Chapter 425 Creature too Broken to Even Scream

Suzuka's boot crunched on the dead goblin's ribcage as she stepped forward, her shadow falling over Hermit's trembling form.

"Ugh. Enough." 

She flicked a chunk of gore off her blade, utterly unmoved by the scene.

  "Your precious Kaka’s fine—just pumped full of eggs and bruised pride. Not even the worst I’ve seen this week."

She nudged Kaka’s bloated stomach with her boot, making him whimper. 

"See? Still kicking. Now strap him to your back like the ugly, limbless sack he is, and move."

Hermit’s head snapped up, his face a mask of tear-streaked fury—but Suzuka was already turning away, scanning the tunnels.

"Or we can stand here sobbing while your hatchlings get turned into goblin soup. Your call."

Hermit’s breath came in panicked gasps as he stumbled after Suzuka, Kaka’s mutilated body lashed to his back with strips of torn cloth. The weight was unbearable—not just the physical burden, but the knowledge of what had been done to him. Kaka’s faint, wheezing breaths against his neck were the only proof he still lived. Every step made Kaka’s ruined form jostle, his bloated belly swaying grotesquely, the eggs inside him shifting with a wet, nauseating sound. But Hermit didn’t stop.

There was no time to stop. No time to grieve. The hatchlings. The hatchlings were still out there.

The next cavern stank of bile and burned flesh.

Primitive devices lined the walls—racks with adjustable spikes, iron cages too small to stand in, a pit filled with serrated hooks—all designed to prolong suffering without granting death.

And in the center of it all, laughing, was the largest goblin Hermit had ever seen.

The goblin stood twice Hermit’s size, his gut swollen with gluttony, his skin slick with sweat and old blood. In one meaty fist, he clutched a squirming hatchling, its tiny limbs flailing as he squeezed it like a stress toy, his fingers sinking into its soft flesh.

"Sssssqueal for me, worm," the brute slurred, tightening his grip. The hatchling’s ribs creaked, its choked whimpers coming out with wet gurgles.

The stench hit first—thick, cloying, the reek of infected wounds and voided bowels. Then the sounds: shallow, wet breathing, the occasional whimper of a creature too broken to even scream.

Hermit stumbled forward, his claws scraping against stone, his breath coming in ragged, animal gasps.

Around him, the hatchlings lay like discarded toys.

One was missing an eye, the socket a festering pit of yellow pus and blackened flesh. Flies buzzed around it, their tiny legs skittering across the crusted wound as the hatchling twitched—not in pain, but in some distant, mindless reflex.

Then another one, a tiny, broken form—curled in a puddle of his own vomit, one side of his skull caved in, the bone pressing grotesquely against his trembling brain. His limbs jerked and spasmed, fingers clawing at nothing, his tiny chest rising in rapid, shallow gasps.

But worst of all were his eyes.

They fluttered uncontrollably, the pupils dilated to black pits, rolling back and forth as if searching for something that wasn’t there.

And his voice—

"Peh… peh… pepepepepe—"

A garbled, wet chant, the same sound, over and over, like a broken music box.

"Pepe… pepe… pepepepe—"

 Evil goblin grinned, nudging the hatchling with his boot.

"Dis one funny. Keeps makin’ noise even after I smash ‘is head! Hah! Like a squished bug!"

He raised his cleaver, tapping the flat of the blade against the hatchling’s caved-in skull, making the tiny body jerk violently.

"Pepepepe! Pepepepe!" he mocked, his laughter echoing off the walls.

Another lay twisted, its spine bent at a grotesque angle, its legs limp and useless. Its chest rose and fell in shallow, shuddering motions. Still alive. Somehow.

Next one gnawed mindlessly on its own fingers, the tiny bones cracking between its teeth. It didn’t react. Didn’t even blink. Just chewed, its dull eyes staring at nothing.

Their gazes—empty, hollow, already dead inside—locked onto nothing.

They didn’t cry. They didn’t beg. They just existed, their tiny bodies reduced to ruins.

 Hermit fell to his knees, his claws outstretched, trembling.

"No… no no no—"

His voice was a child’s—raw, broken, terrified.

He reached for the nearest hatchling, the one with the shattered spine, and cradled it against his chest. Its body was limp, its breathing shallow. It didn’t react. Didn’t recognize him.

"P-Papa’s here…" he whispered, his voice cracking.

  "I’m s-so sorry…"

A wet, choked sound escaped him—not a sob, but something worse. Something guttural, unhinged.

Then—

The fat goblin turned, his piggish eyes squinting in confusion as he spotted Hermit kneeling among the broken hatchlings. His brow furrowed, his slack jaw working like a cow chewing cud as he tried to process the scene.

“Huh? Whuzzat? Why slave outta cage?” he grunted, scratching his belly with one meaty hand.

  “You s’posed be breedin’! Not… not…” He waved vaguely at the hatchlings, as if struggling to remember what they were even for.

Then, like a dim candle flickering to life, his face twisted into a leer.

