Aeon Nether & Idol Effigy

Chapter 76- Confrontation

By the time I sat down in one of the ornament chairs made for the twenty performances today I noticed that a lot of people were still eying me up. Or maybe it was just Trina, Rebecca and Harvey, the three people I was hyper aware of.

My hand waved shyly at Florent, Aster, Petra, the wooden Administrator... and Felixe who sat in the same area in the audience. Petra seemed excited and proud of me. She seemed happier when I waved back and looked at some other audience members. A part of me liked to think that she was gloating to them about how great my performance was. My hand only flattered when I realised that I was thinking too much about it all.

It was the seventeenth performance of the day and seemed to think I had too much time on my hand. I was thinking again. Is this what normal people do? Not that I care much about being normal.

"Is that your friend?", a sugary sweet voice tried to sound out to me.

With a turn of my head I saw that it was Trina. I wondered what she was trying to do, but that thought didn't last long. I suppose one of the boys in our seats had a crush on Trina for whatever stupid reason, I don't know about these people. The boy's performance wasn't great, I hadn't seen it; his desperation at defending Trina over a second of my delay and expression of slight curious surprise, clearly told me he didn't think he was surviving as a contestant for much longer.

His boisterous voice shouting at me, "Why are you being so rude when she just wanted to be kind to you?! Do you try to make people cry when they talk to you?!" His voice was enough to draw more attention to us. I could see some people gleeful about trying to join and help them out to ruin me in some way.

Trina suddenly gasped and started full on crying, "Why?!-"

My attention wasn't on her, as I answered the other one who'd shouted at me. "Are you high? Surely you're not that desperate to fuck her? She normally only accepts married men before and after she's done torturing and killing their pregnant partners. She's also picky about eating the pregnant women and their babies or unborn babies. I don't think you're her type."

"What!? This crazy bi- Hah! Just show everyone what you do to people who annoy you!" The desperate boy shouted.

I nodded exaggeratedly and pulled two knives I'd been hiding underneath my shirt. My knives were slightly countered by two people that had seen what happened to the judge with the consenting audience.

So Trina and her boy didn't get killed outright. But before the shock could continue, Rain's voice lectured me.

"Aeon Nether! How many times must I tell you that even those who've consented to you killing them or asking stupid questions should not be outright killed? Hmm?"

"Oh, I forgot." I gasped in surprise at having my memory flawed ever so slightly.

"I figured that you forgot the judge you killed last time for trying to starve you after you got out of the dungeon and essay writing stupor. But still! Aeon! And you can't just reveal other contestants' life habits like that. It would have been safer for you to kill her when she tries to kill you. And killing the virgin too?! Aeon you know better!"

I looked at my feet. I was pretty sure that my embarrassment at the quick try to kill Trina came across as guilt for being scolded by Rain for murdering wrong.

"Aeon, do you know what you've done wrong?" Rain asked patiently. His/they sounded like a parent who'd felt sympathy and guilt for shouting at their child.

In the now silent venue my voice clearly sounded to everyone, "Killing people just because they've consented is bad. They could have just been stupid." Rain didn't talk to me again for a moment, so I tried to think harder. An expression of concentration and thinking unfolded on my face that the big screen now reflected. "And. Some people would like to have premarital sex, so killing the virgins just because their desperation has reached a stupid level that will end up with them dead is bad. I should just let them kill themselves. I was wrong to warn and have notified my potential killers of my knowledge on their messed up brains."