“Where exactly are we going?” Keilan asked.
He’d never spoken to Zeifar, but considering she was now his group-mate of sorts, he figured it couldn’t hurt to ask.
“The only place which I’m sure is perfectly intact,” she answered, speeding up.
It wasn’t a clear answer, but Keilan shrugged it off. He had something more interesting to ask the others.
“Did you guys get Rankings?” he asked.
“Huh? Oh yeah,” Ethan said.
Keilan looked around for the person who had answered until he noticed:
“I’m here,” Ethan sighed, hitting Adrian on the head, “Can’t you at least move your head?!”
Adrian elbowed him in the chest, “To where, huh?! You’re behind me—do I cut my head off?!”
Keilan stared at them for a bit, then glanced at the other two who were suffering the same fate; Danielle barely seemed to notice Kazerin. Both were on their phones.
“Anyways, you were saying?” Ethan asked, pushing Adrian’s face away.
“Ah—I was asking about the Rankings.”
“Oh, I got ranked 100th,” Ethan answered.
“That’s high! I uh, I’m 370th.”
“I mean, 370th out of a million is really high!” Adrian said.
Keilan smiled, a little flustered, “Thanks.”
So that’s why the media call him an ‘Angel’, huh?
“480th,” Zac said.
Raymond had been Ranked 201th, while Xavier was higher, 98th. Danielle and Kazerin were close, 101th and 97th respectively
“Dammit, how is the pretty-boy above me?” Danielle muttered, glaring maliciously at Ethan, who only shrugged.
“What about you guys?” Danielle asked Adrian and Lauraleith.
Lauraleith only sighed and answered, as if it was nothing at all, “18th.”
“WHAT?” the entire car yelled, eyes wide.
Adrian was quiet. The others turned to him, wild eyes, “And you?”
“Ah…well, you see,” he laughed nervously.
“What is it, Delevane?” Ethan asked, leaning threateningly close to his neck.
“Uhmm…10th…”
The entire car burst into manic laughter—it was so sinister Adrian felt like his life was in danger.
“Zeif, what about you?” he asked, trying to change the topic.
Zeifar didn’t really react as she turned a corner and continued driving, “It’s a bit embarrassing,” she sighed.
“What is it?”
“Ahh, 109th,” she said in a slightly annoyed voice.
Though slightly surprised that it was lower than him, Adrian only replied, “Oh. Nice.”
“Yeah.”
It was a lie, obviously.
Zeifar continued driving, as if nothing had happened.
She’d told the others that it would take some time to reach their destination, and most of her team had already fallen asleep.
It was better for her. In the silence and knowledge that they were asleep, it was easier to ignore the message floating around her. She just could not make it go away, and whenever she tried, it would tell her,
[Cannot be removed before 5 hours.]
So, everyone else also had a message floating around. But hers was extra annoying.
“I wonder who the Strongest in Dubai is,” Adrian said in a low voice.
“Probably someone from Mantis,” Ethan yawned, “I mean, they’re all supposed to be geniuses.”
“Yeah probably, though I’m pretty sure the Ranking is based on a lot of things. Imagine how strong that person would be.”
Ethan only yawned in agreement.
Zeifar could hear their conversation as she drove, but she did not say anything. She could not say anything.
‘This must be a System error anyways,’ she thought to herself.
[The System does not make errors.]
‘Oh, shut your arrogant-ass up.’
She tried her best to focus on the road and get to their destination as soon as possible.
But the message floating around her bothered her too much.
[Zeifar Nadir
Ranking in Dubai-Centre:000, 001
You are the Strongest Contestant of Dubai!]
The message’s optimism made it worse.
The 2nd Round was going to be something bad, really bad, wasn’t it?
****
Their ‘destination’ was a comparatively small, but gorgeous, well-kept three story mansion.
“Wh-what the…”
As the car got to the gate, a guard stopped it and peeked into the car.
“Young Lady Nadir?!” he exclaimed, quite happy.
Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.
Everyone, except Adrian, looked at Zeifar, who smiled warmly, “Oh, don’t call me that uncle, it’s just Zeifar,” she laughed, “By the way, is everything alright here?”
The man nodded, “Monsters didn’t really come around this place much, and the snipers killed most of them.”
Zeifar nodded and went off into the parking-lot.
The others got out of the car and stared at her.
It wasn’t that they didn’t make money—they were sort of celebrities, but ‘Young Lady’?
Not even Adrian was sure of exactly how powerful the Nadir family was, Zeifar rarely spoke about them.
But with the way every person they met on their way brightly greeted her, it was clear that she had grown up in this house. These people were probably closer to her than her actual family.
“My caretaker, Ms. May is in Sweden so…there’s no one else for you to meet. This is enough for the time, right?” Zeifar asked.
