"…!!"
"W-What?!"
-Gulp.
The crowd was rendered speechless at the interruption.
It was an unexpected reaction, for sure.
Who would dare scam them inside the tower?
Because of the illegal nature of the transaction, his parents had decided to sell Psyche's bodily products inside the tower, away from authorities' prying eyes. However, that didn't mean just players could attend.
Fifty years ago, most people woke up on their twelfth birthday to a blue screen in front of their noses. But that didn't mean the tower rejected newcomers who hadn't been invited. It just meant that, before things got more organized on the lower floors, during the first twenty years after the tower's first appearance, they had fewer chances of survival.
Nowadays, hiring a player to carry you to the tenth floor is a normal activity among the richest of the rich from the outside world.
After all, once you went back to the real world, your skills would be sealed, but not your physical advantages as an F-Rank. Hence, most celebrities were tutorial players who came to the tower at least once.
The same was true for other shady businesses that depended on skills; that's why his parents needed both Adolphe and Blasius to be able to come and go to the tower as they pleased. And the reason Psyche had to be confined to the tower.
The people outside of the crystal were not just 10th-floor representatives of some of the most influential people in the outside world.
Some of them were even 20th-floor players, risking causality just to inform even more high-level players about the products.
However, when the man spoke, even if he was currently under the tower's ruling, as they all were, they could still feel the difference in stats between them.
That man was a player who had reached the 30th floor at the very least.
With a look of disinterest and boredom slipping through the mask's empty sockets. The man's words were directed at Blasius, but his frog mask never left Psyche's nape.
"I said… Do you take us for fools?"
It was a white-and-green mask with yellow-and-black eyes that seemed frozen in a perpetually friendly smile.
The porcelain frog shone dangerously under the red hazard lights.
Psyche felt the pain subside, probably Blasius's attention scattering elsewhere; he was sure his brother was the one controlling the artifact to hurt him.
"Huuuuu…"
He felt lighter all of a sudden and gathered just enough of his strength to listen to the conversation.
His brother, on the other hand, despite being free and unrestrained, seemed to be completely out of breath.
"W-Whatever could that mean, sir?"
One second.
Then two.
Then fifty.
"W-We highly v-value our customers."
"T-There is absolutely no way we could-"
"Mess with our guild?"
The abrupt voice interrupted Blasius, low and dangerous, threatening.
Psyche turned just enough to observe the scene through the corner of his left eye.
The man sounded awfully close, but the shadowed figure was stationed in the farthest corner from both Blasius and Psyche.
That voice belonged to a very tall, dark-skinned man wearing black-and-yellow robes, his sleeves decorated with three colored circles and one transparent inverted triangle, all placed in a half-moon shape around his elbow. Braids carefully shaped throughout his long black hair, intertwined with golden accessories.
He so, very carefully detached himself from the wall and took one step up, but didn't move any further.
As if allowing Psyche to examine him.
'Danger.'
The alarms ringing in his head made him cringe even further, as if he could hide from the man's gaze.
The smiling frog made him uneasy. He wasn't especially fond of frogs to begin with, but neither was he of bunnies.
Unlike the tall man's mask, which Psyche had had a hard time distinguishing in the distance without completely showing his face to strangers, he knew his brother's mask really well.
'I made it myself.'
The bunny statue was made after his first meeting with Aphrodite to appease the goddess. Back when he was young and impressionable, he thought that gods were pure and sincere beings.
He had given it to her in hopes of earning her favor.
Hoping she would offer him a helping hand.
Psyche refused to go back to that day because the memories wouldn't change his current situation, and reminiscing about it only made his heart hurt even more.
Alas, he was an overthinker.And he regretted very few things, but that meeting kept haunting him in his sleep.
He never thought he would miss the time back when he was unawakened.
Back when Adolphe could bully him freely without his parents caring.
When absolutely no one knew who he was.
[Charm. (Defensive skill) (Passive)]
When this godforsaken skill wasn't his.
