The Hidden World

With the contract sealed, time resumed its normal pace and Yuki let out a small gasp as she was sucked back into her body. The spirits returned to their own magically made bodies and looked at her. She looked back and smiled.

“I’ll get started on my side,” she whispered.

She channeled mana to her hands that were still gripping the guards’ shoulders. Then with a thought, she shoved it into the bodies of the guards. The mana ran through the magic bodies and shorted out their functions, paralyzing the spirits that were within them.

“I’ll be back soon,” she promised. She didn’t wait for a reply. Their mouths wouldn’t be working right now.

With a quick look around, Yuki slipped past the guards in a flash and walked down the hallway. She made sure to keep her body right behind one of the guards while thanking whoever made the bodies for making them so bulky and tall. 

Before her was the pair of doors she found the day before when she was testing the guards. She pulled out a few strips of cloth from her pockets and wrapped them around the handle of the doors. 

‘Let’s see what’s inside.’

When she opened the doors, she was met with a room with black tiled floors. Directly in front of her was a pair of metal doors that had a glass panel beside them with a single button. A set of stairs laid beside it heading upwards. Ignoring the metal doors for now, she crept up the stairs as quiet as a mouse, curious as to what it led to.

The sounds of a voice met her ears as she climbed up higher and higher. The cheers of the arena crowd was with it, a tad muffled. She recognized the speaker in a flash. It was the Fiddler’s raspy voice.

She stopped herself from going up any further. No further information was needed for. She knew where this set of stairs led to now. It was the one place that would be perfect for what she needed to do. 

‘This is his spectator box, isn’t it,’ she thought. ‘The box where he watches people murder each other for his own enjoyment.’

Creeping back down the stairs, she considered the metal door once again. She wanted to open them, but was worried that there might be some sort of alarm that would tip the Fiddler off. Though, maybe it wouldn’t since the Fiddler wouldn’t expect anyone to enter.

‘That line of thinking is how people get caught,’ Yuki thought with a tight smile. 

She decided against it and left the metal doors alone. As quietly as she came in, she slipped out of the room, making sure that her hands didn’t touch anything and that the door made no noise. 

As she walked out of the hallway, she brushed her hands on the frozen guards’ waists and sent a wave of mana to jumpstart them. The moment she passed them, one of them put a hand on her shoulder.

“How did you do that?” a voice rumbled. It was the first guard.

She looked back and gave him a small smile.

“I’ve played with golems here and there,” she said. “I know a few tricks.”

With that, she walked away, her mind shifting to the information she just found and the events of the day.

---

“Ember, I have a question,” Yuki said.

It was nighttime and the two of them were back in their rooms. Ember was laying down, getting ready to fall asleep while Yuki sat cross legged on her own bed. 

“What is it?” Ember asked, propping herself up with an arm. 

“I want to prod your memory on something.”

“Go for it.”

“The prison cells,” Yuki said. “Did you get a good glimpse of it?”

“Yes I did,” she sighed. “I kind of wish I didn’t. That place is horrible and when I get the chance, I’m going to personally find the Fiddler and dump a bucket of the urine from that place on him. Then beat him up.”

“I’ll try to get that opportunity for you,” Yuki said with a small smile. “Tell me what you say though. The prisoners specifically. Can you describe them?”

“I can’t really describe them exactly,” she said, frowning. 

“That’s fine. Just what you remember.”

“Alright then. Um, there weren’t many prisoners. A lot of them had wounds across their bodies that looked really infected. The smell is horrible. The sounds they made as well.”

Ember shuddered as she spoke.

“Other than that, I can’t really describe their facial features,” she said. “I didn’t want to look at them for too long. It made me uncomfortable. I’m fine with blood and limbs chopped off and all that, but infections are just very very unsettling to look at.”

“I can see why you would feel that way,” Yuki nodded. “I’m fine, personally. Smells though. They can get to me.”

“Luckily for me, I’m fairly nose dead compared to others,” Ember laughed. “I hunt with my hearing more. Puts me at a disadvantage at times. But if you do what I do everyday, having a super sensitive nose isn’t the best.”

“Guarding?”

