The woman closed her eyes with a smile, her hand that was holding Max's cheek fell. Max shed a tear. He immediately turned to look at the crewman holding the sword with a fierce gaze.
"Waaaaaaah!"
Max stood up and pushed the crewman with all his might until he fell out of the door on the side of the deck and into the sea. "Hey, what did you do?" Seeing their friend fall into the sea, the other crewmen immediately drew their swords and moved closer to Max. Max closed his eyes, accepting his fate with tears streaming down his face, but suddenly he heard,
"Live, Dee... you have to live for our sake!" a man said.
Max opened his eyes. It turned out that the slaves who were lined up behind him and the man who was behind him had moved forward to attack the crewmen, even though their hands were chained. "Kill them all!" a soldier-dressed man yelled. "Yaaaaah!" The crewmen rushed the slaves. "Crash... crash... waaah!" All Max could see was the slaves falling, drenched in blood in front of him. They didn't let any crewmen get close to Max, and as they fell, they smiled at Max and said, "Live." Max cried and covered his mouth with his small hand.
"Abe... Ama," little Max said to himself.
Suddenly, "whoosh," everything stopped as if time had paused. Max saw the slaves, the crewmen, and even the heavy rain stop moving. Max stood up. He saw a raindrop right in front of his face. He raised his hand to touch the falling water droplet. "Splish," the water droplet broke, but its pieces immediately stopped moving again.
"W-What's happening?" Max asked himself.
"Flap... flap... flap,"
"Caw,"
A black crow with red eyes landed on Max's shoulder and startled Max because it was the only thing moving in the paused time.
"Caw... caw... caw,"
The crow flapped its wings. When Max turned to look at it, the crow also turned to look at Max with its red eyes.
"Descendant of Ravencrow."
"Huh... wh-who?" Max asked, hearing a voice in his head.
He stared at the crow on his shoulder, which was now looking at him with its beak in front of his face.
"Receive your family's inherited power... the power of the black crow... all of these slaves' powers will become your strength as your new family."
"Huh... wh-what... please ex-"
Before Max could finish speaking, the crow had already put its head into Max's mouth, making Max feel suffocated. He tried to pull the crow's body out of his mouth, but the crow's head had already gone entirely into Max's mouth. "Ugh," Max almost threw up because something large had gone into his throat. The crow went in more, and now half of its body was inside Max's mouth. Max's tears flowed heavily, and he felt an immense feeling of being choked.
After the black crow's body had all gone inside, "thud," Max fell and sat down. "Ugh... ugh," he tried to get the crow out by putting his hand in his mouth.
"Ugh... that's disgusting... truly disgusting," Max muttered.
But there was a new surprise in front of him that made Max forget his disgust and nausea. The spirits of 120 slaves, including the pregnant woman who was no longer pregnant and was holding her hand, were standing in front of him. Of course, Max immediately became scared, his mouth agape, and he got goosebumps, even though all the slave spirits were smiling at him and looked very friendly as well as sad to see him.
"A... Ama... Abe," Max muttered, terrified.
Suddenly, the pregnant woman, who was no longer pregnant, and her child, who was a little girl, floated into his mouth. Before Max could show his shock, all the slave spirits, both men and women, old or young, all went into Max's mouth, making Max feel suffocated again and hold his neck. The more spirits that entered, the more tattoos appeared on Max's body, which was now a pale gray like a corpse, and his eyes were red.
"Aaaah... wh-what is this?" Max muttered in his head, feeling a mix of emotions in his heart.
After the last spirit entered, Max's body suddenly felt an unpleasant and very uncomfortable sensation.
"Now you have my power and the power of your 120 family members inside your body. Live on, successor of the Ravencrow family," a voice echoed in Max's head.
"He... hey, explain what's happening!" Max replied.
But, "Slash... yaaaah," time started moving again. Another slave died from being hit by a crewman's sword. A crewman who saw Max still sitting and looking down approached Max. He immediately raised his sword to attack Max. Out of reflex, Max raised his arm. "Crash," the crewman's sword swing cut off Max's arm. Of course, seeing his hand severed, Max became very scared and immediately screamed.
"Aaaaaah... huh... huh? Why... doesn't it hurt?" Max asked.
"Clang," Max looked up and saw the crewman in front of him trembling. Then he looked at his hand. It turned out that his hand had turned purple and was moving on the floor.
"Huh... wh-what's happening?" Max asked.
He picked up his hand and realized that the arm he was using to pick up the hand had turned a pale gray like a corpse with black nails. Max took his hand and tried to put it back on. It turned out that the arm reattached, and blood looked like threads sewing his arm back together.
"Ugh... that's disgusting," he muttered.
"Wh-What are you?" the crewman asked, terrified.
Max didn't answer. He took his sword and quickly stabbed the crewman in the chest so that the crewman didn't have time to scream and died instantly. Then he looked around. There were still about five slaves alive and fighting back. Without delay, Max immediately ran quickly and went around killing all the crewmen on the ship with his sword.
After that, he saw the slaves who were badly wounded and on the verge of death. He immediately tried to help them one by one, but it was too late. The five slaves' wounds were too severe, and they breathed their last as they looked at Max and smiled. Suddenly, something strange happened. The spirits of the five slaves came out and went back into Max's mouth, which made Max very shocked and sad because there were no other slaves left but him.
But, when he looked at his hands and saw his surroundings where many crewmen's bodies were cut and destroyed by his actions, "clang," Max dropped his sword. An immense feeling of guilt and fear began to fill his heart. Even though in his previous life he was evil and had experienced a hard life in prison, this was the first time he had killed so many people at once. His two blood-soaked hands went to his head, and he pulled his own hair.
"Waaaaaaaaaaah!" Max screamed and "thud," he fell to his knees among the bodies of the crewmen and the slaves around him.
"Click," a man in a military uniform with the rank of captain of a kingdom pointed a pistol at Max's head, who was kneeling and sobbing uncontrollably because of the shock and fear of having murdered so many people. But before the man could pull the trigger, "swoosh," his body was suddenly split in half from top to bottom.
Max turned. A middle-aged man with a muscular body, a thick beard, and his arms and legs in chains in a severely wounded condition had slashed the military-dressed man who was about to shoot Max with a sword in his hand. "Thud," the middle-aged man dropped his sword, then looked at Max and smiled. "Thud," the man collapsed face down in front of Max and closed his eyes forever.
"N-No," Max immediately went to one of the five men he had previously helped while they were dying and shook his body.
"Abe... Abe... Abe... waaaaaaaaaaah!" Max screamed hysterically in the middle of the ship that was being tossed around by the storm and hit by large waves.
This was the first time Max had felt the loss of the people who had become his family while he lived in this world, and it was also the first time he had felt the loss of the people around him since he had repented. "Waaaaaaaaah!" Max screamed hysterically in the middle of the storm, looking up at the pitch-black and thundering sky. His skin gradually returned to normal, and his eyes turned back to blue, no longer red.