All three of the men tied up, though I couldn't say that their state was the best.
One was partially paralyzed, drooling over his long grayish beard, the other was traumatized and the other had just given up, this might have been the oddest bunch of thugs I had ever seen.
"First things first, let's take those masks off." I got up, I was walking around them in circles, taking each of their masks off one by one.
Behind the mask were pretty normal looking people, although the bearded man still looked like the leader of a biker gang, the other two looked young, the one scared by Jun's illusion looked like he was the youngest, and the other one looked like he was in his mid twenties, but one thing they all shared in common were their turquoise, I would feel oddly accustomed to since it was glaring at me with contempt.
"You aren't as young as I thought, don't expect this to be good if you don't answer our questions properly." I said, looking him straight into his turquoise eyes.
He looked away, "Fine." He said roughly, "Good."
"I don't wanna waste either of our time so close your eyes." I ordered him, he hesitated but he did it anyway. "Have you ever seen or heard of this man?" I asked him while I gave Jun a sign to show him through his illusionary Sol technique.
Jun placed his right hand on his head, his hand sinking under his wavy brown hair, I could sense Jun directing Rukh into his fingers tips. "So, have you seen him?" I asked but he shook his head, "What's his name? I might have heard the name, but don't get too hopeful."
"Jermaine Flann." I replied, from his face, I could see from his expression that he was thinking it hard, maybe it's because he had been captured and had no other choice.
"Oh, yeah! I've heard that name!" He said, his mood lifted, "But before I share anything, will you let us go?" It was an interesting question but my gut told me to reply, the look they had on their eyes wasn't that of bad people, rather some people in need.
"Yes. I'll give you my word." I replied, his face turned into relief, but still had that hesitation to share anything, Jun looked at me with concern but he quickly brushed it off. "Alright now, ain't got all day." I said pulling my hair back when it was bothering me by getting In Front of my eyes.
"Well... There has been talks of a new doctor in the underworld, who says he can cure any sort of illness but can also plant such diseases also, he's highly regarded, though I've never seen him in person, his reputation is quite outstanding, despite coming there recently." All the details were matching, that was definitely Dr. Flann, he was extraordinary skilled in any part of human biology and science, which made him either a valuable asset that needed protecting or a dangerous foe that needed to be disposed of, that's the kind of skill Dr. Flann .
I looked at Jun and he nodded, "Where can we find him?" I asked curiously, "The underworld, obviously." He replied raising an eyebrow, Jun laughed but stopped it immediately, covering his mouth with his hand.
I twitched, "Where in the underworld I meant, how do we even get there?" I asked right after, "Oh." Said the guy.
"Just keep walking in that direction." He said, turning his head slightly to the left. "Walk until you see a lot of cracks on the ground, once you get there, you'll know what to do." He said, his expression turning back to one with torment "Will you let us go?"
I sighed "Alright, but if anything's wrong, just know that I can track you wherever you are." I said placing the tips of my index and middle finger on his forehead, placing a Sol technique which tracks everything anyone does, a high level Sol technique which not many could master but even if they did, it was only to be used for police work and such.
"Release." I said calmly while I placed my hand on the ground, releasing the spell binding them. I got up and walked myself to where 2 of the guns that were still usable were laying, I picked up, each in one hand, channeling Rukh through every inch and muscle of my arms, I destroyed their firearms "You won't be needing these." I said with a sarcastic smile on my face.
The brown-haired guy grumbled "Hmph." He turned his head in anger and picked his skinny accomplice up on his left shoulder, and started dragging his bigger one with his right.
"You sure about letting them go?" Jun asked curiously, I nodded, "If anything happens, I'll take responsibility. They don't look like bad people." I said, scratching the shaved hair on my chin, "Really?" Jun asked again, wondering. "Still as soft as ever." He said slowly shaking his head with disappointment in his face.
"You're one to talk." I said, smirking , without looking at him. "Let's go." I said as I started walking, he nodded and started following.
Walking through, I looked around and the place was surprisingly taken care of, the buildings looked just fine, and for a district who's been closed off for almost a decade, it looked well, if I recalled correctly, this was where Noah used to live, Arza and Noah being the children of nobles and the leader of a District this big weren't as cocky as the others with lesser wealth than them were.
Even from such a distance, I could see their castle like abandoned house, even though I had never been there, I'd heard a lot of bad things about it, the castle and the failure of leaders who lived there, they were called the disgrace of their bloodline, and thus why Noah and Arza suffered such discrimination from a young age, from something they had no control over.
