[Log 7: Recording Started]

[Time to homeworld: 17:00:00]

[Time to current world: 08:00:00]

"Citrix! Citrix! Wake up!" a familiar female's voice jolted my consciousness awake.

I felt groggy and my body felt heavy. My backbone ached while some of my limbs felt numb from being leaned on too much. I didn't need to fully open my eyes to see Ai just at the corner of my vision with the clock of the current world below it.

"Wake up, Citrix!" Ai mimicked Lisandra's voice while giggling wildly. It seemed somewhat energetic this morning.

Sitting up, I split my eye lids open to reveal a scenery I wouldn't really appreciate. A lot of people were walking around on the streets, some looking at me as they passed by, but most just went on with their daily routine.

"You should probably get off the roof now while you still can," Ai returned to its original voice.

Now that my mind was starting to clear up, the act of sitting on a roof seemed conspicuous. It was a wonder no one had reported me to the authorities yet.

That is, if they had one at all.

Stretching my legs so they hung on the edge of the roof, I tried searching for the crates I used to get up last night, but they seemed to have vanished overnight, leaving me stranded on the roof.

I thought about using my hands to get a grip on the edge of the roof and get down by lowering my body slowly, but the distance between the roof and ground seemed so far now that I was on it. There was also the option of jumping off the roof and doing a forward roll, but that option sounded painful if I didn't land properly and achieved a perfect roll.

"I'm out of ideas." I sighed while sitting down.

"You can always try calling for help, you know," Ai seemed convinced it'll work.

"But don't you think that's too conspicuous?" I said wearily. I did think about the option for a few seconds, only to rule it out for the fact that it would attract too much unwanted attention.

"Hell, parkour your way down then," Ai seemed to come to the conclusion I decided to have second thoughts on.

The act of parkouring didn't sound difficult or complicated at all, though the amount of skill required was tremendous. The risk was also quite real, be it minor ones like sprained ankles or serious ones, like concussions.

"Just parkour," Ai insisted.

"But it sounds painful!" I yelled out, attracting several passersby’s gazes.

"Stop being such a baby, you're supposed to be at the top of the food chain, so act like it!" Ai berated me. I felt a hotness blooming in my chest, where it then slowly spread itself to my head. It made me feel infuriated, for me to be chastised like I was a boy.

"Oh shut it. Like an artificial like you would understand," I retorted, unable to suppress my emotion.

"At least I'm not a baby."

"Take that back!"

"Baby! Baby! Baby!"

"I said. Take. It. Back." I hinted dangerously.

"Oh, what're you gonna do if I don't, baby? Corrupt me?" Ai mocked, before bursting with laughter full of mock.

"I'll make you take that back then," I retreated a few steps back from the edge of the roof, before accelerating till I was at full speed. My anger towards Ai's words seemed to have numbed my sense of fear I got from the height, probing me to jump off the roof right at the last minute. There were a few surprised gazes as some saw me jump off. There was even a child who called out to his unaware mom. I felt exhilarated as I soared through the air, and soon, I was sure my blood pressure and hormone levels were spiking off the charts.

[Warning: Intense change detected. Suppress? Y/N]

A screen popped out while I was still falling forward and downward simultaneously. Due to the pleasure of exhilaration, I selected [N] instead. In response, the screen went away without interrupting my moment, which I thought was the best moment of my life.

Although the entire thing lasted for several seconds, in my perspective, minutes, even hours, passed by while I took in the feeling. The thrill was enough to sow the seeds of addiction in me and easily sped its growth past the point of no return. But when I looked down, all signs of euphoria were nullified and instead, fear gripped my heart. The ground was only several hundred centimetres away from me and yet, my landing posture was still not in place. Hastily, I tried adjusting myself to a correct posture, but it required all my concentration just to change my body's angle for even just a minute. Logically speaking, I'd die by having a concussion, so I tried focusing more on the pleasure of falling. Fortunately, a miracle happened. My body tensed and moved itself. It felt as if some subconscious part of me reacted to the surging hormone levels and blood pressure, coincidentally just before I died. That proved to be a lifesaving act as it managed to adjust my legs just barely into the right angles for landing.

