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Chapter 84 Volume III - Chapter 5: Dungeon Offer

I stopped walking when I came to the front of the usual building, the Mana Research Laboratories. I stared at the huge building for a few seconds. Its grandeur had always impressed me, but I was slowly getting used to it.

With a deep sigh, I headed inside.

Usually, when I enter here, I always go to the reception desk, but not this time. Instead, I turned left at the reception desk, went up the stairs, and after a few steps on the second floor, I reached the building\'s cafeteria.

After I took my first step into the cafeteria, I raised my arm and checked the time. It was exactly thirty-five past midnight, so it was right on time.

I put my watch back and quickly checked the tables in the cafeteria. Since it was already midnight, there weren\'t many people at the tables, but that didn\'t mean that there was no one there.

Among all the tables, someone was sitting at a table for four in the corner.

He had short dark green hair that could be called curly and dark brown eyes. He was a little skinny, but he was almost a hundred and ninety centimeters tall. Add to that the severe and sharp look on his face, and I couldn\'t feel like I was in the presence of a weak person, even if I wanted to. He looked like an ordinary person, but he had a certain air about him.

While I was studying him, he calmly reached for the plate with a plate full of oranges, popped a small piece into his mouth, and continued to stare coldly at the screen in front of him.

There were so many slices of orange on the plate that it gave me a strange feeling, but I didn\'t find it strange at all.

Even though I knew his eating habits at this time of the day, it wasn\'t out of the realm of possibility that I wouldn\'t run into him tonight. So I was happy to find him, Alexander Callidas, at this very moment.

With a smile, I approached Alexander\'s table, and as the distance between us decreased, he noticed me, because I was approaching him from right before him.

"Hi."

Alexander paused his hand reaching for the plate of oranges and fixed his brown eyes on me. He raised his eyebrows, keeping a cold expression on his face.

"Hi, do we know each other?"

"No, this is the first time we\'ve met face to face. May I sit down?"

Alexander hesitated, but he shifted his chair slightly to the side and gave me his approval, so I took the chair directly opposite him.

He was looking at me coldly and I was smiling politely, so there was a strange atmosphere.

"What are you here for?"

"I came for a job offer."

Alexander\'s brow furrowed slightly, small traces of disgust appearing on his face.

"Isn\'t that a bit sudden?"

He looked as if he was about to dismiss me, but I didn\'t budge. I reached for the plate of oranges on the table and spoke nonchalantly as I popped one of the slices into my mouth.

"Red-tailed Lheal, I know a way to get it."

The disgust on Alexander\'s face disappeared in an instant. His cold expression gave way to a much sterner one.

"What are you talking about?"

He was so serious that was almost frightening.

"There is a dungeon that the kingdom has not yet discovered, and inside this dungeon, there are a few things that I want. Of course, one of the plants that grow in this dungeon is the Red-tailed Lheal, which will be very useful to you."

Alexander narrowed his eyes, paused for a moment as if something had occurred to him, and studied me.

"You... are the guy from the rumors. Aiden, right?"

I widened my smile.

"Yes, I\'m that guy, but that\'s not that important. The important thing is that I can get you the plant you\'re looking for, Alexander."

"Why would you come from nowhere to help me?"

"Because I need you for what I want to take from that dungeon."

Alexander\'s brow furrowed even more.

"I don\'t understand."

"It\'s quite simple, there\'s a locked door somewhere in the dungeon. The way to open it is... complicated, really complicated, and I can\'t figure it out on my own."

I swallowed the orange slice in my mouth, leaned back, and looked into his brown eyes, widening my smile.

"Sure, you\'re different."

I pressed down on all three words that came out of my mouth. I wanted him to understand what I was talking about and... it worked.

Alexander\'s eyes widened, and then his whole body trembled slightly.

This time he was really surprised.

"You... How do you know?"

"There are many things I know in this world, Alexander. Your skill is just one of them, and if you trust me, you will not only get the plant you want, but you will also get something even better."

Alexander stood still for a few seconds after what I said to him. He took a deep breath and calmed himself. Then his stunned expression gave way to a serious one. His eyes were sharper now, daring.

"If you have such detailed information about me, how do I know you\'re not deceiving me? Lheal is a valuable plant, once I get my hands on it, you can kill me and leave like nothing happened. If we\'re talking about a truly unexplored dungeon, you wouldn\'t even leave a trace. As long as there really is a dungeon."

Alexander calmly took another orange slice from the plate in front of him and popped it into his mouth.

"Too many nobles have a grudge against me. Not to mention the ones who are worried about my current and future positions and want to see the end of me just because I don\'t have noble blood in my veins. How do I know one of them isn\'t a hired killer?"

"Simple."

I widened my smile, and just like him, I popped another orange slice into my mouth.

No lie, they taste really good.

"You can\'t know, and you can\'t investigate because I don\'t have any family behind me. Of course, you would interpret that as \'well hidden\' so it doesn\'t really matter to either of us that you can\'t find a family behind me."

Now... I have to be a bit aggressive.

"Of course, I don\'t know how much longer your mother will be stable."

It all happened in an instant. Alexander pulled a long, sharp needle out of the sleeve of his sweater and quickly aimed it at my arm.

I didn\'t move a muscle, and the needle stopped just a few millimeters above my right hand.

Alexander\'s anger was visibly reflected in his eyes, colder than ever. He would not hesitate if he had to.

"Are you threatening me with my mother?"

He held his body steady with great dexterity, the needle would go straight into my hand if he wanted to, and all it took was a tiny movement.

