Sabrina, although she had come forward with a certain fervor, once she arrived in front of Mario seemed to slow down and lose momentum. As the half recluse that she was, Sabrina found it rather tiring to find herself, even if only for a short time, at the center of attention. In addition, even if she didn't give much importance to it, she remembered the minutes just after the first Bolzig attack when the big guy had carried her and left her inside a store far from the battlefield.
It had not been the kindest way she had been treated in her life, but no one had forced Mario to take care of her. So, thinking back now with a clearer mind, she couldn't help feeling a certain gratitude towards him; even if she was struggling to put into words the emotions she was feeling.
In any case, leaving aside the sentimental drifts, the silver Ring that had been put on her index finger seemed to respond to that flow of thoughts better than her tongue, activating itself without any magic formula and filling the surroundings with small glowing bubbles. It was a peculiar sight, but by now the gang was used to the weirdness, so no one really paid attention.
Then, shortly after, most of those bubbles went to crash, not too gently I might add, against various points of Mario's body, exploding on contact exactly as a soap bubble would have done. The girl's Mana reserve was hit hard, decreasing by half from one second to the next; however, the effect of the short magic show proved to be more than reasonable for the price.
"I've definitely seen it all today..." was the hot comment of the big guy, now with a much more natural coloring. Even the heavy breathing and the hint of tachycardia had left the scene with a greeting, so quickly that it made him dizzy. Post-training aches and pains had always been his daily routine, which is why this sudden well-being had an even more shocking impact on him.
"The last time I felt like this was when they'd forced me to do a coke shot," he added as he rose to his feet, opening and clenching his right hand with enough force to inflate his biceps. Indeed, realizing that his physique had not only recovered almost to its fullest but that his muscles had also had quite a jump in quality, even if that had nothing to do with Sabrina, he lost himself for a couple of seconds in a pose of a failed bodybuilder, careful to bring out the muscles of his trapezius now even more responsive than before.
"Oh... I don't notice any euphoric bumps though. Does the white lady tend to be kind to a body like yours?" Roberto asked in the meantime as the other man's ego swelled as his muscles did, with a face like an ass I would say as well.
"Ah, no. That part is missing. But I'm grateful that it is," Mario returned to say, relatively serious, before thanking Sabrina sincerely. She, poor thing, was embarrassed by the big guy's smiling face, immediately lowering her gaze. Roberto almost chuckled when he noticed this, having now clearly understood the girl's usefulness. Right now, as far as he was concerned, things had improved tremendously.
"Well, some things never change. Both from one side and the other I guess," he hurried though to cut to the chase and get on with his next item on his to-do list, taking an Alex under his arm who wasn't expecting it in the slightest and saying, " Good. What do you say now to if we try with the husband of the couple? With a hand reduced like that, he can't even take care of himself on lonely nights." Phrase that, by the way, found the silent approval of Camilla and provided that right amount of embarrassment in Alex that made life brighter.
"I can... I can try..." Sabrina returned from above the clouds, turning in their direction and rubbing her new ring. This time, she found it more complicated to activate her Skill, but having just done so, she still managed to find a loophole to use her Mana the way she wanted.
From there, a new wave of bubbles started agitated in Alex's direction, concentrating in particular on the wounded hand. The process lasted very little and, towards its end, a bubble larger than the others engulfed the entire limb until it almost reached the shoulder. It was a fascinating novelty to study for the smoker and Mario, who could watch Alex's fingers being pushed by a barely visible pair of hands back into the position they should have been in.
The lab rat who endured that mystical operation felt only the pressure from the grip and almost no pain, a bit like being on painkillers at the dentist. It wasn't exactly unpleasant; but the thought that the effect might suddenly end kept him on his toes until the very end when, with another colorful explosion, the bubble vanished, leaving behind a perfectly healthy hand.
