Chapter 589: Untouchable Sisterly Bond
Back in the penthouse suite, both Charlotte and Astrid were sitting upright on the bed right now.
They exchanged glances with each other before slowly turning their gazes toward their sister.
Anya didn’t seem to mind the attention at all.
She was happily sipping Mika’s blood from a small packet, her eyes half-closed with pleasure as if she were savoring the finest wine in existence.
Ever since that day in the cave, Anya had changed in many different ways.
The most obvious was her dependence—no, her need for Mika’s blood.
After consuming his flesh for weeks on end, her body had developed an insatiable craving that no other sustenance could satisfy.
It wasn’t mere preference; it was physiological necessity.
Without regular infusions of his essence, she would grow weak, listless, her newly awakened blessing flickering like a candle in a storm.
But the physical changes paled in comparison to the transformation of her spirit.
The timid, nervous girl who had been dragged along by her sisters rather than leading was gone.
In her place sat someone entirely different.
Someone whose small smile never wavered, whose eyes held a confidence so absolute it bordered on unsettling.
Someone who could make you feel nervous with a single glance.
But it made sense, considering what she had experienced underneath the darkness.
She had matured far beyond her years and completely became a different person.
Thinking about how much their sister had to suffer, they couldn’t help but feel pity for her.
But more than that, they couldn’t help but feel pity for Mika himself, who had sacrificed himself so much for her.
They honestly did not know what Mika had done for quite a while when they were young, since they were still too young to understand.
But eventually they did find out the truth. And when they did, they were horrified.
They couldn’t help but go over and cry in Mika’s embrace, feeling so bad for him and what he had experienced.
Mika at that time was just annoyed and tried to push them back.
"Seriously? I’m trying to study here. Can’t you see I’m in the middle of something important?"
But they just continued to hug him and cry in his embrace, their tears soaking into his shirt.
"We’re so sorry, Mika!"
"W-We’re so sorry you had to go through that!"
"It’s fine." He had grumbled, his cheeks flushing with embarrassment. "It was a long time ago."
"Just...stop crying already. You’re getting my shirt all wet."
Well, he had no choice but to accept it, resigned to his fate as a human tissue.
—
Right now, Charlotte was particularly looking at the packet of blood in Anya’s hands.
She had a question on her mind that she didn’t know if she could ask. She bit her lip, her fingers fidgeting with the edge of her robe.
Finally, the question broke out from her mind. She hesitantly asked, while pointing at the packet,
"Anya...how does Mika’s blood taste like to you? I mean, is it really that good?"
"Or is it just...something you need?"
A expression of pure, blissful serenity washed over Anya’s face.
"Oh Charlotte, it’s the most glorious nectar in existence!" She murmured, swirling the packet gently. "It completely surpasses any juice, any vintage wine, or any earthly beverage. Unlike the things you two consume—"
She glanced at them with a flick of mild disdain,
"—which are always so terribly sour or bitter, his blood simply melts on my tongue. The moment I swallow, it completely revitalizes my entire body."
Charlotte nodded slowly, processing this. Then, against her better judgment, she asked,
"What about...the flesh? What did that taste like?"
The atmosphere in the room shifted. Anya turned toward her sister with a slow movement, and her smile took on a knowing quality.
"Do you really want to know that, Charlotte? Do you truly want me to describe the flavor of Mika’s flesh?"
Charlotte gulped, her throat suddenly dry.
Anya leaned forward, her voice dropping to an intimate, chilling whisper.
"The very same flesh that is stripped from the skin, carved directly off the bone, and smooshed down into a fine, minced meat...Do you really want to know how it tastes when it’s chewed?"
"No! No, no, no!" Charlotte gasped, frantically shaking her head and pulling back. "Keep it to yourself! It was a stupid question. I don’t want to know."
Anya chuckled, a teasing glint in her eyes. "I could tell you, you know. I’ve eaten it so many times that even though it’s been a while, the entire flavor profile is permanently burned into my memory."
"There’s really no need, Anya." Astrid interjected, her face noticeably pale. "Blood is one thing, but the absolute thought of flesh..."
She shivered, rubbing her arms. "Let’s not think about it. It’s too terrifying."
Both sisters cowered slightly under Anya’s amused gaze.
