Chapter 1.2 - Back To the Beginning
Su smiled as well. He, who had never been too good with words, continued to remain silent.
After laughing just a few times, Ricardo began to feel so much pain that he began to gasp. He couldn’t help but latch onto Su to stabilize himself. When he saw the nurse that was half-suppressing her laughter from the side from the corners of his eyes, his right hand suddenly reached out, and with a power that came from who knew where, forcefully squeezed down on her largely exposed chest. This nurse who had a rather sexy body released a cry of alarm, but her way of moving out of the way seemed to be a more playful one.
Ricardo groped a few times before letting go. He gave her a smile and said, “I’m fine, you can leave first.”
The nurse gave Ricardo’s face another look, and only after deciding that he probably won’t die immediately did she leave. Before walking through the door, she still gave Su a look, her eyes rippling with waves full of undisguised flirtation.
Since the day the bandages covering his body were removed, Su was used to seeing both women and men sneak greedy glances or flirtations looks at him. Towards this nurse’s hints, he naturally remained indifferent. However, Su, who possessed exceptionally sharp perception, noticed that the gaze the nurse sent Ricardo was many times more passionate than the one sent towards him, to the extent where it even contained a bit of craziness.
Su had never felt pride in his own appearance and instead thought of it as something troublesome. However, for some reason, with the increase in his abilities, Su felt as if his appearance was similarly changing. At the very least, from the perspective of most people, Su was currently becoming more and more pretty. Correct, pretty. This was an extremely suitable adjective. Even if he stood next to Persephone, Su still wouldn’t look much inferior.
Ricardo seemed to have sensed what Su was thinking and suddenly laughed mysteriously. “Do you know why she feels more passionate towards me than you?”
Su noticed the difference in the nurse’s attitude, but he didn’t think that it was something worth thinking too much about. As such, he replied with a smile, “Doesn’t matter.”
Ricardo shook his head. He patted Su’s shoulder and said while laughing, “Don’t always act like such a great person! You have to know that most of the people who make up this world are ordinary. Only if you look at it from their point of view will you be able to understand them. For example, that woman just now would get 100 yuan from me each time she lets me feel her up. This isn’t something I promised, but I would always pay her, so it became a type of agreement. When my injuries are cured, I wouldn’t mind spending some passionate nights with her, so her income this year might double. This isn’t a type of promise either, but I will pay up. She doesn’t have natural talents and won’t produce high levels of ability, so she will never be able to become a great individual. For her, money is the most realistic, as well as the most dependable thing. Do you now understand why I am far more handsome than you? Why even though I’m not as cool as you, she will like me more?”
“I’ve always paid in the past as well.” Su frowned. This was his principle. However, he understood clearly that when he was in the wilderness, he was extremely poor, so there was no way he could compare to someone like Ricardo with the support of a family behind him. Even now, he still wouldn’t do things like Ricardo did. Su immediately remembered that Persephone was still carrying a huge debt in his place.
Ricardo smiled and said, “That’s not what I meant. It’s just that I had nothing to do while lying in the hospital for two days and let my imaginations run wild. I was wondering, what was it that made us think of ourselves so high above everyone else that we could casually take the lives of others? And the answer I came to was abilities. We, with abilities, in front of the mobs surviving in the wilderness, are like gods. We can do whatever we want while not receiving any restrictions, because there is no way those mobs can pose a threat to us. Similarly, when those with even higher levels of abilities appear before us, they could do whatever they want with us as well. That is why we have become used to focusing our attention on the bodies of ability users and turn a blind eye to the majority of normal people without abilities.”
Su began to think about this matter.
“Perhaps this world doesn’t belong to us, and insteads belongs to these normal people that are silently getting trampled on.”
Just as Su began to think about the implications behind these words, Ricardo who seemed like a wise man just now suddenly had a strange smile on his face, and with a suppressed and somewhat mysterious voice, he said, “Hey! Let’s not talk about these boring things anymore. Brother, did you know? I discovered a smoking hot beauty here! You can’t even imagine how sexy she is!”
“Smoking hot beauty?” Towards Ricardo’s sudden change in expression that left Su between laughter and tears, no matter how Su thought about it, he couldn’t think of any smoking hot beauties in this entire hospital, and he had seen every nurse and doctor in this hospital. Unless, Ricardo thought of the nurse just now as a smoking hot beauty? In that case, Su would start to doubt his tastes.
