After Ranka left her assigned cubicle, Zasha slightly adjusted his glasses while Bora began to shout in glee about the masked girl’s performance. While his employer continued to lose himself in his excitement, the mysterious bodyguard connected his holographic lenses to the camera feed before rewinding to something everyone seemed to have missed.

 

When the woman landed the first hit against the lower abdomen of the Grafted, a golden light had briefly escaped through the gaps of her eerie mask. Subsequently, her body language, despite how suppressed it was, had exposed some amount of surprise and shock.

 

Then, Zasha listened to the conversation that followed. ‘This girl… knew this Grafted’s identity. But the latter was one we picked up this year. The only way for her to meet him is if she was also a new Host at the same time… But her level is allegedly near 200. I also didn’t see any profile matching her in the Clan’s records about this year’s draft…’

 

He secretly grinned and dipped down his hat. ‘Interesting. Ranka… Hm, an anagram? Hah, wouldn’t that be a nice surprise?’ He thought and glanced at Bora. ‘…well, who cares. This Plateau’s usefulness has run its course anyway. If someone is willing to do the cleaning, why not? I need to relay this to that guy…’

 

With that verdict, Zasha quietly left the room.

 

* * *

 

“| Xiorra |” Hans’ voice sounded through Eye of Symphony as Rakna walked into the hall of Arena Zero, a place that served as the building’s entrance all across its circumference and accommodated several relevant services, for leisure and resting included.

 

‘I hear you,’ the therian responded mentally as he handed his scorecard to a staff member of the Arena for them to update it.

 

“| I found it, |” the author’s dry and blunt statement made him pause.

 

‘…I assume you mean that you located the Terminal?’

 

“| Yes. I am sure you can gather my current coordinates with this little thing, right? |”

 

Rakna replied with a hum, as he had indeed already tracked his position. ‘Anyway, how is it?’

 

* * *

 

“…less than desirable,” Hans answered as he sat near a vending machine, sipping on a can of coffee with his eyes closed. He opened one eye and furtively glanced at the building on the opposite side of the street.

 

It was a moderately large property, but nothing grand compared to everything else. The outside seemed to paint the establishment as some sort of high-end brothel, but it was mostly a cover. The Terminal was located below it and several competent guards occupied it.

 

“It is relatively well guarded,” he continued, whispering to the small bug under his collar. “To the regular folk, that is. A few Second Ascents, some Third and Fourth Ascents, and then one Fifth and Sixth Ascent. The latter is a substantial threat, but otherwise, you should be able to infiltrate alone without much noise. They do not have the skill set necessary to stop me, much less you.”

 

“| I see… I’ll go check it out in a moment. What about your ‘other issue’? |”

 

Hans grunted and stood up, walking away from the building to avoid suspicion. “In all honesty, I am unsure. I felt something yesterday. I do not know what or who, and it disappeared as quickly as it appeared, but it was there.”

 

“| Do you think someone’s onto us? |”

 

“There is no point wondering. At the moment, my only option is to stay passive and isolated. Either way, the fallback will end up being the same. We cannot retreat now. Returning afterward would become an incredibly precarious idea. We get this done soon, or we fail.”

 

“| …alright. I have a new role for you. Firstly, when you get the chance, verify the identity of a man close to Bora Quaso. A bodyguard wearing a suit and sunglasses, with razor-sharp hair and scales around his neck. Both Nyx and I think he is one of the Scorpions. The Eion bug I sent to you should be able to guide you. Once Eye of Symphony gets a visual on the cameras, the pill bug will start blinking and you just have to head in the direction it reacts. Your Cursive Insight is less forceful than my Sight, so it would be better if you were the one to check. |”

 

Hans quietly glanced at the miniature robot with an impressed eye. “Quite a nice device…” 

 

“| Other than that, forget about the Abyss creatures for now, and gather information on something called the ‘Grafted’. A label for some sort of human experimentation lab product. |”

 

“Oh, I believe I saw it earlier,” the author mused, plainly unperturbed by the concept. “It should not be a problem. I will contact you back after I take a deeper look into it.”

 

“| Understood, |” Rakna acquiesced and hung up.

 

With the Eion bug retreating inside his clothes, Hans opened the archives in his mind. As if a bird flying across a library, he searched for the right book and flipped its pages.

 

“Hm… a morgue,” he muttered and his eyes shifted to the side. “Now, where was it?” He muttered to himself and headed into a different alley.

 

* * *

 

“Ranka!”

 

Cutting the call with Hans, Rakna lifted his head to see Rita approaching him. He sighed softly and pushed himself off the wall he was leaning against. “Took you some time,” he uttered and the girl smiled.

 

“You were waiting for me?” She asked happily.

 

“Something more along the lines of checking if you were still alive or not,” he deadpanned.

