Chapter 92: Fallen old people may be con men…or just weird
“Oh woe is me! Won’t anyone help an old man like me get back up on to his feet?,” the old musician bemoaned while dramatically sticking his arm outward as if he was calling for help.
Zhen Liu just stared at the old man’s action, his gut telling him that this was probably a con of some sort, especially since a certain voice in his head started talking again.
‘Con man thy name is thee,’ Zhen Liu thought while mentally grimacing at the old man flailing. It appears shameless scamming was another multiversal truth.
Zhen Liu immediately felt his left palm gathering…desire energy(?)…temptation particles(?)…whatever the hell kaijin cores were made of, but luckily his outfit for the day was loose enough that he quickly hid his hand in his shirt. Granted, he now looked like one of those vagabond type characters in an anime.
‘Ok I’m gonna need either pockets or figure out if there’s a way to do this without lighting up like a night parade…’
But while Zhen Liu was dealing with his new kaijin problems, the rest of his friends were being a tad more charitable to this old fellow, more specifically, Harriet and Alicia.
“Oh Mon dieu! Let us help you up, good sir. Alicia, mind lending me a hand?”
“Oh very-”
“Hang on, miss.”
Before Alicia could go and assist Harriet, Matilda put out an arm to stop her.
“Allow me to assist ver Poinette instead. Call it a maid’s intuition.”
Alicia rolled her eyes at her maid’s concern as she moved around her extended arm.
“Oh it’ll be fine Matilda, it’s just an old beggar.”
As Alicia made her way closer and closer to the beggar, the voice on Zhen Liu’s head made a weird announcement.
‘Well that’s fucking ominous,’ Zhen Liu thought as he began to tense up.
[Nepherage?]
[Yes, milord?]
[I think something’s gonna go down, get ready to move.]
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‘Come on, just a little closer…,’ Draigo thought to himself as the two young ladies walked over to help him up. ‘I’m just a helpless old man in need of assistance…’
Draigo made sure to keep one hand out and flailing about as a means to draw attention to it, so that his other hand could sneakily reach to his belt and grab something…sharp.
“Hey mister, are you o-”
*Swish! Swish!*
“Aiieeee!”
“What the hell?!”
“Got it!”
In one, unusually swift movement, Draigo had lashed out with a pair of scissors at the two young ladies and sliced away two locks of hairs from the each of them without drawing a single drop of blood, surprising everybody.
With the deed done, Draigo pocketed the locks, rolled backwards to a standing position and began to make his getaway, moving surprisingly fast for an old guy.
That did not however deter the Roaring Tider girl who was in Draigo’s immediate path from attempting to stop him.
“Stop right there!”
“Outta of the way!,” Draigo shouted as he slashed the pair of scissors at the girl like a knife.
This had the intended effect of causing her to step away in order to avoid the impromptu attack, but it also chopped off a few long strands of hair from her as well.
With his way now clear, Draigo kept running.
‘I can’t believe that wor-wait…what’s that sound?’
From behind and above Draigo came a strange whistling noise that sounded like it was getting closer and closer by the second.
He was just about to turn around and see what it was, until the answer landed in front of him like a descending demon. An apt analogy due to the thing landing in front of him was that weird monster that one of the Roaring Tide boys had summoned earlier. The beast was a few feet away from him, but he could still see the bloodthirstiness in it’s expression.
‘Shit!’
“He’s cornered, get him!”
The two young Roaring Tide men came rushing towards him, rage in their eyes and fists clenched, ready to beat the living shit out of him!
‘Dammit! It’s been years since I did this, but I gotta try.’
With a monstrous being blocking from the front, a pair of strapping, bloodthirsty young men were about to catch up, Draigo did something unexpected and slung one of the instruments on his back to his front, a very strange looking shamisen made of a crab shell and strange mottled skin over it, and grabbed a paddle seemingly out of nowhere.
‘Here goes, [Shock Chord]!’
He struck the shamisen with an unusual amount of force, releasing a sound wave of aether that carried the taste of “fear” in it.
“Ah! What the hells?!”
“GAAAH! MY HEAD!”
“Grr-griiiick?!”
It had caused one of the Roaring Tide boys to momentarily twitch from the sound and stop running.
The other one however started freaking out as if a splitting headache just decided to manifest out of nowhere. Weirdly enough, his movements synced up to the monster who was also griping his head in pain.
‘What the?! No, no time for this…I have to run!’
Draigo was shocked at this sudden turn of events, but not for long. He quickly took back to running now that his pursuers were more less incapacitated.
‘What the hell was that though?,’ he couldn’t help but wonder.
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“Zhen Liu! Are you okay?!,” Zhen Hai asked as he noticed his cousin going from commanding his puppet to screaming in pain. He wasn’t sure what had just happened, but it seemed whatever that old bastard as causing Zhen Liu an immense amount of pain.
“GAAAH, MY HEAD!,” Zhen Liu cried as he felt as if an elephant was bouncing around inside his head. The moment that old man played that chord, a weird feedback occured through Zhen Liu’s bond with Nepherage, which quickly translated into an intense amount of pain.
The worst part was, Zhen Liu didn’t understand how or why it happened!
[Milord…my core…hurts!,] Nepherage grunted as she copied Zhen Liu’s movement of pain.
‘Your…core?’
Zhen Liu tried to piece together what she meant as he fought the splitting headache. Thankfully, the voice provided clarity.
A feeling of relief soon washed over Zhen Liu as the feedback coming from Nepherage began to lessen and lessen until it was back to normal. This entire experience was however exhausting to both man and kaijin, as the two both fell to the floor, breathing heavily as they used their palms to keep themselves up.
“Zhen Liu, do you need a doctor?”
“I’m fine, Zhen Hai. Just…a passing pain.”
It was in this moment, Zhen Liu learned that his abilities weren’t unbeatable, rather it had a very weird weakness.
‘Music, huh? How…poetic.’
