewhat excited as he kicked Laurent’s body. Vittorio’s fine blond hair was stained reddish.

The one who had tried to rape Dennis had been killed right before his eyes. But he wasn’t simply pleased. Such a close punishment. Dennis found himself retching for a long time without realizing it.

Vittorio’s pupils were ghastly as he turned his head to look at Dennis. With the blade he had clearly intended to strike Laurent with, he cut off all the fall-prevention belts. Dennis, finally freed from the belts wrapped around his body and able to control his limbs, exhaled. But his brow furrowed again at Vittorio’s voice.

“You are too clumsy.”

“…”

“Pathetic, ill-mannered, and steeped in cunning, yet naive when it counts… In front of a charging carriage, your whole body freezes.”

“…”

“Things like me, for instance.”

Vittorio wet his thumb with saliva. He leaned his upper body deeply toward Dennis. He rubbed the area under Dennis’s fear-soaked left eye. It was the spot where he had a mole.

As if his mood had soured, he instantly grabbed a fistful of Dennis’s hair. Then, he licked his sweat-drenched face in a long swipe. It felt like a mercy bestowed by a high-ranking beast upon a lesser creature. Dennis could neither push him away nor refuse, and lowered his gaze.

Dennis Kahler was afraid of Vittorio Bonaparte.

“…I don’t think it was necessary to kill him.”

“…”

“This happened to me…”

Vittorio cut him off.

“I call you ‘Teacher’…”

Vittorio pulled Dennis’s face toward him. They were so close their noses could touch. The man, thoroughly drenched in madness, exuded the musty and distinct smell of death.

“And yet that bastard calls you a slut.”

Ah. That was the reason Laurent Remitte’s neck had been broken.

Vittorio opened his mouth and bit Dennis’s nose. Dennis let out a reflexive scream at the strong bite, as if it would crush his nasal bone. Vittorio smiled with the purity of a child and moved away from Dennis. A clear bite mark was imprinted on Dennis’s nose.

“How about we share that, half and half.”

“What…”

“Remitte, I mean.”

Dennis was at a loss for words. The dead were never something to be shared.

“As a token to commemorate the progress between us.”

Dennis reflexively recoiled from him. Every suggestion that flowed from Vittorio’s mouth was unpleasant. The more Dennis became displeased, afraid, and dumbfounded like this, the more Vittorio seemed to feel an even greater pleasure.

“…Why on earth are you doing this?”

The most chilling fact of all was that his harming of Laurent was merely for show. As he kicked Laurent, he was warning him with his whole body. It was a kind of display.

That he could commit this kind of bullshit at any time.

“I haven’t done anything to you yet.”

Vittorio approached Dennis like a beast of prey. A hollow shadow fell over Dennis’s face. It was as if he would spill over at any moment.

“You’re like a little child expectantly hoping I’ll do something.”

“…”

“Your eyes are.”

With those words, Vittorio flipped Dennis over in an instant. When Dennis, his face buried in the pillow, tried to turn his body over with sheer force, Vittorio’s large hand pressed down hard on the nape of his neck.

Vittorio sat on the edge of the bed. The old bed, now having to bear the weight of two people, let out a grotesque sound.

“Good.”

“…”

“I’ll have to test just how far my dear Mr. Kahler will tolerate his student’s stubbornness.”

Vittorio struck the back of Dennis’s head, which kept trying to turn over, with the axe handle. Because it was a wooden handle, his head didn’t burst, but a pain intense enough to make his brain feel like it was falling out followed.

Vittorio, pressing down on Dennis’s head with his elbow, struck his buttocks repeatedly. The friction was strong enough to make his body bend outward. Dennis inadvertently fidgeted with his two legs. Blood rushed to his lower body.

Vittorio reached his hand down below Dennis. Wetting his fingertips with his tongue, Vittorio thrust his fingers in without mercy. Gripped by shame and an unfamiliar foreign sensation, Dennis stiffly raised his head. Vittorio twisted his wrist with a peaceful expression.

“It seems you’re rather unqualified to be called a slut, don’t you think?”

“Ah, ah…”

“I thought dirty water would be flowing from your asshole… My expectations were for naught.”

He whispered to Dennis and readjusted his position. As his long fingers all pulled out, Dennis finally gasped for the breath he had been holding. But it only sounded like an inadvertent moan. Dennis tensed his toes.

