After a long talk with Hullo, Zeke stepped out of the bar. He repeatedly asked about Mr. Sam's true identity during their conversation, but Hullo was evasive about the topic, answering his questions with a cryptic smile.
'Sam… it seems his identity is deeper than I thought.'
Zeke had already inferred this merely from Sam's association with the mysterious Starlight member who helped him before, but if even mentioning his name elicited an aggressive reaction from Hullo, then he was someone with a reputation as well.
He mulled over it for a moment before shaking his head, brushing aside his curiosity.
'Nevermind. It's not that important right now…'
Zeke thought and raised his head, stepping outside the alleyway. But then his expression suddenly froze.
"It's you!"
A pleasant, rich voice echoed right in front of him, shooting a warmth to his ears.
But unlike that pleasant sensation, Zeke's expression was akin to an overworked salaryman. He grimaced, looking at the familiar pink-haired girl in front of him with a wary gaze.
"Crimson? Red Land to Crimson? Crimson to Red Land?"
Seralune tilted her head, waving her hand in front of Zeke.
Zeke snapped. "I can hear you just fine!"
"Oh."
Seralune froze, then continued waving again with a smile. "I thought you forgot about me…"
But just before Zeke could say anything, her mouth rattled again.
"Hey, wait, did you just come out of Solace Bar?" Seralune's eyes widened, her hands covering her mouth. "For someone who looks so innocent, I didn't know you were a hooligan, Crimson! Teacher Cybele was right! You're a hooligan!"
"What hooligan…"
Zeke pinched his forehead, desperately restraining his emotions. He narrowed his eyes and looked at her, finding something odd. Seralune was wearing a white long-sleeve shirt, stacked beneath a brown apron.
Her long, flowing pink hair was neatly tied in a ponytail. While her sapphire eyes were covered with a pair of circular glasses, giving her a nerdy look. She looked completely different from the last time he saw her.
"What are you doing here? And that get up…" He asked, confused.
"Ah, this."
Seralune nodded and spread out her hands, smiling radiantly.
"I work here!"
Behind Seralune, an obscure flower shop sign could be seen. The flower shop was small, and it was beside a medium-sized restaurant. It was also directly across the alleyway where Solace Bar was located.
Seralune saw Zeke's surprised expression and couldn't help but be pleased. "So what, Crimson? Do you have any girls you like? If so, I can give you a discount if you want to buy her flowers…"
Zeke frowned and shook his head. He glanced at her for a moment, then stepped aside, turning his gaze away as he walked straight ahead, completely ignoring her existence.
Seralune looked at his back but didn't stop him.
"If you need any flowers, Crimson, buy them from here! You can also recommend it to your classmates! Also, I haven't forgotten about that time…"
'What time?!'
Zeke sighed and kept walking, ignoring her shouts. He swore he would never come back here ever again. He increased the pace of his steps as his back blended with the crowd, disappearing on the streets.
From a distance, Seralune stopped shouting and smiled quietly, looking at where he had disappeared. She shook her head and went back inside the flower shop, humming a tune as she stepped inside.
Zeke returned to his apartment in the Whiskerbarket's Apartments. His steps paused when he arrived at the floor where his unit was located, seeing a long, dark-haired lady around his age come out of the door.
The two of them looked at each other silently.
A moment later, they both exchanged awkward nods.
Zeke continued walking, passing over the dark-haired lady. He stopped in front of his unit, opened the door, and went inside in a hurry.
Click!
That short meeting with his neighbour removed itself from his mind the moment he entered his unit. Zeke turned on the lights and locked the door from behind. He turned the fans on and opened the windows to get some air.
After putting aside his academy uniform and Herta ID, he sat down in a chair.
'There's too many to unpack…'
Zeke went over his talk with Hullo in his mind, sighing quietly. He didn't expect his job hunting to only last a day… to be honest, even though he decided to ask Mr. Sam for help, he wasn't expecting it to be easy at all.
But just like that, mentioning Mr. Sam's name gave him a generous job right off the bat. This was the power of connections; something he finally felt deeply at this moment.
'I can't waste this opportunity…'
Zeke thought as he resolved himself. No matter how difficult this job was, he couldn't leave it.
He must work hard to change his fate!
'After all, Red Land is completely different from what I've thought.'
Zeke's expression turned solemn, his brows furrowing harshly. His "long talk" with Hullo was basically just him discreetly finding more about Ash City and Red Land.
Before coming here, all he knew about Red Land was from stories passed around among upper-class families. Such as its air turning red from resentment, its reddish brown land polluted from monster blood, and its inhabitants being the most evil and vile humans to ever exist.
Thinking about it again, after his long talk with Hullo, Zeke realized most of them ended up being true.
Red Land covered at least 30% of Earth's land, stretching from the Northeast Hemisphere over to the Southern Hemisphere. Despite its large size, the region only had five cities that divided it.
These five cities were called: Gray, Umber, Black, Silver, and Ash.
All of the humans from Red Land lived in these five cities. Each of these cities was a metropolitan area, as large as Magic City, the capital of humanity, where Zeke had originally lived.
Zeke wasn't clear on the differences between the five cities, but from Hullo's words, there was at least a commonality between all of them.
'They all have two societies.'
For example, Ash City was divided into two societies—the Underground and the Surface.
The Underground was where the poor and lower-class people lived. Zeke didn't realize this, and probably never if nobody had told him, but he was currently residing in this lower society of Ash City.
Above the Underground was the Surface, a completely different reality compared to the grim and sickening situation in the Underground. The Ash City Lord lived on the Surface, and that place was dominated by rich people and corporations.
From Hullo's words, everything about the Surface was better than the Underground. However, if one wanted to enter the Surface, they needed the recommendation of a person who was living there and also pay an upfront fee of 1,000,000 crimson rubbles.
Honestly, Zeke had imagined that all the people in Red Land were suffering from the situation of the region, but… this goes beyond what he had imagined. It goes to show that human greed and vileness always finds a way to make others suffer even more.
'This is basically a dystopian society...'
After a long while, he sighed heavily and stood up, taking a second-hand hair dye from his pocket.
During their conversation, he asked Hullo where he could get some hair dye. To his surprise, Hullo coincidentally kept different colors of hair dye in the bar for an unknown reason and let him choose one.
After some thought, Zeke chose the dark red hair dye. Most people here had darker shades, but varied in color. This would help him blend in and integrate as an inhabitant of Red Land.
There was also another reason he chose red, of course.
His name was Zeke Crimson.