-Let us begin our date.
Saying that, Aliana began walking. The street was bustling with people. But something was strange. Jaden looked at the people walking past them.
'Why has no one noticed us?'
He was pretty sure that the place was the commoners district looking at the attires of the people walking around. And that's what was unusual.
No one was noticing Jaden and Aliana, who seemed to be wearing expensive clothes. As he was staring at Aliana, he stopped in his steps.
"... What?"
Aliana swiftly turned around. She was holding Jaden's hand, so she stopped too.
"Why can't they seem to have noticed us?"
Jaden had not met or felt the gazes of people since they began walking. He knew something was weird.
"Oh. I'm concealing our presence using a type of magic."
Aliana said this while tying her hair up using a hair tie. As she turned around, her ponytail swayed.
'She sure has a lot of weird magic spells.'
Till now, most of the magic spells that Aliana had used, Jaden had never mentioned those in his novel.
"To be specific, I've changed how they perceive us and our clothes."
Softly laughing, Aliana walked a bit ahead.
"We must be looking like commoners to them."
24 hours had not even passed since he woke up inside the novel. The questions Jaden had were piling up and increasing with every passing hour.
Jaden continued following Aliana. She had let go of his hand.
'These all problems on one side...'
He had a lot of issues with his current situation, but the one bothering him the most was something very important yet unimportant.
'Damn... I'm hungry...'
Jaden had not eaten anything for breakfast. As soon as he got ready, Aliana dragged him to the carriage while distracting him with her words.
'I hope Julianne isn't worrying too much...'
Jaden had an idea about what kind of person Julianne was after meeting her for dinner the previous night.
"Follow me properly. We are about to reach the first place."
Aliana said this as she stuck close to Jaden. He wasn't even straying further from her.
To begin with, that place was unfamiliar one to him. It would've been a problem if he were to get lost.
Murmur
Jaden could hear the people talking. It was troublesome. He could actually discern the talks of people standing at quite a distance.
"We are here."
Aliana stopped in front of a store. There was a sign board displaying the name of it.
-Raymond's Café
As Jaden was about to read the sign board, Aliana pulled him along with her inside the café.
"This place is...?"
Jaden possibly wouldn't know where exactly they were. He never mentioned the names and locations of places that weren't really important in his novel.
"We are here to eat. You haven't had breakfast, right?"
Aliana caught Jaden by the wrist and walked into the store. There were many round tables, along with a pair of chairs next to them each.
Aliana didn't say a word while she continued dragging Jaden and stood in front of the counter. There was a lady writing something in a book.
"Can we have two cheese sandwiches?"
The lady flinched at Aliana's sudden words. She was immersed in writing when she heard the sound.
Her glasses had thick lenses making it difficult to see her eyes. She spoke while bowing her head slightly.
"Y-yes. Give me a moment, please."
Ring
A person walked out of the door next to her. The man was wearing a butler's uniform.
"Yes madam?"
He asked with a polite tone. Anyone could tell that he was a veteran in that field of work judging from his behaviour.
"2 cheese sandwiches."
The man went back in as soon as he heard the order.
"I guess we won't be late today."
Aliana slowly mumbled near Jaden. As Jaden looked towards her, she smiled.
'Late for what?'
Jaden could only feel nervous whenever Aliana opened her mouth.
"Here's your order."
The man had come back with two packages in his hand. As he kept it on the counter, Aliana tossed a gold coin towards him. He moved his right arm and caught it.
"Have a good day, dear customer."
The man smiled as Aliana picked up the packages. She handed one over to Jaden and began walking towards the exit.
"Now, shall we continue our date while eating?"
Aliana pulled out the sandwich and took a bite of it. Gulping it down, she smiled at Jaden.
"Delish~"
It had not been long since they met, but for some reason, Jaden felt that they were close to each other.
She knew the answer to his questions. So he wanted to try staying on good terms with her.
Jaden may have used that as his reason to be around Aliana. But deep down, he knew it very well.
'I should take responsibility for my actions. Not as Jaden but as the author.'
He was feeling guilt for ending the novel abruptly and for making Villainess Aliana have a pitiful ending.
"What are you thinking so deeply about?"
Aliana pulled Jaden close to her by his collar. She sounded a bit grumpy when she spoke.
"Focus on our date."
He had barely got to know her. And here they were, walking around the city under the pretense of date. But strangely, Jaden didn't hate it.
"Yeah. Yeah."
He smiled at her. As soon as he did, Aliana let go of his collar and went a bit away from him.
"What?"
Jaden asked this as Aliana tried to avoid his eyes. She continued walking without looking at Jaden.
"I-it's nothing. Just follow me properly."
Aliana's ears turning red went unnoticed to Jaden. He looked around at the people as he continued following her steps.
'Where are we going now?'
He walked as he took big bites of the sandwich. Aliana had finished her sandwich, while he was drowning in his own thoughts.
Jaden had gobbled up the whole sandwich while anticipating their arrival to their destination. His impatience had hit rock bottom.
"We are here."
Aliana stopped in front of a shabby, run-down store. The dust gathered on its sign board made it impossible to read what it displayed.
"Are you sure this is the right place?"
Jaden asked with an awkward smile. It didn't look like a place anyone would actually visit. An abandoned place.
"Yes. No doubt."
Creak
Aliana opened the door. How many months—no, years—was this place left unattended for?
Cough cough
There were countless shelves. The dust formed on the items placed on them flew towards Jaden's nose. He sneezed and coughed.
"Is anyone here?"