The moment my soles hit the ground, I front rolled instinctively to decrease the total pressure exerted on my bones by the total momentum I was experiencing. In the end, I was kneeling with both my hands and legs extended on the side of the path, panting hard with the knowledge of barely surviving a fall from such a lethal height. My palms gripped the loose cobbles as I tried digesting the proper weight of what I just did and why exactly. The exhilaration felt just now gradually dissipated as I stopped moving at all, leaving me in a half exhausted but satisfied state.

After a few moments of trying to catch my breath, I finally noticed something trying to enter my mind. The feeling it gave off was similar to the status screens of this world, but different in terms of complexity. Once my mind calmed, it was finally able to squeeze through the formerly congested mind of mine. It then revealed itself to be a package made to auto unwrap itself the moment it entered its host's mind, with a media file attached to its side, announcing:

[{Instinct Factor: I} Unlocked]

I saw the message pop out and was curious as hell when Ai butted in.

"Holy crap! I mean, good job on unlocking a skill, Citrix! Haha!" Ai corrected itself.

"What's 'Instinct Factor:I '?" I ignored the first two out-of-character words AI uttered

"No idea, let me comb through the skill databases first." Ai seemed to have gotten busy on its own accord. I shrugged since it normally wouldn’t get so hard-working even if I were to order it against its will.

Since I had extra time on hand, I decided to get rid of the currently-growing stares on my back. Most were curious stares, but there were some filled with malicious intent.

Or maybe I was just hallucinating the malicious part. I shook my head to get that thought out.

"Are you ok?" Asked a voice I've never heard before.

I looked up from the cobble and grass and saw a face familiar in this part of town. It was not the face I was familiar with, but one fitting to be born in this village, or town to be more precise. She had freckles on her face and dimples in her kind smile, and her big round eyes had brown pupils. Twin tail braids of dark brown hair decorated her pretty face and she held a basket full of grocery, giving me the obvious hints that she was just a typical yet popular village girl, filled to the brim with happiness and simplicity.

She looked at me with one hand outstretched, just like how I did whenever I wanted to help someone up or encourage someone to stay strong. I paused. How did I know this? The amnesia should have robbed me of all my memories, yet as the smile that seemed so familiar yet unfamiliar to me plastered itself across the features of the girl, my gut seemed to remind me of the person I once was.

"Are you hurt? Falling without a proper landing at that kind of height is almost always fatal," The girl came over, grabbed my hand and pulled me up, all the while smiling incautiously and scanning me for obvious injuries.

"I-I'm fine." I felt a little dazed having survived a fall from such a height. There was also the thing concerning 'Instinct Factor:I' that bothered me, but I thought, one step at a time. “You're a sucker for sweet and innocent faces, ha!" Ai chuckled after that, then returned to working.

"Shut up," I said aloud to respond, even though I knew it would just ignore me. The village girl who stood in front looked surprised at my sudden rudeness, then her face fell and she started apologizing.

"I'm sorry! I'm sorry, I'm sorry..." She kept apologizing until her words were incoherent.

I sighed while Ai laughed aloud, mostly in my head anyway.

"No no no, I wasn't talking to you," I denied as I tried inserting an explanation while moving my hands around to attract her attention.

"Then who were you talking to?" She said between sobs. She seemed a little confused as tears threatened to unleash themselves from her glands.

"It's, uh, my... my..." I struggled to bring a person to mind.

"'My' what?" She was curious now.

"Yea, my what exactly, Citrix?" Ai giggled before laughing in a tone of mockery.

"My, uh, my… … Imaginary friend!" And I knew I just made the worst possible lie in my entire life. It was definitely not worth it, since I was going to be laughing stock for the rest of my miserable life even though I just saved my face in front of someone else. I could even hear Ai’s laughter growing boisterous in the back of my mind after what I just said.

I couldn't just say there's a computer program in my head right? She would have thought me crazy.

"Oh, an imaginary friend," She said, clearly unsurprised, "I have one of those as well, though I got through it a few years back."

I sighed, dejectedly this time. There was an abundance of thoughts going through my mind right then, but 'what the actual fxxk?' was the most common one out of all the others.

"Aww, cheer up. I bet you'll get over it at some point in time," Apparently she mistook my sigh of dejectedness as a sigh of feeling worthless.

Technically speaking, she wasn’t wrong..

"Eh, actually-"

"Oh, you have a cut on your knee!" She looked downward while holding both my hands in her's. Now that she mentioned it, my left knee really was bleeding, and the pain was beginning to set in as my adrenaline was thoroughly cleared out of my system.

