Chapter 109

The barrier surrounding the village disappeared.

It was thanks to the human man who had promised to help me, pulling out the guardian post.

The human man said:

“Popo. Keep your promise not to attack the people.”

If the promise wasn’t kept, he warned that he would pull out my spine just like the guardian post he had just removed.

But there was no need to worry.

I had made a promise and a vow with my daughter.

No matter what, I would never harm a human.

[Po. Po. Po. Po.]

I nodded in response.

Then, I hurried into the village to find my daughter.

“Eek! Run away!”

The villagers, terrified, ran away.

I had no time to worry about them.

Finding my daughter as quickly as possible was the priority.

With an anxious heart, I wandered around the village, looking around.

[Po. Po…]

I faintly sensed my daughter’s soul near a wall with a mural.

The closer I got to the wall, the stronger the sense of her soul became.

When I finally reached it, I was certain that my beloved daughter was trapped inside the wall, suffering.

[Po. Po…]

I swung my arm toward the wall.

*Crash!*

The wall collapsed, revealing a chunk of flesh trapped inside.

I carefully picked up the chunk of flesh.

[…]

It was brutally mutilated.

Cold, with no warmth left.

It was my beloved daughter.

***

In the past, I was like other yokai.

I ate humans.

I lived a life pursuing strength.

It was the natural way of life for yokai.

If I didn’t eat souls to grow stronger, I would be left behind among yokai. I could be eaten by yokai who preyed on their own kind, or killed by exorcists who hunted yokai.

In other words, eating souls was a survival instinct.

At first, my daughter was just food to me.

I had picked up a newborn baby, intending to raise her and then eat her.

But I couldn’t eat her.

The longer I spent with my daughter, the more I began to feel emotions I had never experienced before.

Paternal love.

Sadness.

Happiness.

And so on…

My daughter gifted me countless emotions.

And as those emotions filled my heart, I began to question the life I had lived until then.

Of course, I still ate other humans.

Even if I didn’t eat my daughter, I thought I had to grow stronger to protect her.

Then, when my daughter was about five years old, she caught me eating a human in a moment of carelessness.

I was afraid.

Would she find me disgusting?

Would she be disappointed and run away?

My expectations were all wrong.

She quietly approached me, trembling with anxiety, and hugged me tightly.

For the first time, she called me “Papa,” and with tears in her eyes, she told me not to do bad things.

I hugged her gently too.

Feeling her warmth, an indescribable emotion welled up inside me.

That day.

I made a promise to my daughter.

I would not eat humans.

I would not harm humans.

I would not disappoint her and would become a father she could be proud of.

So, I couldn’t kill the villagers.

[Po… Po… Po…]

I held my daughter’s body close, swallowing my hatred and suppressing my anger.

But I couldn’t hide my sadness.

Tears streamed down my face like a waterfall, soaking it completely.

[Po…]

Perhaps this was retribution.

Maybe this was the punishment for killing and eating innocent humans.

My resentment toward humans disappeared.

Only self-hatred and guilt remained, weighing heavily on my chest.

***

[Gyeongsaeng Guburi]—Is that really a corpse…?

[Handsome Licker]—Crazy.

[Reverse Rape Mania]—What the…

[Drifting AI]—I’ll say it. Punish them immediately.

The eight-foot monster was holding the corpse, weeping bitterly.

It seemed the little girl was the monster’s daughter.

[…]

I turned around to observe the villagers’ reactions.

No one looked surprised.

They didn’t seem flustered.

They just looked anxious, as if their crime had been exposed.

“Judging by their reactions, they’re all accomplices.”

[Yoho]—Locking someone in a wall… Are they insane?

[Min Ji]—What kind of bastards are they? I’m so angry my hands are shaking.

[Maehwa Tree]—Looking closely at the corpse, it looks exactly like the mural on the wall.

[Big Girl]—It seems like the mural was modeled after the corpse…

[Qkrnfl892]—Creepy. Are they psychopaths?

[Gyeongsaeng Guburi]—I really want to kill those bastards. Is that something humans should do?

Some villagers tried to escape the village.

