Tale of Discovery

"Are you ready?" I question while gazing at Tohka and Jeanne, who are standing in front of me with solemn looks on their faces.

Once I receive their confirmation, I mutter, "Arena."

The next moment, our surroundings change from 'my' room to the streets of Dubai.

In front of me, Tohka and Jeanne are both looking around, and to my right, there is the girl I had been keeping hostage tied up on the ground, glaring at me.

"Alright then," I say once I've made sure that there are no abnormalities in the Arena through a quick scan by Clairvoyance, "You two, spar against one another for a moment while I go deal with her."

The two of them both glance at the girl I am pointing at before Jeanne nods her head in confirmation, while Tohka just continues to stare at her.

"Shido," Tohka says, "What are you going to be doing?"

"Extracting information," I reply honestly, "This place is ideal for such matters, hence why I brought us over."

That's right. The Arena is a good place to extract information from enemies.

There are several reasons for that, one of which is the fact that death is not possible in the Arena.

At most, one would get extremely exhausted, so it's only natural that I would use it for information extraction. Strictly put, whatever physical torture I perform here is in actuality mental torture.

Tonight, I have brought these three over to the Arena with various objectives in mind.

For the girl on the ground, I am simply planning to extract information from her.

While for the other two, I plan to gain some insight into their prowess and abilities, particularly Jeanne's.

This young lady barely exhibits any emotions and is invariably in a state of servitude.

Now, that isn't exactly a 'bad' thing, but I would preferably have her be more expressive than just simply following every order I throw at her blindly.

To achieve that, I am willing to resort to all manners of actions that could result in some form of 'unusual' reaction from her.

Leaving her aside, I am also quite curious about Tohka's powers.

That time I dueled against her gave me a general idea, but I would like to know more than just that. Especially now, since I will most likely be partaking in numerous battles against DEM industries, one of which she may provide support.

In that case, it would be better if I had a good grasp of her capabilities and limits, lest I want her safety to be compromised.

This is one of the reasons why I had her spar with Jeanne, as I could ask for Jeanne's thoughts regarding her powers, after all, two heads are better than one.

Anyway, I better focus on the task at hand now.

With such thought cemented in my mind, I telekinetically lift the girl from the ground before floating into the air using Flight and swiftly dashing toward the sky.

The next moment, I find myself floating high in the sky, looking down on the desolate city.

In this position, I look around for a few seconds before locating an ideal place to carry out the plan I have in mind.

And so, I fly over to the rooftop of the skyscraper that had caught my eye and set the girl down in a somewhat rough manner as I neatly land on my feet.

Honestly, I would've preferred to make use of other methods to extract information, such as Indoctrination or Memory Erasure, but the addition of an Effect to my status has made that less favored.

Said Effect is none other than Malevolence.

If I were to take the word's literal meaning into mind, I can easily conclude that the Effect is directly correlated to my intentions when performing certain actions.

The fact that it's a 'passive' Effect is also something that needs consideration.

Gazing down at the girl whom I have tied up, I raise my right arm before utilizing Pyrokinesis to form gentle flames on my hand.

Then, I guide said flames over to the girl's bindings and burn them off without damaging her clothes.

The next thing I know, the girl furiously jumps on her feet and proceeds to throw a jab at my face, which I casually block using Vector Manipulation.

Seeing that her attack failed, the girl's expression contorts as she takes a few steps back.

"I won't talk no matter what you do to me!" she exclaims in a firm tone, "A monstrosity like you doesn't deserve to exist."

"How rude," I respond with a small smile, "I am nothing but a high schooler with some fancy powers."

Hearing my words, the girl scoffs and says, "So much for an ordinary high schooler, capable of taking down The Strongest Wizard."

Hm? Who could she be referring to? Have I encountered anyone like that during my stay in this Platform?

"Hold on..." I mutter before looking into the girl's eyes and asking, "Are you speaking of Ellen?"

"Who else is there? Only she deserves that title," the girl responds with scorn.

Looks like from her perspective this information is 'common knowledge', or else she wouldn't be telling me this.

Still, if Ellen's title truly is The Strongest Wizard, then I've gotten my hands on an extremely valuable hostage.

Speaking of which, no wonder she was still capable of moving and exerting energy while her limbs were missing, as I would expect no less from someone with the title of strongest.

"Say, why are DEM industries so obsessed with spirits? I doubt they truly want to get rid of the spirits for the greater good of humanity."

"What do you mean by that?" the girl responds, "Have you not seen all the damage done by the spirits. In fact, you are one yourself, aren't you? A spirit. So, you should be aware more than anyone else why we seek you."

While the girl is talking, I notice some odd movements with her fingers and legs, as if she is preparing to perform some sort of move.

Heh, so that's how it is. She is stalling while preparing for whatever it is she is planning.

"Hey," I say, "Would you like to experience death?"

"Huh?" a confused voice escapes from the girl's lips as her expression becomes strange.

Beaming a smile at her, I proceed to appear right in front of her before slamming my palm into her abdomen, resulting in her body getting hurled off the building.

Following this, I leap toward her and make use of Flight to remain relatively close to her as she slowly begins to accelerate toward the ground.

Before long, the girl realizes that I am not planning to catch her as all color drains from her face while she looks down at the ground.

"S-top, st-op, stop!" she exclaims, her voice getting cut off by the wind.

The next moment, I halt all my motions through Vector Manipulation and look on as the girl slams into the ground along with the sound of a splat.

More than a little curious about how certain death is dealt with in the Arena, I keep my sight on the girl's devastated inert body.

Minutes pass by and an odd phenomenon begins to take place.

Some form of energy begins to seemingly appear out of nowhere around the girl's body and slowly begins to enter her through her orifices.

Shortly after, the pool of blood on the ground seems to fade into nothingness as the girl's body begins to 'regenerate' right before my eyes.

"Intriguing," I mutter as I descend and land right in front of the girl.

Like this, I patiently wait for the girl to raise her body from the ground, which happens after around five minutes.

And so, raising her head, the girl has a dazed look in her eyes before she seems to notice me as her eyes widen marginally.

That's not all, but an expression of pure horror appears on her face as she gives me a look that I seem to find familiar.

The next thing I know, the girl's image at this moment overlaps with the woman I saw in my vision from quite a while ago.

"Why?" a soft yet shaky voice reaches my ears, "Why won't you leave us?"

What the...

Peering into the girl's eyes, I notice that something has changed about them. They've become dimmer as if the previous 'light' has been drained from them.

All in all, the girl is now giving off a strange vibe that's making me feel uncomfortable.

"Let us go," she continues in the same tone, albeit shakier, "We don't want to exist anymore."

Before I can make sense of her words, the girl suddenly begins shrieking like there is no tomorrow, only to stop after a solid minute of screaming.

Grabbing her head, the girl looks up into my eyes with a wrathful expression as she says, "You... What did you do to me?!"

That's what I would like to know myself...