Trespassing

I jumped the fence, which was a lot easier now that my left arm was fully-functioning and I had the attributes of someone my age. I jogged my way up the dirt path towards the entrance of the orphanage. When I reached the door, the silence in the orphanage scared me. A couple of the kids in the orphanage snore. Loud. So why was it so silent?

Wait! A shuffling sound!

I tried the front door. It wasn't locked. Weird. At least I didn't need to sneak in through a window or something, but it was weird that it wasn't locked. Obaa-san usually locked it before she went to sleep.

It was dark inside, but my eyes had adjusted so that I was able to kinda see where I was. It also helped that I knew the layout of the orphanage well.

I made my way through the entrance, and in the low light, I could see that something was wrong. The orphanage was a lot messier than usual. I could see outlines of things scattered all over the floor everywhere. As I made my way to one of the bedrooms, I could see a little bit better because of the moonlight that shone through an open window. It was chaos.

The beds were pushed around. Several were pushed over. The mattresses were flipped and tossed, and a pile of sheets was dumped in the corner of the room. It looked like someone had lost something and created a hell of a mess trying to find it.

I wanted to call out. I wanted to see if any of the kids were around. But something was off and I felt so uneasy about the whole situation.

Each room that I looked in was in the same dishevelled state. The panic started to grow, starting from the bottom of my stomach. I could taste a little bit of dust in the air as I moved some of the knocked-over things upright again. It seemed like the orphanage had been empty for some time. How long had I been in the dungeon?

I slowly and carefully made my way through the rooms of the orphanage until I stopped in front of the closed door of Obaa-san's room. It was the only bedroom that was not left open located in a hallway that was slightly elevated next to the dining room.

I quietly knocked on the door. No answer.

I stared at the door for a little bit as I struggled to decide whether or not to enter the room. I stayed in that silence to see if I was alone in the orphanage. I couldn't hear any movement, so I opened the door as quietly as possible.

Unlike the rest of the orphanage, the room was dimly lit by a single candle that was placed on Obaa-san's desk on the other side of the room. The change in light level caused me to squint a bit as my eyes adjusted.

The room was a bit messier than I assumed it would be. Obaa-san always got us kids to clean the orphanage quite regularly. It was always to look good for prospective adopters, so the fact that her room was in a state of disarray that would get us in trouble if it was one of our rooms shocked me a little. However, it wasn't as messy as all the other rooms in the orphanage.

Obaa-san's bed was made and it didn't look like anybody has slept in it in a while. Her wardrobe was open, and several clothing items were spread on the ground in front of it.

The thing that looked most out of place was the lone chair in the room. Instead of being tucked in under the desk, it stood conspicuously near the door, and a strange stick was propped up against the wall next to it.

I had never seen Obaa-san use that stick before, as she wasn't so old as to need a walking cane yet, so it seemed odd that she kept a random stick in her room. A room none of us kids ever entered.

I grabbed the candle and used it to light my way as I studied the area around the chair and stick. I checked the floor underneath the chair, as well as underneath the bed. Nothing. I checked the walls of the room to see if anything looked strange. Also nothing. It wasn't until I decided to look up at the ceiling above the chair that I realised that one of the panels had been shifted.

I gingerly stepped onto the chair and held the candle up closer to the ceiling to study the shifted panel. It looked just like any other panel that lined the ceiling, only this one had a dusty handprint smudged up against it. Using my left arm, I placed my hand near the handprint and pushed up against it. It was a bit heavier than I expected and I braced my legs and pushed harder. When I tried to push it to the side a bit to make an opening in the panel that I could look through, I accidentally breathed in some dust and some of it got in my eyes.

I struggled to hold a cough in, and in the bodily motion of coughing, my grip on the panel slipped and it crashed down on top of another panel. The shock and force from that shook more dust and caused the second panel to break in half under the added weight.

The whole thing crashed loudly on the ground and covered me in the dust. Somehow, I managed to step down from the chair as I coughed and rubbed my eyes. I temporarily placed the candle that I had miraculously held onto and wiped the tears that formed away.

Slowly, as the dust settled, I noticed that something had fallen along with the ceiling panels in the flickering candlelight. It was some sort of small box, and its contents had spread out all over the floor among the panel pieces. I shuffled the panel debris out of the way and placed the candle on the ground near the box as I collected some of the papers that fell out of the box.

They were all letters. Letters from Kei.

***

The younger boy, who was fourteen years old, was wearing some dusty old hand-me-down clothing. He was whining as he dragged his feet behind his older peer as the older boy gathered his belongings from his bedroom.

"I don't understand why you're not taking me along with you." The younger boy said with an incredulous tone.

The older boy's head dropped and his shoulders slumped, his greasy hair in a ponytail flopped down off the back of his neck in the motion, "really? You're asking that again?" He then continued to pack his clothes in a small backpack. It didn't take long, none of the children at the orphanage owned many things.

"I'm asking again because I don't believe your answer." The younger boy said defiantly. He crossed his arms to show that he wasn't backing away, but the older boy noticed the split-second look of pain that crossed the younger boy's face.

"Stop that, you're gonna make your arm get worse." The older boy kicked the younger boy's leg — hard enough for an instinctive reaction, but soft enough to not leave any permanent damage. The younger boy clicked his tongue in annoyance.

"Just take me with you!" the younger boy raised his voice.

The older boy reciprocated the raised volume with a dominating "Ryuu. Enough."

The younger boy, Ryuu, closed his mouth after he decided not to retort back.

