Royse immediately turns towards the direction of the voice.
There stood the familiar white-headed figure.
The damn stalker was here.
A smile was plastered on his face as he gazed at Royse. "To think Midnight Terror would bless me with his presence this evening, I'm touched."
Royse doubled his guard and watched every movement of the other male.
When the familiar figure saw the orb in his hand, his expression changed drastically. His smile was replaced by a frown.
"It seems you have gotten a hold of our groups' property."
Seeing his expression, Royse couldn't fight back the smile that crept on his face.
"You can't help but be curious about this don't you think?" The younger male states as he takes a look at the orb. "Make's me wonder what this is~" He states in a sing-along tone.
The whitehead growled. "Were it any other day, I would be more than happy to entertain you but I'm afraid I am not in the mood." The older male reached his hand. "Give it and we can call this off. No fighting needed."
Assessing the man, Royse narrowed his eyes behind his mask. Although subtly, it was evident that the man seemed exhausted.
It only gave him more reason to smile.
"Aww, just when I wanted to fight." Clearly it was a lie but Royse knew they were bound to fight anyway with what he was going to do.
An item box appeared before him.
He reaches his hand, about to put the orb inside when all of a sudden, shadows suddenly attack him.
Royse jumped away just in time to avoid it.
With the orb still in his hand, he sees the man snarl at him.
"It seems I'll have to take it by force."
The younger male smirked. "Try me."
That was all it took for the man to appear in front of him.
Royse quickly blocked the attack and morphed his dagger into a sword.
The man coated his hands with the dark attribute and made his continuous attacks towards the younger male. Royse single-handedly blocked the series of slashes. He gripped the orb tighter, finding no opening to access his item box.
Royse grits his teeth as the man drove him towards the wall, trying to trap him. He buffs himself with further enhancements and summoned a lake of poison underneath his feet.
The man jumped away just in time before the whole floor became poison and landed on the wall. Shadows suddenly crawled and overlaps the poison ground. Using the wall, the man springs back towards Royse and twirled as the dark shadows grew in size, creating a wave.
Leaving him no choice, Royse mutters his skill and engulfed the whole room in a magic circle.
Light attribute poured, causing the man's dark attribute along with the poison on the ground to disappear.
The man halts as he feels his body dropping from his opponents' sudden skill.
Wide red eyes stared at the masked figure.
"I've forgotten that you are a holder of all 3 rarest attributes." He states.
Royse simply shrugs. "I'm not surprised. With how I've lessened my patrolling in the evening, people are bound to let their guard down."
The man deepened his frown.
"It seems I can't delay this..." He whispers.
Just like that, the man charges towards him.
Once again, Royse saw through the action and dodged. In his vision, he sees the man smirking when he avoided.
When Royse jumped back, the man was standing in a corner. He places his hand over the wall.
The wall suddenly made a mark, identifying the owner's hand.
Just like that, many glowing symbols appeared on the wall. Each symbol is then connected in the middle, forming a magic circle.
Using this as a distraction, Royse blinked in surprise when the older male appeared out of nowhere and managed to snag the orb.
Refusing to back down, Royse summoned his own shadow to grab the wrist of the man.
The orb fell and before they knew it, the symbols flashed a brighter light and engulfed the room.
Royse jumps away as he squinted his eyes from the light.
When it was over, he realizes he was now standing in a different room. He examines his area and realizes it was another locked up room, the only difference was how it had tables and bookshelves.
He curses under his breath. "Dammit!" He turns his head in every direction and triggered his map skill. No display of the man can be seen on his map.
He tries to search for the orb but found no sight of the object.
"Was it a teleporting mechanism?" He murmurs, recalling what the man had done.
The symbols suddenly appeared in the wall and from the looks of it, it seemed to have needed to charge up before it teleported them.
He sighed knowing he let his guard down. Shaking his head, he focuses on his situation.
"I need to find that orb. If that dude gets it first, then I'm screwed." Royse knew he had to make sure the object wouldn't lie on the man's hands. Just from the looks of it, he knew the orb was bad news.
He closes his eyes and took a deep breath as he starts sensing his surroundings.
Sweat trickled down his forehead as he focuses on his skill.
Until now, it was still troublesome to use this skill as it required him to feel the magicules in his surroundings.
The thing he was doing was similar to the gadget he used earlier to track the underground's group base.
But it was a bit different in some ways.
This was a skill he recently created and whenever he uses it, it consumed a lot of mana, a heck ton actually. Not to mention how it had a cooldown of 1 week for him to use again.
Which absolutely irks him.
He was saving this skill in case he needed to escape. The only difference was how he wasn't using this to escape, instead was used to finding that stupid orb.
It took him 2 minutes before the skill finished registering everything.
When he opens his eyes, the layout of the area he was in suddenly showed grids.
Everything turned into a wireframe override in his vision.
His skill was similar to that of a designing program used in his former world. He could see the next rooms and its inhabitant. To simply put it, his skill granted him an x-ray vision of sorts.
Looking around, he sees purple particles floating in a direction. He follows its destination and saw it inside a room that his skill was unable to register due to the distance.
Another curse escapes his lips.
"Should I teleport there to make it quicker?"
Royse was torn considering that this skill already took a lot of his mana. Teleporting while using the x-ray vision would deplete it even further.
Not to mention he'd be fighting the man again. He needed to properly use his skills at the right time.
