CHAPTER 57: HOW NOT TO DISMEMBER A BODY?

Still on the ground, Hapia watched as Aisha closed the distance, one step after the other.

He tried to speak, but fear had gotten a complete grip on him, a fear mixed with multiple layers of shock.

An elf was walking him down.

An elf?

How was someone who looked so fragile able to kill his men without batting an eye, all in less than a few seconds? It made no sense.

Finally, Aisha had gotten close and was now kneeling in front of him, her red, vibrant eyes fixed directly on him.

From how close they were, Hapia could feel her breath pressing against his cheeks as he wondered why she wasn’t acting.

By now, he had expected her to slit his throat or stab him in the gut with her knife.

He was so terrified that he had slowly begun to pee, his lips trembling in fear.

In the meantime, a different thought process was going through Aisha’s mind. She was gradually remembering everything Hapia had done to her mother and her.

How he had slammed her mother’s head multiple times to the ground like a brick before ordering his men to dismember her alive.

It had happened years ago, but Aisha could still vividly remember the tears on her mother’s face as she screamed for mercy, every cry for help getting muffled by the heartless men who tore her body to pieces.

All while Aisha watched, hidden from afar.

"HA!"

A short laugh escaped Aisha’s mouth, followed by a warm smile, almost as though she was happy about something.

"I remember my name..." she blurted out.

Hapia could only watch with confusion, as he barely understood half of what was happening.

"Raphy. Haa, my name is Raphy." Aisha gripped Hapia’s head and pulled him close. "It’s what mother called me when she told me to look away.

She didn’t want her daughter looking at her mother getting cut to pieces."

Hapia suddenly teared up. "You have to believe me, I didn’t know it would end this way. I was only following orders, you have to understand. You’re an elf; surely you know th—"

Before he could even complete his words, Aisha slammed his head hard on the ground. The impact immediately caused blood to spew out with force.

Hapia, terror etched on his face, observed the few teeth that had flown out of his mouth the moment his head touched the stone.

"Right, this was how you slammed my mother’s head on the ground, no? Am I doing it right?"

Baam!

Aisha lifted his head and slammed it right back onto the ground.

The impact, once again, not only sent a spray of blood and chiclets of enamel across the stone but also caused the ground beneath to crack even more.

The sound was so loud that it echoed through the entire tunnel.

Satisfied, Aisha lifted Hapia’s head by his hair so she could clearly see his face.

Blood was dripping from his damaged features, injuries already plastered on the fat man’s face.

She stared at him for a while.

"Does it hurt?" Aisha asked, her eyes glowing subtly.

Hapia could barely open his swollen eyes.

Instead, he allowed tears to run down his cheeks as a way to show how badly he wanted to be spared.

But Aisha ignored it all. She wasn’t done with him.

Clenching her fist, she sent a straight punch to the side of his face, removing yet another set of teeth before Hapia fell completely to the ground, landing on his stomach.

Then, Aisha grabbed one of his hands and placed it right above his head.

Hapia, somehow, instantly understood what she wanted to do.

"Nooooo! Please don’t do this! I’ll give you money, whatever you want! I can give you this entire city if it is what you desire, but please don’t kill me, waahh~"

Aisha was so amazed at how Hapia was crying, so much so that she had to give out a sad, cold laugh.

"Master did say you were a coward, but I didn’t think it would be this obvious."

This time, she held her blade aimed at his wrist, already threatening to slice it off.

"Master, yes! Let me speak to your master! He set you up for this, right? Wait, hold on, he might want my offer—"

Slash!

"HAAAA!!!"

Hapia screamed in pain as Aisha chopped off his wrist with a single, smooth push of her blade.

It felt similar to how she would slice butter.

Hapia’s cries continued to ring out loud, a high-pitched, pig-like squeal that bounced off the tunnel walls, and Aisha’s quiet, cold laugh was slowly overpowering it as well.

"Hahaha! How does it feel? Go on, I want to know all of it. How does it feel to have your hand getting severed while you’re breathing? Hurts, doesn’t it? Right? Right?"

