Chapter 235

Chapter 235

The laws of physics do not ascribe grand meanings to life and death.  

Life is motion, and death is stillness.  

It is simply movement and cessation.  

The boy Jafa loved came to a stop in the wasteland, and his corpse rotted away.  

Jafa could not even recover the body before moving forward.  

On that day, a storm of emotions must have raged within her.  

"Kato……."  

Jafa murmured the boy's name. Wrapped tightly in fabric that concealed her body, she walked under the blistering sun.  

After the boy's death, Jafa’s memories became fragmented. Only the most deeply ingrained events surfaced as simulated recollections.  

At some point, the wasteland ended, and settlements and villages began appearing at regular intervals.  

However, the people turned hostile upon recognizing Jafa as a Tajirun. The reputation of the Tajirun people was infamous.  

"When Kato was here……."  

Jafa trailed off and shook her head. If the human boy had been with her, things would have been better than this.  

A Tajirun in isolation was weak. It became clear why exile was a dreadful punishment. The exiled bore the weight of the sins and immorality committed by their kin.  

Jafa had survived countless brushes with death. She had eaten strange fruits and writhed in agony for three nights and days, fled from the beasts of Planet Novus, and hurled herself into a raging current.  

She rarely had proper meals. At night, she dozed in a constant state of alert, fearing pursuit from her family.  

"Bo… der City……."  

At last, her destination appeared in the distance. It was smaller than it would become, but even then, it was a city of skyscrapers and blinding lights.  

Jafa walked toward Border City.  

The hands visible in my field of vision were emaciated and dry. Her steps were painfully slow.  

Of course, Border City was no paradise. It was simply the only place left to go.  

‘A city that rejects no one.’  

Upon arrival, Jafa collapsed from exhaustion. She staggered a few more steps down an alley, supporting herself against the wall, before sinking to the ground.  

‘Jafa has finally reached her limit. Even her last shred of willpower must have crumbled.’  

Her body could no longer move by sheer force of will. Now that she had arrived, the weight of fatigue must have crashed down on her, and the tenuous thread holding her together had snapped.  

Until now, she had endured mechanically, driven only by a vague goal.  

‘It was only upon arriving that she realized the emptiness of it all—that none of it meant anything.’  

Jafa had only ever wanted to come here with her lover.  

Border City held no hope.  

Jafa had even given up resisting the world and was inching toward stillness.  

Swish.

Jafa opened her eyes at the sound of movement. A group of vagrants was rummaging through her body.  

"Tch! What kind of beggar is this?"  

A wad of yellow phlegm landed on Jafa’s head.  

Realizing there was nothing worth stealing from her, the vagrants soon disappeared.  

Jafa was dying in the alley. She had reached the point where even hunger no longer registered. Even her instinct for survival was fading.  

Shhh.  

Rain was falling. As Jafa’s body temperature dropped, her breaths grew faint.  

"An exiled Tajirun? Doesn't look fully grown yet… female—no, no, a woman."  

Someone spoke. The mechanical hum of a translator blended with the sound of the rain.  

Jafa’s vision was hazy. I, too, could barely make out the man’s form.  

But it was obvious who he was.  

‘Paolo Kwan.’  

Paolo had appeared for the first time. He extended an umbrella, shielding Jafa’s head from the rain.  

Rustle.  

Paolo retrieved a wrapped sandwich from his waist pouch.  

"This is my lunch. You can have it. There's nothing weird in it, so don’t worry."  

To prove his point, Paolo took a bite himself.  

"…Why?"  

"A kid is starving. I make my living through cooking, in my own way. It’s hard for me to just walk past that."  

A few more words were exchanged.  

Jafa hesitated before devouring the sandwich.  

Her slow bites gradually turned frantic. By the second sandwich, she was practically swallowing it whole.  

Her sense of taste was reviving, and her stomach would soon begin secreting digestive juices. It must have felt like her halted life was regaining momentum.  

"…It’s good."  

