The Royal Military Academy's Impostor Owns a Dungeon [BL] Chapter 1335: The Boogeyman

They said those majestic beings on Star Net weren’t real.

That for those who’d already been forgotten by society, there simply wasn’t anyone who would ever come.

There were no such things as fairy tales, they’d been warned.

And yet, as the children stared at the impossible sight unfolding before them, what else could this possibly be?!

Everything seemed to happen in slow motion.

Only seconds ago, they’d been desperately praying for any kind of miracle as the bad man pulled out his lethal weapon. Then, before any of them could fully understand what was happening, the massive cell door that had trapped them in darkness for so long was torn away as though it were nothing more than a sheet of paper and hurled into the corridor with a deafening screech!

To everyone else, it probably happened far too quickly to follow.

But to the little girl whose mother had been the main target that monster was trying to drag away, time seemed to stretch endlessly.

A vibrant flash of red swept past her vision, moving with such grace and absolute certainty that, for one strange moment, she nearly forgot how terrified she’d been.

"...!"

By the time the shellshocked captives finally came back to their senses, a massive hand was already clamped over the scary man’s entire face, holding his head as easily as a child might hold a ball.

Jibb was trembling so violently in absolute horror that he’d actually wet himself.

Yet the children, especially the little girl, could only stare up at their savior in boundless awe.

She was certain their hero had said something because the scary demon who’d tormented them for so long somehow began shaking even harder. Unfortunately, the child couldn’t hear a single word over the frantic pounding of her own heart.

Desperate hands carefully pulled her and the other children away from the pirate. The moment she was within reach, her weakened, distraught mother gathered her into trembling arms, sobbing uncontrollably as she held her daughter as tightly as she could.

Still, the little girl couldn’t look away.

None of the children could.

Their wide, entranced eyes remained glued to that towering figure as though they needed to memorize every single detail, afraid that if they blinked for even a second, this impossible miracle might disappear.

Perhaps that was why the little girl nearly missed their savior’s low, resonant growl.

"If any of you have special requests for settling accounts, you’d better list them now."

Then, without loosening the hand still clamped firmly around Jibb’s face, their savior casually extended her other arm.

"...!"

It was something they couldn’t really have noticed earlier, but now, the noxious gas lingering throughout the cell was being drawn toward her outstretched palm. Poisonous wisps rapidly condensed, swirling faster and faster until they formed a dense, volatile ball hovering just above her hand.

Several captives gasped.

Before they could even process what was happening, their savior moved. Tightening her grip around the terrified pirate’s jaw, she forced his head back and wrenched his screaming mouth wide open before shoving the entire spinning mass straight down his throat!

Jibb’s eyes bulged in pure terror.

He couldn’t even beg.

Just like all the people he’d tormented, he wasn’t given the slightest opportunity to plead for leniency. His face rapidly turned a sickening shade of purple as he was forced to choke down the very poison he’d so gleefully spread throughout their cell.

And that was when the captives finally broke.

After everything they’d endured, watching their major tormentor suffer from the very poison he’d used against them unleashed emotions they could no longer contain.

Tears flowed freely as their exhausted bodies practically gave out beneath them, partly from the gas that had already weakened them, but mostly from the indescribable relief of realizing that someone had actually come.

Someone had found them.

And maybe what was happening was cruel.

Maybe grown-ups would say they shouldn’t be watching something like this.

That children weren’t supposed to see things like this.

But children like her to see it.

After everything they’d endured, after being scared for so long, they needed to see with their own eyes that the boogeyman wasn’t unbeatable.

That someone could actually make him afraid too.

Completely.

Jibb was sent crashing into the same hard rock wall that had served as part of their prison for days. His body crumpled against it before sliding downward, limbs bending at angles no human body should’ve ever been capable of reaching.

Yet their savior clearly wasn’t finished.

One heavy fist slammed into the pirate.

Then another.

Each impact carried enough force to make the cavernous cell tremble, yet no one tried to stop her.

For once, the cell had gone strangely quiet aside from the soft sounds of relieved sobbing.

Everyone simply watched.

When these strangers had first barged in, most of the captives had feared what might happen to them. They’d been terrified that one nightmare had simply been replaced by another.

But watching one of their worst tormentors get beaten into the ground finally allowed some of that fear to loosen its grip.

Maybe they just needed to see it end.

Thoroughly exhausted by everything she’d endured, the little girl desperately stretched one small hand toward the magnificent figure in front of her. She wanted to stay awake just a little longer.

Long enough to remember this.

But when a surprisingly gentle voice muttered, "It’s all going to be okay now," her eyelids finally became far too heavy to fight.

As darkness slowly took her, the child held on to one glorious image.

A tall, robust warrior standing between them and the monster who’d hurt them, with a head so thoroughly wrapped in bandages that it looked almost like a strange ball and the most magnificent pair of vibrant red eyes the little girl had ever seen burning brightly through the darkness.

__

Right.

To the unconscious captive children and even the Battalion 9 cadets who’d accompanied her, the pride and joy of the Pyroan Orcs probably looked rather strange at the moment.

Because somewhere between finding a ventilation shaft they could crawl through with the help of the Princess’s wind ability and Kira announcing that there was she’d somehow turned herself into a partial mummy!

"We don’t know what they’ll do once they realize the position I hold, so I need to at least do something," she’d grunted earlier while wrapping the dense bandages snugly around her head and face.

And really, her reasoning had been entirely spot on.

The others simply hadn’t considered it at first because Princess Kira had always been so easygoing. Maybe even easygoing, considering it was sometimes remarkably easy to forget that the person casually joking around with them was actually top-tier foreign royalty.

The literal future of a whole entire race.

Someone who could become an extremely valuable bargaining chip if she ever fell into enemy hands.

Once that realization properly sank in, several cadets had immediately suggested waiting for backup. They weren’t exactly confident in their ability to protect the princess if what they were about to attempt turned into a full-blown raid.

However, if Luca Kyros, of all people, hadn’t been able to stop her, then what made them think they’d be able to do it?

Thankfully, or maybe not... that concern lasted only until Princess Kira showed them exactly what she was capable of when there was absolutely zero reason to keep an enemy alive.

At that point, the cadets rather quickly realized that helping might actually be the least of their problems.

That pirate would probably be dead long before backup even arrived!

Which was why, when Kira finally used her terminal to update her friends on the situation, everyone nearby had expected some variation of or

Instead, what they heard sent an instant, icy chill straight down their spines.

"Hey, guys... how much trouble do you think I’d be in with the Academy?"

No one could hear whoever she was talking to, but they certainly didn’t miss her next words.

"No, no. Still breathing. I made sure to stuff plenty of air into him. But I might’ve chopped off his testicles? That’s not grounds for expulsion, right?"

Even the severely weakened captives wanted to scream

And yet all they could really do was instinctively press their legs together.