Lackey's Seducing Survival Odyssey

Chapter 1690: LET’S KICK OFF OUR WONDERFUL CARNAGE~ Part~2

[Reader discretion advised]"Peekaboo~"

"KYAAAAAA!!"

"MOOMMMMYYY!!"

"AAWWEEEEEEE!!"

The children erupted into terrified screams when a face suddenly appeared upside down from above the table.

Lackey’s rabbit mask hung at an unnatural angle while a disturbing smile spread across his face.

He chuckled softly while observing their horrified reactions.

"It’s alright~ Daddy isn’t going to hurt you."

He said with a wicked tone that made a shiver run down the children’s spines.

Every instinct in their bodies screamed that something was wrong.

They couldn’t explain why.

They couldn’t understand what exactly frightened them so much.

Yet every word coming from the rabbit-masked stranger felt unnatural, and every movement he made seemed slightly disconnected from how a normal person should behave.

"Oh, come on~" Lackey continued while resting his chin against the tabletop.

"I love kids, you know~

I absolutely adore them~

They’re funny, energetic, creative, and endlessly entertaining~

I would never hurt any of you little gremlins, so you should really believe me~"

The children immediately shook their heads so hard.

"NOOOO!"

The response arrived with such speed and conviction that even Lackey paused.

For several seconds, he simply stared at them before an amused laugh escaped his mouth.

"Well... that’s honestly kind of insultinggggg~Hehe~"

The children responded by hugging each other even tighter while staring at him with tear-filled eyes, completely convinced that whatever stood before them was not someone they should trust under any circumstances.

"L-Leave us alone!"

"T-The Beta soldiers will come and kill all of you!"

The children screamed in terror while huddling together beneath the overturned furniture. Tears streamed down their faces, their small bodies trembled uncontrollably, and every frightened glance they exchanged carried the desperate hope that someone would arrive to save them before the nightmare standing before them could get any closer.

Lackey tilted his head slightly while listening to their threats, then his head disappeared.

Causing several of the children to believe he had lost interest in them.

Relief immediately appeared across their faces as they believed that he was scared and ran away; however,

"Caught you~"

Lackey suddenly grabbed the overturned table and lifted it into the air with effortless strength before tossing it aside.

The children immediately screamed and scrambled in every direction, desperately attempting to escape despite having nowhere meaningful to run.

Before any of them could create even a few meters of distance, Lackey reached forward and seized one of the children by the neck before lifting him from the ground... with a pure indifferent expression.

"N-No... M-Mommy..."

The child desperately struggled for air while kicking and twisting in panic. His hands clawed at Lackey’s wrist in a futile attempt to break free, and tears continuously rolled down his face as terror overwhelmed every other emotion within him.

Lackey remained completely motionless while staring into the child’s eyes.

His expression carried no visible anger.

No visible pleasure.

No visible excitement.

Instead, he looked as though he were searching for something hidden behind the fear filling the child’s gaze.

"Yes... Keep looking at me," The dark voice came again, "Compare those eyes to the eyes of the child who begged for death. Tell me... what is the difference between them? What makes one life worthy of sympathy while the other is discarded and forgotten? What’s the fucking difference in both of their eyes?"

Lackey continued staring at him as countless memories surfaced from the depths of his mind.

*This is the same kind of filth that looks down on others and treats us like garbage,* he muttered coldly. *There is no understanding in those eyes. There is no guilt. There is no awareness of the suffering inflicted upon others.*

A familiar voice answered from somewhere deep within his thoughts.

"Hehe... exactly. Look at him carefully. If you allow him to survive, he will grow up believing the same lies and prejudices as the people surrounding him. The fear in his eyes today will become hatred tomorrow, and that hatred will eventually be directed toward your people. Why hesitate when the outcome is already obvious?

Kill him! Make sure to feel the life sniffing out of it!!"

Lackey’s fingers slowly tightened around the child’s neck.

The child immediately began struggling harder.

"L-Let me go..."

His voice cracked beneath the pressure as his eyes rolled back in pain.

"M-Mommy... sniff... D-Daddy... sniff... it hurts... arrh... It hurts... mo-momm...""

The words struck something buried deep within Lackey.

For the briefest moment, his expression wavered.

The pressure around the child’s neck weakened.

His fingers twitched involuntarily and flinched back as though another part of him had suddenly awakened and rejected what he was doing...

However,

"Looks like I need to remind you," the Dark voice whispered.

"Or perhaps I need to make you remember~"

A cold sensation spread through the back of Lackey’s head.

Dark mist slowly emerged from behind him before transforming into countless shadowy fingers that crawled across his face. The black hands covered his vision completely, and the world around him gradually dissolved into darkness before another scene began taking shape before his eyes.

A pregnant woman appeared.

She was running.

Fear dominated every movement as she desperately tried to escape from something pursuing her.

Her breathing was ragged.

Tears streamed down her face.

