A bright morning rose to the curtains of this new day. The night sky had officially retired; the primordial sun slowly rose to the horizon's elevation. Water no longer felt accustomed by overshadowing everlasting darkness as such it began to show lighter colors on its surface.
Two individuals watched this specific event without saying anything to each other. More specifically, on the very tip of the only volcano on that deserted island. Through tremendous effort and said hours put onto escalating that inactive high volcano, they had reach the very peak of it.
Conically extinct to the eye, it was nonetheless carrying the possibility of life within. The pits of the interior of the volcano looked endless and a fall from the very fragile edge where they are would result in absolute death.
Still, they did not care about that factor at all. Their emotions were collected and reasonably calm. All of their attention was stolen by the illuminating sun granting them the light for another day.
Not because he was sleepy but due to his own inner boredom, Hajime Hyunda yawned. He was standing on the left side of Daniel Lead, who was with his eyes permantenly fixated on the rising sun, despite its enormous upcoming luminosity. By contrast, he adored the great luminosity of the sun. A light so shining and radiant that reminded him of someone who he could no longer see.
Though Hajime Hyunda held no particular affinity towards the sun, he did the exact same, disregarding the danger of doing such a thing.
After a break of silence, both their attentions were captured as Hyunda's phone from his right pocket began to ring. With no hesitation whatsoever, he picked up.
Daniel, intrigued, silently cast his sight onto Hyunda.
"That took longer than usual."
Although Daniel knew that Hyunda was talking to Hiroyoshi Sagasuga, he knew there was reason for not being able to be a part of this conversation. Sagasuga had his task to accomplish while Hyunda would have his own task to accomplish. The only issue was that Hyunda wanted to test out the environments underneath this particular island. According to Sagasuga, though human life managed to survive within the environments, it was still quite unstable in spite of all.
However, it would be a misconception to assume that Hajime Hyunda is by any means worried about that. If anything, he was amazed by the fact that human life was still so fragile and could very well be dismantled inside such environments without proper regulations applied to them.
"I see. Hurry up then. We can't raise any more suspicions."
Sagasuga found Hyunda at fault for unnecessarily attempting all of this simply because he wanted to test human life inside the environments. Therefore, he placed the blame onto Hyunda for this, to which he replied bitterly.
"What the fuck is that supposed to mean? We have waited so long for this. Plus, it's not as if they died, right? So it's all good."
Hyunda's uncaring attitude managed to always tick off Sagasuga a little bit, but it wouldn't go beyond the usual argument about how Hyunda should have more safer priorities. Nonetheless, Sagasuga was satisfied with the outcome and he passed the torch onto Hyunda now.
"Are you doubting me, Sagasuga? 500 people here is a piece of cake."
Hajime Hyunda had a "plan" in store that Sagasuga was already aware of its existence. But, he was not aware of what his plan was. Since Hyunda is a rank higher than Sagasuga, he didn't felt obligated to explain to Sagasuga and in the end, the upper rank has the utmost worth in intellectual capacities. Sagasuga already knew that whatever his plan was, it would be devoid of safety and most likely chaotic. In the end, Sagasuga didn't object Hyunda but simply didn't see how he could bring 500 people onto this deserted island.
He however knew that once Hyunda would say something, he was either not taking it seriously at all or he was taking it to a very high degree of seriousness. Each case; towards Sagasuga, another companion of his, he wouldn't lie about something that revolves around his goals.
"I appreciate the vote of trust. Blend in once again as if nothing happened."
Ultimately saying those words, Hajime Hyunda erased his call from one of his cellphones. He always carried two cellphones. A normal average one that is battery-dead at the moment and another cellphone that clearly was far more advanced.
It shocked Daniel how Hyunda had access to such technology, and so, he spoke out to Hyunda the moment Hyunda put his cellphone back to his right pocket.
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"How expensive is that, Hyunda?"
They finally then crossed glances. Daniel's eyes always fascinated Hyunda from the very first time he laid his eyes on him, but Daniel was not aware of this. Daniel found a relic of tenacity containing infinite willpower in Hyunda's white-eyes. Their affinities were both mysterious towards one another.
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"It's not for sale, forget it."
"Tsk..."
Grummy, he looked down on the exterior of the inactive volcano and launched another question on that matter.
"How can I get it then? I caught a glance of it and it had infinite battery. How is that possible?"
There was only one realistic answer that Hyunda could give when it comes to obtaining something related to the technology that he and Sagasuga possessed.
"Climb your way up the ranks and you'll get it eventually. Though, if you think this is something to squirm your eyeballs at, then you are devaluing other assets possible to achieve through ranking."
