12 hours has passed since the two incidents that conspired last night. Hunter was allegedly hit by a strong metallic object by Aero. In all honesty, Aero might just be the suspect behind this case but what about the other case? Why Tara did received the same kind of blow as Hunter did? How was she attacked inside a locked room, anyway? There must be something unusual in all of these. I mean, we live in a world filled with magical people. There must be some trick behind this case. I need to look back at the locked room that Tara was in. I also need to find Jenna who ran away before I was even able to interview her.

But before I do that…I should go and find Zero Yohna first. He wasn’t at the building last night. I can’t just simply rule him out of the suspect list because he is also related to the Battle Royal. He is also a participant. I have to ask him about his whereabouts last night and see whether if he is involved in last night incidents.

After hours of searching, I finally found him at the library. He was reading some books while talking with…White? Why is he talking with White? Are they friends or something? In any case, I still have to go and talk to him about last night. The very least thing I could hope for is that he is not involved in it at all. I made my way to them and greeted them as I usually do.

“Hey what’s up, White?”

White greeted me back, “Hey, Shiro. Looks like you’re up and dandy now, huh?”

“Oh yeah. Just some good rest was all I need.” Then I turned my head to Zero who was a bit displeased by me for some reason. “Oh uh…hi, Zero…”

“Shiro…” He definitely didn’t like that I interrupted their conversation.

Then I quickly said to them, “I see that you guys were uh…busy. Don’t mind me, continue your conversation.” I took a seat next to White.

White turned back to Zero and said, “Anyway…where were we again?”

“We were talking about the monster that you and your friends defeated…The Hydra.”

“Hydra? Isn’t that the snake monster that multiplies its head every time its head was chopped off?” I interrupted.

“Exactly.”

“Wait, White and his friends defeated The Hydra? You actually fought against The Hydra? What?” I was probably being obnoxious to both of them.

White replied, “Yes. My friends and I defeated that beast months ago. It was a difficult battle. It heads keeps on multiplying to the point that it was too much for it. And do you know how we end it?”

“How?” Zero, coldly asked.

“It’s pretty funny, really. It was crushed under a huge rubble after an unforeseen event just happen next to where we were fighting.”

“In any case…You can say that the beast was indeed defeated already, yes?” Zero got up from his chair as he said that.

“Y..yes…”

Zero then suddenly laughed and said, “Looks like I was too late to get the kill, huh?”

“What do you mean, Zero?”

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

“Have you heard of Yohna Pharmacy?”

“You mean the company that provide the best medicine in this country?”

“Yes that company. Yohna Pharmacy had a research department called Yohna Laboratories. My father was one of the head researcher there… 18 years ago, an unfortunate accident had caused an outbreak. 12 Different monsters had escaped the lab and so far only one of the 12 monsters has been slain. But since you said that you have defeated The Hydra…that means only 10 monsters left.”

“Say…is one of the monsters, a bird?” White was making sure of something.

“A bird?” Zero thinks for a second and said, “There is an eagle…you know something, White?”

White shakes his head, “It’s probably not the same monster…I’ve only encountered a Roc. Plus, it was…ancient. There’s no way it would come from the lab.”

“Hmm…can you tell me more about that, White?”

“I’m not sure if I’m supposed to be telling this to strangers, though.”

“You must tell me!”

“Can you two keep it down, please?” I tried to calm both of them down. “We don’t want to make an uproar over here. Especially in the library.”

“Whatever…I don’t need your help to find the monsters. I can do this by myself.” Zero immediately got out of the library after that.

“Hey, Zero. Hold on!” I gave chase to Zero, leaving White behind.

“…Zero…” White quietly said his name as we left him to his own device.

Meanwhile, as I tried to follow Zero. Zero quickly responded to me as soon as he noticed that I have been following him for quite a while.

“Can you please stop following me?”

“I just want to ask you something…”

“What do you want, Shiro? I don’t have time for this…” Shiro seems to be annoyed at me.

“Where were you last night?”

