Ains City Defense Army Hospital
"Is that Mr. Paxiu inside?"
A group of reporters crowded densely in front of the narrow observation window, gazing into the dical room and conversing carefully.
The dical room was filled with various life support equipnt, and a figure wearing a respirator and a hospital gown was lying on the bed in the middle.
His upper body was exposed while his lower body was obscured by massive instrunts.
A faint milky white glow shimring above his body, seemingly illuminated by so special instrunt.
Nurses in protective suits were stationed beside the instrunts, ticulously observing the data changes on each device.
A reporter slowly pulled a miniature cara from his pocket, attempting to take a picture, but before he could press the shutter, a hand reached over and grabbed his cara.
It was a beautiful woman with brown-gold curly hair, dressed in a City Defense Army officer’s uniform.
The woman put away his cara with a smile, saying, "Hello, this dical room involves City Defense Army secrets, and no photos are allowed. If you insist on taking one, we will have to consider you a cultist spy."
The reporter laughed awkwardly and nodded.
This area was indeed a top-secret location for the City Defense Army.
Their caras hadn’t followed them in, and any open smart devices they had were confiscated.
The female officer glanced at the reporters present, then paused before continuing, "If you need photos of Mr. Paxiu’s treatnt, you can ask the City Defense Army for copies afterward. We’ll provide non-confidential photos collectively."
"Hello, may I ask a question?" At this mont, a long-haired female reporter in the crowd raised her hand towards the female officer.
The female officer’s gaze turned to her.
At this ti, the long-haired female reporter glanced quickly through the sowhat hazy observation window at the figure lying inside the dical room, and spoke rapidly, "Mr. Paxiu looks sowhat similar to the assassin Paxiu rumored to have attempted an assassination on the President, and their nas are the sa. Are they the sa person?"
As she spoke, the surrounding reporters imdiately turned their attention, with curiosity shining in their eyes.
Evidently, they were all interested in this question.
"Sorry, my responsibility is order," the female officer said calmly, "I have no authority to answer questions."
While speaking, her hand had already reached out again, directly into the bosom of a voluptuous female reporter beside her, removing the hidden cara subtly exposed by the clothes’ edge.
"Hey?!" The voluptuous female reporter exclaid, "That’s mine, what are you doing?"
She reached out, trying to reclaim the cara, but couldn’t even touch the female officer’s hem.
The female officer didn’t glance at the voluptuous reporter, but rather scanned all the reporters present, "This is the second ti. If there is a third, you may all need to take a trip to the City Defense Army’s counterintelligence departnt."
Upon hearing this, the expression on the approaching voluptuous female reporter stiffened, and the other reporters felt sowhat embarrassed.
Several reporters put the caras they had taken out back into their pockets.
"No need for such asures, officer," a reporter chid in to ease the tension, "We’re just doing our jobs too."
"I’m also doing my job," the female officer directed a sharp gaze across everyone’s faces, "Please show your support."
The reporters withdrew their gaze and awkwardly continued to look inside the dical room.
So sharp-eyed ones could see the life signs displayed on the instrunts, and even witness the rhythmic rise and fall of the chest of the figure on the bed, weakly breathing.
But that was all they could gather.
The limited information available through the small observation window was very constrained.
And the scene inside was almost unchanged.
The group could scarcely confirm the person inside was alive, but more detailed information remained unknown.
Soon, the observation ti ended, and an officer arrived, leading the reporters away from the area.
The female officer who originally stood beside the reporters watched them leave, only relaxing her breath slightly when everyone disappeared from sight.
She turned her gaze to the dical room behind her, slowly grasped the door handle, and pushed the door open.
"Miss Vigina," said a nurse upon seeing the female officer enter, glancing at the empty doorway, "Have they all left?"
"Yes," Vigina, dressed in a military uniform, nodded, "They’ve all gone."
