Piers knows many nicknames of his father, such as âMayor of Outer City,â âPrime Minister,â and âOuter City Ruler,â all of which show his impregnable power and position in the Outer City.
Yet Piers is most familiar with his nickname of âButler,â which is what the Inner City residents have rewarded his father, the Outer City citizen with. His father wears this like a badge of honour, because nicknames like this represented the privileges of the powerful Inner City residents. He would often mention âButler,â alongside his principles of âloyalty,â ârespect,â âgratitudeâ with which he does things.
âAs the Butler, the most important thing is obedience!â
âSon, you must work hard to let the aristocrats see your subservience and sacrifice, so that you will become a fitting successor to the name Butler.â
âThe Inner City has given me such responsibilities, all are indications of trust and reliance on me.â
âThis is disappointing! How can you be so ungrateful like that? Weâre born inferior, both in the past, both in the future, so you must always be gratefulâŚâ
Who will be able to imagine that that strongman who controls the powers of more than half of the Outer City, ruling over 90% of its population, becomes so unbecoming like a dog in front of Inner City residents.
Different from âButlerâ whose main responsibilities are administrative, the military nicknamed âWatchdogâ has shown greater ambition. Perhaps their armed nature has given them the confidence to start viewing themselves as equals. His father is often very displeased with them, and often uses them as a negative example when scolding Piers. He has also been mocked by the military in many public occasions.
If Piers was someone whoâd listen to his father, he would not have applied to join the reality show.
As an Outer City citizen who is closer than anyone else to Inner City residents, Piers has a great understanding of what kind of creatures those people are. Heartless, cruel, greedy. They mask their innate savagery with manners, and under that guise of politeness, calmness and collectedness are cannibalistic beasts. Outer City citizens also eat human meat, but they are more direct about it, perhaps it might be for survival. Inner City residents eat human flesh more for entertainment, to find something fun to do in their dull lives. They do it in a great variety of ways, turning cannibalism into an art form, a means to kill time, and scour their brains coming up with creative ways to do so, until it has reached unimaginable heights and become perfected.
Since he was young, the Inner City residents have been like a mountain that has been crushing him, making him unable to lift his head. This feeling of oppression makes itself known the most abruptly when he is facing the advances and subservience of other Outer City citizens. He dares not forget his position and identity for a single moment â he is no different from a dog.
He is certainly very fortunate to be protected by his father and manage to enjoy a high social standing just below or even tentatively equivalent to that of Inner City residents since birth. The one who is ingratiating himself outside has always been his father, and he didnât need to do anything; he is also unfortunate to be stuck in this contradictory and embarrassing position. He will never be an Inner City resident, be part of that mountain that has been crushing down and suffocating him. He is unable to be like this father who will work willingly and diligently for someone else. What will be his fate? The endless variety of methods of the Inner City residents? Or the genetic modification that transforms him in one go?
Like the Bright he saw in episode seven of the show, that strong man has become the ruler of the apes, yet in the real world, he is still a slave to be toyed with by the Inner City aristocrats.
It is at that moment that he projected himself onto Bright. He realises that no one will understand himself more than that man.
What transpired proved that he was correct.
That sentence, âletâs rebel together,â has scored a bullseye piercing right into his heart. What it is is the wish that he has never dared to voice or imagine.
He wants to topple the mountain.
Then become the tallest one.
His wish is unoriginal and down-to-earth. Reputation, power, wealth, beauties, he wants the best of them.
He is kissing Bright passionately, his tongue cannot wait to breakthrough into his mouth to show his unbearable excitement. Too many things are mixed in the act, such as affection from finally being understood, joy from finding a bosom buddy, a natural ambition when it comes to seizing power, even sexual lust for the man. At the same time, for pulling himself back from the edge of death, a sense of gratitude, at least, he is grateful for that single moment. It is only that this emotion has existed for too short a time before being consumed by other emotions.
He wants to have Bright, joining himself with him. He always wanted to do that, ever since the first episode. Too bad an Inner City aristocrat has taken him before him, and unwilling to let this delectable meal go, not even for other Inner City residents.
Piers is not that vastly different from Inner City residents on a fundamental level, so Bright has a hard time even maintaining his attitude of treating him as a companion towards him, and he certainly does not treat him as anything further than that. If it were not for his use in future plans, Bright would never have exposed his own intentions.
Bright treats basically everyone in this world with an attitude that says âplease ignore meâ so that everyone can get on by unaffected in a distance. Besides perhaps the two youngest ones which have not yet been tainted black by this world to whom Bright can still treat with a softer heart, to others, he has to restrain himself harder and harder just so he doesnât slap them on their faces.
Especially with how Piers has âusedâ Ronald, not from pity for Ginger, but just that Bright doesnât like it.
Objectifying a person, suppressing their will with power and ignoring their pleas.
