About a month later.
A bald fair-skinned girl, Fabby, was carrying a small vegetable basket, and though she looked lean, her stomach was bulging more than usual. And a one-eyed man dressed in uniform was right behind her, full of smiles, as he sang the song he himself had written or so he said. He was tall and sinewy, and he reeked of alcohol.
“Wherever you go
I’m right behind you
Wherever you are
I’m not far from you
What can I do?
My heart is selfish
And it doesn’t want to be alone
So please fulfill this lover’s wish
And hold my hands
And let me walk beside you.”
Soon, Fabby delivered the vegetable basket to the storage room, then quickly reached her room, but when she was about to shut the door, the one-eyed man stopped her.
“How many more times will you shut the door in my face, Fabby?” he sounded a bit desperate. “Let me help you take care of our baby as well.”
“Bittu…” Fabby looked irritated and anxious. “I told you to never follow me in the streets!”
“Ah, that, haha, my bad… What can I do?” he was flirting with his eyebrows while speaking. “You heard my poem, didn’t you?”
“Hmph!” she swallowed her fears and feigned confidence. “If you repeat this, I’d hang myself one day.”
“No!” Bittu backed away. “No, no. Not that, please,” he worriedly pleaded. “Anything but that.” He moved back further. “I’ll keep my distance, so anything but that. Anything but that.” Then he gave a flying kiss and left.
After Bittu was no longer within earshot, Fabby shut the door, and then stood with her back against the door. Tears just wouldn’t stop coming. “Why God? Why are you doing this to me? Just why...” her back slid against the door. She collapsed on her bum and continued to sob so hard that tears clouded her eyes. The swelling pain visibly reflected in her face. “You took my mother from me. I thought I at least had my brother, but you even took him from me. Just why do you hate me so much?”
Being born beautiful was something most people desired, but it had always been the biggest thorn in her life, a curse even. Even though many eyes always look at her, she never felt this alone. Without her brother, she wasn’t sure if she could bear this lonely, heart-wrenching life much longer.
Meanwhile, Bittu was strolling through the streets nonchalantly. He was dressed in a red uniform unlike others. When an old man was passing by without bowing to him, he plucked the old man’s hat and put it on top of his own hat. When the old man begged, he just kicked him down and broke his teeth. One of the dogs tried to express pity for the old man who had occasionally fed her bits and crumbs, and Bittu cruelly beat that dog with a stick.
“You are supposed to bark at and bite the slaves, or stop thieves from entering,” Bittu yelled at the dog. “That’s your job. Understand?” The other dogs that were watching this were growling, but with a wave of his stick, he chased them away.
The other watchers in red uniforms just laughed through Bittu’s affairs.
If one asked the slaves in secret about the behavior of the watchers, they would all reply with one word: vicious.
Bittu joined the other watchers in a small tent, where they usually played cards during hot afternoons. “You look pretty worked up. What’s wrong?” they asked.
“Worked up?” Bittu raised his brows. “Are you talking about beating the old bastard? Our orders were to neither let them die nor let them live. That’s exactly what I’m doing. And I don’t need to be angry to do that.”
“Haha, that’s what makes our job exciting,” the others laughed. “We can take all of our frustration on these slaves.”
When men passed by, they ridiculed them, whereas women got harrassed. They didn’t even let go of the children and forced them to massage their arms and legs while they played cards. What’s more, even though the people were forced to spend their time serving the watchers, that still didn’t deduct any work load from what they had to usually gather per day.
If any slave dared to talk back, then the watchers went so far as to beat them and make them miss meeting their daily workload. This resulted in further severe punishment.
Though hundreds of slaves lived as a community, the watchers lived like kings. Everything from food to clothes, the slaves could only get them from watchers. So licking the watchers’ boots was a common thing for most of the slaves.
The only reason that Edgar still lived after taking one of Bittu’s eyes was because of his sister, Fabby. Even though she didn’t grow hair on her head, everyone in the village would have no problem accepting her as the most beautiful person both outside and inside. Though she didn’t talk with others all that much, the way she treated her crippled brother and how she minded her own business was more than enough to tell she was at least not poison coated with sugar.