Perhaps women was a topic often shared by men. Ricardo’s eyes shone with brilliant radiance. He pulled Su over, and with a voice that almost couldn’t be heard, he said, “Her name is… Helen!”
“Helen?!” Su immediately cried out involuntarily. If any other name was spoken instead, he wouldn’t have reacted so greatly. Su immediately added without taking the time to think, “You find that icy cold, machine like woman is sexy?”
Ricardo took a deep breath, and through clenched teeth, he said, “Indescribably sexy!”
Su suddenly found the atmosphere of the room to be a bit strange. Before he had time to turn around, an icy cold, machine like, and forever unchanging voice sounded. “Who are you calling icy cold and machine like?”
Su revealed a bitter smile and slowly turned around.
He truly couldn’t understand how, with his perception abilities, he was completely unable to notice that Helen had already stood behind him? Could it be that his attention had been completely captured by Ricardo?
“Lieutenant Commander Su, please follow me.” After speaking coldly, she turned around and left this hospital ward. Su helplessly shook his head and followed her out.
Before leaving the room, Su gave Ricardo a look. He saw that Ricardo was still staring at Helen’s retreating figure with eyes filled with infatuation.
As he followed Helen into the laboratory, Su felt a bit apprehensive as well. What he felt wasn’t fear, but rather a bit of embarrassment, just like that of a child that had been caught after doing something wrong.
Even though Su usually acted cold to the point of being completely expressionless, that was only a self-preserving type of instinct during the most extreme and severe environments. In addition, Su would always be feeling a vague sense of danger around him, as if he was secretly being observed by his natural enemy. That was why he carefully avoided people and chose to not make any friends.
After being half-persuaded, half-forced by Persephone into joining the Black Dragonriders, Su’s world completely changed. Endless missions, abundant goods, powerful and complex abilities, as well as twisted and intertwined human relationships; these were all things he had never had before. Battles were carried out continuously, and the enemies were more powerful and more cunning than those he had ever faced before. Similarly, what he received in return was quite abundant. For example, the increase in his abilities he obtained in a single year’s time was equivalent to the total of several years in the past. Of course, there were some things that couldn’t be replaced and needed time to accumulate, such as combat knowledge.
The endless, high intensity battles that oftentimes couldn’t be fought without soldiers brought him something else, and that was that Su felt that he seemed to have obtained a few friends. Friends, this was something that had never been a part of Su’s dictionary. Only during a battle of life and death could one’s true heart be seen. For example, Helen, Ricardo, and even Li Gaolei, Li, and Kane, regardless of the reasoning behind their decisions, all fought by Su’s side. Even during the most dangerous times, they didn’t shrink back. Su, who had an eternal memory, had a memory that was completely comparable with a computer system. However, even if his memory was extremely lacking, he still wouldn’t forget these things.
Su also felt fear. When facing powerful enemies, he would also feel fear, but even more of his fear came from those at his side. He would be worried about Madeline, feel concerned over Persephone’s hard world, and he would also feel anxious about Ricardo’s injuries.
To show softness for those he cared about, and to show toughness towards those that were against him, Su didn’t feel that this was wrong. Only, after Madeline left, he never had the chance to reveal any softness during those seven years.
As he sat in front of Helen, Su’s heart began to beat disappointingly fast. Helen didn’t have any abilities, not even a single level. If one didn’t take her freakish intellect and the unusual feeling she gave off into consideration, she would be a completely normal woman. However, her inhuman temperament made it so that no matter how Su tried, he couldn’t associate her with being sexy.
Helen didn’t say anything and only silently looked at Su. However, it was clear that even though her eyes were resting on Su’s face, her mind was elsewhere. Helen’s face that didn’t contain any emotion naturally didn’t expose her thoughts, but Su could feel a slight bit of emotion from her eyes, which seemed to be sorrow. That little bit of sorrow turned Helen from a piece of machinery into a normal person.
Rare bloodshot veins could be seen in her eyes, and there was a fatigue hanging from the corners of her eyes that couldn’t be scattered. It seemed like the amount of weariness she experienced during this period of time wasn’t light either.
Su felt a bit ashamed and uneasy inside, to the point where he even had the thought to be a bit more compliant during the upcoming examination. Only, as soon as this thought surfaced, it was forcefully suppressed by every part of his body. However, Su didn’t pay too much attention to this. He had confidence in his will overpowering his body’s instincts should the need arise.
However, what followed was just a conventional examination. Helen still had Su lay down on the bed, carried out a body scan, and obtained a vial of his blood as a sample before ending the examination. She didn’t bring up any requests that would make things difficult for Su.