Jafa looked up. She could finally see Paolo’s face clearly. He was an utterly ordinary and peaceful-looking man.  

"Cooking is one of my few talents. I have a sensitive palate. I don’t particularly enjoy cooking, but you do what you have to do to survive."  

"I’ll repay you later."  

"You can repay me now. I happen to need an extra pair of hands at my restaurant. Tajirun have sensitive taste buds, right? You’d be good at seasoning. Half of cooking is getting the seasoning right."  

"If a Tajirun works there, you won’t have any customers."  

"You’ll only be working in the kitchen. My daughter will handle the serving. I’ll provide food and lodging, so just work for a couple of months before you go."  

"You’re… strangely kind."  

Jafa narrowed her slit pupils in suspicion, but Paolo simply shrugged.

"Tajirun are smart. In two months, you’ll have figured out how Border City works, and with even a little money, you should be able to live independently."  

Something in my intuition sensed an odd dissonance.  

I wanted to observe Paolo more closely, but this was Jafa’s memory. That meant it carried her subjective distortions.  

The Paolo I saw now was endlessly kind and gentle.  

Jafa hesitated, unable to answer right away. Just because she had eaten, the fact that she was already desperate for survival seemed to fill her with self-disgust.  

"…I’ll be in your care for a while."  

"I’m your employer now, so you should speak respectfully."  

"…Understood."  

"Good. What’s your name?"  

"‘Jafa.’"  

"That’s a nice name."  

Paolo smiled and extended his hand for a handshake. It should have been a touching moment.  

And yet, I felt nothing heartwarming about this.  

No matter how twisted I might be, it wasn’t as if I lacked this much sentimentality.  

…Something was off.  

* * *  

"I’ve hired workers from other races before, so the kitchen shouldn’t be too inconvenient for you. The sink height is adjustable, though you won’t need it yet."  

Paolo guided Jafa through the restaurant’s facilities.  

From then on, Jafa lived and worked at Paolo’s restaurant.  

‘Anguis Regina?’  

A memory of Anguis Regina from childhood surfaced. She looked drastically different from her post-surgery self.  

Paolo, with a headscarf wrapped around his head, carried out a plate of food and called for Anguis Regina.  

"Elize, food’s ready. Hurry up."  

At this time, Anguis Regina’s name was Elize Kwan.  

Around ten years old, she spent her evenings carrying plates in the restaurant.  

"U-um, h-here’s y-your f-food."  

Elize stammered and moved timidly, almost exuding an eerie presence.  

‘She’s like a completely different person now.’  

It was hard to believe she had grown up under such a warm and affectionate father. Her aura was overwhelmingly gloomy.  

"There were leftover ingredients, so I created this, Elize."  

Jafa spoke clumsily in the human language. Whenever work ended, she would make a small snack and offer it to Anguis Regina.  

"It’s not ‘created.’ It’s more correct to say ‘m-made.’"  

"Ah, I see. I made this with the leftover ingredients."  

Jafa corrected her wording and repeated the sentence.  

In that short moment, Elize snatched the snack away as if stealing it and immediately put distance between them.  

"Sorry about my daughter’s manners, Jafa. I lost my wife early, so I haven’t been able to give her enough attention."  

"It’s fine."

"In times like this, it's better to say, 'It’s all right.'"  

"It’s all right."  

As Paolo cleaned up the kitchen, he glanced up and down at Jafa.  

She flinched and avoided his gaze. Damn it, she was probably making an embarrassed expression.  

"Jafa, you've gained some weight. You look much better."  

"Thanks to you."  

"You’re still growing, so you’ll develop quickly. It looks like all your delayed growth is catching up at once. You’ll reach adulthood soon enough…."  

Paolo muttered to himself before stepping out of the restaurant for a while.  

Since it was just before closing, only Jafa and Anguis Regina remained inside.  

Munch, munch.  

Anguis Regina chewed on her snack, then slowly approached Jafa.  

"Would you like me to make more?"  

At Jafa’s question, Anguis Regina hesitated, scanning her surroundings before shaking her head.  

