Chapter 38 – Torture?

{Mika, can you wait up there? I don't want you to be too close.} Senna points to the Royal Family's carriage.

{Aww.} Mika dejectedly hangs her head, but doesn't fight Senna's request. She flies over and deftly lands on the carriage watching Senna.

Senna arrives at the Prime Minister's carriage and drags the seven prisoners out of the carriage with the help of some of the guards. The prisoners are dropped next to the carriage in a semi-circle. Senna thanks the guards and hints at having them leave, but the guards hesitate at leaving the prisoners alone with Senna. Senna scrunches her brow and sighs. "I ask of you to leave. It would be a problem for me if I am blamed for making you fat and unfit to work."

"F-fat?" One of the guards questions.

"Mmm...You already ate two servings for dinner. You'd start gaining weight if you ask to sample everything. I would rather not get in trouble for feeding you too much on the job. Those two would have gained a lot of weight if I didn't kick them out of the kitchen early on..." Senna mutters the last sentence when she thinks about the Restaurant she worked in. Her best dishes create a magnetic allure that attracts everyone in the vicinity. In addition, restraint seems to fly out the window causing many people to eat excessively after the first bite.

"Anyways, please head back for now. I won't do anything damaging." Senna pushes on the two guards’ backs urging them to leave. When she distances them away from the carriage, she invokes a barrier before the guards can change their mind. The two are surprised at Senna's heavy-handed action and start banging on the barrier. Unfortunately, Senna has already turned back towards the carriage choosing to ignore them.

Senna sits down in front of the Prime Minister’s bound group. They angrily glare at her in turn. Their arms are restrained behind their back and their legs are still wrapped up in Senna’s vines. The assassin leader was detached from the stone cube and restrained in the same fashion as the other six. The seven of them are gagged preventing them from saying a single word.

Senna ignores their glares and takes out various cooking utensils. She takes out a slice of beef and a slice of boar meat. She repeatedly cuts and processes the meat transforming it into ground beef and pork. Mixing the two meats together, she separates enough for one person while storing away the rest. She dices and adds a green onion that has a spicy taste similar to garlic. After adding a few more herbs and spices, she molds the meat into a hamburg steak. Heating up the pan, a piece of butter lathers the surface as it melts. As the sweet smell of butter floats into the air, the pan lets off a sizzling sound as the hamburg steak hits the heated pan.

The sound of someone gulping draws her attention. She looks up to see the starving men panting as they yearningly gaze at the sizzling meat. Senna gives a light smile as she takes out a homemade red wine. Popping off the cap, she uses magic making the wine fly out of the bottle and float in the air. She intentionally makes the wine fly in front of the men's noses letting them get a good whiff. The wine is quickly pulled back when the Prime Minister leans in and tries to swallow the wine despite the gag over his mouth. Senna swings her arm down making the wine drenches the hamburg steak.

The pan hisses as the temperatures clash with the chilled wine. The smell of the wine jumps into the air as it bubbles. With a bit of help from Senna's spell, the smell of the wine and meat float over coating the men in its scent. The Prime Minister's stomach distinctly rumbles with hunger. Senna's expression remains still despite hearing the anticipation, but she's inwardly giggling at the unrestrained desire for her food. According to Captain Lewis, they haven’t eaten any lunch, so most of them have gone without food for almost half of the day. She suspects the Prime Minister is an exception with the bloated stomach, but his rumbling stomach signals how impatient he is.

She places a lid over the hamburg steak waiting for it to slowly cook. Taking out some prepared dough, she places it within a bread pan. She forms two layers of in each direction forming a cube shape around the bread. Using , she generates some heat to mimic the baking process and properly cook the bread. In addition, a spell is secretly cast to shorten the baking time. Within a few minutes, the scent of freshly baked bread bathes over the prisoners when she dispels the .

