The warning bounced off Lucian's mind, not sticking to it as the other Voice wished it would. His body didn't listen either.
His lips moved on their own, vomiting the rest of the food he consumed, "We have to pump the drug...the aphrodisiac...out...of our system...please...help her."
'PUMP THE DRUG OUT OF YOUR ASS!' the foreign Voice shouted again.
Similar pattern of insults, similar pride and stubbornness, even Miss Karina's curses were similar to Voice's. Who knew she carried her own Voice inside her.
As someone who grew up with Voice's nagging in his head, Lucian was doing a lot to not be affected by its distasteful way of communication.
"Aphrodisiac?" The man halted at the door, turning back. His brows were furrowed as he looked at the woman, "Is that what happened to you?"
Karina looked like a stunned deer, her cheeks turning red as she realized Lucian was trying to help her clear her reputation. Her stomach churned, and she puked alongside him, on the floor, "Yes...that's why..."
The man's face softened at the sight of her pathetic state, he quickly closed the distance and helped her up.
'No!' The foreign Voice yelled again, 'He is not supposed to like that slut! You messed it up!' It cursed one last time before it vanished as quickly as it had appeared.
But her fiancé, Cray, didn't seem to mind her puke stained clothes at all. He placed his coat on her shoulders, covering her as he led her out of the room, the anger from before long gone.
"Miss Karina," one of the guards stopped at the door like a bad omen, "Here's a new list of men you might be interested in. Their looks are all above─"
"No!" Miss Karina tried to stop the guard from showing it to her fiance, but her fiancé already leaned over, looking through it.
"You have a type, I see," Cray said, looking at the portraits on the list and what preferences Miss Karina had written next to them.
She snatched the list back, crumbling the papers, "It's not like that. It's just... research... for my father, yes."
"So the rumors about you looking for a lover are true. That's why you said you don't want to marry me." Cray's face darkened again. His good mood completely gone, "You are choosing your lover based on their looks."
"I am not! I'm just..." Again, Miss Karina's intelligence level dropped as she tried to find the right words, "They are all ugly compared to you! Now that you are good looking, I don't want them anymore. So you should just be happy I'm not looking for anyone else─"
Cray dropped her on the ground, looking at her like she was a piece of trash, "You are just as shallow as the rumors say."
Miss Karina lay on the floor as the cleaners and physicians rushed to help her. But not a single one dared to approach Lucian.
"Help," Lucian whispered. His nose kept bleeding due to the Sapphire Rank's pressure. He didn't heal himself and made a show of being a weak hay head.
"Clean him up and bring him to my ship," the man ordered his men without looking back.
Miss Karina turned toward Lucian, her eyes full of resentment as if he caused her love life to fail, not her own actions, "It's your fault...you ruined everything."
She launched herself at him, but her fiance's men quickly carried Lucian out, "Where do you think you are taking him?! Kill him! I command you to kill him, you useless—!"
Cray slammed the door shut on her screams. "Get moving," he said to his men and began walking ahead.
Lucian was being carried by two burly men, their grip on his arms tight enough to cut his circulation. He kept his head down as they walked through the corridors, his mind trying to figure out what had just happened.
Miss Karina's behavior made no sense at all. It was like her feelings were being manipulated by an outside force and she was defenseless against them.
She kept choosing the wrong words to say, leading herself into a trap. Lucian was trying to help her, but even his words ended up going against him.
Lucian was transported to another ship where he was thrown into a cell. It was a dark, damp place, with iron bars and a bucket for a toilet. They brought a physician to check him, and after confirming he was alright, they locked him up.
The foreign voice kept mocking Lucian, calling him an idiot for trying to help Miss Karina, 'That stubborn bitch is going to have a fate worse than death, that's what she gets for being such a hard head. You will meet the same fate if you try to defy us again.'
'Why is someone trying to take over your job, Voice?' Lucian curled up in a ball on the prison's floor, covering his ears from the noise in his head.
There was much more hate in that Voice than he had ever heard from his Voice, but paradoxically, it was weaker. His own Voice was able to drive him mad, while this one was just an annoyance.
'Are you going to let it bully me, Voice?'
As if answering his call, a thud echoed in his mind, and then the foreign voice went silent.
'They succeed in advancing a shackled and thought they could do what I couldn't,' Voice huffed, sounding offended, 'They scrammed faster than a fart after finding out your head is full of shit. Too bad, it was entertaining to watch them struggle.'
'Oh, so you didn't chase it away,' Lucian felt much more safe inside a prison cell than in the company of Miss Karina.
No wonder she gave him such weird vibes. His paranoia wasn't unfounded, 'If I didn't know better, I would have thought the other Voice was trying to destroy their own host. Shouldn't it be enjoying its new identity and becoming the pinnacle of its existence?'
'Oh, you want to know what a shackled feels like after awakening?'
'Yes.'
'How about I make you taste it then?' Voice offered.
'Just tell me, Voice.' Lucian was too exhausted to go through another torture.
'Seeing others fail with you, makes it the sweetest victory of them all,' Voice was as prideful as ever, 'Now giving up on you doesn't sound as bad anymore.'
Voice sounded like it had given up in trying to awaken Lucian's shackles, and let him experience its world through a sensation instead.