"Thank goodness..." He finally managed to relax, cautiously trying to move his fingers and clench his fist. The comment was received by the rest of the gang more as a thank you for finding a way to medicate his wounds, and no one bothered to go looking for the truth. Alex himself put on a good face when Camilla hugged him from behind, elbowing Roberto out of the way, saying all excitedly, " Awesome! Wonderful! Thank you Sabrina! You're an angel!"
The other girl barely nodded, finding herself in even more distress. However, having finished the last amount of Mana she possessed in one go, she was assaulted by a sudden weakness that caused her legs to give out without warning. "Oh, and we got that one, too. That's good to know," Roberto intervened by grabbing her by the wrist and pulling her first towards himself, only to change his mind to throw her in Mario's direction, expecting that she might have a similar repercussion if there was a total reset of her Mana and Energy stats.
"Ah!" Sabrina squeaked like a little mouse when she landed against the giant's abdomen, sending the person who had just avoided her crashing to the ground for some reason. Mario reacted quickly and held her up with one arm, lifting her from under his shoulder and commenting in the meantime that he was barely struggling in his feat, "You should eat a little more. It's okay that you're short, but this seems exaggerated," obviously referring to weight and not lack of strength.
She didn't reply and lowered her brow downward, removing herself from his grasp as soon as she felt she could put weight on her legs again.
"Great," Roberto returned to call attention to himself, clapping his hands and ignoring possible teenage romance altogether. "Now that we've realized we're less in the shit I'd say we can afford to breathe. It's still morning, the day has just begun. Personally I'm already hungry, but before lunch I'd like to take advantage of XK22's presence to decide how to spend our Credits. We have the choices, all we need to do is decide which death to die of."
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What he didn't have a chance to calculate, however, was that Alex, who on the one hand was feeling much better but who on the other hand seemed to have had his pride hurt, slipped into a long sigh once the endorphin hit concluded its effect. "So the only motherfucker who wasn't able to activate his own Ability was me? What kind of..." He then said without completing the sentence, making Sabrina mistakenly think he had done something wrong.
However, not wanting to be an asshole, he did his best to get the bad mood off his chest and, he too, warmly thanked the girl for her services. An action that put a little confusion in her head, perhaps due to something else if we really want to be correct, and that moved the discussion away from the real important topics.
"All right, that's fine. But now we have to stay focused on the useful matters. After that we can waste as much time as you want," Roberto hurried once again to put the discussion on the tracks he wanted, ruining the nice atmosphere that was being created.
Mario however did not seem to be on his side and preferred a more relaxed approach now that his body had recovered its strength. "Actually, we can also afford to take it easier. We just defeated a Boss, right? We have new supplies as well, and I doubt our Assistant will leave us before at least answering our questions. That's not true... Eh, XK22? That's right, isn't it? I have a hard time remembering strange names, let alone yours," concluding with a slightly unpleasant sentence, but said in good faith.
XK22, delighted to be asked to participate again, raised his paw and enthusiastically replied, "Certainly, Mr. Mario. Except due to limitations desired by the System, I will always be available for all of you! However..." Finding himself conflicted at the end of his speech, he then found no way to go on because of Camilla's entrance.
"Then we can postpone it," she in fact said bluntly, satisfied with having survived and having an uninjured Alex by her side. "Besides, can't you see that Sabrina is tired? She has already taken care of two people, we should give her time to rest rather than forcing her to work even harder. Do you agree, Sabrina?" She resumed with the same puff of air, showing an aggression much more suited to her usual manner and using her new friend as an excuse to rest as well.
"I'm actually fine..." She tried to reply, but speaking in such a low tone that none of the others could hear her and thus ending up reinforcing Camilla's argument.
"Seriously guys?" Roberto exclaimed, feeling he was in the company of complete morons. As far as he was concerned that was exactly the right time to get together and get to work, before the next problem could come out of the hat and get them into trouble. Unfortunately, that was not the general opinion and there was little he could do about it.
