Chapter 349 Cruel Fate
After finishing searching the whole room and hiding the black ball, Layla had finished getting rid of every trace of Pure there was in her room. That included her own things as well. Pure didn’t have many agents or students who could infiltrate the base while it was still the school term, so she was safe for now, but it still made her worry.
Although she was safe now, what would she do once the summer holidays arrived? The original plan was to head back to the Pure base, but that was no longer an option. Pure didn’t know what happened to her, and if she didn’t have a good excuse for not responding, perhaps she would have been thrown out of the Hundred Ranks and banned from coming back to the school.
’I wonder if Mum is even worried?’ She started to think as she laid in her bed, completely worn out from the search.
Just then, a knock was heard at the door. "Layla, is it okay if we come in? it’s the doctor and Cia is with me as well." Hayley said.
"Yeah, sure," Layla shouted.
As the door slid open, Cia came in with the doctor behind her, but Layla was amazed when she saw Cia. She looked like an almost entirely utterly different person. One of her hands was rubbing the other up and down, and she was nervously looking around the room. She looked like a piece of glass that was on the verge of shattering any second.
"Now you take your time in here, okay, while I go talk to your roommate. Don’t worry, Layla is one of the kindest girls I know, and you two used to get along." Hayley said, unsure if that was true or not but just wanted to do everything she could to comfort her.
Hayley, the school doctor, and Layla had left the room to have a small talk with each other.
"I don’t know if you already know this, but Cia seems to have forgotten everything that happened. We don’t really know why, and since she was found in the hotel lobby, we can’t link it to anything either. It’s been a few days since this has happened, and there have been no signs of recovery. What we want to do is slowly adjust her back to her old routine. Hopefully, it might spark something back in her.
"You know the doctor’s office is always busy, and she can’t stay there forever. I would have liked her to stay for a bit longer but I can’t, which is why I’m asking if you can look after her. If you notice anything strange or out of the blue, please come to me straight away. Is that okay?"
Hearing all this, Layla felt obliged to say yes; after all, it was partly her fault that all her memories had been removed in the first place.
"Yeah, that’s fine. I will look after Cia. Can I just ask, have the school tried contacting her parents about this at all?" Layla asked.
"Yes, we wanted to inform them immediately, but with the details that are registered, we aren’t able to get in touch. If we do, I’ll let you know straight away." Hayley replied and left as soon as she finished since she had a hectic schedule ahead of her.
Entering back in the room, she could see Cia had opened her wardrobe and was looking at her clothes and items as if they were all foreign to her. After that, she pulled out her bag from underneath the bed, and with the things inside, she picked them up one by one, but still, she could not remember anything.
"Did you know me well?" Cia asked with her voice shaky as if it was about to crack.
Layla came over and sat on her own bed, which was not too far from Cia’s, while looking at her.
"No one at the school knows each other that well since we all came from different schools before, but we were roommates since day one, and you and I used to be on the same team."
Through her words, she could see that Cia was trying to remember, trying to think back if there was anything, but there was nothing. After realizing this, Cia started to break down in tears again. She was crying with her hands covering her face and sobbing away.
Layla quickly came over, and out of instinct gave her a big hug to her side.
"It’s okay, Cia, even if you don’t remember everything, it doesn’t matter. You can make new memories, right? Who knows, maybe your life before was a bad one."
But Cia continued to cry; it didn’t matter if it was a bad one to her, she just wanted to remember who her parents were, how she grew up as a kid. She couldn’t even remember the person who was comforting her right now, and it all was a terrifying thought.
’Will she be like this forever?’ Layla started to think. ’Perhaps removing all her memories was too cruel in the end; I should ask Quinn tomorrow if there’s anything we can do.’
That night, the two girls decided to sleep in the same bed together. It was the only thing that made Cia feel safe now, having someone who knew her next to her.
The next day, when Layla had woken up, she looked at her wristwatch to notice it blinking away. Cia’s face by her side was a little puffy from all the crying.
She quickly got out of bed and listened to the message quietly.
’Layla, if you still want to do this, let’s all meet in the park forest where we trained with Peter at ten AM; everyone in the group will be there.’ The message had been sent by Quinn.
Looking at the watch, she realized it was nine AM now, so she quickly got dressed and did her best to get ready as soon as possible. The sound of opening and closing of wardrobes had eventually woken Cia up, as she rubbed her swollen red eyes to see Layla in a rush to go somewhere.
