Chapter 142: A Birthday Candle/A funeral Pyre
“…and that’s how I ended up sitting on a pile of the very recently deceased Marquis’s stuff,” Zhen Liu capped off his retelling of what had transpired. He didn’t mention the impromptu musical beatdown number coordinated by Hurricroak in too much detail, but he did say he broke through to Aether Master via a mix of stolen pills and extreme desperation. He also changed the details a bit to explain that most of the credit actually went to Draigo, who was actually an Aether Grandmaster.
“Huh…didn’t expect the old guy to be this strong,” Zhen Hai accepted with a surprised tone. He initially had doubts on how Zhen Liu managed to kill an Aether Grandmaster, even if he could punch above his grade with his weird formula and puppets. But the fact that Draigo, that weird old guy,happened to be an Aether Grandmaster made a lot more sense to him. It’d be absurd for his formerly crippled cousin to takedown someone as strong as their grandfather without assistance. That said, there was still one question that was on his mind.
“Wait…if the Marquis is already dead and you’ve taken most of his stuff, why are you burning down his house?”
“Three reasons,” Zhen Liu replied while holding up three fingers.
“First, mass cremation. Turns out the Marquis didn’t just harvest parts from the girls he killed, he straight up kept their preserved bodies like freaky trophies. Even had silver plates detailing time of death and who they were leaving behind,” Zhen Liu explained while putting down a finger.
“That’s… that’s disgusting,” Zhen Hai remarked while imaging the scene. He preferred his women moving and not dead…maybe screaming his name in ectasy while they were at it, but that was another thing altogether.
“Right? The plates are in the pile if you want to read them by the way. There were about a dozen or so,” Zhen Liu said while pointing at the plates in the pile. Evidently, he forgot to mention that the plates included carvings of the victims’ faces.
“Second reason: evidence, both involved in the act of disposal and exposal,” Zhen Liu repeated while holding up his two fingers back up and a book.
“I-followed Draigo’s advice to get rid of any evidence that a looting spree broke out here on the off chance that one of his allies show up to check on him. Which is likely, because, no surprise,the Marquis had been doing some dirty dealings with a lot of nasty organizations, namely against each other. The man had a ledger keeping track of all of this and if one of those guys got their hands on this, it’d be really bad.”
“Then what are you going to-”
“Give it to father and let him figure it out. He’ll probably give it to Uncle Goldshire, but you know, options,” Zhen Liu answered while putting down a second finger.
Zhen Hai nodded in understanding.
A ledge like the one the Marquis had would definitely be filled with all kinds of business dealings, locations of rare contraband and how to make several clandestine organizations dance to the owner’s tune.
The Zhen Clan didn’t have any plans (yet) to expand into Emerald Eye, so it made sense to at least empower an ally who did.
“So…what’s the third reason then?”
The moment Zhen Hai asked that question, one of Zhen Liu’s puppets (kaijin) that looked kinda like a frog woman(Hurricroak) had finished dumping the contents of a third sweet smelling barrel, forming a trail back to the mansion. If one were to follow this trail, they would find it ended on a pile of oil and alcohol soaked silk sheets and creepy ass paintings, with little bricks of sulfur tucked inside.
Zhen Liu proceeded to grab a torch from the pile of stuff he was sitting and had his red horned puppet(Nepherage) light it up. He then proceeded to pass it out to Draigo who hesitated a bit before grabbing the torch and walking over to the start point of the fuel trail.
“Good old fashioned catharsis,” Zhen Liu answered.
Draigo took a deep breath before tossing the torch onto the ground and igniting the trail.
‘Wait… we’re far enough from the blast, right?,’ Zhen Liu thought for a moment as he watched the fire burn. It wasn’t until he saw the mansion go up in flames and a piece of shrapnel slamming into the ground about six feet ahead of them that he realized they were indeed far enough.
‘Well…that could have ended badly.’
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“Wyvara…consider this your much belated funeral pyre,” Draigo muttered as he stared at the blaze. While he didn’t need to burn down the Marquis’s mansion, something about the act felt…needed to him, at least in an emotional sense.
Off to the side, the kaijin known as Hurricroak had moved a bit closer to Draigo and the fire roaring before them, a strange glint in her eyes.
‘Huh…I guess I can consider this my “rebirthday” candle…too bad I can’t blow it out myself…maybe if I asked Frosttusk to help?,’ she thought to herself while tilting her head to the side.
This small action was caught in the corner of Draigo’s eyes, catching a small portion of his attention, but it was enough for him to notice something odd about Hurricroak, rather…why he felt she was so familiar to him.
‘No…it can’t be,’ he thought to himself once this observation had fully registered in his mind.
Perhaps it was due to a bad angle, maybe the smoke was affecting his brain, maybe the night was just playing tricks on him. But from the corner of his tired eyes, he swore he could see, within the visage of this strange frog woman, the familiar face of the woman he loved.
Draigo’s mind turned back to the moment of the Marquis’s death and the words he said to try and survive.
“If any place has the knowledge to bring her back, it’s there.”
‘Could it be…’
Draigo while keeping his face to the fire, began to try and ask to see if maybe, just maybe-
“Apologies, Draigo-ch…Draigo,” Hurricroak interrupted, “But I’m not Wyvara, if that what’s you were going to ask.”
“Oh. I just thought…”
“But I was born from your [Resolve] and…her, shamisen,” Hurricroak followed up, “So I know how much you loved her and how much she loved you.”
“Ah…I guess…that’s enough then.”
Draigo returned to silence after that, same with Hurricroak as she had nothing else to say…but deep down inside…she did have one question she wanted to ask:
.
.
.
“Why didn’t you ask, sooner?”
