Chapter 122- The End of a Grim Story

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Adori didn't know how long her crazed state was, but when she had finally come to her senses, there was only a disfigured bloody figure of a boy in front of her.

His face was no longer recognizable as there were dozens of gaping wounds on it. His eye sockets were hollow as the eyeballs had been cut and flung away in her rampage, making his bloody face appear even more horrifying.

Staring at the result of her action, Adori was completely silent. Unlike what many might have expected, she didn't feel any terror, regret, or sadness…

Only understanding.

Adori knew and understood the reason why he had tried to kill her. Just like him, she didn't have anything either, even just some food.

Even if their relationship had worsened since the expulsion from the slums, they had no grudge that would have driven him to try to kill her.

So, there was only one probability. One that was very likely considering the fact that the two of them had just vanished in a row within a few days.

Looking at his body condition, Adori found out that he was slightly better compared to her and the rest, this fact confirmed her assumption. He had indeed killed the two children and eaten them to survive.

Watching the badly damaged corpse, she felt a wrenching hunger in her stomach. Adori almost hadn't eaten anything for the past two weeks so it was natural that she felt an intense urge to eat.

However, the target of her intense hunger wasn't something that was appropriate for it.

Even in the tower, where many different species of humanoids coexisted with their own different norms and cultures, eating a sapient humanoid being or cannibalism wasn't something that was accepted, and many found it to be disgusting.

However, Adori knew her own circumstances way better.

Her body was extremely weak and emaciated at the moment. Even if she was in top condition, looking for food was very hard let alone when she was in such a bad shape.

Almost nobody cared about the abandoned children, if they do, wouldn't there would be no such cases as what happened to Adori and her friends?

Getting food the right way was incredibly hard so they could only resort to crimes like stealing, theft, and pickpocketing. Unfortunately, their physical abilities were much worse even than the average residents on the floor.

With their undeveloped bodies and malnutrition, they couldn't hope to fight nor to outrun the much powerful local residents.

Once they were seen and caught for committing any crimes, it was all over for them. Some of her friends had been the examples of this.

If Adori didn't eat any foods anytime soon, she would quickly succumb to starvation in a few days, or even faster since her body was injured.

Looking at the corpse, Adori was stuck between two hard choices, to keep her morale or throw it away to survive for another day.

Feeling the intense hunger and the encroaching death, Adori didn't know what had happened to her back then, but as if a switch had been turned inside her, there was no hesitation in her movement.

She quickly dragged his body away from the spot to a secluded corner of the alley, painting a bloody red trail on the ground.

Looking at the unrecognizable face of the boy, Adori calmly raised her knife. She had understood his desire, his will to survive.

Hence, she wouldn't blame him nor hold any grudge against him for his actions, because, in the end, she would do the same to survive!

Without any hesitation, Adori brought down her knife, slicing the flesh of his arm. She picked up the sliced raw meat with her dirty hands, put it into her mouth, and finally bit it.

. . . . . .

Adori was sitting on the cold and hard ground in a corner of an alley. With little to no clothes nor a proper shelter, the night was extremely unkind to her as its cold breeze seeped through her non-existing clothes and bit into her bones.

Even with her body huddled up and her arms cuddled her, the cold easily gripped her thin and skinny body, making her scrawny figure tremble constantly.

As she stared blankly with her vacant eyes, she was losing her last hopes. Even with the intense survival instincts beckoning her, survival seemed to be impossible as she could hardly move her body anymore.

With the lack of sanitary, malnutrition, and harsh living conditions for months, her body was stricken with diseases.

A month had passed when she was almost killed. At the time, she also experienced the taste of human flesh for the first time. Now, it was only her left from the previously dozens of children.

She didn't survive this far by sheer luck. To survive, she ruthlessly repeated what she did in the incident.

Now, she was all alone as she had killed all of the remaining children left with her own hands, the ones who had shared a beautiful bond and happy memories with her.

Adori didn't regret it.

She loved and cared about them, and her feeling was genuine. However, her desire to survive was stronger. No matter how she loved them, she loved herself more.

She had understood the nature of humans, the time she spent in the slums and her childhood had made sure of that. Adori didn't feel any guilt for killing her friends at all because she understood that she wasn't wrong.

Adori had understood that the world wasn't a simple white and black, hence she wouldn't hold herself back to get what she needed even if it inflicted harm to others nor she would hold any grudge to people who had wronged her.

In the end, everyone had their motives and reasons behind their actions. It didn't matter whether it was "right or wrong" or whether it justified their actions.

What mattered was that if they could fully carry them out and deal with the consequences.

Was the member of the ten great families in the wrong for driving her and her friends out of the slums?

If it wasn't because of him, wouldn't the tragedy that fall upon them wouldn't have happened?

Those things didn't matter. He was powerful and influential enough to deal with and stop caring about the consequences of his actions.

As a member of the ten great families, his status was very high up to the sky compared to her, who was nothing more than a trash on the ground.

In the end, it was her fate of being weak that Adori faced such a tragic end. In the end, she was no different compared to her friends.

She had survived with the flesh of her family members, yet it was no different. She would still fall into the embrace of death.

"Ah, what a pair of magnificent eyes!" A deep and raspy voice suddenly sounded from the corner of the alley.