Chapter 5 - You Taste Delicious

They have reached the end of the second circle of hell, The Circle of Lust, and the restless winds had died down. Zhe Chouhen had reached the end faster than Daniele, and he settled back down at the ground with a 'plop'.

"That felt like I was in the middle of a freaking tornado, damn.... My whole body hurts."

The Panda mascot appeared beside him landing face first on the ground, with his eyes as those dizzy swirls in cartoon. [Same.]

"Wait, you were also affected by the winds of lust?" Zhe Chouhen chuckled. "What a naughty panda you are."

[Tsk, shut up! I need to be horny for a living!] Panda tried to stand up and wobbled a bit. Zhe Chouhen supported his chubby body.

"Hehe, if I get to see my system suffer as well, it's all worth it." Zhe Chouhen made a wide smirk at him.

The blushing effect came again at Panda's face. [Why are you such a bully to me yet act so righteous to my MCs!? You keep on refusing to be a scum like you're some kind of a saint.]

"Because your MCs deserve to be treated well and you don't, bad author. You're the one who made them suffer in the first place." Zhe Chouhen flicked the panda's forehead.

[Ow! Fine, I'll leave you be since Daniele is coming. Hmph!] The panda vanished again with a 'poof' effect.

Zhe Chouhen turned back as he heard the sound of Daniele's footsteps and sharp breathes. Daniele finally reached him, exhausted. "Brother.... I... am here...."

'Leandro' caught him in his arms. "You shouldn't have run so fast. I'm willing to wait for you here as long as it takes."

"Brother...." Daniele looked up to him with worried eyes. "Why did you get blown by the wind? Have you lusted for someone in the past?"

(Welp, here it goes. Time to break character to earn love points.)

'Leandro' looked sorrowfully and guiltily to Daniele, with a heavy sigh. "I will be honest to you, my dear, because I know you trusted me. Lust is one of the lightest sin because it comes from excessive love. I have loved someone very dearly that I.... I could not help myself. I hope you will not look down on me because of this."

Daniele blinked, not expecting his brother to confess to his sins so quickly. Somehow, he felt relieved that there's one less secret to ponder.

"This person..... Can you tell me who—"

"I cannot!" 'Leandro' cried. "Daniele.... forget it. That love is futile because that person should never love me back. It is forbidden."

"Oh... Is that so?" Daniele was an unassuming kid, so he feared to make assumptions.

But he was not as dense as a rock, he was aware of the possibility of what 'Leandro' was implying. It made his heart unsettled somewhat, beating loudly in his chest.

[Love Meter raised to 35%. Reverse psychology, huh?]

(Honesty is the best policy.)

[Yeah, well. Because of that early confession, you broke your character's mysterious and dishonest trait. Satisfactory Meter lowered to 30%.]

(Screw the readers, I do what I want!)

The atmosphere had became awkward as the two entered the next circle. They could hear the strong flow of rain water and wails and wallows of people. They were not like the loud and horrified shouts from the Circle of Lust, but low groans and sobs combined together to with sluggish sounds.

There, they see it. A flood of crawling people with a wave of putrid smell that will make you vomit. It was raining heavily on them and they sometimes look more like mud than people, moving together with their flesh indiscernible from one another. A large three-headed dog chewed on them and spat them out, and the people reconnected their limbs again only to be chewed on and spat out again.

Daniele retched, but held it in, and hid his face on 'Leandro's' chest. "W-W-What is this....?"

"The Circle of Gluttony. The dog is Cerberus, who gives them their punishment for their worldly addictions and indulgence by mauling and stepping over them with its claws." 'Leandro' hugged him close as he raised his foot on one of the heads of the mud people. "Stay close behind me, we must venture carefully."

Daniele held on to his shoulders tightly, still trying not to look at the sight. He hated the squishy feeling on his feet and tried to ignore that they were human remains, so he would not vomit on his poor brother who's protecting him. 'Leandro' travelled farther away from Cerberus' reach, who was busy eating on his yummy human dog treats to notice the two of them.

The rain made it difficult to move and they walked at a snail's pace, their clothes soaking and weighing them down. Zhou Chouhen was already using his character's magic to make things easier for them, but he can't do much or he'll be too obvious.

"Help us.... Help us....." A hand reached out on Daniele's foot, and dragged one of his boots.

"Ahhhh!!!" Daniele yelped and kicked away, and his boot was lost in the sea of people.

"Do not touch my Daniele!" 'Leandro' yelled at the bodies below him and kicked them.

He then offered: "Daniele, would you like me to carry you?"

Daniele weakly nodded because he really couldn't take it, and wrapped his shaky hands around 'Leandro' neck. 'Leandro' carried him bridal style, putting the cape over their heads to block as much rain water.

Daniele suddenly started to feel guilty and asked, "Brother, wouldn't I just weigh you down? It's already difficult to move in this terrain, and now you have to carry my heavy weight too."

"You're not heavy at all. Besides, I promised I will take the punishments for you."