Though muffled, the sound of the men swallowing their saliva clearly reaches Senna's ear. Her expression remains still as she takes out the bread from the pan placing it on an earthen plate. Senna slices the bread revealing the white interior. Senna eats the slice quickly without changing her expression, completely ignoring the ardent begging right in front of her. After fully eating the bread slice, Senna's expression finally shifts into a clear frown. Her hand quickly shoots up tossing the entire loaf of bread over her shoulder. Her movements are so quick and fluid that they are unable to react until the bread and the plate are flying into the air.

"AAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHH!!!!!!" Though muffled, their screams are transmitted loud and clear. A dull thud reverberates as sand flies into the air from the impact. A wave of melancholy flows through the group, seeing such delicious food being discarded so wastefully makes them want to cry tears of blood.

Senna maintains her focused expression as she checks on the hamburg steak. Removing the lid, the rich scent of cooked meat covers the area. The men intensely stare at the hamburg steak while salivating to the point of soaking their gags. Flipping over the steak, Senna covers the pan again letting it cook for a short while longer.

Senna takes out more dough and flattens it using a long metal rod as a rolling pin. Forming a nice circular shape, she returns her attention to the hamburg steak. She opens the lid again releasing the same smell of meat. Plating the steak, she gracefully cuts a piece of the steak before biting into the slice. Despite the intense, greedy glares from the men, Senna eats it completely unfazed. A sense of dread ripples through the men when they see the corner of her mouth twitch. In the same instant that they complete the thought, Senna's hand moves.

Senna's arm flings upward throwing the plate behind her. The men scream with bloodshot eyes seeing the food go to waste. Three of the guards lean forward too far and lose their balance crashing into the sand. Senna uses a bit of to push the fallen guards back up into their seats. All seven of the men angrily glare at Senna with the same thought. 'If you weren't going to eat it, then why didn't you give it to me?!'

Senna remains unperturbed, but is actually maintaining her Poker face with all her might to avoid revealing her enjoyment. Using her body to block their sight, she conceals the 'trick' she has been using to irritate the men. When tossing the food, she secretly stored the food away, quickly replacing it with a simple rock. Both the rock and plate fly out crashing into the sand and exploding upwards without any significant loss to Senna. It also didn't help that Senna was using spell to slightly alter the scene for her trick.

Senna gets to work cooking a new dish. Rolling up the rim of the flattened dough, she forms a small crust around the edge of the circular dough. She takes out a jar and pours out the contents spreading a pink sauce over the center of the dough. A strange expression forms on the men’s faces seeing the pink mush being spread on the food. Since getting lost, Senna found a grove of trees filled with a white fruit called towo that has a consistency and savory taste similar to that of tomatoes. Something she happily stored, tree and all, to attempt to selectively breed later. Unfortunately, the wild towo fruit lacked the sweet and sour taste normally found in a tomato, so she mixed in some berries that were a mix of sweet and sour to adjust the taste. The end result was an odd pink mixture that was usable substitute for tomato sauce.

Senna continues working adding in her homemade cheese, herbs, spices, and slices of bird meat. She gives an affirming nod looking over the created pizza. Senna forms a large stone slab with her spell and places it over the campfire. Lightly powdering the surface with a bit of flour, she places the pizza on top. are created again forming an oven around the pizza.

"Ah. Come to think of it, I'm supposed to be feeding you." Senna has a look of clarity as she seriously looks at the seven. "Come." She motions with her finger and the gags untie themselves and pop out of the men's mouth.

"Gah!"

"Finally!"

"Give us food already!"

"I'm starving."

"Hurry!"

Rather than curses, they beg or food after being subjected to the tantalizing smell of Senna's cooking. However, the Prime Minister was an exception. "How dare you tie me up, you commoner?! I demand you release me at once! Don't you know who I am?!"

"No, I don't. Frankly I don't care." Senna replies flatly. A bottle appears in her hand. She uncorks the contents dropping several small pills, about 5 millimeters in size, onto her hand. Grabbing one, she flicks it into the Prime Minster's cursing, open mouth. Surprised by her sudden throw, he accidentally swallows it.

"Guh. Agh. You filthy commoner! How dare you?!" The Prime Minster yells trying to spit the pill back up.

