"Yes, please bring that over here." Kin motioned her hand in the air as she pointed to the area next to her.
Ryan tried picking up the bronze statue of Kane, the founder of Kane Academy. The bronze statue was in a waving pose, standing proudly behind his podium. Mina and Harold watched as Ryan struggled to pick up the statue. You could see vessels streaking across his forehead, his face intense with all of his concentrated might. "That statue has always creeped me out." Mina mentioned, watching the smiling face of Kane. Even as a perfectly made statue, his smile felt odd, and his gaze appeared almost sinister. "Well, Kane was notorious for being a gangster back then before he turned a new leaf. He used to run a gang riddled with the demon race." Harold added, observing the statue alongside Mina.
Kin squinted her eyes toward them. "Can you guys please stop standing there and help Ryan out?"
Ryan, on the other hand, refused with a mighty grunt. "NO! Don't worry, I'm going to lift this up with my own strength!" His muscles tensed before he heaved with a roar that spread across the entire schoolyard. Students who were also setting up for the festival watched as he displayed his prowess in front of them all. Activating his Artifact, Fortified Might, it surrounded his body. His armor cracked on emergence and radiated a green light beneath those cracks. With his Artifact in play, he easily lifted the massive bronze statue and planted it right next to Kin.
Mina and Harold watched in awe, impressed by the sight. "He said he was going to lift it with his own strength but used his Artifact..." Mina mentioned.
"Hey, let him have his moment, okay?" Harold tells her, observing Ryan proudly flexing his muscles to the crowd.
The times were peaceful, and laughter filled the air. Even then, Harold kept his guard steady. "I'm wondering what those Eiden guys are planning. Especially when they're working with Stephen Lyhorn."
Earlier that day, Harold reported to Harlibue and Principal Gared about the Stone of Eternity that Eiden owns. The stone is something that gave him bad memories in the past, and it's now resurfaced to haunt him. A stone that can grant an infinite number of possibilities at the cost of sacrificial souls. A very powerful object in this vast, dark world.
Harlibue said he'll be searching for the stone, while Principal Gared says that he'll increase the security around the school. And from what Harold saw, he wasn't lying. Hundreds of police officers stationed around the borders, while high-ranking adventurers were called in by the mayor of Argon City.
"But who knows if they'll even do anything today..."
As he was lost in thought, Linia approached them from behind. "You two, we need people to be in our play, so you're going to take the empty roles."
Harold turns to her. "Eh, why? Couldn't you have chosen anyone else?"
"Nobody is taking the roles for the main characters, and remember that you all are in the red right now from your brief field trip to the Lurian."
"But isn't the opening festival meant for the celebration of the newly admitted students to Kane Academy?! This festival should be meant for us!" Harold protested. "Yeah, no fair!" Mina exclaimed, joining in on the protest.
"It's a play about a prince saving a princess, a pretty simple job! Harold will be the prince, and Mina will be the princess!" Linia leaned to Mina's ear and whispered in it. "And there'll be a kissing scene between the prince and the princess." Linia pointed at the auditorium as she planted her other hand on Mina's shoulder.
Mina shuddered; her eyes widened in temptation. "K-K-Kiss?" She stared at Harold, who was visibly confused at her apparent shift in demeanor. Her gaze intensified, as if she were staring directly at her prey. Her breathing accelerated as her face turned flushed. "H-Harold... let's do the play." She says with unyielding eye contact. "You really want to do it that bad?" he asked, but Mina ended up dragging him to the auditorium anyway.
As they got in, Mina immediately went to the front desk. "Please, let Harold and me be in the play! I want him to be a prince, and I want to be a princess!" The girl at the front desk was stunned at the abrupt request at first but adjusted her glasses soon after. She seemed to be a quiet one with braided blonde hair and a beanie. Her circular glasses spoke loud, but her dreaded and exhausted eyes were quiet.
"If you want to be in the play, I must scan you both to see if you're registered with the school." Pulling out a scanner device engraved with an inscription, she scanned them both separately. "Good, you are both students here." Looking down at her device, she reads their student bios. "That's also why I didn't recognize you both at first; you two are new to this academy." To her side, she grabbed a coffee mug and took a sip out of it, placing it in the same spot where there's a visible coffee stain on the papers by it.
"My name is Tessaria, and I am your senior. Nice to meet you both." Taking out two slips, she plants them in front of the desk. Both of them had coffee stains on them, and it was even more apparent with Tessaria sipping out of her mug for a second time. "I am surprised you two wanted to take these roles since nobody wanted them."
Harold stepped up, leaning over the desk to sign the papers. "Oh, and why's that?" He asks, signing it off as he watches Mina eagerly signing hers. Tessaria sharpened her gaze, readjusting her glasses. "The main reason is that the prince and princess have to kiss." Harold dropped his pen in shock, his jaw dropping. His face grew a massive blush. "Kiss?! W-What do you mean, kiss?!" His eyes kept averting back and forth from Mina to Tessaria as he asked the question, trying to clarify if he misheard anything.
Tessaria quickly snatched away the papers, putting them in a file under her desk. "Yes, you two will be kissing. You already signed the papers, and we're desperate for actors, so you'll have to do."
"Wait, I didn't know about the kissing part! Come on, Mina! We're going to go somewhere else!"
"No!" Mina says with an adorable pout. "I wanna do the play!"
"B-But why, Mina?" Harold asks in a pleading tone.
"Please, please, please!"
"N-No!"
