Chapter 10. Asking a different murderer.
If a normal person was given a power just for transferring to a different world–.
What would happen if an abnormal person was sent to a different world?
Morto Hai was able to acquire information on "The world's strongest" through the rumors that the people of the underworld had told her.
A murderer who collected the hearts of evil men as someone who achieved the nirvana of evil.
That person's name was, Menticide.
He didn't have a real name.
No one knew where he came from, or how he came to be.
But everyone who had touched upon the dark side of the world had said this.
If you really want the humanity's strongest person, that man is who you are looking for.
Morto had shared such an information with Necro, and succeeded in summoning him after several times.
But the first impression of him she got fell short of her expectations.
Menticide wasn't a cold, cruel psychopath. He was an idiot who did whatever he wanted.
To think he'd read something like a dictionary at a time like this.
'Is he doing this out of a sense of pride? Now really isn't the time for that…'
There were two days until the beginning of the selection tournament.
Right now, Morto Hai was visiting another one of great evils in the underworld, one of the worst murderers in history, Kirisaki Hatsume.
The girl was trimming her fingernails in the second containment room. She felt a presence near her, but didn't do anything as she continued to trim her fingernail as she hummed to herself.
She had a beautiful hair done in a hime-cut.
The sailor uniform she had on accentuated her curves, and the black stockings she had on furthered her beauty.
According to herself, she was a full-time student.
When Morto asked her a question, Kirisaki responded lazily without even bothering to turn around.
"The world's strongest mudererrrr?"
"Yes. I was wondering if you knew about him."
"Ha?"
Kirisaki widened her eyes slightly, and raised her arms.
"I don't just know him. I'm a part of his church! What, you think this is funny? Are you looking down on me?"
Was he that famous? It seemed that the only ones unaware of his existence were the common folk.
"What is it, what is it? Have you become curious of 'Lord Menticide'?"
Kirisaki's eyes began to sparkle.
To think such an innocent-looking girl would be a murderer who tracked down and killed high school girls…
She wouldn't have believed it if it wasn't for the fact that the girl tried to kill her the moment they met.
"Church member…?"
Kirisaki seemed to take offense in Morto asking the same question over and over, and narrowed her eyes.
"Because he's a god! Don't you know?"
"God?"
The title was too much for a mere murderer.
"Just what do you know? What a useless bitch."
"Please don't call me that."
One side calls her an idiot saint, and the other calls her a bitch.
Why do these people like giving nicknames so much?
"Hah? Well, fine. I suppose you might not know. Ahaha! Sorry, sorry."
She said whatever she wanted.
Kirisaki went back to working on her fingernails. Of course, these weren't "her" fingernails per se, but rather those of her victims.
Tekko kagi (手甲鉤).
The ninja gloves that protected her hand was covered with fingernails.
Each fingernails that were decorated with manicure made the glove look as if it was covered in scales.
These fingernails were her 'trophies'.
"Ms. Kirisaki."
Morto carefully opened her mouth to ask a question.
"Do you know why Menticide is dubbed the title of 'The World's Strongest?"
An information that normal people couldn't get their hands on. Morto was hoping that Kirisaki, who was a murderer like Menticide, would know of this information.
Kirisaki didn't let her eyes off of her tekko kagi as she spoke.
"'Lord' Menticide. Don't forget the lord part. Anyway, why do you ask? Aha! I get it. You're thinking of summoning him, right? You should give up. You'll regret it, you know?"
She was speaking casually, but Morto didn't let that slip by her.
The girl in front of her was someone who killed sixty three students and eight armed officers. Having someone like that say 'don't do it' definitely wasn't normal.
"We're doing research before we actually summon him. The decision hasn't actually been made yet."
It was a lie, of course.
"Heeh."
Kirisaki stopped what she was doing, and glared at Morto with snake-like eyes.
"If you don't want your entire nation to disappear, you should give up immediately."
Morto had never heard such a cold and serious voice like this come out of Kirisaki before.
"He isn't someone you guys can control. He's not 'human'. He's more akin to a monster from mythologies."
Someone that even a murderer would refer to as a monster…
Of course, she gave him a few points for being able to destroy her heart in one shot, but there were plenty in this world who could do this already.
And if she had been protecting herself with mana in the first place, he wouldn't have even been able to do that.
"Is that all? He must be pretty good at shooting. Or maybe he's pretty good with a knife?"
"Kyahahaha!"
Kirisaki let out an uncontrollable laughter.
"How funny! What are you talking about? Are you mad? You think he'd be the strongest just because he's good with a gun or a knife? Seriously, are you alright in the head?"
"…Isn't he called the strongest because he's strong?"
"No, well, he is strong, but don't you think you need to have some big achievement under your belt for a title like that? When people judge someone, they look at a person's past deeds, don't they?"
Surprisingly, she said something quite logical for once.
"So just what did he do…?"
Kirisaki rested her chin on her hands, and smiled.
"Do you want to know what much? I can't tell you that for free."
"…What do you want?"
"Finger."
The answer was immediate.
"Not fingernail?"