Trying to steer the conversation away from the macabre, Astrid cleared her throat and asked,
"I’ve been meaning to ask you something else...Is that the reason why you never became a doctor? Why you didn’t follow our mother into medicine?"
Anya took another slow sip, her vacant eyes shifting back toward her older sister.
"I mean, your Blessing is absolutely perfect for the medicinal field."
Astrid continued, her gaze turning analytical.
"Even if you can’t cure internal illnesses the way Mother does, you can perform flawless surgeries without ever lifting a scalpel."
"You can also eliminate life-threatening, catastrophic trauma in a matter of seconds."
"Yet, instead of saving lives in a theater, you chose the legal system."
"It’s a respectable profession, of course." Astrid quickly added. "But given your mother is the most powerful healer in the world and the divine nature of your own Blessing, it’s just...strange."
Anya leaned back against her pillow, the warmth draining from her expression.
A profound, piercing coldness settled into her eyes.
"Most of my reasoning stems from one simple truth." She said. "I despise hospitals and everyone who works in them."
The words hung in the air like a blade.
"Ever since that incident, no matter what hospital I walk into, no matter how decent or well-meaning the staff might be, I don’t see doctors."
"All I see are the faces of those greedy, parasitic vermin we were trapped with underground."
She stared blankly at the ceiling.
"No matter how many lives a doctor has saved, my mind immediately violently flashes back to that cavern."
"Just stepping through the front doors of a medical facility makes me physically vomit. It makes me want to burn the entire building down to ash."
Charlotte and Astrid looked at her with deep, aching sympathy.
"In fact..." Anya added, her tone suddenly casual.
"A while back, I actually severed the head of a doctor on the surface because his face remotely reminded me of one of the administrators underground."
Both sisters’ jaws dropped.
"What?!" Astrid exclaimed. "When did this happen?"
"How did I not know about this?" Charlotte added, her eyes wide with shock. "What happened to him? Did you—"
Anya just chuckled, waving her hand like it was no big deal.
"Oh, don’t worry about it. Even though I did cut his head off, I realized what I did immediately and reattached it once again."
She smiled pleasantly. "He didn’t even know what exactly happened. All he saw was his vision go down further and further...before going back to his head once again. It was really no big deal."
Both sisters stared at her, their faces pale. They realized just how much of a crazy woman their sister truly was.
"Beyond that..." Anya continued, her expression shifting to something more contemplative.
"After I learned that the hospital collapsed because incompetent people siphoned away the construction funds, I became fixated on a different problem entirely."
Her eyes flashed with a cold, legalistic venom.
"If the rules had been followed, if proper procedures had been observed, if the funds had been used as intended..."
"...none of it would have happened."
"The hospital wouldn’t have collapsed. Mika and I wouldn’t have been trapped with those black-hearted wretches."
Astrid and Charlotte listened, understanding the depth of their sister’s conviction.
"Basically everything we suffered can be traced back to someone deciding that the rules didn’t apply to them."
She swirled the packet of blood in her hand, watching the crimson liquid coat the plastic like an expensive vintage wine.
"That’s why I became a lawyer. I want to enforce the rules. I want to ensure no one breaks them, so that no one ever has to suffer such horrific inequalities ever again."
She let out a soft sigh, a wry, melancholy smile playing on her lips.
"You know...people always assume I suffer from severe nightmares or catastrophic PTSD because of what happened down there. But truthfully, I don’t feel bothered by the past at all."
"It’s almost as if...just having Mika by my side during those two months completely shielded my psyche. He absorbed all the trauma. He took the entire burden upon himself, leaving me whole."
The warmth in her voice when she spoke of him was unmistakable.
But then her expression shifted, growing melancholy.
"But I broke my promise to him." She said quietly. "That’s what still haunts me. Back in that cave, he made me promise not to let the darkness change me. Not to become a monster. And I..."
She looked down at her hands—the same hands that had torn apart hundreds of people with nothing more than a thought.
"I couldn’t keep that promise...I became exactly what he asked me not to become."
This was the wound that had never fully healed—not the torture, not the starvation, not the horror of watching Mika being eaten alive.
It was the guilt of having failed him.
But before she could sink deeper into her remorse, Charlotte spoke up.
