Chapter 147: Chapter 147 Hainerd Past Events
Chen Ke wanted to ask Hainerd many questions, including about the deal from a year ago, Lin Mo’s sister, and West Gold Building, Lin Mo’s last night…
Perhaps, the question Chen Ke most rembered: What exactly was the life countdown? He might also get an answer to that.
Was it sothing similar to the Silence Curse?
If the life countdown was also a kind of curse, then could Si’s consortium, or Yasla, have the ability to lift such a curse?
As of today, all the mysteries would be revealed.
“Give them so space,” Pihom said.
Hall and Priskin nodded their heads, walking past Chen Ke and patting him on the shoulder.
Pihom walked past Hainerd, wanting to say sothing but restrained himself, and slowly walked out of the safe house, closing the door behind him.
Now, only Chen Ke and Hainerd were left in the entire safe house, the computer case’s fans whirring loudly, making the atmosphere very oppressive.
“What do you want to know, Chen Ke?”
Hainerd didn’t look at Chen Ke, took out a pack of cigarettes from his pocket—the most popular budget brand in the United Federation, only costing five union coins per pack.
He popped one out and then offered it to Chen Ke.
Chen Ke waved his hand, saying, “I don’t smoke.”
“That’s a good habit,” Hainerd muttered, biting one himself and lighting it with a lighter.
A swirl of smoke filled the room with the pungent odor of tobacco, Chen Ke frowned, pretending to prop his chin with his hand, discreetly covering his nose.
“Talk about what you and Lin Mo did a year ago, and why it ultimately failed,” Chen Ke said.
“That’s a long story,” Hainerd mused, looking at the whirling smoke.
“Then keep it short…” Chen Ke said bluntly, wanting to know the truth, not a trivial family story.
“Alright, you’re as impatient as Lin Mo, so I’ll give you the ultra-compressed, super simple version,” Hainerd said with a smile.
The gates of mory slowly opened, and the white cigarette, consud by the red flas, turned to ash, falling to the ground.
It all started with a woman, Hainerd’s wife, Margaret.
Hainerd was originally a smuggler of Holy Diamonds in the inland sea and had been in the business for over a decade before eting Margaret during a transaction, where they fell in love at first sight.
Like dry wood eting fierce flas, on a small cruise drifting between Opportunity City and Carefree City on the inland sea, Lucina was born.
But the good tis didn’t last long. Smuggling on the sea is a very dangerous and illegal act, and the Administration Bureau’s crackdown on Holy Diamond smuggling never ceased.
When Lucina was four, Hainerd and Margaret were captured by the Administration Bureau’s marine patrol and were thrown into prison.
However, Hainerd was only imprisoned for six months before being released by the Administration Bureau, while his wife disappeared from the face of the Earth. He took Lucina back from the orphanage, reverted to his old trade, and has since been searching for Margaret’s whereabouts.
In a deal with a certain consortium, he learned news of Margaret. Apparently, the Administration Bureau had always been using prisoners to test unknown Skill manuals and Holy Relics, sotis simply as expendables.
They called those people “D-class personnel.”
Margaret and two other prisoners were used as “sacrifices” for the Blasphemous Dagger, which opened a gateway to the Great Void. As compensation, the Administration Bureau released Hainerd early.
Hearing this, Chen Ke shook his head.
“You might consider this a necessary evil in this world, because the initial intention of the Administration Bureau was to better explore and utilize Spiritual Power for the benefit of society. From the perspective of those involved, however, so-called necessary evils are nonsense.”
Sacrificing oneself for the world is heroic, but there is a difference between voluntary and forced, and Margaret’s fate was more akin to being treated like a lab rat.
Hainerd lacked the power to oppose the Administration Bureau and was unable to recover for many years, until one day, a group called Yasla told him that the mutation of a contract demon was reversible.
Sacrifices used as keys cannot be resurrected, but those offered to contract demons can be brought back to life through a ritual. Once that sacrifice becos human again, the corresponding doorway will be permanently closed, never to be opened again.
Additionally, the person would suffer from severe short-term mory loss, unable to rember events from just ten minutes prior, and forever lose their past.
But for Hainerd, this was a price he was willing to pay.
What Yasla wanted was the green Holy Diamond in the possession of “the company,” which was the sa one Chen Ke and his team had stolen today.
“The company” is an organization ford secretly by hundreds of large Spiritual Businesses in the United Federation, without fixed mbers or form, and the leader is unknown.
Core mbers never change, but other mbers co and go, appearing loose, yet incredibly stable. Currently, “the company” is dedicated to exploring the comrcial prospects of Spiritual Power and the Great Void.
In a sense, it is a more profit-driven comrcial alliance than purely academic organizations like the Spiritual Ability Research Institute.
Yasla wanted Hainerd to be their spy, to search for the diamond, and promised to use their power to find Margaret and transform her back into a human.
Years passed, and Lucina grew from a little girl into a robust mature woman, Hainerd’s temples slightly graying, and he joined the postal service.
It was then that he finally learned that “the company” had continually been moving the green Holy Diamond, and its next location was Si’s Consortium.
Was it fate or coincidence? It didn’t matter.
Within the consortium, an assassin, Lin Mo, had a sister who was also sacrificed as part of the Blasphemous Dagger ritual.
Seizing this as an opportunity, Hainerd ford an alliance with Lin Mo, collaborating from the inside to steal the Holy Diamond.
But Lin Mo’s sister was not transford into a contract demon; she was simply used as the key to open a door. Only contract demons could be transford back into humans, and a key, once dead, remains dead.
Hainerd didn’t share this with Lin Mo as this was his only chance.
Yasla and Si’s consortium had longstanding intermittent cooperation. The consortium needed Yasla’s powers to conduct rituals for a new Blasphemous Dagger, and Yasla needed items brought back from the Great Void by the consortium.
However, there were so rare items that even the consortium was unwilling to sell to Yasla, hence the trade a year ago where Hainerd and Lin Mo switched the contents inside the box.
That trade was rely a rehearsal for the subsequent theft of the diamond. The severed hand Yasla coveted ca from another witch in the Great Void, whom the consortium sacrificed many people to acquire her powerful forearm.
That day, Yasla deliberately exposed itself, allowing its mutated adversary to follow and attempt to steal the severed hand amidst the chaos at minimal cost.
Since Si’s consortium was a valuable collaboration, Yasla did not want to jeopardize it over a severed hand. It could attribute the deaths of the consortium’s gunn and the disappearance of the hand to the mutated being.
This was the true purpose of the trade a year ago, and the first collaboration between Hainerd and Lin Mo. A few months later, they did it again…
This ti, Lin Mo smuggled out the green Holy Diamond and mixed it into the traded items, and Yasla repeated its tricks, successfully stealing the Holy Diamond.
“We got the Holy Diamond, but Yasla told that after the ritual, they were unable to successfully summon the contract demon that was once Margaret…” Hainerd shook his head.
A contract demon corresponds to a pair of daggers, it seems, the dagger used by Lin Mo that night was not the one sacrificed by Margaret.
Reviews
All reviews (0)