CHAPTER 23: CHAPTER 23- LATE NIGHT HORROR (2)

Kaidren sat motionless in the light green chair, its back slightly reclined to support his relaxed posture, yet there was nothing relaxed about the air around him. His sharp black eyes remained trained on the open automatic doors of the Dimerian Store. The sliding doors stood frozen in an open stance, like a mouth yawning into the shadowy street beyond. Not a single figure could be seen, no steps approached, no voices followed. The only thing spilling in through that opening was the chilling silence of the night.

And it had been like that for minutes now.

The faint white glow from the store’s fluorescent lighting cast a dull shine against the door’s sensor panel, making the sight feel all the more surreal. For a place meant to be alive with passing customers, the absence of motion felt wrong. Unnatural.

Kaidren didn’t move.

Not out of fear.

His body was still because he was focused—dead focused. Every breath, every thought was funnelled into observation. He didn’t blink. His hearing was locked onto the faint hum of the ceiling lights and the quiet churn of the cooling units behind the beverage section.

Inside his mind, a calm voice muttered, "It’s been too long... The doors should’ve closed by now."

He tilted his head ever so slightly, still unmoving. "Malfunction? Or..." He exhaled through his nose. "Worst case—esper interference."

It wasn’t impossible. Some espers enjoyed messing with electronics as a prank or worse—as a precursor to something far more serious. Still, there was something particularly petty about holding a door open for this long. It didn’t match any standard tactics he was familiar with.

The doors suddenly hissed as they began to close.

Kaidren’s gaze didn’t falter, but he relaxed a small fraction. The tension drained from the corner of his brows as he leaned back slightly into the plastic chair. "Guess it really was a glitch... or a moth with good timing."

He turned his attention back to his phone, thumb poised to scroll through Zbook reels once more.

Then—a sound.

A single, faint footstep.

Soft.

Barely perceptible.

Kaidren’s thumb froze above the screen. His eyes flicked upward. The automatic doors had already sealed shut.

"What was that?" he wondered in a whisper of a thought, scanning the empty store interior. Rows of snacks and drinks sat motionless under harsh lighting. The chilled hum of the fridges hadn’t changed. Everything looked normal.

Yet he’d heard it. The sharp auditory perception gifted by his esper nature didn’t lie. A single footstep. Close. Inside.

He glanced again around the aisles. No movement.

Kaidren shifted slightly in his chair, feigning casual comfort. "Am I just hungry? Hearing things?" His stomach grumbled faintly in support of that theory.

Then another step.

And another.

Then the unmistakable rhythm of someone walking.

Kaidren returned his eyes on the phone but turned off the screen with a tap. Now, in the reflection of the darkened screen, he watched. He listened. The steps were soft but clearly audible to his enhanced senses—bare soles brushing faintly against tile. They moved with deliberation, almost carefully, heading toward the snack section.

Someone was inside the store.

And he hadn’t seen them come in.

"Invisible," he thought, expression unreadable. "That would explain it. Invisibility-based esper."

He listened closer, focusing. His mind reached out, not through nexarion energy, but through honed instinct and the sharpened baseline capabilities of his six body-based abilities. The air shifted just slightly around one aisle. The sound of rustling fabric—then the almost imperceptible sway of long strands of hair catching the still air.

A female.

Young, probably close to his age.

She wasn’t levitating or teleporting. She was walking normally, invisibility likely cloaking her form but not her presence.

Kaidren exhaled softly, tapping the phone screen with his thumb again and watching it glow to life.

"Why would a girl rob a convenience store in the middle of the night?" he mused silently. *"Desperation? Or just arrogance?"

But gender didn’t matter. Theft was theft.

If she planned to steal from the store—on his shift, no less—then she’d have to be ready for consequences. He wasn’t the type to moralize. He didn’t care about motives. He didn’t care if she was struggling or spoiled. He cared about keeping the store intact, keeping his first job clean.

"If she tries anything," he thought flatly, "she’s getting a punch to the gut. Gender won’t save her."

But for now, he’d wait.

He adjusted in the chair just slightly, letting his right arm rest closer to the cash register. It was a subtle movement, something an untrained eye wouldn’t notice—but Kaidren’s entire body was now coiled, like a blade hidden in silk.

He could hear her breathing now.

Soft. Shallow. Probably unaware he’d already clocked her.

She paused near the shelf with spicy chips. A packet rustled. Kaidren narrowed his eyes at the sound.

Still, he didn’t move.

His expression didn’t shift. His fingers hovered over the screen, pretending to scroll. Internally, he began counting the weight distribution of her steps.

Left foot... shift... slight pause... right foot.

Each step gave him more of her profile—height, weight, speed, intent. She was nervous. Cautious. Probably inexperienced.

That could work to his advantage.

Another packet rustled, louder this time.

Kaidren’s internal voice murmured, "So she’s not just browsing. She’s grabbing things."

His thumb paused over the edge of his phone. The moment she made a move toward the exit, he would act. The second those stolen items crossed past the automatic doors, he’d give her exactly one warning.

One chance to drop everything and walk out.

If she didn’t...

Well.

No one said night shifts were boring.

For now, the thief remained unaware that the quiet, unimposing clerk lounging lazily at the front desk had already decided her fate.

___________________________

Kaidren remained seated in the light green, leanable staff chair, his posture relaxed, gaze fixed on the black, reflective screen of the blue phone cradled loosely in his palm. His eyes, however, betrayed none of the ease his posture suggested.

