Chapter 20

"…What are you doing?"

"F-Forgive me!"

Mink comes inside and grabs the jumbled man by the collar.

"Eeek! I'm sorry, I'm sorry!"

"Get your ass over here."

"Eh? Ow…!" Mink grabs me by the arm and drags me off of the bed. Mink drags me and the man out of the room. The rest of the members in the hallway are all staring at us.

We go through an open door at the end of the hallway, and enter the room I was taken to the first time.

Even more members followed us in, adding to the ones already in the room, and it went dead silent inside.

"!" Mink violently thrashes my arm away, grabs the guy by the neck and throws him down to the ground.

"! Mi-Mink-san, forgive me- forgive me…!" The man, his face completely pale, looks up to Mink and then falls back on his butt and crawls away.

"Is it time for his punishment?" A man with short light green hair says.

"Guess so. But what'd he do?" A man with tan skin asked.

"Who knows? Must've been something really bad. Mink-san is pissed."

"And that one over there, isn't that girl he brought gonna get it too?"

"Don't think so."

The surrounding men sit on the floor and stare at us while whispering amongst themselves.

Punishment…?

That can't mean anything good.

"Eek! Forgive me, please have mercy!" Mink stares at the begging man, emotionless. He then grabs him by the collar without a word. "Ugh!"

I can hear the sound of each bone breaking one by one, and the mans' face is effortlessly crushed. The man begins to shake, eyes wide open, and convulses violently. A puddle of blood pools around his mouth, and little clumps of white, like rice, guzzle out.

His teeth were all broken.

With just one attack, he was knocked unconscious. I was struck, unable to speak. Soon all of the surrounding spectators' eyes were on me. Not the man Mink just broke, but me. All of them have broad grins on their faces.

…This gives me an awful feeling.

They're not saying that I'm next, right?

Me being raped or beaten to a pulp isn't funny…!

"…Nng…" As if to deliver the final blow, my head starts to hurt immensely.

…Shit! I don't have my bag or my pills, and I'll be caught if I even try to run away in this situation…

…This is the worst case scenario.

Mink takes one step forward towards me.

"Don't fuck with me…Go away!" I try to fall back, but Mink takes long strides and closes the distance. The pool of blood around the man reflects in my eyes. I don't want to become like that…I tense up right away.

…But.

"…?"

"You over here."

Instead of the impact I was bracing for, Mink grabs my arm and begins to walk out. We head towards the door we came through earlier.

"…She's not getting punished? Are you serious?"

"Ha? Why? Wasn't that girl our target?"

"What the fuck…she looked like such a good one to do, too."

As we pass by, Mink yells at the members to move out of the way. He took me to the room where people receive 'Punishment', so of course they thought I was next.

I thought so too.

Everyone around us is talking, and Mink can hear them, but he doesn't make any responses.

What is it now…?

I get a very bad feeling as Mink pulls me out of the room.

Mink faces me outside the room where I woke up just a while ago.

"Let me go…!"

He enters the room and I shake my hands around to try to loosen his grip. He lets go of me and sits on the bed. I look into his eyes, unable to figure out what he's thinking. I feel intimidated for a second, but I return his gaze with a scowl. He's the type of guy who could change in an instant and start hitting you all of a sudden. That's him.

I felt like I was investigating my overly calm opponent. What he's thinking, what kind of person he is…I'm searching for that in him. Just like prey looking into the eyes of the predator. That's why I can't show any weakness to him. That's what I thought.

"…What's your goal here? Why did you take me here? Where's Granny?" I demanded.

"…"

"Why did you beat him down back there? Wasn't he just following the orders from you to attack me in the first place? Why?"

"He was different. I said no one could enter that room. That was his punishment for disobeying."

"Different…" I said before glaring at him "It doesn't make a difference to me. What are you going to do with me? Do you want to see me raped?"

"…Your most prominent trait is a lack of self-awareness." He said.

"…Huh?"

"I'll only say this one more time. I didn't beat that guy because he went in the room. It was because he did it without asking permission. He was seduced by your voice."

"…My voice?" I want to say that he didn't even know what he was talking about, but instead I swallow my words. That man had some clear attachment to my voice.

…But why does Mink know?

"I wondered why he would dare to disobey my orders in the first place. I don't allow that. Those are the rules here."

"…" The more this conversation goes on, the less I understand. "Why do you know…about how my voice sounds?"

"…"

"Answer me. Tell me what happened to Granny."

"I don't know. You were my primary objective." He said.

"Wha…?"

His primary objective?

Then what about her?

My vision blanks out and Minks pulls something from his breast pocket and waves it around. "It's this."

"!" In Mink's hand is my medicine. I immediately reach out for it, but he quickly pulls away. "Give it!"

"Answer my question."

"It's just medicine for my headaches!"

"Seems like you're not the kind of girl who gives convincing answers."

"Granny is a pharmacist…And I don't know anything else." I told him with a glare.

"You're just like a junkie."

"Huh…?"

Mink puts it back in his breast pocket and stands up from the bed. He opens the door, and in the hallway there are people talking. Two men come into the room shortly after. They're dragging something along, and they drop it off in the room.

…They dropped off a person.

They're two men dressed in black clothes, face down on the floor. I take a better look at them, and can tell that they're faintly breathing.

"Look at their necks." Mink instructed me.

Necks…?

I examine the necks of the two men writhing on the floor. "!" It's Morphine's tag art…

And even…Their previous tags have been painted out?

A different pattern barely shows through.

This is…

This must be my imagination.

"Dry Juice…" One of the men rolls over on his side and I can see his face.

…I know him.

This guy's from Dry Juice.

"It seems they came to your house before we did. Everyone else was already gone and these were the only two left." Mink said "So now you know. We have nothing to do with your grandmother."

"But she's…"

"I don't know. We're tracking down the other members right now."

"Really? Then…"

"Before that, we need to come to an agreement here. I already told you earlier that you were my objective."

"…"

"I took you here because I needed to be sure about something. I had the general gist of it. You're going to do whatever I tell you to do. Once you agree, I'll help you with this stupid-ass job."

"My job…?"

"I'm saying I'll help you search for your grandmother."

"!" I find it hard to believe that he actually said that. He might've just set this whole thing up. He made me go through something awful: there's no way I could believe this.

But even if he was lying, there's no explanation why Morphine…why this happened to Dry Juice.

Why the tag art was painted over…

There's no way he could've conjured that up in such a short time.

"If you don't believe me then you can go search for her by yourself. Go ahead."

"…" It's frustrating, but I can't think of any way to find her by myself. And if her disappearance had to do with Morphine, I'd just be grasping at straws. "You said that I'm what you want, but why?"

"There's no reason to tell you now. Just hurry up and decide if you'll accept my conditions."

I don't want to have to do whatever he says. But… "…"

"…Tch." I hesitate and Mink takes advantage of it by grabbing me by the collar. "Don't waste your time sitting around like a useless piece of shit. Are you okay with whatever happens to your grandmother?"

"…I'm…not."

"Then cough up an answer. Don't take fucking forever."

"...Aug…"

"We're leaving soon. Get ready."

Mink shoves me back and then throws the case of medicine for my headaches. I pick it up from the ground, still shaken.