An echo slowly rang through the chair the old man had touched...

"Interesting," the watcher noted.

"It appears as though you have mastered your craft as to only let sound emit from a single origin point." He continued.

Then moving a frail hand up, small shifting runes on his palm scurried into position, and soon pulsing through the air a low hum overtook the sound of the chair.

The watcher smirked, shaking his head slowly.

"I'm afraid that won't do my friend. It was effective as a gimmick, but I will have to see more for your life to be spared."

The old man's expression literally dimmed, the lighting on his face changing and distorting until finally settling on a serious and dramatic lighting.

"You look serious now." The watcher stated.

"That was the intended effect of my lighting." The old man replied.

"I can see that..." The watcher sighed, touching the shaking runes on his palm lightly, they quickly took the appearance of a green check mark.

...

The chair had begun questioning what it would get out of all of this.

"What the fuck dude." The chair interrupted, previously going along with the old man's plan in hopes of being offered a seat at the round table of square tables and chairs.

But this?...

This wouldn't do. The old man told it that he would only use it's energy once, but it had begun to get very fed up with all of this.

The watcher stopped for a moment, looking around.

"Did you hear that?" He asked the old man, confusion seeping into the runes on his palm, ruining the formation.

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"No, I'm deaf, that's why I came here, remember?" The old man replied, the vibrations in the air enough for him to tell was was spoken in times like this.

"No, I don't, unneeded information for the interview is purged from my brain so I may stay neutral in judging your passing." The watcher replied, then, studied the room for any stray mouths or tongues he may have forgot to clean up in a prior interview.

Realizing he had not forgotten to clean put him at slight ease, but quickly made his attention shift to the only other object that may have contained a consciousness in the room, the chair.

The old man increased the lighting effects on his face, making him appear incredibly angry at the current events.

"Shit, I've got to think my thoughts aloud as to prevent the chair from talking." The old man blurted.

"What?" The watcher raised an eyebrow. Then realizing exactly what was going on he placed the palm of his hand on the old man's mouth, the runes shifting to violently stitch his mouth shut with string from both of their shirts.

The old man clawed at the watcher's strong runes, but to no avail was unable to get the stitches out before the chair was able to talk again.

"Finally." The chair spoke, annoyance and relief seeping into it's fibers.

The watcher listened as the chair explained itself, sharing it's own desires to join the round table of square tables and chairs, as well as how it had made a deal with the old man to bring him across the border. Further sharing it's annoyance on how the old man swindled it with a curse condition to only be able to speak when verbal communication had stopped for 3 seconds.

"I see..." The watcher finally replied, taking in all the new information for the interview and thinking hard about it.

"Then surely by technicality I should be interviewing you as you had the initial intention to come here, which means this old man is disqualified."

The chair nodded it's head rest in confirmation, and with a slow movement of the watcher's hand the runes began to enact a new command.

The old man's eyes widened as the runes began to move around and in his body disassembling and scrambling his molecular structure with the final goal of erasing him from the interview.

...

After a few seconds of agonizing pain the old man was no more.

"Phew, sorry about that, at least he can't bother us anymore. Anyways... to start I'll ask you a few simple questions, first, tell me who your favorite sitter is."

After 3 seconds passed the chair happily responded, hoping deeply it could somehow find it's way seated at the round table of square tables and chairs.

"Well, if I'm being honest, I'd say it's going to be revealed in the next chapter."

The watcher's runes began to be corrupted by confusion again.

"What?"