Aliana seemed to be unaffected. She walked in while calling out for the owner, but there was no response.
She continued to make her way towards the darkness-filled corner. That's when she heard a sound.
"Y-yes."
Someone spoke in such a soft and tiny voice that even Jaden barely heard it. They walked in the direction of the voice.
"We wanted to look around for some stuff."
Aliana said this while moving closer to the table, near the wall. There was a person wearing a robe. Her face wasn't completely visible. But from the voice, it was a woman.
"S-sure. G-go ahead."
She stuttered while talking. Maybe she was that way from the beginning.
Creak creak
The sounds of their feet weren't clear, but the wooden floor was not good enough. It made loud sounds as they continued to move on it.
'What are all these items?'
Jaden had no idea what tools and materials were lying on the shelves. He saw an eyeball in a jar filled with water.
In his previous world, Jaden would always read fictions of different variety of genres. But there was a certain genre he avoided.
'S-s-scary-'
He wasn't a fan of the horror genre. Ghosts, devils, and what-not just scared him. Then suddenly, a voice fell on his ears which made him shake from surprise.
"Let's go. They don't have what I was looking for."
Aliana said this and began walking towards the door. Jaden followed her without saying anything. He was more than relieved to leave the store.
"D-dear c-customer, P-please come back s-sometime again."
The store owner spoke lightly as she saw the customers leave.
"Sure. We will come back sometime again."
Aliana smiled at the shop owner as the door slowly closed. Her eyes adjusted themselves accordingly.
Thud
The door closed with a loud sound. The sound wasn't just from the door. The shop owner was now on her knees.
Blergh
She threw up a puddle of red liquid. With her hands holding her shoulders, she kept on trembling.
'What dense mana.'
The robe's hood fell from her head. Her silver-ash-coloured hair became visible. Somehow, she managed to put the hood back on while still trembling.
"Aliana Rosenstein. It's her again."
Wiping blood off her lips, the woman stood up slowly. Her thoughts weren't clear because of the throbbing pain in her head.
'She broke... past my barrier...?'
The had put up up a barrier around the shop. But Aliana seemed to have broken past it.
Normally, destroying a magic was no easy task. And here she didn't even notice her magic getting destroyed. It was as if Aliana attempted it right before entering the shop.
"Is she even a human...?"
The woman picked up a glass of water and drank it. The red drops of water mixed with her blood slid down her lips, and fell onto the floor.
Remembering Aliana's words, a smile formed on the her lips. She could still feel chills running down her spine when her eyes met Aliana's.
"Ah. We will meet again. Hahahahaha..."
As she was laughing, a red mist began embracing her. The laughter vanished into thin air, following her last words.
"Very soon!"
----------------
"Why did you go suddenly to that store?"
The store looked like it was not even maintained properly. There was no good reason as to why one would bother to enter it.
Jaden was complaining, while Aliana was smiling nonchalantly. She was holding onto his hand tightly.
"Don't mind it. I was a bit curious. That's all."
Aliana kept on walking while pulling Jaden with her. They were on their way to a certain place. Where were they even going?
Jaden had no idea where Aliana was going. He was just getting dragged around.
"Do you remember what I asked you before getting down the carriage?"
Aliana never stopped walking. So, Jaden had no choice but to follow her.
-How much do you know about Dragonaria's division of places?
Jaden remembered the conversation they had almost a few hours ago. It was almost lunchtime now.
"Yes. I do. What about it?"
Jaden replied while pushing himself forward through the crowd. He was struggling to do so quite a bit.
"You were a bit wrong about some parts."
Jaden's face went pale. He was feeling uneasy at her words. He couldn't shake off what he was feeling when he heard what she said next.
"I didn't quite like the old designated areas. So I had them changed a bit."
Aliana was smiling as she looked at Jaden's colourless face. He had a bad feeling about this.
He remembered the previous night what he was feeling when Aliana pulled out a bunch of treasures, like they were common items from her storage magic.
"What do you mean by-"
As Jaden was spekaing, he was interrupted by a sound. Something glistened while distracting his eyes.
Snap
Aliana snapped her fingers, and two masquerade masks came into her hands. One was red, and another was blue.
"First, wear this."
She handed out a red mask to Jaden. Jaden could feel sweat on his forehead. He put on the mask.
"Now then..."
And then she suddenly stopped. The sunlight made her pink glossy lips visible to Jaden.
"We are on time, I suppose."
Aliana looked at the sun above their heads. It was already afternoon before they even realised it.
"Where are we?"
Jaden looked around. He had noticed, but the crowd had gotten a lot smaller now.
The surroundings looked more shabby compared to earlier. As if that place was a set-up for some crime movie scene.
"For having lunch together."
Aliana's smile was bad news for him. That place definitely looked like somewhere he shouldn't be at.
Wherever he looked, Jaden could see huge men with scars on their arms or other visible areas. They looked like thugs to him.
"A-alia, w-what is this place?"
His right eye was twitching. His instincts were saying that something bad was about to happen.
"Oh my. I didn't tell you?"
Jaden swallowed his own saliva and looked at Aliana with a pale face. The chills ran down his spine as he heard her voice.
"This place is the worst one..."
Aliana paused for a while and smiled at He. Putting on the mask, she continued to speak.
"Black market."
Jaden was sweating and trembling with fear. Upon hearing Aliana's words, Jaden's face got even paler.
That place was somewhere he wouldn't even dare to think visiting about. But there he was, getting dragged unknowingly by a person he met just a few hours ago.
'Why are we at a place like this-?!!!!'