Chapter 21: Part Hunt IV

Teo wasn’t as shocked at the newest addition to [Observe] as he thought he would be. The [Players] back at the base had already revealed what to expect, leaving nothing in suspense.

Despite that, the corners of Teo’s lips curled upwards. It felt good to possess the same abilities as many [Players], to whom not that long ago, he could only envy. Now, though, he was in their shoes. Steadily, he was making progress towards what he thought was only possible in a dream years ago.

Callous fingers curled up into a tight fist. Feels great. Teo struggled to keep the grin hidden from Gloria sitting by him.

The notification was still hanging in the air, inches away from his face. The blue-colored box with yellowish borders reclaimed the Dominator user’s attention with a blinking (!) next to lie detection.

Teo interacted with the blinking symbol.

[Lie Detection(mana vision)]

Can see mana flow in the surroundings.

People who lie often have an abnormal mana flow.

Although written in a cryptic form, Teo derived the meaning from those two lines without much difficulty. To summarise, the name of the ability was just an application of what it actually did.

Teo shut his eyes and activated [Observe]. Once they were opened, a new face of the world laid bare in front of him. Everything around him now had a transparent purple flame-like aura cloaking them; the lamps, the walls, and even the wooden sword. They seemed more vibrant than what he remembered.

What about Gloria? Curious, he turned his head at the girl resting next to him… and almost made a loud noise.

Teo fought hard to keep himself from showing a visible reaction. He whipped his head in the opposite direction, then took rapid breaths to calm his palpitating heart. What did he just see?

Gloria’s aura wasn’t transparent or thin like what he saw in his surroundings, himself included. Her’s was thick, foggy, and had a reddish hue, like that of a blood-colored mist. They were kept in control and layered on her uniformly. It evoked dreadfulness in his heart.

Is it because she is of a higher level than me?

Teo wanted to know why it was so scary. Even the soul lamp, which literally had a tormented soul trapped inside, didn’t give him such chills. Why was she different?

Gloria, what are you hiding? After deactivating [Observe], Teo stared at her from the corner of his eyes. A cross-legged stance and closed eyes with steady breathing greeted him back. Gloria exuded peacefulness while performing what seemed to be some sort of meditation.

“What are you looking at me like that for?” Her whisper brought Teo back from his reverie. He suppressed the suspicion that arose in his heart and controlled his emotions.

“You knew I was lying.” It wasn’t a question. Teo was making a statement. Because he knew observe gives lie detection at level three, he didn’t lie to Gloria as much as he could. Even still, there were a few things he took the risk of lying.

“So you upgraded [Observe] to level three, huh? Congrats.” Gloria whispered, then she shook her head. “No, I don’t know that you lied about something.”

What? A look of disbelief was thrown in her way. “What do you mean? Do you not have lie detection?”

“I do, but—” Gloria scratched her neck, trying to find the right words. “Lie detection has many variants. The mode of activation also differs accordingly. My variant needs eye contact. I’ve to look a person in the eye with the skill activated to know if they are lying or not.”

There are variants? He wasn’t aware that this ability had variants. Even still, he took what she said with a grain of salt. Teo silently activated observe; it helped that there was no visible indication when the skill was on. “So, you don’t know I was lying?”

Enduring the repulsiveness he felt from staring at Gloria’s aura, Teo began probing her with questions.

“Nope. I’ve not activated the skill ever while around you.” She said, shaking her head.

The aura, which had been as calm as water in a pond, rippled. The tiny waves spread out on the surface should’ve gone unnoticed had it wasn’t so linear and controlled. It gave her away.

This ability. Wow!! Teo gawked for a few seconds before bringing his attention to the elephant in the room. Gloria was confirmed to have lied.

The only question remained was about which part she bullshitted: her admittance to not knowing that he lied or the part where she confessed to having never activated the ability around him.

Let’s forget it for now. I shouldn’t complicate it any further than this.

Teo once again took a step back for their partnership to continue. He wasn’t going to nitpick with her for resorting to lying—after all, he, too, had done and still doing the same. He’d just have to take extra precautions against her.

For the next half an hour or so, neither uttered a single word to each other, giving rise to tension between them. There were a lot of things to ponder about, especially Teo, who was getting exposed to the world of [Players] for the first time.

This awkward atmosphere was broken when a familiar and dreaded skin-crawling cry resounded through the walls of the hallway before making their way to Teo and Gloria.

You heard the wails of a wraith.

Status effect [Fear] triggered… resisted!

You have an 80% chance of resisting [Fear].

Tears threatened to fall from his eyes when the result of his mindless labor finally showed itself. He gave up on a better career path just so that he could endure the cry of this so-called wraith. In a place crawling with zombies, getting paralyzed even for a second was fatal.

But, even after having close to eighty points in WIL, the damned ‘wail’ would still incapacitate him for a few seconds. He was starting to give up hope.

Took it long enough… What about Gloria?

The Smith descendant seemed to have no outward reaction. She was as undisturbed as she had been the whole time. As if nothing could cause a ripple on the calmness she had maintained on her face.

As expected of the descendant of an elder frontier. So this is the effect of reverse flow breathing. Teo finally witnessed the legendary ‘reverse flow breathing’ in action, and frankly, it blew his mind away. It shrugged off something which required him to have invested almost all his attribute points without so much a hitch. So jelly!!

Out of curiosity, Teo activated [Observe] and came face to face with a different truth.

Her aura had become chaotic, and a blood color had taken over the fog. It might be his imagination, but Teo swore he saw the visage of a slender humanoid shadow wreathing in the red mist.

He still didn’t know anything about mana vision or what it does. Even then, the things he saw set off a few warning signals in his head. Teo began to wonder if he should really stay with her. Even though their hunt was going smoothly, he valued his life more.

I should observe her for a bit more.

He gave her the benefit of the doubt. She had been helping him a lot since their first meeting; it was the least he could do. Without knowing for sure, he wouldn’t jump to any conclusions. Though, he hoped it was just him being paranoid.

XXX

The dim room that welcomed Teo after he used the awakening stone shimmered with a dull yellow light. A group made of men and women in dirty rags tumbled over to the ground. They gasped for air, intaking rapid breaths to fill their lungs with much-needed oxygen.

Leading them was a black-robed individual who had their face covered with a mask lacking any features. There was not even an eyehole. Short brown hair spiked to all sides on his head, and a pair of skull earrings adorned their ears.

“Roll call.” A disembodied voice rang from behind the mask, making it hard to discern their gender. They turned to face the rag-robed people who looked worse than beggars.

“T-e- ten, sir.” The one who answered was an elderly man with an ugly scar running diagonally on his bald head. His only working eye went over the nine people around him, five men and four women—all sharing similar rags he had on his body.

“Ten, huh? Looks like five of you have bailed out. Well, it doesn’t matter. Sooner or later, they’ll be here.” The mumblings of the masked person sent waves of shiver down the scarred man’s spine. He had to pinch himself on the thighs to maintain a coherent brain. The spectacle made by this devil back in the base was still fresh on his mind. It was better to avoid being on their bad side.