"Our… r-restaurant. S-staff… all g-gone in two… three months, at most."  

"M-maybe they just, ah, left to be independent?"  

"No. J-Jafa, y-you’re nice. S-so I’m t-telling you. D-don’t tell D-dad."  

With that, Anguis Regina distanced herself again.  

Jafa tilted her head in confusion. Even with all the hardship and struggles she had faced, she had yet to grasp the true stench of the world’s underbelly.  

Humans—no, intelligent beings—could be far more repulsive than we imagine.  

'Damn it…'  

It hit me at that moment.  

I finally understood why Jafa was unraveling such an unnecessary and lengthy recollection of her past.  

From the very first meeting, something had been off about Paolo Kwan.  

'Even I had trouble distinguishing the gender of a Tajirun. It's extremely difficult for human eyes.'  

Yet Paolo had instantly recognized that Jafa was female and not yet fully grown. Maybe he just had a particular taste for Tajirun, but…  

'No, that’s not it.'  

A sickening realization crawled through my mind. If it had simply been an attraction to other species, I could have brushed it off—I was familiar enough with that sort of thing.  

'Paolo would often watch Jafa closely.'  

And his gaze… was that of a chef assessing a slab of meat.  

He must have felt uneasy about Jafa’s rapid growth. After all, in most species, younger females… are considered the most exquisite delicacy.  

'Anguis Regina has an eerily sharp intuition. Even if she didn’t know the exact details, she must have suspected that the staff met a gruesome fate.'  

After seeing Jafa’s kind demeanor, Anguis Regina had given her a warning.  

But Jafa failed to interpret it quickly enough.  

Paolo acted before the two months were even up.

It was a night like any other when Jafa entered the small room in the corner of the restaurant to sleep.  

Swish.  

A faint noise stirred Jafa’s consciousness. Tajirun had sharp senses. Whoever was moving knew that and kept their sound incredibly low.  

Grab!  

Paolo pounced on Jafa.  

At first, Jafa seemed to think it was something of a sexual nature. She muttered for him to take his time.  

But she quickly realized something was off.  

Clank, clank.  

Before she knew it, she was shackled hand and foot, completely immobilized.  

"You seem awfully practiced at this. When people are shocked, how… how do they laugh again?"  

Jafa spoke, half-undressed. I was relieved that I was viewing this through Jafa’s eyes—I had no desire to see a Tajirun’s bare body.  

"You’re not as flustered as I expected. Must be thanks to all the things you’ve been through."  

Paolo operated his terminal and checked his schedule. Words flickered across the screen—Tajirun, female, meat, shipment.  

"Paolo, don’t tell me you’re… h-hohyohoh…."  

Jafa finally grasped his true intentions and trembled. She flicked her tongue quickly.  

"It’s unfortunate, Jafa. But if you think about it, I actually extended your life. So don’t resent me too much. I’m not a heartless man—I’ll explain my reasons. I have a personal research project I’d like to pursue. But research always requires money."  

"You’re… butchering another person…?"  

"I’ve never butchered another human before. But can we really call this the same species? I don’t think so."  

Paolo maintained his calm, quiet smile.  

"I’ve never heard anyone say Tajirun meat is tasty."  

Jafa forced the words out, trying to buy time.  

"There are plenty of wealthy degenerates who crave rare and exotic delicacies. Whether it tastes good or not doesn’t matter. If it’s a young female, it’ll sell for even more."  

Jafa tried asking more questions, but Paolo didn’t answer.  

Instead, he methodically began filming and laid out a row of slaughtering knives.  

Jafa was alive in the future. That meant, somehow, she had survived this moment.  

"If… if you need money… k-keeping me alive would be more… p-profitable."  

Jafa struggled to speak.  

The moment Paolo heard the word "money," he reacted. Smiling, he picked up a knife and a sharpening rod.  

"Convince me before I finish sharpening my knife."  

He dragged the blade back and forth across the rod as he spoke.  

Clang, clang.  

The sound was chilling.

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