Reaction and Matchmaking Attempts

Hide-and-Seek Round Three (321-323)

Small warning! Thoughts about dying, graphic descriptions of death (partially), PTSD, etc. will happen in this chapter.

Cale put down the gulping Cat Knight Sir Rex from his arms and started to walk.

Tap.
Cale walked down the dark entrance into the underground with only the sound of his steps being heard around him.

Cage watched with an impassive face.

Cale Henituse walked with a calm, almost unnoticeable swagger. His arms and legs moved leisurely and in a rhythmic fashion. People would normally associate his walk with casually taking a stroll or maybe just enjoying the moment, however, the truth couldn't be further.

While he looked relaxed, his muscles were tense, ready for action. Hawk-like eyes watched his surroundings hidden behind a stoic, non-threatening front.

This was the walk of a predator.

'And he found his prey.', Cage thought with a morbid cheerfulness.

Her eyes wandered from the screen toward her table mates, especially Taylor and Cage from Side B. Both watched the scene and didn't pay her much attention. Her counterpart noticed her gaze and gave Cage a small smile before focusing back on the screen.

The smile was weird for Cage as she could never replicate it again. The softness and cheerfulness of her counterpart were like looking at a warped mirror. Just a short time has passed between their timelines yet they were completely different people.

No wonder.

Trying not to fall into a melancholic pitfall, Cage turned her attention back toward the still dangerously calm Cale and his soon-starting assault.

Cage can't wait for the chaos he will undoubtedly cause.

There was a long straight path as soon as they arrived at the bottom of the stairs. It was wide enough for a carriage to travel through.

'It really was a secret passage.'

Choi Han was in the front of the group looking around.
He started to frown.

He could smell the scent of death.

Corpses.
It was a terrible smell that he wished he did not know. It was the smell that he had smelled too many times in the Forest of Darkness and in Harris Village.

His gaze started to turn cold.

Choi Han clenched his hand into a tight fist. The smell of death is always around him, polluting the air and turning innocent into tainted. Just trying to remember a time when his life or others' life wasn't in danger... he drew a blank.

His thoughts spiraled faster than he could catch himself. Faces, some blurry as time already took most of the details from his memory, cover his vision. His breath got faster. His lungs started rejecting the much-needed air yet no sound came out of his throat. Just what-

A soft hand gently grabbed his shoulder, breaking him out of his hysterical thoughts.

Rosalyn's beautiful face distracted Choi Han from his previous memory fragments. Sorrow was clearly visible in her eyes and her mouth was drawn in a tight line. It looked almost like she was holding back some tears. Struggling to look her in the eyes, Choi Han forced a smile on his face. It couldn't be more fake even if he tried, yet all Rosalyn did was carefully lift her hand from his shoulder and instead took his own callused- tainted- hand into hers.

No words were exchanged.

The previously heavy silence got slightly more bearable.

The screen, meanwhile, continued on, ignorant of Choi Han's plight and struggle. Just like life in general as time won't stand still for anyone, no matter who was begging.