When he left the private hospital, Su had a feeling that there was something Helen was keeping from him.
Today was a rather busy day. Su hurried over to dragonrider general headquarters to replace the tactical tablet that was to be carried around with him. Then, after sifting through the equipment available, he selected what he needed to rearm himself. After making it back alive, the only thing he had apart from a standard rifle was a military knife.
The procedure of acquiring equipment was an extremely simple process. The time it took for everything to be completed was only a bit over ten minutes. Of course, speed and convenience came at a cost, as all of the goods general headquarters offered were widely known to be expensive. Combat suit, rifle with secondary sniping mode, ammunition, all types of equipment kits, as well as a tactical computer system added together made it so that Su’s account only had a few thousand yuan remaining again.
Even though roughly half of the injuries on his body had recovered, he decided that now was still not the time to fix his poverty-stricken state. Right as Su was about to look through some newer missions, a beautiful dragonrider clerk walked up to him. With a polite and standard smile, she said, “Captain Su? Lieutenant Colonel Julio wants to discuss something with your distinguished self. He is waiting for your distinguished self inside the general headquarters building.”
“Lieutenant Colonel Julio?” Su didn’t recall meeting this person. However, since he was a lieutenant colonel, he was naturally still a great figure.
“Lieutenant Colonel Julio is the tactical manager of general headquarters. He is in charge of formulating missions, releasing them, and selecting the personnel involved in the missions.” This young girl was clearly smart and good at understanding others. There was also an undisguised passion in her eyes when she looked at Su.
This sounded like quite the important person, this was what Su thought. He organized his belongings before following the clerk into general headquarters. Several minutes later, Su was already standing on the second floor of headquarters in front of Lieutenant Colonel Julio’s office. After the clerk reported her arrival through the communicating system, a rough voice sounded from the speaker next to the room. “Have him come in!”
The door opened on its own, and the concentrated smell of cigarettes that filled the air immediately assaulted Su’s face. The powerful stimulation his eyes and nose felt immediately sent back a wave of sharp pain to his brain. Su frowned. He held his breath and sealed up all of his skin’s pores before walking into the smoke filled office.
There was a pile of documents on the lieutenant colonel’s office table just like the style of an olden era’s office, completely different from the new era that relied on computer systems to complete all tasks. The office table in front of him was a somewhat ridiculously sized ashtray, but what was somewhat terrifying was that the cigarettes on it had already piled up high into the air, to the extent where it was already starting to spill over. The lieutenant colonel’s curly and thin hair stuck tightly to his forehead, and his eyes that were completely bloodshot were somewhat protruding from their sockets. He looked like someone who hadn’t slept for several days and nights.
“Su?” The lieutenant colonel looked at a document in his hands and then stared at Su with his two small and red eyes before asking.
“I am. Your distinguished self should be Lieutenant Colonel Julio? Is there something you need from me?” Su maintained a proper amount of etiquette, but he didn’t wish to speak too much. Something he was certain of was that inside the general headquarters building, he had far more enemies than friends.
Lieutenant Colonel Julio tossed the document in his hand towards Su, but what was rather odd was that when the dozen or so sheets of paper that weren’t bound together slid across the entire length of the table, they were still neat and tidy.
Su smiled slightly. He didn’t even look at the documents in front of him before saying, “I do not believe that these are matters I should be resolving. Your distinguished self can find Lieutenant Colonel Kafen and Maria instead. They should be the ones giving your distinguished self an explanation.”
Julio stared at Su, but the green eye that stared back at him revealed a soft and resolute gaze that didn’t seem to give any room for leeway. After roughly a dozen seconds had passed, the lieutenant colonel’s obese body leaned backwards. “My time is extremely valuable! Let’s just speak bluntly. Captain Su, I heard you killed the two of them, so these missions can’t even be completed. Among them, some have only been completed halfway. This has brought me quite a headache!”
Su’s gaze gradually became colder, but he still maintained his smile. “Even if your distinguished self’s head splits open from pain, that has nothing to do with me. Since your distinguished self heard a few rumors, shouldn’t you have received their death reports as well?”
The lieutenant colonel’s face immediately became pale, seeming to have recalled some extremely unpleasant matters. He heavily slammed down on the table and roared, “Are you threatening me?”
Su calmly said, “Of course not. I am just reminding your distinguished self not to try and push matters that have nothing to do with me my way.”