Greg and I were having breakfast in the AA canteen. There weren't many people awake, yet the space was filled with different aromas coming from the assortment of food present.

  Congratulations on reaching S-rank. It took you long enough.

  Greg was having any potato dish the canteen had. I don’t know how he can stand that overrated plant stem.

  Eating mainly fish and poultry as usual.

  You’re a cat, so shouldn’t your diet be the same instead of…

  I glanced at his abominable mashed potatoes.

  …that?

  I don’t see what the problem is with a varied diet.

  Greg… look at my plate. I have fish, chicken, mushrooms and vegetables. You have… potatoes, baked potatoes, mashed potatoes, fries, and what’s that?

  Gratin.

  Let me guess, potatoes?

  Fine… you have a point.

  Greg continued his potato diet but seemed to want to say something.

  Spit it out.

  I’m not spitting out my potatoes, that’s disgusting.

  I wonder if he does this on purpose or is this dense.

  You want to say something, right? Go ahead.

  Aren’t you supposed to hang out with Giana and Yvonne?

  Those two are ehh bedridden. But since you brought that up.

  I placed my elbows on the table and rested my chin on the back of my hands.

  I noticed a strange shadow entering my room while I was…busy. What are you planning, Greg.

  That is concerning, but why would you suspect me?

  Don’t play dumb, you know that I have excellent eyes. Don’t tell me you have developed strange hobbies.

  I was just curious.

  You do know that there are things you should and should not do right?

  No harm was done. I don’t understand what the issue is.

  You know what…there is no issue. I didn’t come here to start a fight. Just don’t do that again. I do however want to ask why you haven’t lifted that curse off yourself.

  Greg continued eating as if nothing had happened. It pissed me off a bit.

  It’s work in progress. I have refreshed myself on the basics and I will be delving into the intricacies soon.

  How long will that take by your estimate?

  I can’t make a definite deadline for that, as I will have to delve into the practical after the theoretical.

  Greg drank vodka as if it was tea.

  Vodka at 8 in the morning?

  I am an adult, I don’t have to get told what I can or can’t do.

  He is right but man he’s a pain in the ass. I wanted to ask him if he wanted to join me on the S-rank mission I got in this morning, but I’m reconsidering it. Giana and Yv won’t be able to come out for a bit, and Raishin had planned a date with Noelle today. He is finally bringing her to the Yttroz Industries to turn the ruby into jewelry.

  I will just be going by myself then.

  A C-rank party of 6 had disappeared and an A rank party of 6 had been sent to find out what happened, but they also disappeared. I should be going with my team but… 2 can’t move, 2 are having an important date, and 1 is a pain in the ass.

  This is one of the reasons why I didn’t want to become an S-rank. I have to do babysit and dangerous retrieval quests. Being successful will only catapult my popularity even more. Although. I don’t know many S rank adventurers. Only Daddy’s girl and that juggernaut. Maybe it won't be so bad. Or I’m living under a rock and should know more S-ranks.

  I quickly cleared out my plates and got up after munching down the last baked mushroom.

  I’m going to be busy today. Don’t worry about me, as I’ll probably be away for one or more days.

  Something reckless as usual?

  It’s a specific S-rank quest, so who knows. It might involve a lot of water, so I don’t think I can bring you.

  I will pass on that. I will keep an eye out on the ‘missing adventurers’ list.

  Not funny…I will be fine. Be careful that your bath doesn’t explode and flood your room.

  This tale has been unlawfully lifted without the author's consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.

  I left Greg with his potato mess, went to a mission terminal and read over the details. It had been a personal request from Daddy’s girl. There were many more, but I could ignore them.

  The same forest where I encountered the shadow behemoth and the scythedogs previously. Couldn’t they just cut that forest down? The first team had gone deep into the forest as nearby villagers had reported people gone missing.

  So something is either killing or kidnapping people. It is strong enough to make a party of A-rank adventurers disappear. The entity is either strong, deceptive or it’s an organization. I wanted to go with Nilah, but I decided to have her watch over the ladies.

  A [Paradox Teleport] took care of the transportation.

  Nothing seemed different about this forest. I scanned the forest, as I didn’t want to stumble on nasty surprises. No shadow behemoths, this time some strange monster and… a demon. It seems relatively weak though. This one must have escaped one of the ancient buildings.

  Maybe I should have brought Greg…

  Getting near it would get me in trouble. Maybe if I snipe him. Can I one shot a weak demon?

  I made a 1 kilometer tall frost pillar and locked on to the unsuspecting demon in the distance. I drew my frostbow and aimed. It has to pack a lot of frost.

  The unsuspecting demon moved to a favorable position and the arrow flew off. The demon didn’t notice anything and got its chest pierced and turned into an ice cube. The frost shattered into fine dust and the demon was no more.

