273 273: An artificial world [pt2]
“Who are you and what do you want from us? You better answer truthfully if you don’t want your head to go off flying.”
Rita’s fast actions caused the young teen in her grasp to be startled. He flailed in panic as he tried to get out of Rita’s grasp and Rita had to be careful not to graze him any more than she already had.
Even though Rita held the kid at knifepoint, she did not want to kill him off for no apparent reason. She at least wanted to know why they were brought into that tiny room in the first place.
“P-Please don’t kill me off. I will do anything if you let me live. I p-promise to give up magic if you want me to. But please don’t kill me off.”
The teen was crying at that point, too terrified to even move from his place. Rita had pressed her knife more firmly against his neck so that the kid could feel its sharp blade every time he breathed.
“Don’t worry kid. You won’t die as long as you do what we ask of you and tell us where we are.”
Aurora felt like it was prime time for her to interfere. She did not like playing good cop bad cop but this situation called for such a thing to happen.
Besides, Rita had already terrified the kid so why did it matter if Aurora tried to make him feel better.
“I w-will do anything you ask of me. B-But please don’t kill me. I want to at least graduate from school work. Please.”
The desperate cries of the kid made Rita feel nothing. She did not let him go until Aurora gave her a ‘go ahead.’ The kid quickly arranged his body in a kneeling position and lowered his head.
That black-clad yellow body was shaking. It was a truly pitiful scene to see but Aurora could not afford to have sympathy in this situation. If she sympathized with the kid once, she would end up sympathizing with the kid forever.
‘I want to let you go kid, but I don’t think such a good chance to ask questions would come again in my life.’
“First of all, tell me how we got here. According to the law, the door should have opened up into another door, not in that random place we ended up in.”
Aurora’s words were vague and not easy to understand. But if the kid had any concept of the tower and its ascension system, he would know what Aurora was talking about.
“Hahahaha, ah that? I think it might be my fault. When I was casting my magic, I made a small error and ended up pulling things I should not have. I-I’m so sorry. I will make it up to you.”
The kid looked embarrassed to be saying that and his body was shaking even more. Aurora could see the fear of death in his eyes.
The kid was expecting Aurora to be angry with him but she was more shocked than angry at what happened. According to this kid, he had pulled Aurora in when he had been casting magic. It was something that should be impossible to do.
The tower had an amazing defense system for those who were crossing across floors. General magic could not interfere with it. Only the magic on par with a goddess or an overlooker could do that.
So either this kid was lying or he had something that made it possible. And Aurora was willing to bet that it was the latter.
“Nice story kid but interfering with the floors should be impossible. Now, why don’t you tell us the truth?”
Quince caught on to the same facts Aurora did and he looked annoyed to be made fun of. His words were harsh and it caused the kid to flinch.
He suddenly looked like he was going to run away from them.
“I-I…it’s not…I’m not lying. I did manage to pull you but it was o-only because I had help. My teacher lent me his mana stone to practice since I’m bad at magic. You can a-ask him if you don’t believe me.”
The teen quickly corrected this statement as soon as he realized that Aurora and her party were not happy with his answer.
In this way, he was trying to avoid all the blame and invoke Aurora’s curiosity. And she had to say that it was working quite nicely.
If it was an elder that lend this kid the power to pull them here, then he should be a big shot off this floor. Having such a person would help them out a lot in clearing this floor.
“I understand what you said kid but I am not still satisfied with your reply. So, I need you to arrange a meeting with your master for us. And before you try to escape remember that I marked you off. I will know where you are anytime I want to.”
The teen wilted at Aurora’s words but he no longer looked surprised. His expression said that he had expected to be in such a situation but he did not like it.
“I u-understand. Why don’t you all make yourself at home while I go and contact my master. Feel free to take anything you need. A-And also, can you do something about that thing behind you? I don’t think my house can fit something that big here.”
The teen pointed back to Ur who was in his miniature form. But his miniature form was large enough to touch the ceiling of the room and make the space feel even smaller than before.
Aurora pointed toward Ur who tilted his head but his body did shrink down into the form of a kid dragon. He was as large as a dog right now and he looked around curiously.
“You better hurry up and run away now. The longer you make us wait, the harder it would be on you. Who knows, maybe Ur will eat you out of your house before tomorrow morning.”
Aurora was not serious and Quince realized since he laughed. Rita was amused as well at the joking tone but the teen did not seem to find it funny.
“O-Of course I should hurry up now. By the way, my name is Subaru so tell anyone my name if they ask why you are here. I s-should get going now.”
The kid left the room as if his backside was on fire. The threat of having him being tracked down had gotten to him hard.
“So, when did you tag the kid? I did not see you using any magic once we came out.’
Rita asked with a curious voice. She looked back toward the kid who had run away and then back at Aurora with questioning eyes.
“I did not tag the kid. I lied to him to get him to cooperate with us. But I can track him down if I want to so that was not all a lie.”
Aurora chucked at the reaction she got from her companions. It was such a knowing smile since these were the people who knew her the best.
“You ended up terrifying the kid in the end. I cannot believe I have such a terrible person as my master. What should I do with you now?”
Rita joked around and it caused a whole string of debates to start.
Aurora quickly excluded herself from that talk because she had better things to do with her time. She had felt weird energy trying to take note of herself so Aurora decided to track it back in her mind.
She felt the energy as it was rushing away from her and caught it in her hand. The person on the other end looked startled by Aurora’s quick actions and even tried to get away from her but Aurora did not allow him to flee.
“Where do you think you are going? Why did you decide to follow after me like this? What do you want from me?”
Aurora asked but she got no reply for her actions. The only thing she got was a sensation of shock as the light on the other end finally ended up breaking the connection with her consciousness and run away.
And just like that, Aurora had been duped but she did not seem to mind that much. The sensation of being probed into was a new one and Aurora was curious about the origin of that power.
Just who in the world had tried to look into her of all people and for what reason?
‘It seems that this floor is not as simple as I made it out to be. I have a feeling that we are in for a tough time ahead of us now. I wonder how things would share up to be.’
Aurora was curious but she also had a bad feeling about what was to come next.