But it was mostly Noah who endured it, he didn't let anyone touch a single strand of Arza's hair, bullying was out of the question, he was truly an honorable brother, something I wished I had been but could not, the regrets would still make my chest ache with pain but thankfully, there were still people who relieved it, even for a short while, I wouldn't know where I would've been if not for them.
"What are you spacing out for?" Jun interrupted my thoughts, flicking my head hard by the right side, "Ugh, stop interrupting my beautiful conversation with nature." I said aggressively, "Yeah, yeah, mother nature is scolding her son for being such a dumbass, isn't she?" He said comedically, "Stop pretending like we aren't almost on par with each other on everything, or maybe you're a dumbass too?" I replied, my tone switching from aggressive to sarcastic to match his energy.
"Huh? What are you talking about? I don't remember studying the language of dumbasses in school." He said pretending not to understand while bringing his left hand closer to his ear and with a slight sarcastic annoyance apparent in his face.
"I don't even know how a guy like you runs a Doj-" I was interrupted when I stepped on a shaking part of the ground and suddenly cracked stones and dirt started falling on us from the sky "What the-" even more fell as I accidentally stepped hard on it.
"Watch out!" Jun shouted as he pulled me back as fast as he could, I fell on my bottom and started as a hard brick fell right where my head was a minute ago, "I owe you one." I said getting up quickly, "What even happened?" He asked curiously as I got back up, cleaning the dust off my clothes.
"Let's find out." I pulled my hair back up, but still a dozen of strings fell right back on my face but I could see more clearly now.
"This might be the place he was talking about right?" Jun asked while still staring at the gleams of light peeked through the cracks on the ground, "Could be, the detail matches." I replied.
Something felt odd about it, why did rocks and dust fall from above when I had clearly stepped on the ground, I wondered, out of curiosity, I stepped on it again, but from little farther this time, more pebbles and dust fell right back to its place, I could see them joining back with the cracked ground "Fascinating." Said Jun with an excited expression as he pushed his round glasses back in its place.
"So the particles that usually drop below are dropping below but actually from above." Jun said excitedly, "You're not making sense but I kinda get the point I guess." I said looking at my friend who was pretending so he could look smart, but in this case, it wasn't just a bluff perhaps.
"Perhaps it's a unique Sol technique." I suggested, "Yes, that would make sense, because this isn't a Sol technique that just everyone can possess, unique Sol techniques like this are rare, they usually manifest while a person is in their mid teens are under 20, rare cases are when someone above that age awakens it, mostly that one's are the most unique and the strongest, this must be the ability of a grown man because a teen developing this would be nearly impossible." He replied and I nodded agreeing with him.
"And each one has a weakness most importantly, even mine, but another unique Sol technique is the weakness of the other, let me try something." He got in a samurai-like stance, his left hand looking as if he's holding a scabbard beside his waist, and the other holding the handle, both his hands floating in the air. He took a deep breath and prepared himself, "Gijutsu: Phantom Sword." A sword formed on his hand, it was obviously an illusionary sword but knowing it was made from Rukh made it terrifying.
Since it was made from Rukh, this blade would be able to cut one's very soul, hence it was an A rank technique, but even that was surprising, a technique that could cut soul should've been ranked S or atleast, I thought to myself, I hadn't seen this move in action in such a long time but it was still fascinating to see.
He pulled out the katana-like illusionary blade and lifted it up in the air, and with no time to waste, he swung it forward, slashing the ground in half.
A clean line shaped crack opened on the ground, we stared at it for a bit but then decided to step in to check if it worked, I put my feet carefully on it, my body behind my leg as I braced myself, once my feet was placed on the broken ground, it started crumbling, we were confused but there was still nothing to answer the puzzle about this technique, I was annoyed, but Jun, he was different, he had a look of surprise on his face but he wasn't annoyed a bit, he was actually interested.
I thought of ways to try and open this place up, when suddenly a knife came flying from my left, grazing my left cheek as I slightly dodged just in time, the knife crashed into a wall and got stuck there, "Jun!" I said in an alerting manner, we stood up, I wiped the blood dropping from the fresh wound I got with the back of my hand, I turned my hand and started healing myself, swiping my fingers through the wound softly and swiftly, as I was done swiping my fingers, the wound was gone, only thing left on my face was small traces of wiped blood.
I looked around and no one was noticed, only shadows covering certain parts of the area, I didn't have any unique Sol techniques like Jun, Noah or Arza but I did make up for it by mastering all of the Sol techniques that anyone could master, I placed both of my hands on the ground, connecting my Rukh to the Earth's, Soul Scan, I scanned the whole area we were and there were no traces of another Rukh signature but a single faint one, "An assassin?" I said in a low voice, but I made sure Jun heard it.
