Heart Devil [OP Yandere Schizo Ramble LitRPG XD]

Hidden deep in Hellnia's northern countryside, nestled between twisted bramble thickets and hollowed trees cursed with greedrot, sat a moss-covered cabin. The roof bowed under its own age, and the faintest hum of newly formed wards pulsed through the air. Anyone who might've wandered close would feel a mild nausea, turn around, and forget they were ever walking that way at all. Inside, however, the atmosphere was sterile. Scrubbed clean with discipline and paranoia.

Cashmere hunched over a broad ledger on a rickety table, the quill in his hand jittering between stillness and spasms. His fingers were stained with ink, the cuff of his sleeve stiff with dried blood, his own. The result of trackers and bramble during his last relocation. Around the table floated the stale scent of bloodwood smoke, and through the cracked shutters came dim beams of distant firelight, red glows from the Greed Capital miles away yet ever looming.

He didn't bother glancing up. His eyes followed his hand.

[

Sell Immediately.
Sell Immediately.
Sell Immediately.

]

Over and over, his fingers wrote those same cursed words like a metronome of doom. The phrase wasn't his own. It came from the tug of that damned [Golden Investment] skill, a power not quite alive but close enough that it haunted his nerves. In the past, he could channel it with precision using his favorite coin. But that coin had slipped from his hand when he fled Hazy Mountain after the disastrous meeting with Hannya and Baku. His fingers twitched at the memory.

Now he had to do it the old way, burn mana in little bursts to let the skill guide his hand. It was less direct, more draining, but marginally safer in this cursed atmosphere. He didn't need a perfect answer. He just needed it to say something different.

He paused, glanced at the ragged candle dripping wax beside him, then dipped the quill again. Just one spark, one signal, one deviation.

The door creaked open.

Cashmere didn't startle. He simply looked up, adjusting his posture like a bored host who'd been expecting a late guest.

"You're back early…" he said.

A broad-shouldered demon stepped in, kicking the door shut with one boot. Over his shoulder hung a gutted deer-like magical beast, its eyes still glassy.

Krolm, once a contractor under Cashmere's informal payroll, now a mountain rat with better instincts than most nobles.

Krolm grunted, tossing the beast down on a side bench. "Smelled something wrong in the wind. Figured you'd still be alive."

Cashmere chuckled faintly. "Barely. The wards are holding, how's the air out there?"

"Rotten." Krolm untied his axe and leaned it against the wall. "They're eating each other in the capital. Started slow. Now it's obvious. Nobles, merchants, gangs, slavers. Whole syndicates chewing through their own ranks. Like the apples were just a warm-up."

Cashmere's smile thinned. "So all of them, then."

"Yeah." Krolm shrugged. "Everyone with a filthy enough soul to glow in the moonlight. You should've seen the barter houses. Looked like a feast day, but without the plates."

Cashmere closed his eyes. "And the Enforcers?"

"Dead. Torn to pieces, near as I could tell. Happened early. Fever hit 'em hardest. Probably the power scaling. Stronger they are, faster they fall."

A resigned silence followed.

Cashmere drummed his fingers against the edge of the ledger, jaw clenched tight. His leg bounced, a rare tell. His golden skill thrummed faintly through his body, but still offered no clear answer. The pages before him were filled with the same phrase.

"Worthless." he muttered, standing up and pacing once around the room, the worn floorboards creaking beneath his boots.

He stopped by the cracked window and peeled back the curtain just enough to peer through. The capital still burned on the horizon, orange and red consuming the once orderly skyline like some market ledger soaked in flame. But off to the eastern edge, just past the old banking towers, he caught a glimmer. A strange pink hue, pulsing faintly through the smoke like a heartbeat.

He took in a quick breath. That wasn't firelight.

He stared for several seconds, unmoving. Then stepped back with a frown and returned to his desk with a sharp exhale, flicking a hand over the open ledger like one might slap sense into it.

Cashmere reached for the side of his ledger and turned a page. He glanced at the calendar etched into the woodgrain beside him.

One day until Tax Day.

The Day of Avaritia.

The day the contracts came due.

"I told her I'd leave before then…" he muttered.

Krolm blinked. "Who?"