She moved the blade to his shoulder, ready to start slicing from there too.

Hapia’s screams were still echoing, pleading for her to stop.

The pain from his wrist was already unbearable; any more and he was sure to die.

Sure, I did the same to her mother, but that can’t be enough reason to do it back to him, right? he thought. I’m human. Whereas she is nothing but an elf.

His thoughts, however, were abruptly interrupted by the agonizing sensation of the blade digging into his shoulder.

Slash!

"AAAAAARRGGHHH!"

A second, more guttural scream ripped from Hapia’s throat as the knife sliced through the joint and bone, disconnecting his arm from his body.

The first wrist wound had been a shock, a sudden spike of agony; this was a deep, sustained, bone-jarring pain that promised death.

Aisha pulled back, the severed arm falling to the blood-soaked ground beside the wrist. She looked down at the screaming, convulsing man, her red eyes burning with cold satisfaction.

"You said you were only following orders," Aisha said, her voice a low, musical purr that contrasted horribly with the carnage. "My mother followed orders too. She followed the order to look away from people like you. But she didn’t follow the order to die without a fight."

She knelt again, her face close to his, the smell of fresh blood strong in the air.

"She fought until your men... they cut off her legs first. Then her arms. They wanted to see the fight leave her eyes slowly. Do you remember?"

Hapia was choking on his own tears and blood, unable to form a single word, merely shaking his head weakly in a desperate plea of denial.

Aisha traced the path of the knife down his remaining arm, which was stretched out above his head.

"This is just the first arm, Hapia. We still have the other side. And then the legs. I want you to remember everything she felt. Every moment of it."

She positioned the blade, the light catching the razor edge. The glint of steel was the last thing Hapia saw before another wave of blinding pain consumed him.

Slash!

Hapia’s muffled scream was swallowed by the tunnel. His second arm, sliced clean off at the shoulder, joined the first on the crimson-soaked dirt.

The man was no longer capable of coherent sound, his body wracked by violent, silent tremors.

His mind had retreated into a primal state of shock, barely registering the pain that now engulfed him entirely.

Aisha stood up, stepping back slightly to admire her work. The ground around Hapia was a gruesome tableau of blood and severed limbs, a mirror of the memory she carried—the memory of her mother.

"Two arms," Aisha whispered, her smile now completely gone, replaced by an expression of cold, focused finality. "Now the legs."

She moved with surgical precision, circling to his legs. Hapia’s eyes, swollen and nearly shut, flickered open at her movement, a final, desperate recognition of the impending torture.

He tried to thrash, to roll away, but the loss of blood and the intensity of the shock had anchored him to the spot.

Aisha grabbed his right ankle, the skin warm and slick with his own sweat and blood.

She positioned the blade, not near the hip, but lower, just above the knee, where the bone was thickest, but the cut would be most debilitating.

Slash!

The sound was heavier this time, a sickening crunch and scrape as the knife met bone. Hapia’s mouth opened wide, but only a wet, choking sound escaped. The lower half of his leg detached, falling heavily.

Aisha didn’t wait. She immediately moved to his left leg.

"You said you were following orders," she repeated, her voice perfectly even. "I’ll cut you off for my master. Yes, my revenge and Master Ash’s praise, I’ll have both. I want both."

Slash!

The second leg was severed, and Hapia, now nothing more than a torso with a head, collapsed fully onto the ground. The final, immense shock to his system was too much.

His chest hitched several times, the tremors ceased, and his labored breathing slowed, becoming shallow and erratic.

Aisha knelt once more, pushing aside the curtain of his matted hair to look directly into his eyes.

They were glazed over, seeing nothing.

She had kept him alive just long enough.

"Remember Raphy," she said, her voice dropping to a near-silent murmur, a name not for him, but for herself.

With a swift, practiced motion, she plunged the knife down, finding the space between his ribs and piercing his heart.

Hapia’s body gave one last, final shudder and then went completely still.