“Last night? I was out of the city. I was looking for the monsters that I was talking about just now. Now can you please leave me alone?” The silver haired guy pushed me away and left me.

“Now that was not very nice of him…He doesn’t have to be such a jerk…”

Zero Yohna, a pretty standard physique. Silver ruffled hair, shining silver coat with golden embroidery. Nice boots. Main weapon is…unknown. Zero was not the talkative type in class. But he did raise his hand when we were deciding who wants to be The Cardinal candidate. We didn’t really know why he did that. Doesn’t like to talk, always harsh with his words. Never shows his magic in front of us, yet. He always skips class whenever we had a sparring session.

He has always been the mysterious person in our class and since he doesn’t want to tell me anything about what he was doing last night, I decided to follow him from a distance and see what he is actually up to.

I followed him for quite a while until Zero suddenly stopped near one of the campus court that was next to the parking lot. Next to that was the classroom building. The same building where the library was located. Zero was standing around a bunch of motorcycles around him. In a few seconds later a bunch of monster appeared out of the motorcycles mirror and tried to attack him.

“Cursed mirror monster…What are they doing here?” Zero talked to himself.

It was then I realized something about yesterday. Inside both room, there was mirrors on the wall! Does that mean that it was all these monsters fault? I had no time to think about that for now. I quickly decided to help out Zero.

“Shiro? What the fuck are you doing?”

“Woah. Language, bro. Can’t you be more polite than that?”

“Like I care, you dipshit.” Zero then opened his Dimensional Bag and grabbed a blade.

His blade was unique when compared to any other swords. Upon closer inspection, it might have been made from parts of legendary monster. Zero quickly cut one of the monsters in half. The monster then turned into dust as it went down to the floor.

“What is that blade made of, dude?” I asked him.

“Dragon bones.”

“What? Where did you get that kind of material?”

“I don’t have the time to talk to a shithead like you. Here I thought one of the monsters I’ve been looking for was at campus…But in fact it was only monsters from the mirror.”

“Do you think this monsters might be related to last night’s incident?”

“Last night? What happened?”

“Hunter and Tara was mysteriously attacked and I’m still investigating the reason behind the attack. The rooms had mirrors on the wall.”

“Really? Well that is up to you, Shit-ro.” Zero blocked an attack from the monsters and countered back with his blade.

Another monster tried to attack me but it went through my body as I quickly reacted and made myself transparent. I countered the monster with a ghostly punch right at its face. The monster fell down to the floor and crumbled into dust. I turned my back and charged an energy to a single point with both of my hand. This greenish energy is called ectoplasm. It’s a term to denote a substance or spiritual energy ‘exteriorized’ by physical mediums. In other words, it is something that a ghost has inside of them. After finishing charging up this energy, I blasted it to the monsters that were in front of me.

“You should have fucking warned that, Shit-ro.” Zero jumped a bit from that blast. “Behind you, Shit-ro!”

Zero threw his blade right next to my ear as a monster was very close to my face. It turned into dust as the blade also went down the floor. I grabbed the blade and gave it to Zero. He took it back and hid it inside his Dimensional Bag. Afterwards, he immediately walked away from the parking lot.

“Hey, Zero! I still have some questions!”

“What do you want, Shit-ro. Don’t you know that you are wasting my fucking time right now?”

“Can’t you slow down with the language, Shiro? I’m asking you politely…”

“Is it about the mirror monsters? They are called Reflectors. They only attack humans whenever a battle royal is happening nearby.”

“You mean…the monsters appeared because of The Battle Royal our class is having?”

“Yes. I should have realized that.”

“Then we have to stop them!”

“No. I shouldn’t have got myself involved with this stupid infighting.” Zero went away and left me.

“Hey, Zero. Darn it…” It was useless. He wasn’t listening to me at all. “What am I going to do about these Reflectors…”

They only appear during a battle royal. So how do we stop them? The only thing I could think of is by stopping The Battle Royal itself but that’s going to be a hard thing to do…I mean…the participants…they are all relentless…I might have to take Zero’s place if there’s no other choice…

TO BE CONTINUED