Zhe Chouhen also thought, (You're slowing me down more if you keep getting dragged by these mud people, so I better carry you along while putting up an enchantment.)

They trudged through the muddy trail for a while until Daoist Panda's voice suddenly came to give him a warning:

[Watch out, Cerberus is coming.]

(WHAAAATT!?)

Zhe Chouhen did hear the three-headed beast sniff out loud and howl. He turned and saw that its six eyes glowed red, leaping into their direction!

Zhe Chouhen started to run in the difficult flood of flesh and bone while carrying the weak MC. (Why is it following us!?)

[You must be a glutton in real life as well.]

(Ah, shit! I'm just a foodie, okay!? It's hard not to appreciate food when you're so poor! I don't even eat that much!)

[Maybe it's not just food and drinks. Maybe it's another addiction that's why Cerberus set its eyes on you.]

(Does internet addiction count?)

[.... If it does, I hope Ol' Cerberus doesn't like panda meat. I don't think I taste good, and were close to an endangered specie after all!]

Zhe Chouhen activated more of his powers so he could run faster from the three headed dog. The sprint felt like forever, and Daniele who was covered by the cape held on tightly to him.

"Brother, is Cerberus chasing us!?"

"You don't need to worry about anything, Daniele! Just hold on tight to me!" 'Leandro' said bravely, until—

The giant three-headed dog leaped in to the air and were now in front of them!

"GRRRRAAAHHH!!!" It growled and howled, three mouths full of stinky breath and the irony smell of blood. The middle head reached out to bite on them.

"Ahhhhh!!!"

Daniele was about to be chomped when 'Leandro' turned away quickly and got his back bitten instead!

"Hnnghhhh!!!!" 'Leandro' yowled in pain as the sharp canine teeth dug onto his flesh and bones, and he can hear several cracking.

He gritted his teeth and concentrated instead on using magic to make the big bad doggo let him go.

He made himself taste as horrible as he could, and Cerberus felt like he was sprayed with acid on his tongue. It opened its wide maw again and writhed, disbelieving how terrible that human tasted like, and he has been eating all kinds of human shit. Literally.

'Leandro' sidestepped him and kept running the hell away from the fucking big dog.

"Brother, you are hurt!" Daniele's eyes widened as he realized he had just been saved at the expense of his own stepbrother's injury.

"Worry about it later! Let's just get away from here!"

Finally, they reached the end of the circle, exhausted as hell, and collapsed on the the now dry soil.

'Leandro' set down Daniele gently before lying on his stomach on the ground. He writhed in pain, his clothes torn and his back soaked on both rain water and blood.

"Oh, brother! It looks terrible!" Daniele knelt beside him cried, his hand hovering over the large scars and not knowing what to do.

"Don't worry, you saw those bodies heal themselves earlier right after being chewed. I think these would also heal on their own." 'Leandro' growled and tried to push himself back up.

(Fuck, it hurts so much that I want to die. Why can't I use my magic to lessen the pain?)

[Because again, it is dark magic. You cannot heal anyone, even yourself.]

(Dark magic is fucking useless.)

[What useless!? =_=. You can resurrect corpses with it and make an entire skeleton army. You even controlled the greatest figures of hell!]

(Doesn't matter if it can't help me in this moment of pain!)

[At least on the plus side, your Scum Meter went down all the way to 5%. You should be happy now!]

(Why isn't it all the way to 0!?)

[Hey, you already lost 40%! That's a big lost! I think the reason why it did not go all the way was because Daniele still doubts you a bit.]

Zhe Chouhen felt his own torn skin very slowly reconnecting and healing because of the regenerative abilities of the denizens of hell, and so he tried to stand up.

(So I have to clear up all his suspicions, huh?)

He managed to sit up fully and leaned on a rock wall but acted like he was still weak. "Daniele, come here. I have something to tell you."

Daniele sat beside him, face full of tears. "Brother...."

"I am very sinful. Though I may not seem to be, I actually really am. The reason why Cerberus chased me was because in my darkest moment, I became indulgent to alcohol. I wanted to forget the pain for my forbidden love and so I often drunk myself to sleep in my bedroom at night." 'Leandro' spoke slowly and winced. "You must understand, this indulgence is the result of pain."

"Why did you never tell me about this pain before, brother? I could have redirected us back to holiness." Daniele frowned and cusped both hands on 'Leandro's' face.

'Leandro' kissed his hand solemnly and said, "Because I do not want you to suffer the same pain as I did once you learned the truth."

He hugged Daniele closed to him, caressing his head. Daniele was stunned, but hugged him back.

[Love Meter raised to 40%.]

[Scum Meter back at 0%]

[Satisfaction Meter lowers to 20%, tsk, tsk. My fans are going to kill me.]

Zhe Chouhen mentally winked to Panda, feeling very satisfied of himself. (Boo-hoo, go cry about it. I'm still winning this bet—)

Panda suddenly said in a serious, chilling voice: [I've added two new rules by the way. I'm getting tired of your OOC-ness. You can't just do whatever you want and ruin my story.]

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