Melina turned around and walked out into the hallway. I followed as several drops of water slid down my neck and got caught in the yukata. Her hips swayed slightly as I followed along, the slippers feeling uncomfortably strange on my feet. I was rather surprised she hadn’t changed her choice of dress while I was bathing, but I didn’t mind. I actually preferred it, as it meant that she felt comfortable enough around me.
Just then the dress slid down her back several inches, showing me something quite interesting. She had a tattoo on her back, one that rose up to her neck. It was a flower bush, one that was in full bloom and went all the way down her back. I didn’t recognize what it was, but it didn’t matter. Her attractiveness just went up another notch in my eyes.
I sighed inwardly and put on a smile as we entered the main room. I followed her to the booth she wanted us to use, where Sandro had already taken his seat. He was all fidgety and nervous, almost as if he’d done something stupid.
I narrowed my eyes at him and was about to ask when Melina took the initiative.
“Don’t worry, he didn’t do anything but tell me the truth. That’s why I was drinking some extra while you were… in there. And dare I say, you look like a different person.”
“I—”
“Oh, come on. I saw your nose wrinkle slightly when you smelled the alcohol coming off me.”
“I’m not going to pry in your business, Melina.”
“Oh? He really does have some manners besides being able to kill four men easily after being beaten to death. Now, do you want to talk before or as we eat?”
I shrugged. “Can I choose option three?”
“And that is?”
“We don’t talk about it at all. At least not for now.”
Her smile wavered for a brief moment but turned up a notch right after. “I choose during food. Please make yourself comfortable and sit anywhere.”
She turned her back to me and almost ran off. My right eyebrow rose when I saw a fresh wound on Sandro’s face. It was a small cut, barely visible to the naked eye.
“Did she beat you?”
He nodded hurriedly. “Yes, sir! Please, I’m sorry!”
I put up my hand to stop him and waved the man off. “It’s not like she wouldn’t find out soon anyway. At least we’re on the same page right now. This way it’s much easier, and we don’t have to come up with lies.”
Melina walked in just then, balancing three trays between two hands. Shit, how the hell was this woman so able? My admiration turned up even higher, and I almost imagined how it would be if she was mine. I let the thought go just as quickly and focused back on the trays as she put them down in front of us.
Chicken, duck, and veal filled one tray. Garnished potatoes and salad filled another one of the trays, and the last held a ceramic flask that sat in a bowl filled with ice. Three small cups were placed inside each other and sat next to the flask. The glasses looked quite wondrous as they sat there depicting a dragon in flight.
Melina pulled her right sleeve back as she picked the cups up and placed them in front of us. The flask was next. It was much larger than it had looked a moment before, as the tip was thin. A clear liquid poured from the glass container and filled the porcelain cup in front of me. It had a slightly sweet scent to it, but I knew it was strong by the way Enma interacted with it.
“To the future, Viktor,” Melina said as she picked her cup up and brought it to her lips.
“To the future and much more than that.”
She looked much more relaxed after the first cup kicked in, and the uncomfortable silence was quickly replaced by her low chuckles and questions. I hadn’t given her anything else than what Sandro told her, but she seemed relieved after hearing it from me. I left the taking-over part out, as I had no way to guarantee my words, at least not right now.
I leaned back against the wall and let out a sigh once we were done. Sandro excused himself and rushed off to go get some sleep. At least that was what he told us. I hoped for his own sake that he wouldn’t do anything stupid.
Melina didn’t seem interested in leaving me just yet. She went and got another flask of the drink called sake, and sat back down on her knees. The dress slid almost up to her waist, and I couldn’t help but dare a glance. Melina either didn’t care or acted as if she didn’t notice.
“Do you think he’ll be rid of those bastards if you… you know?”
I flashed her a weak smile and nodded slightly. “In a way, yeah. We’ll get rid of them tomorrow if my recovery goes well. Most of it is thanks to your medicinal bath as well as… your hospitality.”
She smirked and leaned with her elbows against the small table. The sleeves dropped down her shoulders and her arms, revealing her chest. Her breasts were bound with bandages, but not the way one would ordinarily do to flatten them. She just used it to cover her breasts, I guessed. How odd.
“Shouldn’t you lie down for the night?” I proposed.
She shrugged and poured some more of the drink into my cup and then hers.
“You know, every other man would have used the chance to jump me by now,” she whispered. “I’ve been trying really hard to entice you, but you’re either too dense to understand or—”
“It’s none of your business, hostess,” I replied, my voice neutral. “Forgive me if I’m being rude, but I’ve just been reborn, so to speak. I’m not interested in anything but the problems we’ll be facing tomorrow. Once everything’s been taken care of, maybe you and I can sit down again for a drink? But without Sandro this time.”
“Reborn, huh? What a strong word,” she muttered. Her hands moved to her shoulders, where she pulled the dress back up and tightened the sash around her waist. As a man, I felt sorry for missing the view, but this wasn’t the time. Not yet.
“Where do I sleep?”
