Chapter 91 86 - 'Master' of the Ballet Twin

With Phaethon

"That should restore the power in this building," Wise says as he uses Eous to press the last button, causing the lights around him and the Victoria Housekeeping to turn on.

"And the Ethereals around us have been taken care of," Lycaon says as the Ethereal under his leg is slowly disintegrating.

"Alright, get some rest," Belle says through the comm. "I'll try to calculate our next route."

"You mean, I calculate our next route," Fairy exclaims.

"I'm pretty sure I didn't stutter," Belle retorts.

"I'm actually surprised you didn't," Fairy replies.

"That's because I'm pretty confident of my skill!" Belle boasts. "I've been doing this for years now, right before you joined us."

"Indeed you are," Fairy says, and Belle seems to be happy as the AI seems to concede, until she continues. "And it seems that despite your long records, you did make some mistake that is quite...intriguing. Like how you managed to send Eous, controlled by Master, into the sewer system filled with corrupted sh-!"

"Hey, hey, hey! Stop that!" Belle exclaims in panic before she turns off her communication. The Victoria Housekeeping stare at Eous in silence.

"...please ignore that..." Wise says, embarrassed by both Belle's and Fairy's attitudes, and by the secret Fairy was about to spill.

"...If that's your wish, Master Proxy..." Lycaon says with a straight face while Rina softly giggles behind him. All of a sudden, the light starts to flicker.

"... Is it normal for the light to flicker like that?" Wise asks curiously. "I'm very sure I had restored the power properly..."

"You did, Master Proxy. This seems to be something else." Lycaon says as he glances around.

"...now that I think about it, the light seems to flicker a lot on our way here as well..." Wise muses.

"Oh, I-is that so? Hehe..." Corrin tries to hide her nervousness by chuckling, but it seems that it only made Wise suspicious.

"It's happened a few times; it seems the rumor is true..." Ellen comments.

"Huh, rumor? What rumor?" Wise asks in confusion.

"Oh, you haven't heard of it, Proxy?" Ellen asks curiously.

"Ahem! E-Ellen!" Corrin hisses, trying to keep Ellen from saying anything.

"What? Was I not supposed to say anything? Boss' mission brief was so long I didn't read it," Ellen says with a yawn. "But, whatever. Rina's here anyway. If the Proxy finds out anything, she'll take care of it."

"Um... 'Take care of it'? What's going on?" Wise asks, slightly nervous as Eous glances at the maid and butler.

"Ellen, Corrin, keep talking like that, and you're going to give people the wrong idea about Victoria Housekeeping," Rina says with a smile before she looks at Eous. "Dear guide, allow me to clarify - are you familiar with supernatural rumors regarding the Ballet Twins?"

"...I've heard of it once or twice..." Wise replies.

"The story goes like this: When the Ballet Twins' buildings were swallowed up by the Hollow, a pair of famous dancers, two sisters, died here," Rina explains. "Rumor has it that the sisters became the masters of the building and would warn visitors with flickering lights."

"..." Wise didn't say a word, letting Rina finish her story. At the same time, Belle heard the story and started hugging Wise out of fear.

"Now, if those visitors still refuse to leave, the sisters will cause a blackout and show up in the darkness to harvest the souls of the visitors," Rina said, a bit cheerfully. "It's an old story, but recently someone claimed to have experienced some similar phenomena in the building. Our master believed letting the rumor spread would inevitably affect the value of the Ballet Twin, so we were commissioned to investigate the truth under the guise of maintaining the building."

"So, that's the reason why you all are here," Wise muses. "That explains a lot..."

"Originally, we believed the rumors to be the fabrications of troublemakers, but at the very least, it appears the power outages do indeed occur," Lycaon muses. "But a power outage could pose a problem. Tower B's atrium is fitted with automated, fire-resistant partitions - power failure causes them to instantly close. Since finding Miss Rain is our priority, to avoid having our route cut off, we should speed things up."

"Lucky for you, I've done our calculation for our next route!" Belle exclaims proudly.

"You mean, I did it?" Fairy tries to 'correct' her, earning a huff from Belle.

"Let us make haste, Master Proxy," Lycaon says as he offers Eous a ride on his shoulder, which the Bangboo doesn't hesitate to climb onto before the group starts rushing off.

On their way, they encountered a caped Ethereal with a double-sided blade as its hand, and it's easily the greatest annoyance they ever faced. Every time they managed to corner the bastard, it would simply disappear and reappear when things had gone smoothly.

It's safe to say that the group didn't make it in time to reach the bridge connecting to the other building as the partition closed their path. To make things worse, the Ethereal is still alive and constantly annoyed the group.

"We really need to deal with this Ethereal fast, or else they would just keep popping out of nowhere," Wise grunts in annoyance as Lycaon takes a deep breath and adjusts his tie.

"I agree," Lycaon says before he gently gives Eous to Rina. "Rina, please keep an eye on master Proxy. I shall handle this."

