Chapter 45: Research Room
Breakers HQ
Jennifer sat still in the research room, her attention completely drawn to the computer screen in front of her, which had Leo’s face on it . For the past hour, she had been watching anything related to Leo, from the footage of his fight against Lord Gara to the pictures the cameras had taken of him in his white room before they went to the Awakening Trial.
’Where are you, Leo?’
’I know there is an explanation to all of this. You can’t be a spy. It’s impossible.’
She had her own psychological battle going on in her mind. With Jake throwing around the theory that all the events that happened were orchestrated by Leo and that he had been with the Meta Humans all along, many had sided against him, even though Jennifer outright denied it.
"What are you looking at?"
Bandaged Katelyn’s voice interrupted her as she came from behind.
Jennifer quickly removed Leo’s image from the screen, hiding it from Katelyn’s gaze. But Katelyn had already seen everything, so she acted as if she hadn’t just to make Jennifer feel safe.
"It’s, it’s nothing... how are you feeling?"
Jennifer changed the subject.
"Much better now. It’s been two weeks since the fight, but I still feel like crap."
Katelyn replied, pushing a chair near Jennifer so they could talk face to face.
Anyway, Katelyn was right. Bandages covered almost her entire body, so the only piece of clothing she had on was a jacket she had placed on top, along with some wide black shorts that covered her lower half.
"But that’s enough about me. Let’s talk about you . How are you feeling, baby girl?"
Katelyn was already acquainted with Jennifer, so it wasn’t weird for her to speak like that.
"What... what do you mean?"
Jennifer hesitated, trying to brush the topic aside.
"You and Leo. Must be so hard to love a bad boy, huh?"
Jennifer flushed with emotion, her cheeks turning red. In her gut, it felt like her insides were turning to jelly.
"I know they’re saying he’s evil, but I’ve seen the kid when everything was against him to know that there is much more to the story."
Jennifer’s face brightened, realizing she wasn’t the only one who felt that way.
"You believe that too?"
"Yeah, I kinda do. But once again, I don’t completely trust him. Some parts of the story are sketchy, like why was he hiding that power all along. He needs to explain himself."
Her eyes rolled as she chose her words carefully.
"But now he’s missing, which is a pretty bad pickle."
She changed her tone into a more optimistic one.
"But I know he’s gonna come back, so don’t worry about him."
Katelyn finished her little pep talk, and by the look of things, it worked. The worrisome look on Jennifer’s face completely disappeared, replaced by a more hopeful one.
It was a good, hopeful scene. Little did they know that Sabrina had watched their entire conversation as she peeked through the door, her eyes looking even more suspicious than Jake’s.
"So Katelyn is on Leo’s side too huh. The General will be happy to hear about this."
An evil grin spread across her face as she quietly closed the door.
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LASTWORLD
They didn’t wait for sunrise to leave the rest room. By that time, the streets were cold, with fog coming out of their mouths whenever they exhaled.
Even at that hour, business was still progressing. But unlike tangible goods, some vendors were selling memories. Yeah, you heard that right. Sweet memories they had never actually experienced. Many people felt empty in this world, so to replace that emptiness, they injected memories directly into their heads using painful injections.
It weirded the two so much that it made them run far away.
So they kept walking until they reached another part of the world in the mountains.
Leo checked his stats again on his system screen.
[Name: Leo Hamany]
[Role: Attacker]
[Affinity: Darkness + Fire]
[Rank: SSS+ Rank User]
[Level 1 Skill: Materialization]
[Level 2 Skill: Genesis Forge]
[Points: 250/10000 to Level Three]
[Strength: 106]
[Agility: 92]
[Speed: 122]
[Special Features = Neutralization
=Assimilation
]
It really seemed like a long time since he upgraded, but without any beasts to kill and earn Skill Points from, he was doomed to stay where he was for a long time. In terms of power level, that is.
They were following the map they got from the shop owner. As badly drawn as it seemed, it was actually pretty accurate. It knew where the best roads were, and it also aligned perfectly with the rivers they passed by, even though, as they crossed one river, a crocodile attacked them only to be cut in two by Vegor’s blade.
"That has to be it."
Vegor muttered, pointing at a lofty cabin on top of a hill. It stood behind a lot of closely planted trees that made it hard to see from afar.
Leo took a deep breath, preparing to go into a dark abyss he knew nothing about. But that was exactly what he had been experiencing ever since coming here, so he never let it weigh him down.
As they progressed farther, they came across a problem. The map said they should follow a road that curved around the mountain to reach the cabin. But in reality, that route would’ve made the journey much longer than necessary. Passing through the straight road seemed like the common-sense solution.
Leo was disturbed by the situation, and when he asked Vegor, the knight said nothing other than that he was waiting for his master’s decision.
"Let’s follow his road. Maybe there is something wrong with that one. If horror movies tau—"
He wanted to reference a movie he had once seen, but when he thought about it, his mind became blank, like it had completely forgotten that part of the puzzle.
A constant reminder that soon it wouldn’t be horror movie memories he’d be forgetting, but something much more important to his life.
They walked along the road swiftly, their minds trying to imagine what the old woman would look like.
A woman with wrinkles all over her face and a long weird nose for every lie she had told. Or a woman who walked with a stick, her back bent over, with a magic potion mixing pot sitting in her living room.
"Hey there, gentlemen."
A strange voice interrupted.
Their imagination time was interrupted by a sleek-looking being with ears like gills and a chopstick in his mouth. Behind him, ten more men emerged from the forest with weapons strapped to their backs.
[They are called Gillkods, the same kind of beings as the shop owner.]
’Alright?’
Leo replied, the light shining brightly in his eyes.
"We’re a band of thieves. Our friend got killed in the forest the other day. And coincidentally, that’s the same forest you two fell into, says the information merchant."
The man finished.
’That shop owner set us up. You can’t really trust him to keep his mouth shut.’
He paused, outsource who he was speaking about.
’So he’s talking about the man that stabbed me when I came here.’
The image of the man’s crooked face appeared in Leo’s mind.
Vegor moved in front of Leo, gripping the blade in his hand.
"Don’t worry, Master. I will kill him."
"We don’t wanna fight with you. No, we want to talk."
The leading man replied.
