Imogen is silent.
The pendant drops, and the sound of it hitting the surface of the couch get both of their attention. Kyrie turns his head around, and his eyes focus on the pendant attached to the silver chain around Ian's neck. Kyrie looks at the cylinder-shaped pendant with the green potion inside.
[A potion? Green potion... Is this...]
"The potion of truth," Imogen confirmed Kyrie's thought.
Kyrie holds his breath as he picks up the pendant. The liquid inside glides down as Kyrie turns it vertically.
[Why... Why does Ian have it?]
Kyrie turns around and studies Imogen's face, who is standing petrified like a statue pinned to the ground.
"Was it Nate?" asks Kyrie.
Imogen nods. He knows that Imogen is not the kind of person who will get her hands on these kinds of things. The next most probable guess is Nate.
[That damn collector!]
Kyrie clasps the potion wrapping it completely inside his palm.
[Ian has it on his neck... Does that mean that he accepted it?]
He looks at his clenched fist with clouds of gloom gathering over his head.
"What are you going to do, Kyrie?" asks Imogen.
The questioning and criticisms from Imogen are raising a storm inside Kyrie's mind. It is annoying. He has yet to take in all of the inundating thoughts from today.
"It doesn't concern you, Imogen," replies Kyrie coldly.
"This will determine almost everything for you," says Imogen.
Kyrie releases his grip and lets the pendant fall from his hands. He looks at Ian with many different whipped up emotions that he cannot pinpoint exactly what he is feeling. This potion can destroy him mentally if Ian uses it on him.
"Kyrie!" Imogen urges.
"Leave me alone, Imogen!" Kyrie turns around, peering at Imogen while feeling overwhelmed.
[I don't want to hear it... Not from you... Especially you!]
"Leave it! I will deal with it!" Kyrie exclaimed.
Kyrie's fists crack as he tightens them even more. His irritation is flooding his mind, and he knows he is getting irrational from his building anxieties.
"If he asks you to drink it, then are you really going to?" Imogen says, hastening her breath.
"You really need to stop! Stop confusing me! I don't need you to tell me anything regarding Ian. You know how he ends up in the previous rounds!" Kyrie glares at Imogen.
Imogen gnashes her teeth, trying to hold back her wish to crush this frustrating man in front of her.
"I have already set my mind on Ian. I don't need you to question me!" Kyrie discloses.
Kyrie picks up Ian and turns around to leave. However, Imogen's angry face turning into a sad expression gets to Kyrie's conscience.
"I am sorry, but I can't afford to doubt myself in times where I need a clear mind."
He leaves, disappearing from the hallway into his room. Imogen is left in the lounge area alone. Her figure inside a dark room looks lonely as she stands in the same place for a long time before she takes a step back. Imogen goes out with the sword drawn out by her side. She is pissed, really pissed. She might as well vent it off with these pests that are surrounding the building.
From the window, on the second floor, Nate gazes at Imogen, who is walking outside. He steps back from the line of sight when Imogen turns around to look at his room.
"As perceptive as ever," says Nate.
A cube on his desk brightens up.
"Did you finish what I told you to do?" a woman's voice resonates from the cube.
The cube's lights blink to the rhythm of that voice's breaths.
"Yes," replies Nate.
"hehehe... Good! I am pleased with you, my dear puppy!"
"Just meet the end of your promise," replies Nate coldly.
"Yeah, yeah... I will. But Collector... You have gotten soft. Who knew that you would also ask me to spare their lives than to use the opportunity to help take away that curse of yours."
"It is just a transaction."
"Whatever you say, Collector."
The cube dims.
The night passes by without much movement around the inn, so Kyrie closes his eyes to end up falling asleep. Imogen returns once the sunlight shatters through the darkness of the previous night. Its soft rays scattering slowly into the atmosphere dissolving the darkness from the skies and the engulfed town from the land. Ian opens his eyes to encounter a different view from yesterday before he closed his eyes. He can no longer see the empty lounge when looking straight in front, but now, just a wooden ceiling. Ian rolls to his side to look at Kyrie, who is still asleep. He remembers the words that got captured by his ears despite being inside his empty dark dream.
Kyrie's words resonate inside this empty space, "I am sorry, Ian. I still cannot tell you."
---
Cynthia turns the knob of the door and pushes it open with her fingers. The door slowly opens to the view of a man's back with his white shirt turned red, soaked through enough that it is sticking to his body, revealing the muscle tones of his back.
She looks at the walls, slowly following the tails of blood throughout the room. Sil might have taken out all his anger unreservedly towards Saskia, helping her to regenerate time after time to torture her again.
Then, she ends her gaze to the floor in front of her. She does not want to step in because she could dirty her cute shoes. However, she wants to go in. There is an exciting sight waiting for her.
She takes out her handkerchief and puts it on top of her nose. She hates to smell that disgusting metallic stink.
When she took a step forward, her eyes narrow at the blood soaking into her heels.
"Ergh! My heels!" She complains.
However, she gives up whining and excitedly strides to Saskia's beaten up body. Saskia looks like a tattered bag littered to the streets. She uses the tip of her heels and turns Saskia's body. When Saskia's body drops to the ground, Saskia frowns from the wave of pain. Cynthia's lips spread out into a broad smile. After she got summon thanks to this witch, she never had a day where she does not want to see Saskia getting messed with. Saskia took away the comfortable life she once had.
"Did you get her to end the game?" asks Cynthia.
"No, she is too stubborn. She will not end it unless we kill her," replies Sil with annoyance.
"Using her life as a game as well, she does have such a reputation..." says Cynthia.
"Let's just change the game then," Cynthia proposes, "I have a good idea..."
Sil looks at the woman whose eyes glint with anticipation.
"Let's make a dungeon. I don't think Eberus will mind it that much with this one..." says Cynthia.
Sil smiles at Cynthia sarcastically. He has known Cynthia for already some time, and he is aware that her type of plan is always the worst. It is not over-exaggeration to say that it is worse than Saskia's idea. Every servant under Erebus knows that Eberus met Phanes in a dungeon. If Saskia touched Eberus's old wound just by using Phanes's first trial, then Cynthia is reopening the injury that took centuries to heal.
"Cynthia thinks that she is irreplaceable for Eberus, unlike Saskia," thinks Sil, "I wonder... Is she that irreplaceable?"
Sil frowns because he does not want to deal with Cynthia.
"Don't give me that face, Sil. You will enjoy it too!" says Cynthia.
"Oh?!?" Sil gives his attention to Cynthia while he cleans his hands.
"I got our puppy to give Ian the potion of truth," says Cynthia, "Aren't you dying to know what Kyrie thinks about you?"
Sil snickers. Cynthia is wrong. He does not care about what Kyrie thinks anymore. Kyrie just needs to be by his side, but Cynthia's mention of the potion of truth gets his attention.
After all, that potion draws out memories, and in most cases, most memories associated with the drawn-out ones also get forever lost. Sil is interested in that effect.
"The old shaman is so smart. After committing the unforgivable towards someone, it is not wrong if they forget, right?" Cynthia says, while looking at Sil's reaction.
Just like she has expected, Sil is thrilled about the opportunity to get back with that boy. If Kyrie forgets what Sil did to him, would Kyrie return to his side? Wouldn't it also be better if Ian was the one who did it? Sil finally breaks into a smile - a smile that Cynthia feels unhappy about.
"We can't get back to how we were... This is the only way for me to keep him by my side..." Sil convinces himself in his mind.