“Follow me upstairs. I’ll give you the room next to mine if you don’t mind?”
I chuckled inwardly as she waited for me to get up. I did so and followed her out of the room and up the stairs. This woman was a tease, I was sure of it, but I had to say there were much worse ways to come back to life. Her character was much darker and more mysterious than I thought it would be. I wasn’t quite sure if she was testing me, but there was no way in hell she was like this with everyone. Men were fickle creatures, so it would have been a death sentence to play this kind of game with the wrong man.
The wood creaked beneath our feet as we made our way up the flight of stairs and into the hallway. A light shone from the first door to our left. I guessed it was Sandro’s room. Melina turned right and motioned for me to follow her. I did as she asked and stopped in front of a white door. Her hand wrapped around the doorknob before she pushed it wide open.
The room was quite spacious with a king-sized bed at the center. A vanity cabinet sat to the right along with a comfortable-looking chair, while the whole left wall was filled up with closets and cabinets. The furniture was old looking, yet I could see it wasn’t something that was crafted by hand, it was mass produced. Or at least part of a mass-produced line of furniture.
A large sofa sat to the left along with a small table. Two lanterns hung from the ceiling, glowing weakly. I had to give it to her, she really tried hard to give visitors the feeling they expected from this place. And that was just one of the reasons why I wanted this ryokan for myself. Shit, I didn’t just want this place, I wanted her as well by the way my heart was fluttering inside my chest.
“I see it’s to your liking by the smirk on your face.” She chuckled. “I’ll be in the next room over, so if you need anything at all, just knock on my door.”
I nodded. “What about the ryokan? Aren’t you afraid people will waltz in while you’re asleep when everything’s wide open?”
She shook her head slightly and flashed me a warm smile. “Trust me, no one from around here would even dare try. You just have a good night.”
I turned to watch her leave and growled weakly. Man, I wanted to pull those hair sticks from her
bun and jump her. Tingles ran up and down my spine, and I could feel something strange going on in my chest. What the hell was this feeling?
Melina stopped at the door and glanced over her shoulder. She flashed me a smile and stood there for longer than necessary, but then finally closed the door behind her.
“Damn,” I whispered. “She’s one hell of a woman.”
I dropped to the sofa, both my heart and mind still racing. I wasn’t being horny or excited about sex; no, there was something enchanting about her that I just couldn’t look away no matter how hard I tried. Sandro and I would need to have a chat tomorrow once we were all up, and she was going to be one hot topic.
A sudden sensation came over me. It wasn’t painful exactly, but far from pleasant. My chest tightened up even further as I tried to breathe, but I was having trouble doing even that much.
The flickering flames inside the lanterns froze along with the wind and everything else in the room. My body was stiff, and I couldn’t move my eyes, much less my fingers or anything else. I tried to speak, to scream for help, but no sound came from my mouth.
An insanely strong pressure wave struck me, one faintly familiar to when I was with Krajolik. Then another, and another. A dozen. A score, and then thousands. The ground started trembling, and the furniture shook, cracked, and even broke in some places, but everything still stood in place.
Faint whispers appeared in the back of my mind, chatting about things I didn’t understand. I couldn’t make anything out. They were there and speaking about this world, this place, and some even this ryokan. A cold sweat washed over me despite not a single droplet being able to flow down my brow or back. It was there, though; I could feel it.
The tremors picked up again and became much worse as seconds passed. I could feel the very Enma cry for help, as something was very wrong, but I had no idea what. Shit, what about Melina? I wanted to get up, to run over and see if she was alright! Why was my body frozen? Damn it!
The very ryokan trembled, and dust dropped off the ceiling as a last, much stronger earthquake struck the city. Explosions reverberated in the distance; the sounds of stone breaking, glass shattering, and metal tearing filled my ears. Other than that, I couldn’t hear anything.
An image appeared before me, one like the status window from earlier, and was filled with lines of text.
Notification:
Time until the start of TOWERS AND RIFTS:
13:22:18
NOTE: Over the next 13 hours, the world Earth#231
will undergo the necessary transformation to host
the start of the next game.
Towers and rifts? Was that the game Krajolik told me about? The strange thing was that the feeling I got from him back then, well, I felt it in a thousand different directions as if there were as many copies of him.
The air grew thick with something I couldn’t place. It became harder to breathe, almost as if there was a thick mist seeping through the very fabric of space. My breath grew ragged, and I had a hard time breathing and staying awake over the next minute, maybe longer.
A chime rang out in my mind just as a second message replaced the first, startling me.
Notification:
The first adjustment period has ended.
The 2nd period will start in 03:17:22
The 3rd period will start in 08:17:16: The 4th period will start in 12:17:09
NOTE: Make sure you are in a safe environment
during the adjustment periods. They can possibly
cause injury or even death.
So there would be three more periods like this. I sure as hell wasn’t looking forward to any of them. Before I could get up or move, a strong pressure slammed me face-first into the floor. All lights went out again.
