The Author's POV

TRIIIING—! TRIIIING—!

Waking my groggy mind up was the sound of my phone ringing beside my bed.

Without moving, I extended my hand and touched the side of the bed until my finger tapped onto the screen of the phone and the call went through.

"Who is it?" I groggily asked.

—Ren, Jesus Christ. How much are you planning on sleeping?

Smallsnake's voice rang from the speaker of the phone.

"What time is it?"

Rather than checking for myself, I opted to ask Smallsnake.

—It's 12 in the afternoon.

"Huh?"

Raising my head, my head turned in the direction of my phone.

Leaning toward my phone, I looked at the time.

[Wednesday, 12 : 38 P.M.]

"Oh wow."

Slumping back down on the bed, I stared at the ceiling of the room. I had slept quite a bit.

—Ren, are you even listening to me?

Snapping me out of my thoughts was Smallsnake's voice. I could feel hints of frustration in it.

"What is it?" I lazily asked.

—Connal Rhinestone, the person that you've asked me to keep watch of has gone missing.

"Oh."

—Hm? How come you don't sound surprised at all?

"Because I'm not."

I replied in a flat and monotonous tone. Covering my eyes with my arm, I yawned.

"Huaaam."

"To be honest, I sort of expected this outcome from the very beginning."

I mumbled in a low voice. Low enough for Smallsnake to not hear.

—Hm? Did you say something?

"No."

I shook my head.

The reason why I had asked Smallsnake to take a watch of Connal was because I wanted to get rid of him before he got too troublesome, however, the preparations needed to take care of someone of that caliber were not simple.

I needed a lot of time, at least a couple of months, and that was something that I, unfortunately, did not have.

'Looks like some demon managed to strike...'

Given Connal's current state of mind, this was not surprising.

The man watched his son die in front of the whole human domain, and instead of feeling anything for him, they all cheered for Kevin.

Treating him as some sort of hero.

Not only that, after the deal that I made with Octavious, Aaron was framed as 876, and with all the stuff that the Union had put up, Aaron's guild naturally underwent turbulent times, falling into extremely chaotic times.

Though I did not know exactly what happened, all I did know was the fact that his father was taking blows after blows.

In just a couple of days, he watched as everything he built and worked hard for crumbled right in front of his eyes.

Had I been in Aaron's father's shoes, I too would find my mentality start to wane.

I wasn't the only one who had figured this out as the Union also knew of this and hence why they kept a close watch on him.

The Union was not stupid to the point of thinking that just because he was <S+> rank he would not succumb to the temptations of the demons. If they actually thought of it that way, then there would've been no hope for humanity.

Just because someone was strong didn't mean they were strong mentally.

If strength was correlated to mentality, then why was Kevin's mentality still so weak mentally? Why were there so many strong figures with strength above <S> rank in the Monolith?

With their strength, they shouldn't be able to succumb to their mental demons, right?

Unfortunately, that was wrong.

It was simply a naive way of thinking.

Someone's mentality was not built over strength, but a true real struggle.

...And this was not something that Aaron's dad had considering the fact that he had a similar upbringing to that of Aaron. A sheltered one.

Fortunately, although some of the Union's actions were questionable, they weren't arrogant to the point of thinking that someone like Connal would succumb to his demons.

Now, the real question was.

"Smallsnake, do you have any idea on how he managed to avoid your sight and the Unions?"

As far as I remembered, the Union was keeping a very tight watch on him.

Not only did Connal manage to escape from the Union's watch, but Smallsnake's as well.

—About this, actually, it looks like he had external help from somewhere. Also, the fact that a crack in the sky appeared made things a bit easier.

"I see."

I had a sudden look of enlightenment.

With the crack in the sky appearing, a lot of the focus was shifted away from Connal.

That being said, they still kept a tight watch on him.

Most likely, this was the Monolith's doing.

"Alright, I think I already have enough information to somewhat make a conclusion about what happened. I'll call you later Smallsnake."

Turning my body, I quickly turned off the call.

Sitting up straight on my bed, I let out another yawn and scratched my chest underneath my shirt.

Standing up, I headed for the bathroom. Upon entering the bathroom, the first thing I did was stare at myself in the mirror.

If I had to use two words to describe how I looked at the moment, then it would be 'a mess.'

My hair was all over the place, and I could even see some residual drool on the side of my cheek.

Let's just say it wasn't really the most pleasant of sights.

Splash—! Splash—!

Turning on the tap, I washed my face.

As I did so, I couldn't help but think back on the topic of Connal. To be honest, there was something about the situation that bugged me.

If I looked back on the past, from the fact that I didn't eliminate Aaron back at the dome to the Emma incident which resulted in Kevin publically killing Aaron, everything was linked together.

I mean, was the Emma incident truly only just there for the sake of hurting Kevin's mentality, or was there something deeper at play?

If there was one connecting factor between all of these events, then...

It would be the other entity inside of my body.

He was the driving factor between all of those events. Once I realized this, the gears of my mind started to quickly turn.

'This may be a farfetched theory, but what if this was all planned by him from the very beginning? What if aside from doing what he did to me, his other goal is to make Aaron's father a part of his plans?'

That would make sense.

Given Aaron's father's strength, he would without a doubt be a formidable asset to use. It would be stupid of him to not take advantage of the situation.

'Then, if this hypothesis is true, the demon in question could be Everblood...'

I had already come to a conclusion a while back that Everblood somehow had a link with the other entity inside of my mind.