The target suddenly moved, in our direction no less. I kept my eyes on the direction he was moving in and kept staring at the empty dark spot. No one came, even though the target was supposedly in that direction, there was no one.
"You think I wouldn't be able to bypass such a simple trick now, did you?" A whispering voice came very close to my ear, I tried to turn around but my collar kept me from moving, the assassin had an insane grip that didn't let me move my head, I tried hitting them with my elbow but it was too late, I was thrown and slammed on Jun, making us both go flying towards a building.
I groaned, and got back up immediately, "You alright?" I asked my friend who most likely suffered more damage than I did just then, "Yeah, I guess." He replied coughing, "That was some insane power." He continued, "Yeah..." I replied.
"Took me years to train for that kinda strength, ain't giving ya the routine tho." The same young voice came from above, I looked up and a short person with short pitch black hair with baggy brown clothes, I was startled but I immediately got my guard up, "No need to get so hostile now, big bros." The person continued, then they fell to the ground swiftly, landing on one foot.
"Who are you calling that after doing us like that, shorty?" Jun finally got up, cleaning the dust off his long hair, "I was just playing, ain't kids my supposed to play around and stuff?" I looked at the supposed kid with a disgusted face, "I'm not sure that's playing around but sure." I said, "For real? My bad." He replied nervously smiling while scratching the back of his head.
"Who are you anyway?" I asked curiously, "Who me? I'm the star of hope around these dark and sad places, a hero who works in the night to protect the weak from injustice, a light that shines on the night, I'm Archer!" He said in an extremely enthusiastic voice. But all I could do was cringe, "What's that face for!??" He said defensively, "Nothing. But ain't you an assassin?" His facial expression turned to a curious one as I asked him, "What makes ya think that silver haired bro?" He asked.
"The way you fake and mask your presence is just like that of an assassin, at least that's what I've read in data books." He looked at me, pinching his eyes as he looked at me, his face turned normal again, "Oh that? It's just something I learned where I was raised, don't worry though, I ain't no assassin." He replied to reassure us but I still kept my wits up.
"And who're you guys? Least you can do is tell your names." He said, I looked at Jun and we both nodded "I'm Alan, and this is my friend Jun." His face turned to fear "Jinn!?" He asked and took several steps back, "It's Jun, idiot!" Jun got defensive and yelled at him, "Oh, almost scared me there bro." He said stopping to take a breath, "What about Jinn though? Why are you scared?" I asked as I was curious as to why he was afraid of such things, "That... Where I live it's a known story that if a Jinn possesses you, you can go crazy, hurt people and stuff like that. but there's also a story of a wise man a long time ago who had complete control over Jinns and had immense wealth, amazing isn't it?" He answered.
"It's King Suleiman isn't it?" I asked enthusiastically, "Yes!!!" Replied in the same energy, "Tell me more!" I asked him, he was about to open his mouth but was interrupted, "Hey! You can talk about your stories after we're done with this, let's focus on what we came here first." Jun interrupted our enthusiastic conversation that was about to occur, we both turned our faces and looked at him with disappointment, "You're no fun." We said in unison.
Jun gave off that he was angry now, "You asked me to come and help and you're wasting time now. also why are you getting so friendly with the guy who tried to kill you just now!? I'll kill you instead, moron." He said aggressively, "5 minutes ago's enemy is now's friend, Jun, haven't you heard? Isn't that right, Archer?" I replied nodding, putting my left arm over Archer's shoulder, Jun calmed down, he let out a sigh, "Let's get back on track now, please?" He said.
"Fine, fine..." Me and Archer were shaking our heads at the same time in disappointment, "Thank you." he sighed again, "What am I gonna do with 2 idiots on my trail now?" Jun muttered, fixing his glasses with his index finger and thumb on each side.
"If we're gonna talk, then let's go inside, it's cold out here." Archer proposed, "Inside where?" I asked, "the place you were tryna get into just now." A happy expression was on my and Jun's faces, "For real?" We asked happily, "Yeah." He replied, "I brought him back under my arm and started running my knuckles through his hair, "You're a good kid, you know that?" I complimented him genuinely, "Well, aside from that fact that you tried to kill me earlier of course." He laughed nervously but he seemed happy.
"Let's go then." He said and we all got back to where the cracks were on the ground, Archer took out 4 stones and put each one on each side of the corner, in a rectangular shape, he got down on one knee, and placed his left hand on the ground, and his right formed into a similar sign to that of the binding Sol technique we used on those thugs earlier.
"Release." He said and the stones fell below this time, and what we saw were old but refined stone stairs, Archer entered and we followed, the stones formed back again as we entered, and we finally got into the pathway of the so-called Underworld, now all that was left to do for today was gather information.