Edgar also had a naturally bright smile and the rare shining teeth, but his skin complexion was more close to that of a commoner who had spent so much time under the sun, so naturally, people’s eyes didn’t particularly turn their eyes toward him as much as they turned toward his sister. After all, seeking after distant things was part of human nature. So, naturally, people with fair skin were automatically seen as better people, whether it be in wealth or knowledge. Nevertheless, it didn’t bother Edgar that his sister was getting more attention than him other than that he was worried what harm they would bring to her.
Currently, Bittu was enjoying the company of other watchers, while he drowned himself in cheap rum.
“Haha, Bittu. You really stepped on a fox tail. Otherwise, how would a drunk guy somehow slip into that beauty’s room at night and successfully make her pregnant?”
“Hehe, stop praising me, or I might do it again,” Bittu sniggered.
“Kekeke. But only if you can successfully reach the bed without falling midway,” a blonde guy with a heavy build said.
“What?” Bittu looked at him with a smile. “Say that again, Harley.”
“Haha, sure. But let me put it better through a saying, ‘a drunk’s wife never has to sleep alone.’”
“Pfft! Puhahaha!” everyone, including Bittu, burst out in laughter. But suddenly, Bittu broke the bottle and stabbed it in Harely’s throat.
Everyone fell silent and were in utter shock and disbelief.
“Kuuhh!” Harley’s eyes bulged out as blood poured out of his throat and sprayed on other’s faces. Despite his attempts to cling to life, he fell back, his eyes as broadly open as a dead man’s eyes.
“You want to fuck my bitch!” Bittu started kicking the dead man. “In your dreams, mother fucker!” he pointed his fingers to other watchers. “If I see you guys around her, expect the same fate!” He began beating Harley with his foot. “She’s mine. She’s only mine!”
The other watchers could only frown and dare not to speak. After all, Bittu was the head of the watchers. They could only watch as he kicked Harley for some more time. Only after he left, they breathed a bit better.
“This Bittu is as hot-tempered as ever. He didn’t even think twice before killing Harley. Our lives are probably worth the same to him.”
“If only the master wasn’t on his side, we’d have long killed this bastard and fucked Fabby up.”
“Yeah, I’ve had my eyes on that bald lass since the first day, but I never got the opportunity to fool her like I did other girls just because of her crazy younger brother and this damn Bittu. We all may be vicious, but he, the one-eyed watcher, is the brand name for it.”
“Well, we thought that Fabby’s knife-throwing younger brother would kill Bittu one day, but that prick died somewhere. Now, we can only wait.”
“Yes, we just have to wait. Sooner or later, he’ll commit a bigger mistake. And then, we’ll rule these mountains together.”
“Haha. Right.”
With smiles on their faces, the four watchers cheered their rum bottles over the dead body of Harley.
The sun had set not long ago, but the moon was up already, and the winds turned cold.
In the northern cliffs of Shushui mountain range, a human-sized bat came flying out of the dark foggy valley, and its screams and screeching noises made the rats and rabbits in the mountain tremble in fear as they looked up toward the skies. The bat crazily kept dashing through the skies in a zig-zag fashion, trying to free itself from the odd being that had grabbed its ankle for a long time.
“I’m out!” a voice echoed in heaven.
Related Chapters
WHIT 17 - OVERFAMILIAR VOICE
As the big bat hovered crazily in the sky, the human who was dangling by its feet was clearly struggling. Not only was its speed too much, its flight force was out of his expectations. All he could do was wait for the right opportunity to jump.After some patient yet hurtful waiting, when the bat came close enough to the surface, he let go of the beast. Though he tried to land gracefully, his roll was rather clumsy, and he ended up hitting his head to the nearest boulder.“That hurts…” his whole head felt dizzy.This person standing in his leafy underpants was Edgar. The mysterious copper plate was still stuffed in the back of his underwear.There were cuts and bruises all over his legs, arms, and back, but his face and chest were clean. Though Edgar&r
WHIT 18 - BURN
Bittu’s back slammed against the wall before his body slid and collapsed on the floor. His eyes grew open as wide as they could from the impact, but his sight was still blurry. Blood rushed through his sedated veins, and with every fraction of a second, his sight bettered.The young man in green, Edgar, was walking straight toward him like a beast whose shackles were on the verge of breaking. The peeping heads that were looking in slackened jaws couldn’t recognize him at all, as they couldn’t quite get a full view of his face.However, that wasn’t the case for the one lying on the floor.The moment he regained his sight, Bittu’s eyes grew as wide as they could. “It can’t be…” Time slowed down from the extreme tension he felt upon slowly but surely recognizing th
