Eric wondered if he had heard that right correctly.
No seriously, did she just ask him, out of all people, to come along with her as she confronted the individual?
More importantly, did she actually say the word 'please' to him?
Even though Eric didn't remember everything exactly that was ever said and done in the novel, he sure as hell knew for a fact that Aria never asked Aurora to come confront the individual who indirectly killed her parents with her when told everything, as Aria was the one who wanted to deal with this entirely by herself.
He remembered Aria actually specifically saying that when Aurora offered to come with her as a form of support after all.
So why in the world does she want him to tag along as well?
This is supposed to be her special moment, not his!
Eric had to take a step back and look at this from a different angle.
Throughout her entire life, Aria had been living sort of like a lone wolf.
Besides Aurora, Aria had no other friends whatsoever at this time.
And she honestly also preferred it that way as well.
It wasn't until much later on down the novel when Aurora started letting Aria in on some of the secrets that she wouldn't have told otherwise in her earlier regressions that Aria slowly started to open up and comfortably interact with others.
In theory, Aria would never voluntarily want any company, especially coming from a man, and even more so from him.
But having also navigated through this cruel world all by herself, Aria knew how to easily take advantage of others and situations when necessary, which was something she did quite frequently during the later half of the novel.
She wasn't like some sort of manipulator per se, but she definitely didn't have any problems reading the room and making the best out of the hand she has been dealt with, even if she had trouble controlling her emotions and took lots of things personally.
It was fundamentally the reason why Aria was also such a useful asset to Aurora at times even when she initially had no combat prowess at all.
She was just the complete opposite of Aurora, who had trouble in social settings, couldn't find the heart to take advantage of strangers when needed, and was generally just nice to almost everyone that she had spoken to as long as they didn't wrong her in the past before, even after regressing over thousands of times and seeing all of the horrors this world had to offer.
Taking all of that into consideration, Eric was almost certain that Aria was cautious about this individual, and wanted to bring him in, someone who appeared to know everything on the surface, for reassurance.
Perhaps her mindset was also the same in the novel as well, but Aria just didn't want to bring Aurora with her out of fear that something both could happen to them, and it just wasn't mentioned in the novel.
And in that case...
'How crafty.'
Eric couldn't help but want to laugh out loud.
He was still bleeding from his newly opened wound, hiding from the authorities, and was clearly hated by her, and yet Aria still had the audacity to ask him for help.
It was brazen for sure, but... he honestly didn't mind it.
He was trying to use Aria as well for a more sinister reason anyways, so who is he to criticize her?
In fact, although it might diverge from the original plan a little bit, it seemed like the perfect opportunity for him to also further ensure that he gains a bit of trust from her with almost no drawbacks whatsoever.
The individual Aria wanted to meet would never lay a finger on innocent people after all, and her being able to still come back alive after her long awaited confrontation with them in the novel was already good enough evidence of that.
Thus, after thinking about it for a few more seconds, Eric lightly shook his head as if he was bothered about something before getting up out of his chair and headed towards the kitchen.
"Where are you going?" Aria stared at the back of Eric's head and cautiously asked.
Eric remained silent however and grabbed some dish detergent, a bucket of water, and a sponge before bringing it back to the table.
Afterwards, he handed the supplies to Aria and pointed towards the front doors.
"Clean the blood trail outside for me."
"Excuse me?" Aria was dumbfounded by what she was hearing and didn't move a single inch from her seat whatsoever.
"I don't know how close the authorities are to my doorstep right now, but I can't afford to move around much until I patch up the wound on my stomach again, and I don't want to risk showing my face out in public." Eric stated as he pushed the cleaning supplies closer to Aria.
"No I get that, but why should I clean the blood trail outside and become an accessory to your crimes?" Aria pointed out.
"Because I can't help you confront the person if I'm stuck in prison."
"..." Aria stared at the cleaning supplies that was in front of her for a couple of seconds and frowned.
Even though Aria truly appreciated the fact that the man in front of her has given her the answer to the biggest mystery that has haunted her throughout her entire life and was even willing to assist her even further, she has never actually committed an actual crime that is usually enforced before.
