Chapter 36: Valuable Helper
"Ahhh?"
Suddenly, a man with disheveled black hair and a drowsy face shot upright, sitting on the ground as he hurriedly glanced around. For some reason, he still felt weary, even though he had managed to sleep... quite peacefully.
The only thing that confuses him is how long he was sleeping...
This man was no other than Cillian.
"Ugh..."
Letting out a short groan, Cillian stabilized his thinking due to how chaotic they had become.
Once he managed to gather a certain amount of his thoughts, Cillian shook his head as he remembered what had happened
Only then did he truly become afraid, entirely different from the fearless action he had displayed inside the illusion.
He couldn’t remain calm at all.
He tried to, but failed to do it.
The different kinds of pain he encountered with every fake death were... demoralizing.
Or was it fake at all?
"Bluergh!"
Just the thought of it made him puke.
"Ugh"
Once he was done puking for almost a minute, as if he had just come from the worst hangover, Cillian’s eyes surveyed around the area and still found himself inside his club.
"I’m... still here?"
After a little more searching, he found three familiar faces scattered around the room. Vin was slumped over his desk, hugging a chair as if it were the most comfortable pillow in the world.
Phillip was lying on the floor, spreading his four limbs apart. Caspin was inside a cabinet, cooped up while in a fetal position.
All of them were still sleeping with a huge grin on their faces.
"You’re still here, duh. God didn’t take you with him."
"!"
Startled by the call, Cillian jolted and immediately tried to find the source of the voice, but to his suspicions, he couldn’t find anyone.
What made it more suspicious was that Cillian became certain it was near him, as if whispering beside his ear!
As of now, his thoughts have started to get clearer.
’The fuck! Have I gone insane now?!’
Cillian will eventually know if this was the mental toll he had to take after the series of deaths he had experienced, which slowly affected every part of his body and mind.
Who knows if this was the result?
Alas, he was wrong.
"You can definitely hear me. Why won’t you look here?"
Less surprised than earlier, Cillian traced the origin of his sound... at his shoulder.
Moving his eyes sideways, he watched a black, dried lip with a single obsidian-like eye in the middle staring back at him.
"Hi, it’s me."
"Oh, hey—"
Pak—!
Cillian smashed the eye away from his shoulder as if removing a pest that managed to climb onto his shoulder.
He didn’t even get to finish his reply.
The eye slammed into the stone wall, yet it didn’t suffer any kind of damage. Cillian, however, immediately decided to put as much distance between himself and it as possible.
"Man, what did I do? I just came to greet you, Cillian. This is me, Aiden!"
The lips pursed, the eye slightly saddened.
"Well, part of Aiden. I’m just a mere consciousness that has been divided. I’m only awake now, but I’m going to sleep most of the time since maintaining this...uwah, form will require a lot of energy. You really have to rub or shake for me to wake up. But that doesn’t even guarantee everything."
It dared yawn before adding.
"The main body is in that door. Look, I’m not laughing now, but the way we speak is the same, yeah?"
Cillian’s gaze shifted to one of the three spare rooms available inside his club room. One door was different.
It had an artistic design covered in a variety of colors, creating a strangely humorous appearance in some way. Even the doorknob and peephole had been painted over, blending into the colorful design.
All in all, if a person enters his club room, this will be the very first thing their eyes will set upon.
’This is not great,’
His club isn’t a center of attraction but an establishment focused on professional matters. He just managed to clinch a certain amount of influence over some people, but it might affect their reputation if their room looked like a circus.
"Can you...uh, do something about this?"
The eye rolled to the ground, and its pupil shook.
"No, he’s in the state of assimilating the Singularity into himself. It might take weeks or months, depending on how far he has come in his broken progress. Thankfully, it will not take years or decades to do so since he has been doing this for quite some time now. And he should not be disturbed. Disturb him and we’re all going to fucking die."
’Man, just say no. What’s with the long speech? And Singularity? That seems to be an important word...’
Cillian took a moment to gather his thoughts before speaking steadily. His mind had finally returned to normal, allowing him to push aside his nervousness for the time being.
"About the deal I made with him, did he leave it before he slumbered away?"
The eye, for some reason, let out a restrained scoff as if it couldn’t believe the words Cillian said.
As if hurt, the eye replied.
"I’m the deal, duh. I am a valuable helper, the artifact, and the information."
"..."
Cillian stared at the eye for a moment.
For some reason, he felt robbed by its words. He waited for a bit to see if the eye was lying, but eventually had to accept the fact that he might have been scammed.
’He made it look like the valuable helper, the artifact, and the information are three different things, not in the same quantity... God damn it. All the traumatic experience for just a single, stupid eye?!’
Cillian shot his gaze at the circus door.
’Can I disturb him to get the last laugh?’
Cillian had to set aside his dark thoughts and relax.
By the end of the day, he managed to get something out of Aiden as promised. He would’ve totally freaked out and let his dark thoughts run wild if Aiden somehow didn’t do the end of his bargain.
He might even tell the authorities at the school about this.
