The real you – Chapter 15

After concluding that this was another stupid mental challenge against me, I let out a sigh and then sternly looked at the girl, who did not fret about charging towards me at top speed.

She had transformed her sword back into its solid sword form, and then, with two jumps, she closed her distance and attempted to cut my neck. But to her disappointment, I was able to avoid getting cut by simply leaning backwards, avoiding unnecessary movements. Then, in return, I kicked her stomach before she could back away from me.

"Nguuh!"

The pink-haired girl was pushed back, spit coming out of her mouth from the powerful kick that came right into her stomach. But after a brief moment, she stood on her feet before realizing that she couldn't defeat me in close combat. So, without wasting any more time, she transformed her sword back into its whip form while glaring at me.

So that thing can still resent the fact that I was able to attack her?

A bit curious to know what kind of monster or illusion that girl was, I braced myself for the following attack. From where she stood, she swung her sword, her whip almost reaching me in an instant if it weren't for me changing positions.

Her movements and attacks, while were rather precise, had also become faster, leaving me with no other choice but to run around in circles. But that didn't leave the girl standing, as she persisted in aiming my legs in order to prevent me from running away.

While trying to run away from her whirling whip blades, I kept my eyes on her movements and the style of attack she would use. And from what I understood so far, that girl must've been training for this sort of skill for a long time, if not gifted by this illusion itself. But even so, with just a flick of her wrist, she was able to change the direction of her whip blades and move them around in a way that should be physically impossible.

Even I am not able to do that sort of thing without using my whole arm and a lot of force for a full-out swing. And that sole attempt would only make the whip move in one direction, leaving me vulnerable in the end. But this girl, on the other hand, had complete control of her whip blades, to the point where she was able to make precise attacks with no problem.

Once I got a good idea of how this girl uses her whip, I came to a stop, avoiding the upcoming blades one more time before charging directly towards her head. She attempted to cut me down as a response by tangling her blades all over the place. However, I easily managed to go through her attacks, avoiding the blades that were moving like tentacles in all directions. In an instant, I closed the gap between us within two seconds and swiftly kicked her wrist, causing her sword to fly off her hand.

She looked at my attack in disbelief before glaring back at me. She tried embracing herself for what was about to come. Before she could even move an inch, I punched her in the solar plexus, sending her breathless to the ground.

I knew that she would take a minute to recover, so I jumped on top of her body and tried restraining her with my hands in order to take a closer look at her.

I was expecting her to be some sort of illusion or even a monster, but from what I was feeling... 

She was warm and soft…. Incredibly soft…

And on top of that, she seemed like a master of the whip-sword, with barely any muscles in her arms. On top of that, she also smelled really good.

This is the first time that a monster had resembled another human this closely… I'm seriously in disbelief.

After a few more seconds, the girl below me was beginning to regain her breathing, realizing that she had been pinned down by me.

"You never thought you would be caught like this, did you?"

"....Ugh… N-no…"

I was expecting her to either remain silent or let out growling sounds like a monster after being caught like this. But the moment she responded with a human-like whine, her face filled with fear and despair, something snapped inside of me.

The scared expression on her face resembled the mental attacks I received from those glassy entities. It was an expression that, despite being a monster, my heart couldn't help but ache with anxiety and regret.

"...why…."

".....Sniff… Ugh…"

"....Why the fuck are you making that expression?"

"...please… *Sniff* d-don't hurt…. M-me…."

"Why am I feeling like this!?" I snapped at her, my eyes glaring at her pitiful, sorrowful cries. "Explain what you did to me! These emotions do not belong to me!"

As I was trying to get some sort of response from the terrified girl below me, my body began to tremble, my arms got weaker, and I let my guard down for a split second. In that instant, her tearful expression changed back to its stern one, seizing the opportunity to break free. Swiftly, she escaped my grasp and landed a knee strike on my balls.

"Ugh!"

Feeling stunned for half a second, that was enough for the girl to quickly regain her composure and take back her whip sword, which was lying some meters away from her.

On the other hand, I grunted for a split moment before also taking the katana from the ground and looking at the girl who was about to charge at me once again, almost as if she wasn't begging me not to kill her a few moments ago.

It somehow pissed me off. But in the end, I already knew that this was also part of the dungeon's mind games.

