Intertwined Outlanders (first draft - v.1.0)

12

I was seated next to Hazuki, who was completely unfocused during the meeting, although she was the Investigation Centre's leader. Instead, faint pixelated sounds trailed from her direction, and I saw that she was happily playing a game on her tiny flip-phone screen.
XVI had taken over the meeting, and he was summarising a report related to Lucien.

I was scanning the entire room with my eyes. From the corner of my eye, Willow gaped at the surface of the table thoughtfully, with no light in her eyes despite how bright the lights were in the room. Valentina was typing away on her laptop opposite me, and I watched her expression carefully.

Then, I could feel Kaden's hostile gaze on me from beside Valentina. He stared intently at me, like a predator waiting to pounce on its prey. I tried not to look in his direction. He couldn't hurt me when Hazuki could effortlessly subdue him if she wanted.

"Layla?" XVI called.
"Yes, I'm here.." I traced my eyes over to the wrinkles between his eyebrows that made his expression concentrated and stern.
"Did you ask Mr. Lucien, who his superior is?" He questioned with an expecting gaze, and this question attracted Valentina's attention.
I completely forgot that I even asked Lucien that, after we strolled around the whole underground city trying all the desserts from the shops.
"Yeah...um.." I waited for my mind to echo his superior's name.

Everyone except Hazuki turned to face me, waiting for my response. I was a deer in headlights, especially due to Kaden's mean and amused gaze that I saw from the corner of my eye.

"It's Ren, he told me it was Ren Nakamura."

My anxious voice triggered everyone's concern, and it even seized Hazuki's attention which caused her to pause the 8-bit game on her phone and look up with mild amusement twinkling in her eyes. Meanwhile, everyone else exchanged looks at each other except Hazuki, and Willow whose nonchalance never broke.

"He's the one I fought yesterday when Layla and I were on a mission." Valentina mentioned, "if he was Lucien's superior, there's a chance that he might come to the Investigation Centre and come take him back as a traitor. He's really dangerous and might summon more Agents.."

I had never met Ren personally, but since he was an associate which usually holds immense power in an organisation, he would likely be after me since the Order wants to seize me from Maple City that badly.

"Nah, he's only dangerous because you suck at fighting." Kaden snickered.
"If you're all not happy about this, we could escape from the problem. They already know our location by now since the incident with two Agents." Willow's pretty eyes trailed across the room to meet all of our eyes once before she stood up and left the meeting room.

"Ren Nakamura, huh?" XVI quickly read files on the translucent blue screens he held in front of him, "I just hacked into some of the Order's records. He's been doing iaijutsu since he was six and he defeated tons of people before. Dude clearly knows what he's doing. I wonder who his master was..." I tried to read the text that showed through the translucent screens, but several words, likely describing his master's identity, were eerily redacted.

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