Their First Meeting.

[3:52 p.m.].

Looks like I barely made it.

After checking the time on his phone, Shade finally breathes out a sigh of relief.

In a hurry, he had made a sprint from his home to the library he suspected.

The place wasn't very far away but it wasn't the closest library from his home so he was completely unknown to this place.

"Huff, huff." Taking a few deep breaths he continued his search.

Even though his body was exhausted, he looked through different sections of the library trying to find something.

[3:57 p.m.]

Mere 3 minutes were left from the scheduled time to end, which was when he found the person he was searching for.

Looking around, the place was quite empty. Nearly 4 in the afternoon was perhaps not a time when most regular readers were active in this library.

The answer to Chandler's puzzle was the only person sitting in the area.

Sitting near the biography section, was a girl with silver hair who looked around the age of Shade while being surrounded by mountains of books placed around her.

Hastening his steps, Shade took a seat beside her and looked at her, his eyes shining in anticipation.

As he sat beside her, she slowly raised her gaze from the printed words of the book she was reading to the glistening eyes of Shade.

"?!"

Her scarlet scarlet eyes glared at the odd stranger looking at her for a response.

Struck with the sudden moment of awkwardness, Shade lowered his head looking at the table.

Sitting right beside her when the whole library is dead empty may have not been the best idea I could've come up with.

He cursed at his actions in his mind while trying not to make it obvious.

Ignoring Shade's actions, the girl simply shrugs and continues focusing on her book as if nothing ever happened.

Scary and beautiful. Seeing her the first time, he could only define her as such.

Like a bright red rose with a dozen intimidating thorns attached to protect her.

Experiencing her gaze firsthand, Shade felt like being pricked by one of such thorns, when her sharp eyes glared at him.

*Beep* *Beep*

Breaking the tension, the sound of an alarm starts ringing on the girl's phone.

[4:00 p.m.]

It was now officially the end of time Chandler wrote.

Taking a deep breath, Shade spoke.

"Chandler sent me here."

She looks at him and continues to wrap up her work.

"Why, why did Chandler die?"

He asked but no reply came.

Completing arranging the books, she finally looks back at him.

"So what's your role?"

"Role?"

"Chandler, didn't say anything about your role?"

Furrowing his brows, he pretends to think over her words while he celebrated inside.

If she said something like "Who is Chandler?" or "What do you mean, you creep?!" I would have just ran back home crying out of embarrassment.

But he kept a hard expression on the outside.

"I'm not sure…"

"…"

"He asked me to come to the biography section of this library before 4 today."

"And that's it?"

"Yes, I want to know why the accident happened to him and did he really know about it beforehand."

After pausing for a second he added.

"And also who are you?"

"Hmm… who do you think I am?" She replied back with a question.

Holding back his dissatisfied expression, he thought clearly.

Was she the person who is responsible for his death?

No, there were too many contradictions.

Then a person who was mixed with Chandler in whatever conspiracy they were involved in?

Probably not, she wouldn't have asked his role in that case.

His thoughts were all jumbled up but the longer he thought, the more obvious it became, he already knew who she was before even meeting her.

Looking at her with a smug face, Shade opened his mouth.

"You asked me my role, you don't know what you're doing here either."

She is another participant.

Letting out a "Hmph" sound, she picks up a pile of books she arranged and hands it to Shade.

"Follow me."

"Eh?"

The books are heavier than she made it look.

Shade was in awe with how easily she handed the books over but he didn't voice out anything.

Without putting on any resistance, Shade obediently followed behind her while she put the books back at their places.

After that was complete, she then started talking with someone she knew at the library and then finally left the library.

During the entire time of following behind her, his ears were up, patiently catching the sound of each tick made by the clock.

"I'm Irina Lister, please call me Irina."

Switching her tone, she gave a formal introduction.

"…I'm Shade."

"Then Shade, can we talk at your house?"

"M-my house??"

"If it's not a problem. We have to discuss a lot of things."

"Okay."

Coming to the library, helping her, waiting for her conversation with her friend to end…

He made mental notes in his mind.

Regardless of his choice, he wanted to at least respect Chandler's last wish by figuring out about his death so he agreed pretty quickly.

"First of all let me confirm this, Chandler is dead?"

"Yes, the news came from his own sister so it's not false."

"Do you know about the thing he carried and called a 'Relic'?"

"No."

"I see."

Throughout the way, Irina continued to ask a few more questions out of the blue.

To some questions, Shade thought out his answers and to some he replied back in a word or two.

After a 20 minutes walk back, Shade still walked nervously beside her.

"My home's here." He points at the house ahead.

"Then the last question for now, did you receive the dice?"

"The black one?"

"Yes."

"I did, it's with me."

"I see…"

Is it really okay, bringing her to my home?

Rather than her questions, Shade was busy questioning his past judgement.

Fortunately for Irina, because of that he missed the sinister smile that had unconsciously formed on her face.