Sergeant Faye's eyes narrowed in suspicion at Leo's words, but before she could even ask him about it further, the blind man had gotten up, and made his way towards the door of the meeting room.
Sergeant Faye watched his retreating body, until he disappeared down the hall.
'I wonder just what that was about…' she thought.
***
Back in a certain room in the Student Dormitory, Tsukuru sat down on his bed.
He brought his wristwatch up to his chest, and looked down at it.
In the upper-right corner, the wristwatch's digital clock displayed "18:45".
Currently, there was a little over 3 hours until curfew.
And while that wasn't enough time to do much of anything on the Base, as he would need to be back in this very room the second those three hours were up, Tsukuru had something specific in mind.
Something that he could do without even stepping a foot outside the dorm room.
He placed his hands in front of his chest, roughly half a foot apart from each other, and thought about taking a specific item out of his System's Inventory.
***
In another part of the room, Vorden, who was also sitting on his bed, turned to look at Quinn on his.
"Hey, so what was that strange attack you used on your Beast anyway, Quinn?" Vorden asked, an excited look on his face. "I've never seen anything like that. Was it some kind of Vampire technique?"
Quinn let out a nervous laugh, and scratched his cheek, looking away.
"Well…um…"
Despite the fact that Vorden knew that Quinn was a Vampire, he had yet to see him use any of his Vampire Skills or techniques, such as the Blood Swipe, Blood Spray, or the Flash Step.
Back when they had been alone in the Training Center on Pioletic, Quinn had focused on using his Shadow Skills, as he had just learned the Ability.
But before Quinn could think of an answer, the two boys were distracted by the sudden appearance of a bright light in the room.
The light wasn't exactly blindly bright, but it was noticeable.
It was essentially the equivalent of turning on a lava lamp in a dark room.
As they both looked over towards the source of the light, they saw a mass of square and rectangular glowing light-blue pixels forming in the space between Tsukuru's hands.
The pixels clustered together into the shape of Tsukuru's VR Headset.
Once the shape had solidified, the glowing object began to dim down, causing the finer details and colors of the VR Headset to be seen.
Quinn stared in awe at the metallic-gray helmet that Tsukuru was now holding in his hands.
'He said that thing was like a portable VR Pod, didn't he?' Quinn thought.
A part of his wished that he had something like that.
Then, he wouldn't have to go all the way to the VR Room to play Power Fighters, and could just spend hours playing the game without ever having to leave the dorm room.
Who knows, maybe Logan could even program in that "private server" that he had in his room, letting Quinn spend hours practicing his Shadow Ability.
"Hey, Tsukuru," Quinn replied, causing the boy to turn to him. "Any chance you could get Logan to…make me one of those, too?"
Tsukuru smirked in amusement at Quinn's words.
"You got a spare 20,000 Credits to spare?" he asked.
Quinn's eyes widened, and his heart jumped.
He had almost forgotten just how many Credits the VR Headset had cost Tsukuru.
It had completely cleaned out his Credit Balance, leaving him essentially broke.
And if Tsukuru, who had one of the highest amounts of Credits among anyone Quinn currently had a relationship with, with the sole exception of maybe Logan, there was no way that Quinn would ever be able to afford it the way he was now.
Quinn let out a nervous laugh.
"Yeah," he replied, looking away. "Never mind."
Tsukuru raised the VR Headset above his head and was about to start lowering it down when a voice interrupted him again.
"Hey, Tsukuru?" Vorden asked, glancing away slightly. "I was wondering if you could…do me a favor?"
Tsukuru turned towards him, a look of confusion on his face.
"Uh, sure, I guess," he replied. "What do you need?"
Vorden felt his heart race, as he knew that his request would be a "big ask".
"Well, it's just that…as you can probably tell, I'm the only person in our group aside from…him…without a weapon," Vorden replied, glancing over at Peter with a look of hostility on his face as he said "him". "So I was wondering if…"
Tsukuru raised his left eyebrow.
"What?" he asked. "You want me to create you a weapon?"
