---Chapter XIV: Goodbye (Part 2)---

///Third Person PoV///

"You take care of that one! We'll take care of these two!"

"Japan! Are you all right?!"

"I'll take care of it while you do the chanting!"

Meanwhile, back in the current time loop, the other countries were engaged in a vigorous battle against numerous alien-like creatures in the room that had bloody numbers written on the floor.

"It's really tough...My sword can barely cut it!" France panted.

Prussia looked at his two friends and spoke aloud, "Let's go all three at the same time! Drei, zwei, eins-"

"Cero!!" Spain shouted as the three of them charged after the rock-like monster in front of them. After critically hitting the creature, they were able to defeat it.

On the other hand, Romano and Japan were battling against a flying alien creature in the top right corner of the room. "Jump, Japan! I'll distract it for you!" Romano yelled.

"Thank you!!" Japan said, jumping up into the air.

Romano grabbed the monster's attention by shouting out, "C'mon, you bastard, your trophy is over here! "

When the creature started to move closer to to the Southern Italian, Japan appeared and attacked the monster from above, successfully defeating it.

"...Arrivederci." Romano smirked as the creature disappeared.

Japan walked over to his comrade and smiled. "Well done, Romano!"

"... Yes! Get down, China!" England called out as he prepared his magic attack against the monster in the bottom right corner of the room.

China nodded and warned him, "Aiyah! Don't miss, or else!"

"Hah! You fucking tell me! Take that! Sectumsempra!!" England smirked as he used his magic to critically hit the monster and leading it to its end.

"We have it cornered!" Canada cheered as he and Russia battled against the short alien creature in the bottom left corner of the bloodied room.

Russia looked down at the creature and smiled."So, what do you prefer? Burning until not even your ashes are left, or being frozen up for the rest of your life? ...Just kidding~! I won't give you a choice." he laughed. Once he attacked the monster and made it disappear upon defeat, he smirked. "It's okay, I won't give you time to have any regrets, either."

Once all of the monsters were gone, they all gathered in the center of the room. "Thank God...somehow, we managed to swipe them clean..." Japan said, taking a deep breath of relief.

England nodded.  "Italy's journal made a lot of them disappear, and yet that was still tough. Well done, Italy-" he suddenly stopped when he realised that the person was nowhere to be seen.

"Veneziano?" Romano said in a low voice, looking around the room.

Russia frowned. "Italy? Hey, he's...he's gone...isn't he?"

"...West is gone, too!" Prussia exclaimed as he noticed that his younger brother wasn't there, either.

Japan's relieved state had faded. "A-Along with....(Name)-chan..."

"And...America...too..." Canada stated in a worried tone.

Spain enumerated them, raising fingers. "So...Ita, Germany, (Name) and America are gone...? They're the ones who were close to the journal, aren't they?" he pointed out.

"There were so many enemies that I didn't even notice...I'm sorry...we were supposed to run away the moment we secured an exit..." Japan said, hinting regret.

China looked at them. "Do you think they're...gone? Because of the journal..."

"Gone...as in...dead?" France said slowly, horrified at the thought.

Prussia shook his head. "That's impossible! I'll look for them! But...I don't know where to start..."

All of a sudden, they heard a phone ring.

=*=*=*=*=*=*=

///Reader's PoV///

"(Second Name)...Hm. Fine, then. Untie her." Luciano ordered, walking away.

I felt the ropes that bound me loosen and fall down to the floor. After I was fully untied, I stood up and stretched a bit, feeling a bit of numbness for sitting there for I don't know how long. Suddenly, I felt a pair of hands grab my waist from behind, making me let out a small squeal of surprise. "Ooh~ You've got a nice body here, honey. I could think up a lot of good designs for you..." the person behind me said.

Turning around and moving the hands away, I realised that it was Flavio. "U-Uhm... I don't know what to say about that..." I told him, geniunely unsure.

"You could say, 'yes' to me designing some clothes for you. Ehe. You know, I always wanted to open my own boutique, so I like thinking up new and creative designs." Flavio proudly said.

Luciano turned to face his brother and clicked his tongue. "That again, fratello?! How many times do I have to tell you that that's completely impossible? You already know why--so why try and blind yourself with false hopes?!" 

"Well, someone's being a little bitch." Flavio snapped. "Look, I hate those 'original' bastards as much as you do and I do want their severed bodies on a silver platter--but I don't want to make it our life! Our plan played out so well last time, but then your fcking counterpart had to go back in time and ruin it. Now, we're going through it all over again. But what will we do after we successfully eliminate all of them? What then, huh?! Can't I even dream? I know that all of us are practically psychopaths here--but are we not allowed to think of normal thoughts once in a while??!" the blonde haired Italian shouted in an exasperated tone.

