VOLUME THREE
CHAPTER 17:INFLUENTIAL RETIREMENT, LAST PROM ARC
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(Important reminder!! Volume Three consists of only FOUR chapters, making the entire Book 1 series consisting 22 chapters involving both Prologue and Epilogue. Due to the lack of chapters, the number of parts separated will be more than 5-6 in order to exceed Volume count.)
[Existential Charactism Log]
[Week Date: Monday, 7:11 am]
‐Involved Representations:
Wyne Kylie = Alive
Location: Wandering around the Entertainment District of the Hotel.
Margaret Sensha = Alive
Location: Just left the clinic on Monday morning.
-Grand Minister:
Yuri Calypso = Alive
Location: Standing in front of a certain dorm in the dormitory area of the hotel, in shock.
Koby Frantzes = Alive
Location: Currently landed on Dumai Port Dickson, Malaysia and is about to board a military helicopter.
-Prophecy Beings:
Symbol of Loneliness = Alive
Symbol of Connection = Alive
Location of both individuals: Inside assigned dormitory.
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Influence of Vanity, Trizha Frantzes = Alive.
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In the wake of the previous day's torrential storm, the students of La Luna Sangre remained blissfully unaware of the horror that had taken root within their sanctuary.
The heavy weather had provided the perfect shroud, masking any sounds of struggle or cries for help.
Most of the teenagers were preoccupied, swarming the local boutiques and accessory shops to finalize their vanity for the upcoming Prom night.
The pursuit of the perfect appearance had inadvertently extended the period of silence for a cold, lifeless body resting in a darkened room.
It was only when Yuri Calypso—the enigmatic Founder of the La Luna Sangre Hotel—made her rounds that the veil was finally lifted.
She was the first to stumble upon the disturbing crime that had been fermenting in the shadows since the afternoon prior.
Yuri stood frozen in the doorframe, the hallway light spilling over her shoulder like a judgmental spotlight.
Her gaze, usually unseriously unapologetically frustrating, was now fixed in an intense, shocked stare at the floor.
There, lying face-first in a pool of dried, dark crimson, was a young woman whose life had been violently extinguished.
Yuri's hands began to tremble, a rare sign of anxiety that quickly curdled into something far more dangerous.
Her fingers curled into white-knuckled fists, and her jaw tightened until it ached, fueled by an innate, volcanic rage at the desecration of her establishment.
"Sorry for the loss, boss," a gravelly voice broke the silence.
It was a detective, a man with tired eyes hired by Yuri's personal assistant.
He moved past her with a professional detachment, offering a brief pat on her shoulder before approaching the Assistant, Ramoss, who was standing further inside the room.
"Any hints or evidence regarding this incident?" the Assistant asked, his voice wavering with a nervousness that was palpable.
He clutched a stack of documents—the victim's records—against his chest as if they could shield him from the carnage.
"Unfortunately, no," the detective replied, exhaling a long, exhausted sigh.
He had spent two grueling hours scouring every inch of the room. "The killer seemed to have left no evidence at all. No fingerprints, no fibers, nothing. What a clever old hook we're dealing with."
The detective glanced back over his shoulder at Yuri.
He watched as her tremors subsided, replaced by a terrifying, stony calm.
Even though her hair obscured her eyes, the air around her seemed to drop in temperature.
She was acknowledging the infiltration, the violation of her final event.
The detective turned back to the Assistant, who was now weeping silently as he flipped through the victim's file.
"No clues... and yet you're certain this happened yesterday afternoon?" the Assistant asked, wiping his eyes. "Those poor children... they had so much ahead of them."
"I checked the CCTV myself, just as I told you," the detective responded, his frustration mounting. "The only thing the cameras caught was a figure in a heavy black cloak. Their identity is a total void."
"I see," the Assistant muttered, his gaze drifting toward the second body in the room. "I just... I didn't think it would be the two of them."
Yuri finally lifted her head from the girl on the floor and turned her attention to the second victim.
There, slumped in a chair, was the body of no other than… Zackier Morkator.
He sat lifeless, a knife still clutched in his stiff fingers, his torso riddled with jagged stab wounds that mirrored the brutality visited upon the girl.
The detective clicked his tongue, looking at the boy's corpse with a skeptical squint.
"At first glance, it looks like the kid killed himself after doing the deed," the detective noted, pulling out a polaroid he had taken from the weapon. "But that theory raises more questions than it answers. Why would a child end his life by showering his own body with a knife like that? It's anatomically absurd."
He pointed to the blade in the photograph.
"Not to mention, the knife isn't even sharp. It's a dull piece of decorative steel. If he did this to himself, it would have been an agonizingly slow and painful way to go. No one chooses that."
The Assistant stared at the photo, his brow furrowing as he opened Zackier's personal file.
"Indeed... the footage you mentioned supports that," the Assistant whispered. "But something else is bothering me. This document... it's too fresh. It looks brand new, almost as if it were placed here recently. Though, I suppose that doesn't help much with the 'who' or the 'why'."
He closed the folder with a heavy snap and looked at the detective.
"Should I call the police now? Hiring you in secret was a necessary first step, but the department has resources we lack. No disrespect intended."
The detective shrugged, letting out a short, hollow laugh as he patted the Assistant's shoulder.
"None taken. The more eyes on this riddle, the better. I was thinking the same thing; there's no solving a puzzle when the pieces have been dissolved in acid."
The Assistant tucked the documents under his arm and reached for his phone, his thumb hovering over the keypad.
"Alright. Just give me a second to make the report. Hopefully, they can make sense of this mess."
The detective leaned in, his voice dropping to a low, conspiratorial whisper.