No, wait a minute... He thought in a last attempt to impose his own vision of things on the others, shifting his gaze in the direction of Alex who, until recently, seemed as interested as him in discovering new information about the System. "My friend," he said, rubbing his hands together as if he were about to sell a used car at the dealership. "You agree with me, don't you? Before the situation escalates further, don't you think we should have a good discussion about how to invest the one useful resource we have at our disposal?"
But Alex didn't want to listen to him either, and answered without even trying to figure out the best answer: "Let's take it easy for now. We've had enough trouble for the moment. Don't you think it's worth stopping for a second and rest? If it wasn't for Sabrina's care we'd be on our asses right now. Let's not go over the edge, okay?" He spoke less and less firmly as he went on, shifting his gaze perpetually to the end between Roberto, Mario and Camilla, trying to navigate the waters where the current seemed to be less strong.
"This son of a bitch..." Declared with annoyance and force a, needless to say, irritated Roberto before Alex could stop flicking his tongue. After that, already on the warpath, he went to poke him in the chest with a finger of his right hand, telling him bluntly: "Oh, asshole. Weren't you the one who was dying to have the little monster behind my back answer your questions? Well? Do you have anything to say or are you going to keep looking at me with that fucking face of yours?" Unloading on the innocent imbecile, probably eh, I can not say with absolute certainty, much of the stress that had united risking the bone of the neck until a few minutes before.
To avoid trouble, Mario put an arm between Camilla and the two fools, finding himself on top of that the nails of the girl stuck well into the flesh when she tried to overcome him. However, the boy suffered in silence, keeping his defense solid, just because he found terribly fascinating the idea of a healthy bar fight. A sign that perhaps he too had not come out too mentally stable from the confrontation with the Boss.
Yet, Alex disappointed everyone, including Camilla who would have liked to see him show more character, saying without much reaction: "Forget it... After seeing Sabrina activate her ability, I realized that I was the one with the handicap in the group. That was the part that interested me, and now I'm a bit pissed off if I'm being completely honest. Let's have lunch and talk about this more calmly later. You really expect to learn anything anyway? Do I need to remind you of what we've been told so far?" Pulling out, as he continued to speak, a certain pair of balls that managed to raise an eyebrow at the beloved smoker.
In addition to this, Roberto had the impression that the discourse on Skills was the only part that interested his companion. A small detail that, in spite of appearances, made him very curious. Considering the cards on the table, in fact, and removing from the deck the possibility that the companion was a complete demented, that informations could not really be the only ones that could have interested him.
Oh... I smell something interesting... He thought while he was retreating half a step from the other, dropping his eyes sideways towards Camilla. Indeed... Was this imbecile jumping into the fray with his girlfriend without a plan? As gutless as he is, I find that very hard to believe. Did something extremely stupid and fascinating happen to him while Mario and I were putting our balls on the plate? He continued to ponder, perhaps going beyond what would have been considered sharable logic, instead espousing the possibility that there was more bullshit within the game they had ended up in than there could have been in a classic Chinese web novel.
[Excuse me... Players? Excuse me, can you... can you give me a moment of your attention?] XK22 ended up interfering, as the focus of the conflict began to die down, using his cute little paws to catch the glances of the Scooby gang members. Resuming then, with some difficulty by the way, saying: [The System has already resumed its full operation. The downtime given following the defeat of the Mini Boss has already expired. Here... Well, here... I've been informed that the next enemies have already been summoned and are already inside this mall... I'm sorry].
And, with perfect timing, the boys heard a series of footsteps sounds coming from the distance that were beginning to echo. Whatever kind of creatures were approaching had to be much more human in proportions than the Bolzig and, judging by the noises, they had to be bumping into quite a few pillars and obstacles on their way.
"The next time I say something," Roberto said at that point, gentle in both look and soul. "Next time I say something you do as I command. Make a scene and I'll set all of you on fire," making clear his stance as a die hard pacifist on the importance of civil discussions.