Sumiye immediately apologized when she saw the woman beside the man calm him down. She feared the man exuding a baleful aura, she initially underestimated him even when he had a spear. She thought to herself that he was still a child who'd break under pressure of numbers.
She knew what Yori was doing before and she decided to let him do it because that spear would've increased their chances of surviving, she could only curse Yori in her heart when the pressure appeared.
The woman beside the man spoke when the pressure disappeared.
"My name's Eliza and this is Riku and the one holding the knife is Rikka. All we wanna do is rest for the night, so we'd like it if we don't bother each other."
The woman called Eliza introduced the man and the other woman, when Sumiye heard her, she realized that they wanted to leave. She first assumed that the trio in front of her were planning to hide in the mall as well.
Now that she knew they weren't there to say, she was honestly relieved. She felt like Riku was a walking land mine, one wrong move and they'd trigger an explosion.
"Of course, the mall is quite big so even if you guys stay here, there'd be no issues."
She answered politely, Sumiye didn't want to risk it. If there was anyone there who could stop the man named Riku without getting harmed it would be Eliza so she wanted Eliza to think of their group better than she already did.
When she said that Eliza thanked her and the trio moved to one corner and just like what Eliza said they didn't bother anyone.
It was then that a woman came and told her.
"Sumiye-san, I don't think Yori is gonna take this lying down, you know how he is, he'd scheme against that man when he recovers."
Sumiye could only grit her teeth, the man who tried to take the spear was called Yori. Sumiye was a teacher, the woman who talked to her and the man named Yori were her students.
They happened to meet each other while they were escaping. Sumiye's head started aching when she heard the woman. It was true, Yori would probably try to get revenge. He has always been an arrogant student because of his rich parents and he was still someone who's thinking hasn't changed yet.
"There's nothing I can do, if I tried to warn him it'll look like I sided with the man named Riku, now that we're in a group what we need the most is unity."
There was probably a way for her to stop him, but she wanted to use this opportunity to either make him change or to at least lessen the burden.
She was not a saint after all, she knew that the world has changed and murder would soon be acceptable while she still wasn't ready to kill anyone, she was ready to get someone killed if it was for her survival and that someone might possibly be Yori.
Not wanting to deal with him anymore, she tried to dissect Eliza's answer. It was guaranteed that the trio knew a lot of things about the current situation outside, so she wondered whether there was a way for her to gather information.
She couldn't try eavesdropping on them, especially when there's that animal beside them. She tried to think about how she'd use the trio to increase her own chances.
Meanwhile, Riku apologized to the two, especially Rikka. He felt bad even if he didn't mean it. He didn't think he was able to release that aura after all. He was honestly confused, he tried to do it again, but he couldn't anymore.
"It must be the system, otherwise there's no other logical explanation for it."
He thought to himself, there was still a lot of things he didn't know about the System. He initially thought that the skills and status were all it could do to help, but then it made the monsters drop equipments.
He wanted to find out more about the System, but to do so he needed to become stronger.
"I feel like that woman is dangerous. She's not powerful, but something tells me that we need to be wary of her"
Rikka suddenly said, Rikka was a very intuitive person and her intuition has never betrayed her yet. Riku started to think about the woman and although she acted quite suspiciously, he didn't feel like she was someone who could kill.
Not wanting to dismiss her instincts Riku said.
"Let's just do this, let's take turns watching them. Kohaku could you sense them while you're sleeping?"
Kohaku nodded, speaking of Kohaku she didn't stop getting bigger and smarter. She knew how to say yes and no through body movements which she observed from Riku and the rest.
Riku was the one who took a nap first, he was no longer able to take the pain from his chest along with the pain in his thighs.
He could only sleep the pain away and hope that he'll be able to recover sooner than expected.
Somewhere not so far away from them, Yori has changed to a different set of pants. His eyes were filled with fury as he remembered the humiliation he suffered before.
Still, there was also fear in them remembering the pressure he felt when the man was angry, but he couldn't take the shame seeing the eyes of his fellow survivors look at him with ridicule in their eyes.
"I will get my revenge! I'll make sure you feel shame much greater than the shame that I feel."
He vowed to himself as his eyes were filled with raging fury and determination.
Riku found himself in a hotel room that was extremely familiar, it was his hotel room befoe the whole madness started. Wondering if everything he experienced was all just a dream he ran to the balcony and watched the streets which were normal
There were no screaming, no one running or the sound of a siren.
Everything was normal. He pinched himself to see if it was a dream, but he didn't wake up.
Looking at his phone he could see that it was nearly midnight. He still didn't believed it and immediately called his mom on the phone. It rang and rang.
"Of course there's no way it was all a dream." He thought to himself.
Just as he was about to end the call, it was answered followed by the sleepy voice of his mom.
"Hello? Riku why are you calling in the middle of the night? Is something wrong?"
Tears started to flow from his eyes as he remembered his mom who would always worry about him first. Trying to hold his tears back in he answered.
"No mom, I just wanted to say I love you."
Perhaps it was a mother's instinct but she said.
"I love you too dear, but is something wrong? Wait for me I'll go to your room."
She didn't give him a chance to reply as she ended the call. Riku couldn't hold his tears anymore as he bawled his eyes out. He was just tired, he had been constantly fighting for his survival and now that he found out he didn't have to, every emotion he hid deep inside his heart just came bursting out.
He cried for what seemed like hours that by the end of it his eyes started to feel like they were burning until he heard knocking on the door.
He went to the door and opened it, outside her mom was looking at her with worried eyes. Her mom saw his red eyes and pulled him inside before she asked.
"What's wrong? Why were you crying? Did you have a bad dream?" Her mother asked non-stop.
Thinking to himself that it was just like her, he smiled as he replied.
"No mom, I was just tired."
Hearing this, his mom sat on his bed as she pulled him and made him lie on her lap as she caressed his head gently. She hummed the start of Chopin's "Tristesse" as she caressed him before saying.
"Just take this moment to rest dear. Forget about everything and savor this moment of peace. For tonight just think that we're the only ones in this world and rest. I'm sure you've realized, you're smart after all but still enjoy this moment for a while."
"Show me your weaknesses because you need to be strong after this."
She said as she slowly planted her lips on his forehead. It was at this point that Riku could no longer hold it back and cried on his mother's lap.