Luciano grit his teeth and suddenly stabbed the table with his switchblade. "How are we even allowed to think of normal thoughts, if we aren't normal in the first place? We could never be normal. You should know that from the day we were created."

Flavio ran his fingers through his hair. "Si. Si! I know that, but you aren't getting my point! My point is--"

"--We don't need to listen to that shit. That's my point. Because my point is that this conversation is stupid. We don't need to think about those matters right now, because right now, what we need to think about is following our plan....And this conversation is not part of it. It's wasting our time. This conversation is over." Luciano said coldly, walking through the door and exiting the room. 2P! Germany and 2P! Japan followed, along with 2P! China and 2P! Russia. The only people that remained in the room was the Second Players: Flavio, Allen, Oliver, Matthieu, Francois, Gilen and Andres.

A great amount of tension was left in the room, along with ear-ringing silence. Flavio simply let out an irritated groan and sat on one of the chairs. "What's the point of being his older brother if he doesn't even listen to me? Italy is such a problematic child." he sighed.

"...Italy?" I suddenly said out loud. If I recall correctly, this was the second time loop...so they haven't met me yet or even know that they have human names. I almost forgot about that fact.

Allen went over to us and spoke, "Uh-oh. Looks like the dollface is preettyy confused about what the fuck just happened." he chuckled.

"Should we tell her?" Flavio asked, turning to me.

Oliver, who was actually beside me, made me sit down on a chair and spoke, "Well...I don't know about that..." Out of nowhere, he pulled out two cupcakes on a tray. One of them looked like a red velvet cupcake with white icing and dark red sprinkles, and the other looked like chocolate with light brown icing and sprinkles with a browner colour.

"...Care for a cupcake, poppet?" 

=*=*=*=*=*=*=

///Third Person PoV///

All of a sudden, they heard a phone ring.

"Oh, it's your phone, Japan." Spain pointed out.

Japan took out his phone and nodded as he saw the screen. "Indeed. Please excuse me for a bit." he then distanced himself a little as he answered the call and set it to speaker phone. "Yes, this is Japan-"

"What took you so long, Japan?!" the Korean man on the other side of the line scolded.

Japan's eyes widened as he realised that it was South Korea who was speaking to him. "Oh...you...Long time no see. What is wrong?"

"What's wrong, you ask? Well, nothing, really. I-It's not like I was worried about you or anything!" South Korea denied.

Japan gave a confused look as he heard the statement. "I'm sorry? W-well, you may not care, Korea, but...er?"

"Pfft! Japan! Korea just called because he was worried about you! You didn't call him, so he got tired of waiting!" China laughed.

Japan raised an eyebrow. "Oh, is that so?"

"What are you talking about, bro?! That's not it at all! Hey, Japan, you are alive, aren't you?" South Korea asked.

Chuckling a bit, Japan replied, "Huhu, yes, I'm alive, thank you. I heard that the enemy is outside, too. How are you fairing with it?"

"It's piece of cake! We're cleaning the way for you, so you better get out of there already!" he told them.

China listened in and shook his head. "Yeah, except we kind of can't right now. We've been in a...dead end for a while..."

"Haha, what are you talking about, bro?! If I'm here, that means everyone is going to get out!" South Korea told them proudly.

China tilted his head. "Why?"

With a proud huff, South Korea beamed, "Because 'escaping with everyone' originated in me! That's why everyone is going to get out! Absolutely!"

"Huhu, I see. Then we will do our best to see if you are right. Won't we, everyone?" Japan asked the others.

Canada smiled. "Yes. Now that we got some time, our heads have also cooled down."

Humming a little, South Korea then spoke, "Oh, Japan, I was looking around the house and wondered, are you in an annexe right now?"

"Annexe?!" England exclaimed in surprise.

Another voice was heard from the other line. It was Austria. "You really didn't notice? Then again, we just realised it ourselves-"

"An annexe...Hey, what does that mean, little master?! If it's true..." Prussia trailed in thought.

Russia adjusted his scarf. "Yep, we need to find a door."

"That house is quite vast. Oops...Excuse me, we must go for now. We have some urgent business to attend to." Austria told them hurriedly.

South Korea then spoke, "Well, then, I'll hang up! ...Bro, Japan!"

"Y-yes?" Japan asked nervously.