Cashmere ignored the question and dipped his quill again, pushing out another test stroke of mana into his arm. The skill fired weakly, the quill shuddering across the page.

[

Inquire Further.

]

His eyes widened slightly. It wasn't 'Sell Immediately'.

Something different.

He tapped the page once, twice. The words didn't fade. His heart pumped into a higher gear.

"I have to go." he said, standing.

"To the capital?" Krolm scoffed. "Are you out of your damned gold-lined mind?"

"Possibly." Cashmere grabbed his tattered coat and slung it over one shoulder. The stitching was barely holding, but it had inner pockets he needed.

"City's burning," Krolm said. "The streets are butcher shops. Even the mirror routes are probably locked down."

"I don't need all of them open," Cashmere replied, already moving toward the door. "Just one, the one under the central business building. Still has the direct mirror to Mirror Way, if it's not cracked yet."

"Mirror's probably guarded, if not buried under corpses."

Cashmere pulled the door open and looked over his shoulder with a smirk that barely touched his tired eyes.

"Then I'll step over them. I'm not like you, Krolm. I'm not an employee. I'm a businessman. And a businessman has to take risks."

"Risk doesn't mean suicide." Krolm muttered.

Cashmere didn't respond at first. He stepped out into the mountain air, the capital burning far away like a wound on the horizon. Then, just before he descended the slope, he turned his head halfway back.

"Thanks for everything," he said quietly. "If I live, I'll pay my debt in gold. And if I die…"

"You'll still owe me." Krolm grunted.

Cashmere smiled.

Then he was gone, vanishing down the slope like a fox in tall grass, ledger clutched under one arm, his golden skill flickering faintly in his blood.

The capital had fallen into an artificial twilight, a false dusk that refused to fade into either night or dawn. The sky churned above Cashmere as he crept down the abandoned slope toward the city gates.

Clouds the color of rotting plums spiraled above the territory's center, forming a slow, demonic whirlpool in the sky. It was as though Greed itself had cracked open, spilling madness like wine over the lips of its gluttonous citizens.

Cashmere tightened his coat and stepped through the twisted iron gate. No guards, no checkpoints, Just the smoldering silence of a city devouring itself.

As he entered deeper, shadows moved unnaturally. Laughter echoed from distant alleys, accompanied by the wet sounds of chewing. Clumps of demons gathered like celebrants in a feast, their mouths smeared red with gore, happily chatting with blood on their teeth. The cursed hunger made them see no difference between apple and flesh.

He ducked into a ruined storefront, slipping through shattered glass and splintered wood. Through the cracked windows, he saw a noblewoman being pulled down by three shirtless demons, each one cooing about her being "the juiciest catch of the day." She didn't even scream, just gasped in horror before her voice was drowned in a sickening crunch. The crowd roared with delight.

"Farmer! That's a good harvest!" Someone cheered.

"Praise Harvest!" another yelled, face smeared in red.

Cashmere pressed himself against the wall, bile rising in his throat. Every corner he turned brought more horror, a merchant gnawed on the thigh of a former tax collector; two devils fought over the head of a black-market dealer like hyenas tugging at carrion. They grinned, sharing bites, exchanging tips on how to find the 'ripest' ones. It was a festival of madness. A feast for fools.

And still, he moved forward.

Every cautious step he took brought him closer to the towering black building at the city's center.

The Business Center.

The great monument of Greed, where contracts were signed, fates sealed, and profits claimed. His only chance to reach the Mirror Way lay beneath it.

But just as he slipped into a narrow alley to avoid a feasting crowd, he froze.

A girl stood at the other end of the alley.

She looked no older than sixteen, though with devils, that meant little. Her crimson eyes glowed faintly in the gloom, and dried blood painted her chin and hands. Her horns curled low around her temples, and she wore a schoolgirl-style skirt spattered in gore.

She tilted her head at him and sniffed.

"You smell pretty sweet," she said softly, voice sing-song and lazy. "Almost ripe."

Cashmere's heart skipped a beat. "Farmer," he said quickly, trying to keep his voice even. "I was chasing an apple. Slippery thing, they ran this way. That's probably what you're smelling."

The girl blinked. She stared at him for a while.