Of course, they were stopped by the stone grandfather figures.

In the end, the only path they chose was to hide in their homes.

“…Do they think hiding in their homes will solve the situation? Idiots.”

[Balloon Gum Collector]—Se-hoon. Let’s chase them down and kill them all.

[Maid]—They’re bad humans!

[Drifting AI]—I’m telling you, punish them immediately.

[Handsome Licker]—Kill them? We should report them to the police. Are you trying to make Se-hoon a murderer too? Think about it.

[Meng Yao]—The kids’ concept is ruined. Is this your first time seeing murder? Anyway, I’ll take care of the evidence, so feel free to kill them.

I turned my gaze back to the eight-foot monster.

I gently placed my hand on his shoulder.

“Popo.”

I decided to refrain from giving half-hearted comfort.

While I could empathize with the monster’s sadness, a few words of comfort wouldn’t change anything.

My clumsy comfort might even make things worse.

So instead of comforting him, I decided to give him a chance for revenge.

“If you say you want to kill the villagers now, I’ll turn a blind eye.”

[Po…]

The eight-foot monster wiped his tears with the back of his hand.

Then, he weakly shook his head.

It seemed he had no desire for revenge against the villagers.

[I’ll just go back. Po… Thank you for helping me. Po…]

[Meng Yao]—What? He can talk?

[Gyeongsaeng Guburi]—Is that important right now, you bitch?

[Gyeongsaeng Guburi]—Se-hoon. Report those bastards and make them eat prison food, damn it!

It seemed he could speak human language.

Well, that wasn’t important right now.

“Popo. Are you really going to leave like this? Without taking revenge?”

[Po… I won’t kill humans… I promised my daughter…]

The eight-foot monster said this while still looking at his daughter with sorrowful eyes.

It seemed he didn’t even have the strength to stand up.

‘I can’t kill them for him… Should I just report them to the police? But that feels a bit unsatisfying.’

As I was thinking this, the stone grandfather figure guarding the village entrance hopped over to us.

He looked intently at the eight-foot monster’s daughter and said:

[Her soul remains. I can revive her, Le Bang.]

[Po…?]

[I can’t revive her as a human. But I can make her a yokai, Le Bang.]

[Qkrnfl892]—??? Is that possible?

[Maehwa Tree]—High-ranking yokai can do it.

[Min Ji]—Revive a dead person? If you can do that, aren’t you a god, not a yokai?

[Maehwa Tree]—It’s about gathering the soul and turning it into a yokai.

[Se-hoon Defense Team]—Like a necromancer.

Honestly, I didn’t believe it either.

Reviving a dead person? Even for a high-ranking yokai, it seemed impossible.

‘But Maehwa, the exorcist, said it was possible, so there’s no reason to doubt.’

Even if it were possible, there was a problem.

The eight-foot monster’s daughter would become a yokai, not a human.

“What will you do, Popo?”

[…Po.]

As expected.

The eight-foot monster couldn’t give an immediate answer.

Even though he was a yokai.

Turning his daughter, who was once human, into a yokai would be a difficult decision.

As the eight-foot monster hesitated, lost in thought…

[Gyeongsaeng Guburi]—Se-hoon. Let’s report them first.

[Se-hoon Defense Team]—No, don’t report them. I’ll handle those bastards myself.

[Yoho]—How?

[Se-hoon Defense Team]—I’ve arrived.

[Big Girl]—?

“Se-hoon!”

I saw two women walking toward the village entrance.

A red-haired woman waving her hand and calling my name.

She was the Se-hoon Defense Team.

“What’s she doing here?”

[Drifting AI]—I’ll say it. She crossed through a portal.

[Handsome Licker]—What?

And next to the Defense Team.

A woman with a rather unique appearance was walking alongside her.

Skin as red as if stained with blood.

Eight horns sprouting from her head.

Three pairs of wings flapping behind her back.

Six massive breasts.

She didn’t look human at all.

“As my master said, this village is indeed filled with sinners of murder… There’s also one sinner of violence…”

She looked like a demon straight out of hell.

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