Seb wasn't sure how had he managed to get back home, but ever since he had his life had never been the same.
Ronnie's death had been covered up as an accident of gang violence and there was no mention of who was the one responsible for it.
Damien had also 'transferred' to another university without saying a single word.
No matter who he asked, there was no clue as to what had happened or where had he gone.
Nothing in his life seemed to make sense anymore.
He went on to finish his final year of college and even managed to get a few good job offers thanks to the paper he had written about using psychological techniques in game design to manipulate the playthrough experience of the players.
However, despite his accomplishments, he didn't have anyone to share them with…
After Luna's death, he moved away with his mother to another city.
He had only come back here because the best Uni in game design just happened to be within the same city.
There was no way he could ask his mother to come back to the city that would just bring her bad memories.
Moreover… they hadn't been on speaking terms for quite a long time.
Small quarrels led to big ones… and eventually… things ended up for the worse.
In the end, both of them were broken people.
Thus, Sebastian ended up being completely isolated.
To him, every day felt like just another waking dream.
Reality was but a sham.
He wasn't sure what he was living for anymore.
Why was he struggling through every day?
Having lost all sense of purpose in life, his world had lost all its colours.
It was like being suddenly trapped in a monochrome world.
Day by day, he felt incredibly numb and…
Bored.
Boredom is a curse, that once you get afflicted by would never go away until you did something drastic about it.
Thus, when he had received the mysterious message from purgatory.
Other than a sense of hope of starting a new life…
Sebastian had secretly felt a little excited.
Anything would be fine…
As long as he could escape from his dull reality.
However, one must be careful what they wish for…
As what he had gotten might be far, far worse than what he had bargained for.
.
.
.
As Sebastian regained his consciousness, he found himself in the same chair, bound to the same table as he had been back then.
Right across Ronnie lay handcuffed in a similar manner, alive and breathing… but was he truly.
Ultimately, this was but another simulation of the tutorial.
Even if the Ronnie in front of him had all the memories and mannerisms of the 'real' Ronnie, his existence would come to an end once this phase came to an end.
Thus, the real Ronnie was already dead.
Nothing he did here, would affect reality…
The captor made the same boring speech; thus, Sebastian had already started zoning him out.
The way to clear this tutorial was very simple.
He just had to sit still and let Ronnie shoot himself.
Of course, there was the possibility that his memories had been twisted somewhere again this time.
But it didn't matter.
As stated earlier, Seb had no intentions of clearing this tutorial.
He only had two goals-
1) Find out as much as he could about what really happened back then
2) Use his knowledge to summon and kill the hidden boss, directly clearing the tutorial
Everything else… was of no consequence.
Sebastian turned toward the man dressed in the suit.
"Say… are you done? If you are can we just get the game started already? Don't waste time building up the bloody atmosphere."
Sebastian's bored and sarcastic voice was the last reaction the captor had been expecting, was the file he had been given inaccurate? No… that shouldn't be possible.
Never mind… it's possible that the kid was just trying to put on an act to fool him.
Since he wanted to play the game so bad… so be it.
"Unlike the traditional Russian Roulette, we are using a pistol this time. This means that the position of the bullet is no longer decided by luck… and the winner is simply the person who decides to shoot first."
*Click* *Clack*
The man fed the single bullet magazine into the M1911 before placing it halfway between his two captives.
"Go ahead… the game has begun."
No sooner had the last syllable left the captor's mouth, than Sebastian had grabbed for the gun.
Feeling the grip of the gun within his hand Sebastian felt the familiar feeling of absolute power rush up his head.
This was strength.
Taking a life had never been as simple.
All he had to do was point and click.
"Say... Mr. Captor- I can call you that right?- What is stopping me from just shooting you with the gun instead?"
Seb pointed the gun in the man's direction.
"I hope you didn't think that we would be too scared and out of our minds to even consider this option."
A cynical smile slowly blossomed upon his face.
"Since somebody has to die for me to live. Why don't you…"
Sebastian's voice was practically dripping with venom at this point.
".. DIE for me!"
The man however didn't show any signs of being flustered.
"Wrong choice."
He snapped his fingers and multiple red laser lights were suddenly pointed at Seb and Ronnie's bodies.
"You are completely surrounded by my men, while this warehouse might seem empty at first glance, they have all been lying here in wait."
Seb looked around himself and sure enough, he had been surrounded by multiple armed men with assault rifles in their hands.
He still wasn't sure how he hadn't managed to notice them before this.
They had been there all along… he had been perceiving them all this time… but it was as if all information about them had been blocked from reaching his brain.
Now that he had been made aware of their presence, it was impossible for him to ignore their existence though.
"Who do you think is faster, you or my men? Even if you manage to shoot me… you only have one bullet. You and your friend will be immediately shot into sieves by my men. At best… we will die together. Do you want to do that?"
Seb just sighed in annoyance at the result and put his gun away.
There was no need to waste his life trying to kill a person who was fated to die either way…
If the sniper was real… the captor would be shot once he tried to shoot Sebastian… and that would probably make the men panic and go after the sniper than try to shoot him.
"Say… tell me which organization you guys belong to?"
"Why should I bother telling you any information when it is not certain that you would live to see another day?"
"Dead men tell no tales… why not give it a shot?"
"Nice try rebenok." - [1]
"Well… after all the clues you keep on dropping only a complete idiot won't be able to tell that you belong to some sort of Russian mafia…"
"…"
"What's the name of your 'bratva'? Do you have any tattoos to identify yourself by?" - [2]
"…"
"Come on… tell me something… Since you have already shown us your face it is pretty obvious that you don't plan on letting us live anyways."
"Well… you did figure that out correctly"
"See, talking isn't that hard, is it? At the very least please tell us why you want us dead? It's an honourable and noble thing to do"
The grey eyed man contemplated for a moment before sneering.
"Sure… let me tell you something really interesting."
"Don't you guys love friendship so much! Tell me… how much do you really know about your best friend Damien."
"What are you talking about!" This time it was Ronnie that had spoken out.
Ever since Seb had snatched the gun abruptly, Ronnie hadn't spoken a single word.
He wasn't sure what Seb was planning.
At first, he was a little shocked but then he was reminded of what he had been asked earlier- to let Seb do the talking.
But, now that Damien had been brought into this mess as well, there was no way he could just sit still and stay quiet!
"Haha, let me tell you something interesting. Your 'best friend' Damien Caputo is the young master and eldest heir to the Caputo Familia- an extremely infamous Italian mafia family… and he is the reason behind your kidnapping."
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[1] - 'rebenok' means 'kid' in Russian
[2] - 'bratva' can mean brotherhood, it's a term that was used by the mafia in Russia.