He was almost like a cold-blooded killer.

"I may be weak, I may not be ranked very high, but that doesn\'t mean I can\'t kill you."

I felt something dripping from the tip of the needle onto my arm, a drop that sent the cold straight through my skin, but I kept the smile on my face.

Alexander is not physically strong, just as he says himself. Because he is a commoner and his family is poor, he has not been trained since he was young like other nobles, and he has no extreme skill in direct combat. On top of that, only one of his stats is rated E- and that is agility. His other stats hover around F to F+, mostly F.

Still, he has his own ways of fighting his way into the top two hundred.

For example, he uses poisons to compensate for his weakness by using his agility. The cost of these poisons and needles is a bit steep, though, so he only uses them on special occasions.

Still, he is skilled and knows how to use what he has at his disposal.

"I\'m not threatening you with anyone, Alexander."

I slowly raised my hand and started to push the needle aside, but then Alexander gently pricked my hand with the needle. Then I felt my hand slowly going numb.

That was it though, I knew there would be no more unless Alexander pushed the needle deeper.

"I just need you to take care of my business. And to convince you, I\'m offering you something you need, with more options. If I hadn\'t used my contract privilege this month, I would have made you a contract, but unfortunately, I did... If you have, then we can make a contract right now."

Contracts are really powerful things, but it\'s also frustrating that I can only have one contract a month. And there\'s nothing I can do, I hope Alexander has contract privilege.

"I have... used it too."

Great...

"Then there\'s nothing we can do."

I pulled my numb arm back and slowly stood up, then put a small piece of paper with my number on it on the table.

"I\'ll say it again, I don\'t want to harm anyone. I just want to take care of my own business and I\'m offering what I can to convince you, that\'s all. Again, you\'ll take it as a threat, but we both know your mother doesn\'t have much time, Alexander. Unless you come with me, think about the next time you will have the opportunity to find Lheal. The plant is really rare, so its market value is quite high. Red-tailed Lheal in particular are even more difficult to access than the normal ones."

Alexander looked thoughtful again. He pondered normally as if he hadn\'t just injected poison into my hand.

"I don\'t want money from you, you won\'t even owe me any favors when you get the plant. Just come with me, we\'ll crack that cipher in the dungeon and we\'ll both be happy at the end of this journey."

With that, I took one last orange slice from the table and slowly left the table without saying anything else.

From the look on Alexander\'s face, I could tell that it would be better to give him some time since the weekend is still far away.

Well, if he doesn\'t agree, I have another idea, but I hope I won\'t have to use it.

I don\'t want to poison myself.

Anyway... I\'d better go to sleep.

*******

After entering my dorm room and letting myself into my bed, I was sleeping almost soundly.

So when I opened my eyes for the first time in a long time, not because of the sound of the alarm going off, but because of something else, I couldn\'t understand what was going on.

I sat up from my bed and started to look around in vain when a loud sound slowly echoed inside.

~knock! ~knock! ~knock!

Ah... there\'s a knock at my door.

And it\'s not even eight o\'clock in the morning, considering my alarm hasn\'t gone off yet...

Why would anyone come to my door at this hour?

After a quick splash of water on my face from the bathroom, I ran to the door. By the time I arrived, there was another knock on the door, indicating that whoever was at my door was in a hurry.

Seriously... what\'s going on?

As I approached the door, I looked out through the peephole, so I was momentarily disoriented when I saw three security guards and two men in suits standing in front of my door. It didn\'t take long, though, before I finally realized what was happening.

Right... I had forgotten.

With that realization in mind, I first straightened my posture and then opened the door with a sleepy look on my face. I also put a puzzled expression on my face as I faced the five men standing in front of my door.

"Yes?"

One of the men in a suit stepped forward and began to speak in a monotonous tone.

"We apologize for disturbing you so early in the morning, but the academy is investigating something very important and we need to be quick. So we\'re going to ask you a few questions, and if we don\'t find anything suspicious, we\'ll leave."

The surprise on my face gave way to complete \'shock\' and I blinked my eyes several times \'senselessly\'.

"Am I being accused of something? What exactly is the case?"

"It\'s about the disappearance of several students of the noble class. The name of one of them is Justin Malus and we have determined that you had some interaction with him. Due to the magnitude of the case and the speed with which it is being investigated, the Academy has suspended this week. So you won\'t miss any classes, will you please come with us?"

After the suit\'s words, I quickly looked at my watch and saw that there was indeed a message that there would be no classes this week.

"Sure, but let me change first."

Obviously, I can\'t go to testify in my pajamas. Of course, they don\'t need to know, but there is also something else I have to do.

"I\'ll be back in five minutes tops."

I left the door open so they wouldn\'t suspect me, and I quickly went to my closet and took out some clothes. At the same time, I was thinking.

So they\'ve started investigating the Justin thing... Only the people there know about me betraying Justin in the preliminary, thanks to the illusion device. So they might find out that I betrayed Justin after a few interrogations, but they have no proof that I did anything to him directly.

Melany and I have already changed the CCTV footage to show that on the night of Justin\'s disappearance, after leaving the Mana Research Labs building, I went straight home and didn\'t leave until the morning.

We even took a look at the location tracking system of the clocks, which is only active within the academy. It shows that I was completely in my room that night. And so was Sue, of course. So even if they accuse me, they can\'t do anything because they have no evidence.

They might question why I went to the Mana Research Labs that day, but I already have a solution for that, so it\'s not a big deal.

After I finished changing, I approached the drawer next to my bed. There was one last thing I had to do.