“Welcome to my room…”
The man sat upright in the central chair, eyes like winter wells, cold and cruel as black ice.
If a regular soul met that gaze, fear would flood like icy rain, soaking every cell, every trembling pore.
Lian, a bull of a man with a lilt of mischief, stared back, a stormcloud of annoyance instead of bravado.
“So… you’re the intruders, aren’t you…”
His words slipped out like frost, breath misting in a room that shouldn’t feel cold.
Lian eyed the hulking figure with contempt, sharp as a blade of wind.
“Idiot. Just a knock-off Dio. Drop the act.”
That so-called Dio who called himself D spun lies like smoke, yet some truths burned through.
The seated man’s face never shifted, a stone mask beneath dim firelight.
“My name is I, not Dio.”
That unmoving face made Lian’s certainty wobble, like a reed in sudden rain.
“You… really not Dio?”
The man didn’t answer at once. He gripped the armrest, standing slow as a rising monolith.
“Yes or no—didn’t your answer surface the moment you asked?”
Embarrassment pricked Lian’s scalp. He scratched his head, a puppy baffled by a riddle.
“Then… can’t you leave here? There’s no treasure ahead for you.”
Final choice—Lian’s heart thumped like a war drum. Boss fight flags snapped like banners in wind.
“Yes or no—didn’t your answer surface the moment you asked?”
On a whim, the little loli inside Lian echoed him, parroting with the crispness of a bell.
The man’s face stayed corpse-calm. He stepped down one stair at a time, ritual-slow.
With each step, candles along the rail flared, blue flames swaying like ghostly orchids.
Tap…
He reached the end of a longer-than-expected staircase, and the room’s fire roared to life, sea-blue and hungry.
A ring of blue flame rose around Alicia and the others, an arena drawn by burning paint.
The man looked at Lian, expression flat as a dead moon.
“You fought someone called D. His Stand was Stair Warden, control over stairs themselves. Guess mine.”
Lian bowed his head, thoughts flicking like sparrows—then snapped up with a spark.
“Could it be—Hermit Purple!”
Hardly his fault. Rules had stopped mattering; if that old man’s Stand showed up here, nothing would surprise him.
What if I used Hermit Purple and then dropped THE WORLD like a thunderstone?
Luckily, this world lacked that level of cruel whimsy. I shook his head, slicing the thought clean.
Lian exhaled, relief flowing like warm tea.
“Right… no way something that unscientific…”
He hadn’t finished when I cut in, voice like a blade through silk.
“I… don’t have a Stand.”
He snapped his right fingers. A gold-red ring bloomed behind him, a sun forged of steel.
“My ability—the Vampire’s Treasury.”
A road roller eased out of the ring, its surface rippling like a lake disturbed by thrown stone.
Boom!
The roller blasted forward point-blank, a shameless mirror of a certain King’s Treasury, thunder in a hallway.
Lian was caught flat, lightning-struck—steamroller slammed, and his body vanished beneath the crushing moon.
I leaped, landing atop the roller with beast grace, raising fists thick as cannon barrels.
“Muda muda muda muda!!!!!”
Both fists hammered down in a storm, blows falling like meteors to pulp the steel and the man beneath.
He looked like a taciturn slab of muscle, yet “Muda!” lit his face with fever-bright joy.
“Ora!” came a sugary loli chirp from under the roller, a cute thunderclap with a titan’s force.
I felt the surge, obeyed instinct, dodged like a swallow—and the roller flew from a single punch.
The two forces weren’t equal, not even by rumor, but I’s reflex saved him from an “Ora” skyward.
Lian rose from the floor, river-calm, eyes frost-still on I.
“You guys really aren’t worried about getting reported for plagiarism?”
I shook his head, confusion a drifting cloud. Who could report strength carved from fear? Cream puffs to the slaughter.
Lian sighed, regret like a dim lantern.
“Eh… my bad for bringing it up. Golden Sparkle in that other world won’t mind his King’s Treasury being borrowed, right?”
“Both blond, yeah? That’s right—both blond. So Golden Sparkle won’t mind a 1.9-meter muscleman stuffing steamrollers into his vault!”
Self-comfort found purchase like roots in loam. Warfire came back to Lian’s face.
“Well, rare that I can let it go this easily. So play with me—properly!”
He flicked a magic circle behind him, a moonglass barrier sliding up to seal Alicia and the others away.
Of course, Alicia hadn’t consented. Her knuckles tapped the glowing pane, nerves tight as harp strings.
I kept gentleman’s distance, blade sheathed till prep was done. When Lian looked ready, he spoke.
“Prepared?”
“Always. Don’t you dare disgrace a certain Sparkle’s King’s Treasury.”