  Are thing supposed to be this easy? I floated down and walked over to the impact zone. It was a 30 minute walk but I couldn’t let my guard down. This demon was weak but a demon nonetheless. Some of the black foggy aura was still lingering in the area.

  I froze some of it and had my tails analyze the energy. So what now? The demon is gone, doesn’t mean my job is done. I need to find out what happened to the…

  I couldn’t finish my thought as a disturbing energy wave interrupted me and an enormous, but a subtle barrier got erected around this part of the forest.

  Is this the demon’s work, or was the demon a distraction? What do demons actually want? Possess inhabitants on the Mainfloor? Why was he in his demon form if he had 12 people to possess? I don’t know anything about demons, I’ve realized. Any chance there’s a friendly demon who could spill the beans? Maybe I just one-shot the friendly demon but…better safe than sorry.

  Someone has set up this trap, surely the one responsible would come for me now, so I sat down and waited patiently.

  An hour passed and nothing happened. My tails had analyzed the barrier. It would have been a pain in the ass to lift if I had never studied in Witchaven an A-rank team and maybe even an S-rank team would have issues getting out of this.

  The mana runes are normal, so no extra-dimensional stuff.

  A tall male slender man approached me. He almost looked as if he came from a comic, but his face looked familiar. I went through my tablet and opened the quest I accepted. It had the faces of the missing adventurers.

  Spencer, is that you? Where is your team?

  Spencer was acting weird and I checked my tablet again.

  Spencer was supposed to be a dwarf. This must be the weakness of only showing faces but… a dwarf doesn’t look like this, right? Did he get cursed?

  My Elgards eyes revealed that I didn’t recognize his race. I know what a dwarf is, so this is a problem.

  You’re not Spencer are you…

  It ran at me at great speed and tentacles closed in at me from all sides. My tails grabbed the tentacles and froze them. The frost moved toward the main body and froze it beside its face.

  “Who are you? You’re not normal.”

  Oh so now it talks! How about you introduce yourself first, as this attack doesn’t apply as an introduction.

  “I am Spencer!”

  Spencer is a dwarf, you’re not a dwarf.

  “I made a mistake. I mean your race no harm. Please leave and I will do the same…”

  I don’t know what this thing is, but he recognizes my race. He either doesn’t want to mess with me or knows that messing with my race will put the dimension one step closer to doom.

  His hostility had dropped, so I thawed him. He also retracted his tentacles.

  Why do you have the face of a missing adventurer?

  “I am of the Bytga race, commonly referred to as face stealers.” The Bytga went through faces he had stolen, and his voice changed accordingly. He only had faces of men. Of the adventurers, nearly half were women. Something else is going on here.

  “I only steal faces of those near to death, as I avoid the living or scare them off. I can't steal faces of dead people, however…”

  There was no deception. This made the situation even more bizarre. Did the demon kill Spencer and this Bytga just stole the face of the dying Spencer? What about the other male adventurers?

  I see, I apologize for assuming the worst. Your race…it’s not very common, is it? Are you the only one?

  “Of my race? In this forest, yes. Not sure about other forests but…there is another one…the one I’m trying to catch. Watch out!”

  A tentacle pulled me away from a large figure that slammed the spot I had been sitting for the last few hours.

  “That…that’s the one! He’s drawing attention to this forest, causing adventurers to blame me!”

  Another face I recognized, but something was off with this one. Shadows appeared and more figures appeared. All with the missing faces, and to my assumption also with the correct bodies.

  An Iron Wall with all his equipment, giving off mana corresponding to an A rank, a Toxic Donkey also A rank with equipment and all. Both parties, minus Spencer had gathered. They looked normal to the untrained eye. To mine, they seemed off.

  Their insides look mechanical… what in Hourai’s name is going one?

  “Ahh it seems our secret has been revealed. Was it you who told him?” A voice unsuited for the petite female, Golden Angel said as it was a deep male voice. “Either way, that doesn’t matter. I’m upset that he stole the dwarf from me, but it seems he brought me to an interesting…specimen.”

  The voice came from another ‘adventurer’ this time.

  These adventurers… they’re all dead, aren’t they…

  “What do you mean? They are very much alive! Look how they move!”

  The voice came behind me and more individuals [Shadow melded] and revealed themselves.

  Thin mana wires. These are marionettes? Are you a dark puppet master?

  “Smart and perceptive, but I am only interested in the quality of your body and mana.”

  Ugh, what a creep.

  The Bytga and I were back-to-back as we were caught in an encirclement. So this dark puppet master is causing the disappearances and trying to pin it on the face stealer. Quite an ingenious plan, especially since the face stealer tries to scare people away, so nobody would be able to hold a conversation with him.

  It is a self-inflicted problem, but he’s not completely to blame.

  But a puppet master, eh? Can’t say I expected that. Life is full of surprises.