Blood rushed from the wound, and Phepheroni's grip on her weakened. She fell to her feet as he dropped to his knees, his hand clutching his blood-stained apron.
"What have you..." he began to say, his face slowly tilting upward, his eyes widening. His furry visage turned pale. "What have you done, peeper girl?"
Akemi squatted down and put a comforting hand on his shoulder. She saw her fingers shaking, ever subtly; for any other person, it would be due to nerves. Burying metal into the chest of some innocent chef would cause most normal people a fair bit of panic, but she hadn't felt anything but... adrenaline. A giddy sort of dominion. This was her afterlife, after all. She wasn't going to waste it contemplating philosophy. For all she knew, he would just get reincarnated again, just like she had, a muddy jacket caught in life's turbulent washing machine.
Her mind had been long dead, cradled by meaningless jobs and ever-present depression, but now. God, she felt alive.
So she saw it like this: There was no real murder when there was no real end. He was a target, she was the arrowhead. As fair as fate itself.
“Sorry, mate, but this is on you. You’re the one who made the awful mistake of being a hero,” she said. Then she froze, a doubt crossing her mind. “You are a hero, right?”
Before he could answer, his body went slack. The knife in his mouth clattered to the ground.
Three notifications instantly popped up in her field of view.
Villainous Achievement Unlocked! [The Overachiever]
You killed someone triple your level. You should probably be glad you’re not dead!
[+200 XP] [ -50 Reputation]
Villainous Achievement Unlocked! [Hero Killer]
… Wow, the CHEF?
[+500 XP] [ -100 Reputation]
Villainous Achievement Unlocked! [Greater Hero Killer]
Let me reiterate. Of all the people in this ginormous hall, you really had to go and kill the CHEF? The provider of pizza? The great wizard of spaghetti? Now that really is cruel. But, in your position, a very wise choice. Every single person in this hall admired Phepheroni. That made him a very reputable man indeed. Not just a Hero, but a Greater Hero. Well done.
[+1000 XP] [ -200 Reputation]
Akemi grinned. She had been scared for a moment that her side mission had been for naught, but her hunch had been right; there’s no one more beloved than the cook.
You have leveled up! [Lv. 2 -> Lv. 3]
[+1 SP] [+1 STR, +1 DEX, +1 INT, +1 CHA] [+10 HP, +2 MP]
You have leveled up! [Lv. 3 -> Lv. 4]
[+1 SP] [+1 STR, +1 DEX, +1 INT, +1 CHA] [+10 HP, +2 MP]
Two entire levels? Glorious.
Adrenaline surged through her veins, and she found herself grinning wider than she had in months. The action felt unnatural, like a phantom limb coming to life, and she padded at her lips just to check they really were there. It was stupid and silly, but she felt relieved that her mouth could even still move like that.
See, for as long as Akemi could recall, she had been confined to her tiny, festering swamp of a room, drowning in takeout containers and laundry, interminably burning at the stake of her regrets and unfulfilled aspirations. Her sole escape had been the characters she built and embodied in video games: the devilish rogues, the cutthroat bards…
But now, there was no escaping. There was no need to escape. These were her bloodstained hands. These were actions and their deadly consequences.
She laughed to herself, giddy. She had never felt happier to be alive.
A loud knocking came at the door, bringing her out of her thoughts.
“Chef?” a nervous voice asked. “You alright in there? It’s been awhile.”
Shit. She froze. They weren’t supposed to come check on him.
“Uh… yes, we’re fine. Get back to chopping!” Akemi yelled.
“Huh? Who are you? You don’t sound like Chef.”
Akemi cleared throat, summoning an Italian accent from somewhere deep inside of her cultureless pit of a brain.
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“Be quiet!” she bellowed. She winced. It did not sound convincing. “I am conducting business!”
Persuasion Check (Easy)
Failed!
You’ve gotta be kidding me.
“Chef, you don’t sound too good. We’re coming in.” The lock jiggled. “Shit, the door’s locked…”
“I’ll grab Veni, he can pop that thing right off.”
Akemi tensed. Crap. Stupid low Charisma score. If they got in here and found her with the body, she’d have no chance. There were at least ten of them, backed by an army of hungry heroes clutching their lunch trays just outside.
She frantically scanned the room for any escape route. Her eyes darted around, but there were no other doors, just stacks of paper and beat-up cardboard. She looked towards the ceiling, and spotted a grate. My salvation, she thought, scrambling towards the chair. But first, she grabbed the chef’s knife. Rule one: always loot the body.
You have acquired [Phepheroni’s Well-Seasoned Butcher’s Knife]
Closing out the notification, she clambered from the chair onto the table and strained her limbs as she reached for the grate. Standing at a modest 5 feet 6 inches, or 167 centimeters, she couldn't quite reach it without jumping. With a determined push, she leaped, trying to force the grate open, but it remained stubbornly immobile.
“Stupid thing,” she growled.