"Don’t say such stupid things, Anya!"
Anya looked up, startled by her sister’s sharp tone.
"What you did was necessary." Charlotte continued, her voice gaining strength. "You call yourself a monster, but you were protecting Mika. You were making sure the people who hurt him understood exactly what their choices had cost."
"And if it had been me—if I had been in that cave and seen what they did to him—"
Her eyes flashed with something dangerous. "I would have done the exact same thing."
"Charlotte’s right." Astrid added, her voice cold with conviction. "Throughout your career on the surface, you have treated countless criminals and corrupt officials in the most brutal, unforgiving fashion."
"But none of them were innocent. Every single one of them earned your wrath."
"And frankly..." She smiled, a hidden warmth in her eyes. "...you becoming a monster is a blessing."
"Only a beast like you can hunt down the other beasts of this world. The timid Anya of the past could never have cleansed the filth."
She squeezed Anya’s hand harder. "In a way, it could be a good thing. You’ve become the monster that the world needs."
Anya looked at both of her sisters in surprise.
They were doing their best to support her right now, to lift her up when she was feeling down. A warmth spread through her chest.
She chuckled softly, and then suddenly pounced on both of them.
"Come here you two!"
"A-Anya! What are you doing?" Astrid exclaimed, flustered.
"Stop it! Get off!" Charlotte added, trying to push her away.
But Anya just held them tightly, a genuine smile on her face.
"With sisters like you." She said, her voice soft and full of emotion. "I don’t need to worry about anything at all."
She pulled them closer.
"Even though we’re all fighting for a place in Mika’s heart, I just want you to know—I love you both very, very much."
They both froze.
"The only reason I’m sane right now, the only reason I haven’t gone completely mad, is because I’m surrounded by your love."
The sudden, raw confession caught Charlotte and Astrid entirely off guard.
They stared at each other for a beat, their hearts melting, before a synchronized, tender smile appeared on their faces. They wrapped their arms around Anya, hugging her back with equal fervor.
No matter how fiercely they competed for Mika’s affection, they were sisters bound by blood and shared tragedy.
They cherished each other above all else, and without a fraction of a second’s hesitation, they would lay down their lives for one another.
—
And somewhere far away, watching through her blessing’s sight, the Maiden of Fate wiped tears from her eyes.
She remembered those dark days all too well—the desperation, the fear, the prophecy that had foretold one child rising while the other fell.
She remembered pushing her powers beyond their limits, bleeding from every orifice as she tried desperately to see a future where both children emerged unscathed.
She had failed. She hadn’t been able to change what was written.
But looking at them now—at these three sisters holding each other in the warm light of the penthouse—she realized that perhaps the future had unfolded exactly as it needed to.
The suffering had forged bonds that nothing could break.
The darkness had given birth to a light that shone all the brighter for having been tested.
But then she thought about what Mika was doing in the bathroom and immediately frowned.
’That boy...’ She thought, a vein throbbing in her temple. ’The brave, noble little boy from back then has completely morphed into a depraved, relentless beast!’
’He is actively going after the very woman who raised him like an animal in heat! He’s become an absolute, unrepentant pervert...’
But then she quickly shook her head.
’No, no. He’s still that brave, self-sacrificing boy. He’s just...also heavily perverted now.’
But as she pondered it further, she let out a soft sigh, realizing that perhaps this twisted outcome was actually a mercy.
After the unfathomable amounts of childhood suffering Mika had endured, trauma that would have permanently shattered the psyche of any mortal man...
...he by all accounts should have become a broken, hollow shell, terrified of his own shadow.
Yet, despite the universe throwing its worst horrors at him, he had braved the tide.
He carried the absolute entirety of that historical pain, locked deep within his soul, and still managed to walk forward as the dominant, unyielding man he was today.
The Maiden’s gaze drifted specifically toward Charlotte.
’Especially what he went through with Charlotte...’ She thought, a cold shiver racing down her spine.
Of all the terrible things that had happened to the children, what Charlotte and Mika had endured together might have been the worst.
Anya’s ordeal in the cave had been horrific, yes.
Astrid’s experience in that other dark place had left its own scars.
But what had happened with Charlotte...
The Maiden of Fate shivered, forcing the memories away.
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