John dusted his hands off with the casual air of a man who had just finished a mildly strenuous chore rather than orchestrating a brutal murder.
He reached over and patted Mariannetta on the shoulder, his palm making contact with her bare skin just above the edge of her corset. "Nice throw. Good form. You've been practicing."
Mariannetta preened under the praise, her crimson eyes glowing with delight. "Thank you, Master. I've been working on my aim. The trajectory was particularly satisfying this time. Did you see the way he—"
John snapped his fingers, and the open field dissolved around them. They materialized in the throne room, the familiar black pillars and flickering torchlight replacing the sun drenched meadow. Mariannetta's sentence cut off mid word as she took in the grand hall, her head swiveling in every direction, her mouth falling open in genuine awe.
"Oh! Oh, Master, this is magnificent! The architecture! The ambiance! The sheer scale of it!" She spun in a slow circle, her dark hair fanning out around her.
"I've never been in a throne room before. Not a real one. I was always kept in the dungeons, you see, or the holding cells, or the torture chambers. This is so much nicer. So much grander. The pillars alone must have taken decades to carve. Is that obsidian? It looks like obsidian. I love obsidian. It's so dark and reflective and—"
Her ramble cut off as her eyes landed on something in the distance. Malice. The massive, muscled beast stood in the shadows near the far wall, its grotesque form a hulking silhouette against the torchlight. Mariannetta's eyes gleamed with naked hunger. She was running before John could say a word, her bare feet slapping against the marble floor, and she threw her arms around one of Malice's thick, corded limbs with the enthusiasm of a child embracing a beloved pet.
"Look at you! Look at these muscles! They're beautiful! Absolutely beautiful!" She ran her hands over the creature's arm, tracing the thick veins and the bulging sinew with reverent fingers. "Master, please, please can I have it? I've been such a good girl. I threw the spear exactly where you wanted. I didn't even complain when you took your time. I've earned this. I've earned a reward. Let me have this beautiful beast. Let me keep it. Let me love it."
John waved a hand without even looking. "Sure. It's yours. Do whatever you want with it."
Mariannetta let out a squeal of pure joy and pressed her face against Malice's arm, murmuring soft, adoring nonsense into its flesh. The creature didn't react. It just stood there, breathing slow and steady, its many eyes staring blankly at nothing.
John's attention shifted to the other occupant of the throne room. Alrick. The nervous, trembling woman was still chained to the marble pillar where he had left her, her wide eyes darting in every direction like a cornered animal. She had watched everything. The portal opening. Mariannetta's arrival. The casual way John had handed over a monster like it was a stray puppy. Her chains rattled with every tiny, involuntary shake of her body.
John's gaze landed on her, and he blinked as if he had genuinely forgotten she existed.
"Oh. You. Right. Still here." He walked toward her, his footsteps echoing in the vast chamber, and Alrick shrank back against the pillar, her chains clanking.
"So. Necrophilia. That's what you did. That's what got you here."
He reached down and grabbed her head, his fingers pressing against her temples with bruising force. Alrick screamed before the vision even started, a raw, animal sound of pure terror. Then the pain hit.
It was Zedrik's death. Every single second of it. The desperate sprint across the field, the burning lungs, the legs screaming, the brief, false hope of the merchant's cart, the straw doll's empty eyes, the realization that there was no escape, the blood spear punching through his chest, the slow, agonizing bleed out. All of it. But amplified. Multiplied. Ten times over. The physical agony of having her ribcage shattered and her heart pierced. The emotional devastation of knowing she had been tricked, that there was never any hope, that every desperate plea had fallen on deaf ears. The existential horror of feeling her own life drain out of her body while the world went cold and dark.
Alrick writhed on the marble floor, her chains screaming against the stone as she thrashed. Her mouth was open, but the sounds coming out were barely human. High, keening wails that cracked into guttural sobs. Her back arched so violently it looked like her spine might snap. Her fingers clawed at the floor until her nails tore and bled. She slammed her head against the marble, over and over, trying to knock herself unconscious, trying to escape the endless loop of dying, dying, dying. But John held her there, forced her to feel every agonizing second, and her screams echoed through the throne room like the wails of the damned.