’Wait, will the same result happen if I didn’t bargain for anything? Will I wake up like today, but in a different scenario when the eye introduces itself as Aiden’s gift for helping? Very... cunning,’
Even though these were merely speculations, Cillian somehow believed the suggested plot he saw on webnovels.
It might be because Aiden is giving him a different kind of vibe than the rest of the people he has encountered.
At the very least, Aiden isn’t a dumb person.
With a regretful look of concluding that he was slightly manipulated in the end, Cillian threw a doubtful look at the eye.
"I get that you’re a valuable helper, much more an information teller, but I found it hard to believe that you’re an Artifact as well. If you are, what kind of uses do you have?"
As if proud to represent itself, the eye rolled a little closer and triumphantly sold itself to Cillian, trying to appear usable enough.
"My name is Mouthful Eye. I can lend you two abilities. They are Peering Eyes and Whispering Sphere. The former can perceive mid-level illusions that are enough to discern reality and fake, but anything higher than that is impossible.
Its next words made Cillian think differently about the Mouthful Eye’s uses.
"I can also peer through Categories Four Ruiners below and [Four] until [One] Piece, [Zero] excluded, though the process requires time. It would be better if I had to stay still while doing it.
"Pieces aren’t hard to peer through, but it still requires time. On the other hand, Ruiners are hard to peer through. The more complex the Piece and Ruiner’s powers are, the longer the time for each."
’Ohh, the possibilities!’
His mood heightened when he realized he had made a boon after being manipulated— no, for his temper to remain as it was, Cillian arranged to put it as ’rewarded’.
Yes, rewarded it is.
After being rewarded by Aiden, Cillian can think of a lot of possibilities to use this Artifact.
With this artifact’s function, he can peer through Category Four Ruiners and Pieces that are [Four] and below, [Zero] is not included.
Even though [Zero] is unavailable to know and the processes to do them are long, Cillian still felt glad.
In fact, he might’ve even found it disturbing if such limitations weren’t put on such an already god artifact, for him who was only starting as a Ruiner.
Nevertheless, this was already a boon! And it was one of the two usages of the artifact bestowed upon him!
There was another!
"Whispering Sphere is a concealment-type barrier that revolves around me. It obscures what others outside can hear from the inside. It will disrupt their hearing if curious individuals want to eavesdrop on the conversation happening inside. The size of the concealment is like this room. There’s no time limit, but I couldn’t be moved even an inch once this sphere is activated, or the concealment will be broken instantly."
’Not bad! Not bad!’
Right now, the resentment he had for Aiden instantly diminished, hoping to torment him once he was out is gone, replaced by a repeated gratitude ringing inside his head.
Throughout decades or even a century of roaming around this world, Cillian thanked his luck for the mysterious man to land upon him after all his adventures.
He was thankful enough to forget half the trauma he had gone through.
Still, bygones be bygones.
Now, another additional weapon has been added to his grasp, but he needed to study them in case there were surprises. Still, the description the eye shared is very straightforward and makes it easy for him to understand fully.
His happiness was short-lived, however.
Calming his raging emotions, Cillian only wished for one thing after all the usage of the eye had been explained to him.
’Don’t have severe negative effects...’
Artifacts have negative effects after all.
Crestfallen, Freya’s Artifact, is an example.
As if the mouthful eye understood his sudden change of demeanor, it explained and spoke grimly.
"I have two negative effects if used too much. First, the person became talkative. There will be instances when important information might slip your tongue, and it will be too late to realize it. Second... well, the wielder can hear unexplainable ravings that can somehow drive the person mad.
"But you don’t have to worry, you can only use my abilities if I am ’awake’. My eyes might open if you rub me, but I won’t be responsive, like what you’re thinking right now."
’Ahh, there it is,’
The first effect was doable, a reasonable negative effect even.
The second one, however, sounded very ominous. Ravings were already hard to hear, but the unexplainable part made it even more eerie.
’Oh goddamn it. Do I have to use it now?’
Still gladdened that he received his first-ever artifact that can be called his own, Cillian let his negativity shoo away in his head.
If it were to have negative effects like this, he could think of a way to use them at the right time and in the right places.
’Now is not the time, though. Speaking of time, I think it’s already morning. The others should not stay cooped up in this club any longer, with Caspin here as well.’
Cillian mused and immediately moved to wake the others, who were still asleep throughout the time. They all seemed very lively, though, making him regret waking them up.
’Oh right, I have the System—’
Just as he was about to look for his system, Mouthful Eye suddenly spoke.
"That’s right, you should wake them up. It’s been a few days since you four have been asleep."
On its way to shake Caspin, Cillian froze.
Brushing his ear to see if he had heard everything wrong, he made the eye compelled to answer by staring at it.
"What?"
"What do you mean, what?"
Mouthful Eye gave a clear answer.
"After the influence of the Singularity has been removed from this room and transferred to one of the spare ones, you all have been affected by it still. You should be happy that sleeping is all you get instead of coughing up blood."
It paused.
"Well, you did puke, but it’s not blood... so yehey, I guess?"
Cillian immediately realized how dire the current situation is at this point.
