He asked himself again as he staggered like a drunkard, "What is happening here? I’m going to go mad, I don’t understand anything! Who took Jane? And what do they want from her? And did I really meet them, or is all this a figment of my imagination? I have to wake up. I’m hallucinating. There’s nothing real. There are no superpowers, no one who can’t be hit by bullets, and no girl who can stop time. It must be because I play a lot of virtual reality games. Reality and fiction have mixed from sitting on these games so much. This must be what happened. But where am I then?"
And as he thought about what had happened, he decided to kill himself, believing that this might wake him from his dream or from his hallucination, and thus he would wake up from this bad dream now.
For the first time in his life, a deep despair overwhelmed him, pushing him to kill himself. He reasoned that perhaps he was inside one of the realistic fiction games that had become so widespread in this era, and maybe someone was joking with him with a new game with a unique idea that no one had ever done before. And maybe this game wanted to put the person in a state of feeling danger and being lost until it succeeded in conveying its message.
This seemed realistic to him. Perhaps he was trapped inside one of the games, and all he had to do was kill himself to get out of this ridiculous game.
He pointed the pistol directly under his mouth and closed his eyes, then took a deep breath and began to slowly press the trigger.
But before he pressed it completely, he heard the sound of footsteps coming from behind.
He woke up from what he was doing, and his human instinct for survival took over. He aimed his pistol at the sound, waiting for the person coming from the end of the alley, and said to himself, "What are these misfortunes that come one after another?"
The sound of footsteps slowly approached. He heard the voice of the approaching person calling out, "Is there anyone here?"
When Noor heard what he said, he realized that he was a lost person like himself in the midst of this madness. He said to himself, "His situation is like mine. He seems to be one of the eight, but who?"
He appeared in front of him, and Noor was still aiming his weapon. He couldn’t trust anyone now, that’s what he told himself.
The person in front of him looked to be in his thirties, tall, wearing glasses for vision, his hair short and combed back, and his features were Asian and seemed to be completely peaceful. He was not wearing strange clothes like the cloaked figure, but ordinary clothes; a white shirt and black jeans.
Noor kept his weapon aimed even after he saw him, his eyes widening in surprise. He said in a trembling tone, "Is that you, Keno? I can’t believe you’re still alive! You’ve changed so much, I barely recognized you."
"Noor, I finally found you," he said, raising his hands in complete surrender. "I came to help you. You’ve changed a lot too. Have you found the others?"
"Jane was kidnapped a little while ago and may be dead," Noor said, looking at him with a broken gaze, sadness slowly eating at his heart. "And Ivanov was kidnapped by some robots. As for the rest, I don’t know."
Keno’s expression changed slightly, and he said, not believing what he had heard, "What? How did this happen?"
Noor told him his story from the time he left the tower until now.
Keno was surprised by Jane’s kidnapping by one of the Enix members and felt sorry for Noor. He saw that it was difficult for a young man like him to go through such incomprehensible circumstances, but as he had learned from his life and what he had been through, the human being can endure any circumstances, no matter what. It just depends on the psychological limitations that a person places on himself and on his ability to adapt and adjust to them, no matter how difficult they are.
He broke the silence to relieve Noor’s sadness, saying, "We will find her, don’t worry, and we will understand what is happening here."
"How did you find me?" Noor asked, reproaching him. "And why didn’t you find me an hour before this happened?"
"It’s a long story, but I wouldn’t have found you if I hadn’t heard the sound of gunfire coming from here. I went, hoping to find someone in trouble. I pinpointed your location, but it was very far away, so I walked for a while until I got here."
Noor put his hand on his face and laughed sarcastically. "In trouble, you say? What an irony of fate."
Noor sat with his back against the wall.
Keno said, adjusting his glasses, "You said the golden robot saved you, right? So you met Leonis."
"Leonis?" Noor said, furrowing his brows. "Who is that?"
"The golden robot that saved you and your friend from the spider robot. I met him on my way. He is the good type, unlike the rest of the robots. I asked him to help me find you. He took off quickly and left me, saying he would come back with all of you, and I mean all the eight. But he hasn’t come back yet, and it seems things have gotten a little out of control."
Noor was silent for a moment, lost in thought. Then he broke the silence, saying, "So this strange golden robot that saved us from death is called Leonis! But how did you meet him? And why is he helping us? Aren’t the robots our enemies here? I don’t know how it started, or how there are strange robots roaming our streets and attacking everyone they see! And I also don’t know why I don’t remember anything about my arrival here, or where I was last time before I woke up in this tower?"
"I think you’ll want to hear what I’ve learned from Leonis," Keno replied in a calm tone. "But the truth may actually terrify you. Do you want to hear it?"
"Of course I do," Noor replied in a quick, firm tone. "There won’t be anything more terrible than what has happened so far."
Keno smiled sarcastically, a hint of turmoil in his expression. "Believe me, you will be shocked by the truth. And you may also find out where your friend went, but I can’t confirm that this is..."
"What, do you know where Jane went?" Noor interrupted, roaring. "Is she alive?"
Keno raised his hand, signaling him to calm down. "I’m sorry to disappoint you, but I don’t know where she is. But what I’m about to tell you might make you guess where she might have gone."
He jumped to his feet quickly in excitement and said to him, "Then what’s holding you back? Tell me everything now! I have to get revenge on that bastard."
Keno sighed deeply, crossed his arms, and said, "Alright, I’ll tell you everything from the beginning."