"They're all mad…"
Darren's hands still trembled in the water bucket. Ripples spread ring after ring, mirroring his completely unsteady heartbeat at this moment.
He suddenly jerked his head up. Wet hair plastered to his face, those eyes no longer holding fear, but something forced out when fear was pushed to its absolute limit—an accusation made with reckless abandon.
"You turned them into madmen…"
His voice was hoarse, like sandpaper scraping his throat.
"You're living off those neighbors, draining them dry!"
The last few words, he roared.
After the roar, the cramped shack fell silent. That muffled, thunder-like roaring outside seemed to fade too, leaving only his own violent panting and the steady drip, drip of water from the bucket.
"This is a fucking cult!"
—
Scar stopped in his tracks.
He stood a few steps from Darren. That foot, about to step forward, suspended in mid-air, then slowly lowered back into place.
In the dimness, his intact eye widened slightly.
As if hearing some extremely absurd accusation. As if seeing an ant raise its front legs at him, challenging him to a duel. As if—in all his decades of life, he'd heard countless curses directed at him, but this one... this was a first.
Then, the corner of his mouth slowly curled.
It wasn't a friendly smile. It was something more primitive, something seeping straight from his bones.
"Living off neighbors?"
Scar raised an eyebrow. That old scar moved with it, looking grotesquely twisted in the dim light.
He didn't deny it.
Instead, he stepped forward with absolute self-righteousness.
"Yeah."
He said it lightly, as if commenting on the fine weather.
"That's exactly what makes old Scar a dangerous motherfucker."
He paused, as if savoring the taste of the words.
"Living off my own kind—so fucking what?"
—
He suddenly intensified his tone.
The sound hit like a blunt club, hammering ruthlessly into Darren's heart. Darren shuddered, his hands sinking another half-inch into the water bucket.
"I make the money—"
Scar deliberately paused. That intact eye locked intently onto Darren's ghastly pale face. He looked at him like a teacher awaiting an answer, or a predator admiring its prey.
"—flow backwards!!"
He raised his voice.
"So what?"
He pressed forward another step.
"You hear me? I have the juice. I make them willingly rip the gold teeth out of their own skulls and hand them to me! What about it?"
He reached out, his hand suddenly clenching the empty air as if grasping something tangible.
"What about it?"
—
"Living off neighbors…"
Scar chewed on these words. Like chewing a piece of dry, tasteless flatbread—chewing and chewing, until he extracted an entirely different flavor.
Then—
BAM!
He suddenly kicked over a broken wooden stool nearby.
The loud crash exploded in the cramped shack, like a gunshot against the wall. Darren shuddered violently. Water splashed everywhere from the bucket, hitting his face and soaking Scar's pant legs.
Scar's chest heaved, exhaling a heavy breath of stale air.
Those eyes—that single intact eye, now staring at Darren—became feverish and extremely aggressive.
"These gutter rats want a single shred of hope to change their pathetic lives—"
He hammered out the words, syllable by syllable.
"—they gotta pay the toll!"
"I hold the fucking leash!!"
He pressed forward another step, now standing mere inches from the bucket.
"I am their goddamn master!"
He tilted his head, his gaze nailing into Darren's face.
"So what?"
—
He suddenly lunged toward the bucket.
That face covered in dust, crossed by the hideous old scar, was now pressed almost directly against Darren's. He could see his own reflection in Darren's eyes—something manic, burning, a force belonging to no earthly definition.
"You think if they don't pay this money, don't come here to kneel and kowtow—"
His voice dropped to a dangerous whisper, but each word was like iron tempered in a forge.
"—they can survive?!"
Darren's lips moved, but nothing came out.
"If I hadn't given these people a 'god' to worship—"
The corner of Scar's mouth twisted into a mocking arc.
"—they'd have fucking killed themselves in some gutter long ago!"
He suddenly straightened up, looking down at Darren with an expression reserved for utter fools.
"Worrying about money? They wouldn't even have their lives!"
—
"Calling me a cult?"
Scar gave a cold laugh.
That laugh echoed in the cramped shack, grating like sandpaper scraping across stone.
"I never needed to brainwash them."
He extended a finger, circling it beside his temple twice.
"Never needed to force them to hurt themselves."
That finger then pointed straight at Darren.
"It has nothing to do with me!"
His voice suddenly rose to a shout.
"It's the fact that they can't survive in society!"
"It's that they're forced to devote themselves, sacrifice themselves, just to buy a scrap of peace of mind!"
He slammed his fist against the bucket's edge! The water violently shook, splashing over both of them.
"Not forced by me!"
"I'm not the one who made them this way!"
—
Then—
"Hahahahahahaha!"
Scar suddenly burst into loud laughter.