"Come on, I'll help you," Although initially the dumb-muted me was standing there like a rock, after an intense tug of war, I was dragged along with her, with my bleeding knee pulsing hell every time it got bent.

Ai was strangely silent for the entire time. All the while I got dragged along by the village girl who had a surprising amount of strength, it just remained in silent mode. Whenever I tried speaking to it, it shushed me, saying "You're disturbing me!" In the end, I was left with just the option of getting dragged around by the girl, leaving behind and forgetting someone very important that could possibly be searching for me now, worried sick from just the thought of me getting a near-death experience.

[Log 7: Pause]

[Log 7: Resume]

"My house is really close by, come on," the village girl repeated for the fifth time.

Not only was her strength extraordinary, so was her stamina. I had to stop several times to catch my breath while the girl kept going at the same pace without even breaking a sweat or stopping at all, that is, if one excluded the few times she did just for me to catch up.

We were twisting and turning at almost every corner, making it hard for me to map the entire town. From what I saw, there were probably more than ten rows of houses, each row having at least 10 to 15 houses, separated by the occasional alleys and junctions. Most shops were using the owner's house as a premise, making the rural area sound like a shopping area.

I got dragged a few more miles before stopping right in front of a house. This one obviously wasn't a shop, which made it stand out from the rest. The two large windows sitting just beside the door reflected light on its glassy surface, annoying some of the passersby.

The girl knocked on the door a few times, before opening it and yelling, "I'm home!"

After that, I got pulled in through the doorway. The door slammed itself shut the moment I entered, causing me to wince and tense a little. There was little sound echoing in the house, which made me wonder if it really was inhabited.

The girl then lead me into the first room we encountered after walking down the hallway. It was furnished with two arm chairs facing an unlit fireplace, a coffee table positioned right in the middle, and clocks and picture frames decorated the fireplace's mantelpiece. A carpet was spread out just below the furniture and the floor was revealed to be made of birch wood. All in all, it was a lovely space if not for the deathly silence lingering in the place.

"Sit here," she gestured, "I'll go get the first aid kit." She ran off into another room through the door connected to the living room.

I sat down on one of the arm chairs while my knee still throbbed, albeit not as painful as before. The dried blood was clotting, if not already stopping the blood from flowing out. The wound obviously would leave a scar, even if I were to try and completely heal it, but the thought of having a souvenir from my first job didn't seem bad at all, if not better.

I looked around the living room, trying to take in finer details which I may have missed. There was a pile of wood just beside the fireplace, which I couldn't see before due to the chair blocking it from view. Then there was the carpet, having the part nearest to the fireplace burnt a little, likely due to jumping sparks from a long ago fire. A charcoal black mark stained the coffee table, likely because of some spilt coffee from before.

Everything looked normal, nothing out of place. But there was still a feeling of foreignness and uneasiness seeping through me, which I could vaguely tell was originating from this room. The foreignness I could explain, which was most likely due to coming to a stranger's world, but the uneasiness, I could not. I tried ignoring it, telling myself that it was merely just my overly active imagination, but my guts told me a whole different story. It was as if my guts knew the truth and was trying to tell my brain, to caution it, yet my brain didn't want to accept it because of reasons and emotions, blinding me from the obvious truth.

I looked around more, trying to ease that uneasiness of mine. Thinking it was a good idea to investigate the village girl, I stood up (through a lot of struggling) and looked at the pictures decorating the mantelpiece.

The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

Everything was arranged tidily to the point where the doer could take pride in it. There was a total of five pictures and two clocks, with the clocks arranged at both ends of the mantelpiece.

I looked at the clock on my left first. It showed that it was "9:15".After comparing it with the one in my logs, I concluded that this clock was accurate. I moved on to the second clock. The clock read "10:15" instead of "9:15", which I thought strange since both clocks had different times.

Probably an error? I thought to myself, but my gut twisted at such a reason, refusing to believe such an outrageous conclusion.

I tried double checking, but the time shown on both clocks changed again. I tried again and again, but the results kept changing every time I took my eyes off them. It was as if someone or something didn't want to let me know the time, purposefully messing up my view on this aspect. I got dizzy after several more attempts, which made me give up and get back into the armchair.

Coincidentally, the village girl came through the side door after a few more moments with a first aid kit in hand. She looked a little gloomy in the dark, but the impression she was presenting was no less than before. She walked over and grabbed a stool from under the coffee table which I didn't notice, before sitting on it and grabbing a bottle of iodine from the kit.