"Eh?"/"Very well, Mr. Lycaon," Wise and Rina say in unison as Lycaon turns around, staring at the empty wall for a moment. Without another word, he rushes toward the wall, raises his foot, which is covered in ice, and slams it down. Wise wonders what Lycaon is doing till the ice foot makes a shattering sound, and the Ethereal from earlier crashes to the ground in impact.

This surprises Wise, as he wasn't expecting this at all. Earlier, neither of the Victoria Housekeepers was able to deal with the invisibility problem, and now, Lycaon is somehow able to sense him.

Also, is it him, or when Lycaon swings his leg down, there was a silhouette of a wolf biting down their prey?

"Oh, dear," Rina covers her mouth a bit before her lips curl into a small smile. "It seems the cleaning time has begun."

"Cleaning time?" Wise asks in confusion as more Ethereals start showing up. Most of them seem to be the intangible ones, similar to the ghosts.

"Well, we were in charge of maintaining this building for our master. Of course, cleaning them up is part of our job," Rina says with a teasing smile. "But it seems Mr. Lycaon wants to do this himself. He's quite frustrated at the current situation."

What Wise witnessed next is not something that hwould expected from someone as elegant as Lycaon. The best description for everything that happened is a wolf slaughtering a herd of sheep inside their pen.

Currently, Lycaon feels like a hunter hunting down their prey. And it seems that the more Ethereal he beats, the clearer the silhouette is.

"..." Lycaon takes a deep breath before he slowly approaches the group while adjusting his tie and clearing off the frost on his clothes. "Sorry for taking your time, Master Proxy. It seems that we might need to take a different path..."

"I-it's fine," Wise says nervously.

"We might need to take a look at the map more to determine which path we should take, and perhaps we could figure out why the power is out," Lycaon muses as Wise controls Eous to nod in agreement.

"This thing doesn't seem too durable, perhaps Corrin and I-!" Ellen was about to suggest something, but Wise cut her off.

"L-let's not act too hastily now," Wise says quickly. "Didn't you guys suppose to maintain the building for your master?"

"Indeed, master's judgement is correct," Fairy adds. "As the only structure connecting the two buildings, the atrium is in a highly unstable state due to Hollow. Any sizable blow could lead to localized structural change."

"Yeah, let's not..." Corrin says with a haunted look. "I don't want to see the tower turn into a result of an explosion..."

"...Corrin, that's not how structural change in Hollow works. That's just Mr Caelus'....unique strength pulling it off..." Lycaon sweatdrops, remembering how Corrin explained what she saw before being saved by Caelus.

How that young man, capable of doing so much damage, is beyond him.

"Huh?" Wise asks in confusion.

"A story for another time; let's get out of the building for a moment," Lycaon says as they all nod. On their way back, Fairy had discovered something that shocked her.

"Master, I've detected something that you should know," Fairy says, getting both siblings' attention. "For some reason, I detected some sort of foreign energy signature coming from Sir Lycaon when he fought those Ethereals."

"Foreign energy signature?" Wise asks in confusion.

"Yes, and to make things weirder, it shares similarity when Caelus' 'Path' Energy, but at the same time, different..." Fairy mutters. "Master, could it be that Sir Lycaon managed to gain access to Path energy?"

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With PubSec and Cunning Hares

"Tch, those guys truly annoyed me," Perlman mutters as he stares at the PubSec officers and the Cunning Hares who arrested him not long ago. It's safe to say that he has a disdain for them for ruining his plan to get more money, but one thing that confused him is the lack of a certain someone.

Perlman decided not to look at the gift Horse Thiren at the mouth. The absence of a smart person will increase his chance of success, after all.

As he looks at the time, he feels like the time has finally arrived. Without any hesitation, he starts opening the suitcase that woman had given him.

He just hopes the woman gives him a proper tool, or else he will spill everything he has found about her. As he opens the suitcase, he is blasted with a heavy dose of unknown gas, causing Perlman to cough.

"D-damn it, what was-!?" Perlman suddenly feels a bit dizzy as everything looks blurry to him. He feels his entire body grow lighter, his head slowly falling into the open suitcase. "Oh, that bitch-!"

Without another word, he falls unconscious, along with all of the passengers. A few seconds later, the airship attendants, each of them wearing a gas mask, walk out of their hiding place; each of them holds a weapon.

They are members of Exaltists in disguise, and under the order of their current leader, they were told to infiltrate the airship and do everything to murder Perlman along with the 'witnesses' by any means necessary. At first, the plan simply required Perlman to knock everyone down and control the airship via autopilot towards the Hollow, making it look like an accident.

But Caelus' existence made their leader rethink their plan. The Exaltist members are there to make sure things go smoothly, or if Perlman somehow miraculously survives, finish the job. One of the members looks at the unconscious Perlman silently before he raises his blade to strike him down.

But neither of them would expect a sword blocking their blade and knocking the member away. The rest of the Exaltists look at the culprit, Anby, who wears a gas mask as she shields Perlman from them.

"This is the Public Security; you all are under arrest." The members turn and see two officers pointing their weapons at them.

"H-how are you all still awake?" One of the members asks in shock.

"A little birdy told me," Qingyi says as she winks. "I suggest you all stand down, or you'll experience a painful lesson."

To be Continued