When he was just another normal human being.
Not because of his F-Rank strength. That really wasn't as different, especially when confined to the awakened cell room.
'No. That's not it.'
He meant the time when even his parents didn't care about him.
When no one wanted his tears, sweat, or feces.
When no one had wanted to hurt him out of obsession.
Because Psyche was just Psyche.
And a statue was just a statue.
-Coughcough.
"Ahem!"
He heard his brother clear his throat.
"T-The specimen is an authentic angel from the 750th floor."
The bunny had only gone to his brother because it broke, and the face ended up becoming the symbol of his family's auction business.
If he turned around now, he would be able to pinpoint the exact place where she struck down and broke the mask. The impact dyed the statue with a small black dot in the middle, cleanly slashing it into three parts, one of which caused the small scar on his upper lip.
'I thought I had forgotten all about that day.'
And yet.
-Buzz.
"This 'angel' you speak of…"
Psyche could now appreciate just how much the cell had restrained him.
He didn't know when it happened, but the frog man had moved from the farthest side of the room and was positioned right in front of Psyche's bed, behind him.
Unlike when he fought Adolphe, he realized it only because he felt the crystal vibrate under the man's touch. A small reminder that the restraining power could activate both ways, as long as it came in contact with an awakened being.
"… is a fake, human scum."
-Tap! Buzz!
The man tapped the tip of his index finger against the glass with barely any strength, but the crystal rang in rejection, signaling the opposite.
'Danger!'
-Buzz!
"…!"
Psyche flinched and buried his head in the mattress. He didn't want the man to see his face at all.
Unlike the other guests, who had gone quiet and were merely observing the situation unfold, he had a feeling the man wanted Psyche to look at him and not the other way.
Like he was baiting him.
The uncovered lower half of the robust man's face visibly showed sweat traveling down from his hidden forehead.
"H-He's weakened!" His brother almost shouted, desesperately.
His brother carried different task inside and outside of the tower. He had developed a thick skin in order to deal with the worst of scum in both worlds.
Blasius was a seasoned scammer.
But the tone of his voice made Psyche doubt his experience.
'Why is he stuttering so much?'
"Bullshit."
"It's the tower's c-curse!!"
Psyche could no longer see him, and he didn't have his usual perception skills to be able to locate him without looking.
'Danger.'
But he just knew he was stretching his hand at him.
* * *
No other player stood in his way.
The man's height alone towered above all the others.
But it wasn't just that that made them cautious: He belonged to the Purificatio guild.
A guild that had established itself on the 30th floor in only two years since it was first established, all thanks to his boss and guildmaster.
He looked down.
Pitifully bent in a fetal position was the product.
From where he stood, the man perfectly saw his spine and ribs, showing how severely undernourished he was. His back was smooth, and his skin was a pale pinkish apricot color, with no sign of tears or scars where an angel's wings should've been.
He licked his lips.The man thought his boss would be extremely happy just by striking the deal with no other basis except the back of the man's head.
'His organs will fetch us a high price in the outside world.'
He should have asked for the price and placed a bid immediately.
But there was something weird.More exactly, he felt weird.
Earlier, the man had caught a glimpse of something purple.Whatever that was, it had made him strange.
Like the idea alone of breaking that man's fingers was a great sin he couldn't commit.
Even now, his eyes were glued on the man.
His silky white hair.
His slim wrists.
The red marks that swelled because of the bands that restrained him.
The way he shivered under his gaze.
He needed to be sure.
He had to see his face.
It was a primal instinct whose origin he couldn't recognize.
Enough to make him forget where his loyalties lay.
-Buzzzzzzzz.
He let his hand linger against the crystal, not caring about the sudden nausea that it caused.
And he slid down his hand, almost as if caressing the man's back.
Despite knowing that there was no way the other guy could know what he was doing, he smiled when the man flinched in response.
Without looking back at the short, fat man with the rabbit mask, not allowing his eyes to miss even one of his movements, he slowly spoke.
"Prove it."