The others nodded, surprised that she would even ask, “Of course it is!”
She smiled, “Alright then—I’ll go cook some food while you guys freshen up, someone will give you clothes, and uh, if you need anything just ask anyone,” she blabbered, shooing them away to rooms.
****
“Zeif, thanks a lot but…you should seriously take some rest,” Lauraleith commented, concerned.
Zeifar rubbed her eyes, “Yeah, yeah.”
The others shared a look. She wasn’t even eating. At that rate, she would get sick.
“Oh god,” she sighed, “I ate already!” she said, hitting Adrian.
“Huh?”
“I ate while waiting—it took you all more than an hour to come downstairs!”
“…oh.”
They could not really argue anymore. Zeifar had finished cooking early, and called them all to eat. They had gotten downstairs an hour after—and faced her wrath.
“You still need sleep,” Adrian reasoned.
Zeifar sighed, “After you all finish eating—now eat! Eat more talk less!”
****
“Just when I needed to sleep,” Zeifar said, standing in the doorway of her room.
“Hey—the cameras stay off from midnight to 2am now!” Mika reasoned.
“Only 2 hours?”
Mika rolled his eyes, “Midnight to sunrise.”
“Don’t lie to me again,” Zeifar smiled icily and pushed him out of her way, sitting down at her desk,
“Now, what do you want?”
“I wanted to know why you wanted access to my shop, well, my shop account,” he answered, laying down on the bed.
“Oh, it’s so that I can buy stuff in case of emergencies. The System shop seems unreliable,” she answered, sketching on a notebook.
Mika glanced at her curiously, “You really think a lot, huh?” he sighed, “You know, my world was in debt for 200 years.”
Zeifar stopped sketching for a bit and looked at him, “Your world faced Rounds too?”
“Pff, obviously,” he replied, “How do you think I’m so powerful? I finished the final Round as #1,” he said. Of course he had. He wondered if that information scared his sort-of business partner.
“That must’ve been terrifying,” she commented.
He blinked. That was an unexpected answer.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, your world was in debt for 200 years, to become the strongest it would’ve taken a lot—! Sorry, I didn’t mean to sound like that—I’m not trying to pity or anything!”
He stared at her, still a little surprised,
“No, I didn’t take it like that,” he responded, “But didn’t that make you a bit scared or anything?” After all, it had been a bit of what he had intended.
“…not really? Am I supposed to get scared by looking at you?” she asked.
“W-well yes!”
“Okay???” she gave him a judging look, “Anyways, since you’ve decided to be an intruder, at least be helpful. Explain all of this,” she went on, handing him a paper list, as if he had totally not just told her that he was the strongest in his world.
It had been a while since anybody had even given Mika a paper list. Even at work, people used tablets. The last paper list he had ever used had probably been a grocery list from his mother. Though, this one was different.
It was a list of questions.
“Woah, that’s a lot of questions,” he muttered.
“Well, go on, don’t waste my time.”
“You could just ask these to the System,” he suggested.
“And let you slack off?” Zeifar countered, “Talk less work more—do your job.”
Was she his boss all off a sudden??
‘What is Galactix?’
That was the first question.
“Well, for starters—are you even listening?” Mika asked Zeifar, who was still sketching, “Yeah, yeah, go on,” she answered.
“…Okay then,” he yawned, wrapping the blanket around himself, “To start with; The Galactix is a streaming platform of sorts—sort of subscription-based service, following Noviar Laws, for Stellars. As for people like me, we’re Conductors,” he explained sleepily, “We’re ya’ know, powerful but most not Stellar-level powerful, we run streaming channels blah blah, conduct Rounds—just inter-dimensional business-people. We don’t get involved with all that sciency-Noviar stuff,” he yawned again.
“Hmm, so a streaming platform. And I’m guessing you guys, Conductors, work for Stellars?” Zeifar asked.
“Sort of?” he replied, “I’m not sure what you mean.”
“What I’m asking is, how are these Rounds designed? Are you part of it?”
“Oh, well, there’s a Stellar level committee of Conductors, higher-ups in business yes, who plan out all of these Rounds,” he answered, wondering exactly how much information would be too much information, “They only discuss the Rounds with us a bit before we announce them.”
“A bit before…so you don’t know anything about the 2nd Round right now?” Zeifar asked.
Mika’s eyes widened, “That’s where you’re taking this?” he asked.
“Obviously?”
“I…I don’t think I’m allowed to tell you even if I did know.”
“Why not?”
“If anyone found out…I’ll get sent into imprisonment—no, they’ll probably kill me!” he replied.
Zeifar put her pencil down and got up from her desk, staring at him like a con-artist trying to trick an old lady, “It’s not illegal if you don’t get caught though,” she reasoned.