"This'll hurt a bit, so stay strong," It sounded like she wanted to sound strong for me, but the tone was so artificial that I struggled to hold in my laugh.

"Hey! Don't laugh!" The village girl sulked a little before taking in iodine with some cotton and applying onto my serious looking wound. It stung a lot, making me bite my lips and swallow my laughter.

"Huh, your wound isn't as bad as it looks, though I'm sure it was very serious before." She kept going even after she said that.

Listening to her words, I couldn't help but look at it as well. Indeed, it was just as she said, the wound looked a lot smaller than before, not as serious as when I was still kneeling.

Perhaps it was just my imagination? But the girl said so as well……

One after another, questions kept popping out of my mind. There were a few that kept lingering around, such as the question 'What's instinct factor I?', 'Why is Ai taking so long?' and 'Why does it feel so lonely?'

"Hello... Hello? Hello~~" Before I knew it, the village girl's face was inches away from mine, yelling 'hello' non-stop. Seeing my eyes focused on her's, the girl backed away and sat back onto the stool.

"I said I was done. Are you ok? Did you hit your head? Need to see a doctor?" The girl asked with concern.

Seems like me dozing off worried her, though I should let a stranger worry less...

"I'm ok, and I don't need to see a doctor."

"Ah, good, good." she sighed hearing my response.

It seemed that she was naïve enough to think that a normal response was already enough to confirm the existence of lasting brain damage.

"Oh, right. What's your name?" A sudden thought made me ask the question.

"Huh?" She looked confused.

"I mean, you've been helping me a lot, so I wonder if I could know your name," I tried sounding normal, but my tone didn't really strike the criteria as 'normal'.

She pondered for a few moments while staring at me. There was a sudden lifelessness and coldness in her eyes, but it was quickly replaced with her usual kind and warm aura.

"Ah, my name is Sophia, you can just call me Fia, if you like," Sophia said.

"My name is Citrix, and it's nice to finally introduce ourselves properly," I reached out a hand for her to shake.

She grabbed onto my hand, before squeezing too hard and eliciting a bone crushing pain in my palm. I yelled out in pain as she loosened her grip.

"Ah, sorry. I'm not used to controlling my grip strength," Sophia apologised sincerely, though the coldness suddenly flashed through her eyes, just for that instant.

Gosh, that's creepy... ... I told myself to calm down, but it seems my gut suddenly began twisting in fear. I hugged my stomach as the pain intensified.

"A-are you ok?" Sophia tried supporting me up, but instead, skin contact made the pain even worse.

"Y-yes, I-i'm fine. I'll be leaving first." I stood up and prepared to leave. Sophia pulled my hand, seeming reluctant to part ways with me.

"You should rest here instead since you're sick," Sophia tried persuading me to stay, but I kept refusing after noticing the pain intensified while I stood near Sophia.

"I'll get going first. I-I'll come back and v-visit soon!" I shouted as I dashed through the door and went out.

As I looked around, it was already evening. I checked my logs to see the time, to make sure it wasn't an illusion, to make sure I wasn't hallucinating from the pain.

"H-how?" I stared in disbelief as the clock showed I've been in Sophia's house for more than a few hours.

It felt like just a few minutes!

My stomach's pain disappeared after a few more minutes of idle standing, staring at the setting sun. There was a red arrow coming towards me, and I finally remembered who I forgot.

"Citrix..!" Lisandra ran over, fueled with rage and worry. Her look told me a lot more than she was currently trying to express.

"Uh, hi-" I stood there, legs frozen solid as she ran over and punched in the face. There was a minor shockwave as her fist connected with my nose, and I was sure my nose was now broken. The shockwave also sent me staggering a few steps backwards, while a stone tripped me from behind.

"Gargh!" I fell backwards, certain my face was ruined.

"Why'd you abandon me like that!? I was worried... sick!" Lisandra yelled at me with a berating tone. She looked like she was going to send a ton of fists into my stomach.

"I-i forgot, sorry.."

"You little shit, trying to throw me off like that. You could've just told me if you didn't want me in your face so much.”

"No, it's nothing like that! I just forgot, that's all."

"No more excuses!” she shouted before continuing “By the way, how'd you get down from the roof? I was certain you'd break a leg or two when jumping off, not just a sorry wound," she pointed at the sanitized wound. The wound wasn't even there anymore, as if it evaporated.