WHIT 19 - DEAD WEIGHT
Bittu’s future was all set in stone with that one act of gouging the eye. Like a wood tossed in fire, all he could do now was burn.Seeing that pitiful state Bittu was in, Edgar’s anger softened a tad. “Your eye is gone.” He spat out the truth.Those four words crushed all of Bittu’s hopes. “No!” he cried and sobbed. “You’re lying. No!” If he had his eyeball, there was still a slightest chance of him regaining his sight, but without it, he lost that last ray of hope, as transplanting someone else’s eyes would be a lot more harder.“Take it however you want,” Edgar coldly said. “Just as much as I want to kill you, I also want you to suffer. Repent for your sins and change your ways, otherwise, the next time we meet will be your last d
WHIT 20 - TEMPTING WOODS [VOL 02 - OUT AND ABOUT]
Tempting Woods, the name, as per popular belief, was solely given from the slaves’ perspective, for they had always seen the woods as their means to escape. Still and all, the creatures dwelling in those woods weren’t something regular humans could hope to intimidate, let alone defeat. The only hope the slaves had was that they could somehow get through those woods without getting seen. Till date, no one knew if any slave ever made it out of the woods and stepped in the world on the other side.Currently, in the morning, Edgar and Fabby were resting outside a rather small cave tucked away in tall bushes, eating roasted meat of a boar that Edgar had caught and killed.Though Edgar was right next to her, Fabby was feeling tense. After all, there were tall trees around her in the distance. And from high up in the trees, a few monkeys were looking right
WHIT 21 - DAYS IN THE WOODS I
Wee~!! Cree~!! Boo~~!! Six monkeys sat on the side and played the audience role in the fight between Fabby and the leader of the troop. The leader actually played with her in the beginning by making her run around. Then it had her arm in its mouth and bit her hard enough she thought her arm would fall off. And then it got rough with her in many other ways through scratching and kicking. Even though she kept trying, she couldn’t even get an inch closer to the monkey, which always seemed to have heightened senses. And she could see the cockiness the leader exuded, as though suggesting to her that it could eat her alive if only her brother wasn’t around. If anyone were to ever tell her that animals didn’t have a soul inside them, she would surely reject that idea and show them the expression the leader was making. T
WHIT 22 - DAYS IN THE WOODS II
As she looked around at the one-meter odd tall spikes all around her, she was left in awe and disbelief. Was it really her who did that? So many thoughts ran in her mind, but the ends of her mouth ever so subtly rose by themselves.Edgar, on the other hand, was calculating things in his mind. He had to go through hell of a physical training to unlock Drive, but he didn’t want Fabby to experience such tireless practice. So he bet on her absorbing the core would be a better thing to do. As for unlocking the drive, she could slowly get closer to that. Though his Master told him that physical training wasn’t necessary to unlock one’s Drive and that it could also be achieved through severe mental training, Edgar knew where that path would lead. He just didn’t want his sister to put through the mental burden again. The trauma she had gone through all these years was already too much. If t
WHIT 23 - MISSION
In the early morning, loud noises woke Edgar and Fabby out of their sleep. They tracked the source of the voices, and there was a group of three fighting a ten-foot-tall gorilla with an intimidating build. Two of them were dressed in black, and the third in white. “That’s one big gorilla,” Fabby was startled. She could feel her heart picking up speed. “It’s breaking trees with ease.” The monkeys she practiced fighting with were nothing compared to this monster. Even Lice might not last more than a couple of punches. “Yeah, those guys are not bad,” opined Edgar, squinting his eyes as he observed the patterns with which the beast moved, “but the difference in skill is a bit too much.” Both of them were watching from a higher ground, while hiding in the bushes. And a few dozens of feet behind them were t
WHIT 24 - ORSEYA TOWN