"So after all that, you're going to poison us?" The assassin mutters resentfully. He turns his head giving a weak sigh.

"If I wanted you dead, I would have instantly killed you earlier when I had the chance. You're test subjects for my medicine. That's all." Senna sweetly smiles giving her answer.

"Trash! How dare you feed me your garbage?! I..." The Prime Minster keeps yelling.

"Ah, yes, yes. Please be quiet. " Senna casts a simple orb of wind and has it lightly strike the Prime Minster's neck. It strikes directly under his Adam's Apple making him falter from the attack. Recovering from the recoil, he opens his mouth to start cursing again, but no voice comes out of his mouth. "Much better."

"What did you do?" The assassin focuses his gaze on the Prime Minister. His eyes sparkle with interest at the sudden change in the Prime Minister.

"Nothing special. Just made him be quiet." Senna answers vaguely. "He won't die from it, so he should be satisfied." The assassin gives a weak sigh seeing Senna vaguely answer him. Senna holds him another pill in front of the assassin's face. "Anyways, obediently eat it or do i need to force feed you?"

"At least tell me what it is." The assassin groans.

“Food substitute. Eating one means you can skip meals because you ate what you need.” Senna replies. Her atmosphere changes from a kind feel to a sinister aura. “I’ll make you eat it and see if you get hungry while I cook and eat food in front of you. Now will you be obedient, or do I need to force you?” Senna holds out a pill in front of the assassin’s face. She presses it close enough for his lips to kiss the pill.

The assassin stares at Senna. Realizing that he can’t resist, he obediently sticks out his tongue. Senna drops the pill and watches him swallow it. “Good.” Senna smiles and turns to the five guards. They resist more violently in comparison. Senna calmly casts again creating more vines to keep them from moving around and damaging the pizza that is Still cooking. One by one, she pins them to the ground and forces their mouth open. Dropping the pill and a cup of water into their mouthes, she clamps their mouths and nose shut.

"Swallow it or suffocate. Your choice." Senna gives a bright smile holding each guard down. Faced with the ultimatum, the guards can only reluctantly swallow the pill down. "Good."

Senna sits back in front of the pizza. Seeing the crust colored a nice golden brown and the bird meat fully cooked, she nods and snaps her fingers. Taking out a knife, she quickly slices the pizza into eight pieces. Storing the knife, she lifts up a slice. The stringy cheese clings to the rest of the pizza leaving thin strands of cheese as Senna separates the slice. Drool forms on the corner of the men's mouth watching Senna's every movement. She lightly blows on the slice before taking a bite.

"Hmph. You'll have to do a lot better than that if you want to get information out of me." The assassin averts his gaze away from the pizza.

Senna giggles at his response. "That's not very convincing when you have drool running down your cheek. ...Besides, I'm not here to gather information. That's their job." Senna points to King Victor and Captain Lewis. "I'm just using you for experimentation. Hup." Completely distracting them with her conversation, they react too slowly seeing Senna lift the stone slab. Without showing any strain, she deftly lifts and pitches the pizza and stone slab behind her.

"NOOOOOOOO!!!!!" The men mournfully cry out seeing the food go to waste. The stone slab sharply crashes into the ground making a loud rumble as sand flies into the air reaching far enough to rain down on them. The raining sand puts out the campfire, but completely misses Senna.

"You're evil!" One of the knights curses at Senna on the verge of crying.

“You’ve been fed. What more do you to complain about?” Senna shrugs and snaps her fingers. "." Two granite stools appear beneath the assassin and the guard with the strongest endurance. A slanted backrest forms forcing the two to lean forward 45 degrees placing their head under a newly formed headrest. Vines appear from behind the slanted chairs firming binding their upper and lower bodies to the chairs. Even their heads are firmly strapped to the headrest to prevent excess movement.

Granite poles extend upward from the seat and form a stone bucket one meter above the headrest. A miniature crack can be seen in the center of the bucket's bottom. Senna nods with satisfaction seeing the device construct fully formed.

The assassin scoffs. "After all that, you're going to kill us now."

