Chapter 8: Samuel's Point of View

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From Samuel's point of view during James' reflection.

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While James was smoking outside, I went into the occult club building. At the entrance, I saw the same couple as during the day. I waved at them since they greeted me.

I quickly went up to the second floor. I decided to examine the room more thoroughly, looking at it in more detail than during the day.

The walls were painted in a dark, almost black color, complemented by deep golden patterns in the form of parts of pentagrams and symbols. It was as if the patterns were moving. Also, hanging on the wall were lamps imitating the look of Renaissance candles, shining dimly like candles.

My gaze fell to the floor, where black carpets with colorful pentagrams lay. Some club members were already sitting on some of the carpets, chatting about something, giving me a quick glance.

In the center of the room was a long table, apparently the same one where Alex sat during the day, but now it was opened to accommodate more various attributes, such as masks, runes, paintings depicting ancient gods, various symbols used in magic. There was also a lighted tray on which old books about occultism, magic, and esotericism were neatly arranged. Some of the books were strikingly old, and they looked like they were several centuries old. Tarot cards, amulets, mirrors, and several crystals were also arranged.

Despite the room seeming large, it gave me a dominant feeling, as if the room was trying to dominate me, but that feeling quickly disappeared as I turned my attention to the head of this club, namely Alex.

Alex calmly approached me with a smile, but his expression in his eyes seemed cunning to me. In a subdued tone, he addressed me while introducing me as a member of the occult club.

"Hello, Samuel. Let me introduce you to the others sitting here," he said, then turned to them. "This is Samuel, he joined our club today. Wait, where's your friend?" he asked.

"He's outside now, but he'll be up soon," I briefly replied.

"Okay, that's good since we don't have too many club members. We just need to wait for three more members to arrive before we can start our meeting," he said.

"May I ask how many members the club has in total?" I asked.

"Just wait a bit and get to know everyone first, and then you can answer your own question," he said with a smile.

I quickly counted the people in the room. Together with Alex, there were twelve people, not including myself. If we add a couple more from the bottom, it would be fourteen. And since we need to wait for three more, that narrows down our suspects to seventeen people.

I walked towards the table and picked up a book, pretending to read while studying the people gathered here. The first person who caught my eye was a tall guy with bright colored eyes. He was surrounded by three other club members, including two girls and another adult male. The man was lean with a detached look, as if distancing himself from them. One of the girls looked like a high school student around 17 years old, while the other girl sitting next to her was about 25-26 years old, dressed in office attire and resembled a teacher more than anything.

Next, I looked at the older group, where there were three members. The group seemed to be led by a woman in her 50s, whose behavior and clothing indicated that she was from a higher society. She kept her distance from them, as if maintaining a certain level of distance. Closer to her was a man around 55 years old, dressed in formal attire, but he only spoke in short phrases, more like nodding in agreement during the conversation. The last member of their group was a man who looked to be around 40 years old, very loud in a bright suit, with an unusual necklace wrapped around his wrist.

The next group was the last one. The oldest person in the group was a woman, about 32-35 years old, with a notebook and a pen. She spoke softly and mostly wrote something in her notebook. Two other women and a guy around 20-22 years old were sitting next to her. Maybe that was Steven from Emma's story. He looked impatient and was wearing a bright T-shirt with a pentagram print on a skull background. The girl who was very close to the oldest person in the group was about the same age as the guy. I noticed a small cross hanging on a chain from the neckline of her clothes. And the last girl was a bit younger, very bright-looking, wearing clothes of bright contrast.

As I was studying them, I saw a couple consisting of a girl and a boy come up here. Maybe it's two of the remaining three participants; by their appearance, you can tell that they are teenagers between the ages of 16 and 18. The girl wore a cheerful cross on top of her clothes with a martyr depicted on it. The boy looked like a remnant of the emo era, dressed in all black with bangs that covered his eyes.

Now we just have to wait for the last member of this club.

At that moment, I noticed a man with a bracelet on his hand approaching me from the second group. Coming up to me, he loudly addressed me.

"Hello! As far as I heard, your name is Samuel. My name is Riley. I hope we can be friends," he said, extending his hand.

I shook his hand.

"Pleasure to meet you," I said. "May I ask you, two more members of the club arrived, who is the last one missing?" I asked.

"Hmm, let me remember for a minute," said Riley. "As far as I remember, she's been with us for about four months now and is very religious. What was her name? Oh, I remember. Her name is Nina. She wants to become a nun, so she's studying different occult practices to better understand the difference between religion and the occult. Although, to be honest, it's strange. If I were so religious, I would never have come here, because it's all sinful, apparently," he said, laughing loudly at the end.

His loud laughter made my ears hurt, but the information he provided was useful. Now I know that Nina is the same girl from Emma's story. All that's left is to find Steven and try to get information from them through conversation.

While I was thinking, I saw James go up with the last members of this club, namely the couple standing on the first floor and the girl from Riley's story. Now all that's left is to find the keys to unlock the mystery of this psycho's identity.