“Yeah,” she said. “But what comes with guarding is a lot of monster killing and other kinds of killing.”

“I see. Well, going back to the original topic,” Yuki said, “do you remember the number of prisoners that you saw?”

“I think?” 

“How many?”

Ember frowned. “Five, I believe. Three had injuries. Not sure what kind.”

“Do you remember what location their cells were in relation to the room?”

“Not really. I don’t believe there were any directly next to the cell I was thrown in.”

“Which cell was that?” Yuki asked.

“It was in the back. One before the last on the right,” Ember replied.

“I see. Anything else you might remember?” 

“Not really. I think that’s everything I can say. I’ll tell you if something pops up in my head tomorrow.”

“Alright,” Yuki said. She uncrossed her legs and drew up her knees. “Sorry to bother you when you were about to sleep.”

“No problem,” Ember smiled as she laid back down. “Glad I can help. I’m going to sleep now though.”

“I’ll be thinking for a bit. Have a good rest.”

“I will.”

Ember quieted, and in a few minutes was sleeping peacefully on her bed. Yuki leaned her back against the headboard of her bed and stared at the wall as her mind began piecing information together. 

The prison layout that Ember described was the same as the one that Yuki remembered. The amount of prisoners seemed to be the same and the prison cell that they were placed in were the same. 

Normally, Yuki would chalk this up as most likely a coincidence as this was only two cases. She would need to ask someone else new to see if the prison still sounded the same to make sure that this wasn’t all just happenstance. 

But one thing stuck out to Yuki that she couldn’t ignore.

‘The prisoners are still injured,” she thought. ‘And the injuries are infected as well which means that the prisoners had to be there for a bit of time.’

Injuries wouldn’t have been a big deal to Yuki if it wasn’t for the fact that injuries in the Coliseum could be fixed almost immediately by the medical staff in the sick bay. The Fiddler said that the people in the prison cells were there because of disobedience which suggested that they were punished in some way, but there were many ways to inflict pain on someone that didn’t require blood. 

‘And they’re still injured. The Fiddler could easily heal them and still keep the pain in their mind,’ she mused. ‘I know it’s possible. Having them actually be infected and possibly die wouldn’t seem to be something he would risk.’

Being placed in such a rancid and isolated place could be punishment enough as well. 

‘So. Same amount of prisoners. Same starting place in the prison. No real need to even have injured people.’

The conclusion was glaringly obvious to the point that Yuki wondered why she hadn’t thought of it before. The prison was as fake as the arena and the room she was sitting in. Why the Fiddler created such a place was quite obvious. It was a scare tactic to discourage disobedience.

‘I wonder where he got the idea for such a place,’ she wondered. ‘It’s very detailed. The smell and the design of the place seemed like something in real life. Maybe it was based on something real.’

Before she started to muse about the reasoning for the design of the place, Yuki’s attention was distracted by Ember. She was still sleeping, but now was muttering to herself and thrashing a bit in her bed. A nightmare, most likely.

Yuki crept closer to see what was bothering Ember. Her mutterings were filled with phrases that Yuki didn’t quite understand without context and names of people she didn’t know. But Ember’s stress was apparent just from her tone and the way her brows were furrowed.

Without much thought, Yuki reached out and touched her hand, wanting to comfort her. When their skin touched, emotions flooded out from Ember into Yuki, a gasp escaping her. Anger and sadness. Much like the feelings that Ember said she felt from Yuki. 

The flood stopped almost as quickly as it began, and Ember’s nightmare dissipated. She fell back into a peaceful slumber, a slight smile on her lips as her mutters stopped. 

‘So this is what she had been doing for me,’ Yuki thought, her expression softening. ‘You little liar. Trying to hide it.’

Yuki had promised to help Ember, and that was exactly what she was going to do. Even if Ember protested, Yuki would take what was weighing her down. Just as Ember was doing for her. 

‘It’s a two way street, Em. You don’t need to carry it all by yourself.’

She let go of Ember’s hand and went back to her own bed, the feelings of anger and melancholy from Ember still stirring around within her. As she laid down, a thought struck her. 

‘Beating the Fiddler up would probably help her calm down,’ Yuki thought. Then she smiled. ‘I know it would help me.’