Beneath the veil of indifference, every part of his senses was alert, calculating. He tracked every faint shift in the air, every subtle creak of a floor tile, every brush of movement that might indicate the invisible presence still lurking within the store.

She was still there.

The soft, almost imperceptible hum of breath. The faint scuff of a shoe. The creaking hesitation in her steps. Kaidren had long since confirmed her existence.

His enhanced perception parsed it all—breath patterns, heartbeat fluctuations, weight distribution on the vinyl tiles. But what caught his attention now was a hesitant hum—a soft "hmm" that escaped from the woman’s mouth, as though she were weighing a decision.

In his mind, Kaidren raised a brow.

She’s... deciding? On what to steal?

He didn’t linger on the thought. It was too strange and too trivial to waste energy on, and more importantly, he couldn’t afford distraction—not even in thought. So he remained motionless, looking like an underpaid clerk who had zoned out at work. But in truth, he was a tightly wound trap waiting to spring.

Time crawled. Kaidren didn’t shift, didn’t blink more than necessary. Yet eventually, a new thought crept in.

Is she even robbing the store?

He frowned inwardly, parsing the last several minutes of subtle activity. Her breathing—nervous but not erratic. Her footsteps—measured, unhurried. There was no rustling of packaging, no pocketing of items, no hint of mischief. Just slow, deliberate movements, like a customer hesitating over their choices.

Still... why invisible?

He didn’t get to complete the thought. The sound of footsteps—soft, deliberate—began to approach the counter. The direction was clear now. She was heading toward him.

Kaidren’s every internal alarm began flashing. Not visibly. On the surface, he was still slouched in the chair, eyes half-lidded, phone screen black. But internally, his mind surged. A silent, cold storm.

A seasoned fighter would’ve felt the shift. The way the air around Kaidren seemed to settle into something heavier. His expression didn’t change, but his atmosphere grew razor sharp. His dead black eyes, unfocused as they seemed, were already mapping out countless routes—attack vectors, counters, evasions. Over a hundred scenarios unfolded silently behind those dull irises.

And then—

"U-Um... excuse me..."

A timid voice pierced through the mental simulations like a pebble dropped into still water.

Kaidren blinked.

The voice came from the middle of an aisle, not far from the counter. Where a few snack items now hovered awkwardly in midair—floating, weightless, suspended in an invisible hand.

He turned his head slightly, slowly, toward the voice. His expression unchanged. Just his eyes, locking onto the floating bags of chibi-designed chips.

"I-I’m not a ghost! I swear!" the voice stammered again.

It was female, shaky but oddly loud, as if she thought raising her voice would somehow make her more visible. "I’m an esper! I’m harmless! I—I just came to get some snacks! Please don’t freak out, okay? I swear I’m not trying to rob you!"

Kaidren didn’t say a word.

He simply pressed the tips of his index fingers lightly into his ears, dulling the volume slightly as the girl kept babbling in a panic. His expression was as blank as ever. In his mind, he sighed.

At least I won’t need to punch someone tonight... maybe.

The floating snack bags bobbed slightly as the girl fumbled about invisibly. Kaidren watched them, already picturing the clumsy anime-esque poses she was likely making. His expression remained unreadable.

After a full minute of flustered monologuing, the invisible girl finally approached the counter, items still levitating. Kaidren let her finish placing them all down before scanning each one, the soft beeps of the register providing the only ambient sound aside from the fridge.

The items: a variety of brightly colored snack packs, most featuring over-designed anime mascots, bubble letters, and flavors that tried too hard—cheesy octopus, spicy melon chips, honey soy curry crunch.

He didn’t comment.

She, on the other hand, said nothing now, but Kaidren could feel her gaze on him. She stood directly across the counter and was probably only reaching up to his shoulder in height.

The girl’s internal monologue practically echoed in the air as she examined Kaidren. His disheveled light blue hat, plain white shirt with short blue sleeves, and matching pants. His face, however, caught the most attention—those dull, lifeless black eyes that looked more like someone surviving a war than working a shift. He didn’t look startled. Or impressed. Or remotely interested.

He doesn’t care, she thought, both amused and confused. There’s literally an invisible girl in front of him and he’s acting like I’m just some regular late-night customer.

And then she smirked to herself—a smug little private expression invisible to the world.

I’m being kind, really. I could’ve robbed this guy blind... but no. I’m too nice for that. Give me some credit.

Kaidren, unaware or just uninterested in whatever her thoughts were, finished scanning the last item.

"That’ll be 5 AUR," he said, voice flat, tone mechanical. Twenty-five Earth dollars.

She didn’t hesitate. From her invisible pocket emerged a gold-toned coin, just an inch wide, ridged along its edges and embossed with the image of a blooming tree. She let it hover briefly in the air before letting it float into Kaidren’s hand.

He took it, slid it into the register, then handed over a plastic bag stamped with the store’s generic logo—DMStore—in stylized silver font.

The girl took the bag.

"Thanks," she mumbled.

"Come again," Kaidren replied. His voice as lifeless as a gravestone, the tone as welcoming as a tax audit.

She blinked.

"...O-Okay."

She turned, walking slowly through the aisles toward the automatic door. Her invisible steps made little sound, save for the faintest echo of soles on tile. As the door slid open and let in a breeze of humid night air, she looked back briefly—not that Kaidren could see—and whispered to herself:

"...Yeah. I think I just found my favorite store."

The door hissed closed behind her.

Kaidren exhaled slowly through his nose, leaned further back in his chair, and let his head tilt lazily against the wall. His phone screen still black.

Just another night shift.

And just another anomaly not worth losing sleep over.