From Player To Npc

Chapter 95: Darkroom

Shingi started getting back his senses, and then he noticed that he wasn't in Zhen's lab anymore.

He was in the darkroom, the same as before he wakes up to his NPC body for the first time.

For a second, he thought that maybe everything was a dream that his mind played from being stuck in that place for too long, but a System notification appeared.

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Because of the upgrade, sNPC#12 has been set to sleep mode for 24 hours.

During that period, every ability, passive or active, is inaccessible.

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Shingi tried to open his Status window, but it seemed he couldn't access that either.

He could only open a System window showing him the remaining time on his sleep mode.

As time passed, his ordinarily calm and serious attitude got replaced with one of fear.

He had spent a lot of time in this Dark Room and didn't like the quiet, not anymore.

He had made new friends and got used to being around them, so not having the option to see them seemed to have hurt him more than it would in the past.

He wasn't able to use his VISUALISATION skill or a minor illusion, but he tried to focus on the memories of everyone to keep his mind sane.

He started thinking about how he met his students and the rest of his allies and the small adventures he had with them.

Then when he started thinking about his NPC sister, a System notification appeared.

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SCRY OPTION ENABLED

Do you want to use SCRY at sNPC#1?

YES / NO

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Shingi was aware of what SCRY was as it was a Master Grade Spell and actually one of the most difficult to learn.

The Spell would allow the user to focus on a target and see what it was doing at that moment, but the user had to be somewhat familiar with the target, or the Spell would have a chance not to work.

Shingi was interested in it and to make sure if his suspicion for the identity of sNPC#1 was correct.

He knew from Night Wind that sNPC were the Special NPCs made like him.

After he picked to accept, a bigger window appeared in front of him like a screen, and he could see himself, or more specifically his NPC body, on the bed in his room at his NPC house.

Aneta seemed to examine his current situation with Wild Tycoon, and Hineko seemed to be anxious to hear her findings.

But Shingi didn't stay for long as his point of view was turned away, and he started being raised in the air. He passed through the ceiling but without causing any damage.

Then after went quite some distance in the air, his sight started flying in a specific direction. He wasn't controlling where he was going but just seeing like through a drone recording its trip.

The speed started being increased as he couldn't take the details of what they were passing, but he soon Understood where his SCRY was leading him to.

There at the center of Enerias, into the territory of the Neutral Zone, the place belonging to no kingdom, was the Tower.

The enormous structure in all the Realms that even the Gods, Old or New, didn't know how tall it was.

His speed got slower a bit, and he noticed some tents outside the Tower, which was expected as many Players were making settlements, but the number was way lower than what it used to be.

He quickly went through the massive entrance of the Tower. His speed got increased once more and was even faster than before.

He was barely able to get some details of each floor he was passing as the image was also somewhat blurry before it reaches its target, but he was able to understand one thing.

The Tower's low floor not only seemed to have been restored in power but also new creatures of higher floors were in lower ones.

This wasn't good as if stronger creatures appeared on the lower floor, stronger ones replaced them.

As he passed one floor after the other, the speed his sight was moving was increasing, making them more and more everything a blur and making him Shingi losing count on what floor they were supposed to be on, but it may have been higher than what he had reached.

Then the sight of his stopped, and he could see a great open hall.

It seemed to be a training ground as there were many wooden training dolls and targets.

Just a few meters from him, he could see two figures sparring each other, one of an Old Man and one of a young teenage girl.

These were Mikhail and Annooue, of course.

Mikhail seemed to train Annoue, who appeared to be focused on her training.

Her clothing had changed from the poor clothes of her town to more glamorous ones. Those were showing the beauty of her body but without revealing much.

The clothes were also designed to be combat friendly and not restrict her movements.

She seemed somewhat more mature, or at least her eyes looked like that as she was carefully fighting Mikhail.

Shingi notice that she had a burn mark over at her left side of her neck, which looked like the letter M.

Even if Shingi didn't have his MANA SENSE, he could tell that this was part of a Special Spell to keep Annoue under surveillance and possibly punish her if he willed it.

