Chapter 13: The Jar of Paranoia (1)

"Your Majesty!", Yin Ling shouts in front of Xin Suan's door.

"...What? It's already late, what the hell are you doing?", Xin Suan opens the door lazily. It seems he was sleeping.

"I was checking those magic weapon as what you ordered me, but that old jar is already gone!"

"*Yawn* Huh? What jar...", Xin Suan still hasn't gain his focus, "Oh that jar... What did you say? Gone? Is there someone who took that?"

"Of course!!", Yin Ling starts to get upset.

"...Who stole that?", Xin Suan still trying to get his consciousness.

"Who do you think? Got some clues in your mind?"

"...", Xin Suan tries to think harder, "Ah!! Ai Lie!"

"Ha... Stupid.", Yin Ling slaps his forehead with his palm.

"We have to go to her!", He is rushingly go out from his room.

"Sigh...", Yin Ling releases a long breath. The two immediately run to the left wing.

In the other hand, Ai Lie has entered the unknown room with that demon masked man. The room covered with absolute darkness. She couldn't see anything, but she can sense how dusty inside that room is. She can smell something rusty. This room must be rarely entered before.

"Y-Your Majesty? Are you there?", She keeps moving forward.

'SLAM!', That man closed the door powerfuly. Ai Lie immediately turn her body to the door's direction. What she can clearly see is only his terrifying mask, that is lit by the candle. The man keeps moving closer to Ai Lie, but Ai Lie tried to moves backward. She is very scared right now. The two are all alone in that room.

"W-WHAT DO YOU WANT!?", She keeps moving backward.

"...", That man continues his steps slowly in silence.

"WAH!!", Ai Lie's back is hitting something so hard. Her back is aching. When her hand tried to reach what was that, it was a wooden table.

"Hahahaha so weak! Such a weakling!", He keeps moving closer to Ai Lie, "You can't see anything without the lights, right? Here, I will help you to see clearly."

He pinches the tip of the candle with his fingers, and the fire burning on his palm. That small fire on the candle is now becoming a ball of flames. She can see her surrounding clearer than before. There are some rusty chains and axes hanging on the walls. But the most frightening part is there are so many old blood stains, splattered on the surface of the walls and the floors.

"W-W-W-WHA...?", She starts to trembling as she scans every corner of that room.

"Ahh!! I'm so hungry! I can't help it anymore!!", That man suddenly speak loudly, "I could easily kill you, but it won't be interesting if I don't hear you cry first..."

He become closer and closer than before, but her feet is freezing, she can't move at all.

"S-STOP RIGHT THERE! I WILL TELL HIS MAJESTY IF YOU KEEP CONTUINING THIS NONSENSE!!", She is cornered.

"So what? I don't give a shit that bastard!!"

"Ba-bastard!?", She is confused, he is just a lowly underling, how could he called his own master bastard?

"He is a selfish fool. Sealing away our precious realm while there are so many delicious preys living up there. If he is satisfied by eating those vegetables and meats, he just had to eat those trash by himself! Why would he dragged everyone else here!?", His feet stops moving.

"What do you mean!? He isn't fool, he is wise! Do you think humans have no right to live!? Who are you to look down on us!? Beside, he already made a peaceful contract with the gods, he has no ill will to break his own vow! You are the selfish fool!!", She got triggered by his words. She unconsciously defended Xin Suan from his mockery and forgot that right now she is in a grave danger.

"Ha! Peaceful contract my ass! You've got some nerve, you weakling! How long do you think that bastard will treat you like a princess? a month? a year? Who knows, he is an evil king anyway! You can be easily killed with only one slash, but it seems you still don't understand your current position, huh?"

"Fufufufu very well, that doesn't matter... Now, let the show begin.", He starts to move his feet forward, and stands in front of Ai Lie.

"W-WHAT ARE YOU DOING!? PLEASE, STOP!!", Ai Lie tries to avoid him. He stands so close until Ai Lie can feel how hot the flame in his hand is.

His empty hand takes something behind her back. It was an ancient jar, placed on the table behind her. The jar is pretty big. It has a smiling face carving on the front side of the jar, but on the back side, it has an ugly crying face. He hands over the jar to her.

"W-WHAT IS THIS!?", She refused to take that jar. She hides both of her hands.

"Come on, take it, don't be shy.", He is forcingly pushed that jar to her belly.

"DON'T BE SHY YOUR ASS! GO AWAY, YOU FUCKER!!", She pushed his body and ran away to the door. But when she tried to open it, the door has been locked, "NOO!! YOUR MAJESTY! GE GE HEI SHE! SOMEONE PLEASE HELP ME!!!" She is crying for a help.

"Hehehehe... HAHAHAHAHA!!", That man laughs so hard. He feels so excited.

"No one can hear you, weakling, I have put a barrier so that no one would bother us. Very well, if you don't want to take this, I can show you the best part with my own hands.", He turns the jar upside down. A black liquid is being poured from the mouth of the jar.

At the first time, there was nothing happened with that liquid. But just after one blink, so many small black dots separated from the liquid, and they ran to Ai Lie's direction in a high speed. That small dots gradually turned into cockroaches and centipedes. Those are the bugs that Ai Lie hates the most.

"EEEEEEKKK!!! NO!!, Ai Lie avoids those bugs. They are trying to crawl on her shoes. She steps on them, but everytime she kills those bugs, they will turn back into a black liquid.