John grinned and released her head. Alrick collapsed onto her side, twitching and whimpering, drool leaking from the corner of her mouth. But John wasn't done. He stepped on her. His boot came down on her stomach, pinning her to the floor, and she let out a choked, wheezing gasp. He kicked her in the ribs. Once. Twice. A third time. Each impact sent her skidding across the marble, her chains dragging behind her like dead weight.
"You know what really gets me?" John said, his voice conversational, almost pleasant, as he delivered another kick.
"You were a noble. You had money. You had status. You had gold sitting in your coffers, enough to hire any whore in the city. Enough to buy yourself a harem if you wanted one. But no. No, that wasn't enough for you. You had to go dig up corpses. You had to defile the dead. You had to sink to the absolute lowest, most pathetic, most revolting form of gratification imaginable." He stomped down on her ankle, and Alrick's scream reached a new, higher pitch.
"A sick man. A sick, sick, sick, sick, SICKKKKKKKK man. Do you even understand how sick that is? Do you even comprehend how utterly, incomprehensibly vile you are?"
Alrick couldn't answer. She was beyond words, beyond thought, beyond anything except the endless fire of agony consuming her body.
John stepped back, breathing steady, and addressed the empty air. "System. What race or subrace is known for raping the most humans?"
The System's voice chimed in his ear, clinical and detached. "Orcs. Orcs have the highest documented rate of sexual assault against humans across all known realms. Their breeding practices are particularly—"
"Nah," John interrupted, waving his hand. "Too basic. Too predictable. Everyone sends their worst offenders to the orcs. It's practically a cliche at this point. Give me something else."
The System let out a sound that was unmistakably a groan. "Fine. If you want something more creative, there are always the Doldfines."
John's brow furrowed. "The who what now?"
"The Doldfines. A sentient species of dolphin native to the equatorial waters of the seventh realm. Highly intelligent. Smarter than most humans, actually. Their problem solving capabilities are remarkable. Their language is complex. Their social structures are fascinating. However." The System paused. "They are obsessed with raping anything that enters their waters. Humans, elves, other dolphins, small boats, floating debris. If it moves, they will attempt to mate with it. Aggressively. Relentlessly. Until it stops moving."
John stared into the middle distance, processing this information. "Sentient dolphins. Who rape everything. That's... that's a thing that exists."
"I don't make the biology. I just report it."
John sighed, a long, put upon sound that seemed to drain some of the energy from his shoulders. "Too much work. Getting him to the ocean, finding these specific dolphins, making sure he doesn't drown before they—no. I'm tired. I've been torturing people all day. I'm done."
He crouched down beside Alrick, who was still twitching and whimpering on the floor. "Guess it's your lucky day, Alrick. No rape for you. No orcs. No dolphins. You're getting off easy."
Alrick's bloody, tear streaked face tilted up toward him. Her cracked lips moved, forming words that were barely audible. "Thank you. Thank you, Master. Thank you for your mercy. I don't deserve it. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry for everything. Thank you for sparing me. Thank you—"
Mid sentence, John's hand shot forward. His fingers punched through her chest like a blade through wet paper, past the ribs, past the lungs, closing around her still beating heart. Alrick's eyes went wide. Her mouth opened, but no sound came out. John squeezed, and the heart burst in his grip, a wet, pulpy explosion that sprayed blood across the marble floor.
The System let out a low whistle. "Yeesh. Nice mortal kombat fatality. Very clean. Good hand placement."
"Keep her alive for the next hour," John said, pulling his gore slick hand free and wiping it on Alrick's tattered dress. "Paralyzed. She can feel everything but she can't move. Then dump her in an orc settlement to be a fleshlight."
"Done," the System said. "Coordinates locked. Transport in sixty minutes. You want me to add a note? 'Free use, please destroy'?"
"Surprise me."
John stood up, stretching his arms over his head with a long, satisfied groan. His spine popped in three places. "PHEW! What a productive day. Lottttttts of torture. Good variety. Zedrik got the spear. Alrick got the existential despair. Mariannetta got a new pet. I got some cardio in. Honestly, I'm feeling pretty good about this."
The System's voice was dry. "You ran out of ideas with Alrick. You literally said you were too tired to come up with a proper punishment and just defaulted to orcs."
"Shut up," John said, but there was no real heat in it. "I didn't run out of ideas. I just decided to be efficient. It's called time management. Look it up."