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Sinmonger by San Tian Liang Jiao || Book 1: Sin Is Born of the Heart

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** CONTENT WARNING: violence **

Prologue: Tianyi

December 3rd, overcast.

It was already past ten in the morning when I opened my eyes. I didn’t have to open the curtains to know that the sky outside was entirely clouded over, for the humidity in the air pervaded my house, crept under my blankets, gnawed at my bones.

I had two choices: I could make myself a cup of coffee, or I could close my eyes and hope that it would be December 4th when I opened them again.

In the end, I chose to get out of bed.

Per usual, I spent my day sitting in the shop, praying that nobody would patronize this dump of a place.

Afternoons on overcast days remind me of the minutes spent waiting in line for a vaccine shot, as a kid, or the seconds right before the monster jumps out in a horror movie.

You sense something ominous coming your way, but you can never tell when the hammer will fall — nor the first drop of rain.

The hours passed quickly. Thanks to the weather, it turned out that not a single customer walked in until four in the afternoon, for real.

It was a most wonderful time for me. I could sit behind my desk without disturbance, drinking my coffee, reading my books.

At half past four, someone came in. I must admit, I hated him then.

He, however, still gave me a pleasant surprise. He wasn’t here to buy books, but to rob the shop.

I had a strong urge to throw a few complaints at him, as he advanced on me, his gun out. It was getting harder and harder these days to dispose of dead bodies; .

I did the math: it’d take half an hour to pull out his teeth, shave all the hair off his body, and saw him into six; another full hour to drive him over to Bob’s pig farm; and I’d still have to clean up the bloodstains and waste when I came back. By then, it’d be too late to start dinner.

So I instead raised both hands, made a show of being frightened, and told him with a tremble in my voice: all my money is in the drawer, please let me go alive.

I thought my act should have been quite convincing. Whether my expression, my tone, or my body language — I’d portrayed it all perfectly. I thought he would just take the money and leave, and then I could go back to enjoying my alone time.

But when he reached for the drawer, I suddenly remember that it’d been a long time since I kept around cash or currency of any kind…

So, what greeted him after opening the drawer was a half-slice of pizza (leftovers courtesy of me), and a half-chewed mouse (leftovers courtesy of some mystery creature). He got really angry — swearing as he pressed the gun to my temple, glaring at me, demanding whether I thought playing him like a fool would be funny.

I was afraid that he’d fire by mistake, so I ended up reluctantly shoving his handgun down his throat instead.

I had an epiphany as I watched him flop on the ground like a dead fish: public safety was underwhelming in Philly; I should move away.

These days, the city saw no shortage of youngsters like him, who prowled the streets with a gun, looking for some quick cash. I was seriously doubting whether he had any brains, though, given that he somehow managed to wander into this crappy bookstore to do his plundering.

Based on common sense, the best kinds of small or middle-sized businesses to raid would be restaurants or shops that sold household items; ticketing offices, clothing stores, and home appliance stores came second. And those that sold furniture, antiques, or books were the worst of all.

Do people nowadays not even have the time to estimate the average daily profit of various businesses and weigh the risk accordingly? Why even bother robbing a store, then? One could just break into a private home; there’s bound to be some cash lying around.

Of course, there’s absolutely no point in trying to loot cash from me. There’s probably better luck to be had robbing a homeless guy in the subway.

Tens of seconds passed. The guy looked like he was going to go into shock, though he was still struggling to crawl his way towards the door.

I cut him off, locking the door, turning the “Open” sign over so that the “Closed” side was now on display. I also rolled down the blinds on the nearby window display.

When I turned around, he’d already made it to where I stood. To avoid complications, I broke — quite easily — the bones in both his arms.

Finally, I could settle back into my comfy armchair, and continue having a good time with my coffee and reading.

I reckoned the guy would have a hard time standing at this point, given the state of his body, and even if he managed to get himself off the ground, he’d still find it hard to turn a door handle of that size, using his mouth. In half an hour he’d kick the bucket, and then his corpse would barricade the door. Perfect.

Regardless, today was still a loathsome day, all things considered. By the end of it, there were still some things I couldn’t figure out — for example, the relation between me, the mouse, the mysterious creature, and our respective places in the food chain.

Ah well… Forget it, such things were hardly important.

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