Their gazes locked. One was of hesitation, and one was a plea. The air tensed. Even the surrounding people shifted. Mina's fingers clenched her dress as if this was the most anticipated moment in her life.
Eventually, he gave in.
"Did you really agree to this shabby ol' play when we got greater concerns?" Konge asked him while perched on his shoulder. Harold was in the midst of walking into the backroom halls of the auditorium, going to the men's dressing room. "I can't just flat-out deny an adorable girl like Mina! It's like not feeding a starving puppy on a street!"
Konge pecked his head in response. "You dumbass, those Eiden bastards have the Stone of Eternity! They're clearly planning something! Didn't you say that the stone will grant any possibility as long as you give it enough human souls?! That's something we should be watching out for!"
"You say that, but not even Harlibue or the principal knows where the Eiden base is located. And not to mention, I was told that Stephen Lyhorn went missing recently after our last encounter at the Lurian. We pretty much got no leads. Our best bet is to be on the defensive, especially when I am weakened in my current state." Harold looks down at the area that used to be where his left arm used to be. Unexpectedly, he smiled with a soft sigh. "On the bright side, it seems like Mina really wanted to do this play. If it makes her happy, I'm willing to do this for her regardless of how embarrassing it may be." Harold snapped his fingers in discovery. "Ah! Maybe because she had a horrible past, she never had a chance to experience something like a school play her entire life!"
"Hmmm... well, she was in a crappy state when you found her as a slave. She must've been through hell at the very least."
"Then it's decided! I'll give this play my all for Mina!" Harold clenched his fist tight against his chest as a spark of determination filled him.
Meanwhile, in the ladies' changing room...
"Marvelous work, Mina! It's almost as if fate is gracing you with their love!" Sorrow blurted, with an ecstatic tone, as she rattled on the desk in front of her.
"I know! I'm so nervous! It's going to be my first kiss ever! W-What should I do? Sorrow, teach me how to kiss someone!" Mina asks Sorrow as she stares at herself in the mirror.
"You don't know how to kiss somebody properly? How unladylike of you, Mina! Hmph, fine, I'll teach you since you sound so cute right now!"
The stylist, still putting on makeup for Mina, listens to the awkward conversation at hand but tries her hardest not to add any input to it.
"W-Wait, if I kiss Harold, would I get pregnant?! Or is that only when being violated!?"
"Mina, dear, you won't get pregnant from kissing someone. That's only when you do adult things, okay?"
"Adult things... so like the stuff I saw on Harlibue's TV that one day?" She recalled the anime that played on Harlibue's TV. It was the first time she witnessed such a thing, and the first time her mind was ever tainted.
Hesitant, Sorrow lessens her volume. "Well—erm... yeah..."
Excited, her eyes light up with an idea. "Then I want to try it with Harold!—"
"DON'T EVEN TRY!" Sorrow screamed.
The stylist was blushing wildly upon listening to the conversation, hardly able to apply makeup efficiently at this rate.
"Listen, Mina, you're not ready to be doing that stuff yet!"
"But I haven't done anything like that yet! I wanna try it!" Mina says with a pout as she crosses her arms.
In the midst of their conversation, one of the students helping in the play entered the room. "Here's the script, please study it accordingly within thirty minutes. If you have any questions, you can ask. My name is Lusia, and I'm the director of this play." She handed Mina the papers before walking off with the stylist. Taking the fat package, her mind is muddled with words as she reads the entire script.
"Sorrow, I can't memorize this all within thirty minutes!" she mentioned as her hands trembled with the package in hand. Her eyes glossed over the endless paragraphs, and her breath hitched. "What do I do?!"
"Oh my, it seems something like this isn't my forte..." Sorrow sadly responds.
Suddenly, bloodcurdling screams are heard in the hallway, startling them. One of them sounded just like Lusia's voice, the person who gave Mina the script. Then, came pure silence. First came confusion, then concern. "U-Um, excuse me, are you okay?" Grabbing Sorrow, she tip-toed to the dressing room door. She has seen enough horror movies to know what happens next. "I-I might just stay in this room..."
Summoning out Ruin in her other hand, she patiently waited for anyone to make some noise outside her room. But there was none. In her mind, if there were any passerby, she would know that nothing is out of the sort, but there was no sound in the building at all. It was eerily unnatural and gave her the chills.
Then a voice calls out to her. "Mina, the play is about to begin, please step out so I can guide you to the stage!" It sounded just like Lusia's voice. Now she was asking her to step out. Mina had her suspicions, but she figured she couldn't stay trapped in this room forever. "Horror movie tropes are meant for horror movies anyway!" She gleefully says, stepping out of the room. But her expectations were horribly shattered. As she stands in the hallway, she saw a disturbing sight.
Lusia's limp corpse was standing upright. Her eyes had no life in them, and her expression was uncanny to the human eye. Making her stand upright was a person who held onto the back of her spinal cord. This person had no hair, no eyelashes, and no eyebrows. His skin fully pink. His face had a deranged grin that never changed. He didn't blink, nor have his grin even lower. It just stuck onto his face as if it were glued. His plump body was barely covered, only thing that covered him was filthy tattered pants.
He spoke to her with Lusia's corpse, her voice gurgling and becoming more indecipherable. "Mina. The play is about to start. Please. Sacrifice your soul. Sacrifice it. Now." Her vocals finally breaking, he dropped her like a defective product. In the mere silence of the halls, all that was left was the thud of Lusia's body, creating an echo that felt like the loudest thing in the world at that moment.
As the horrifying man stepped forward, Mina prepared to fight.