Chapter 32 - Feng Ling.
He had been listening to Ash'Kral for a while now and throughout all the crazy stuff he uttered, this topped it...Not 100% human? Levi just failed to believe him.
'I understand your misgivings, and to be honest, I am not really too sure if my assumption is correct.' Ash'Kral replied, 'We will find out at night.'
'What do you mean?'
'There is no point in explaining it now. We will check if I am correct or not once night falls. I have a foolproof method.' Ash'Kral said, 'For now, you should focus on three goals. Get rid of any suspicion that might implicate you in the Harrowing Forest massacre, reach stage one in the Nine Senses evolutionary path to unlock your first weapon and ability, and lastly, participate in the upcoming Assembly to launder our partnership.'
Levi could only nod his head in understanding, putting the bloodline issue at the back of his mind for now.
He had much bigger problems to solve and one of them was surviving the upcoming interrogation.
'I will return at night, I can't be seen with you in public, not before our contract becomes official.'
Sensing the approaching of multiple auras, Ash'Kral closed his eye and exited the bridge of darkness, returning to the Shadow dimension.
After a few moments, the room's door slid open. Shia, Sergio, and Jamal entered the room with flowers, balloons, and many packages of chocolate.
Of course, Shia was holding nothing but a popsicle in her mouth.
When they saw Levi sitting on his bed with the wind gently playing with his messy hair, their eyes lit up in delight.
"Levi! You are finally awake!"
Shia was the first to rush him and give him a tight hug. Levi was startled at first as he hated getting touched by people out of nowhere. As a blind person, it felt like his comfort zone was invaded against his will.
But, knowing that it was Shia, he relaxed his shoulders and accepted her hug with a serene smile.
"You have been sleeping so long we started getting worried." Jamal shared as he dropped the gifts on the side of the bed.
"No one invaded your dreams? Just tell me what they look like and I will handle them." Shia asked coldly while pulling away from Levi.
"Thanks for your concerns, but I had a great sleep." Levi smiled.
"Good, we would have stayed to watch over you, but we were called to assist with the investigation efforts," Sergio said calmly as he went to kick Arthur's couch, waking him up from his coma.
Once his muddled eyes settled on the light and saw his brother up, he yawned lazily and asked, "Big bro, you good?"
"Never felt better."
"Good, wake me up in an hour or two."
"Okay."
Then, he closed his eyes and went back to sleep, snoring soundly. Levi wasn't bothered by his reaction as this was how they dealt with checking on each other. As long as the other party was alive and well, there was no need to make a big deal of it.
Shia and the others didn't judge Arthur's reaction as they had seen him stay around Levi ever since he woke up, uncaring that some of his wounds were still untreated.
They said that love was actions and ever since they hung around the Larson Brothers, they had seen nothing but a tight brotherhood, which they envied greatly.
"Can you update me?" Levi requested.
"I will tell you exactly what we heard after we woke up and found ourselves in the hospital."
Shia went on and shared how the Harrowing Forest incident had caused a massive uproar across the entire holy region, even the capital's governor getting wind of it.
If it hadn't been for Sir Feng Ling, who was situated at the nearest Outpost and making an early move to save as many survivors as possible, the incident would have shocked even the nearby holy regions.
"Sir Feng Ling was there?" Levi was taken aback.
"Yep, isn't he the coolest?" Jamal said with an awed tone, "I have heard he has gathered all the survivors and placed them on a giant wind boat, taking us straight to Tamara's settlement hospital. He didn't even wait for rescuers to come."
Levi didn't hear the rest of what he said as the moment he received his confirmation, he was assaulted with faint broken memories of that dreadful night.
He could remember hearing the faint agitated voices of three men as he was being carried on someone's back. He was at that moment constantly fainting and waking up, allowing him to hear some jumbled sentences here and there.
But, one memory stuck in his mind and he never forgot it.
"If only I came faster, your parents might have been still alive...I am sorry, I am sorry."
It was Feng Ling weeping silently and apologizing from the bottom of his heart as if he was responsible for their death. Levi had never understood why he did that. Why did he cry or even show this much emotion to a random child?
He had searched Feng Ling's public data, and he found out that he wasn't a man of nonsense or such rich emotions...He always seemed cold, depressed, and couldn't care less.
Yet, Levi sensed the agonizing pain and guilt of failing to save his family even when he had nothing to do with it...This always intrigued him, but he ended up dropping it eventually.
"I am glad we had him on our side." Levi smiled in appreciation and then asked, "What about the public?"
"Well, the government has settled with sharing this version with the public," Shia said calmly like it was a normal occurrence to keep the public in the dark.
As the daughter of Morningstar's Lineage family, she had access to many secrets that would scare the citizens straight.
"We were the only ones seeing the monstrous entity that is believed to have killed all the spiders." Shia felt chills after being reminded of Ash'Kral's appearence, "We have been forced to give access to our Neurolens' recorded data and also sign a nocturnal contract to keep the information a secret."
"Did Arthur sign it too?" Levi asked.
"Yes, but he was kinda useless to the investigation team." Sergio nodded, "He was already passed out when the development has taken place."
"Don't worry, you will also be ruled out swiftly since you don't record with your Neuralens." Jamal assured him.
"I see."
Levi wasn't too sure about Jamal's confidence as he knew that he had enough information on Ash'Kral to implicate him...Blind or not, he understood that they wouldn't show mercy and would use all possible means to extract any useful information from him.
So, he had to be careful about it.
"May I ask who is leading the investigation unit?" Levi inquired.
"Since Sir Feng Ling has played a great role in saving us and was the first to bring footage of everything that went down, he was appointed the investigation unit head." Jamal added disappointedly, "If I knew he was the guard appointed at the outpost's gate, I would have gotten his autograph."
"It's never too late, he is still in the hospital," Sergio smirked.
"F*ck off, you are trying to get me disciplined?"
Jamal's eyelids twitched, knowing that approaching a high-ranked governmental Daywalker on duty for such a crap might result in terrible consequences...Especially when he was involved in a serious investigation.
"If he is still in the hospital, I believe it's best I go visit him and deal with the matter as soon as possible."
Levi shared while trying to stand up. But, Shia and the others pushed him back and told him that Sir Feng Ling was still making rounds and would be here in a few hours at best...Hearing this, Levi decided to wait for him.
"What about the crystal blood flower and its variation?" Levi smiled bitterly, "We have gone through so much trouble, and we haven't found a single one. I am sorry it ended like this."
"While it's unfortunate, not all was lost." Shia smirked, "I used my connections to ensure that we receive at least 30% of the slain spiders' crystallized seeds."
"You did?" Levi was surprised.
He understood that the wastelands followed the rules of the jungle most of the time. In other words, the rescuers would be the ones collecting the crystallized seeds off the spiders' corpses after the survivors were taken away. Those crystallized seeds would go straight to the government's treasury.
To obtain such a big chunk of crystallized seeds implied that her father must have definitely interfered.
As expected, Shia went on and told him that her father had made sure not to get them ripped off after almost getting killed to clear the forest.
"30% of the total turnover has rewarded us with four hundred crystallized seeds of mostly Tier 1 Flesh-Eating spiders." Shia shared.
"That's good to hear." Levi sighed in relief, "I believe it should be enough to buy you all the necessary materials for your perfect evolution."
"What are you talking about?" Shia lowered her orange sunglasses and said, "You think I am planning to get all of it? I am not that vile. We decided to split it evenly amongst each other. You and Arthur included."
"Huh? You sure?" Levi was genuinely stunned.