Living Life As A Game: Through And Through 28 Back To The Dojo

"So… What do we do now?" Elizabeth asked after she told Sun about how she had encountered those people last night. She had already healed Sun, they had already cleaned up from the previous night's battle, and even breakfast had been served. Naturally, Elizabeth wanted to know Sun's opinion on how they should proceed.

"Now? First we'll have to go talk to Atid and Jane about what happened. They'll probably know more about this "Jhan's Gym." Sorry, I don't know more about them right off the top of my head…" Sun's head drooped down almost as if ashamed for his incompetence.

Suddenly though, he seemed to recall something and that depressing atmosphere revolving around him dissipated as a light flashed in his eyes and he resolutely said "But! We'll probably launch a counter attack to get revenge for what they tried to do to you! Then… you can count me in for the counter assault when the time comes..."

"Uh… I think you forgot that nothing happened to me. If we're going to get revenge, it wouldn't be for me, rather, you were the one who almost died..." With each of Elizabeth's words, the ignited spirit Sun possessed seemed to dim down; cold and weak by the time she stopped talking.

Elizabeth picked up on how badly she was shutting him down so, after a momentary pause, she said "But then again… we're… f-friends? ...I'll have your back when we launch our counter assault too..." The way she stumbled through her words made the moment exceedingly cringeworthy. Fortunately, Sun didn't laugh at her attempt to lift his spirits. Instead, he just put one hand on her shoulder and like some idiotic anime character, actual tears started spilling out his face as he nodded profusely.

The situation was becoming increasingly hard to withstand for Elizabeth's antisocial personality, so she quickly found a reason to separate from the still crying Sun. She took the hand he had placed on her shoulder to get his attention and said " Well, it's already early in the morning… We should probably get going and reach the dojo."

Through a sniffle, Sun said "Yeah..."

Before leaving though, Elizabeth told Sun to wait for a moment. She had been thinking about the previous night's encounter and remembered that she had found those people while enroute back to her house. It was frightening to think that those people might know where she lived and could attack her while she slept, so she followed through with most would consider an extreme manifestation of paranoia and decided to pack up her most essential personal belongings and leave her house for a while; at least long enough for her to become a bit more powerful through the levels of her game-like reality.

When Elizabeth returned to the kitchen where she left Atid, she was carrying her purse. The only belongings in that purse where the beginner set of armor she had received, her phone, wallet, the keys to the house and gate, as well as her blood armaments and needles. With her credit and debit cards, finding any extra daily essentials such as food, water, and shelter of the highest class would be easy as can be, but those magic gifts from P and the gods could not be so easily replaced.

Elizabeth led Sun to the front entrance of the house and quietly prayed for her state-of-the-art PC, a silent godspeed, before she locked the gates for the temporary future. As she was about to leave though, P's voice came out of nowhere, sarcastically saying "Wow you really like walking don't you."

"W-what?" Elizabeth didn't quite get it with such a vague and random comment.

"I mean seriously, just look at the poor boy! Oogling and ogling at the neighbor's cars~" The sarcasm in P's voice grew exponentially the more she had to spell it out for Elizabeth.

"What ca..." Elizabeth turned to look at Sun and the look on his face was utterly priceless. He was staring all around the neighborhood at the various flashy sport and luxury cars that were as common as cabbages. One car in particular had Sun's interest like honey to a bear, as his eyes seemed to be glued to the car's tantalizingly curvy body.

"Che! Just an Enzo Ferrari?!" She couldn't believe Sun would be so ensnared by such an old and outdated car! Just in her garage there was also a Ferrari, but at least her's was a LaFerrari Hypercar, not that decade old hunk of junk!

With a gasp as if he could not believe his ears, Sun turned to look at Elizabeth with blasphemy plastered all over his expression. He asked "Just an Enzo Ferrari? That's a Hypercar and only one model away from the last released model of Ferrari Hypercars!"

To his exclamation he was met with Elizabeth giving him an unbelievably disappointed look. She turned around and opened the gates to her home again and opened up her garage. Before she could even talk down to Sun, the poor guy had already lost his shit while fangirling over the line of prestigious cars presented before him.

Just from the entrance alone he could see all types of amazing cars he could only previously think about when taking a break from his near-endless training sessions. Ferraris, Lamborghinis, Bugattis, Rolls Royces, Mclarens, even his favorite car line of all time, the illusive Koenigsegg… They were all there!

"Oh my god! Oh my god! Oh my god..." This phrase would go on repeat for the next couple minutes as Sun begged Elizabeth to let him touch and sit inside all the cars in her garage.

Eventually, Elizabeth drew a connection to what P was saying with Sun's behavior and she asked him "Say… Sun… Do you want to drive one to the Dojo?"

"Do I want to drive one to the Dojo?" Sun repeated as the color drained from his face…

"Yeah?" Elizabeth could felt the atmosphere sort of evaporate around Sun as he processed her question…

.

.

.

"Can I really?" Sun asked, through the pain of biting his lips at his own stupidity for giving Elizabeth the chance to recall her proposal.

"Mhmm… Yes, but you have to drive me to and from places." Elizabeth didn't mind letting Sun play around with a car. It's not like her parents would care either, as they would throw money at her for any conceivable reason she could want in the past. In fact, if they knew that she was actually going out of her way to use their cars to "hang out" with friends, it was entirely possible that they would reward Sun with a car of his own for his ability to draw her out of the house…

As the word "yes" sunk into to Sun's psyche, he flew into ecstasy once more and happily agreed to drive Elizabeth wherever she wanted as long as he could drive. From his perspective it was like she was rewarding for nothing! She had already healed him from near death, given him clothes and food, and now she would let him drive such amazing cars? Why was she so good to him?! Never did it cross his mind that her cooking for him and letting him drive were beneficial to herself, as the apathetic demon she truly was had yet to find a reason to come out of hiding.

Nevertheless, for whatever reasons she was treating him so well, all these instances were firmly recorded within his heart as Sun ran around the room deliberately thinking of which car to drive. He liked all the cars in the garage, but given that his favorite car of all time was present, there wasn't much contest.

Sun just pointed at the Koenigsegg Agera located in near the center of the twelve car garage and was met with infinite happiness when Elizabeth finally gave him the keys. He got in the car and adjusted the seat with the care and caution of some sort of professional, played around with the settings of the car until he got exactly what he wanted, and started driving away…

At first Elizabeth was rightfully concerned with how Sun would behave after getting his hands on the car. She thought he would turn into a true psycho and just go full on street racing, as if they were in a Grand Theft Auto game, from the sheer excitement he displayed. But, her worries were unfounded as Sun drove more defensively than the most hardcore soccer mom she could think of.

Forget speeding and reckless driving, Sun looked like his life would end whenever he glanced down to the dashboard of the car and found that he was going two or three miles over the speed limit. He would never drive in the left most lane and barely ever passed anyone while they were enroute to the dojo.

Even when they arrived and parked on the dojo parking lot, Sun was so careful and considerate for the car's safety that he parked in a spot reserved for dojo residents on the backside of the establishment. He nearly went insane when he found some bird droppings on the roof of the car and wasted no time in cleaning the mess; not even bothering to pay greetings to the dojo residents that were worried about his disappearance as he stormed in to get paper damp paper towels...

Chapter end