Some days later.In the western border of Orseya Town, two guards were resting on their rock benches, guarding the entrance leading into the town. A man was coming from the woods, having killed a deer with a longbow, and the guards took the antlers before letting him pass.On either side of the entrance, a good ten meters away from them, there were dozens of metallic boxes placed in a row. There were grains in those boxes with open doors. And there was water placed in a wide saucer next to the box. Birds came alone or in groups, drank water and then stepped into the boxes for the grains. The doors of the boxes then suddenly shut, trapping the birds inside.“There aren’t many birds visiting this year, other than crows and pigeons,” one of the guards said. “I wonder what’s the reason.&rdq
Latest Chapter
- WHIT
273 - CRAZY BEAUTIFUL GIRL
After bathing in the mud pool created by Elder Gavin, Edgar came down the mountain to bathe in the river, as per his sister’s orders.“My Fuzzy Step has gotten much lighter,” Edgar found himself smiling. “I don’t feel any soreness in the muscles. The pain in the toes and shin is also completely gone.”He felt so refreshed, he jumped off tall, thin boulders that were hundreds of feet apart.And he jumped in the river with full energy.He swam underwater like a fish and shot himself out of the water like a fish and landed on the shore.To his surprise, there was a girl who just covered herself with clothes. Her hair and body was still wet. Her thighs and below were still uncovered.Her skin was so white. He had never seen someone so white before. And her blue eyes were striking.“I-I’m sorry,” Edgar turned the other way. “I didn’t know you were in the river.”“This has never happened to me before,” she uttered in a cold voice.“What never happened?”“Someone disturbing my peaceful bathin
- WHIT
272 - CLOSED BOOK
Edgar woke up, only to find himself in a pool of mud. He could feel that he was being healed by fish that were swimming in the mud and were nibbling at his skin.At first sight, it might look like they were eating him, but they were actually taking away the negative energy from his body, though he was not able to feel that.Edgar tried to grab one of those fishes, but they turned into pure mud, pleasantly surprising him.He looked at Fabby who was sitting in the distance, by the cliff. “What are these fishes, sis?”“Elder Gavin made them with his drive. He said they can suck away impurities from your body and make you stronger,” Fabby explained. “He said even your drive will get smoother and faster afterward. Also, the negative effect the beast cores have on our bodies can also be reversed, or so he said.”“Such a thing is possible with drive?” Edgar was both surprised and doubtful. “These fish are biting me, but I don’t feel any pain.”“Yeah. Just stay there until all those fish are
- WHIT
271 - DAY BY DAY
The eagle brought the siblings to a mountain range and dropped them next to Gavin who was weaving gloves with drive.He wasn’t surprised to see the position the siblings were in.“Here,” Gavin handed the gloves to the eagle, and it put the gloves on its feet and then screeched in happiness.“Haha, you like them, huh,” Gavin smiled. “They are durable as I knit them with my drive. So, don’t lose them.”Scree~!The eagle replied in a confident voice and then began to walk around happily in its new footwear.“They look like gloves, but they should be called socks, I guess?” Gavin wondered. “Ah, well, whatever…”Gavin then looked at the siblings, out of whom only Fabby was still conscious. She was trying to sit up, and it was taking her a while.“You don’t seem to have any external injuries. You are probably tired from using too much energy,” Gavin said. He sent a bullet of energy into her forehead, which didn’t hurt her but went straight into her brain and melted into it. This suddenly ga
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270 - A DIFFERENCE TOO BIG
“Surfing Strike!’ Edgar’s foot viciously struck Ryu’s face and sent him flying high like a rotating paper fan. Any normal person would have had their head separated from their shoulders from that kick, but Ryu’s neck was flexible as well as sturdy as rubber.Ryu grabbed his head and stopped it from spinning before somersaulting and landing in the distance.“Huh?” Fabby was quite shocked by it. “Why is he not dead? Is he even human?”“His body is a bit special, you see,” Anarga smirked and then looked at Ryu. “But, hey, how could you get hit by that brat like that? You should be glad that there isn’t anyone else around, or it would have brought such shame.”Blood leaked from Ryu’s ruptured upper lip. He licked it and faintly smiled. “It’s been a while since I tasted my own blood.” His eyes turned red.“Oh, crap…” Anarga skipped backward. “You guys brought a disaster on yourself. When he goes into that frenzy mode, he’s unstoppable. Even I wouldn’t dare stand next to him because he can
- WHIT
269 - KNIGHT OF NIGHT