"Uh, well, Ai assisted me in getting off, and I've gained a skill through that risk! Yay..?" I looked at her, expecting some proper response like being happy and let bygones be bygones, but instead, she looked at me suspiciously.

"What kind of skill?"

"Not sure, I think it's an active one."

"The name?"

"Instinct factor one."

She looked bewildered, but closed her eyes and asked again, as if my answer would come out different.

"What's the skill name again?" She asked very seriously, though I couldn't really look at her in the eye while she's so serious.

"Instinct, factor, one." I replied with a tone hinting my annoyance from being asked the same question over and over again, even though it was just the second time.

She freaked out at last, running around in circles while holding my shoulders and yelling in my face.

"Woooooooooooooah!" Lisandra looked wild.

"Hey, cut that out. Tell me, what's the use of Instinct Factor One?" I got my question out, and now she was looking at me as if I was the odd one out.

"I don't know anything about Instinct Factor One, though what I do know is, a- no, I mean, the Instinct Factor," She replied in my face.

"Back up, what's Instinct Factor then?" I moved back a little.

"In legends and myths and tales passed down by the Old Ones, Instinct Factor is said to be the progenitor skill for other abilities. The one who wields the skill is categorized as 'Bioweapon' classed hunter or any other job. In your case, it's Bioweapon-classed hunter"

"And.. what's that?"

"Bioweapon basically means you're a living weapon. Legends say that only one in a million years would a new breed of Bioweapon be made."

"So...?"

"Ain't that obvious? Since you've got the progenitor skill, I don't think I need to explain more," LIsandra looked expectedly at me, waiting for revelation to dawn upon me.

"Oh my god," I couldn't help but gasp after comprehending how special I was.

"Yes, oh my god indeed." Lisandra looked at me with a crazed look, before faking a cough and getting back into her usual personality.

"I'll tell you more about it after we get back to the tavern. Meanwhile, follow me, and be quick about it!" Lisandra started sprinting. Not long, she was already rounding a corner. I didn't know exactly why she ran since we've got all the time in the world, so I just stood there breathing the fresh air a bit.

An icy cold sense of dread washed over my body, overriding my rationality in lieu of fear. Run. It was all my mind told me to do. Yet, as I trembled like a prey stalked by its predators, I found I could not consciously move my muscles for even an inch.

"Don't you just stand there! Run, dumbass!" Lisandra yelled from a few streets away.

Broken from the spell of unmoving casted by my predatory sense, the previous fear gripping my heart showed me what I had to do, and in that instant, all I knew was that I had to run, to get as far away from what laid behind me. The heightened sense of fear sent adrenaline coursing through my body and at the same time, caused my feet to move at unprecedented speeds. Yet, nothing registered in my mind besides the fact that the chill intensified.

The blurs flying past me streamlined as my heart threatened to burst from its exertion. Every fiber told me I could no longer go on, but the fear told me otherwise. Not long after, breaths were coming out in ragged clumps as fresh air struggled to fill my burning lungs. My arms pumped hard as my breathing rhythm went wild. And when finally I knew I could no longer run, my legs came to a halt as my body fell due to tripping on a loose cobble.

Lying face flat on the floor, I lost the will to run anymore and instead, embraced the fear of death that was closing in. My lids closed as I breathed in deeply, taking in the surrounding air for what I think would be for the last time. I could smell the distant taste of food and liquor, hear the distant sounds of crickets chirping into the night and feel the rough cobbles under me. Every minute detail was taken in as I gave up and embraced the fear of death that was soon to send me into eternal slumber. But at the last moment, something sprang to life within me, turning that fear into untapped power.

[{Fear Factor:I} Unlocked]

A distance voice called to me, begging me to stand up and run again, to not give up and fall to a quick and miserable death. "Run! Dang it, run!" Her voice traveled through the air, overlapping with the chirps I heard from before. There was distress and worry, anxiety and fear all bundled up as she hope again for me to stand up. "Run, Citrix... ... Run!" I could hear her sob a little as she regretted not pulling me with her back to the tavern.

I opened my eyes as new determination rooted and budded. Although the fear from before took control of my body, not allowing any of my senses to gain a clear perception, now it felt like it was providing a greater clarity and control over my body. Fatigue and pain no longer plagued my senses as I stood up just at a thought, without forcing. 