Not even littering.
So him asking her to erase evidence linking him to this morning's crime scene was quite an extremely big deal for her.
But... he was right.
She definitely wanted his help, and he couldn't help her if he was in prison.
And while she could honestly just wait until he gets out of prison or something like that, she honestly didn't want to wait even a single day longer to confront the bastard who had 'accidentally' ruined her life forever.
Plus, while the man in front of her had given her all the information she had asked for so far, even though it probably wasn't out of the kindness of his heart, she wasn't sure if he was willing to be as helpful to her again after getting out of prison.
Their relationship was already bad enough as it was after all, although she was aware that it was entirely her fault, and while he might not even care about it in the slightest, she still didn't want to risk it.
Because of that, Aria eventually agreed to do it and went outside with the supplies in order to clean the blood trail that he had left behind.
After watching Aria leave the house, Eric made his way to the medical cabinet near the bathroom and began stitching up his wound again in a more careful manner this time.
As he was doing so, he redid anything that didn't meet his expectations, causing him to restart more than once.
It wasn't until a couple of hours later that Eric was satisfied with his stitch work, after which he cleaned up the mess and returned to the living room, hoping to get some rest before Aria came back.
When he went back into the living room however, he found Aria sitting on the couch, staring at him with an indescribable look on her face.
"Is there something on my face?" Eric didn't think too much of it but asked anyways.
"No, it's just that... nevermind. I've finished cleaning." Aria shook her head and mumbled something underneath her breath as she handed him back the cleaning supplies.
"All of it?" Eric questioned.
"Obviously not, I could only clean up about a quarter of it because of the heavy police presence around most of the areas where your blood was left at. But I cleaned the area closest to us."
"That's good enough then, as long as they can't trace it back here." Eric replied and then brought the supplies back to the kitchen.
Afterwards, he tore out a piece of paper from the nearby notepad that was tucked away in a drawer under the console table and jotted down an address.
"Here. Meet me at this location tomorrow at 12 pm, and make sure to bring plenty of essentials with you as well." Eric handed the paper to Aria and then added, "We'll have to be away for a couple of days if you want to meet this person directly."
"...I mean, I don't mind going out for a couple of days if we really need to, but I have work tomorrow. Give me a couple of days so that I can find someone to cover my shifts for me." Aria took a close look at the address that was written on the paper before stuffing it in her pocket.
Since this job was her only source of income for now, she needed to be mindful about missing work and potentially getting fired even if she wanted more than anything else to meet the culprit behind her parent's disappearance.
"Not possible, it needs to be tomorrow otherwise I won't go with you. Alternatively, I can give you the location of where this person resides and you can go meet them by yourself whenever you have the time to." Not wanting to waste any time whatsoever otherwise it might be too late for him, Eric immediately shut that option down and offered an alternative he figured Aria wouldn't agree to despite her doing so in the novel.
Upon hearing this, Aria gave him an offended look.
Really, couldn't he be at least a little patient and understanding with her for just a bit?
Based on this 'ability' of his, he should know about her work circumstances anyways.
Aria wanted to point that out, but ultimately held it in and slowly exhaled.
Honestly, what other option does she even have anyways at this point?
A job can always come and go, and she was sure that she could easily find another one again with her looks alone, but something like this most likely won't come again.
And sure, even if she can still technically go by herself, she wanted this man to come as well no matter what.
As strange as it sounded, even though she still felt hatred for him after all of this, she also felt much safer just having the thought of him tagging along.
He just seemed so... different compared to everyone else.
As such, Aria reluctantly gave in to his terms and walked to the front door.
"Make sure you're there tomorrow. If I don't see you at the exact time..." Aria then paused briefly and seemed to be reconsidering something.
But in the end, Aria chose not to say it and simply just left the house.
Once Aria disappeared from his sights, Eric closed the door and turned to stare at the entire interior of his safehouse.
He wasn't too concerned about what Aria had said, since she would've held a stupid grudge against him anyway if he didn't show up, even without mentioning it.
But still.
"..."
"Sigh, this all better be worth it."
Because if it wasn't, then this will be where his story ends.
Maybe.