Lucas hoisted himself up into the pitch-black attic in a swift motion. Xerxes caught sight of Lucas's feet disappearing into the abyss of the attic. He quickly made his way over to the chair in the corridor, shouting after him.
"Lucas? Lucas! Are you alright in there?" Xerxes would follow after him if he was brave enough.
Which he wasn't.
As for Nova, why would he enter such a place, it was definitely crawling with all sorts of bugs and what not.
Lucas ignored the shouts and tried to look, but it was really hard to see anything. He didn't have night vision like the characters in the video games he played, nor did he possess a flashlight like them. The whole house didn't have a single thing related to light. In fact, he had already seen everything this house had to offer.
"If it's too difficult to see, do you want my lighter?" Nova generously offered.
"How—where?" Xerxes was speechless. All this time, Nova had a lighter, and he only told them now, after all the struggling to find a light source. They had even stumbled on the mountain rocks due to not being able to see them in the night. Nova had not once pulled the lighter out.
"I got it from the kitchen. I thought since it had been revamped, there had to be an addition, right? It wouldn't just go back to its original state."
So that's why... I thought he was hiding it for another reason.
"Gimme." Lucas's half-body crawled out of the hole for the lighter. He extended his bruised hand, with a few small cuts.
"Say please and promise you'll warn me next time," Nova held the lighter in front of Lucas, teasing him with its presence. Xerxes could feel Lucas's anger sparks coming through the oxygen. He was going to negotiate with Nova.
"The lighter, please. I promise I'll warn you next time." Lucas's submissive voice stunned both Xerxes and Nova. They didn't know what was going through Lucas's mind as he said those words. They had greatly underestimated him. Lucas could do anything to achieve his goals.
"You should have just behaved like this from the beginning. If I knew you had such a soft side—" Nova hadn't yet finished speaking before the lighter was snatched from his hand. In the blink of an eye, both the silver lighter and Lucas were gone. Lucas took advantage of Nova's guard being down.
After what felt like an eternity, Lucas's voice resounded. "Catch!" Before he threw down a foldable wooden ladder from the punched ceiling, almost hitting both of the bystanders. The ladder hit the dining chair before settling on the dark brown wooden floor of the corridor.
Lucas's promise was almost useless; the warning came with the object, not in advance. He jumped down, casually brushing his white tracksuit, which was plenty dirty. He was not wearing his black jacket, which only made it worse. The cover-up had still protected him from a lot of things, like the little wood splinters in Nova's beautiful dirty blonde hair.
"Lucas, you didn't get hurt, right?" Savannah nervously asked. She had a last-row view of everything that he did, but the only worry in her mind was for Lucas's safety.
"Why would I get hurt? I'm fine. There were only spiderwebs and dust up there." Lucas still felt his right arm shaking from the earlier outburst, but in front of others, he would never admit being weak. He especially didn't want to make Savannah alarmed by appearing frail. It would only dispirit her more.
"Was that really all you saw?" Xerxes was a bit suspicious of his claim. Lucas had nothing more to say. He just picked up the ladder from the floor and placed it neatly against the wall. He descended, taking the chair with him, and with that, the show was over.
For their next step, they had to wait for the moon to come out. Nova was bored out of his mind to the point he had even considered daring himself to use the bathroom.
"Hey, I'm hungry." Kai poked Nova's shoulder repeatedly as though it helped with suppressing his hunger.
"What do you want me to do? I'm hungry myself." Nova whined as he lay sideways on the bed, his legs sprawled on the floor.
"Didn't you find anything to eat when you looted from the kitchen?"
"The lighter was the only useful thing I got from the kitchen." Nova rose from his position.
"Are you rich in the real world, Nova?" Kai fidgetingly asked out of nowhere, not acting like his usual self.
"I do have a lot of money, although it's of no use here in the dungeon." Nova earnestly answered.
"Do you want to place a bet with me? If I win, you would have to support me with however much money I need until I can earn on my own." Kai said, carefully observing his reaction.
Nova was amused by the bet. It was kind of a clever way to get money for a young kid. With a bet, he would have something to look forward to. So, he agreed. "Alright, but if I win, you would have to listen to one of my requests once we're out of here." Money was never a problem for him; he wasn't afraid of losing.
"Okay, I bet that you will survive no matter what." Kai proposed.