Chapter 69: The Malevolent Gourmet (2)

“According to the vote results, for the sake of us all, you will have to make the sacrifice.”

The person the hunter pointed to was a middle-aged woman who looked to be in her forties.

She had large wounds on her thighs and ankles, making it difficult for her to move.

Soon, the woman cried out as if wailing.

“This… this is unfair! It’s unfair that I… that I was chosen—!”

Yet the others deliberately turned away from her desperate screams.

The emotion they felt right now was not guilt, but relief.

One by one, people began to speak.

“Ahem, it was a democratic vote.”

“That’s right. You agreed to the vote too, ma’am.”

“Don’t waste your strength and just accept the result gracefully.”

“Hurry and get into the pit! Don’t make us the bad guys!”

Words of persuasion and threats flew from all directions.

Those whose survival was now assured were desperate to protect their own safety.

“N-No… I have parents at home I need to take care of… and children…”

The woman chosen as the sacrifice began to sob.

At the sight of her tears, people turned their gazes away one by one.

They wanted to look away.

From the fact that this person, reduced to nothing more than a “sacrifice,” was someone’s precious daughter and someone’s cherished mother.

But there was no other way.

If someone else didn’t die, then I would.

This was that kind of place.

At that moment, I—who had just finished my “consultation” with the skeleton chef—joined the group.

Seeing me, the middle-aged woman pointed and shouted.

“That person hasn’t voted yet! He still hasn’t voted! He really hasn’t…!”

She collapsed onto the floor, sobbing.

But even she already knew.

Fourteen people had voted her as the sacrifice.

Everyone except herself had voted for her.

In other words, even if I participated, the result wouldn’t change.

Still, the hunter who was moderating came over and handed me a ballot.

“You’re right. Everyone should participate. It has to be democratic.”

Without a word, I quickly wrote on the ballot and handed it back.

The hunter’s expression twisted violently the moment he checked it.

“…”

Soon, he showed my ballot to everyone.

“Huh?”

“What the hell is that?”

“Is this a joke?”

Their reactions weren’t much different.

Because this was written on the ballot I submitted:

[Victim: Everyone]

The hunter glared at me, frowning deeply.

“What the hell does this mean?”

He looked ready to draw his sword at any second.

I answered calmly.

“Do you know the idiom sipsiilban—everyone contributing a little?”

“What kind of nonsense…”

“I have a good idea. A way for everyone to sacrifice, yet no one has to die.”

And so, I began explaining the plan to the group.

***

A short while later.

Including me, everyone stood in a circle around the pit in the Appetite Section.

Murmurs soon rose among them.

“Is this really going to work?”

“I’m not sure… Hmm…”

“Let’s just try. We’ve got nothing to lose, right?”

“If it doesn’t work, we can always go back to the original plan.”

The strategy I explained was simple.

The skeleton chef had only one demand.

“One person’s worth of body.”

More precisely, forty kilograms of human ingredients had to be thrown into the pit.

Meat, organs, bones, skin—plus all kinds of secretions and waste byproducts included.

Soon, I shouted loudly.

“Alright, let’s start! We don’t have time! Only thirty minutes left—hurry!”

At the same moment, people began throwing things into the pit.

Thud— Thud thud thud— Thud thud thud thud thud—!

Liquids and solid clumps poured down like hail.

Closely shaven hair, fingernails and toenails clipped from hands and feet, dead skin and calluses scraped from elbows and heels, full-body grime scrubbed off.

On top of that, snot, saliva, phlegm, sweat, blood, urine—every kind of bodily fluid and waste—was tossed inside.

If you collect all the byproducts that come out of a human body, the amount is astonishing.

The skeleton chef wanted at least forty kilograms of human ingredients.

If sixteen people each contributed about 2.5 kilograms of byproducts, the mission would be cleared.

Then, the woman who had been chosen as the sacrifice spoke to me.

“Thank you… student… really, thank you…”

Tears welled in her eyes, ready to fall at any moment.

I patted her shoulder and said,

“No problem at all. Ah, please cry into the pit.”

“…Right. Of course.”

She cut off a large handful of hair along with her tears and threw it in.

At that instant.

Ding-dong!

<Human ingredient total weight: +11.9 kg>

The weight of the “human ingredients” accumulated in the pit so far appeared before my eyes.

…11.9 kilograms. Not bad.

The biggest contributor by far was hair.

Human hair is surprisingly heavy; waist-length hair weighs roughly 200-300 grams, shoulder-length about 100-150 grams.

For the average man, a buzz cut yields around 50 grams.

If we take the average hair weight as 150 grams, sixteen people’s hair alone would amount to roughly 2-3 kilograms.

Fortunately, more than half of the sixteen were women.

Snip— Snip— Snip— Snip—

People cut their hair as short as possible and threw it in.

They looked pathetic, like new military recruits, but it was far better than dying.

Soon, the newly buzz-cut group started plucking eyebrows, eyelashes, beards, nose hair—everything—and tossing them in.

Some kept spitting saliva, while others closed their eyes tightly and dropped their pants.

Those who had nothing left cut their fingers and palms with knives, letting blood drip in.