Anarga squeezed Edgar’s chest down, but when Edgar saw Ryu step toward his sister, he uttered, “Thunder Knight…”The ground beneath them cracked, and the air around them crackled. The very cliff itself vibrated in resonance with Edgar’s heartbeat.Anarga lost her balance just for a second. A double-edged lightning spear appeared in Edgar’s hand, and he thrust it right through her abdomen.She thought it would leave a hole in her, but it didn’t. However, it then electrocuted her to the point her clothes were half-burnt, and she looked like a semi-roasted grizzly bear.Ryu immediately clawed through the middle section of the spear and then took Anarga and jumped a few feet away. “How could you be so careless?”Anarga fell on one of her knees. Blood leaked from both corners of her mouth, even though she tried not to leak any blood.“Does it hurt that much?” Ryu asked.She gave him a glare.“I see…” Ryu then looked at Edgar, who was rising off the ground without the use of his hands, as th
- WHIT
268 - DRAGON THAT DEVOURS ALL FLAMES
Anarga’s body went into the rock, causing cracks all around her to spread for over thirty feet.Ryu’s feet were still locked by the earthen boots that Fabby had created, but he forcefully broke through them and whipped his leg at Edgar. “Dragon Knock!”“Ngh!” Edgar raised his left arm and blocked the kick with his forearm.Ryu’s foot forced its way through Edgar’s flame drive and struck his forearm and hit a nerve, sending a jolt of shock through to Edgar’s brain. On top of that, Edgar’s forearm got dislocated near the elbow.Ryu’s kick still sent a gust of energy over into the distance, which ended up blasting away a part of the cliff, shocking Fabby and Edgar.Fabby’s heart shook at that moment because if Edgar hadn’t deflected that kick, he wouldn’t have just got his arm dislocated. It was Edgar’s hunter-like instinct of parrying the kick at the last second was what saved him from experiencing a crushing defeat.Ryu didn’t even use drive. Whether he could even use drive or not, Edg
- WHIT
267 - HOTTER THAN FIRE
“Is this the best you can do?” Ryu said disappointedly. “I know you can do better, bald brat.” He treated Edgar as nothing more than a kid because he was much older than him. “Why don’t you show me what you got, or I’ll kill this bald girl.”Edgar, who was bleeding profusely from the chest, felt his soul stirring madly after hearing Ryu’s words.“Don’t listen to him,” Fabby said in a low voice. “We are not their match. Fighting them will only put us at a disadvantage. And there’s no one else here to stop the fight in case things go bad. It doesn’t benefit us in any way no matter how I look at it. Moreover, you are already badly injured.”Fabby’s words made total sense, but there was one thing that she didn’t consider. Edgar just couldn’t digest let alone accept the fact that Anarga Utsav had used her wind attack and pushed Fabby off the cliff. What if Fabby died from that?Edgar utterly disliked Anarga as well as Ryu. He didn’t want them to leave with a sense of victory.“Sis,” Edgar
- WHIT
266 - PERSONAL MISSION
“AHHH!” The siblings cried out in horror, mostly because of the pure shock value. Their eyes sprang out of the sockets. They totally didn’t expect that the eagle would do such a thing.Edgar was about to use his skill, but Fabby quickly said, “No, wait.”“Huh? Wait for what?” Edgar asked her back as winds viciously whipped at their faces.“Just wait,” she replied. As both of them kept getting closer to the ground, Edgar’s heart raced fast. “Screw this. I’m-” he was saying, but then the eagle suddenly came swooping down and caught both of them when they were about 100ft close to the ground and took them away with him.Edgar and Fabby held onto its talons so they wouldn’t fall.The eagle stopped by another mountain top and acted as if everything was okay.“You think I’ll thank you for saving our asses, you shitty bird!” Fabby punched the eagle hard in the face. “I thought I was going to die! You were the cause for scaring me near to death.”Even Edgar looked angry. His heart jumped in
- WHIT
265 - LOVE AND DUTY
Coming back to the present.The eagle had no idea who Edgar was, so Fabby had to do all the work except for flying. “Where is he?”She was worried for many reasons.The eagle even flew over the colosseum grounds, and she shouted for him, “Are you there, Eddie?”“Who’s that?” some masters and disciples wondered as she wasn’t clearly visible from below. “How rude of her to be flying over this place when the competition is still going on?”“He’s not here, either,” Fabby told the eagle to keep flying.As she kept looking around, she noticed someone bathing in an open pond. Just when she looked at him, he also looked up. She remembered his face mask. This was the same guy she met in a cave not long ago.Numo was not wearing a shirt right now, and his body was pristine white. It wasn’t muscular, but it still looked athletic and toned. It was very attractive, especially because he was a tall man.“Ahem,” Fabby looked away.After the eagle flew out of his sight, Numo continued rubbing his body