For one endless moment, he thought she would lunge.

Then she smiled.

"Ahhh. Clever. Must've been a juicy one."

She turned away from him and began to shout, "Hey! Farmers! Apple just came through here!"

Cashmere stiffened, a chill running through his spine. More voices answered, distant but closing. If too many came, someone would take a sniff too close, a look too long. And they'd know.

He hadn't built his fortune entirely on clean hands. He had signed backdoor deals. Sold suspect investments. Cut out the small-timers. That guilt clung to him like oil.

He couldn't risk it.

So…He ran.

The girl blinked in surprise, then shrieked with glee. "Haha! He tricked me! That's not a farmer, he's an apple!"

Dozens of heads turned. More laughter, more howls.

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Then the chase began.

Cashmere sprinted down the twisted alleys of the capital, dodging overturned carts, trampling over papers and gold leaf contracts soaked in blood. Behind him, the screams and cheers of the farmers echoed louder and louder.

"Apple!"

"Bite him!"

"Get the core!"

He tossed down a Panic Coin.

Flash

White light exploded behind him, disorienting the closest chasers. Another coin.

Smoke.

The alley behind filled with choking mist.

They weren't as strong as his old investment coins, the ones tied to his account with permission lines and divine backing. Those were frozen now, his entire investment ledger in limbo, thanks to the curse. But these emergency coins still worked, barely.

He turned a sharp corner, slammed shoulder-first into a wall, pushed off, and kept running.

Just when his lungs burned and his mana reserves thinned, he saw it.

A restaurant.

Amid the ruin and ash, it stood untouched. Its white brick walls glowed faintly with golden script. No blood, no broken windows. The lamps on its patio flickered peacefully, casting long shadows against clean tablecloths.

It was like an island in a sea of madness.

Cashmere's instincts screamed.

He ducked into another alley, flipped open his ledger with trembling hands, and poured the last of his focus into the skill.

The quill moved.

[

Buy Immediately.

]

He didn't hesitate.

He sprinted across the open road and shoved himself through the back kitchen door just as a mob rounded the corner. The kitchen was dark, but still clean, stocked, and eerily calm. The scent of spiced bread lingered in the air, warm and fresh.

Outside, the farmers ran past, yelling and cheering, completely ignoring the building.

Cashmere leaned against the counter, panting, heart hammering in his throat. He didn't notice the soft golden glow emanating from the front of the building. Didn't look up to read the name carved into the ornate sign above the door in gilded script:

Manjar Manzana.

The silence inside felt wrong.

Cashmere stood still just inside the empty restaurant, his breath shallow. The chaos outside sounded far away now. Muted laughter, the crunch of teeth on flesh, the manic joy of farmers hunting their prey. But within these marble walls, lined with golden lattice and copper vine carvings, all was still. A thin tension hung in the air, like a violin string pulled taut.

He glanced around the pristine interior. Polished floors. Amber backlit walls. Tables set immaculately for guests who no longer arrived. Bowls filled with perfectly ripened apples sat at every table, red, green, and gold. Each one untouched. Silverware with stem and leaf motifs glimmered as if just polished. No dust, no decay, no blood.

He rubbed his temple, trying to clear the haze. This interior was familiar. Too familiar.

But he couldn't place it.

With shaking hands, Cashmere pulled out a reserve mana potion from his coat and downed it in one swig. The heat coursed through him, and he exhaled sharply. Not enough to cast major spells or teleport, his investor permissions were still revoked, but enough to stabilize his body. Enough to let him think again.

"I'll just rest here a moment," he muttered to himself. "Recover. Move on."

But instinct tugged at him, something deeper than caution. A need to understand. He moved carefully, silently through the dining hall, past rows of untouched settings and unbothered utensils. He paused by a side hallway, one he hadn't noticed before, leading toward the kitchen and beyond.

Then he heard it.

A low, cheerful humming, faint but unmistakable, drifting upward from a barely open door at the end of the corridor. His nerves stretched taught.

He stepped closer.

The basement door creaked softly as he pushed it further open. Cold air wafted up from below, carrying a faint scent of wet earth, fruit, and… iron.