What Piers has done has shown many things. In Brightâs view, he is half an Inner City aristocrat, different from other Outer City citizens. He is gradually and discreetly evolving into the creature known as Inner City resident.
He is someone he can use but cannot confide in.
He notices that tongue which is acting up so Bright bites it with a bit of force as a warning, meaning that itâs enough now that a deal has been struck so act your position! Though this action seems to have been interpreted, perhaps intentionally, as a signal for flirting. Piers is becoming even more passionate, so Bright can only push him away in speechlessness.
âMy head hurts.â The manâs tone has a slight wavering.
âWhat a bummer,â Piers complains while laughing, âwerenât you the one who said you wanted me?â He looks like a bad boy when laughing, his lips perking up in a naughty angle. He looks like a fickle young master. His normally yellowish-brown hair has been delicately treated and his appearance has also been well-managed. If it were not for him just having been physically suppressed by Bright, he would have been quite the handsome and dreamy man as well.
Brightâs eyes look dead. He knows that Piers is covering up what he has just said next to his ears and tricking others who are watching the show, and that the other person is trying to feel him up given the occasion. He is irritated because of his extreme physical discomfort and his mind is birthing ideas of murder and torture, though he decided to suppress his inner devil that is going berserk in the dark corners of his mind.
This is treated as him admitting by silence.
AaaaaahââThe man does not retort! His true love is number 56? My worldview has been shattered! Iâve lost my bet?!
Harry is stunned while feeling that he is acting as a shiny light-bulb .
âDonât let anyone interrupt me.â Bright tells the two people here before gradually closing his eyes.
He has given the only samples to the two, so he can only withstand the rest with his body.
Itâs just pain, endure it and itâll be over.
It canât hurt more than the brains being fried, can it?
The Shithead has trained him a lot, dulled his senses against pain, though Bright will not thank the Shithead for that, he will only thank himself who has made it through the Shitheadâs torture.
To thank himself, the one who has not become insane due to the torture and worked hard to assemble the pieces of himself back together.
To thank the hardships? To thank the pervert?
Yeah, go to Hell!
As he has gradually levelled up in the game world, Bright doesnât even know how high his top speed and strength has reached. When he lets his presence known there, no monster was willing to appear in a hundred-mile radius.
He has managed to open up a new feature, and instead of just raising his pure physical stat and control, he can wield his power more precisely like a doctor in a medical operation. Now he can already find the nerve that controls pain in the brain and shut it down. With a mirror and a chisel, he can even open his own skin and skull up to do an operation on himself, and dig that tumour pressing on his nerves out. Though to conceal his true power, he has to give up on this thought.
At night, Bright who is unconscious on the surface has entered the game world.
He is quickly traversing on a flat plain. Up to now, he has managed to go through every location at the coordinates of the City and familiarised himself with its terrain and geography, especially the locations of the show and the Inner City. He has formulated a detailed plan of escape.
From making a deal with the werewolves for a way to break the bracelet, to a fake attack and working with his allies to get through the City walls, and finally to escape from being caught by the people of the City. The parts of the plan all depend on one another, linking tightly together.
Right now he is still one part short, which is also the most crucial part. That is to steal the information on creating werewolves, which Piers might be able to help with.
The ârebellionâ is an excuse. He has no such plans to build an army and carry some flag to become some heroic figure! He only wants to run away. Since he doesnât trust Piers, and so that his interests would be piqued, he said it that way. Of course, if he can manage to get rid of a few Inner City residents on the way, that would be merry as well.
Many people seem to have forgotten or ignored the fact that when the Wolves wanted to kill Bright but failed due to numerous reasons, and when Wolfie was having a stand-off with him, exactly what did the werewolves do when they were off the grid from surveillance of the show?
They must have discovered the underground river of the place!
Bright doesnât know how the werewolves discovered it, and he only had a faint guess back then, without proof, because even the show and the Inner City residents have not managed to dig anything up following after their route. He had a prediction already then, that since it was not above ground, it must have been underground.
After checking in person, Bright has become sure of it.
Underneath him is a large and complex underground water system. One of its main channels is linked directly to an overground lake outside the City.
Even the narrowest part of the river is enough for an adult to pass through.
Bright predicts that he getting hurt âsacrificing himself for othersâ would catch the Shitheadâs attention. He can use this chance to enter Inner City.
âSpeaking of which, the Shithead has been quiet all this time, strange indeed.â
While Bright is wringing his wet clothes out and hanging them onto tree branches, he is speaking to Latiao, âdid he really think that a kid with my genes is enough to completely tie me down?â
âWoof woof!â
HmmâŚ
Bright goes over that sentence a few times, and realises the double-entendre within.
âI sound like a scum boyfriendâŚâ
âWoof!â
Hearing Latiaoâs affirmation, Bright harumphs indignantly, âthereâs a reason he gets scum treatment.â
Authorâs notes:
Bright: I might as well gobble up Hopkin before I go!