“Most people are usually scared of these things…” he mumbled, feeling like bursting into tears, “What the heck is wrong with you?!”
“Whattt? I’m just saying,” she shrugged, “You can already communicate with me through personal System messages, you wouldn’t get caught.”
“I would—WHAT IF THEY’RE RECORDING THE MESSAGES??”
“Sheesh, stop yelling, you’ll wake up the others!” in addition to a slap was what Mika got for being reasonably paranoid. Something was extremely wrong with the people of #9739, he was certain.
“I s’pose I could talk to you with telepathy…but what if someone else with mind-reading type Skills hears you? They won’t just think you’re talking to yourself, now will they?” Mika said.
Zeifar shrugged, “They might.”
Never in his life had Mika ever seen or met any ‘intellectual’ creature with such low intellect. Did she have any logic? Maybe at least a moral code? He couldn’t see one.
“I should’ve took a deal with someone else,” he sighed to himself.
…Oh no.
Zeifar had not considered her crazy idea could possibly scare someone like him.
Unfortunately, it had.
“Dammit,” she mumbled.
“Okay, fine. Come here, I gotta’ say something as quietly as possible,” she said, “And if you tell anyone you’re as good as dead.”
****
“…oh.”
“So a Skill of yours works like a mirror and mind-reading doesn’t work on you?” Mika repeated, a little fazed.
Zeifar nodded, “I won’t tell you all about it, but basically that, yeah.”
A System window popped up in front of her,
[Mikhaenil has enabled personal messages using Skill: ‘Telepathy’ (Level unchecked). Accept?]
‘Yeah.’
[“Can you hear me?”] Mika asked, blinking at her.
[“Hmm.”]
“Anyways, before you leave,” Zeifar finally said out loud, yawning, “Why do you wear a mask?”
“Oh, I dunno’, it’s part of the uniform,” Mika answered.
“You’re off-duty, I don’t want to work with a faceless person.”
He grinned, “You just wanna’ see if I’m good-looking or not. Don’t worry, I am.”
“A pebble telling the moon” Zeifar rolled her eyes, pulling the blanket.
“You leave me no choice if you think I’m a pebble!” he threw the blanket at her and took the mask off, “See—I am not a pebble!!!”
“…pebble.”
“Am not!”
“All I see is a pebble.”
“I AM GORGEOUS!!!”
But the girl only gave him an unimpressed look, “I’ll call defeat and say you’re the moon when you’re useful, then.”
“Bet?”
“Bet.”
****
Ethan woke up to the noise of his alarm blaring.
“Huh?” he stared at the time, not being able to remember what day it was.
7:00. Sunday.
Where was he? It wasn’t home, it wasn’t a hotel, why was he even…oh. Right.
In the rush of a moment he had forgotten the entirety of the previous day.
Someone opened the door, it was a servant probably, “Uhm, sir—Young Lady Nadir made breakfast, she’s calling you.”
Still messy and disoriented from the exhaustion, Ethan sleepily got up from the bed and walked down the stairs, still half asleep.
An air of warm, familiar-ness hit him as he sat down at the dining table. It woke him up easier than an alarm. Ramyeon and tteokbokki.
“…did you cook this?” he mumbled, voice still low.
Zeifar poured a glass of tea for herself and answered, “The noodles and all that? Yeah.”
Ethan looked around, nobody else had come down, “Where’re the others?” he asked, taking a spoonful.
“You’re the only one that wakes up at 7,” Zeifar answered, making him choke on his food.
“What?”
She gave him a surprised look in return, “You didn’t know?”
He looked back at his food, “You woke up to make food this early…?”
“No I,” she yawned, “Had work. A lot of work,” her face turned strict, “If you don’t eat because you feel guilty I’ll throw you out.”
Ethan gave her a smile and took a bite of the food.
…it wasn’t what he had expected.
Of course, it wasn’t his mother’s cooking, but it was something. Quite similar to a place near his old school. A painful hit home.
“Woah,” he said through a mouthful of food, “It’s good!”
“I know,” she replied, taking a spoonful from his bowl, “Make sure you eat enough. I don’t think we can stay here during the 2nd Round,” she said, patting him on the head like a parent.
“What do you mean?”
“A little birdy told me it might be slightly unsafe.”
“Oh,” Ethan couldn’t care less—he had tteokbokki, who cared?
Zeifar poured the rest of the food into big bowls and put them on the table with lids, “Heat the food up for 5 minutes and serve it when they wake up,” she instructed a maid.
“Where are you going to, Young Lady Nadir?” the maid asked.
“Ah, to run some errands,” she answered, stopping to take car keys.
She picked one of the sports ones, after all, it was the most suitable for her ‘errand’.
“I’ll be back before dinner.”