Chapter 72: Ch111. Questions won’t answer themselves
K chuckled for a moment.
Kurt looked at him, still serious.
"What’s so funny?"
K tried, but after what Kurt said, he burst out in laughter.
"Oh, boy. Nothing, nothing. Sorry, but you getting so serious and determined all of a sudden... It reminds me of when I was younger, naive and innocent."
K kept laughing until he cried.
After a few minutes of that, he wiped the tears off his eyes and stopped laughing.
"Sorry, kid, I didn’t mean to offend you, but you gotta admit that it was at least a bit funny."
But not a single one of K’s friends were laughing with him.
And Evellyn glared at him as if she knew something.
"K..." She called.
"What?"
"If you keep looking down at him, I’m going to punch you myself."
K quieted down, little by little, until only silence remained in the room.
"I’m sorry, but... Is he who he think he is?" Nikolai asked, shaking his head.
"Yes, his frequency is a bit different, but every single one of his wavelengths match K’s to the minutest." Nadia said, looking at her computer.
"So you’re younger K?" Nikolai smiled.
It was strange for Kurt, seeing him with that eye patch, or even seeing him so... Grown up.
"I’m Kurt, I’m not sure I can say K is me or that I am him. I’m Kurt, that’s all." He answered. And I’m sorry for passing out, it was a bit too much to take in all at once. Even more because the only time I saw you all grown up like that... Well..."
"You died, by Quintus’ hands. And that was the beginning of the craziest downwards spiral towards power that I ever seen." K added.
Nikolai looked from Kurt to K, raising his brow.
"And you didn’t fill me in on that part why, exactly?" He asked, confused.
"Because that was your most meaningless version." K sighed. "You were a regular who basically founded an institution called Black Market, helped Kurt while he lived in the streets-" He suddenly paused and corrected himself. "Sorry, that version of Kurt, only to be killed by Quintus. I didn’t fill you in on that part of the story, because you only served the purpose of creating the foundations of that version of... Us." He finished, pointing from himself to Kurt.
Nikolai looked at K, offended, but Kurt interrupted.
"Sorry, but... Answers here? Please?"
"ASK. THE FUCKING. QUESTIONS. YOU MORON!" K yelled, closing his eyes and breathing deeply.
"KAY!?" Evellyn shouted. "He’s just-"
"A FUCKING CHILD, I KNOW THAT! I’m seeing it... I’m just-"
"Look." Kurt got up and breathed in, deeply. "I would love to stay here for as long as you need, in order to scold me for whatever reason you have, but I don’t have the time. So, if you’re not gonna answer my questions, I’m gonna find the answers myself, out there, bye!"
"Kurt, wait!" Evellyn and Nikolai asked, calling him out, but Kurt had already turned around and was walking towards where they came from.
"Don’t chase him." K asked, his voice sounding like a plea. "He’ll find out soon enough how hard this world is, and when he does... He’ll come back to do what he came here to do."
But Kurt didn’t come back.
As soon as he arrived at the stairs of the subway station, the system beeped in his head.
[THE TITLE – KING’S MASTER – IS IN EFFECT]
’what? But I didn’t activate it. System, can you tell me what happened?’
[EXTERNAL FORCES INTERFERING WITH THE COMMUNICATION BETWEEN DIMENSIONS]
[UNABLE TO STATE THE SITUATION]
Kurt gritted his teeth.
’I hope everyone’s okay...’
He breathed in and out, and went up the staircase, still with [CONCEAL] on.
Luckily, for him, as he noticed while on the first run, even though it was an active skill, it didn’t have a cost of activation.
So it didn’t matter for how long he used it, it wouldn’t wear off.
He was angry, and wanted to go back to his world badly, but no matter how far he ran or how many beasts he fought.
Nothing would happen, other than the system beeping in his head and sending messages.
[THE ATMOSPHERE OF THE AMBIENT INCREASES THE EXPERIENCE FROM EVERY BEAST YOU KILL]
[ACQUIRED BLOOD VIAL X1]
[ACQUIRED BLOOD VIAL X1]
[ACQUIRED BEAST CORE X1]
[ACQUIRED BEAST CORE X1]
And the messages flooded Kurt’s mind.
He didn’t feel much tired after he drank the stamina potion, and the increase in his stats, after the system completed the first step of whatever this [CONVERSION] was, made everything slightly easier.
But the beasts there looked tougher than the ones Kurt fought before.
Whether back in the test, or in the [MEMORY FRAGMENT].
[THE BEASTS IN THIS WORLD CARRY CORES WITH HIGHER QUALITY]
’It makes much more sense... So the beasts here are stronger after all. But... Why?’
One night, however, the system sent Kurt a message that was much more different than any other that he had received in any situation.
[SOMETHING INSIDE YOU URGES YOU TO FIGHT]
"Will you follow the system’s words? Or will you accept my apology in K’s stead?" Kurt heard Evellyn’s voice behind him.
She appeared so suddenly and so silently that Kurt almost jumped backwards.
Evellyn chuckled at the scene that unfolded in her mind, of him jumping backwards and assuming a fighting pose just to find her, looking at him.
"How long have you been around?" Kurt asked, sighing.
"Long enough to say that K is gonna be pissed to know how wrong he was about you." She smiled. "But I’m glad he is, you know?"
"Yeah? Why?" Kurt crossed his arms, frowning.
"Because whether you believe it or not, the odds of everything lies on your shoulders, and he knows that."
"Yeah, yeah. The system told me that once, already, but it doesn’t answer the questions I came here with." Kurt huffed, walking around.
"Such as why the beasts here are stronger than in your world, why the system called this world a Nest when it warned you about its opening, what K meant by people eating dead beasts and what the people here in the surface truly are... Did I forget any specific question?"
"Yes." Kurt smiled without any emotion. "Two, actually."
"Tell me, then." Evellyn gave him a lopsided smile.
"What’s that alleged prophecy about, and how do you know about the system?"