With a smirk, South Korea shouted out. "Show 'em what asia is made of!"

"That goes without saying. You, too, try not to kick the bucket." China said, smiling.

"Thanks, bro! Bye!" South Korea said, ending the call.

Outside the mansion in the gardens, South Korea and Austria were standing back-to-back, each in a fight against an alien-like creature. For the time being, it seemed as if they were using some kind of forcefield to fend the monsters off.

"...I won't let you die." South Korea muttered as he placed his phone back in his pockets.

Austria looked to his side and gave an annoyed look. "Are you done with your phone call? Good grief, don't make phone calls out of nowhere! Let me know beforehand!"

"Sorry. Well, now, let's go back to making a way for them!!" South Korea said as they continued their battle against the creatures.

=*=*=*=*=*=*=

Back in the room where Japan and the others are...

"...He's such an interesting character. ...May they also have a successful battle." Japan said, smiling a bit.

Spain raised his hand. "All right, let's look for the annexe door now! Maybe that's where Ita and the others wound up! There's still hope!"

"Yeah! We'll definitely find them!" Romano cheered.

Japan nodded. "Indeed. Let's split up to look for them."

And at that, everyone but Prussia, Romano, and Japan left the room.

"So, why on Earth are you two in my group, again?" Japan groaned.

Prussia placed a hand on Japan's shoulder. "C'mon, it'll be fun! There's nothing wrong with working with some new faces once in a while! We'll be the Little Brother and Cute Girl Search Party!"

"I do feel...out of place...but whatever. And we're definitely NOT using that name." Romano told the albino, squinting his eyes at him.

Japan looked confused.  "But then, wouldn't it have made more sense for you to go with England instead of---Oh, never mind. Shall we go, then? It won't be a problem if we end up on the same floor as the others."

=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=

Meanwhile, in the second time loop, Italy and Germany were hiding in the piano room to avoid being seen by the people from that time. They waited there until it was safe enough to leave and walk around the mansion.

Italy peered through the door then closed it. Walking over to Germany, he spoke, "I think...it's about time everyone got together again. We'd better go now." 

"Understood. By the way, if this is the second time loop...does that mean America and the others are going to get killed?" Germany asked.

Italy nodded and gave a sad expression. "Yeah...America, England, and China. I'd like to help them, but...I can't."

"Right...Oh, and you haven't found the journal, have you?" We have to look for it, too." Germany reminded him.

Snapping his fingers, Italy widened his eyes. "That's right! We have to find it before the others do. We must have come to the past because of the journal. If we find it...I think...we'll be able to go back."

"Yes, I agree. Well, then, let's search for it. Carefully, of course." Germany told the Northern Italian.

Saluting with a left hand, Italy smiled. "Sir, yes sir!"

=*=*=*=*=*=*=

///Reader's PoV///

"...Care for a cupcake, poppet?"

I felt like my heart stopped when he asked me that question. This wasn't the Ollie that I knew and befriended. No. This is...2P! England.

Looking at the facial expressions of the people around me, I saw that some of them had curious expressions, while others just stared with a bored one. Scarily enough, no one seemed to plan on warning me or anything. They just waited for me to make my move.

And I knew the answer very well.

"....They look lovely and well-made....but....is it alright if I pass?" I answered him nervously.

Raising an eyebrow, the strawberry blonde haired Brit spoke "Hmm?~ Why, poppet? They're delicious, I tell you."

"Just pick one. He'll kill you if you deny." Matthieu told me bluntly.

I froze. What? No! I can't pick one!.... I know what he does to his cupcakes... 

What the heck?! Were they actually going to kill me, after all?

Biting my lip, I spoke softly, "...I'm...sure the cupcakes are delicious."

"Then take one, poppet!" Oliver growled, no longer asking--but ordering.

I stood up and took a step away from him. "I'm sorry, but I can't!"

"And why not?!" Oliver stood up, as well, glaring at me.

Without thinking, I replied, "Because both of them have poison!!"

"Heh. Well well well. This is getting interesting." I heard Allen chuckle beside me.

The pink swirls in Oliver's eyes slowly disappeared as he placed the cupcake tray on the table. "....Poison...." he turned to face me. "......How did you know about that?"

All eyes were on me now, as they were also somehow alarmed by the fact that I knew that there was poison inside perfectly normal looking cupcakes. How am supposed to explain that?! 

"C'mon, (Name), don't dig your grave any deeper than it already is." I thought to myself, staring at the floor.

Looking up to face them, I spoke,

"...I'm not from this world."

"Idiot." I mentally facepalmed.