“Ohhhh! You like lil’ worms?”

He let out a wet, wheezing laugh, kicking one of the limp hatchlings toward Hermit. 

“Here! Take ‘em! They broke now—no good for nothin’!”

He wiped his nose on his arm, then blinked, as if just realizing something.

“Wait… you not s’posed be here!” He grabbed a rusty cleaver from his belt, pointing it clumsily.

  “I tell boss! Boss gonna strap you down—make you pop out hunnid eggs!”

He took a lurching step forward, drool dripping from his chin.

“Gonna melt yer brain ‘fore he put ‘em in—”

The world stopped.

Hermit's breath froze in his lungs. His claws, still cradling the broken hatchling, locked in place as if turned to stone.

That face. That ugly, scarred, drooling face. The cleaver. The laughter.

"No..."

The word slipped out, barely a whisper, but it carried the weight of a soul being ripped in half.

His vision tunneled. The sounds of the cave—the hatchlings' whimpers, Suzuka's cold presence waiting in the shadow, the distant crackle of fire—vanished. All that remained was him.

 Butcher. The monster who had torn Lyn apart. The beast who had made him watch as his hatchlings were skinned alive.

The demon who had laughed as he dropped Lyn's severed head into Hermit's lap. And now—here he was. Alive. Breathing. Still holding that fucking cleaver.

 Every instinct in him screamed to cower, to submit, to fall to his knees and beg for mercy like the broken slave he had been conditioned to be.

But then his gaze flickered to the hatchling he had raised, now twitching and broken, its tiny voice reduced to a mindless chant. And beyond, the other hatchlings—discarded, ruined, their eyes hollow.

And suddenly, the fear was gone.

Replaced by something hotter. Something wilder.

"Butcher!" The name tore from his throat like a curse, his voice cracking with the weight of years of swallowed rage. 

"YOU!"

Butcher blinked, his dull eyes squinting in confusion before recognition dawned.

  "Huh? Holup a moment. I seen you before... Ohhh, you! Dat crybaby slave! Flom Rakrak farm, hissss favorite."

He let out a wet, wheezing laugh.

"HOW?!" Hermit's scream echoed off the cavern walls, raw and shattered.

  "How are you still alive?! You—you monster! You filth! The Cat People—they had you! They tore you apart! I saw it! I dreamed of it every night! How are you still breathing when Lyn is dead?! When my hatchlings are dead?! When so many are GONE because of YOU?!"

His body shook, his claws digging into his palms hard enough to draw blood. Butcher only grinned, scratching his belly with the cleaver.

"Eh, cats got soft," he chuckled.

  "Tried ta make it quick. But I don't die easy." 

He licked his lips.

  "Just like yer Lyn didn't die easy. Heh. She squealed real pretty—"

Hermit shouted. No hesitation. No fear. Just rage, pure and blinding.

"You don't deserve to live. You don't deserve mercy. You don't deserve anything but PAIN!"

Hermit rocked back and forth on his knees, clutching the twitching hatchling to his chest, its broken little body jerking in time with its endless, mindless chant.

"Pepe... pepe... pepepepe—"

Butcher loomed over him, grinning, his yellowed teeth glinting in the torchlight as he tapped the flat of his cleaver against his palm.

"Aww, lookit you!" he cooed, his voice dripping with mock sympathy.

  "Still playin' papa to a buncha broken worms! Hah! Even dumber than I 'member!"

Hermit's breath hitched, his whole body shaking.

  "Shut up! Shut up shut up SHUT UP!" He sounded like a child throwing a tantrum, his voice cracking on every word.

 Butcher laughed, kicking a pebble at him.

"Make me, slave! Oh wait—you can't! Still just a weak little breeder, ain'tcha?"

Hermit's face screwed up, snot and tears mixing as he whipped his head toward the shadows where Suzuka stood.

"HELEN!" he wailed, pointing a trembling finger at Butcher.

  "Kill him! No—wait! Don't kill him! I wanna kill him! But—but burn everything else! The whole stupid farm! This nest… this filth… erase it. Let nothing stand. No survivors. No reminders. All the mean goblins! But not him! He's mine!"

He turned back to the Butcher, his expression twisting into something between a snarl and a pout.

  "You're bad! And—and stupid! And your face is ugly! And I hate you!"

Butcher blinked, then burst out laughing.

  "Ohhh, scary! You gonna cry me to death, slave?"

Hermit's lower lip trembled. Then he screeched—a wordless, childish sound of pure frustration—before turning back to Suzuka with big, pleading eyes.

"Pleeeeease, Master Helen? I'll—I'll owe you! A big favor! Even bigger than before! Just... just let me have him! He doesn’t get to die. Not fast. Not clean. Not after what he’s done. Not after Lyn… not after the hatchlings… I will make him suffer. Even if it kills me. Even if I have to drag him to hell myself."

His breath came in gasps, tears cutting through the grime on his face. 

“Please. Let me have this one thing.”