Chapter Five
The sound of creaking wood and sirens blaring in the distance woke me up. The broken furniture lay on the ground along with the dust and plaster from the ceiling. I sat up and looked around as I took in a deep breath. Enma. The very air was so rich now that I felt like crying. Even the air I breathed would nourish me with Enma from now on!
“Melina,” I whispered as my eyes landed on the cracked wall.
I darted up and rushed through the door, almost passing straight through it. I turned to my left and grabbed the handle on the door that led to Melina’s room, then pushed it open without even asking if I could enter. Who cared during such a situation?
“Shit! You’re finally here!” Melina cursed as she lay on the ground.
Her leg was bent at an angle it shouldn’t be. The leg wasn’t broken, or at least that was what I thought at first glance, and the skin hadn’t been punctured from the inside out.
I picked her up and carried her over to the large bed, then placed her there gently while making sure her leg didn’t move too much.
“You alright, hostess?”
She bared her teeth at me and shook her head. “Fucking leg hurts!”
I pulled the robe aside, causing her to flinch slightly, but then she relaxed when I didn’t do anything inappropriate. Shame was far less important than a possible injury. I couldn’t help but notice a strip of red mesh between her thighs. Calling on the body’s memory, I knew it was a thong, and one far more intimate than the ordinary ones.
I looked away hurriedly and cursed myself for being so irrational around this woman that I was slowly starting to lose it. If I didn’t get my shit together, I just might do something stupid and agree to these little games she played.
“Did you get the messages as well?” I asked as I studied the leg and the knee. I wrapped my hand around it and imbued the place with Enma.
“Wh… what is… what are you doing?” She squealed and then let out a moan. “What is happening?”
I focused on the bruised leg and didn’t answer for several seconds as I poured all I had into her, alleviating the pain. I let out a sigh and slumped back to the floor as she scurried up and covered herself.
“I’m slightly different than—”
Hard footsteps rang out in the hallway and quickly made their way toward us. We turned around just in time to see Sandro rushing in.
“Sis! Are you… alright?”
His face fell slightly when he saw me lying next to Melina and her in a slightly compromising pose. The reason why I knew he loved his sister was simple; I could feel his disdain for me. Shit, I’d feel the same way. In his eyes, I’d seduced his sister and was about to go down on her.
“She is, Sandro. I’m glad to see you’re alright as well,” I replied and nodded.
“Yeah, thanks, boss. But what the hell was that text that appeared in front of me? Did you see it too? It looked unreal!”
I shook my head slowly. “I have no idea, but the next adjustment should start sometime in the next three hours. If it’s going to be anything like what happened earlier, then we’d better take this seriously.”
“Yeah, it said so on the images. What’s going to happen next, though? Dragons?” Melina chuckled.
“I wouldn’t even be surprised if they did appear,” I murmured. “Anyway, what’s the most secure room in this place?”
“The cellar, but I’d rather have the roof collapse on top of me than being stuck under tons of stone down there,” Melina whispered. “And what’s this about not being surprised? Do you know something we don’t?”
“No, but seeing… let’s just say that not everything is black or white, hostess. Some things are gray and rainbow-ish in nature.”
“And what the hell is that supposed to mean? You were going to say something about being different?”
“Huh?” I asked, trying to divert her from the question. “Did you hear that?”
“Hear what? And don’t brush my question aside, Mr. Viktor.”
“I’m not. Listen. Outside.”
“Yeah, those are sirens, as in police car sirens.”
“No, not just that. Come with me.”
I offered my hand to Melina, which she took reluctan
tly. I would be the same, not wanting to get up on my injured leg just to see what was outside.
“I don’t hear anything,” she whispered and tried to stand on her leg. “Hey, it doesn’t hurt anymore.”
“I do hear something, and I think it’s best we see what’s going on.”
Sandro’s phone rang. He pulled it from his jacket’s pocket and looked at it. “Shit, it’s my boss… umm, I mean the guy I used to work for.”
“See what he wants,” I said and nodded at the phone.
Sandro shrugged and did as I told him to. “Sir?”
I pulled Melina aside and walked over to her balcony, opened the door, and stepped outside. The air was heavy with dust and a thick earthy smell, but not to the point visibility was lowered. At least not that badly.
I walked over to the balcony railing and frowned. I didn’t remember some of the things being like this.
“Was there always such a big tower over there?”
“Huh? What are you talking about?” Melina asked as she joined me at the railing.
Part of the wall that separated the balconies prevented her from seeing what I was talking about where she stood, but once Melina spotted the same thing I had, her eyes grew wide.
“I take it that’s a no,” I whispered.
She shook her head slowly and let out a string of curses.
“Thought so.”
“Thought so? What the hell is that thing? What’s going on?”
To my surprise, she hadn’t cried out or started yelling, but she wasn’t calm either. Her body shook like a leaf in the wind. I put my arm around her almost on pure instinct, and that was when Sandro joined us. He gave me that look again, which was starting to grate on my nerves. We were all adults, even if something was going on between us.
Beginner Quest: A LitRPG Cultivation Series (Towers & Rifts Book 1) Page 5