"These reporters are odd, insisting on coming to see," the nurse began sterilizing Vigina with the instrunt while comnting, "Ains’ City Defense Army isn’t so infamous organization, we’ve all served in the Central Army; is what we say that untrustworthy?"
"Most people do trust us," Vigina smiled, "But tracking rumors is part of a reporter’s job."
"True enough." The nurse nodded, putting away the instrunt, implying sterilization was complete.
Ever since learning about her previous service in the Central Army, the ’nurses’ or rather ’dical soldiers’ in Ains’ City Defense Army had ward up to her noticeably.
Especially after knowing she joined the Federal Bureau of Investigation post-retirent and rose to regional branch chief in just a few years, their admiration was visible.
Such is the culture of the Federation Central Army, revering the strong.
Ains’ City Defense Army also falls under the Central Army.
"Is there any situation?" Vigina looked at the nurse, sweeping a glance at the figure on the hospital bed, while slowly walking over and softly inquiring.
"Still the sa as before," the nurse’s voice was slightly sombre, "Worsening condition. Let pull up the degradation image for you."
The expert team from Stars Pharma and Wel dical was not useless, they brought state-of-the-art instrunts and devised a way to bypass the patient’s red ball and assess their condition.
But that was it, even if they could monitor the state, what they saw was rely data reflecting an ongoing decline.
Vigina reached the patient’s side, gazing at the erald suspended above him.
The stone was obscured by massive detection equipnt, invisible from the door.
This erald, presented by the president of Qiming dical College, had been consistently attuning the patient’s body, in conjunction with the patient’s life energy, slowing the ’deterioration’ of his physical state.
This was the only clearly effective protocol discovered thus far.
Yet even so, the glow of the erald was dimming at a gradual pace.
This seems to symbolize the patient’s physical state.
However,
Vigina observed the erald,
She had a faint ’illusion’ that the dimming speed of the erald had slowed?
At this mont, the nurse beside her also seed surprised, looking at the screen before her, saying, "Miss Vigina, look, the patient’s degradation rate appears to have slowed."
Vigina leaned over to look at the line on the screen, it was a simple data graph.
According to the experts from Stars Pharma, these figures were derived through comprehensive tests, calculating weighted data on the patient’s physical state.
The lower the data, the worse the patient’s condition. Zero indicates death.
Overall, this line showed a downward trend, but the first part dropped slightly steeper, while the latter part followed a curved path, noticeably declining at a slower rate.
The ti at which the rate of descent changed the fastest seed to be precisely when the City Defense Army acknowledged Paxiu’s achievents and prepared to hold a news conference.
Is it really effective?
Vigina turned her head to look at the patient on the bed, slightly relieved from the previously tense and oppressive mood.
——
Vitland Kewort Group Archive
Clack——
The crisp sound of pages turning echoed in the silent archive.
He Ao quietly observed the books on the shelf.
The lean man standing by his side was seriously flipping through the books page by page.
He Ao’s gaze wasn’t directed at the books, but the contents were vividly reflected in his mind.
The Kewort Group is considered one of the Federation’s long-established consortia.
Though it barely squeezed into the Federation’s top twenty in recent years, relying on rare earth mines, it once had a glorious past.
The foundation of the consortium dates back to the Federation’s third century.
The founder of the consortium was quite legendary.
The founder of the Kewort Group was just a small vagabond in the city, orphaned, uneducated, and made a living by doing odd jobs.
His turning point ca from an ’outing.’
At that ti, finding a job in the city wasn’t easy for the uneducated progenitor of the Kewort, often unable to earn enough for a living.
So, at the age of fifteen, he decided to take the risk and join a caravan to visit a newly established city.
Nowadays, migrating to a new city is safe if you’re prepared, traveling by airship, and quickly starting a new life with the benefits of a new city.
But for the young Kewort in the Federation’s third century, it was a very dangerous act.
There weren’t as many safe routes back then, airship technology wasn’t advanced, flight tickets were expensive, and routes were scarce.
