Reina opened her eyes and groaned. Sitting next to her was a familiar but unwelcome face. Brandon, another of her classmates who had rejected her attempts at being friends. Unlike Angel though, he'd turned out to be somewhat of a bully. “Figures you would be here. Can’t you leave me alone?” she asked.

“Look, princess! I didn’t ask to be sent here! We’re all prisoners, or have you not looked at our situation?” Brandon snapped. Reina recoiled at the sheer amount of emotion in his voice. They were raw and real. Desperation oozed from his tone.

Reina heeded his words. They were inside the cafeteria and it appeared like a lot of people were present. The other grades, the faculty, and even some first years were all here. The killer had decided to gather up everyone and jam-pack them into this room. She supposed it made sense in a twisted way. The cafeteria was one of the few places which could be locked down and fit everybody.

Standing five meters tall and half as long as a football field, the cafeteria was huge. Rounded windows with crisscrossed mullion patterns lined the longer walls of the cafeteria, and a set of oak doors was part of the shorter walls. Hanging lamps brightened the room enough so she could see where everything was; the numerous desks covered the walls like they'd been pushed aside in a hurry. The area devoted to the kitchen and food was sanctioned off, metal sheet door closed shut.

Speaking of everybody, hundreds of chairs with ropes and for some, metal chains were here. Everybody was in one, ropes binding their limbs to the rests and in some cases, the chains crossing their chest in an X.

Reina couldn't believe her eyes; there was so little resistance. Not one mumble or protest. It was as if somebody stripped away the souls and spirits of these people. They were all sitting lifelessly in their seats. In all honesty, it reminded Reina eerily of execution scenes.

Where was Angel? She must be here too, right? Reina lost consciousness before Angel, but given the trouble Angel had. . .it wasn't unlikely they'd captured her too. If it was around the same time as Reina, she might not have resisted whatever was happening with everybody else.

Was it some tonic? An Art? Or was it plain old depression and helplessness?

{Notice} Scanning. Scanning. Scan complete. {Notice} No outside factor was detected.

So it was the helplessness the murderer had created. It was beginning to grate on her nerves and she hated that. Reina grit her teeth and struggles against her metal chains. Her efforts didn’t go unnoticed. Brandon faced her with dull eyes, not at all full of the arrogance it’d held before.

“You’d best stop what you’re doing. It’s futile,” he said. His head hanged, his chin touching his chest.

“You know, you sounded a lot more like yourself earlier. Can you call up that spark again, hm? Or maybe I need to annoy it out of you? I’ve heard I can be annoying, though I don’t see it myself. Somebody about my being too loud and talkative but I think it’s because I have red hair and they don’t have red hair and they’re jealous because their hair isn’t anywhere as cool. Did you catch that, Brandon? My hair is better than yours.” Reina ranted, hoping to conjure some reaction.

He didn’t respond and Reina let him be, moaning mournfully. Fine then. If Brandon wasn’t going to come back on his own, he would have to wait. Reina had more important things to think about.

Like how she was confident the killer or whoever programmed the robot knew her. It was what the robot had said before she fainted. One sentence, but it had embedded itself into her mind.

“Hello, little fire spark.”

It was what her parents had always called her. Only a few people alive knew about it, including her and about three of the staff members. Maybe. . .her sister?

A commotion upfront startled her from her thoughts and Reina tried to gain a better viewpoint. She cursed the fact she was in the very last row. Ironic, wasn’t it? At the moment, she hated the fact she’d been one of the last captured.

A puff of smoke filled the air before them, Reina inhaling some and coughing. Reina watched with more than a little incredulity as the smoke drifted over to her area, chilling her feet slightly. What was the killer doing? Did he think this was some sort of magic show?

“TA DA!” The smoke dispersed as suddenly as it came, blown away. Reina sneezed as the smoke assaulted her face, filling it with the toxic scent before it drifted away. Then she laid eyes on the killer for the first time.

He–for yes, it was a male–was an average-sized man. About 5’9 if she had to be exact. Excellent build, though his bulky gear hid a lot of it.

A bulletproof suit, ragged and old, made up his gear. It was battle-damaged, showing many scars and wear. Tears were visible on his suit, woven and sewed back together. He had on thick combat boots with pockets for knives and his belt was also filled with knives, along with other small items. He was wearing a set of red-tinted goggles that made it impossible to see his eyes, and a thick scarf covered most of his lower face. He had unruly hair that went all the way down to his torso, a tangled mess with ingots of metal tied to some strands.

{Notice} WARNING: Hostile Skills detected.