 

“Hey! That’s not nice!” She huffed and crossed her arms. “Not everyone is like you. I can’t bulldoze everything. I heard on my way out that you even had the leisure to talk with the last monster. Are you crazy?”

 

“…my curiosity was piqued,” Rakna replied succinctly and left it at that. “More importantly, do you have enough credits now for your goal?”

 

“Eh?” The short-haired woman blinked in surprise. “How… did you know?”

 

“It’s obvious. You’re certainly not participating for the thrill of it. The desperation with which you fought in the first round was real. Other than being a willing participant or being compelled to, the natural motivation would be the prizes; you want credits.”

 

Rita opened her mouth to speak but swiftly closed it and pursed her lips. She looked down bitterly and slowly nodded.

 

“So? How much do you need?”

 

She bit her lip and answered, “Half a million… I’m lacking more than three hundred thousand.”

 

Rakna scowled. For what did she need that much money? Does she have a debt in Zero? Or is she being blackmailed? 

 

Regardless, that many credits would require 300 million Talys to buy… normally. It was true that Zero’s credits could be bought and sold for Talys, but those two actions had completely different ratios. Selling was 1:1. Buying, 1:2. In other words; 600 million.

 

‘I guess I can’t help her on that front… Hans is wealthy from his writing, but most of his fortune is in the Pavilion’s Bank. And that’s something we can’t access in this Plateau. Kratos figured out how to crack personal wallets, but certainly not the Pavilion…’

 

After some thought, he spoke up, “Pass me your scorecard.”

 

“Huh…? Why?”

 

“Don’t worry, I’m not going to steal it or anything.”

 

Rita hesitatingly pulled out her card and handed it to him. He grabbed it and proceeded to press his own against it. A transfer confirmation popped up on the object and he used his fingerprint to allow it. Promptly, his entire balance, a hundred thousand credits, was wired into Rita’s card.

 

He handed it back to her who was gobsmacked at what she just had seen.

 

“With that, you only lack about two hundred thousand, no? If you manage to get through the third round, our combined earnings might be enough to reach your goal.”

 

Her expression went through several swings. Her mind couldn’t keep up. She eventually snapped out of it. “W-wait! I c-can’t--!”

 

“Shush. Keep your ethics to yourself. I don’t care about those things,” Rakna cut her off and put his card back in his pocket while Rita stepped back blinking as if she had just been struck. “Well, once again, see you tomorrow. Don’t die,” he said airily and left the Arena’s building.

 

The young girl was left behind, dumbly staring at her card. After a while, her stupor collapsed and she chuckled wryly. “They really do exist, huh? Those kinds of people…” She uttered and clenched the card tightly.

 

* * *

 

“[Reflect My Reality, Antanasia,]” Rakna intoned as the sound of glass shattering echoed and he disappeared from Plateau Zero’s root dimensions. In the blink of an eye, he found himself inside the mirror world.

 

“All right, let’s get this over with,” he muttered and unfurled his wings. He rushed back inside the mirror version of the Arena, flying past or through the hazy ghosts representing people outside of Enthymio.

 

The first thing he did was check the VIP room he suspected Bora to be in. He went back inside the main core of the arena, where several participants were still fighting the Grafted, and simply used Sonata to cut through the walls; they barely had any resistance in Antanasia.

 

When he broke into his destination, he recognized the fat figure of Bora Quaso but frowned when he noticed that the potential Scorpion wasn’t there.

 

‘Well, this isn’t too bad. It’s Hans who will check his race, and honestly, I’m still a bit nervous that a person perceptive enough could sense me through the dimensions… the last and first Scorpion I saw was hiding in them, after all,’ he thought and glanced at a reflective surface big enough for him to materialize into the room.

 

‘…’

 

“{…are you thinking what I think you’re thinking right now?}”

 

‘…maybe?’

 

“{Don’t.}”

 

‘…yeah, for once, I suppose I’ll listen to you,’ Rakna snorted. ‘It’s too risky to pop in here with all these bodyguards ready to jump me at the first sign of hostility,’ he thought matter-of-factly and headed for the private exit that Bora takes to leave the Arena.

 

“{The fact you even entertained the idea is frankly scary,}” Fray sighed.

 

Rakna smiled faintly and arrived at the elevator reserved for Bora’s exclusive use. He put his hand on the glass wall of the contraption and when he made sure no one was nearby, he shifted out of the dimensions back into the original one.

 

He breathed out as his body was relieved from the pressure of the dimensional force. He looked around for a few seconds before crouching and extending his hand toward a corner. A few insects of the same type as the ones he had planted on the participants of the Arena emerged from under his sleeve and crawled up the walls where they blended in with the colors like chameleons.

 

“This should be enough preparation for Bora,” Rakna muttered and stood up. “Now, the last thing to do is check out the Terminal’s location,” he added and swiftly vanished into Antanasia again.