Cashmere crept down the stairs, sticking close to the wall. The humming grew clearer. A melodic, almost innocent tune. One sung by someone content with their work.

The staircase opened into a vast subterranean greenhouse.

He blinked in disbelief. The space was enormous, its domed ceiling ringed with alchemical lighting. Dozens of squat apple trees dotted the rows, each barely waist height but heavy with massive fruit. The scent was overpowering. Sweet, ripe, and vaguely sickening. Between the trees were neat garden plots, patches of fertile soil that pulsed softly, unnaturally.

And at the center of it all was a man.

A devil, dressed in a pristine chef's uniform stained with apple juice and something darker. He hummed as he moved down a row, carrying a metal sprinkler jug. The water inside tinged red.

Cashmere stayed low behind a pile of crates, watching.

The chef watered the dirt slowly, lovingly, cooing to the trees like a proud father. "There, there… my darlings are extra thirsty today…"

Then the jug emptied.

The man sighed and chuckled to himself, shaking his head. "Well, no helping it."

He turned and walked to a table nearby. Cashmere's blood froze. There, neatly laid out, was a large cutting board. And, without hesitation, the chef placed his arm down.

He laid it forearm to wrist as he picked up a cleaver. And in one fluid motion…

Chop

His arm was severed at the bone.

Cashmere slapped a hand over his mouth to stifle his gasp.

The chef didn't flinch. He simply picked up the twitching limb with his good hand, still humming, and walked to a large metal bucket beneath a faucet. He dropped the limb inside and turned the tap.

The moment the water touched the severed arm, a foul black mist rose in a swirling burst.

Cashmere felt it. That pulse of energy, the corrupting wave of that cursed sickness.

Apple Fever.

His mind reeled. That was the source. Not the apples themselves, not just some magical manipulations. It was in the blood. His blood.

The same blood that fed this soil.

Then, as the mist faded, the chef's gaze flicked to the stairwell.

And locked eyes with him.

Cashmere froze.

The devil's grin spread slowly. "Investor Cashmere," he said warmly. "We meet again. I thought I recognized your steps. It's a shame you didn't try the dessert I offered last time you visited."

Cashmere took a step back up the stairs instinctively.

"You remember this place, don't you?" the chef continued, stepping forward, his severed arm already regrowing in a slow, grotesque shimmer of muscle and skin. "It's where you refused the apple. A wise decision, I suppose. Yet here you are."

"...Manzana," Cashmere whispered, the name falling from his lips like a confession. "You were the chef back then."

"And still am," Manzana said proudly, slapping his now-healed arm. "But now I'm more. Her Royal Chef. My Queen turned my life around. From a lowly slaver to a cultivator of paradise."

Cashmere's stomach turned. "You're not a Greed devil. You're a Feaster."

Manzana chuckled, nodding. "I knew you'd figure it out. It's in your nature, after all. Investors are clever, even without their coins. But you shouldn't worry, this restaurant is unholy ground, blessed by the Queen herself. And the rest of the city? A festival."

He turned to gesture at the glowing orchard behind him.

"Greeders would only hinder the growth of the apple of her eye. They needed pruning. So, the soil needed blood. And now it blooms."

Cashmere's lips parted, but no words came.

"Oh, don't look so betrayed," Manzana said gently. "It was always going to happen. The seeds were sown long ago. I'm just the gardener."

He turned back to his apple trees and lifted his sprinkler again. "You've got maybe 30 minutes before dessert is served. I'd recommend heading out through the residential path. The other ways are closing."

Cashmere's body trembled. He didn't answer, nor did he want to.

He spun and fled up the stairs without another word.

He didn't stop to question further. He couldn't afford it. The truths were sinking in too fast, his mind couldn't hold them all.

'Gula. Gula caused this. Why?'

They weren't allies with Avaritia and greed… but they weren't enemies either. This was too much. Too far.

This was a massacre.

He burst into the empty dining room, panting, sweat pouring down his back. He didn't look back. He didn't dare.

No point in killing Manzana now. The damage was done. The curse was in the roots.

The tree had already borne fruit.

He continued with haste. Leaving the restaurant in a panicked daze.