Desperation filled her eyes.

Behind her, a towering mech-suit advanced with a rotating saw on its hand and swung it towards the pregnant woman... without mercy.

Lackey felt his breathing become uneven.

"N-No..."

The vision continued relentlessly.

"No"

The saw pierced her stomach!

"NO!"

And in the next instant, the memory shifted.

And in the next instant, the vision changed once again. A woman lay motionless upon the blood-soaked ground, with only the upper half of her body remaining intact... Beneath her torn abdomen rested a tiny, fragile form beside her, just like the woman it lied... connected by the flesh between Mother and Child as the last remnants of connection.

Lackey’s entire body stiffened.

"Tell me something."

The vision remained fixed before him.

"What exactly did that unborn child do wrong?"

The question echoed through his mind.

"What crime justified that fate? What sin did it commit before it even opened its eyes and witnessed the world for the first time?"

The darkness around him seemed to tighten.

"They never hesitated. They never questioned whether it was right. They never cared about innocence, fairness, or mercy. They simply decided that your people were worthless and acted accordingly."

The voice grew colder with every word.

"And yet here you are, hesitating to kill a brat who will one day grow up and come after your people. Is that really what you want?

Do you really believe your people would thank you for this hesitation?"

The horrific memory remained before him.

"Do you want to watch your people suffer again?

Do you want more innocents to die because you lacked the resolve to act when you had the chance?

If they saw you hesitating right now, they would probably think it would have been better to die than place their hopes in someone who couldn’t even claim the revenge for their life that never sinned!"

"..."

"And you talk about getting revenge? How pathetic."

"..."

The dark voice didn’t need an answer because the silence itself revealed everything it wanted to know.

The accusation lingered inside his mind while the horrifying memories continued circling through his thoughts, and when the darkness finally receded from his vision, reality gradually returned around him.

The hesitation that had briefly surfaced moments ago disappeared from his expression. The stiffness in his fingers faded, only to be replaced by a cold certainty that slowly spread across his face.

His eyes didn’t waver anymore, and they became unreadable, and whatever conflict had existed within him seemed to sink beneath a layer of emotionless calm.

Just as his grip began tightening again and ready to snap the child’s neck—

Thuck!

Lackey’s eyes widened slightly when a rock suddenly struck the child’s head with surprising force.

For a brief moment, he simply stared at the screaming child that never reached his ears as if he had closed everything... before tilting his head toward the source of the attack.

A skeleton stood nearby.

It was one of the same skeletons that had spent years being mocked, humiliated, and pelted with rocks by careless children who treated its suffering as entertainment.

Without hesitation, Lackey released the child and allowed the body to fall to the ground.

The skeleton slowly walked forward and retrieved the stone.

Then it struck again.

And again.

And again.

The repeated blows felt less like an attack and more like the release of years of buried resentment. Every movement carried the weight of countless humiliations, as though the creature was desperately trying to reclaim something that had been stolen from it long ago.

Nor was it the only one.

Throughout the path, other skeletal liches had begun dragging away terrified children. Their hollow eye sockets burned with madness while manic laughter echoed from their bony jaws. Years of imprisonment, ridicule, and abuse had twisted whatever remained of their sanity, leaving behind only bitterness and an overwhelming desire to lash out at the world that had treated them as nothing more than objects of amusement.

"TKTKTKTKTKTKKKKK!!!"

Their unsettling laughter spread through the ruined Zoo like a plague.

Lackey silently watched the scene unfold before him.

The screams, the panic, and the chaos failed to stir even the slightest reaction within his heart.

No pity surfaced.... No sympathy emerged.... No emotion appeared at all.

It was as though every emotion that might have reacted to such a sight had simply vanished, leaving behind an empty void where his conscience once stood.

The realisation felt strange, yet even that strangeness failed to move him, as though something deep within his soul had finally... shut down forever!

Lackey turned away from the scene and continued forward without another glance. His attention shifted toward a wounded guard dragging himself across the bloodstained pavement.

The man’s legs were ruined, one arm bent at an unnatural angle, and every movement looked agonising.

Lackey casually approached him before grabbing a handful of his hair and forcing his head upward.

"Where is the zoo’s control room?"

The guard trembled uncontrollably, his face covered with tears and mucus as terror completely overwhelmed him.

"P-Please... n-no... I didn’t do anything... please..."

Lackey didn’t respond.

Instead, he grabbed the man’s hair and yanked his head upward with brutal force.

"ARRRRHHH!!!!"

The guard’s scream echoed across the area as agony shot through his body.

"Tell me where the control room is," Lackey said coldly. "Otherwise, this conversation is going to become much worse for you."

The man’s remaining resistance immediately crumbled.

"I-It’s near the C-C-Central Zone," he stammered through panicked breaths. "B-Behind the Orc habitats. P-Please let me go... I-I have a family—"

Crack!

The guard’s body instantly went limp.