Senna gives a resigned sigh. "I would say you're the pathetic one if you think that death is the only option available. I just want to see what will happen. You won't die from this, but I will have to properly restrain you, so you can't commit suicide." The gags are quickly reapplied to all seven of them. The two bound to the constructs are further blindfolded. She tosses the other five back into the carriage and jams the door. "" Orbs of water form and fill the two buckets with a splash. From the bottom of the two buckets, a droplet forms and each release a drop of water landing directly on their exposed foreheads of the two. Water droplets continuously fall every 10 seconds accurately striking the same spot every time. Senna nods seeing it work correctly. "I'm a busy person, so I'll take my leave. Enjoy~"

Senna gives them a parting wave even though the two of them cannot see anything beneath the blindfold. They let out muffled groans and cries beneath their gags. She swings her arm up dispersing the barrier blocking the spectators. She stops in front of everyone that had gathered at some point. "You must be bored if you're standing around watching me play around. Did you need something?"

"What is that?" Captain Lewis points at the strange set up before his eyes. Every once and awhile, he can see the two strongly squirm trying to escape from the bindings.

"That thing is a torture tool I once heard stories about. I promised not to hurt anyone, so I obliged to that, but my curiosity got the better of me." Senna scratches her cheek giving a shy smile. "I heard that this torture method could drive people crazy so I did it out of curiosity. Water constantly drips down on them making them unable to relax their bodies and mind. It can also give the illusion that the water is boring straight through their heads. Various men have been driven to insanity through this method, or so the story goes. Could this method really drive someone crazy? I’m not sure. I chose the assassin with the best endurance for torture and the knight with the best physical defense to see what happens. At the very least, I hope to see some of their resolve shatter."

King Victor and his guards listen to the explanation silently. However, they honestly feel chills listening to Senna talk in a cheerful tone as she describes this method of torture.

Senna coughs with some embarrassment when she sees their uneasy expressions. "Anyways, you can leave them like that. They can't die since I completely restrained them in every possible way and they shouldn't take 'that' much damage from the process…I think... Anyways, Mika!" Senna finishes their conversation and directs her attention to Mika. Mika immediately flies over and lands on Senna's outstretched arm.

Or she was supposed to. In the second before Mika clamped down onto Senna's arm, Senna immediately retracted her arm using both hands to grab Mika. Senna tightly holds Mika's body while using her magic to restrain Mika's wings and beak. Mika turns to Senna confused about the rough treatment, but before she can ask why, Senna's next words completely alarm Mika. "You're really dirty. Resign yourself and get ready for a bath."

{Ehhh?! NOOOO!!!} Mika yells mentally. She tries to squirm from Senna's grasp, but only her neck has the freedom to move. Getting desperate, Mika ignites her body coating it in flames, but Senna remains unfazed.

Senna stands there nonchalantly holding the burning Mika. "If you need me, I'll be taking a bath over there." She motions to a nearby sand dune. Ignoring their surprise, she starts walking away.

[1] Based on the Chinese Water Torture. The seating I used is slightly different just to increase the discomfort that those two will feel.

Author’s Note

A randomish torture session based fully on capriciousness. Hope it was enjoyable. For everyone hoping for something more serving, I ask for patience because it will come soon.

I remembered a college roommate of mine randomly telling me about how he and his friends tested the Chinese water torture method once. They tied him up and lightly punctured a plastic water bottle to drip on his stomach. Since I remembered that talk, I decided to make use of it. A quick search on google told me that the historical methods are done to drip on the forehead instead of the stomach, so I went with what the internet said. XD

On to news! As I mentioned last chapter, I will be hibernating to focus on studying for my upcoming exam on June 4th. Sadly, I’ve been lazy. But I’m a procrastinator, so I just have to do what I can. I have no clue how I’ll feel after that 4 hour exam, so can’t promise anything for the June 4-5 weekend since I might be completely burnt out. I will be glad once it’s over since I bloody hate this textbook. Plus next weekend is Fanime, so I can only allow myself to go part of the time to get some proper studying it.