While Mizuno kept sitting in the middle of the plaza, feeding the remaining Uma false information, the first wave he'd tricked into running the opposite way to find their trainers had now come storming back...
"Wrong! All of it is wrong!"
The returning Uma ringed Mizuno's stall, the resentment rolling off them darkening the colors of the whole plaza.
"Mr. Dorm Supervisor..." A spiral-curled Uma stepped out, slammed the tabletop, and shattered the stall into four or five pieces on the spot.
"Mr. Dorm Supervisor! The addresses you gave us were all wrong! We went to the room numbers you provided, smashed the doors, and the trainers inside weren't ours at all! How do you explain that?!"
The spiral-curled Uma clenched her fist. If Mizuno couldn't give a reasonable explanation, his fate would match the wrecked stall.
"Ah? Is that so?" Looking at the enraged spiral-curled Uma and the suspicious stares from all around, Mizuno leaned back, putting on a look of shock.
"Sorry, I'm getting on in years. My memory's not the best..."
He scratched his head in embarrassment, then pulled from his pocket the trainer address sheet he'd lifted from the old dorm supervisor, put on a pair of glasses, and squinted at it like a man with presbyopia.
"Oh, right, I remembered wrong. Your trainer's address is actually that way..." He raised his hand and pointed in another direction.
"Really?" The spiral-curled Uma frowned, watching him with narrowed eyes.
"Why would I lie to you?" Mizuno spread his hands, casual. "If it's still wrong, come back and find me. I'll be right here."
With that, he puffed out his chest, wearing an expression that said, Go ahead and check—everything I say is true, so I'm not afraid.
"..." Seeing that his reaction didn't look like a put-on, the Uma who'd been ready to denounce him felt their rancor ebb by about thirty percent. They couldn't help but start believing his story.
Maybe this black-clad dorm supervisor really was old, so he'd mixed up the addresses...
"Fine..." The spiral-curled Uma glanced at the trainer address sheet in his hand, then let her face sink and warned him:
"Mr. Dorm Supervisor, if you're wrong again, I swear I won't let you off!"
"Sure, sure." Mizuno straightened his back another half-inch, utterly unafraid.
"..." She stared at him for a moment more, then turned to head for the address he'd just given, off to open another trainer blind box.
But before she left the plaza, she whispered to the Uma still there:
"Please keep an eye on him. Don't let him run."
"OK." Several companions flashed the "can do" gesture.
"..." Hearing them, Mizuno swallowed nervously. The leg he'd stealthily stretched out when they weren't paying attention slid quietly back.
Crap. I was planning to sneak off. Didn't think they'd post Uma just to watch me!
What do I do now... His eyes flicked rapidly as he secretly counted how many Uma were still in the plaza.
He discovered there were dozens clustered around him, guarding, giving him no chance to bolt...
"That's way too many!" Mizuno muttered.
Outwardly, he still looked calm, like some aloof hermit sage. Inwardly he was terrified, trembling head to toe, cold sweat streaming, hands and feet gone soft.
He hated showing his face in front of people at the best of times—now he was being stared at by so many unfamiliar Uma. How was he supposed to take that?!
So scary! If I'd known, I wouldn't have tried to act cool!
If only I hadn't stepped into this muddy water in the first place—just found a dark corner and stayed quiet...
Regret set in. He regretted abandoning his own safety to help those senior trainers who weren't even friends...
If they got jumped, they got jumped. What did that have to do with Mizuno...
But regret was useless now. He'd already exposed himself in front of a crowd of Uma, and he'd even stopped them from going off to do happy Uma-Pyoi with their trainers...
Facts wouldn't change.
All he could do now was sit still and pray that Symboli Rudolf would make it in time to save him—or else be "settled with" by the Uma once they realized he'd deceived them yet again...
...
Three minutes later...
"Li—ar—!"
In the distance, the spiral-curled Uma from before came charging with a whole group, fury blazing, straight at Mizuno.
Obviously, Symboli Rudolf still hadn't arrived...
"You super-sized liar!"
She reached him first, lashed out with a kick, and sent the chair under him flying. Mizuno hadn't even reacted before he hit the ground.
Right then, he fumbled—and the crucial trainer address sheet in his hand went spinning away.
"!" Every Uma present saw it happen.
"No!" Mizuno cried in panic, scrambling and reaching to grab it back.
But the Uma were faster. Before his fingers could touch it, they'd already snatched the sheet away.
The spiral-curled Uma took the sheet her friend handed her, a wicked smile blooming on her face.
"Haha! With this, we can find our trainers' exact addresses ourselves!"
Then her expression shifted. She glared at Mizuno, who lay on the ground shivering.
"Tie this hateful dorm supervisor up! Hang him from the lamppost! That's the punishment for daring to trick us twice in a row!"
"Got it!" The other Uma nodded, pulling out the ropes they'd originally prepared for abducting their own trainers. They trussed Mizuno up like a fish and hoisted him onto the plaza lamppost.
"Guh..." Mizuno dangled like a salted fish being wind-dried, swaying everywhere in the evening breeze.
"Heh-heh~" Satisfied to see the despised black-clad dorm supervisor punished, the spiral-curled Uma nodded, then swung her arm. Waving the address sheet she'd seized from Mizuno, she led all the Uma present away to "open boxes" in the dorm buildings and collect their trainers.
"Sisters, move out! Let's blow the trainers' doors!"
...
Three minutes later...
"Why is it fake again?!" A thunderous roar erupted from the dorm side.
The spiral-curled Uma once more led a group back to the plaza, determined to wring an explanation out of the black-clad dorm supervisor hanging from the lamppost.
Three times—three times! This damn guy had tricked them three whole times!
They'd followed the sheet's recorded room numbers, spent the time to smash open doors, only to find the trainers inside—curled up in the corner, shaking, squealing "Don't Uma Pyoi me!"—weren't theirs at all!
Worse, a large portion of the rooms they'd worked so hard to break into turned out to be unoccupied! Not even a "thanks for playing" in the blind box!
They realized in an instant that Mizuno had fooled them yet again!
But when they rushed back to the plaza, ready to use Mizuno as a human punching bag, they were shocked to find that the black-clad dorm supervisor who'd been tied up like a zongzi under the lamppost... had vanished?!
Under the dim light, only coils of rope lay on the ground...
...
"Retreat, now!"
Mizuno had already left the plaza and was sprinting for the tunnel entrance.
As for the address sheet the Uma had snatched three minutes earlier—of course it was just a way to stall them.
Mizuno was a normal person, not a game NPC. How could he drop a crucial item just because he tripped once...
So that so-called trainer address sheet in the Uma's hands was a counterfeit Mizuno had made on purpose, "accidentally" tossed out for them to see. The real sheet had been safe the whole time in his four-dimensional pocket. Unless he handed it over himself, those Uma wouldn't find it in this lifetime.
"Huff—huff—" Gasping, Mizuno glanced back and saw the Uma at the plaza had already discovered his trick and begun searching all around for him.
Judging by the rage twisting their faces, a simple lamppost-hanging wouldn't be nearly enough to vent it...
"Gwah!" Startled, Mizuno pumped his legs even faster, while one thought pounded in his chest:
Didn't Symboli Rudolf say she'd arrive within ten minutes?! Why isn't she here yet?!
If she didn't show soon, these furious Uma—burning with pent-up heat and repeatedly blocked from uma-jumping their trainers—would tear Mizuno clean in half!
"Luna, hurry up and save me—!"