Chapter 844: Delays, Departures and Deep Connections
|Spirit Body Stabilization at ninety percent. ETA until normal function resume: two hours.|
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“Well then, that’s enough emotional trauma dumping today,” Daria said after stating what little philosophy she knew in regards to [Chaos] and essentially cutting open a scar that she thought healed a long ass time ago. “I believe now would be an excellent time for you to do a little sharing as well, my darling baby boy.”
“Of…wait, what am I sharing?”
“Don’t you remember? I wanted to know what this, ‘psychological torture’ thing consisted of exactly.”
“Oh…right.”
Despite understanding that it was only fair for him to share some personal stuff after his mother had done the same, Zhen Liu really didn’t like the idea of showing he got people to metaphorically spill their guts in front of his mother.
Hell, he could only imagine how badly the girls would react if they saw him act like a megalomaniac.
…Speaking of the girls…
“Wait a minute…Jin Fang? Rianna? I have a weird question for the both of you. Do you know if Alicia and Bellona have any vague connections to the previous Kaijin Lords, or kaijin in general?,” Jinju Ren asked.
“Uhh…”
“Don’t think so? Why?”
“Well…can’t help but find it weird that darling’s mother, technically his grandaunt, and the three of us have some vague connection to the kaijin before we even knew they existed, and now we’re in his orbit,” Jinju Ren explained. “This would be what those fortune tellers call destiny or something.”
“Wait…,” Rianna interjected. “How do you have a connection to the kaijin? I thought you were related to dragons.”
“Huh? Oh! Yeah, my father apparently fought the Storm Queen back when he was younger and significantly more of an ass-hat. He apparently thinks about her fondly now and again. Did I not mention that?”
“No…”
“Huh…weird, I thought I did…”
Evidently, this information bomb caused a certain childhood friend/maid to develop a rather weird expression on her face.
She had heard of enemies becoming lovers, but she didn’t know if it applied in this situation.
‘I…I’m gonna have to tag along for that expedition to the Abyssal Lands…great…’
…Now back to Zhen Liu…
Thankfully for him, life had other plans.
[Wait a moment ringmaster, ring mother,] Spring Brawler interrupted. [The others have informed me that the Zhen Clan scions have finished their borrowing spree and awaiting in the central lobby. While they may not mind a delay in leaving, I’m fairly certain that the elders and patriarch are worried about their well being by now.]
“Ah right…very well, I suppose we can do this information extraction later,” Daria capitulated with a sigh. “Is it safe to assume you have the facilities necessary to maintain their health before we do any proper interrogation work?”
“The Library can accommodate things such as food, medicine and beds, yes,” Zhen Liu confirmed.
“Good,” Daria nodded as she stood up from her seat and began to make her way back to the central lobby. “You can choose to stay here or follow along. If you do the former, I’ll tell the others that your ‘master’ needed you on hand for something.”
“Oh. Thanks, mother.”
“You’re welcome. This ain’t the first time I had to lie to family about kaijin stuff.”
Zhen Liu and Spring Brawler were quiet as Daria made her exit from the interrogation room, watching and listening until they were certain she was out of earshot.
*Tap, tap, tap.*
Once they heard the last of her footsteps disappear into the hallway, Zhen Liu began to quietly reprimand Spring Brawler.
“Why did you tell my mom of all people that I dress up and put on a performance to interrogate people?!”
[I’m sorry, ringmaster! But your mother is a force of will, nature and terror all at once! If anything though…I can at least understand why.]
“Y-yeah…that’s true…”
Zhen Liu was silent as he tried to think of his next move…much to Spring Brawler’s dismay. The proto-kaijin was used to at least feeling some form of emotional radiation from his connection to Zhen Liu, even when silent, so not being able to do so right now was unnerving.
[Ringmaster? What are you thinking?]
“A lot of things, but for now…whether or not I should stick around to do interrogations or head back for some minor damage control…”
[Which are you leaning towards?]
“Well…”
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[Well…that was about as sad as learning about how someone had to watch as their best friend died in front of them.]
