Chapter 127 - Recommend Against
"Ah, you're here," the fuckers who didn't get the memo aka the members of the New Dawn Guild greeted Azell.
To be more precise, they were Noelle, Vafferan, Neia and Arteria.
While only one member was invited from each organisation, there were five from the New Dawn Guild.
It wasn't that they were given special treatment and provided extra tickets to this event; it was just that these four women were pretty influential in their own right.
That just showed how special the New Dawn Guild was.
"Oh, look, your harem is here," Jennifer grinned at her own joke.
"Ah, so you're here as well," Vafferan sighed.
"What's with the sigh?" Jennifer asked, appearing to be a bit hurt. "You're acting like you're not happy to see me."
"Huh, to think I'd live to see a day when you of all people would pick up on the hidden implication behind a statement," Arteria replied before Vafferan could.
"…You seem different," Jennifer scowled.
"Thanks. I've been following a new skin care routine lately."
Obviously, the difference Jennifer was talking about wasn't her skin, though to be honest, Arteria's soft, supple, fair skin glowed like a baby's, making anyone who cared even a small bit about their skin care routine jealous of it; courtesy of her new heart, of course.
Jennifer had actually commented on how the air around Arteria was different than the last time she had seen her. It seemed the latter had grown stronger.
"Would you care to share your skin care routine?"
"That's a secret," Arteria winked.
She couldn't really ask Jennifer to get a motherfucking heart transplant, after all.
That would be a bruh moment.
"Anyway, if you'll excuse us," Noelle said as she took a seat beside Azell.
The rest followed the same pattern until everyone was seated.
"Do you know what we're here for?" Neia whispered to Arteria.
The Dragon had taken some tips from Sam on the art of lying and decided to practice them today.
"Nope. What about you?" Arteria asked Vafferan.
"None of us know what they're going to reveal today. So, let's just wait and see," Vafferan made the mature call.
Wow.
Some time passed as the six people chatted among themselves, until the time of the reveal, as stated in the invitation, arrived.
As soon as it did, the lights in the hall dimmed, and so did the chatter of the people in the hall.
"Now, for the event you have all been waiting for," suddenly, a voice resounded inside the large hall.
Spotlights lit the stage as the curtains raised and revealed a man behind them.
"Let's begin, shall we?"
The attendees looked at him with bated breath at the man draped in a long cape and a white mask hiding his face.
Jennifer immediately tried to use magic to see through his disguise.
'What?' She furrowed her brows as her magic was effortlessly cancelled.
The man glanced at her and his eyes squinted as if he was smirking, then he went back to look at the rest of the audience.
"Good evening, ladies and gentleman. I'm your host today," he bowed slightly. "Who am I, you ask? Well, my identity does not matter; what matters is what I'm going to present to you today."
"What is it?" Someone from the audience asked.
"Believe me, monsieur. I am just as eager to present it as you are to see it. But there are some steps which have to be followed."
"What steps?" It was Jennifer who asked that.
The man looked at her and simply snapped his fingers.
Suddenly, from behind him, a flurry of papers burst out.
'Oh?' Jennifer raised her eyebrow as that little trick elicited gasps from the audience.
The white sheets of paper continued revolving around the man for some moments before suddenly ascending to the ceiling.
From there, like meteors falling through the night sky (but less amazing), the white sheets descended on the audience, until each of them had one of them floating before them.
"These are contracts," the man said as the sheets fell on their laps. "To be more precise, they are non-disclosure agreements. By signing them, you will agree to not disclose anything you see and hear here today."
"And what happens if we don't sign it?" Jennifer asked.
In events such as these, it was her role as the leader to ask questions on the behalf of the members of her faction.
"Then with an apology for wasting your time, we will escort you out of the premises," the man replied.
"Can you, though?" Jennifer smirked as she released a tiny bit of her bloodlust on the man.
"Well," the man looked at her unflinchingly, "if you want to raise a commotion in the Royal Castle, then you're welcome to do so."
"I don't fear the Crown."
"You don't, but what about your Guild? Are you sure you want to risk the lives of your followers over your petty pride?"
"Is that a threat?"
"It's the reality. The choice, ultimately, depends on you," the man shrugged. "Let me assure you, however, that the thing we're going to reveal today is more than worth your sign on a non-disclosure agreement."
"Hmm," Jennifer cupped her chin. "Well, I'll need to check the contract first."
She wasn't really serious about what she had said before; it was just a way to gauge this man through his reactions.
"Please take your time," he looked back at the rest of them. "All of you are advised to look through the contract and ascertain that it's nothing more than a non-disclosure agreement. Only then should you sign it."
Heeding his words, everyone took their contract and started reading through it.
Azell, by the way, already knew what was on the contract- he had helped create it, after all. But he still took it and read through it to keep up the charade.
"About the final clause," Jennifer again spoke up. "It says that breaking this agreement will lead to severe consequences."
"There would be no point in making you sign an agreement if we didn't punish you for breaching it."
"Yes, but what are the consequences this contract speaks of?"
Jennifer asked both for herself and her fellow Guild Masters. The last thing she wanted was for them to do something stupid and jeopardise the Player faction's position.
"In precise terms, if you ever speak about what you see, hear, feel, interpret et cetera from today's event to an outsider, your soul will burst apart. You will feel pain worse than a million years long torture within a fraction of a second before dropping dead."
"…"
"Also, since your soul would have disintegrated, you will no longer be a part of the cycle of life and death. Your existence itself will be erased from the world. No one, not even the world, will remember that you ever existed."
Neia shuddered as she imagined her existence itself being denied.
"So yea, I'd recommend against opening your mouth."
Wow.
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