A solution was therefore presented, but Daniel became perturbed deep down as he knew there was a slight problem with that.
"But can't I only climb the ranks by succeeding in missions? And isn't the leader the one who attributes the rankings? You said you weren't the leader nor Sagasuga..."
There is a lot that Daniel doesn't know about that Hyunda refuses to explain, but he said to Daniel that the higher he climbs the more he'll know. Daniel is undoubtedly curious as he respects Hyunda's interests and Hyunda shows interest in the possibility of showing him what he doesn't know.
"The leader allows me to attribute the rankings of who I deem fit. If I see you are fit, I'll give you the first class ranking."
"Which is?"
"Noviciate."
Daniel thought to himself how that ranking sounded insulting, but Hyunda quickly dismissed that thought of his.
"Everything starts from there. Being admitted is already tough enough, but, if you're successful with your mission, then you are in."
Dedicated to following Hyunda's footsteps, Daniel no longer thought that it was offensive and instead saw it as an honor. Of course, to get in, Hyunda had to explain to Daniel what he had to do before being admitted into giving a mission.
"Daniel, you were successful in outdoing Kawahara and his dogs by associating the right combination of passwords with limited knowledge. I don't mean to boost your ego, but that's a small impressive feat."
In his mind, Daniel still remembers how Sagasuga was successful in leading Kawahara into the environments and then how he purposely lost to Kawahara. Noticeably, Daniel was the one Kawahara was chasing all along. Daniel and Sagasuga cooperated with one goal in mind---to bait Kawahara into further advancing onto the environments left to explore. To an end, they were successful.
"But I couldn't have done it without Sagasuga, I think."
"True. But, don't think this is over yet. That was just the prologue. Soon, we will get onto the main attraction. Oh, it's here!"
From afar, in the high blue morning sky, a helicopter was arriving in their direction. Midst this, Daniel was not aware that a helicopter would be arriving and as such, he felt the need to ask Hyunda what was his plan of action.
"What're you gonna do, Hyunda? I thought that we would be working together from now on, or was that not the case?"
Hyunda began to stretch his upper arm muscles and fixated his jawline a little bit whilst taking a tremendous fast deep breath. Only then, did he place his eyes on Daniel.
"We are together in this, but our tasks differ. My task is to bring them to you and you will bring them there."
"Oh... I see. But still, Sagasuga probably asked you this but how are you getting 500 people in this island? That sounds pretty absurd."
To this, he smirked and replied back without traces of hesitation.
"Tell me something, Daniel. On the top of your mind, where would you take 500 people from?"
"From our school. But this island is strictly limited to us, so there's no way they are getting there."
"Who said it was strictly limited to us?"
While it is true that this island is a private resort temporarily owned by the ones behind the program that Hyunda and Daniel are endorsed in, it was by no means strictly limited to anyone. The fact was that this island did not show up on the global map to begin with. Ergo, getting in this island, in theory, was impossible. So there was absolutely no need for this island to be "limited" to a group of students only.
"Are you telling me you have an actual way to bring people here...?"
"Not exactly... But it's not like I have to be the one who brings them here, right?"
Daniel wasn't dumb and understood what Hyunda was already implying. If he wasn't doing it deliberately by himself, then who would be the one who could allocate that many people onto an island? To that question, Daniel was yet not aware of this person, but Hyunda already knew who that person was.
A person that goes to their school whose financial wealth is enormous to a point where even the absurd could easily be possible.
"Make sure you're not spotted in school, yeah? Can you imagine the controversy? If Arkalee saw you, she would go batshit crazy for you and you wouldn't be able to return to this island."
To this, Hyunda laughed out loud as the helicopter began to close in on the swift upper edge of the volcano.
"Haha! I seriously forgot she even existed, thanks for the reminder, but I'll do things my way."
Upon the landing of the helicopter, Hyunda said his last words to Daniel before he would enter the silver-colored helicopter piloted by a pilot who Daniel could not see who it was due to the interference of the solar light clashing in the stelled glass.
"It shouldn't take me more than a day to get it done. Review the plan as many times as it takes. I'll be counting on you, Daniel!"
Hyunda's voice echoed throughout the empty volcano and resonated clear to Daniel. Daniel didn't think that he would need to say "Good luck" to Hyunda because of something he had previously said to him about luck.
Taking off, the helicopter flew to the North-west side of the ocean at great speed as Daniel was left alone in the tip of that scorched petrified volcano amounting a towering presence towards the other elements of nature below.
Regardless, in pure silence, Daniel continued to watch the sun while basking in transient memories of a not so long time ago.