《Stolen》Chapter 4

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"Nnn, good job, it seems your strength has improved yet again..." she muttered softly as she scribbled down some words onto a piece of paper.

Its been a few months at least, within these few months, he grew much taller and his slivery hair grew even longer, reaching his hips.

"Got it." Lupus replied as he left the training room, she seemed to have a large amount of space and rooms.

"Oh and, since you've improved by quite a lot since the last time, I prepared something for you, hehe." She said happily, her face resting on her hand.

"What is it?" Argo asked as he took over, Lupus had given control to him.

"Ah, Argo is it? Good thing you're here, since you're the one that asked for it~" She said even more excited, "Come with me, okay?~"

"?" As Argo thought about what could his request be, he tilted his head and looked at Iris as she opened the door.

"Nnn?" she turned around, perhaps wondering why he hadn't moved, "You forgot? Haa... The adventurers! You said you wanted to kill them, right? I got them for you but it took quite a bit of money! I can't believe your memory is that bad! Geez..."

"Oh..." Argo muttered, he had thrown all of his thoughts about them to the back of his mind, now that he was suddenly reminded of their existence, his mood was slightly dampened as he recalled his short time with them.

"Lets go!~" she chirped, "Hurry and do the deed so we can attend to other things~ We can't be wasting time on your wilful requests."

Hearing her chirp excitedly, he was brought back to reality and he answered with a "Okay." and wearily trudged on as he thought about what their reactions would be when they saw him.

The whole building was white, within these few months of living with the girl named Iris, he noticed that her favourite color was white, though perhaps by coincidence, her hair was pearl white and her skin was similarly milky white.

She did not speak much about herself, or the world that she used to inhabit, in return, neither did any of the personalities attempt to connect with her, their relationship was rather vague.

Though, Iris had seemed to be rather compliant to the requests of the personalities and all her actions were to their benefit, she had provided literature to Noctus as well as weapons for them.

As Argo thought about the elf named Iris, she suddenly called out to him as he bumped into her, it seemed that she had abruptly stopped in her tracks to talk to him, however since he was lost in his thoughts, he failed to notice her and continued to walk.

"Ouch, oi! Snap out of it!" she shouted as she waved her hand in his face, after confirming that she had his attention, she continued, "I have them tied up in there in case they attack you together, if you want you can always untie them, I'll be monitoring you with him, okay?~" She cheerfully said while a bird appeared in her hands.

Noctua knew about her familiars, they were kept in a space using magic and can be summoned at her will, all of her pets were modified to suit her needs, this white hawk in her hand was modified with mind magic to relay visual information to her.

"...I got it." Argo said as he hesitantly placed his hand onto the door's lever handle, slowly pushing it open, he entered the room as the door closed behind him.

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How would they react to him? Perhaps guilt for betraying him? Or relief knowing he was fine? Or anger at him for kidnapping them?

As he walked further into the room, he caught the sight various small rooms enclosed with glass panels and glass window doors, though they were strategically made so that the occupants of a room was unable to see into an another room.

They had been tied up and placed individually in those rooms, as he came into their sights, Koa's worried expression had suddenly changed to relief, though his mouth was blocked with a cloth, the muffled shouts were still audible.

Opening the door to Koa, he sat down next to him and asked, "Umm, are you okay? Can you tell me something?"

Seeing the child he betrayed sitting next to him with a sad expression, various thoughts whirled in his mind as he attempted to relay the fact that he was unable to speak due to the bindings at his mouth.

"Oh, eh....I'm sorry!" Argo apologised as he took off the cloth that was stuffed into Koa's mouth.

"Haa, haaa...." Koa panted for quite a while before he finally spoke, "Kid, why are you here? Please take off these ropes for us, its dangerous here!"

"Eh? It is?" Argo asked, "Whose dangerous?"

"I dunno kid, but someone is out for us, you need to release us!" He explained in a panic.

"I'll get you out of here too! Just take off these ropes!" He shouted again, seeing Argo who was lost in his thoughts.

"Umm, Iris will be angry if I let you go...." He hesitantly said, she would most certainly be upset if she found out that the adventurers she had caught for Argo was released.

"Is she the one that abused you? Don't listen to her! She's not a good person! She caught us here to kill us!" He shouted as his arms shook violently in attempts to escape.

"Eh? No, I'm the one who wants to kill you, she only got you all for me..." he replied, unsure why Koa would think that Iris would want to kill them, she wouldn't even bother to.

"What?" Koa asked in disbelief, this innocent looking child would want to kill him? It was a ridiculous thought.

Brandishing the knife Iris had bought for him, Argo said softly to him, "Umm, please answer my question.

"What are you doing! You're being manipulated, aren't you! She's the one that's been abusing you, why are you helping her!" seeing the knife, he started to shake more violently to get the ropes off.

"Eh? She didn't manipulate me or did she abuse me, she said it was a necessary process to go through if I wanted to be strong.... Plus I'll get to kill her soon, so it doesn't matter..." he muttered, wondering why Koa would speak such things.

Lupus who was watching at the sidelines suddenly spoke, 'What are you doing? Just kill him already!' he shouted, 'If you can't do it, I will!'

"Umm, Lupus... I can do it... I just want to ask him things..." he said rather petulantly, perhaps upset at Lupus's words, he hated the idea of being weak anymore.

"Who are you talking to? No, is it Iris? N-Noctus, listen to me, please just untie these ropes, I'll take you away from her, don't believe her lies, okay?"

"Don't call me Noctus, that isn't my name.... I'm Argo...." He said seemingly upset, within these few months, Iris had been treating all of the personalities differently, causing the personalities' to develop a strong sense of identity.