He had encountered other people with a similar type of magic, and they were hard to fight, especially when one of their people was someone you knew.

He couldn't hear anything, but it didn't seem like they were speaking, just fighting.

As time passed, his hearing seemed to be enabled as he started hearing the sound of their swords hitting each other.

"Too slow swings. It would be best if you put focus more on your speed than the power. If you don't hit your target, what chance do you have to beat him?"[Mikhail]

Annoue seemed to be adapting to the tips he was telling him and was noticeable being improving quickly.

"ENOUGH. Go to get something to eat, and we will continue your training lately."[Mikhail]

Annoue seemed confused, but one Mikhail glared at her; she ran towards a door while having one of her arms over her burn mark as it appeared to have started hurting her a bit.

After Mikhail show her leaving the room, he turned and starred toward Shingi.

"How interesting you can use SCRY and even have passed the Tower's special fields. It seems my expectations for you weren't wrong."[Mikhail]

Shingi was surprised that he could see him quickly as his scry self was supposed to be invisible even to Gods.

"But those tricks aren't welcome here, but you ARE. If, of course,  you have the power to handle the trip here. Well then, bye."[Mikhail]

Mikail then just pointed one of his fingers towards Shingi, and the screen of his cracked, and as Mikhail used his second finger, it got completely destroyed.

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An Unknown Force destroyed SCRY.

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SCRY to NPC#1 has become unusable.

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Shingi wasn't expecting things to turn like that, but at least he learned something new.

Mikhail was at the Tower, and Annoue was in good health but under his control.

He was planning on going to the Tower as he knew he had to start cleaning up the mistakes of the Dark Guild, but now he had another reason to go there.

He focused his mind on every detail he saw of the camp and the floors

for any clues or information that could help him in the future.

He was mad at seeing Annoue being controlled like that, but he tried to calm his mind. He had to work on his plans to get to her as soon as possible.

He had to become more powerful and strengthen the rest of his party as if Mikhail was indeed on a higher floor than what he had reached that made it a foe more powerful than even his Player self would handle, even with his old equipment.

He tried each of his Skills once more, either of his NPC or Player, but none of them worked.

There were more than 20 hours left at his countdown, and there wasn't an option to SCRY anyone else.

The darkness surrounding him started affecting him once more as he remembered one thing; the song of his NPC mother.

He wasn't able to speak to sing it, but he started imagining the memory of the sone as when he heard it from that music box gift of Aneta.

The memory of the voice wasn't that clear at the beginning, but as time passed, it was like he could hear it, which he was.

A small sphere of light appeared in front of him as a tiny humanoid form was at the center of it. The figure was in a sitting position on a chair, and he heard the song coming by this figure.

The song continued repeating itself, and with each loop, each light became brighter.

Shingi had lost the counts of how many times he heard the song, but each time it seemed slightly different, as more life got added to the voice each time.

Then the voice became the same as the recording at the music box, and when it finished the song, it stopped speaking, but the light remained.

"For one to climb a tower, he must first enter it. For one to enter a tower, one must make the first step. For one to make the first step, he had to find his light. For one to find his light, it is like finding his balance."[???]

A voice seemed to come from all over the room as multiple people with the same voice were speaking at the same time from different directions.

Then the light moved closer to Shingi, and from having no body in this room, it was like he had an imitation of his NPC body and the light staying where his heart was.

"The light is part of you, and you are part of it. Remember this, my little Angel."[???]

And then the light was starting to get less bright until it had disappeared.

He was back with having no body, but he felt some warmth in him nonetheless.

He was calmer now and could handle being in the darkroom much better.

He checked how much time was left, and it seemed like just a few minutes were remaining.

He was excited to see the result of using the crystal, although he was mad that he lost 24 hours like that. 

Aneta didn't mention anything like that happening, but it could be that his case was rare; that's why this happened.

But with a cooldown like that, it should be something pretty good.

The minutes became seconds until the time was up, and Shingi had the option to get back to his NPC body which he used right away.

But it seemed things changed more than he thought.