It echoed in the cramped shack—crazy, piercing, carrying an unbridled arrogance that saw through the hypocrisy of everything. It made Darren tremble. It made the scar on Scar's own face twist grotesquely.
Laughing, laughing... he suddenly stopped.
That face instantly shifted from manic laughter to extreme contempt.
"If you want to talk about cults—"
He pointed at the shack's roof, at the sky above Darerenz, at that high and mighty place he could never reach in this lifetime.
"—those bastards at the top are the real cult!"
" Their bullshit laws are the real cult!"
His finger jabbed viciously at the air, as if trying to pierce through an invisible ceiling.
"Butchering people like livestock, bleeding them dry and tossing the carcasses !"
His voice lowered again, drifting up like smoke from hell.
"—that is the real cult."
—
He looked down from on high at the trembling Darren.
That ghastly pale face. Those hands still soaking in the bucket. That fragile "morality" completely crushed by his onslaught of words.
Scar let out a snort of pure disdain.
"If you want to talk about who's the monster here—"
His gaze cut across Darren's face like a blade.
"—do I even qualify?"
"Line up every demon in this world, count to ten thousand—"
He paused, then hammered out the final verdict:
"—and old Scar still wouldn't make the fucking list!"
After saying all this, Scar stared hard at Darren.
His chest still heaved, his breath not yet even. But that intact eye was locked dead onto Darren's face, unblinking.
He waited.
Hoping to see relief on the other's face.
To see that sudden "oh, so that's it" realization. To see the expression of someone finally understanding, of being awakened.
He hoped Darren would stand up, flatter him like usual.
Even if he used the same tired words—"Scar, you're really a genius," "Scar, you're right," "Scar, what would we do without you." He'd heard them a hundred times, a thousand times. From Darren's mouth, from those idiots in strange clothes, from those madmen offering up their gold teeth.
He was tired of them.
But right now, he wanted to hear them.
Even just a simple—
"You're right."
Four words. It would be enough.
He stared at Darren. Stared at those hands still soaking in the bucket. Stared at that ghastly pale, wet, slightly twitching face.
And waited.
—
"Now they'll be exploited by both sides, won't they?"
Darren spoke.
The voice wasn't loud. It was incredibly light. Light as a bubble floating up from underwater—pop, and it was gone.
But those words—
They hit Scar square in the face.
Scar's expression froze.
That intact eye narrowed slightly, then suddenly widened. It wasn't anger. It was something deeper. Like having a bucket of ice water poured over his head. Like a dull knife slicing open a wound he'd never even known was there.
Exploited by both sides?
Both sides?
—
Scar's chest started heaving again. This time, not from excitement, but because something was stuck in his throat, unable to go up or down.
"You idiot!"
He roared. Louder than before, more furious, yet somehow lacking that earlier impenetrable certainty.
"How many times do I have to say it!"
He pressed forward another step, his boots crunching on broken bowl shards.
"They're willing!"
Another step.
"They asked for it!"
He stood before Darren, looking down at that ghastly pale face. Those eyes—now looking back at him, stripped of fear, holding only something he couldn't read—made him deeply uncomfortable.
The words "asked for it" smashed down, and the shack fell dead silent.
Only the occasional drip from the bucket. Only the muffled roaring filtering through the thick felt from outside. Only Scar's own heavy panting.
Darren didn't speak.
He just looked at Scar.
That gaze... It wasn't submissive. It wasn't fearful. It wasn't even the reckless accusation from before. He just looked.
Like looking at a stranger. Like looking at someone he had never really known at all.
Scar's back prickled under that stare.
He didn't know why he felt this way. He had just won. He had refuted all of Darren's accusations. He had used his fist to smash the stool, his roar to shake the roof, and his words to cement his own twisted righteousness.
He had won.
But why—
Why did that look in Darren's eyes make him feel like he had lost?
Scar stood there, panting heavily, staring back.
Darren didn't speak again. Slowly, very slowly, he pulled those trembling hands out of the bucket.
Water dripped, dripped, dripped back into the pail.
He stood up. He staggered slightly, steadying himself by gripping the bucket's edge. Then, he walked around Scar, step by step, heading toward the shack's door.
"Where are you going?!" Scar shouted from behind.
Darren didn't look back.
"I'm asking you! Where are you going?!"
Darren's hand rested on the door latch.
He paused for a long time.
Then—
"To vomit."
He pushed the door open and walked out.
Scar stood there alone, watching the door close. Watching the flickering torchlight from outside seep through the cracks.
He suddenly remembered the words Darren had just said.
"Exploited by both sides."
He didn't know why he kept thinking about those four words.
He only knew—
Those gold teeth reeked of blood and filth.