"I-It's not real!?", She is surprised, but she realized that those are just very realistic illusions. But although it's just some replicas, they are still frighten her a lot.

One of a big tarantula crawling from her back to her arm without her knowing, "NO! SHOO SHOO!!", She slaps it and smashes it powerfully with her foot.

"Hahahaha look at you! Acting like an angel but you killed them mercilessly! You are no different than us, you know!?", He shouts at her.

"I'm different than you!! I didn't them because I like it, I killed them because I need to protect myself!!", She keeps smashing those bugs with her shoes.

"Hahahaha yeah, whatever, keep acting innocent, you hypocrite!"

"Hmm... Bugs aren't enough, huh.", He felt unsatisfied, because Ai Lie can manage her fear, "Then, why don't we try something more challenging?"

"H-HUH!? STOP THAT, YOU PSYCHO!!"

Those bugs that were crawling on the floor melted away. Now, they changed into some rotten human's hands form. One of those hand grabbed Ai Lie's ankle tightly.

"NOO!!", She tried to remove it from her foot with both of her hands.

"HUMANS!!"

"KYAA!!", She is jolted because those hands can speak. She kept trying her best to remove that hand, and finally she did it. She runs away to the other side of the room while those hands keep chasing her. She took an axe that was hanged on the wall, and swung it to the floor.

"GET AWAY FROM ME!!", She slashes those hands. The axe is very heavy, she can't move it too freely. Her sweat is everywhere.

"Hehehehe... so smart, what about the next level?"

Now, the hands vanished and change into some zombies. Those zombies looking exactly the same as one in the thriller movie she ever watched when she was a child. They have dark grey colored skin, red eyes, very sharp fangs, with torn clothes. Their salivas are dripping from their mouth, describing how wild they are. As a child, it's only natural for her to be scared by the look of those undead creatures, but she couldn't believe that now they are real, standing not far from of her.

"GRAAAAA!!!", One of those zombies screaming loudly at her.

"Nooo!! Please, sir, spare me my life!!", She couldn't think clearly.

"Hahahahaha!!!", That masked man laughing so hard, "I really love this jar, it's such a waste for something this powerful being kept away!"

"Hey kid, do you wanna know why this jar keeps summoning those 'horror' things?", He raises the jar on his hand.

"W-why??"

"Because this is the Jar of Paranoia, it will summon anything that will tormenting your mind! Not only those that will make you tremble in fear, but even to show you your traumatizing past events! It will do you anything that will make humans like you scared to death!! Interesting, isn't it? Ahahahahaha!!"

"But why!? Why do you need to make the humans scared!?", She doesn't seem to understand his intention.

"Huh, what a boring child... Of course because it's fun! It's fun to hear the humans cry! Nothing more exciting than making them trembling in fear, then eat their fleshes mercilessly afterward!! Now, go! Cry for me, weakling!!", This man is simply a psychotic crazy!

"GRAAAA!!", Those zombies started to move closer to Ai Lie.

"Y-YOU ARE DISGUSTING!! GET AWAY FROM ME!!", She swung her axe powerfuly to those group of zombies.

She is trying her best to keep the distance between her and those group of monsters. She keeps swinging the axe in a messy way. Her arms and her back start to feel aching, it looks like there is a sprained muscle because of her wrong moves. Her hard work is being paid off, she succeeded to attack them. Some of them are already losing their hands, even their heads. But everytime the zombies slained, the liquid will spawns she couldn't move any longer, the axe is too heavy for her small body!

'Thud!', She falls to the ground and her hand lost her weapon. The axe is thrown away from her.

"Ugh!!!", She realized her hand is empty, "Noo!! My Axe!!", She is crawling, her hand trying to reach back her weapon.

'ZRAASH!', The nearest zombie has successfuly scratch her right calf leg with its sharp long nails. She is bleeding badly.

"AAHHH!!", She keeps trying to crawl away eventhough her leg is terribly painful. Her eyes starts to shed tears.

"HAHAHAHA, SO WEAK!!!", That man throws the fire ball from his hand to the ceilings, and the whole room starts to burn.

"Hey kid, what if I give you the highest level!? It must be very very intersting!!"

"No, please stop...", She leans her back to the wall that is safe from the fire. She checks on her wounded foot with her blurry eyes. The scratches are so deep, until she can see a bit of her flesh exposed among her flowing blood.

"Xin Suan, Your Majesty, please... I need you... Please!"

"Hehehe he won't come for you, you spoiled brat! He is so selfish, he won't care even if you die here!! NOW LET'S BEGIN THE LAST SHOW!"

'Snap!', The Zombies vanished and turn into somewhat like human form. She couldn't see it clearly, but the more she tried to look, the more she felt familiar with that form.

"AI LIE!!", That form shouted at her loudly. It a man's voice that she knows very well it belongs to whom.

Meanwhile, Xin Suan and his general have just arrived in her room. They both are already very late to realized Ai Lie's disappearence.

"Ai Lie!", Xin Suan opens the door powerfuly.

"...", the room is empty and quiet. But they can see that the blanket on her bed had already been spreaded, which means she was sleeping.

"Huh? Where did she go?", Yin Ling scanning her room.

"Huh!?", Xin Suan is gasped. Just a few moment ago, he heard Ai Lie was calling his name. "No, she is not here! Someone has taken her away!"

"What!? A enemy in our own place!?", Yin Ling widened his eyes.

"Let's go! We are wasting too much time!"