"Aha~ you're looking down me too much."
Kirisaki looked at Morto with mocking eyes.
"Hey, bitch, don't try to fool me. I already know that you don't even flinch when it comes to fingernails."
It was a pretty high price for some information. But if Morto tried to barter, she'd be refused immediately.
That was what Kirisaki was like, after all.
"…I understand. But not now. After the selection battle, I'll give it to you then."
Kirisaki grinned.
"As I thought. You give a finger to people as if it's nothing to you. If it was me, I would've asked how many I needed?"
Morto didn't understand Kirisaki's words. Obviously, the amount of fingers would be…
"Ten, no?"
"As I thought… you're broken, little bitch. How sad, kyahahahaha! How funny!"
This person didn't know anything. She didn't know anything, but acted like she knew everything.
That annoyed Morto.
"Fine, I'll tell you."
Kirisaki straightened up.
"Menticide. Humanity's worst killer. Heartless monster. Unknown name. Unknown age. Unknown gender. Unknown nationality. No one's sure if he's even human. All attempts to track him down through DNA had failed. The official record for his victims are 96,732 people. This is only because they failed to find corpses for the other victims, though. The actual record would be 129,683 people. Amazing, right? He managed to kill that many just by himself."
"Hundred twenty thousand…?"
She would've thought that this was a lie just five years ago.
But this wasn't the case this time. This number wasn't much in a world like this.
It was a lot of people, sure, but Morto had seen more people die in the front lines.
It was common for a wizard to kill tens of thousands at a time.
"So he's the strongest because he killed a lot of people?"
Kirisaki shrugged.
"Ei~ that can't be it, right? Nowadays, murderers are graded based not on numbers, but on quality. You can't even brag with numbers anymore."
Bragging? With killing people?
Just what was in the heads of these idiots? Do they not understand how hard it was to save a life? Did they not understand the value of a human's life?
"Well, the reason is simple. Lord Menticide simply did things that no one believed was possible."
Because he did things that was not humanly possible, he was the strongest.
At least, that's how the logic went.
"Think about it. Is it possible to destroy an entire drug cartel by yourself? Without any help?"
The enemy was a giant gang association armed with heavy weaponry.
Just touching a minion from this gang would get one's family killed off.
If they take hostage of someone, no one would be able to do anything.
"Right… If you don't have the confidence of being able to protect those around yourself, then…"
Everyone has connections. Especially those who pursue justice.
It's impossible to destroy evil whilst protecting everyone in the world. No matter how much one tries to hide oneself, strands of hair or drops of blood would always be left at the scene.
Evil would always manage to take advantage of that.
"That's right. But Lord Menticide did it. He destroyed forty eight gangs just by himself."
"How…?"
"It's simple. He didn't think about the hostages at all. The connections he had in the first place was minimal, but… one time, a mafia group took a preschool hostage and threatened Lord Menticide. They told him that the children would die if Menticide didn't give in. Do you know what happened?"
"Could it be…"
"Yup, that's exactly what happened. He sliced off the neck of the mafia boss as each and every one of the children got executed."
He doesn't care for hostages. He's a hero who destroys evil organizations, but he has no regard for the lives of innocents.
His actions were contradicting.
"Can you believe it? He isn't human. He's a 'demon god'."
Morto tried not to show any facial changes.
"He was already the strongest before he came into this world! If someone like that comes into this world, if he manages to learn this 'magic' of yours, something very very scary would happen? I can bet you on it!"
Morto, at this time, thought 'oh no' on one side, while at the same time thinking 'it doesn't really matter, does it?'
After all, magic wasn't something anyone could do.
"I'll report what you said to the prime minister. But according to what I heard, he turned himself to the police…?"
"Correct."
"The reason being…?"
"Something about life not being fun~?"
It felt like there was a deeper story to all this, but the talk did not continue.
"Boring. Let's stop here."
Kirisaki smiled enchantingly, and lifted one of her arms.
Kii-, kiriririri!
Her index finger turned silver, and began to lengthen. It became thinner, and turned into a blade.
"Now, my turn to ask questions."
Kirisaki pointed her bladed finger at Morto's white neck.
"The person who was summoned this time. Who is it?"
"I can't say."
It seemed that she had no idea that the person summoned might've been Menticide.
"Is that so?"
The finger moved sideways, and created a tiny red line on Morto's neck.
That line immediately disappeared thanks to Morto's regeneration ability, though.
"I'll get to know it later anyway, so you might as well tell me now? After all, you told everyone about my power already."
"That's something you asked me to do, though? You told me to just leak 'that' info."
Kirisaki moved her finger away after listening to Morto's unafraid voice.
"This is why people with a firm belief are so scary. They aren't afraid even when you put a blade to their neck. Now, leave. You're done here, aren't you? You know everything you need to know now anyway."
"Thank you for sharing your time with me."
The person in front of Morto was essentially a criminal. Even so, Morto acted courteously to her.
The young murderer watched the saint exit the room, and smiled bitterly.
She complained to herself that… If god really did exist, it would be better for him to show some mercy to people.