She tried using [Knife Fingers] on it, but the material was some kind of reinforced metal that her razorblades couldn't penetrate. Moreover, there were at least ten screws holding it in place. She briefly considered using the tip of Phepheroni’s knife to try and unscrew them one by one, but that would likely ruin the knife and, even more likely, result in an unfortunate eyeball incident.
“We found Veni, Chef!” the voice yelled, accompanied by a pounding on the door. “We’re going to bust this lock open. Back away from the door!”
Akemi clenched her teeth and glared at the grate. There seemed to be no other option; she’d have to use a sledgehammer to solve a screwdriver’s problem.
“[Orb of Pestilent Bloodlust]!”
The red, glowing sphere of bees and locusts surged out of her hands again, levitating in the air just below the grate. As Veni pried at the door lock, Akemi guided the sphere upwards. A triumphant grin crept across her face as the insects devoured the metal, gnawing at it with the fervor of a hungry dog attacking a shepherd's pie. Even more promising: there was a small handlebar further up the vent. Now all she had to do was reach it.
With a powerful leap, she stretched her arm towards the handlebar, but her grasp came up short, causing her to tumble back onto the table.
“Just a little more now, boss!” Veni called out. “We got you!”
She huffed. Stupid legs.
She made a quick, reckless decision to gain momentum. She retreated to the beginning of the long table, clearing off the scattered files. With a burst of speed, she sprinted forward, leaping right at the table's edge and reaching out to catch the handlebar.
Contact!
She clung to it, her legs swinging beneath her like a child on the playground monkey bars. Straining, she heaved herself up, groaning audibly as she aimed for the next handlebar, then the next, until her entire body was inside the vent.
She breathed heavily, trembling from exertion. I’m so out of shape. The supernatural boost she got from her initial stats made the jump possible, but there was only so far that her inflated Strength could take her. But she had to keep going, or else—
With a loud click, the door to the backroom opened. It slammed against the wall, and several bodies rushed in, their white chef hats visible just below her feet.
“Oh my gods, Phepheroni! There’s been a murder!”
Come on, arms, do something. Her fingers trembling, she climbed higher and higher. The darkness of the vents closed in around her, forcing her to rely solely on her sense of touch to find the next bar.
“He was struck straight through the apron,” one of the chefs remarked. “These marks… It’s like he was stabbed with five incredibly thin daggers…”
“But where did the killer go?”
The chefs' voices echoed faintly through the metal vent, growing tinny and distant as she ascended. She pressed on, her forearms trembling with fatigue. She knew she wouldn't be able to hold on for much longer before she came plummeting back down.
How far up does this motherfucker go?
“The vent, it’s been blown right off! He must have gone through there!”
A muffin top hat appeared directly beneath her feet, its wearer peering upward into the darkness of the vent with wide, startled eyes. The sight almost caused Akemi to lose her grip, but she forcefully suppressed her fear.
“I don’t see anything up there,” the chef said, scratching his head. “Just darkness and more darkness. The killer must have made off real fast.”
Akemi kept climbing. Two more handlebars, and the vent made a sharp right angle, allowing her to switch from climbing to crawling.
After lifting herself into the flat, crawlable section, relief poured over her. For a brief moment, she rested her forehead on the cold surface of the vent, and breathed.
Man. The worst part of murder is getting caught.
Resolute to get herself the hell out of there, she raised her head and kept crawling. The ruckus from the kitchen got more and more distant. If someone was going to follow her, they hadn’t tried to yet. The chefs were like headless chickens without their leader, just uselessly flapping their mouths and waving around their knives until help arrived.
After a few more minutes of crawling in the claustrophobic tunnel of metal, light touched her deprived eyes. Daylight. She was coming up on another grate, with four slits that allowed her to peer through at what lay above.
Looking through, she saw something strange – the sky. A blue expanse dotted with white.
Did I reach the roof?
She used her orb again, gently devouring the metal and then dispelling the locusts. Then she heaved her body up onto the flat stone with a groan, her dark-rimmed eyes slowly adjusting to the daylight. As she began to take in her surroundings, she realized she had made it to some sort of widow’s walk. Surrounding her was a border of stone, a shallow, circular fence of rock.
She groggily raised her body and stepped forward. She could see the entire region around the hall: the front yard, the back; the surrounding forests that she had crash-landed into like a comet flung from space. She could see everything, like a queen glancing upon her vast domain.
For a moment, she allowed herself to just bask in it; she pretended that she really was that queen. She let herself grin, and laugh, and shake off the exhaustion in her limbs, bathing in the warm light of day like it was a spotlight meant especially for her. A circular halo of light begging her to take a bow.
So she did, humoring herself. She bowed to an audience of one, herself.
First hero disemboweled, many more to come.
Almost as if it sensed her thoughts, the System served her a notification.
Quest Complete! Accountant Training
* Kill a hero [1/1]
Reward:
* Rank 2 Accountant Skills have been unlocked
You have received a new quest, open it?
Forgetting the urgency of her situation, she feverishly toggled yes.