Chapter 65: The Mage in the Theater
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
When Suits saw Benjamin standing dumbly, he stalked over and dragged Benjamin back.
"Who are you?" Benjamin struggled out of his grasp and asked, confused about the situation.
Suits frowned at Benjamin as he said, "Oh, you don’t recognize me now? Aren’t you the one who begged me to let you play a part in the performance today? What are you dawdling now? Quick, the performance is about to start!"
Begged? A part in the performance? What?
Bewildered, Benjamin refused to go with a stranger like a kid baited with candy. He prepared to shake off the man and leave the vicinity. However, a familiar voice was heard the moment he wanted to run.
"Why, what happened?"
Standing at the intersection and walking towards them was Dick Fulner, and his mentally troubled baby brother, Cante Fulner. Dick was confused as he questioned. His eyes were set on Benjamin.
Immediately, the sirens in Benjamin’s head were screeching away in warning. Benjamin could only bow down his head in hopes to avoid detection. He tried his best not to face the two directly.
"Don’t worry, young master, nothing happened," Suits was noticeably nervous as he explained immediately. Benjamin was thankful for that as Suits successfully got Dick’s full attention, "This boy is the beggar that will be helping in our performance tonight, young master."
A beggar performing? Could it be...?
Benjamin kept his head low as he slowly understood the situation. If he was not mistaken, the little beggar, the one that asked for trouble and ran after Benjamin taught him a lesson, was the one who agreed to perform in the theater. Hence, when the person in charge of the theater came looking for a beggar, they assumed that it was him. Thus, that previous scene happened.
Benjamin was dumbfounded by this turn of events. How should he consider this? He was not actually unlucky per se; just baffled by this. He came here disguised as a beggar to get some information, but now people really took him as a beggar and demanded him to perform at the theater owned by the Fulners. What the hell?
It did sound fun though....
Stop joking around! How would he dare to go on stage? There would be thousands of eyes on him; it would be a miracle if no one saw through his disguise. The best way to handle this matter was to leave, as soon as possible.
"Good," Dick nodded pompously, "Bring him backstage now. Let him try and work on the cooperation first; I don’t want him to mess up anything during the actual show."
The Suit replied as he tugged Benjamin backstage, "Yes, I will bring him backstage immediately."
By no means was Benjamin going to allow that to happen. He struggled desperately under the Suit’s grasp, trying to escape and run towards the opposite direction. He absolutely did not want to risk Dick seeing his face.
"Why, you don’t want to do it? Are you kidding me?" Dick nudged Cante, who was standing behind him, "Cante, don’t let him escape, there is no time for us to get another beggar anymore."
Benjamin froze before Cante could even react to the command. Benjamin remembered how Cante behaved during the war simulation game, and was hesitant to leave. Benjamin would never have a chance with this idiot if he refrained himself from using magic. He would never use magic now; as if the problem was not big enough as it is! He should not even be behaving weirdly to avoid attracting attention!
What should he do now?
When Dick noticed Cante’s lack of reaction, he furiously slapped the younger’s back. Only then did Cante reacted to Dick’s orders as he walked towards Benjamin.
"No, don’t come here, I’m not escaping, I just.... I just want to go to the toilet," With his quick wit, Benjamin squeaked in an effort to stop Cante. It was successful; Dick stopped Cante from moving in towards Benjamin after he heard his plea.
Dick did not recognize Benjamin’s voice, nor did he suspect Benjamin’s excuse. He just looked as if he was hit by a sudden realization as he shook his head.
Whew! Benjamin escaped from a probable disaster there. He could not help but praise his intelligence.
"Alright then, follow me. We have our own toilet inside the theater," Suits said with a tone that was abnormally disappointed, "Okay, okay, I know people like you probably never seen a toilet before. You’re in luck today, brat, let me broaden your horizon. Come."
"...."
Intelligent? Hah! That was funny.
Benjamin had no choice but follow Suits into the Fulner’s Theater of Happiness. The theater was huge, and it could contain thousands of guests. The stage was extraordinarily wide too. It was obvious that the Fulners did not jerry-build this.
As a newly furnished theater, there was a distinct smell of paint in the air. Although the interior of the theater was not extravagant, but it was brand-new and clean. All in all, this was a place that people would choose to stay for a long period of time for a performance.
However, Benjamin was not willing to stay here. Benjamin felt a migraine growing as he stood in the toilet of the theater. Suits, who was the person in charge of the theater, stood outside the door while he waited for Benjamin. He was impatient as he shouted for Benjamin to hurry as Benjamin would still need to go through the performance flow after this. Benjamin felt like dying when he thought about what he would be required to face next.
How exactly did he get himself into this predicament?
"Hurry, we’ve no time to afford you dragging your steps!" Suits bellowed at him outside the door.
Benjamin yelled, "Got it, I’ll be done soon."
Just as he wanted to leave the toilet to follow Suits and find a way to sneak out of the theater, he suddenly saw a corner of a dark cloth lying in the corner of the toilet. His heart leaped at the finding. He walked over to pick up the cloth and studied it.
"Hey, look at this," Benjamin called for the System.
The System answered after a brief pause, "This cloth was made from the same material as the cloaks of Michelle and the 3 Silent Academy mages."
Benjamin guessed it correctly. He nodded, deep in his thoughts.
If he had not learned the method to create this magical cloak from , he probably would never have been able to recognize this small piece of cloth from the cloak. This theater was undoubtedly newly built, and judging by the lack of rubbish, its cleaning routine was frequently done too. There was very little litter even in the corners of the toilet! Thus, it was obvious that this piece of cloak was unintentionally left behind by someone else within the last 24 hours.
There are mages around here?
As he recalled Dick’s words, he understood that this theater had not staged a performance before. Thus, no audiences had access to the theater.
So.... it was someone from within the theater? Now this is interesting!
"Hey! Quick, what are you doing in there?" Suits started shouting again.
"Alright alright, I’m coming!" Benjamin replied. He threw the piece of cloak back into the corner, as if it was untouched. Then, he pushed open the door and stepped out of the toilet.
"Why were you so slow?" Suits scolded Benjamin as he led the latter backstage, "Right. What you need to do is simple; Before the start of the performance, you will hide in a box, and the box will then be moved to the stage. When the magician knocks thrice on the box, you will then walk out of it as if you had no idea what happened. Understand?"
"O-Okay," Benjamin feigned himself to be a cowardly beggar as he answered. However, his heart was already fled towards the piece of cloak in the corner.
There was a mage in this theater!
When he thought of this, he suddenly felt that he was abnormally lucky as a person. Every time he walked around in the outskirts, he would always run into mages. Was his encounter with magic a result of fate, or was it because mages already populated the outskirts?
For some reason, he felt like something was off. His instincts screamed at him saying that the appearance of mages in the theater was no mere coincidence. That was the reason why he temporarily halted his idea of escaping the theater. He intended to stay for a bit and observe.
He could not help it, his curiosity was unsated. Benjamin knew that he was basically setting a trap for himself, but still he could not talk himself out of staying.
He had a hunch that if he stayed here, he would receive something unexpected.