It was an instant massacre. With not even much of an effort, both of the opponents were defeated. He was truly the protagonist, no one and nothing could stand in his way, except for the fated meeting between the villain and him.
Glimpse Water questioned why he himself was even needed in the story and he wondered if the protagonist was already this strong, how he could get captured and tortured?
The two opponents who seemed so sure of their powers and were confident to defeat Prota were taken out by just one punch of his.
Prota hurried down the hallway with Glimpse Water in tow. The bandages on Prota opened and his wounds started to bleed again as he rushed his body to move.
To move and move and move. Closer to Frozen Milk. Closer to rid this pain in his chest. All that was on his mind was to get Frozen Milk.
Go. Go. Go.
Prota and Glimpse Water finally arrived at the hallway Holbe was minutes ago.
"Damn, what the hell? So much blood," Glimpse Water walked after Prota who knelt down to examine the unconscious Oppoa. Prota slapped him on the cheek.
"What you doing?" Glimpse Water got curious and moved closer.
"Waking him up."
"Seriously?" Glimpse Water narrowed his eyes in disbelief, "He seems like an enemy but- "
"No wounds," Prota finished the sentence and continued slapping Oppoa like a fish on a cutting board. He gave up and saw the blood trail.
"Could be Holbe, ain't it? Wow, she finished him with one blow too? No wonder she's the captain."
Monsters, added Glimpse Water in his head.
However, he felt something wasn't right. There was too much blood for it to have been peaceful.
Glimpse Water couldn't help but ask, "Hey Prota, why were you captured... like that?"
Prota didn't stop walking, "Because they thought I was a water person."
"How did they realise? You ain't told them, ain't it?"
Prota remained silent.
"You really told them? What the hell? You ain't even a water person!"
"When they asked where I came from, I told them the water capital because that's where we've been..."
Naïve! Truly naïve! Yep, that was still their protagonist. Glimpse Water somehow sighed in relief.
"And then?"
"Well, the nature people seem to have a grudge against the water people, so they wanted to take it out on me. They especially didn't like the idea I wanted to join their prince's army."
"Ah yeah, that makes sense. We should've thought about it better," Glimpse Water had to admit their whole plan was full of plot holes and was rushed, poorly executed and just thought up on the spot.
As if an author really wanted to troll their readers and just went out of steam and started to write whatever the fuck they wanted. Glimpse Water was also an author, but he'd never write bullshit like this.
If there was really an author with such bad writing skills and storytelling and abrupt plot turns, they better hand themselves in and quit writing for the rest of their lives!
They walked for a while down this one endless, long hallway with no end in sight until at one point the blood vanished. Glimpse Water explored the path a bit further but there was no blood anymore. Everything was clean.
"There must be a shortcut," Glimpse Water thought. It was a problem since none of this was in the book Frozen Milk wrote.
"Ah damn not shortcut, I mean hidden passage."
"I agree," Prota started touching the surrounding walls. Glimpse Water followed suit but even after minutes, they found nothing.
"Maybe the ceiling?" Glimpse Water jumped up and touched the ceiling for a while.
"Nothing... Where could they've gone?" Glimpse Water had to be the brain here because the protagonist was indeed handsome and powerful but as for brains it was lacking, but Glimpse Water wasn't that much better off, though he didn't know that himself.
Prota and Glimpse Water went in circles until Glimpse Water finally noticed the abnormality in the blood trail.
Glimpse Water looked down and narrowed his eyes, "Wait."
He moved the spot where the blood ended.
"The blood here's thicker and more up until here," Glimpse Water turned around and moved about a short distance back the way they came from.
"The double amount of blood stops here. I see," he clapped his hands and pushed on the wall. He noticed a tiny blood print of a hand.
"See what?" Prota couldn't follow along.
"See the short part where the amount of blood seems to have increased? Holbe or whoever walked until there and saw they couldn't move further because they missed the hidden passage. So, they went back again and stopped here. Here's the entrance,"
Glimpse Water was proud of his deduction skills and pressed his hand on the blood print.
The stone wall moved back and opened a passage for them to enter. It led to another long and dreading hallway that seemed to go on endlessly. The wall behind them shut and Glimpse Water turned around to see Prota lean against it.
"You alright?" Glimpse Water was concerned.
Prota lost a lot of blood, "I'm fine, let's go."
Prota went ahead.
It was sheer garbage how long the hallway was, but Glimpse Water could guess in his little author's brain that this underground place did not only run underneath the arena but a good portion of the area. Did Frozen Milk know of this?
Was this one of his hidden plots later on in the book? Glimpse Water did manage to make Frozen Milk spit out the ending, everything he had planned of the book and when he realised what a badass but literally bad and ass character Frozen Milk made him, he started to reflect on himself a bit.
It was true he wanted to take the protagonist's spot but wasn't that just because he was following his fate- the plot Frozen Milk wrote for him? Wasn't he in the end just a puppet with no will?
At first, the thought of that made him resent Frozen Milk but later he came to realise that not everything was up to fate and he was able to change himself and this made him feel better upon realising he was just a character in a book.
At the end of the hallway was a single door and behind this door was a single magnificent room and, in this room, stood the villain with the holy beauty being strangled by him as Frozen Milk laid on the sofa, badly wounded.
Prota and Glimpse Water noticed the ripped dress of Holbe, the blood running down her bare skin forming a puddle on the ground, they noticed Frozen Milk unconscious with black threads surrounding him again and they noticed the villain.
The terrifying and intimidating villain whose dark eyes flickered to them and with his deep, threatening voice said,
"You're here? Good timing. You were able to beat some of my good fighters, so I'll reward you. You can either save her or him. Choose."