Marked Ones: Advent of the Demon Prince

The researchers and assistants in the Orichalcum laboratory had been on edge for a few days. Headmaster Orllan suddenly showed up out of the blue with three extra guests. At least two of them were human, but the third seemed to be some sort of mixed blood.

Whatever they were, their presence was a break from the norm, and that caused many people to feel stressed and concerned. How were they to assume their purpose or intentions? What made them trustworthy enough to be allowed around the research material?

"Hey, Silis, what are you doing?"

One of the other research assistants noticed that Silis was moving samples from one lab to another. Since he was usually doing jobs like this, no one thought his behavior was strange.

"Oh. I am just moving these samples to Hall C for Professor Itone. Did you need something?" Silis asked.

"Yes, actually. They are performing interviews with the research staff right now. We are being grouped up and told to wait outside the main meeting room near Orllan's office. I found out you and I are in the same group. So I guess I will see you over there in half an hour or so!"

Silis's fellow research assistant smiled innocently and trotted away, leaving him to his own devices. While his friend left, Silis maintained a smile. However, the moment his friend was gone, Silis went into a small panic. He hurriedly placed the Orichalcum samples into their containers and rushed over to Professor Itone's office in Hall C.

It was fairly common for the assistants to run around the laboratory in a hurry like he was. Many professors required their helper staff to respond rapidly at any given moment, so no one gave Silis a second look at his behavior.

Once the material was deposited in Itone's office, Silis quickly turned around and gathered his personal things. He made sure not to grab so much that it was obvious that he was trying to leave for a long period. Despite that, he still needed to ensure he had anything deemed personally important as well as anything he needed to flee the academy.

"Tonight. No, not tonight. Right now. I need to leave the academy right now." He muttered to himself repeatedly while dropping things in a hurry.

Storage rings were not allowed inside the research building in the event of theft, so he had to figure out how to carry what he could out in his hands and pockets. Whatever wouldn't fit, Silis simply placed it back into his storage locker. Those items would end up left behind.

Silis quickly exited the office and headed toward the lower-level exit. He noticed there seemed to be a decently long line at the doors. A number of people were trying to leave the research laboratory at the same time. Many of them were arguing with the guards, who kept putting their hands in the air and proclaiming there was nothing they could do.

When Silis asked what was happening, a coworker informed him that the doors to the facility's exit were locked, and no one was allowed to leave. The strangers who had come down earlier had requested that Headmaster Orllan block entry and exits to the facility.

Basically, they were trapped.

Silis was not cut out for this kind of work. He never wanted to help the people who confronted him in the first place. They had basically forced him to do their bidding. Now, here he was stuck like a rat in a trap, simply waiting to be discovered.

While he was panicking, a hand settled on his shoulder. The sudden sensation made him almost jump out of his skin. Yet the hand held firm and kept him in place. It wasn't forceful or painful in any way, though.

Silis followed the hand upward to its owner and locked eyes with a handsome man with purple hair and eyes as blue as the ocean. He was human and he was smiling comfortingly at the elf researcher in an attempt to settle the young man's nerves.

If Silis could hazard a guess, he assumed the young man was at the beginning stages of the mature cycle of human growth, which would place him around eighteen to twenty-three years of age. Silis would easily be five to six times the human's age, but still, he did feel settled by the man's warmth.n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om

"Hello, my name is Desmond. Is everything alright?"

"I'm Silis. Student of Professor Itone."

"Nice to meet you Silis. Are you wanting to go out tonight?" Desmond asked with a voice filled with concern.

"I wanted to go see my mother. I have not seen her in some weeks now."

"Let him."

Another voice rang out from behind Desmond. Unlike the soothing tone that the purple-haired man had, the other voice was one that lacked any emotion. There was no hostility, but neither was their warmth. Somehow, that was worse.

The owner of the voice was a black-haired man with different colored eyes, burn marks along the back of his neck, and several scars. Next to him was Headmaster Orllan. She simply watched as the other human walked up to the guard station and whispered something to them. They nodded and proceeded to unlock the doors to the stairway.

"You all are allowed to leave. My investigation has been concluded. Please enjoy your night."

Silis sighed in relief. It seemed he could get out of there without complaint or concern. He still decided to leave only with what he had already prepared, though, just in case there were any unforeseen incidents.

"Well, I wish your mother the best." Desmond said with a gentle clap on his shoulder.

Silis quickly thanked him with a smile and exited slowly alongside his coworkers. If anyone among the staff attempted to leave in a hurry it would only draw suspicion. So against his better instinct, Silis simply moved with the flow of the crowd to maintain a sense of normalcy.

If they were investigating something, he had to wonder what it was. At first he was concerned that it was him. Since he was leaking information to the person that confronted him several months ago. However, it seemed this was not the case. If it were, then he would have been caught.

Relief washed over him as he realized that something else must have been happening. Since the investigators were mostly human, save the black-haired man, they were likely investors that were unhappy with something.

A number of lab accidents recently resulted in lost material. So the academy was likely going after the staff responsible for those failures. Thankfully, Professor Itone was a brilliant man. So there were no issues with any of his experiments. His genius allowed Silis to leave the facility without any concerns for unnecessary oversight.

Still, even though he seemed to have escaped, Silis still felt as though a predator's eyes were upon him as he left. He assumed it was a trick of the mind after being unsettled by the black-haired man. After all, there was no way for them to know.