Chapter 744: Clearly Sorcery.

"What... did you say?"

[This is now a restricted area. Any attempt at entering will be met with lethal force.]

A hostage situation, that was the only way to call what was happening in the Rouge Sun restaurant, located on the seventy-fifth floor of the hotel with the same name. The diners suddenly fell unconscious, and by the time the security team arrived, they found that the place had been sealed by strange individuals in black cloaks.

They claimed to be the security team of Dante Sokolov, the gang boss known as the Red Demon, the Cyberpunk himself. The staff were already informed of the arrival of such a character and had prepared accordingly, but they never expected things to escalate so suddenly. To make matters worse, the restaurant floor was suddenly isolated from the rest of the hotel by an invisible barrier, preventing anyone from going in or out.

Several hero teams had been alerted, including Flame Guard, but since the matter didn’t seem particularly urgent, the city’s protectors elected not to involve themselves.

~[ ]~

In one of the private rooms inside the hotel.

"Looks like we won’t be able to get in from here."

Sitting in a cloud of pink wool, a young girl stared at the screen of a tablet device, twirling her left pigtail around her finger with a bored expression.

"You have done your part, Rajab." The green-haired boy sitting in a lotus position beside her spoke. "We will handle the rest, so just relax for now."

"You say that every time, Rito. I have already told you how boring it is to wait for you to be done."

"Well, nothing we can do about it." Sitting on a nearby sofa was a dark-skinned woman with dreadlocks that reached down to her shoulders. "You remember what to tell the cops if they show up?"

"Do you have to remind me every time, Eva?"

"It’s just a habit. Don’t think too much about it." Smiling at the young girl, Eva then turned to the green-haired youth. "How is it going?"

"I have isolated him from the NPCs, though a few seem to have followed him," Rito said. "And here I thought he did us a favor by getting out of the restaurant."

"What about the hero?" Eva asked.

"She’s still with him," Rito said.

"That’s... going be a problem..."

"Who cares?" A burly man sat on the floor with his back visibly hunched. "If she gets in the way, we can just kill her."

"Reyad, we have already discussed this," Eva said. "If we end up making trouble with Eidolon, the client won’t pay us. Gaia might be a giant, but they can’t handle being on their bad side."

"Tsk..."

The burly man rested his chin in his palm and grumbled something under his breath. Glancing at him for a moment, the green-haired youth turned to the dark-skinned woman.

"I will try to separate them when I get the chance. Do you want to wait until then?"

"No, I will go in now," Eva replied.

"What about you?"

"Just send me in," Reyad grumbled. "I will kill that bastard and get this over with."

Getting off her sofa, Eva walked over to the center of the room and sat down on the floor, putting an equal distance between her and the others.

"Alright, I will begin then."

Saying as much, Rito closed his eyes and placed his fists together. Eva did the same, and although he still looked annoyed, Reyad followed suit. Soon after, the room began to glow a faint green, the light following lines engraved into the floor, forming a tapestry of complicated symbols and patterns.

~[ ]~

"What do you mean this is a dream?"

Boris’s reaction to the revelation was to be expected.

"It’s clearly sorcery of some type," Dante said.

After walking through the alleyways, he became convinced that they were being led somewhere. The doors disappeared as soon as he took his eyes off them. The paths they walked through were the same. As soon as they went down a flight of stairs or turned a corner, a wall would manifest behind them, forcing them to keep going forward.

’Damn it...’

For the time being, Absolute Awareness seemed to be working just fine. He also had access to the abilities of his Modules as well. The commands to equip and change his armor were available, but he couldn’t test them with others.

’How does this even work?’

Every last one of his mental commands goes through his MLP, so it didn’t make sense that some would work and some wouldn’t. He didn’t have much luck manipulating the dreamscape as one supposedly could manipulate lucid dreams.

"Um, Boris..." As they descended another flight of stairs, Dante heard Nana whisper to his overweight friend. "Are we... are we going to be okay?"

"Of course we are." The big guy replied. "If anything dangerous happens, you can always hide behind me. I will never let anything get to you!"

"Just don’t stand too close," Dante said. "He might trip and crush you to death."

"Pffft!!!"

Merry almost let out a laugh, and Nana smiled as well, despite her nervousness.

"Hey! That was-"

Before Boris could say anything in return, Dante raised a hand, silencing him. Something had appeared at the end of the hallway, walking in slow steps. It appeared to be a dog, although it seemed to have green flames growing on its back and tail.

"Nana, watch the other end of the hallway." He said. "Boris, you keep looking ahead. Don’t turn your backs on each other."

Dante was afraid that the moment he put some distance between them, another wall would appear, preventing their reunion, but he couldn’t risk fighting anything so close to them as well.

"GRRRRRRRRRR..."

The dog-like creature began walking toward them, its pace picking up quickly. Dante moved to meet it, and though he kept his eyes forward, all of his attention was on the input of his Absolute Awareness. He clenched his fist and prepared to swing at the creature, which had leaped at him from quite a distance, but just as he was about to swing.

"GRAAAAA!!!"

With its jaws wide open, the black dog suddenly grew twenty times its size, blocking the entire hallway.