As that fear intensified to a blizzard like chill, my control over my body tripled compared to before. In the blink of an eye, I was up and running just like a fully-rested well-trained athlete. My soles were hitting the ground more frequently than before while my breath no longer roughened at even the slightest amount of exertion. Blood rushed up my head as I smelled the liquor trail, clearly emitted from the tavern we took refuge in.

The chill lessened as I sped through the door and slammed it shut, earning a few annoyed glances who went on drinking after that. One moment I was standing on both of my feet, the next I was kneeling just like this morning, only panting and even harder than ever before, with my heart threatening to stop beating at all if I were to continue my previous feat. I laid down on the floor, resting my head a little when Lisandra squatted down and poked both my eyes.

"Poke~" She said annoyingly, though her sniffle made it evident she cried a little.

"Ouch! Cut it out, Lis," I was tired beyond belief, and if she was going to start interrupting my rest while I'm still in such a state, I swore I would definitely bite my tongue to end it.

Fortunately, though, it didn't have to come to that, since she understood enough to stop doing it. Pitying me a little, she got to her feet and requested for a muscular waiter to throw me onto the first floor while she went up first. There was a slight push at my butt as regulars tried to enter the tavern, complaining while they went to find a seat to start drinking. The waiter hesitated a little since he saw I was still conscious, but after considering the dissatisfaction that would be brought upon their regulars if I was still unmoved, he shrugged and shouldered me like a sack of rice, up the stairs before throwing me onto the boards with an ominent "Oof" and returning to where he carried me from.

There was a voice shouting, "Hey!" that was followed by a loud crashing noise from below. Curious as always, I climbed onto the stairs to get a glimpse of the commotion. There was a skinny man, with a glowing red face, running out the tavern's door, followed by a muscular lumberjack with a small head chasing after. Both of them burst through the door and ran into the night, ignoring the disdainful glares from the ones who had their drinks knocked over as a result of their commotion. Some even joined in on the chase, determined to get back the few drinks they lost. Thinking it was best not to get involved, I stood up and dusted myself, before moving towards the room. The others below must've thought the same since the nightly routine resumed not long after.

The door to the room I shared was left ajar, with several beams of light escaping through it. From afar, anyone who saw the light would definitely be able to see that it was brighter than any capable light source from this town, or to be exact, from this world.

Panicking, I ran towards the room with clear thuds coming from every step I took. The sound rebounded across the hallway, reflected by the hard walls that surrounded isolated the rooms from the hallway. After a few quick strides, I was already in the room, closing the door and desperately trying to block the seams between the door and its frame, for fear the outlandish light betraying our existence , mine and Lisandra's, to this world. Lisandra, who was doing something, stopped doing whatever it was after seeing me trying to block the seams of the door with my own body. The light died down shortly after, which relieved me, and she chuckled before bursting into a huge laughter with one hand in front of her mouth, attempting to hide the horrendous laugh of hers.

"Are you out of your mind!?" I yelled at her. She was still laughing even though I tried to sound as serious as possible.

"Well, you know. It was just really funny seeing you try so hard like that, when that light can only be seen by our kind," She proceeded to chuckling, which didn't make me feel as bad as her laughter did.

"Geez, at least tell me something like that next time. My general knowledge, as a hunter, still isn’t that great yet," I backed away from Lisandra and jumped onto my bed, with everything still on.

"Got it, got it. Anyway, aren't you forgetting something?" She looked at me with a calm smile, but her eyes and stiff smile betrayed the calm smile she had. Pure sarcasm, I guess.

"What did I forget again?" I sighed while pretending to look defeated. I only did it because I really didn't know what she was talking about. She seemed okay with my poor acting skills though, so she proceeded to tell me what we forgot to do.

"What are we going to change into after bathing, genius?"

"Shoot! I forgot about our promise to buy clothes today!" I looked at her with feigned surprise, then continued with a pleading smile. “ We’ll do it tomorrow, promise.”

Her face lost her smile and instead, it was replaced with a strict expression, "You keep saying that! You promise, but you don't even keep that shit!"

"I know- Wait, it wasn't every time. I just wasn't able to keep the ones I broke because of……. certain circumstances!"

"Yea yea, always blame it on circumstances. You're the worst, Citrix," She crossed her arms, "the worst!" She stuck out her tongue before turning away from me.

