Chapter 180: Infected (1)

"When you started checking them, I thought you were wasting time."

The stranger kept talking, entirely unaware that somewhere between checking them and wasting time, Misha had stopped tracking his words. His hands moved through the air as he spoke, reenacting fragments of a scene she had lived through and he had watched from a safe distance. The difference between those two experiences suddenly felt large enough to stand between them like a wall.

"Everyone around me thought the same thing, because the infected were already copying the normal symptoms. We were all trying to figure out what you were doing."

Misha offered nothing in return. Behind her mask, her face had gone still enough that anyone who knew her properly would have recognized the warning, but the stranger knew Gravekeep only through archive footage and public projections where every pause could be interpreted as confidence and every silence became something people filled with whatever personality they preferred. Carl, unfortunately for the man, knew her much better.

A small hand slipped into hers.

Misha’s fingers twitched.

Carl did not squeeze for comfort or tug for attention. He simply closed his hand around hers and stayed there, the way he did whenever he noticed she had wandered somewhere he could not follow. He had developed the habit without either of them discussing it, which Misha disliked mostly because a young boy like him should not have needed to become proficient at identifying when an adult had mentally left the room.

The man leaned forward, encouraged by her silence instead of warned by it. "The others kept looking for monster traits, but you looked at them like patients instead."

That pulled Misha’s attention from him.

She remembered crouching in front of people who hated her for examining them like specimens. Fingers had tangled in her sleeves hard enough to stretch the fabric.

"I’m not infected."

"Please... please believe me."

Then, a man screamed that she was the one killing them. He stumbled backward with both hands raised, panic warping his face into something she still saw on bad nights.

"Please—Please don’t kill me!" His voice broke on the last word as he stared at Misha like she was the monster standing in front of him.

Her surroundings disappeared, not literally tho.

Ashmoor remained exactly where it was, bright advertisements crawling across the sides of glass towers while suspended rail platforms passed overhead in almost complete silence.

None of it mattered.

A different room had opened behind Misha’s eyes, and a System window hung in the middle of it.

****

Two months ago...

The transition ended without warning.

One moment, Misha stood beneath the ruined arch marking the end of Floor Sixteen’s previous zone, Carl close enough that his sleeve brushed hers whenever the crowd shifted. The next, cold white light flooded her eyes, and the smell of stagnant water vanished beneath dust, old wood, and something medicinal that reminded her unpleasantly of disinfectant that had never worked.

When her sight adjusted, she was standing inside a hall large enough to swallow most of the buildings they had passed on the previous Floor.

Two stories of narrow balconies ringed an open central chamber, their railings overlooking rows of doors that vanished into branching corridors. Heavy pillars climbed toward a ceiling lost in shadow. Lamps burned behind cloudy glass without flame, and a wide staircase split halfway up before reaching toward separate wings.

Couches, benches, and overturned cabinets suggested that people had lived here long before the Tower dragged Misha’s group inside.

They had entered with nineteen people.

They were not alone now since sixteen strangers were already gathered in the central hall.

They wore no guild insignias and carried no System-issued gear. Their clothing was plain, patched, and stained by weeks of use. A few looked terrified when the newcomers appeared, others showed relief so immediate and intense that Misha couldn’t help but doubt it at first.

They didn’t look like Raiders. NPCs, probably. Or at least, that was what Misha preferred to believe.

「 〔FLOOR QUEST〕

«The Infected»

Objective:

Identify and eliminate the parasites hidden among the survivors.

Parasites Killed: 0 / 5 」

「 〔WARNING〕

Killing the incorrect target will not satisfy the Quest Condition. 」

Nobody spoke for several seconds. Then, her gaze moved across the hall and stared at the sixteen strangers who had been here before them.

’Great. A mafia game, except instead of accusing somebody and voting them out of the village, we apparently had to murder them correctly.’

Misha hated the Floor already.

Then the Observer Channel opened.

<The Saint Buried Upside Down> Oh, I LOVE this one!

Misha stared blankly at the floating message, then sighed inwardly.

Dorian stepped forward with both palms visible. "Nobody draws a weapon."

People turned toward him, from both his group and the sixteen residents. His voice carried without becoming a shout, calm enough that following him felt less like obedience and more like arriving at an obvious conclusion on your own.

"Until we understand the Quest, everyone here is innocent."

A local man laughed bitterly. "Easy for you to say. You just got here."

Dorian faced him. "Which means we know less than you do. And that’s exactly why this makes unnecessary violence even more dangerous."

The man frowned.

"You know this place. We don’t," Dorian continued. "We know combat, and maybe you don’t. If we start killing each other because someone looked nervous, whatever those parasites are won’t have to do anything."

That silence more people than Misha expected as she watched him. ’Good answer.’

Dorian knew how to speak to frightened people, and more importantly, he knew how to make them feel that the calmest person in the room should naturally become the one deciding what happened next.

<The Saint Buried Upside Down> I like him.

<Pale Regent Beyond Seven Doors> You like anyone who survives long enough to entertain you.

Misha’s group remained behind the Blackthorn formation, with Dorian and the others occupying the front.

Astrid stood close to Misha’s side, quiet and watchful. Caius kept his attention on the strangers’ hands, tracking every shift that might turn into a reach for a weapon. Alaric rested against a pillar a little farther back with a composed posture, though his eyes moved far more than the rest of him did.

Carl stayed near Misha without touching her, peering past the Blackthorn members with the guarded suspicion of a child who had already learned how quickly frightened adults could become dangerous.

Misha lowered her voice until it came out into a whisper. "Astrid."

The redhead glanced over.

"They may not be the only ones here so count everything, people and the rooms." Then she turned to Caius. "Remember where everyone is standing right now, who they came in with, who avoids whom, and which rooms they avoid."

His brows drew slightly together. "You think first reactions matter?"

"I think everything might."

Carl glanced toward Misha. "What do I do?"

She looked down at him. "Stay near me."

His mouth tightened. "I can help."

"You are helping by staying with me." She crouched slightly so she could speak quieter. "And while you do, watch those who reacts when someone else gets scared."

"Why?"

"Because scared people look for help. Guilty people might look for witnesses, and angry people look for someone to blame."

Carl nodded, that seemed to satisfy him.

Alaric pushed away from the pillar and started toward them the moment he noticed the quiet exchange passing between them. Whatever they were whispering about, he had apparently decided he wanted in on it.

"You’re planning something without me."

"No," Misha hurriedly said.

Alaric glanced between Misha, Astrid, Caius, and Carl. "You’re all standing close together and whispering."

"We’re discussing you."

"That is considerably better."

Misha stared blankly at him.

His lips curved into a sly smile. "You’re planning to solve thirty-five strangers like a puzzle, right?"

"Only sixteen." Misha eyed him. "And I’m planning to avoid killing the wrong one."

"That’s less fun." His mouth curved into an amused smile. "Then I’ll watch the ones who smile too much. People who smile in rooms like this are always hiding something."

"Including you?"

"You wound me, darling. I only smile when it’s you."

She rolled her eyes and chose not to dignify the remark with a response. Instead, her attention returned to the strangers standing beyond the Blackthorn line.