Forbidden Link

21. NPC's Attack

The number of NPCs in the room that Alex, Marvin and Bianca had just entered was about twenty people. Not a single NPC was moving in the room. They are like a mannequin clustered at one end of the classroom and looking at the door that just opened.

Alex looked around. It was true that there was hardly any difference between the room he saw right now and the previous tenth grade E classes. Lighting that only relied on sunlight from behind the window. Dozens of tables neatly arranged. The dummy window that leads to the corridor looked so real.

Alex's eyes continued to scan the surroundings and tried to get clues from his vision. And after a while Alex finally found another door which was at the other end of his current position. The door was not clearly visible because it was blocked by the NPCs clustered there but Alex was pretty sure the door was the way out of the room.

"You can see that door, can't you?" said Alex, pointing towards the place in question.

"Ah, before this I didn't realize there was a door there."

“That’s maybe because you were distracted by the NPCs’ movement. I’m sure the door is the exit door.” Bianca nodded excitedly at Alex's words. "But I'm not sure if the door can be opened immediately." And Alex's next words made Bianca's face immediately frown.

"I'll check it out first. It's possible that the creatures will move if we are near them."

"Yeah, just try it," replied Alex. He wanted to check it himself but had promised to be near Bianca. So Alex let Marvin walk among the horde of NPCs to reach another door.

Alex looked at Bianca who was worrying about the NPCs. Bianca’s confidence seemed to be reduced slowly. Her sight couldn’t move from the NPCs’ position with a worried look. When he saw Bianca his intuition suddenly said that they would not make it at that time. But instead of worrying about his intuition, Alex chose to continue checking the surroundings.

From a distance, Marvin shouted "it can't be opened" as he kept trying to lower the doorknob but the door wouldn't open. What Alex worried has happened. The exit door could not be opened if the entrance door was still opened. So Alex glanced at the opened entrance door beside Bianca.

“Supposedly after the door is closed, another door will be able to be opened. But those NPCs will definitely move after,” said Alex with a tender voice.

Alex and Bianca stared at each other in silence for a moment. Alex could see Bianca's unsettled face. Even though Alex wasn't sensitive to people's feelings, Bianca's expression was too easy to read. The girl would immediately change her expression when her feelings changed right then and there.

"Bian. Remember. Don't worry, they're not humans."

Without a nod, Bianca lowered the doorknob and pulled it inside. After the sound of “BLAM!”, the NPCs started to make noises. As Alex expected, creatures that were very similar to humans started to move after the entrance door was closed. They looked to their right and left while uttering words that piled on top of each other so that they couldn't be heard clearly. It was as if the NPCs were whispering to each other to talk about Alex and Bianca who were at the entrance.

Alex's gaze shifted from the NPCs to another door he believed to be the exit. Marvin had managed to open the exit door. And just as Alex was trying to communicate with Marvin from a distance, Marvin had already entered the exit and closed it again. Marvin was no longer in the same room as Alex and Bianca.

“He… left us…,” said Bianca with such a disappointed face that she almost burst into tears.

Alex who was originally calm was now angry. He thought he should have known that Marvin would betray him, but his mind was already a little distracted when he thought about Bianca's condition. Alex's frustration was from his inability to read the condition of the people around him.

While Alex and Bianca were still standing at one point, the NPCs walked slowly towards them. Alex caught the movement of the NPC and tried to move his feet. But Bianca suddenly grabbed Alex's hand.

"Come on, Bian. We have to move towards that door.”

Instead of following Alex's directions, Bianca grabbed Alex's hand even tighter. Bianca's mouth trembled and her eyes filled with tears not long after Alex spoke. Bianca's confidence disappeared as soon as she saw the NPCs who were starting to approach her with their voices getting louder and louder.

“Hahaha… look she can't speak.”

"Damn you weirdo!"

"Just get out of this world!"

Screams after screams grew louder as a group of NPCs surrounded Alex and Bianca. The dozens of lifeless creatures approached the two humans standing in front of the entrance from all directions. Alex tried to pull Bianca's arm but the girl closed her eyes instead.

Bianca's grip on Alex's arm was released because several NPCs tried to approach Bianca. Still with scream after scream emitted, the NPC tried to push Bianca's body towards the door. Bianca's small body was easily pushed away and hit the door. The more NCPs managed to touch her body, the more Bianca wept louder.

Alex and Bianca were further and further apart because the bodies of the NCPs managed to push Alex's body out of the crowd. When he looked around, Alex found an exit that was very easy to reach. If at that moment he had the heart to leave Bianca alone, then Alex could walk towards the exit without any effort at all. Like Marvin did. But Alex didn't want to regret it later.

After fully convincing himself, Alex tried to get into the NCP crowd by elbowing the bodies of the people around him. He didn't care if any NCP fell because of it. He didn't even care whether the fallen NCP was a woman or not. And his ignorance seemed to prevent Alex from being attacked by the NCPs, unlike Bianca who was so affected by the emotions of the NCPs.

"Bian!!" Alex's screams were less audible when compared to the dozens of NCPs who kept yelling at Bianca.

Bianca's face was not visible at all and was replaced with the back and head of the NPC that was getting closer to the door. More accurately, the NCPs were trying to intimidate Bianca without giving her room to move. Alex panicked even more when he thought that Bianca might run out of breath at that time because she was surrounded by so many people. Alex began to pull the bodies of the NPCs one by one and pushed them backwards. Until finally he could see a pink-haired girl who was squatting while covering her body with both hands.

"Bian! Hey! Bian!” As Alex's movement was getting closer to Bianca coupled with continuous screams to wake Bianca, several NPCs began to change their target to Alex. Faces of annoyance, disdain and anger began to appear in front of Alex. Several NPCs started shouting at Alex and left Bianca to chase Alex instead.

If previously Alex only needed to push the NPCs who didn't fight back, now the NPCs have surrounded Alex, thus indirectly pushing Alex's body away from Bianca. The NPC crowd split into two. Half of it surrounded Bianca and the rest surrounded Alex.

“Argh… why is it like this?”

Alex's exasperation expressed in speech was not heard by anyone. No one could help him but himself. But Alex couldn't think calmly as his body was knocked back and forth due to the movement of the NPCs around him.

Alex could not think about Bianca's condition at all at this time. He really wanted to get out of the NPC crowd as soon as possible. He wanted to be given time to think for a while without being disturbed by creatures with whom he could not be discussed at all.

And when Alex felt his condition was getting worse, he gave up on the condition. It was then that his sense of hearing could no longer perceive any sound and his sense of taste could no longer sense any movement touching him.