With what little hope I had left, I exhaled and glared at the pink-haired girl. She, on the other hand, didn't waste any time but took one step forward, which allowed her to flick her wrist and extend her sword into its longest whip form. And without letting the momentum of her whip go down, she launched the whip filled with blades toward me.

I could guess that this girl was trying to somehow restrain my options of running away and instantly cutting me apart. But from my experience fighting countless monsters and human-looking ones, this level of attack was nothing to me.

So with a swift move to the side, I dodged the moving blades and shot one bullet at her. The bullet precisely hit the handle of her whip sword, which caused her to drop her sole weapon. This earned me the chance to quickly jump at her and restrain her body by hovering over her chest and using my body weight to prevent her from moving.

Her face expression quickly changed into a scared one, similar to the one she tried tricking me. 

But I had already made my resolve.

"...ugh… *Sniff* Don't h-hurt me."

"...Too bad that we didn't get to know each other." I sternly stared right into her eyes. "We could've gotten along."

And since I didn't want to see this girl, I held my katana with one hand upside down and thrust it deep into her heart. Her eyes widened for a split second before the light in her eyes faded away, and her tears became dry in an instant.

It's over.

My eyes remained shut for a few seconds before I swung the blood away from my katana and sheathed it back inside. 

I quickly got up from the corpse of what I thought was a cute girl and looked at the door that appeared in the center of the room.

I was confused for a half-second as to why the dungeon had become this easy. I thought that something bigger and stronger would appear next. But the fact that the door that leads me back to the mansion appeared proved that I had conquered this dungeon and completed its challenge for me.

Maybe it didn't expect me to be this cold towards another fake humanoid girl? Yeah, that must've been it…

I let out another sigh, then walked towards the door that would lead me back to the mansion. I wanted to let out some stress by killing lots of monsters. But from what I could see, even the dungeon wasn't going to make this easier for me.

As I opened the door and prepared to leave, something suddenly caught my ears.

"...So…ra."

I quickly turned around and saw the corpse of the girl still laying dead in the same position. I was sure that she was dead, so I figured that she wasn't the one trying to trick me. 

Is this another trick from the dungeon that could keep me trapped inside? No, thank you. I don't think I plan on returning here for another ten years. So good luck with that.

"...Sora…"

But right as I was about to re-enter the door and close it, I heard her voice once again calling out my name. 

I knew that this was another trick from the dungeon. 

I knew it very well!

But why!?

Why does it hurt so much when I hear her voice calling out to me?

"...Sora."

I clenched the wooden door, which I was trying to close, before finally making up my mind. I turned around and looked around the heart of this maze filled with mirrors.

Even if this was another trick from the dungeon, somehow I simply couldn't turn a blind eye to this. 

"...Sora!"

From what I could hear, the voice was definitely coming from one of the mirrors, so I decided to look around and see if someone else was going to come out of it.

I didn't really have any high expectations, but still. I knew that I wouldn't be able to rest at all if I didn't go through it until the very end. So I began looking around the mirrors, hoping to find something other than my reflection.

"...Sora… can you hear me?"

And just when I was wondering when I was going to hear her voice again, I turned my eyes to a mirror to the side and saw the same pink-haired girl. The one I had killed was still lying some meters away from here, so I knew that she wasn't the same one.

"Sora! I'm over here! Can you hear me?!"

And just when I met her eyes, I couldn't help but feel my heart beating really fast. 

"Yes, I can hear you."

Her eyes lit up with hope the moment I responded to her. It almost felt like she was truly happy that I was able to see her. She was holding her hands against the mirror, as if she wasn't able to come through like the previous one.

And I, on the other hand, couldn't help but also put my hands against the mirror, trying to somehow reach out to her hands. And to my surprise, instead of meeting a cold surface, my hands felt the warmth of another pair of soft, bruised hands. All of our fingers wrapped against one another, and in the next moment, I began pulling her out of the mirror.

Her face, which somehow felt relieved to see me, quickly turned into tears as she wrapped her arms around my chest and rested her head against me.

"You dummy! I'm so glad that I found the real you. *Sniff* I'm so glad."

And as I returned her comfort to the crying girl, something went like a shock to my mind before I realized what was going on. I felt really stupid for not realizing it sooner.

"I'm sorry for making you wait… Aoi…"

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Author's Thoughts:

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