A couple of hours passed with Senzo's clone sitting quietly beside Yugiri, who remained fully focused on the series playing on the TV.
His eyes suddenly narrowed. The air shifted, and his clone, together with the TV, vanished into thin air.
Yugiri, now left alone, had a pouting expression on her face. But she knew what it meant when he disappeared just like that.
They were coming. And her whole body stiffened as tears started forming in the corner of her eyes.
"Why now?" she muttered.
She thought back to the moment she'd just been enjoying with Senzo.
But she couldn't do anything about it. He had said countless times that he couldn't be seen in her glass cage ever, or the whole plan would fall through.
Gritting her teeth, she lay back down on her back and closed her eyes tightly, knowing the unpleasant sensation that would come next.
The only silver lining in the current situation was that he always kept his eyes on her and made sure they couldn't do anything too outrageous.
***
Senzo sat upright on his bed, his senses sharpening. The subtle shifting of vectors told him where they stood and how they moved. He didn't need to see the tube to know. They were draining her blood again for their disgusting experiments.
His brows furrowed as he kept his full attention on the scene unfolding just above him.
He didn't dare relax for a single moment, as even though according to the anime she would survive, you could never be careful enough. His whole escape plan was banking on Yugiri surviving and having her guide Hyoubu to him.
After a tense thirty minutes, the men finally shut down the machine connected to the tube, by which point Yugiri's complexion had turned visibly pale.
But instead of showing any concern for her, he could hear their words, and he couldn't help but glare at the ceiling.
"We're done here!" The larger man wearing a military uniform said, his eyes never meeting the little girl's.
The skinnier man who seemed to be lower in rank wore the same green military uniform, bowed politely, and rounded up all the equipment without even pulling the tube out of the girl's arm.
"Yes, sir!" he shouted with a military salute.
Yugiri, on the other hand, was heaving heavy breaths after so much blood had just been taken from her small body.
She couldn't even sit up. Sprawled on the large bed, her eyes struggled to stay open.
"Dirty pig." The larger man remarked right before they both left the room with the containers full of her blood.
The moment they left the room, Senzo reappeared next to Yugiri with a worried look on his face. As he clenched his fists while glaring at the two men's backs.
"I'm sorry," he muttered before disappearing again to let Yugiri rest undisturbed.
Back in his own cell, he gritted his teeth. "I truly hope he comes sooner rather than later."
And while keeping an eye on the sleeping Yugiri, he took his laptop out of the phone's storage and his headphones as well.
Quickly putting on a tune to improve his mood, he started testing things out on his laptop, like if he could still access the services he used on Earth or if everything had changed to services of this world.
To his surprise, he could still access the internet and even his banking app.
"Quite handy, I must say. Could I not just transfer money to my current bank account then?"
With that in mind, he decided to try it out; his background gave him a special bank account bound to a normal citizen, and a non-esper at that, so no one would be suspicious if any amount of money was transferred in there.
"Guess it was to be expected. I guess only the money I decide to transfer with and any money earned in this world are able to be used here."
It was at least good to know for any next worlds he would visit.
After that he had no idea what to do; he was patiently waiting for Hyoubu to appear, but until that time he could hardly do anything. Or his whole plan would fall through.
And although he enjoyed spending time with Yugiri, most of the time she asked him to watch some TV series or play video games. So he didn't really have anything to do.
Then, the exams came to mind... and with a long sigh, he quietly opened his textbooks and just started studying while keeping an eye on Yugiri and patiently waiting for him to appear.
***
Like that, a week slowly passed; his days were a blur of studying, doing research, and entertaining Yugiri, but for some reason he didn't mind this in the slightest.
It was very peaceful, and even though the cell was anything but comfortable, he had gotten so used to it he almost began calling it home.
With the memories of his background fully integrated, he had spent over three years in this single cell already without any contact with anyone with his real body.
The only human interactions he had were with Yugiri, and because she was still a little girl, it felt more like taking care of a little sister.
"I hope he shows up soon. Life like this isn't bad, but Yugiri deserves to be free—to live a real childhood." He muttered with a sad look in his eyes.
But just then he felt a large commotion from the main island, and he couldn't hide the grin on his face.
"Finally, now shit is about to get real."
***
On the main island multiple helicopters were slowly descending. Inside were highly geared soldiers and a young man wearing a simple all-black school uniform with a confident look in his eyes.
"We've finally arrived," the young man muttered, overlooking all the prisoners wearing orange overalls that surrounded the helicopters that had just landed.