Vorden remained silent for a moment, before he let out a sigh.
"No," he replied. "I was wondering if, during the Portal Outing, I could…borrow her."
Vorden turned his head, and looked directly at Galina, who was currently leaning over the opposite side of Tsukuru's bed, as so there would be no confusion about just who he was talking about when he said "her".
***
Back in the Main School Building, Sergeant Shizuka was making her way down the winding halls towards the main entrance when she heard…a commotion coming from the base's Security Room.
"Ser-Sergeant Faye!" A scared-sounding voice replied. "This order is…highly irregular!"
Shizuka stopped in her tracks upon hearing Sergeant Faye's name being mentioned.
A moment later, Shizuka heard Sergeant Faye's voice respond in the room.
"Are you ignoring a direct order from a superior?" she asked in a steely tone.
Inside the room, Sergeant Faye was looming over a low-ranking private who was standing in front of the main security console, a look of deep irritation on her face.
'I should have just used the Influence Skill on him,' Sergeant Faye thought in annoyance. 'If I had, this would be over and done with, and I'd already be on my way back to my room in the Staff Dormitory!'
The private gulped.
"No, but…an order like this…I would require authorization of at least a General!" he replied in a timid voice. "I'm sorry, but a mere Sergeant doesn't have the required clearance level! After all, this would be a huge security concern!"
Sergeant Faye's left eye began to twitch in annoyance.
She now knew exactly who was going to be the unlucky victim when she ran out of blood in her blood flask.
Only she wouldn't be using the Influence Skill on him like how Muka had suggested.
She would overpower him, and drain as much blood out of him as she could, biting his neck as hard as possible, just so she had an outlet for the extreme frustration she was currently feeling due to this man.
She could always just wipe his mind later if he tried saying anything.
It was then that Sergeant Faye heard footsteps entering the room, followed by a very familiar voice.
"Sergeant Faye," Shizuka replied in an obviously theatrical fake gasp of shock. "Is our base's straight-arrow…breaking rules?"
Despite her words, Shizuka had a mischievous grin plastered across her face.
Sergeant Faye let out a low growl of annoyance, as if Shizuka's sudden presence in the room had now her growing irritation become several magnitudes worse.
The private turned his head to Shizuka.
"Sergeant Shizuka!" he replied in a panicked voice. "Sergeant Faye is ordering me to completely wipe all of the security feed from the school's Assembly Hall for the whole day!"
Shizuka's look of amusement morphed into a look of wide-eyed shock, her eyebrows raised above her eyes.
Sergeant Faye snapped her head over at Shizuka.
"Student Hikiko Tsukuru has voiced the desire to…conceal certain details of his exact capabilities from the Military," Sergeant Faye replied in a sharp tone. "I'm merely acting on that request!"
She then turned her head back to the cowering private.
"Besides, isn't this exactly the reason why the Original Families didn't want there to be any cameras in the school in the first place?!" she growled in a low, dangerous tone. "So that we wouldn't learn the secrets of their Ability?! Seeing as how Hikiko is a New-Gen Original, I'm sure the Head-General will understand if we give him this as the reasoning for the deleted footage!"
Of course, this wasn't the whole reason.
Mainly, she wanted to delete the evidence of whatever that attack that Quinn had used to knock the wind out of Gobkiko.
While she wasn't 100% sure it was a Vampire technique, Sergeant Faye wasn't taking any chances.
Using Tsukuru's Original Ability as the reasoning was just a convenient excuse, and in a way, she wasn't lying.
He really had voiced his intentions about keeping certain aspects of his Ability, such as the exact number of "Beasts" he could have active at one time, secret from the military.
The private gulped.
"But…But…" he stammered.
It seemed that at this point, Sergeant Faye had completely lost her patience.
Her hand lashed out, and she grabbed the man by the center of his military top.
She lifted him up into the air, until their faces were mere inches apart.
Sergeant Faye's eyes began to glow red, as she prepared to activate the Influence Skill.
"Actually, I think that makes perfect sense," Shizuka replied.