Most poor people could only choose one way: ’follow’ caravans, cross dangerous wilderness, and emigrate to the new city.
Caravans would usually receive a commission from the new city’s governnt for carrying new immigrants, so they were happy to do so.
However, caravans had limited capacity, and their ability to accommodate determined the limit of immigrants they could transport.
Even caravans mainly focused on transporting people to new cities couldn’t take many at once.
So every ’qualification’ to head to a new city was scarce.
So immigrants would pay for a ’ticket’ to the new city, but others simply couldn’t afford that price.
The young Kewort back then was such a person.
But Kewort ultimately persuaded the caravan leader to let him join as a handyman, thus embarking on the journey to the new city.
Of course, this was the point where normally sothing goes wrong.
The caravan Kewort hitched a ride with was attacked by an exotic beast just as they were about to reach the new city.
The entire caravan was wiped out.
According to Kewort himself, when he woke up, he was surrounded by remnants devoured by the exotic beast, and he survived by falling into a crack in the rocks due to his frailty.
After that, he salvaged the caravan’s compass and communicator, along with so leftover food, and continued towards the new city following the route.
During this process, he faced several crises, encountered a dangerous sea of flowers, and a terrifying exotic beast, among other various dangers.
But ultimately, he managed to avoid them all smoothly.
Just as he was about to reach the city, he inadvertently entered an ancient ruin from the Era of the Great Cataclysm.
He survived nine deaths and found the treasure from the Era of the Great Cataclysm within the ruins.
Later, he arrived at the new city, sold the treasure in batches, and discovered a mine near the new city, which he purchased, thus initiating the entire history of the Kewort Group.
After reading this account, He Ao found it extraordinarily legendary, legendary like a classic fairy tale.
The destitute young man, unable to make a living in his hotown, chose to leave, encountered crises on the road, accidentally found treasure, turned his life around, and created a magnificent family business.
But is it really as fairy-tale-like as it seems?
How did a fifteen-year-old, frail city boy traverse a wilderness full of crises to reach a city?
The caravan conveniently had everyone perish, leaving only this young man.
And how did he find treasure amidst the crisis-ridden ruins?
Most Federation ruins don’t actually an treasure but rather pollution, distortion, and madness.
Encountering pollution from an Evil God inside is quite a normal occurrence.
Adventurers are among the most prone to becoming cultists within the Federation, not knowing what they’re excavating and getting tainted by an Evil God.
For Historians exploring such ruins, they need to bring a complete team of Transcendents to clean it bit by bit.
Moreover, the Kewort Group’s developnt history indicates that when the Kewot Family faced difficulties later, descendants tried to find that ruin but found nothing.
So there must have been sothing unsaid about Kewort back then.
He most likely had his own fortuitous encounter that protected him across the wilderness.
For instance, the Seven-color Flower.
In the mory of Denno City’s CEO Colin, the founder of the Kewot Family had once used the Seven-color Flower to make two wishes, which led to the Kewort Group today.
And in Kewort’s recollection, when he crossed the wilderness alone, he encountered a wondrous sea of flowers.
If his narrative’s sequence is rearranged, for example, placing the caravan attack at the ’sea of flowers.’
Kewort might have been ’fortunate,’ or perhaps through other ans, obtained the Seven-color Flower in the sea of flowers.
Then, relying on the protection and guidance of the Seven-color Flower, he acquired wealth and returned to the city.
As for the treasure-storing ruins, they might not have existed, or they really did but were concealed for so reason.
The whole thing seems to fit a bit more logically, of course, not excluding the possibility of Kewort’s founder being extrely lucky—anything might happen in this world.
However, the entire Kewort Group developnt history doesn’t ntion the Seven-color Flower.
After the founder’s death, there were no further depictions, and the following storyline is just the normal developnt of a group.
During this period, the Kewort Group was firmly in the hands of the Kewot Family.
And in the next Chapter, it’s the Kewort Group’s first peak period and the decline of the Kewot Family.
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