Cashmere moved like a shadow unbound, silent, fast, and deliberate. His cloak fluttering behind him as he darted through the twisting alleys of Greed's residential district. His boots made no sound against the cobblestones slick with blood and fruit pulp.

Around him, madness reigned. Farmers laughed and greeted one another in twisted joy, the word now a poisoned salutation passed between cannibalistic demons and devils dressed as merchants, clerks, and contractors. A woman with gold-threaded sleeves waved a bloody hand at her neighbor as she chewed through what remained of a leg. A delivery demon pushed a cart of screaming, still-living captives bound in vines of apple roots.

Cashmere ducked past them, slipping between buildings, always just out of sight.

He took the longer route on purpose, straight roads were death, and he couldn't afford another ambush. Mana was still dangerously low despite the potion. Every second counted.

But it was what he knew that made the fear worse.

Gula. It was her. She was the one behind the Apple Fever. Not a plague, not a natural curse, but a crafted, directed mechanism of destruction.

And it wasn't just to poison Greed's territory, it was surgical. A blade through the neck of Avaritia's economic web.

He grit his teeth, turning a corner sharply and vaulting over a half-collapsed fence. The fields here had once been shared-owned gardens for middle-tier traders, but the soil was now soaked with miasma and rotting fruit. The apple trees here had burst open, maggots and purple mist leaking from the core.

His thoughts raced faster than his legs.

'...The apple of her eye…' Manzana's words echoed in his mind. The "apple" she was protecting wasn't literal. It was a person. A person important enough for Gula to do the unthinkable, weaponize herself, her power, her people. The gluttonous queen who never meddled in politics had suddenly crossed every boundary for the sake of this one individual.

And who in Hellnia had risen fast enough to justify such investment?

'Hannya!'

His breath hitched. The charming, elegant devil under Baku who had once merely lingered at the edge of civilized society had rocketed to influence. The Dreamveil Compact. A council seat. A sudden alliance between Hazy Mountain and Sweet Oasis.

That kind of rise didn't happen naturally.

His business instincts flared like an alarm bell. He knew a favor-trade chain when he saw one. This wasn't chance. This was cultivated.

'Hannya is tied to Gula.'

And maybe more.

Another piece fell into place.

Cashmere's footfalls paused as he took cover behind a collapsed balcony, scanning the street before crossing. No Farmers. Clear.

'If Hannya had a fate mutation… if she could see potential futures…'

She would've seen it coming, all of it. The apple fever. The collapse. The rise of the Dreamveil Compact. If Hannya had a fate mutation, as he long suspected, then she'd seen these events unraveling like threads on a loom long before anyone else caught wind of it.

And her actions had been the reason behind their own fate devils path collapse.

Cashmere's thoughts sharpened. The meteoric rise of Hazy Mountain. The sudden unity with Sweet Oasis. Gula's uncharacteristic involvement. None of it was incidental.

Then came the piece he hadn't dared name until now.

There was a… presence sealed within the deepest vaults of Greed's Abyss. He remembered the strange fate readings, the information connections, the abnormal mana density radiating from sector black. Files scrubbed clean, records vanished. It had never been spoken aloud, too dangerous, too destabilizing. But the conclusion now pressed against the back of his skull like a blade.

A six-star devil was imprisoned there.

Not a myth. Not a rumor.

A fact he would bet his savings on.

Chained by Avaritia himself. Hidden away in secret, too valuable to destroy, too dangerous to release. That motivation fit perfectly.

And now?

Now, Hannya was planning to free him.

It wasn't just political subterfuge anymore. Not just a maneuver to destabilize the territory.

This was a liberation. Or a resurrection. And possibly… a founding.

The Court of Gilded Woe.

Whether it had once existed or was only now being conceived, the goal was the same. Hannya meant to form a court, one powerful enough to challenge the core plane of Hellnia itself. With the backing of a freed 6-Star god and the collapse of Greed's power base here through the fever, it was all within reach.

A shiver ran down Cashmere's spine.

This wasn't revolution. It was a reckoning.

And at its heart was a devil with malice in her eyes and the ability to read fate like ledgers.

His pace doubled.