"Why are you up so early?" Cia asked.
"I have to go for my usual morning... er run," Layla replied.
"Can I... Can I come with you?" Cia asked.
Hearing these words caused pain in Layla’s heart. She could tell she was afraid to be left alone still. But she had no choice.
"You get some rest, I really need to leave now, but I promise when I’m done and come back, we can spend all the time you want together." She replied as she rushed off and left the room.
Yesterday. When returning to his room, Quinn opted to act normal about everything that had happened so far. He planned to meet everyone the next day anyway, so it would have been best to explain everything in one go. So he had yet to tell Vorden about what happened to Leo.
All the boys were in the park woods. They were quite deep in away from the actual park, and no one would travel in here unless they were up to no good or just wanted to go for a walk through the woods. Logan had spread out his little spiders in all directions in a large circular manner; that way, if someone had decided to come into the woods, they would know.
"So, anything interesting happened to you guys yesterday?" Vorden asked, trying to break the boredom while waiting.
He hated to admit it, but everything had been kind of normal so far, and due to all the excitement that had happened, things felt boring.
"The usual. Just worked on tinkering with my gadgets; I could go into detail of what I managed to accomplish yesterday if you are really bored." Logan replied.
"No thanks," Vorden said, knowing he would be bored out of his mind listening to Logan.
"Well, I certainly have some interesting news for you all, but we will wait until Layla gets here."
The sound of footsteps and rustling leaves could be heard stomping on the ground. No one was worried as Logan didn’t cause any alarm, and shortly after, they could see Layla arriving all huffing and panting.
"I’m sorry I woke up a little late," Layla said.
"Oof, and on your big day as well, huh." Said Vorden.
The groups were standing in a circle in the forest, and Quinn walked into the center to speak to them all. "First, before we do this, I have something important to tell you all, it is about Leo..."
Quinn proceeded to tell the others what had happened yesterday. He didn’t go into details about Qi, as it seemed to be something that was meant to be kept secret and passed down to those they chose. Still, he explained how Leo had been accidentally turned while trying to help Quin get stronger, also informing them how he had chosen to leave the school.
Everyone was shocked by this; they couldn’t even believe what they had just heard. It was as if one surprise had come after another as Quinn explained the details.
"Wait, so you’re saying Leo’s a vampire now just like you. Then is he okay for blood? Is everything going to be okay?" Vorden said in a panic; he clearly seemed to think this was a huge problem, while Quinn remained calm.
"I think he will be okay. It seems like he already left yesterday night," Quinn said, placing his fist on his chest. The connection between the two was now gone, meaning he was no longer close by. "I explained everything to him, and you, Vorden, should know the most how powerful he is."
Vorden started to think back about when he had copied Leo’s power. Even for him and the multiple different powers he had wielded before, Leo’s was surely special and different.
"Since we’re all involved in this, I thought you guys should know. Especially since right now, we’re about to dive in even deeper."
"It seems like being a human is quickly going out of fashion," Logan commented; now, everyone was looking at Logan strangely.
’Was that supposed to be a joke?’ Layla thought. Right now, they didn’t know what was more shocking, the fact that Leo, their teacher, had turned into a vampire or that Logan had tried to make a joke.
Ignoring the small comments, Quinn wanted to get down to business and turned to look at Layla.
"Now, we don’t know what’s going to happen to you; you could turn into a ghoul, like Peter, but this time we have Logan helping us so we shouldn’t have the same complications as before, or you could turn into a vampire, like Leo. We have Vorden’s blood for that."
"Ah, jeez, now I’m going to be your little snack bar for you two," Vorden commented.
"Or, you could become something that we haven’t seen before. Are you sure you want to go through with this because there’s no turning back?" Quinn asked.
"As long as it will make me stronger, then yes. I’m sick and tired of being useless to you guys, and before you say I’m not. You need to start to look at the people who are coming after us. As we make more enemies and go higher up, they keep getting stronger and stronger, and I want to rescue Erin from Pure. At the time, I did what I thought was right to save her, and I know she will be safe, but the longer she stays there..." Layla didn’t finish her last sentence. But after learning of their strange tactics, and the death pill that Cia had, Quinn knew the place wasn’t the best.
"I understand."
[Blood Ritual Activated]
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