The students continued to fight against each other with a lot of teamwork to achieve good grades for the exam. Not everyone was as extraordinary as Kye and his group, but the students were content with good grades because they guaranteed a good future. Unfortunately, for them, this would make them ordinary people for the rest of their lives.
That was how the second day of the competition started. The first day had stopped around 3 p.m. to allow people to rest a little bit. As there were too many students in the academy, there was no need to rush things.
As a result, there were no interesting fights, at least not as thrilling as those from the first day when numerous famous people fought against each other with extraordinary abilities. And so the third day of the competition started.
However, things didn't go as planned.
Everything came to a halt when someone was found dead right before the students could fight again.
"Do you know what happened?" asked one student.
"Did something happen?" asked another.
"You guys don't know?" asked a third.
Students started talking among themselves while the teachers held a meeting after making the competition halt.
"How can something like this happen!?" Azul slammed his hand on the table in front of him. Even though the person who died wasn't close to him in any way, she was still part of the Viso family. "Who killed Maria!"
His tone made it look like he wasn't asking anymore but was commanding others to tell him the answer.
"Please, calm down, Sir Azul. You might know that we wouldn't hold this meeting if we already knew who the culprit was," Tarica answered calmly. She was used to such meetings, so it wouldn't be a small human who would make her shiver.
"How dare you speak so informally to me, you bitch!" Azul was about to use his ability but was stopped by Tarica's smile.
Her smile was genuine, but her closed eyes emitted so much killing intent that he almost wet his pants.
"How in the world could she emit so much killing intent without even looking straight at me?" he wondered.
"Azul, please calm down," the headmaster asked him this time. The headmaster wasn't a pushover, so if Azul didn't calm down right now, he knew that things would become worse for him. "We're holding this meeting to know who killed Maria Viso, not to quarrel between each other."
Azul reluctantly calmed down, but his fists were still tightly clenched. The headmaster continued speaking, "We have gathered some evidence and have some leads, but we need to investigate further to confirm who the culprit is. Until then, we will have to put the competition on hold."
"The only question is for how long?" Tarica continued as the headmaster nodded in agreement. "We all know that it's not wise to keep this atmosphere, knowing that students may already be speculating among themselves. And it won't be far-fetched to say that they probably already know who died."
"What do you suggest, then?" Azul asked with an angry tone
"To calm the students first and then hide the body. None of the students have seen the body yet, so not a single one of them knows that it's a monster that killed this little girl."
"What?"
"A monster?"
"Are you kidding me?"
The meeting went into an uproar as everyone started talking among themselves, with fear slowly overcoming them. Even the headmaster was surprised by Tarica's statement.
"I knew you were not the brightest, but I didn't expect this level of idiocy," Azul chuckled as he looked at the headmaster to confirm his words. However, the headmaster had a serious face. After all, Tarica looked like someone who had a lot of experience in this field. He had never heard of her during the war, but he knew that she must have had a very good reason to hide during the war, or at least, not fight on the frontline.
"Would you please explain why you think it's a monster, Miss Tarica?" The headmaster asked her after everyone had calmed down a bit.
"I knew that humans were slow, but I didn't expect this level of ignorance," Tarica sighed as she stood up. She then clapped her hands, and a golden screen appeared out of thin air.
"As you can see, this is Maria Viso's dead body." The screen showed exactly what Tarica had said. It was Maria's naked body with wounds all over her body. "You can see wounds all over her body as if she had been tortured by someone. However, most of them are self-inflicted wounds."
"What do you mean?" The headmaster asked, looking at Azul to help calm him down.
"The wounds on her shoulders were caused by herself." The screen zoomed in on her shoulders before going to her hands. "You can see here that her fingers, and more precisely, her nails are torn because of how much she scratched herself. She did it so much that she opened many wounds on both shoulders, leading to excessive bleeding."
"Unfortunately for her, it was only the beginning of her pain. While we can assume that those wounds are self-inflicted because of trauma, we can't say the same for other wounds." The screen then went to show her ears. Inside them, a transparent liquid could be seen.
"This liquid isn't visible with the naked eye under normal circumstances, but only by changing the composition of a few gadgets could it be seen." She explained. "Now tell me, do you think this is body fluid?" She looked at everyone to see if there was an answer, but no one knew. After all, they had never heard of or seen such body fluids. Not even the doctor who was present in the meeting.
"So, as you may have concluded, no, it's not body fluid." A swipe of her hand made a new screen appear. "This microscopic bug, or should I call it a monster, is called Zaionistazer." Everyone gasped upon hearing this. After all, they had never heard of insect-like monsters. "For those who are curious, it's a new type of monster that appeared not too long ago, only three years ago to be more precise, so it's normal if you've never heard of it."
The chatter spread once again among the people present in the meeting. But unlike earlier, their tone was far worse.
"Are monsters evolving?" a teacher asked.
"We've been at peace for approximately a decade now, but they're still trying to attack us?" Another teacher was scared.
"What should we do..."
"Now now everyone please stay with me." Tarica's smile made everyone's expression loosen up a little. "I know it's hard to believe, but even we find it not too long ago on another planet."
"Can you tell us more details about this monster?" The headmaster asked with an even more serious face than earlier.
"Absolutely. The Zaionistazer was first discovered when people started mutilating themselves for no apparent reason. To be more specific, there wasn't any type of trauma to cause such things. A completely sane man for example would become mentally ill the moment the Zaionistazer secreted its fluid into someone." She explained in such a way that it was very easy to understand. "And as you might have noticed, the Zaionistazer is so small that we can't see it, unless we're very cautious about such microscopic things."
"And so once someone is infected by this monster, the only outcome is their death because of self-mutilation."
"And how do you know that, huh?" Azul scuffed. "You just came a few days ago and bring foreign information like this. Do you think any of us will believe in you?"
Everyone agreed and nodded their head when they heard Azul's statement. As he said, there was no concrete proof.
"If so, please play with a Zaionistazer for a bit. We'll see if this is real or not." Tarica snap her fingers and a jar appeared out of thin air and fell on Azul's hands.
At first glance, it seems like the jar was empty, but if one were to look a little bit more closely, one would easily see that there was something inside of it.
"Is this the Zaionistazer that killed Maria?"
"How can such small things kill a human?"
"It's sometimes the tiniest things that are the most dangerous, remember that." She rolled her eyes at the teachers who shut their mouths immediately. "While you guys are enjoying peace, the monsters are preparing for another war. It might be in ten years, twenty years, or even tomorrow, but if things go like this, you'll be the one to die for unknown reasons."
The headmaster thought carefully about all the information he got from Tarica. She was truly like an angel who came to save them at the right moment. Without her, all the military would have probably died already.
"I'm grateful for all the things you have done for us, miss Tarica. All the information you provided to us will be rewarded greatly, I'll make sure of that, you can rest assured." He looked at Tarica who didn't answer as she knew that he wanted to continue to say something else. "But I'll still ask for another favor..." The fact that the headmaster of this base was asking for a favor, and not ordered Tarica showed how great the latter was in the first place.
"I'm listening to you, headmaster, but I can't guarantee you anything."
The headmaster nodded and took a deep breath. "Could you please inspect everyone on this base and eradicate all the Zaionistazer, please?"
Tarica smiled as she had another idea in mind.
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