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Suddenly being recognised as another personality irked Argo, he repeated yet again to perhaps further highlight his point, "I'm Argo, don't call me Noctus." as he spoke, he threw the knife to the ground with upset.

Gritting his teeth, Koa profusely apologized, "I-I'm sorry, okay? A-Argo, let me go and then we'll talk, okay?"

'You're too fucking slow, you shitty bastard!' Lupus shouted, upset that Argo had taken too much time, he forcefully took control and took up the knife that was thrown to the ground.

"Now...Argo, please cut the rope, okay?" thinking that perhaps Argo had relented and decided to save them, he smiled as he asked him.

"Fuck you." Lupus smiled and stabbed at Koa's heart with the knife.

Noticing the knife embedded in his chest, a shocked expression appeared on Koa's face as his mouth opened and closed, it seemed as though he was attempting to speak but only incoherent noises were formed.

After being taught the basics of biology by Iris, Noctus had learnt various things, though uninterested, Lupus who could access the senses of the body even when he was not in control involuntary learnt some facts, one of them was that by puncturing the right ventricle or perhaps the major veins or arteries, the pericardium sac would be filled with blood causing the heart to be incapable of expanding and thus causing a quick death.

After stabbing him, Lupus pulled out the knife and left the room, his hand reaching for the door that led to Alice, pushing it open, he smiled and did the same, however this time, he punctured the left ventricle.

"Hey hey, Alice, does it hurt? Can you heal yourself?" Lupus asked, due to Noctus's request of experimenting with Alice's healing power, he had decided to not cause a quick death.

Sitting down facing her who was still gagged, the personalities watched with varying amounts of interest, but instead of amusing them, Alice died from blood loss as she was unable to chant and cast the spell.

After that Lupus went on to kill the rest, their deaths were rather anticlimactic, finally they reached Lira's room.

Entering her room, Lupus who was covered in blood smiled, but somehow, his hands trembled at the thought of killing her, it was as though Argo was a phantom that was currently holding back his hand.

Fighting the resistance that kept his hand still, he spoke to Argo, "You idiot, weren't you the one that said you can't trust them? Weren't you the one that asked to kill them?!"

'E-even so, I wa....want to trust them....please just.....just ask her why...'

"....Tsk." clicking his tongue, he pulled off all of her restrains and grabbed Lira by her neck, "Tell me, why did you betray us?"

Noticing the bashful child whom she had known had disappeared and changed into such a character perhaps because of her betrayal, a guilty expression appeared on her face, "I'm so sorry, Noctus, I didn't want to do it, but we already agreed to the request.... If we did not hand you in before the deadline, other groups would steal you and pass you in, I just, believe me, I'm sorry okay? I really liked you Noctus, I tried to convince them but they said you had to go, I wanted to keep you..." she apologized profusely, fear evident in her eyes as she saw the blood stains on her clothes, "I have a sick brother, I need to collect money to cure him, I had no choice, neither did the others, are they okay, please tell me they're okay, we're sorry..."

They had bee kept here for a few days, she who was worried about her sick brother was worn down mentally and physically, seeing the child she betrayed stained with blood, her mind was on the brink of collapsing.

"I'll love you okay? Please let us go, we can go and live together with my brother, he's very sick so we need to go back and cure him, I'm sorry Noctus, please don't do anything rash."

Hearing the words "I love you", Lupus's hand dropped, a shocked expression seen on his face.

Realizing that Lupus had reacted to those three words, she who fell to the ground, hugged him, "Thank you Noctus, I love you, we can be happy together with my brother, my brother's name is Linley, you'll like him, he's your age, I'll adopt you and love you, lets go back with the others, okay?"

Instead of registering what the desperate Lira was speaking, Lupus fell down as he was attacked with a painful headache, he was blocking Argo from taking control, but someone other than him was pushing against his block.

"Vulpecula?! You bastard, what are you doing?!" Lupus shouted as he grabbed at his head, seemingly incapable of fending off the personality that had never spoken or took control before.

After merely a few seconds, Vulpecula took control and blocked all of the personalities, cutting off any sensory feed to them as he did so.

Becoming the sole controller of the body and blocking away the senses of the personalities, he gently caressed the face of Lira with a wide smile, "Sister Lira, I'll love you back if you love me."

Finally seeing hope from the child, she replied with a shaky voice, "Yes, I love you, but what happened earlier?" Although she had a bad feeling about the sudden change of demeanours, she couldn't help but ask.

"The other personalities are mean, they want to kill you but I won't let them, because you're mine and I love you, Lira." He said with the same wide smile as he embraced her.

As Vulpecula spoke, the personalities who were entirely cut off from the body were panicking, especially Noctus.

After talking with Iris, they had came to the conclusion that the personalities were formed by the mindsets they had possessed before.

Noctus was the calm and intelligent side of the original that longed to learn more about the world he was forbidden to explore.

Lupus was the violent and hateful side of the original that thirsted for the deaths of those around him.

Lepus was the fearful and weak side of the original that feared everyone.

Vulpecula was the twisted side that had first thought what the man did to him was love.

They were a social being, living in a place and experiencing only beatings by a man he always saw, he had somehow interpreted the man as his father and that the beatings were a way he showed his love to him.

They who had experienced nothing else, thought that those beatings were good, that the time he spent alone was bad, they had first spent their times awaiting eagerly for that man.

Of course, such thoughts were abandoned after they received kind treatment from that woman, but somehow, that part of them were resurrected in a personality.

The personality that thought abusing was a form of love.

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