The older boy swiped a Window over to Ryuu, "what does that say?"

Ryuu read the message in the Window out loud: "Title Quest Qualifications have been reached."

"And what are the qualifications?"

Ryuu read the words below the first sentence: "User must be eighteen years or older... and user must be at least LVL 10."

The older boy turned to face Ryuu with his arms crossed, "and what does the caution warning under it say?"

Ryuu looked below the previous sentence and the words got caught in his throat. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn't read them out loud. The older boy sighed and patted Ryuu's head softly.

"Due to the high danger level of Title Quest, the above qualifications are mandatory prior to start." The older boy said in Ryuu's stead. "It's not that I don't want to take you with me, it's that I can't. For your own safety."

Tears started to well in Ryuu's eyes as the overbearing sadness started to wash over him, "but I don't want you to go..."

Ryuu's words were cut short when the older boy hugged him tightly. They had always been close, so close that they considered each other brothers. But they had never been this physical before.

The older boy pulled away first and softly punched Ryuu's right shoulder. "I know you don't, but I have to do this. I have to follow the System."

"But when you're gone, I'm going to be alone..." Ryuu mumbled quietly through his soft crying.

"What do you mean? The others are still going to be here. Like Gorou..." the older boy's voice trailed off before he shook his head and continued, "Actually, nobody likes Gorou, so that's no good."

Before Ryuu could say anything, the older boy grabbed him by his shoulders. He took great care not to hurt Ryuu's left arm whilst doing so. "You're going to be the oldest here when I'm gone, so I need you to be strong. I need you to be smart. And most importantly, I need you to keep everyone safe as best as you can."

"What do you mean?" Ryuu asked. He was a little bit confused at the direction that the conversation had taken.

"I'm going to have to ask you to be like me and look after the little ones. I know that—" the older boy paused as he looked at Ryuu's left arm, "you have your limits, but as long as you do your best in watching out for the young ones, I can rest easier when I'm out there on my Title Quest. That would help me out so much."

"It would?" Ryuu continued to mumble, but his crying was finally settling down.

"Of course. I can focus on my Title Quest more if I know you're here as the big brother to all the little ones. Who knows? It might mean I get to finish the Quest faster and come back sooner!" the older boy gave Ryuu a wide, reassuring smile.

Ryuu nodded weakly. He wiped the tears off his face and looked up at the older boy with determination. "I'll do it. If it'll help you, I'll do my best Kei."

Kei chuckled as he straightened up and grabbed hold of his small backpack of belongings. "It's kinda depressing that this is all I have, but I'm an adult now. I'll be able to make do."

He looked at Ryuu and held out his hand to help the young boy up. Ryuu grabbed hold and Kei heaved him up.

"Do you believe in me?" Kei asked, a hint of doubt behind his words.

"Of course I do!" Ryuu exclaimed with as much confidence as he could muster.

Kei smiled, but the smile didn't reach his eyes. Ryuu could see the sadness in there but Kei started to walk out of the room before Ryuu could say anything.

"I'll write to you and keep you updated, okay?" Kei said without turning around.

"Okay — wait, are you not going to wait to say goodbye to Obaa-san? She's still out with Koda!" Ryuu asked as he followed Kei out of the orphanage.

"No, it's okay," Kei said softly.

***

Tears had started to form in my eyes as I looked at all the letters Kei wrote to me. I looked at some of the dates that were on the letters and realised that he had written to me for a long time after he left three years ago. The latest letters were apparently sent when I turned sixteen years old, right when I started hunting to try and get money and food for the orphanage.

As I opened more and more of the envelopes, I found out that Kei had written quite a lot to Obaa-san specifically. A letter said that he agreed to send money to her to protect the "kids of the orphanage". Another letter voiced concern over us.

Then in the letter that was dated the most recent to Obaa-san, a cold chill ran down my back as I could feel the anger and anxiety coming from Kei's writing. He wrote that he was going to be stopping over at Shinobu City in time for their Hunting Games and that he had "proof of what you're doing."

He wrote that he was going to send a sample of what he had in the next letter that he sends, but no matter how hard I looked, I couldn't find a letter that was dated more recent than this one. This one was dated around the same day as when I left to go to the Solo Dungeon, so it made sense if the letter he mentioned had the proof hadn't been sent yet.

A Window suddenly popped up that made me jump a bit, the light it omitted toward me was a lot brighter than the light from the candle. It said:

[ALERT!

A SECRET QUEST FEATURING THE LEFT ARM OF THE ████████████ HAS REVEALED ITS COMPLETION GUIDELINES TO THE SYSTEM!

"Some kind of e̸͎͋n̷̩͆e̶̫͘r̷͈͗g̷̞̚y̵̢̕ emanates from the Left Arm. It calls out in longing for its sacrifice. It is hiding a secret truth.

This piece is willing to reveal its truth after sacrifice requirements have been met."

BLOOD SACRIFICE STATUS TILL COMPLETION : 0%]

I physically recoiled from the message and fell heavily on my ass on the dusty floor of Obaa-san's bedroom. Blood sacrifice? What the hell does this arm need with a blood sacrifice?

All of a sudden, something stirred from inside my left arm and reverberated through my whole body. A sense of deep hatred and killing intent washed all over me until I felt like I was about to pass out from the pressure, but the sound of a board creaking under some weight snapped me out of it.

I noticed a figure standing by the door and when they stepped into the light from the candle, they greeted me with a chilling and severe familiar voice.

"Oyoyoi you little shit. You're finally back."

It was Obaa-san.