Therefore, I had no trouble linking him with Aaron's father.

"Although quite farfetched, I believe that this sequence of events is part of some intricate plan that the other entity planned beforehand. Since I found Matthew at the Monolith back when I was there, it is safe to assume that Everblood also has a link there, and with the fact that the Monolith may have had a hand in this, possibly, Everblood is indeed involved...."

Clak—!

Closing the tap, I leaned both of my arms by the side of the sink and deeply stared at the mirror before me.

"Therefore, if my hunch is not wrong, at the moment, both Everblood and Connal are in the Monolith."

Honestly, I wasn't entirely too confident about this hypothesis, but, this was definitely worth taking into consideration.

I wasn't going to once again risk the idea of falling for the other entity's plan like before.

Call me paranoid, but after everything that happened to me, I wasn't going to discard any little piece of information I had.

"Alright, it's way too early for me to think about all of this complicated stuff."

Though I said that, it was in fact twelve in the afternoon.

Ruffling my hair, I proceeded to take a quick shower. After that, I got changed and finally got out of my room.

"Oh my, Ren was like that?"

"Yes, he was. Although he looks lazy, he actually is a very hard worker."

Nearing the living room area, I heard a couple of familiar voices.

'Who's talking smack about me?'

Squinting my eyes, I turned toward the living room area. The moment I entered the living room, I was left surprised by who the person in the house was.

"Miss. Longbern?"

"It's Donna."

Donna corrected before smiling at me.

"You're no longer my student Ren, you don't have to call me Miss. Longbern."

"Oh, right."

I scratched the back of my head.

"I did it out of habit."

"It's alright."

Tilting my head, I looked toward my mother before looking back at Donna.

"Are you here for..."

"No, I'm here for you."

Donna quickly cut me off before looking in my mother's direction.

Taking the hint, my mother stood up with a smile on her face.

"Okay, I'll leave the two of you to discuss. I'll go back to the kitchen to make some lunch"

"Thank you."

Donna thanked my mother with a grateful look on her face.

Clank—!

Soon the door closed and an awkward silence enveloped the room.

"Why don't you take a seat."

The first one to break the silence was Donna who looked at the seat opposite her.

"...Yeah."

Nodding my head, I did as she asked and sat down on the sofa.

As I sat down, I stared at Donna.

She looked exactly as she did in the past. Although only three short years had passed, during that time, instead of looking older, she looked even younger. Wearing a gray suit that perfectly outlined her body, Donna looked stunning.

Crossing my legs, I met Donna's eyes and asked.

"So, what is it that you wanted to talk about?"

Pursing her lips, Donna sat up straight.

"Ren, I would like to ask you a favor. Before you say anything else, I want to say that you can refuse this request and that I will totally be fine with it."

'A favor?'

The moment I heard her words, my eyes sharpened a little.

To be honest, I actually owed her and Monica quite a bit. For one, during the conference while I was negotiating with Octavious and my identity had been leaked, the two of them offered to leave the elven domain to protect my parents till I came back.

I also had to thank Douglas for that as he was the one that allowed this to happen as they were technically not supposed to leave.

Not only that, I also owed them for the Mask of Dolos.

The moment I revealed myself to the world and the mask appeared, the Union heads were able to make a small connection with the fact that it previously belonged to one of the criminals that Monica had captured.

Had it not been for Monica vouching for me and putting on her job on the line, who knows, perhaps the Union would've forced me to give them the mask.

"What's the request."

Crossing my arms, I calmly smiled at Donna.

Although I couldn't make her any promises, I was willing to listen to what she had to ask.

"Thank you."

With a grateful nod, Donna quickly cut to the point.

"Actually, ever since Douglas came back, we have been trying to find out all of the Monolith spies that are in the academy. We have managed to pick up several, however, we are unable to ascertain for sure since there is no concrete evidence. They have hidden their roots quite deeply."

"Ah."

Listening to her words, I was able to instantly get the gist of the situation.

Now that the Union and the Monolith were in a truce, if there was a better time to dig out spies it would be now since they couldn't exactly retaliate.

Given that the Monolith was an organization that was many times more powerful than the Lock, the fact that there were a couple of spies or two wasn't strange.

In fact, it would be weird for the Monolith to not have any spies.

"We've already asked Kevin for help, and we just need someone else to help us enroll at the Lock as an assistant professor for just a couple of months. Because of your fame, we will obviously give you a new identity and everything."

In the midst of my thoughts, Donna continued to speak.

However, halfway through her talk, a certain word caught my interest.

"Wait, did you just say Kevin?"

"Yes, he has also agreed to participate."

"Oh."

I nodded my head.

Things were starting to become a little bit more interesting. Still couldn't exactly say I was interested.

Before I could say anything else, Donna added.

"By the way, before you misunderstand, although I am asking you as a favor, I'm not asking you to do this for free. After talking to Douglas, we have agreed that upon completing the mission, he will give you access to the 'cube', the Lock's personal vault."

Right then and there, my interest finally started to peak.

Leaning my body forward, I asked.

"...Will I be able to pick anything from there?"

"Yes."

Donna nodded her head. A smile soon appeared on her face.

"Douglas said that you can pick whatever you want if you manage to accomplish the mission."

"I see.."

Leaning forward and picking one of the cookies on the table, Donna took a small bite of it and asked.

"What do you say? Will you come back to the Lock for a bit?"