With Erin's Level 6 Ice Ability now copied, he turned and walked away.
"He's a tough one!" Erin shouted as Vorden began to leave. "He kept his mouth shut even in the face of Sergeant Shizuka!"
Vorden smiled.
"Don't worry," he replied. "I know someone who's taught me a few things!"
Vorden then continued to walk away from the two girls.
'Looks like you might get to have some fun after all, Raten,' Vorden thought.
Unseen by him, Raten had a predatory smirk on his face back in the dark space.
Layla watched as Vorden's body became smaller and smaller, as he got further away.
"Crazy boy," she muttered under her breath.
***
Back with Tsukuru and Quinn, they continued to give the two female Sergeants wary looks.
"Don't worry, Tsu-Tsu," Shizuka replied with a smile. "You're not in trouble or anything. We just need your help with something."
Faye's eyes narrowed.
"Indeed," she replied. "I know that confronting you right as you were leaving your Combat Classes seems a bit sudden, but we didn't want to wait hours for you two to finish up in the VR Room."
Tsukuru and Quinn exchanged looks.
"Well, actually, we were going to go spend some time with Logan in the VIP Dorms," Tsukuru replied.
"I see," Faye replied. She glanced over to Shizuka out of the corner of her eye. "Sergeant Shizuka."
Shizuka turned to her friend. However, as she did, she saw that her eyes were now glowing red.
Immediately, Shizuka felt her mind begin to cloud over. It was as if she were falling into a trance.
Moments later, her eyes began to glow red, as well.
"You should escort Student Talen to the VIP Dorms," she suggested. "I can take care of this on my own."
Faye's words began to echo in Shizuka's mind.
"Right," Shizuka replied, her eyes glazed over, and all emotion absent from her voice. "I'll go escort the Talen boy to the VIP Dorms."
The eyes of both Quinn and Tsukuru widened as they saw what was happening right in front of them.
Instantly, they both exchanged glances.
'What the heck was that?' Quinn thought.
"The Influence Skill," the voice of the blonde-haired man replied. "It's like a form of mind control. With it, Vampires can erase memories, hypnotise people, and even make them spill their guts. However, much like with the Daze Skill, this Skill's effectiveness depends on a Vampire's Charm Stat. If the Stat is high enough, they can even make people kill themselves. But that is only for the very top of Vampire Classes."
Quinn thought for a moment.
'Can I use this Skill?' Quinn thought.
"Well, not right now," the man replied. "Your Charm Stat is too low. But, once you increase your Charm Stat, the Skill will be automatically unlocked."
There was a short pause.
'Do you know how many points I need to have in my Charm Stat to unlock the Skill?' Quinn asked.
"Tenpoints in the Charm Stat are needed to unlock the Influence Skill," the man answered.
Quinn's eyes narrowed.
'Great,' he thought. 'So that means that I either need to Level Up five times, or somehow get lucky enough to find five people with O-Type blood.'
Quinn was snapped out of his musings as he felt Shizuka's hand grab his forearm.
Wordlessly, she began to guide him away from Tsukuru and Faye, her movements like those of a robot.
"Hey, wait!" Quinn protested as he felt himself being dragged away.
Tsukuru and Sergeant Faye watched as Shizuka began to guide the uncooperative Quinn towards the Student Dormitory.
Faye then turned to Tsukuru.
"Student Hikiko," she replied. "If you would, please follow me."
***
On the other side of the school, Quinn and Sergeant Shizuka had finally reached the Student Dormitory.
The two of them entered the door and walked down the winding halls until they came across a set of stairs. They proceeded to go up the stairs, as well as the second flight of stairs, to the third level.
The second the two of them touched the ground on the third level, Shizuka began to act weird.
Her glowing red eyes began to flicker, like a light going out. A moment later, they reverted to normal.
Soon, expression returned to Shizuka's face, and her motions became more…human, for lack of a better term.
She let out a groan and clutched her forehead.
To Quinn, it looked like she was recovering from a headache.
"What the hell happened?" Shizuka muttered.
