8 Carved up Empathy

The moment they entered the cavern, Xahi felt like a lamb to be slaughtered. All types of equipment littered the cavern. Slabs of meat hanging in on a rope line, various machetes lined on a stand, and a huge saw with teeth bigger than a shark's stuck in a massive skullbone. Many kinds of meat processing equipment were installed and scattered around the cavern. The huge space barely lit with flambeaus hanging from the walls gave a vibe of an illegal meat factory. It had been the reason she had refound her voice despite the exhaustion, to beg again for her life.

"Please! Leave me alone." The girl's wails entered both of the humans' ears once again. Emotionally hurting one and pleasing the other.

She was yelling in a different tongue than Trino's own, yet her misery transcended the language barrier as he could feel his stomach churning at her screams. Trino was rapidly lost his composure and turned angry with helplessness.

At that point, both Trino and Xahi's thoughts were in sync, as both of them wanted nothing but Hugo to die, disappear, or to be killed, yet were helpless to actually do anything.

Hugo threw her down like a ragged doll and pulled a long rope lying on a table beside him. The stench of rotten meat assaulted her nose when she hit one of the table's feet, overwhelming and confusing her.

"Now, it will be over in just half an hour if you cooperate," Hugo said while stepping on one of her feet when she regained her balance and tried to crawl away.

"Ahh…" She shrieked, and it sent a shiver down Trino's spine.

"Mo…sft...op.." Yelling, he flinched at the horrific sight. The gagging cloth distorted his pleas. There was no relation between them, but Trino was a soft-hearted person, not to mention the brutal scene in front, which could melt any human with empathy. Unless they were a psychopath like Hugo.

For a moment, screams filled the cavern as Hugo assaulted the teenage girl while she was struggling to not be tied by the rope. Once he roped her wrist together, he released her. Immediately, she stood up and started running towards the tunnel.

Hugo did not bother chasing after her. He threw the other end of the rope over a pole installed horizontally along with the ceiling. Holding the rope from the other side, and he spoke in a language that was out of Trino's comprehension, "Run! Let's see how far you can go."

Xahi had already run 5m away from him towards the tunnel. When she was about to reach the exit, Hugo pulled the rope so hard that she got swept away by it. Her intensity of the crash on the ground was such that her scream seemed like a hiccup.

"Ahh…" The long continuous wailful scream turned Trino pale.

Hugo was pulling the rope through the pole using it as a pulley. While being dragged and experiencing the jerk-phenomenon, Xahi couldn't even scream properly.

"Shof… Stofph...Flease...Stopp." Trino filled her part for the lack of pleas, stressing his brain to its limit and forcing the system to solicit a series of severe notifications.

[Alert: You are experiencing a panic attack.]

[Warning: It's not feasible for instance 2158989233's mental health to forcibly log out in this scenario.]

[Altering mental stability under protocol: Players' Security XS7911.]

[Temporarily providing +200 composure stat with a mitigation rate of -2 composure stats per/second.]

The system rang in his ears and flashed red in his eyes, but he didn't give a damn to the bitchy thing's apathetic measures and ignored whatever was being shown. The sudden mixture of composure caused a whirlpool in his emotions. Despair, empathy, pity, sympathy, compassion, anger, and hate got all lumped together, intensifying the darker one; anger. Trino really wanted to murder Hugo now, if only his hands were released. He didn't have any relationship with the girl, but the monster went too far and it carved empathy in him for her. There was no way in hell he would leave such that monster alive. If given a choice, he would even kill Hugo when he was young.

Yet they say: One should put emotions on the backseat to be in control. The system's measures were to stabilize Trino's mental health, not to interfere in the scenario. He was given no strength to break free. Not even to talk about the power it would take to save the girl from the human. So the overall effect of the system's meddling had put him back to step 0. Trino was now screaming in rage instead of despair.

"Lib.. Har… anone.."

His eyes turned bloodshot while he almost dislocated his wrist from the struggle to escape free.

As if to mock his helplessness Hugo spoke to him, "Why are you yelling like crazy? I am not going to kill her, nor would I do anything immoral to her."

Then he looked towards the object of focus. Xahi. She was hanging in the air, the rope stretching her hands straight up and feets only an inch away from the ground. Her face had become paler than it was before. She was a fragile existence at level 18. The tension her weight forced onto her upper body while hanging just from her hands was too much. Previously visible veins on her face were now almost popped out from stress. She barely mustered the words, "Leave me, I am alive and can feel pain too."

But those words were true even for cattle as well.

"I know that. It is the same reason I will leave you once I get what I want." He grabbed the shabby robe she had been clad in for the last three days and snatched it away.

"No..." both Trino and Xahi yelled, but Hugo was deaf to them.

Relieved of the robe's weight, Xahi was now scantily clad. Only her undergarments were protecting her nudity. She started crying while Trino closed his eyes shut helplessly. His wrists were on the verge of tearing off.