"Make sure you tell them to send an ambulance too. We don't have the equipment to handle victims in this state. They need to be moved with care if we want any hope of—"
BAM!
The sound was like a cannon blast, a violent, bone-shaking thud that caused both men to jump out of their skins.
They spun around, eyes wide with terror, toward the source of the noise.
…Yuri Calypso, the founder, had stepped toward the far side of the room and, in a silent explosion of rage, had driven her fist straight through the reinforced wall, shattering the plaster and lath into a million pieces.
The detective leaned toward the Assistant's ear, his voice trembling.
"Hey, quick question... your guards told me the door was locked tight before Yuri 'found' the body. How did she get in? Did she have a master key?"
The Assistant gulped, his eyes fixed on Yuri's back.
He hesitated, his voice a stuttering mess.
"A-actually... she didn't use a key. She kicked the door off its hinges. At times like this, whenever she's truly upset... she crashes out in ways nobody can predict. I'm not usually afraid of her… but we're talking about a monster in human flesh here."
The detective's eyes went wide.
He looked at the hole in the wall and then back at the woman's slight frame.
Fear began to take root in his gut; he realized that the "Founder" was far more dangerous than the murderer they were hunting.
After all, she was formerly a Mafia Queen herself.
Suddenly, Yuri turned.
Her stare was predatory, a menacing gaze that made both men feel like prey caught in a spotlight.
When she spoke, her voice was a deep, guttural rasp—the sound the Assistant knew meant the hotel's sanctity had been permanently "Interrupted."
"No one hears about this," Yuri hissed, her eyes boring into them. "Do you hear me? If a single word of this leaks to the students or the press, I'll personally cut your ears off."
The Assistant and the detective nodded frantically, their heads bobbing in unison.
The Assistant immediately shoved his phone back into his pocket, canceling the call before it could connect.
Yuri stepped away from the ruined wall and marched toward the guards standing in the hallway.
She pointed a sharp, accusing finger at the lead officer.
"You. Tell every single guard in this establishment to arm themselves," she commanded, her tone cold enough to freeze blood. "Take a walk around the hotel. Search every closet, every vent, every shadow. The killer is still inside my walls. Find them and bring them to me. I will show them what 'torture' means in the Calypso way."
The guards snapped to attention, shouting a unified "Yes, Ma'am!" before vanishing into the corridors to execute her orders.
The Assistant let out a long breath of relief.
He knew that when Yuri was in this state, she was liable to level the entire building.
He watched her carefully, waiting for the storm to fully pass.
"You."
The Assistant jumped again as Yuri's eyes locked onto him.
He stood up straight, waiting for her next demand.
Yuri took a deep breath, her expression shifting into something strangely nonchalant.
"Tell the friends of the girl on the floor that I executed her myself," Yuri said, her voice devoid of emotion. "Tell them she was caught stealing my lunch."
The Assistant's eyebrow twitched with a mix of exhaustion and irritation.
"Yeah... I'm telling them absolutely nothing of the sort," he muttered.
Yuri's eyes narrowed dangerously, and she crossed her arms over her chest, stepping into his personal space.
"What did you say to me?"
The Assistant, pushed to his limit, didn't back down.
"I can yell it for you if you'd like. Trust me, I'm in the perfect mood for karaoke."
Yuri blinked, the mention of music momentarily derailing her fury.
A flicker of something resembling amusement crossed her face.
"Count me in," she said, turning on her heel and walking away toward her private quarters.
The Assistant huffed a small, victorious breath, already mentally preparing for a singing duel with his boss.
The detective, however, just stared at him with profound concern.
"He's messing around with an 'upset' founder?" the detective thought. "No... they've worked together long enough. He knows when she's actually dangerous and when she's just masking the pain with absurdity. Hmph. Unbelievable. Or maybe she really is just a pain in the ass, like in the rumors."
The detective began to pack his kit, and the Assistant gathered the folders, both preparing to leave the room to the cleaning crews that would arrive by noon.
But before they stepped out, the Assistant paused, a thought striking him.
"Wait, Mr. Detective," the Assistant called out. "I have a question."
The detective paused, one hand on the door. "Yeah? What is it?"
"Did you... did you actually touch the bodies? Did you check them for a pulse or lingering warmth?"
The detective stared at him for a long moment, his eyes unreadable.
Finally, he gave a slow, deliberate nod.
"I checked them, alright. But I only observed. Direct contact can contaminate a scene, and a glance is all a professional needs to see the truth of death. And I'm apparently a professional myself. Why?"
The Assistant raised an eyebrow but eventually shrugged it off.
He figured that detectives had their own strange codes.
He stepped out and locked the door behind them, ensuring the horror remained contained.
Inside the silent room, the air was still.
The two corpses lay in their respective places.
Then, a sound.
A slow, rattling intake of breath.
Zackier's slumped body began to move.
His head lifted, his neck cracking with a series of wet, sickening pops.
He opened his eyes, and they gleamed with a violent, shattered red—irises that looked like cracked glass.
It was the look of a man who had traded his soul for the ultimate freedom.
He grinned widely, his teeth stained with copper, and tightened his grip on the dull knife.
"Detectives who have touched a corpse and those who haven't... they have such different ways of seeing the world," Zackier whispered to the empty room, his voice a rasping shadow. "But I find it truly naively and absurdly idiotic to only 'observe' my body. That is the fatal flaw of those who refuse to live with the taste of disgust."
He stood up, the wounds on his torso remaining open but bloodless.
The overhead light flickered once, twice, and then failed entirely.
When the light returned a second later, the chair was empty.
Zackier was gone, leaving nothing behind but the cold, silent girl on the floor.