Immediately after the two was done eating, Eric quickly walked over to the hospital without any hesitation whatsoever while Aria silently trailed from behind, looking a bit anxious.
As they approached the hospital's perimeter however, they saw heavy police activity and a large crowd gathered outside the area.
"What a headache." Eric glared at the officers from a distance.
"Maybe we could go through one of the staff or exclusive entrances instead? I'm not too familiar with this hospital, but a place like this surely has got to have at least a secret one, right?" Aria suggested softly as she stood on the tips of her toes and peered above the crowd.
"Whose side are you even on right now, Miss Aria?" Eric furrowed his brows at Aria before drawing his attention back to the hospital, "Regardless, the biggest problem isn't the police, it's... Aurora herself I suppose."
"Want to elaborate on that? By the way, you're saying it again." Aria pouted after she stood flat on her feet again.
"I'd rather not, and saying what?"
"Miss Aria." Aria grumbled.
"Oh, sorry."
Eric was worried though.
With the amount of people crowding around the hospital, there was a good chance that Aurora might've secretly snuck away from the hospital already and went off the grid.
She was definitely more than capable of doing such things even if it was still extremely early on after all, and it was one of the primary ways that she was actually able to kill some of the villains this early on.
She just shows up randomly sometimes after laying in wait and kills her targets in a swift and brutal manner.
"Aria, do you know what the news is saying happened here?" Eric inquired.
"Um, I think you already know this but the short version of it is that someone obviously tried to kill a patient at this hospital but failed to do so."
"No, I get that, but that doesn't explain why there's so many people here." Eric frowned and pointed out.
"Ah, that's because someone leaked what the picture of the assailant looks like on the internet yesterday. Look." Aria then pulled up a photo on her phone of Aurora lying unconscious on an operating table and showed it to Eric.
"Of course that's the reasoning." Eric wasn't even surprised when he heard this.
Aurora's natural beauty just had a tendency to attract people no matter what, and when that was coupled with the fact that she was seen as a killer, people were bound to become deeply fascinated with her.
Especially those 'I can fix her' types of people.
"Good grief." Eric lightly smiled thinking about it before continuing, "So I'm not being mentioned anywhere in the news whatsoever?"
"Nope. Even after your sudden disappearance last night, I checked the news and forums periodically for any mentions of you or your name, but there hasn't been anything. It looks like the hospital is very adamant about keeping your identity a secret, though I can see why." Aria bluntly spoke as she put her phone away.
"Yeah." Eric's eyes drifted toward the front entrance as he thought for a moment, "In that case, I'll just walk through the front entrance and have one of the staff open the door for me. You coming?"
"Mhm, the crowd's seen me already anyways when I rushed out last night to go to your penthouse, so I don't mind the eyes anymore." Aria gave a small nod.
"Alright."
Eric and Aria then walked past the crowd, were briefly stopped by the police officers in front before one of them recognized Aria from the night before and let them through, and before they knew it they were at the front entrance where a staff member quickly let them in.
Once inside, all of the staff members who had originally been there to see or hear about Eric's injuries a couple of days ago stared at him in shock at how normal his appearance was now, and they didn't move from their spots whatsoever.
"Don't worry about it, just tell me where I can find the girl who attacked me the other day." Eric walked to the woman over the counter and asked.
"Uh, she's in the hospital room down to the left." The woman blinked repeatedly a few times in confusion, still fixated on his appearance, before gesturing toward the general direction that Aurora was supposed to be in even though it was confidential information.
Eric simply smiled in response and then without hesitation, rushed over to the left and started looking inside the vacant hospital rooms one by one.
It didn't take long for Eric to find an occupied room however, and once he entered inside of it, he took the only sharp item that he was able to locate inside, which was a pen, and got ready to move the privacy curtain that was around the bed.
The moment Eric immediately pulled the curtain aside and lifted up the pen in a striking position, assuming that Aurora was most definitely going to try and counterattack or even be gone from the hospital entirely though, he froze up when he saw the sight before him.
Why?
It's because Aurora was sat up on her hospital bed with her eyes opened.
Now if that was all, Eric wouldn't of have hesitated like this.
But the thing was that... Aurora didn't even look like herself at all.
Instead, she had a somewhat distant, empty look in her eyes.
Moreover, when she saw Eric, and scanned his entire body up and down for a while before then glancing at both her injured arm for a few seconds, tears welled in her eyes.
But that was it.
She didn't even attempt to get up, defend herself, or move at all.
It was as if she had given up entirely and resolved to die here, just like that.
And Eric couldn't comprehend this behavior of hers to begin with at all.
Because he has read and followed Aurora's story all the way to its conclusion.
He had seen her ups and downs, her highs and lows, and even when she was at her most pitiful moments.
There were times when she even had to regress over thousands of times just to get rid of one single villain.
The odds had always seemed incredibly insurmountable at times, but even so, Aurora never let that get to her.
Even if Aurora was still weak minded especially very early on, if she were to die, she would prefer dying knowing that she at least tried everything she could, or something useful for that matter, and use what she had learned to become even a stronger person in the next regression.
That was how it was supposed to be, and why she never stopped fighting, not even once in all of her regressions, until she couldn't anymore.
Because she was what made the protagonist truly a protagonist in the first place.
And why he never even attempted to do anything else besides get rid of her to save his own life.
So how did he... mentally break her within such a short period of time this badly?
"Aria, by any chance, did you try and talk to her at any point within the last two days?" Eric slowly lowered the pen down but still stayed vigilant.
"...I did." Aria nervously answered after a moment of hesitation.
"And? Was she like this?" Eric questioned as he stared deep into Aurora's now dejected lifeless eyes.
"Yes... I tried talking to her multiple times after the doctors gave me permission to, but she's been like this every single time and wouldn't talk to me." Aria bit her lips and glanced at Aurora depressingly.
"I see... that's why you said that there was no stopping me earlier this morning..." Eric finally fitted the puzzle piece together and realized it.
Aria must've realized that her best friend was so mentally broken that it might've been doing a disservice to both him and Aurora if she were to try and stop it, especially considering that she doesn't even know why they were fighting in the first place.
'Hmm, and if that's the case then I should take advantage of this and get rid of her before she changes her mind and tries to go after me again.'
That was obviously the best solution here, and most likely the only solution if he wanted to live peacefully afterwards.
With that in mind, Eric did the only logical thing here, and raised the pen on his hand once again right in front of Aurora's face.
Then without hesitation, Eric quickly swung his arms and aimed the pen directly into her neck, all while both Aria and Aurora closed their eyes at the same time and gritted their teeth, waiting for the inevitable to finally come.
But no matter how long they waited, the sensation of the pen entering Aurora's flesh and blood or even someone's crying could not be heard at all.
Eventually, the curiosity got the better of Aria, and she opened her eyes first to see what was going on.
And from there, she saw that the pen Eric was holding was all the way up to Aurora's neck, only mere inches away from making contact with it.
However, Eric didn't seem to have any intention of pushing it in, and only stared at Aurora coldly as if he was contemplating about something.
Then after a very long sigh that definitely sounded like he lost interest or something, Eric retracted the pen from Aurora's neck, placed it back onto the table, and then left the room without saying another word.