Legacy of Forgotten Times 149 Welcome to our show!

 His first thought was establishing his connection with the gods, but he immediately vetoed that notion. Ever since Solas found out he was a transmigrator he hadn't spoken to her or Lozna, so he was still afraid of their retaliation.

 Maybe he was in another VCSR scenario? Nah, if it was he wouldn't be able to remember its existence and, most importantly, today was Saturday. So no classes and he clearly remembered going to sleep yesterday after talking with Riku for hours, meaning this was a real situation.

 He looked at his surroundings. The room was dark, so he couldn't see anything. He was sitting on some sort of chair? His hands were tied. Linri tried to summon a fire bullet to burn the ropes, but he couldn't. So it was either night or he was in an anti-magic zone.

 What else can he gather from this? He was still alive so they must have some sort of use for him. They couldn't have kidnapped him for ransom as his family was quite poor... on paper at least. That leaves two possibilities: they were either searching for an Autumnfall student or they were searching for him personally.

 Taking the worst possibility between the two, let's assume they were looking for him personally. Why would anyone want to kidnap him? He was such a lovable smart student... even Linri himself didn't buy that. Anyway, back to the noteworthy stuff about him. What was he? He was an apostle of the gods... No, no one beside him was aware of that. He stood up to Zero and almost made him commit suicide... Nope, Church of the Sun wasn't that petty... at least he hoped they weren't.

 He was an information bank. Knowing almost everything about every student along with the future attacks of the Renegades. Now that seemed plausible. Maybe Renegades really did have a mole among the teachers and that person informed them about him and how he knew some of their plans, so their aim should be to torture him and find out the rat among their ranks. Okay, now we were getting somewhere.

 So, assuming everything he thought was right, what kind of an attitude he should have towards them? Should he be willing to cooperate or should he act hostile? Both of them had pros and cons so maybe-

 *Creak*

Linri's thought process was cut short by the sound of an opening door. The gears in his head started to turn at full speed: he had to come up with something before they start interrogating him.

They turned on the light and Linri's vision suddenly turned white. The light was too bright for him to open his eyes.

"It seems like you are finally awake, my little stars," an unfamiliar voice spoke to Linri.

 Wait, stars? Was there someone else beside him trapped here?

Linri furiously blinked to let his eyes get used to the light in the room. Once he saw the man in front of him his eyes were about to pop out. The man had an arrogant demeanour, short black hair and brown eyes. He was wearing a fuzzy black windbreaker. He was handsome and his smile seemed eerie. However, at that moment there was only one thought in Linri's head: isn't he Izaya from Drrrr!!!!

The resemblance was uncanny. He can't be a normal resident of the world. He must have been created by someone. The question was who and for what purpose. He was too old to be a student and he definitely wasn't a teacher. Maybe another NPC? No, they weren't in the school grounds, so he couldn't be an admin character.

"What do you want with us?" a cold familiar voice came from Linri's left. It was Luke. Linri saw that he had already gotten rid of his bindings and was holding a knife in his hand. It seemed like he was waiting for Izaya(?) to get closer before stabbing him to death.

However, Linri actually relaxed and started to smile. He had finally figured out where he was!

"Nothing special. You see, a little birdie told me that you two were special and I am very interested in that. So I created a stage for you to display your little magic tricks. I am going to make you two stars," Izaya(?) said as he made a square with his hands and looked at the two of them.

"Oh? Then what do we gain from that?" Linri spoke.

"How about I don't kill you?" Izaya(?) said. He seemed like he would really kill them if they displeased him.

"Sounds good. Then shoo! We need to change and get ready for our performance" Linri shooed him away.

He left in a satisfied manner. After he went away Luke got up and freed him. That was when one of Izaya's(?) goons walked into the room to free them. He looked at them and, seeing that they were free, was confused. He just scratched his head and then shrugged before closing the door.

"Any plans?" Luke asked while creating an arsenal worth of knives and hiding them all over his clothes.

"Maybe?"

"What is it? We don't know how many men they have or what kind of weapons they carry. Do you need me to carry anything?"

Linri shook his head.

"How about we do just do as he says?"

Luke frowned. It seemed like he thought too highly of Linri. He was just another coward.

"Don't give me that look. To be honest, I have been quite stressed lately and thought it would be entertaining to act as magicians for one night. Also, after the show is when we have the best chance to escape. There is an emergency exit door just behind the stage and we can easily force our way through there and, afterwards, we can make our way back to school. What do you say?"

Luke eased his eyebrows. He seemed to be thinking about his suggestion.

"Okay," Luke nodded his head.

Linri smiled from ear to ear and handed Luke a pair of magician's clothes.

"Since we are gonna play the part, of course, we have to look the part, right? This is gonna be so much fun!" Linri said as he started to dress.

5 minutes later Linri and Luke walked out of the room all dressed up.

"Are you sure you memorised all your parts?" Linri asked.

"Yes."

"You will have no problems with the acts, right?"

"Yes."

"Phew! I am getting performance anxiety. All those people are going to be watching our show!" Linri said as he peeked through the curtain and looked at the lounge.

This time Luke didn't say anything and just gave him the eye.

"Fine! I know, no need to give me that look," Linri said as he rolled his eyes. He didn't even know how to joke around.

Well, now that Linri was about to take the stage, he thought about how this event played out in the club. He called this an event but it wasn't an official event. This was something Linri and Trumpet came up with in their free time. Even though Autumnfall was a Combat RP club, that didn't mean there was a fight going on each and every second. There was obviously some downtime between the events. Just like how The Game event didn't start right after the Opening Ceremony: there was in-game free time for the players to do whatever the heck they wanted. Actually, that was also one of the reasons why the relationship craze started, but that was not the point right now.

Back to the topic at hand, in their free time, both Trumpet and Linri did not know what to do. That was when Trumpet had an idea. He wanted to play out a fun kidnapping scenario, but he didn't have anyone to play it out with, so he posted on the comments section in the club asking if anyone was interested.

Linri was in the same boat so he replied with "yes" and they started to plan this little event where they would be kidnapped and forced to act as magicians. The magician part was Linri's idea. Ever since childhood he really adored them. There was just some sort of wonder in their field of work. Anyway, that was also how the OG Linri and Luke became friends in the first place. Before that pseudo-event, they were total strangers.

Linri took deep breaths. It was almost time for them to appear on the stage. He didn't need to be this nervous as what he was going to do was actual magic, but he just couldn't help himself.

Seeing the signal from the announcer, Linri and Luke walked into the stage.

"Ladies and gentleman! Welcome to our show!"

Chapter end