Slowly, she began to look around.
As she did, her eyes widened.
"Wh-Where'd Faye and Tsu-Tsugo?!" Shizuka asked, her head whipping from side to side. "And how the hell'd I get all the way to the Student Dormitory?!"
Quinn stared at Shizuka in confusion.
'What's going on?' he asked.
"The Influence Skill has worn off," the voice of the man replied. "You know how they say that when you make a wish from a genie, to be very careful on how you word it? That's essentially what's going on here. The Blood Knight told her to 'escort you to the VIP Dorms', but not where in the dorms. Therefore, her task was technically complete the moment you two reached the third floor."
Shizuka continued whipping her head back and forth. Eventually, she noticed Quinn.
Immediately, she let go of his arm.
"You, Talen Boy!" she replied in an accusatory tone. Her hands reached down for the handle of her rapier. "What happened to Faye and Tsu-Tsu?! And why are we on the other side of the school?!"
Quinn gulped, seeing her actions. He was afraid that if he didn't say something, she might do something rash.
"Uh, Sergeant Faye told you to escort me here?" he replied in a nervous voice.
He then glanced away from her.
"She said that she could 'take care of it herself'."
Shizuka stood there, taking in Quinn's words.
'I guess that does sound reasonable,' Shizuka thought, as she loosened her grip of her sword. 'But…'
Her eyes narrowed.
'Why can't I remember anything?'
***
Back on the other side of the school, Sergeant Faye began to lead Tsukuru away from the main buildings. Closely trailing behind Tsukuru was Starrk.
"This is highly confidential information," Faye replied, once they were out of earshot of the other students. "But a small 'Salvage Team' was deployed to Pioletic, the Red Portal Planet you three were stranded on, to…'acquire' some of the materials that you…left behind."
Faye then turned back to Tsukuru.
"Primarily, some Beast Gear and Glathrium," she continued. "The team consisted of me, as well as eight Level 2 privates."
Faye's eyes then narrowed.
"However, those eight soldiers were killed by a Beast Horde, and the mission was deemed a failure."
Tsukuru glanced away.
"These Beasts wouldn't happen to have glowing red eyes and a thirst for Human blood, would they?" he asked.
Instantly, Faye's eyes widened.
That was an oddly specific question. And it indicated that he had knowledge that he shouldn't have.
Her gaze snapped back to him.
Seeing that he was looking away from her, Faye's face hardened.
"You know, it's disrespectful not to look a superior in the eyes when you're speaking to them," she replied in a steely tone.
Tsukuru let out a scoff.
"Why, so you can use your glowing eye trick to hypnotize me just like you did with Shizuka?" he asked.
Faye let out a low growl.
"Anyway, in an attempt to save face, the higher-ups decided that, rather than admit that the mission failed, they're going to just pretend that the mission was a success," Faye continued. "As such, we need you to recreate everything we would have retrieved from the Beast Planet."
Faye came to a complete stop in front of a large building. It was an empty storage building.
"Here we are," she replied.
She punched a 12-digit code into the passcode machine to the right of the door. Once she was done, she hit the "enter" key at the bottom.
The screen flashed green, and an electronic beep was heard. Afterwards, a metal "chunk" became audible.
Faye pushed the door open, revealing the empty building. It was roughly the same size as the storage hanger Tsukuru and Quinn had come across on Pioletic.
***
Back with Quinn and Tsukuru, the two began to walk down the winding hallway. As they did, Quinn noticed that, instead of having numbers like the normaldorm rooms, each of these rooms had a metal plaque on the door. Each plaque had a name embossed clearly on it.
And halfway down the third row, the two of them stopped at a certain door.
As Quinn looked at the door, he saw the words "Logan Green" written on the plaque.
"We're here," Shizuka replied with narrowed eyes. She was still annoyed that she had been roped into being a chaperone.
She reached forward and banged on the door with the back of her palm three times in succession.
"Hey, Logan!" Shizuka replied with a tone of familiarity. "You got a guest!"