Reina tensed. This man. . .he had Skills as well? This situation just went from horrible to worst case scenario. And again, what connected all of them? What did she, Angel, and this murderer have in common that enabled them Skills?

“Greetings, greetings? Did you miss me?” the murdered asked. There wasn’t a response. When he spoke again, his tone was harsher. “I asked, did you miss me?”

Yet again, nobody replied and Reina had the out-of-place urge to laugh. But an angry animal was not something that was amusing.

Sure enough, his next action proved it. He bent down and grabbed something. Reina narrowed her eyes. Why were there so many chairs in the way!? She angled her head to the side, attempting to find a better view.

When he stood back up again, he had somebody by their collar. Reina fought back the desire to throw up, swallowing down bile. Whoever it had been was impossible to discern. His or her face was damaged, scarred beyond belief. One of their eyes was a bulbous mess, and the other looked like it'd been cut out. Blood trickled from every opening in their body, mouth, nose, ear, etc. Their jaw was crooked, looking broken. Blood matted their body and they hung limply on the killer’s arm, like puppets who had their strings cut.

This killer was nobody to mess around with. As Reina studied her classmates, she noticed them all struggling to not look. At the same time, the twisted curiosity was also in their eyes.

This-this must have been the reason they were so silent. How many other times had this happened prior to her awakening?

“I asked, did you miss me?”

“Yes!” a tiny voice squeaked up and as if it had triggered something, a chorus of ‘yes’s’ filling the cafeteria. The killer raised his arms and nodded, lapping up the words like a starved beast.

“That’s right, you missed me! Why?”

“Because you’re the best, and our savior!” everybody yelled. The man nodded to himself, holding his spare hand to his ear. Reina sneered. Was this guy for real?

What was he, a child? What kind of killer would make students memorize that? It seemed like what a child pretending to be a villain would say. Reina was sure now he was mentally ill. Something traumatic could have happened when he was younger. There was definitely a need for attention here, a craving. Obviously, he hadn’t received the proper treatment.

Still, a mentally ill killer was oftentimes more dangerous than a sane killer.

“Good, good, good. Now, let’s go off script a little, shall we?” he asked nonchalantly. Reina noticed that everybody shivered when he said that. “You must be wondering, 'why am I here?'”

He paused, perhaps waiting if anybody would speak up. When nobody did, he clicked his tongue and went on. “You’re all here because - hold on a minute.”

He hunched his back and retrieved something from his belt. Was that - a notebook?

Sure enough, he opened it and flipped through the pages, occasionally stopping at a page to murmur some nonsense to himself. Finally, he threw the book over his back and it landed on somebody's head, after which it dropped to the ground.

“Just kidding! No reason!” he cheered. “Isn’t that amazing?”

Nobody answered and he groaned. “We can’t have fun if you don’t respond! Do you want me to choose somebody else again?” he asked.

He dropped the student and stomped on the fallen body. Reina winced at the crunch sound that reverberated. She had the feeling he was smiling as he dug his heels in more, forcing everybody to hear the sickening sound of bones and flesh ripped apart.

There were tears sliding down people’s faces but even now, they didn’t say a word. Amidst her fury at the killer, Reina experienced something she thought she would never feel: admiration for her peers. There must be so much terror, but they weren't screaming; something she was sure the killer could take offense at. However, being silent wouldn’t mean they were going to be safe. This couldn't get any worse.

“Hello, sir!” Reina spat out the last word which tasted like knives on her tongue. The word ‘sir’ was the last thing she wanted to address him as. It was better than being the cause of people's death though.

“Ah, a speaker! I like you! Why don’t you come up here?” he asked.

“Oh, I’m kind of tied up here. Mind cutting me loose?” Reina asked. It was a weak try, she knew, but she figured it may work. After all, his smoke rouse wasn’t very strong either. His mind seemed to rely on childish tricks and cartoonish tactics.

“Ha! Tied up, oh, I like it! You are so funny, so, so, funny!” he laughed himself hoarse before starting to walk towards them. More than a few people shrieked as he got near. The sudden feeling that something bad was about to happen slammed into Reina.

When less than a second later, his arm darted out and he latched into somebody's collar. He pulled her closer to him until her chair only had two legs on the ground.

“Did you yell at me?!” he asked.

The girl couldn’t utter a single word, shaking from fear. Reina wanted to rip these chains off of her and help the girl but knew it would only make things worse.

“DID YOU YELL AT ME!?” he yelled, his eyes shining with bloodlust.

Reina was wrong; it could get much worse.