Ding-dong!

<Human ingredient total weight: +12.5 kg>

Ding-dong!

<Human ingredient total weight: +18.3 kg>

Ding-dong!

<Human ingredient total weight: +22.1 kg>

Ding-dong!

<Human ingredient total weight: +29.4 kg>

When about five minutes remained.

Ding-dong!

<Human ingredient total weight: +35 kg>

We had successfully reached 35 out of 40 kilograms.

Only 5 kilograms left.

However…

“Ugh, how much more blood do we have to bleed?”

“Forty kilos is inhumanely too much!”

“I have no more hair to pluck…”

“How are we supposed to make up the last five kilos…?”

Everyone looked utterly wretched.

Saliva, sweat, blood, nails, dead skin, waste, body hair—everything had been poured in.

There was literally nothing left to give.

That was when I noticed a woman wearing a hat pulled low over her face.

She glanced around nervously, then quietly tossed a black clump of fur into the pit.

What was that? It didn’t look like hair…

Sure enough.

Ding-dong!

<WARNING!>

<WARNING!>

<WARNING!>

<WARNING!>

Warning messages began flashing furiously above the pit.

At the same time.

[You filthy vermin…! How dare you…! Contaminate sacred ingredients with dirty garbage…!]

A voice boiling with rage echoed deafeningly through the slaughterhouse.

The skeleton chef approached, its bones creaking with every step.

Crimson light blazed from its sunken eye sockets.

Another message appeared.

Ding-dong!

<Foreign substance not classified as human ingredient detected!>

<Foreign substance: Synthetic fiber 180 g>

Synthetic fiber? Don’t tell me…!

I looked at the woman in the hat.

She had gone pale and was trembling anxiously.

My eyes fell on the black jeans she wore.

Threads of black synthetic fiber were sticking out from the torn hem.

Meeting my gaze, she stammered with a deathly pale face.

“I-I’m sorry…! I thought… just a little wouldn’t be noticed…”

But she couldn’t finish her sentence.

—Slash!

“Kgh… ugh… ah…”

The skeleton chef had cleaved her from head to groin with its massive butcher knife.

Blood sprayed like a fountain.

Spluuuurt—

Flesh and organs scattered over the blood-soaked floor.

The woman’s body tilted and fell into the pit.

In an instant, the slaughterhouse became hell on earth.

“E-EEEEEEK—!?”

“KYAAAAAAA—!”

“Sh-she’s dead…!”

But the screams didn’t last long.

Slash~! Slash~! Thud!

The chef’s cleaver indiscriminately cut people down.

Throats were severed, waists torn apart, heads split in half.

Spluuuurt—!

The interior turned into a mess of corpses, blood, flesh, and brain matter.

A river of blood flowed across the black tiles.

Meanwhile, the skeleton chef’s movements were so fast they were hard to follow with the eyes.

Its speed is even faster than Jeanne’s.

Then the hunter standing opposite me screamed in fury.

“You fucking…! If you had just killed that woman…! Thrown her into the pit…! None of this would have—because of you we’re all—!”

Slash—!

The hunter’s enraged face rolled into the pit.

A moment later, his headless body followed.

I quickly assumed a combat stance.

Guess I have no choice but to use the Seven Demons First Strike.

From what I had observed, the skeleton chef was at least A+ rank, possibly higher.

I wanted to save my S-rank skill for later, but fighting half-heartedly now could get me killed instead.

At that moment, the skeleton chef fixed its gaze on me.

And at the same time.

BOOM!

It charged, crushing the floor tiles beneath its feet.

A cleaver the size of a pot lid swung down toward me.

…No choice.

—Ding-dong!

<Skill ‘Seven Demons First Strike: Gluttony Slash, Beelzebub’ activated.>

Black demonic energy erupted from my entire body, spreading in all directions.

In that instant.

It stopped dead.

The skeleton chef corrected its posture, then abruptly turned around.

And said,

[…I have received full payment.]

“?”

[These hands exist to express the blessings of heaven and the delicacies of the mountains and seas. I have no intention of wasting time on barbaric fighting.]

As if nothing had happened, it strode thud thud thud back to the butchering table.

Then I noticed the message floating above the pit.

Ding-dong!

<Human ingredient total weight: +400.0 kg>

…No way.

The skeleton chef’s earlier words flashed through my mind.

[…Do not even think of playing tricks. If you toy with the food, you will pay tenfold.]

Tenfold.

So it literally meant it would take ten times the amount.

The pit was now filled to the brim with the corpses of everyone the chef had slaughtered.

It had originally demanded 40 kilograms of human ingredients.

After receiving exactly ten times that—400 kilograms—it stopped the massacre.

I looked around.

Blood and flesh splattered everywhere. Scattered pieces of corpses.

A scene straight out of hell.

In this hell, only eight people, including me, had survived.

At that moment, a large gate appeared in the center of the slaughterhouse.

I stepped toward it.

If I couldn’t go back, the only way was forward.

Soon, I passed through the gate leading to the next floor.

—Ding-dong!

<Entering the third section of the Physiological Needs Layer!>