Deciding to walk, he leaves the room and followed the purple particles.
Doors upon doors, Royse easily manoeuvred in the dark place. It helped that there was no one inside any room, it gave him an easier job to travel.
As he gets closer, his field of view widened and saw the orb inside a room. He runs towards the place and slams the door open, rushing to get the object of his search.
Just as he stepped foot, he backflipped from the wall of shadow that blocked his way.
Not giving him a chance to rest, the man suddenly rose from the ground and ambushed him.
When Royse dodged in time, he was about to retaliate when the man became a shadow and retreated to the ground.
The orb suddenly had dark particles floating around it.
Royse didn't waste a second and made his next move.
In just one step, Royse zoomed towards the orb and unleashed his light skill.
The dark particles perished as Royse stood above the orb. He huffs, regaining his breath but once again, the man's shadow appeared and towered over him.
Royse grits his teeth as he coated his sword with the light attribute, slashing the shadow.
"I'm afraid we'll stay here until one of us no longer has any mana."
The man's voice echoed in the room.
Multiple shadow clones emerged from the ground, taking in the appearance of monsters.
Royse does the same and summoned his own clones.
The room became a battlefield as the clones fought. With the x-ray vision, Royse turns his head in every direction, trying to find the man's real body.
When he senses a presence, he turns his head below his feet and saw a pool of darkness.
Shadow grabbed his legs but Royse made haste to purify them.
Muttering his skill, he shields himself. He flinches with the amount of mana he had used in the span of minutes.
Panting, he grits his teeth as he reaches his hands towards the orb.
Of course, another attack was sent his ways making him use his sword to stop it.
Another attack to his side.
Block it again.
A shadow clone of a snake slithered to his legs without him knowing, the clone pulled his leg causing him to lose balance. Before he fell, he uses his other hand to purify the snake and regain his standing.
Glaring at every monster in the room, he swung his sword and sent a slash of light attribute flying towards the monsters in front.
With each attempt of the monsters, Royse felt himself becoming irritated.
The orb suddenly glowed and emitted an aura.
The same sensation he felt earlier returned. Instead of pain, a part of him howled and welcomed the aura.
Feeling his anger taking control, Royse's eyes suddenly changed into a colour red, removing the effect of the colour changing potion.
Maintaining his gaze on the ground, his body moved and stabbed his sword on the floor.
The monster clones saw this as a chance to attack and headed straight towards the figure.
Everything was a blur to Royse.
His lips moved as he chanted his skill.
Not only one, but two magic circles appeared on the ground. A beam of light engulfed everything as the shadows disappeared.
Unbeknownst to them, the beam shot through the area they were in and lit up till it reached the sky from outside.
The 2 circles disappeared as the skill finished its job. Royse swifts his head towards the orb and grasped it.
He then grabbed his sword from the ground and pointed the sharp edge towards the floor.
At first, it seemed as if Royse was simply in a stance but soon, the man revealed himself on the floor, collapsed and injured with burns.
With Royses' sword pointed at the mans' face, it rendered the man unable to move.
A smile graced the mans' lips despite his current situation.
"Are you going to stain your hands?" The man asks.
Royse remained silent.
He tilted his head.
"Perhaps I will."
The man widened his eyes when he sees a flash of red underneath the mask.
The figure before him exuded a different aura from before.
It was an aura the man was familiar with.
Memories flooded the man. Scenes from his early years flashed through his mind, recalling the things he had faced.
The man smiles as his sweat trickled down his temple.
"Who are you?"
The younger male became silent.
Seeing he wasn't going to reply, the man triggers his final move.
Royse blinked in surprise when the room glowed blue. He was even more surprised when the orb he was holding was replaced by a crumpled paper. When he returns his gaze towards the man, he sees the orb in his grasp.
Royse realizes the man had placed an item exchange trap.
"Son of a-"
"This is farewell for now." The man announced before the surroundings became fully blue.
Royse gritted his teeth as he rushes towards the man, trying to capture him. His lips moved to chant his skill but halted when he was transported to another different place once again.
He clicked his tongue in annoyance. "I was too late to nullify it."
With his x-ray vision, he realizes he was now inside a small shed, not too far from the castles' outside wall.
Disabling his skill, Royse stumbled as he feels his tiredness catching up. Feeling his strength leave his legs, he allowed himself to collapse.
Sprawled on the floor, a heavy sigh escapes his lips as he tries to collect his thoughts.
Although it was a bit hazy, he remembers the scene that happened. He lost control and despite that, he still failed to capture the man and take the orb.
"Ah, this is embarrassing." He comments as he stared at the ceiling. If Amy had seen his display he was sure she'd definitely mock him.
At least he wasn't injured or anything.
Royse tiredly sighed and felt the amount of mana he used. He opens his item box and drank a recovery and mana potion to help his state.
He closes his eyes as he allowed himself to rest for a couple of minutes before returning to his home.
Of course, nothing was going his way when he hears a familiar sound from outside the shed.
He huffs as he sat down and gazed at the wooden door. The sound from behind only grew louder with each second. It probably sensed that there was a person inside.
He grunts as he stood up and dusted off his pants.
The wooden floor creaked with each of his steps. Pushing the door open Royse readied his skill.
He blinked in surprise when a familiar ombre-haired figure greeted his view.
The figure did the job instead and stood on the corpse of the monster.
"I expected you'd be here." She comments.
"Can't say the same for me." He replies.