"Oh come on, it’s not that bad. I really promise to go tomorrow, ok?" The thought of accompanying a female to get clothes scared me. There were loads of dramas I watched where the female would keep shopping none stop, while the male accompanying her would either be bored to death or face bankruptcy. To prevent my fate from being set just like in the dramas, I purposefully chose my words carefully.

"Ok," Her reply allowed me to release the breath I've been unconsciously holding in, but I imprisoned another when she started again, "but..."

"But...!?" My forehead felt cold, while my heart pumped faster.

[Warning: Increased blood pressure. Further increase will result in auto hormone readjustments]

"You have to accompany me for the entire duration, and pay me back after we finished this job of yours."

”Noooooooooooo!” I moaned in frustration at the thought of having to accompany her for the whole day, causing her to snap her attention to me.

"So it's a 'no', then?" She looked at me with a spark of cunningness flashing in her eyes. Instinctively, I knew I raised the wrong flag.

"I mean, yesssssssssssssssssssssssss!" Though I agreed, I felt like I would have cried at any given moment, provided there weren't any more serious things to do first.

"Great! I'll forgive and believe you then!"

Why does everything have to be so wrong..? I cursed my luck.

"Ok, now that we've settled the least important and least urgent argument, it's time to move back onto some serious topics," Lisandra's tone took a 180 degrees spin, startling me, even if it was just a little. She then continued, "Just now, before we made it back to the tavern, you felt the chill down your spine, right?" Her voice sounded though a little grim, it still held some unwavering certainty and strength.

"Now that you reminded me of that, yes, I did feel that chill. I'll assume you had the same feeling as well, then."

"No need assumptions, it's a definite fact that there was a thing preying on us."

"Explain, thing."

"A creature of the unknown. It got through the barrier somehow and is now roaming in the material realm."

"Then we need to report it to the Organisation as soon as possible!" My tone hinted at the panic I was feeling. My instincts were telling me there was no doubt I'd be destroyed if I were ever to get caught by it.

"Hold your horses, Citrix. We can't just report something such as a hunch to the Organisation. Wasting time and resources just isn't their style."

"Then what do you suggest we do? Sit here like idle ducks, waiting for our imminent death!?" I accidentally raised my voice, but Lisandra showed no sign of being bothered by it, as if it was a completely normal reaction for a first-time hunter, especially someone like me.

"We need to gather proof. The moment it breaks any of this realm's laws, the Enforcers will get here and clean up. Meanwhile, we need to be very sure of the sighting and report its movements if it really was true, to HQ. They'll send someone to clean up," her tone was stone cold and business-like, similar to Victor's in many ways. I couldn't recognise for a moment there, but managed to gather enough of my bearings to ask another supposedly logical question.

"Would they not send us after it?" A sense of horror must've shown itself on my face as I muttered those words, because she tried calming me down.

"Slow down. No, they wouldn't send someone so inexperienced into obvious danger," Her tone held a little softness, which was enough to soothe my fears, but when I processed what she just said, I couldn't help but ask her again to confirm my thoughts.

"They would send you, since you're experienced, wouldn't they?" I tried stopping the emotion from entering my voice, but failed horribly.

"Yes, they would, probably," her expression looked grim for a moment, but shone brightly afterwards, "but look on the bright side! At least you wouldn't be exposed to consequential danger, and you'll rid yourself from an annoyance if I were to be-"

"Don't say it! You wouldn't!" I struggled to hold back my tears, but they were just too much for me to handle.

"Aw, don't cry. I never knew you were such a crybaby!" She joked while punching my arm lightly, before getting into her bed. I couldn't help but sob a little more since the thought of Lisandra being gone forever was something unimaginable for me. I mean, how could I? Yes, even though I thought of her as an annoyance so far, she still held significant weight in my emotional heart. I couldn't just let her be sacrificed away, could I?

Could I?

"Time to sleep, Citrix. We'll need to get new clothes tomorrow, otherwise you'll be paying a hefty price," I could hear her crunching her knuckles to emphasize her point as she chuckled, though I was sure there was a sad expression on her face even though she was facing away from me. Sensing her in such a paradoxical and troubling mood, I couldn't help but go along with her act.

"Goodnight, Lisandra," I got into bed and closed my eyes. The darkness swallowed me, numbing my anxieties and sadness while the tiredness made me fall into a slumber on a whole new level.

[Active Log: End]

[Log 7: End]

[Activating Log Subroutine]