“It’s going to hurt a little.”

It was a cliché threat. Dennis squeezed his eyes shut. He desperately wanted this moment to be over. Vittorio, who had been crushing Dennis’s entire body, got up. Soon, he was pressing down on Dennis’s back with his knee.

Forced to lift his lower body by him, Dennis retched. Looking at the blood and sweat flowing down his thighs, Vittorio smiled once more.

“Ah…”

“…”

“Ah, ah… Aaargh!”

Dennis felt like he was going to faint. The pain was something he had never felt before in his life, and he almost bit his tongue.

He wanted to twist his body, but the knee pressing down on his back was unyielding. Something extremely uncomfortable, unpleasant, and even hard pierced Dennis’s rear. A rough tool was rummaging inside him.

Dennis’s cheeks grew damp. His face, smeared with blood and snot, crumpled endlessly. It was a relief that he could at least hide his face in the pillow. Whenever he flailed strongly, Vittorio would strike his buttocks.

What was shoved into Dennis’s rear was the axe handle. The very thing Vittorio had been holding in his hand the whole time. A wooden, hand-worn, very hard handle.

Every time Dennis exhaled, it trembled slightly. The wooden handle, stuck between his legs like a huge phallus, was truly overwhelming and painful. He was on the verge of passing out.

Vittorio’s straight hand casually kneaded Dennis’s groin. Soon, as Dennis’s tearful moans subsided, he grasped the other end of the handle and twisted the axe to make it lodge deeper into the still-tight place.

“It hurts, I said it hurts, it hurts, you, son of a…!”

A single drop of blood trickled down the axe handle. Vittorio grabbed Dennis by the hair. His small face taking in the unfamiliar pain, panting as if he would collapse from exhaustion at any moment… Looking down at his face, Vittorio became erect.

Vittorio’s lips touched Dennis’s forehead and pulled away. Dennis’s eyes were rolled halfway back. He would sometimes twist his body to somehow remove the handle stuck in his asshole.

Vittorio, who had been admiring the lovely Dennis, called to him softly. Teacher.

“When you go to your room…”

“…”

“A gift will be waiting for you.”

Dennis had no memory of how he had left the nurse’s office. Even after the handle was completely pulled out from inside him, he convulsed for a while, clutching the sheets in shame and humiliation.

Vittorio rummaged through the shelves as naturally as if the nurse’s office were his own property. He then indifferently sprinkled the liquid he picked up over Dennis’s body. The distilled water from the bottle soaked Dennis’s back and buttocks.

His whole body felt cold and at times stung. Until it even soaked the crown of his head, Dennis was still trembling.

Dennis stared blankly at the steel axe, which, having served a purpose other than its intended one, had been carelessly tossed on the floor. He lost himself in the fantasy of picking it up and striking Vittorio’s neck. Into the vision of Dennis, who was steeped in such delusions, Vittorio’s blond hair suddenly appeared.

The hallway was quiet.

The entire kidnapping and murder felt distant, as if it had all been a dream. His thighs throbbed, so Dennis would occasionally stand vacant, holding onto the wall.

In the midst of a cruel act he could report to no one, Dennis’s body lay strewn. This place was an unknown and remote land, beyond the reach of Quercy’s influence. Dennis had no backing, and his opponent was the king’s maternal cousin, the ‘prince’ revered by everyone in Volle.

It was then that Dennis threw up on the hallway floor. He sensed a presence from across the way. He hid himself around the corner.

“…So what about that Remitte bastard?”

“He’s obviously in the nurse’s office. What a dirty fucking homo… As if Yan Richter would even bother with someone like that.”

The place they were heading was the nurse’s office. Dennis sucked in a breath. He hastily checked his shirt to see if he had lost a button there. Expressing his condolences for the scene they would inevitably face, Dennis hurried his heavy legs.

The first gift Dennis remembered was a model of a galleon.

It had been hand-carved by his father. The next year, it was a hefty pouch of gold coins. But for a while, he couldn’t receive anything. It was only after a very long time that he received and wore a few suits that fit his height from Quercy.

Dennis carefully opened his door. Dennis’s room, with its high ceiling and narrow width, showed no signs of anyone having entered or left. He checked inside the bathroom first, but it was the same.