His neck twisted backwards instantly. Lackey silently stared at the man’s head, which now hung at an unnatural angle while the torn muscles and tendons around his neck stretched disturbingly beneath the skin.

*Everyone has...*

The words escaped his mouth in a quiet mutter before taking an ID from the dead man’s pocket, and he continued walking toward his destination.

Several moments later, several flying drones emerged from behind the surrounding structures.

Unlike the military drones he had encountered days ago, these machines possessed... low quality?

Not sure... but he could see it was low quality!

There were ten of them.

Each drone immediately locked onto Lackey.

A crimson warning light swept across his body.

[THREAT IDENTIFIED]

[ENGAGING HOSTILE TARGET]

The drones accelerated simultaneously.

Blue energies ignited behind them, leaving glowing trails across the air as they moved into a coordinated assault formation.

Lackey merely smiled.

"Oh? The zoo’s personal security force?"

His fingers casually pulled the cartridge from his weapon.

Click.

In one smooth motion, the rear chamber opened and released an Origin Core Crystal that flew towards the incoming drones.

[ELIMINATE TARGET]

Without hesitation, they fired.

Dozens of blue energy beams erupted through the air.

The attack resembled a web of concentrated light converging toward a single point.

The moment those beams struck the Origin Core Crystal, the surrounding atmosphere distorted violently.

BAM!

Thin cracks spread across the crystal’s surface.

The drones continued firing.

More energy poured into the crystal.

More cracks appeared.

The patterns surrounding it accelerated until they became little more than rings of blinding white light.

Crack!

The crystal suddenly collapsed inward.

For a fraction of a second, every bit of energy is compressed into a point smaller than a fingertip.

Then-

BOOOOOMMMMMMMM!!!

The resulting shockwave expanded outward like a white tidal wave.

Lackey took a single step backwards and closed his eyes briefly as the force washed over him.

Dust and smoke rolled past him.

When the shockwave finally faded, only burning wreckage remained... drone broken pieces fell down like rain.

A slight frown appeared on his face.

"Interesting."

His gaze lingered on the falling debris.

*It’s the same Origin Core Crystal as before, yet the resulting destructive output increased significantly.*

*The concentrated energy beams must have destabilised the itching process we did on it and amplified the chain reaction beyond normal parameters... Interesting~*

The thought remained with him for a moment.

Then he shrugged.

His destination remained ahead.

Without sparing another glance toward the burning remains of the drones, Lackey slipped his hands into his pockets and continued walking toward the control room while distant screams, explosions, and emergency alarms merged into a single chaotic symphony behind him.

"NOOO!"

"Someone help me!"

"Save me!"

"My baby!"

"ARRHHHH!"

Lackey nodded with a satisfied smile as the distant screams echoed throughout the collapsing Zoo.

To anyone else, those cries would have sounded horrifying, but to him, they felt almost intoxicating.

The fear, the pain, the desperate pleas for help, the endless chorus of suffering, and the sight of blood staining the world around him created a twisted sense of fulfilment that he hadn’t felt in a very long time.

For the first time in what felt like an eternity, the thirst consuming his soul seemed to be easing.

Yet even that...

"It’s not enough," Lackey muttered coldly.

The smile gradually disappeared from his face.

No matter how much chaos unfolded around him, no matter how many screams reached his ears, and no matter how much blood was spilled across the Zoo, a hollow feeling still lingered deep inside him.

Something remained unsatisfied!

Using his skill, he vanished from his location and instantly reappeared behind the Orc Habitat near the Central Zone. His gaze immediately landed upon a reinforced security door hidden behind the artificial environment, and a wicked grin slowly spread across his face as he slipped both hands into his pockets.

"Hehe~ Daddy’s coming~"

His laughter carried through the air as he casually approached the entrance.

Meanwhile, deep within his consciousness, beyond the Domains and layers after layers of depth...

A pure white space stretched endlessly in every direction.

Within that endless expanse stood a solitary deep black door.

Before the door stood a silent figure clad in black mist-like armour. The entity resembled a guardian stationed before prison or something, remaining completely motionless while staring toward the endless white sky above.

Despite the emptiness surrounding it, the figure appeared to be watching events occurring far beyond that realm.

A faint chuckle escaped from beneath the dark armour.

"Hmm... not bad. He’s doing far better than I expected."

"It’s a pity he didn’t kill that little thing earlier, but that hardly matters anymore. The important part is that he finally stopped hesitating.

The moment that hesitation disappeared from his heart, everything changed."

"Just a little more pressure. Just a little more lovely pressure, and he’ll finally be ready. Hehehe..."

The figure’s laughter echoed throughout the white void before it gradually lowered its gaze toward its own hand.

"Isn’t that right... LOG?"

Resting upon its palm floated a small Periwinkle glittering Star.

The moment the black mist surrounding the figure touched the star, the tiny celestial object trembled violently as though reacting to something profoundly unnatural.

[...]