The crime came into view: Avaritia, in his climb toward divine status during the Neel Reformation, had not only betrayed and slain his equals, but imprisoned one. A god. A living secret buried beneath the gold-fattened foundations of Greed's rise.

It was a loose end that had festered for centuries.

Now, it was bleeding open.

He sprinted toward the back of the Business Center, a once-mighty tower where investments were made and futures written in blood and ink. The loading bay door hung crooked on its hinges. An old access panel flickered faintly with internal power.

He keyed in his outdated authorization code. Miraculously, it still worked.

With a chime, the metal door slid open.

He was met with silence.

The interior was painted in death. Bodies lay slumped across marble floors, but they hadn't been touched by the apple plague. No chewed limbs. No laughter or grotesque smiles. These were clean kills.

Precise.

Sliced. Dismembered. Executed.

One devil's head rested beside her torso, her face frozen in horrified disbelief.

Cashmere didn't slow. Neither did he inspect or notice the abnormal scene around him.

Down the stairwell, skipping every third step, he pushed toward the sublevels. The only illumination came from emergency crystal lighting, soft, flickering crimson.

Every hallway was quieter than the last.

The Mirror Way was just ahead. If he could reach it, he could report everything to the high council. The Fever. The conspiracy. The dark, abyssal truth.

He rounded the final corner…

And stopped.

The Mirror Chamber loomed before him, bathed in silvery glow.

But someone was already there.

A demon stood before the great mirror, her back to him, surrounded by a pile of corpses stacked with surgical symmetry. Her skin was hot pink, glowing faintly in the sterile light. Short bob-cut hair curved against her nape. She wore a pristine maid's uniform, the apron somehow untouched by gore, and a long black veil trailed over her head like mourning silk.

Cashmere's heart shuttered.

The blade in her hand snapped together. A segmented whip-sword, now locked into a single fluid weapon, dripped blood with a final, metallic click.

She turned.

Eyes like garnets locked onto his.

Cashmere's blood ran cold.

'Cherrymaid.'

His legs locked in place.

She was supposed to be gone. Vanished after those few chaotic raids on Greed's slave caravans. Rogue operatives, pain demons, no known affiliations. Theories ranged from personal vengeance to vengeance-driven mercenaries. But they were all dangerous. And all gone.

So why was one here now?

Cherrymaids were surgical butchers, stories spoken in whispers. Living grief made manifest.

And this one was standing between him and his only escape.

She stepped forward, quiet and composed. Despite the carnage behind her, she moved like a proper servant, modest, graceful, almost apologetic.

Then she spoke.

"Name," she asked softly, her voice delicate and nearly bashful. "And position."

Cashmere swallowed hard. His instincts screamed don't lie.

"…Investor Cashmere. Second-tier. Under review."

She tilted her head, veil shifting.

"…You are… untainted enough," she murmured, almost to herself. "No hunger on your scent. No fruit rot, and an acceptable level of pain."

He didn't move. Even breathing felt like a gamble.

"Why are you here?" she asked again.

"I… I need to contact the high council," he said, voice barely audible. "The fever. The Queen. The corporate structure is collapsing. I have to report."

The Cherrymaid exhaled.

Her shoulders drooped. Her ample chest rose and fell in a slow, solemn rhythm, like a sad lullaby.

"Why bother? The world has already been broken," she whispered. "We're only serving the despair after now."

The blood on her sword glistened as she angled it back toward the floor.

Cashmere licked his lips.

"Look…I'm not your enemy."

She took one final step closer. The air felt heavy. His legs twitched…but she paused.

"You may go," she said gently. "But don't look back."

She turned toward the mirror again, her wrist flicking once.

The surface stilled.

Glass, flawless and still.

She didn't turn again as she spoke.

"Tell your greeder council," she said, "that dessert is being served. And this time, everyone is on the menu."

Cashmere didn't wait.

He sprinted through the portal.

And the last thing he saw before vanishing was her veil, fluttering despite the stillness of the air. She stood poised like a funeral statue, blade in hand, sorrowful, calm, amid a perfect arrangement of corpses, each sliced like a dish prepared for presentation.

Cashmere kept running, keeping the bile down and his eyes determined. Completely unaware that a silent sigil had attached to the back of his tattered business coat.

And then he was gone.