[H-hurricroak? That was exactly what we just listened to.]
[I know that! I’m just bored that y’all get to influence and mess with the maestro’s cousins on a more personal level than me or…I was gonna say Screamira, but she tagged out with Razorstella, right?]
[I did, and I helped Zhen Tai deal with his one sided crush. Although, I think he also checked out several books about boosting confidence…which I didn’t even know we had?]
[Please stop painting me as the bad guy here, I’m just ending expectations before they can happen. By the way, are they done poking around here yet? It’s been awhile now.]
=Just about. Archanidame and Lacerage should be bringing the “carriage” shortly.=
[Is…is the carriage a giant lacewing or a giant spider?]
<=Yes.=>
[We really, really need to get a transportation or speed focused kaijin in our roster.]
[I thought that was Frosttusk’s job?]
[Not…without…heat…]
[Right…speaking of heat, how is that Olstenna guy holding up? Is he still trying to burn down his cell door?]
=Turns out the dumbass has significantly lower poison resistance than we anticipated. I just flooded his room with sleeping gas and he’s been snoring this whole time.=
[Nice.]
[Wait, does that mean milord is going to be heading back for the time being or sticking around?]
<=Well...=>
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“Wait…Zhen Hai, shouldn’t your legs be working by now?”
“They are, but this wheelchair is way to convenient for holding all of these aether art scrolls and skill books.”
“Fair enough…”
“Cooking Alchemy? The hell is that?”
“It’s a lost form of aether medicine making! Apparently it fell out of favor because not a lot of people could remember all of the steps to prepare everything.”
“And…you can?”
“I can remember everything when it comes to food.”
“Huh.”
After spending who knows how much time perusing the shelves of the [Library of Nowhere], the Zhen Clan scions had finally gathered once more in the building’s central lobby.
Accompanying each scion were several pile of books and scrolls, with a majority of them consisting of aether arts that they wanted to use to increase their move repoitire. As for the rest of the texts, it consisted of everything from useful skill books that could help them figure out other aether skills such as array formation and medicine making to historical records of kingdoms and empires both past and present.
Well…that and some more… anachronistic works of fiction.
Granted, those works of fiction also happened to have been translated into several languages native to Valresta for some reason.
…
“Zhen Yue…what the heck are all of these books? They don’t look like aether arts.”
“They’re not, Xiao Guo, they were in some section titled ‘Romance for women’. I think they’re like those cheap copper novels but bigger.”
“Huh. Let’s see here…’Pride and Prejudice’, ‘Twilight’, ’50 shades of Gray’ and…what the fuck kind of title is ‘I made the CEO Alpha of my company into my boytoy’?”
“I don’t know, but I get the feeling it’s gonna be alluding to a lot of sex scenes but never deliver on any of them.”
“Is…is that a good thing or a bad thing?”
“I don’t know.”
…
“Whoa that’s some intense artwork.”
“Yeah.”
“What are those weird white bubbles though? It doesn’t look like poetry…”
“I…I think it’s suppose to be spoken words? Like the subjects of the pieces are talking to-WHOA!”
“IT’S FACE IS GONE!”
“HOW?! WHY?!”
“SHUT UP AND WE’LL FIND OUT ON THE NEXT PAGE!”
“R-right!”
…
“How to be an Alpha Male, how to be a Sigma Male, how to just be happy and not fall for the self-help grift…Zhen Tai, what the fuck are any of these?”
“I don’t know, but I found them in a section of the library marked with the placard, ‘Self-Help’. I figured at least one of these has to be helpful for mending a broken heart and instilling confidence.”
“Okay, I get that, but why do so many of these books have pictures of guys that look like they would cry if we so much as slap them on the cover ”
“I don’t know, but I think it’s because whomever wrote these books were trying to inspire readers on how to be the opposite of what’s depicted on the covers?”
“Maybe…”
…
Regardless, now that they had picked out their books and finished their day, it was finally time for them to go home.
There were just a few things to take care of first…
