Chapter 532 - 7: Level Tax
A barrage of cold, cruel questions utterly shattered Ron’s last shred of delusion.
He was wracked by a violent shiver, and his eyes finally focused. "I... I don’t want to die..."
A hint of desperate resolve had crept into his hoarse voice.
"Then cut the fucking bullshit and get your ass in gear!" Uncle Scar snarled, gritting his teeth. He propped himself against the wall with his good hand, trying to stand, but slid back down from the weakness and pain. "Pack our stuff! Anything valuable! Food! Medicine! Quick! We don’t have much time! Grove could come back at any moment, or send someone to check!"
The shouting jolted Ron, and he scrambled to his feet on pure instinct.
But fear and the toll of the recent life-or-death struggle left his limbs feeling like jelly, his mind a chaotic mess.
He stumbled around the room like a headless chicken, tripping over the corpse and nearly falling. He then froze, staring blankly, with no idea what to do or what to grab first.
Watching Ron’s dazed, inefficient fumbling, Uncle Scar’s chest heaved with a mixture of fury and desperation.
He gritted his teeth. With a trembling hand—his only good one—he fished out the jar of Nightmare Pills from the corner. He struggled to twist the lid open one-handed and shook out two small, white tablets. After swallowing one himself, he ordered:
"Ron! Get over here!"
Ron approached in a daze.
Without another word, Uncle Scar pinched a pill and shoved it directly into Ron’s mouth with his blood-stained fingers. "Swallow it! Now!"
Ron instinctively dry-swallowed, and the pill slid down his throat.
The moment the pill hit his stomach, a strange warmth spread from his gut, flowing rapidly to every corner of his body. The stinging pain from the blows he’d taken during the fight, from the places where the club had struck him, began to fade at an astonishing rate.
The weakness that had turned his limbs to jelly, the fog that had clouded his mind, the fear—it all felt as if an invisible hand had wiped more than half of it away.
A strange, almost feverish energy took its place.
He stood there in a daze, feeling the changes in his body, then suddenly looked at Uncle Scar. "Uncle Scar... I... I feel much better... Aren’t you taking one?"
"Did that pill fry your brain?" Uncle Scar spat. His face was still pale from blood loss, but he was clearly more energetic and moving without any sign of pain. "I took mine ages ago! You think I’d have the energy to waste my breath on you, let alone fucking spoon-feed you a pill, if I hadn’t? Now, hurry up! Stop spacing out! Under the bed! My emergency stash! Get it!"
It was as if Ron had finally snapped out of it.
He gave a firm nod and, without further hesitation, sprang into action.
He moved quickly, dropping to the floor in front of the crude wooden bed and reaching into the dark space beneath it.
His hand came away covered in dust and cobwebs, but his fingertips quickly brushed against a long, narrow object wrapped in thick oilcloth.
He forcefully dragged it out.
The oilcloth bundle was heavy, and several loops of hemp rope were wound around the outside.
Just as he had pulled the bundle out from under the bed and was about to straighten up.
He froze.
At the far end of the bundle, just at the edge of the deep shadows beneath the bed, sat a pair of black cloth shoes. It was impossible to know when they had appeared.
The surface of the shoes was spotless, forming a jarring contrast with the filthy surroundings.
Ron’s heart clenched.
His eyes traveled upward with excruciating slowness, starting from the pair of cloth shoes.
First, the equally spotless cuffs of a pair of black trousers. Then, the hanging hem of a garment as dark as ink.
Finally, his gaze met a pair of calm, dark eyes that were looking down at him.
A pale face was tilted slightly downward, watching him in utter silence.