I'm Not a Flame-Chaser - Chapter 611

The Journey Begins in the Sky: Chapter Twenty-Three - Let's Perform a Magic Trick

"Alvitr, how are you all doing?"

"Vice-Captain, we finally got in touch with you! We couldn't get through to headquarters or contact you. Are you alright?"

"Alvitr, I'm fine."

Rita, who was running in the shadows of the city to avoid the patrolling guards, couldn't help but sigh after hearing the panicked voice in her earpiece. Despite being a member of the Blade of Immortality, this technician always gave people a flustered feeling, as if he were a little sister who hadn't even reached adulthood yet.

"The situation has changed. The Blade of Immortality will assemble at the coordinates I will provide later. Do not reveal your whereabouts and wait for my orders before proceeding."

"And what about you, Vice-Captain?"

"I still have some things to do."

Rita recalled her conversation with Kiana not long ago. They had reached a temporary agreement to cooperate in the city to find a way to stop the World Serpent's experiments. In exchange, Kiana would share the information she had obtained, and Rita's Blade of Immortality would be an asset in Sky City.

Of course, that's what they said, but in reality, Kiana and Rita both knew that she wouldn't let Kiana off so easily. The alliance was only temporary. On the surface, she was going to join forces with the Blade of Immortality, but in reality, she was heading to the Gray Serpent's stronghold.

"All communications with headquarters are down... It seems we have no choice but to leave a message for now."

She entered the base and used the special message transmission device there to transmit information to the outside world.

"Operation codename: Moonhunter, Reporting to: Durandal, Reporting to: Rita Losweiser..."

It took her a few minutes to finish leaving a message, and after looking at the screen and thinking for a while, she raised her hand and sent another signal.

"Phew... Such a small Sky City is truly rife with undercurrents." After Rita finished doing all this, she walked out of the base, smiling as she looked at the crescent moon. The moonlight was extremely cold, and her smile was equally devoid of warmth.

Then she planned to go to the gathering point of the Blade of Immortality. She walked towards an inconspicuous path next to it. A beggar with his head down, covered in mud and blind in one eye, was sitting at the entrance of the path. When he saw her coming, he shrank back in fear and hid the wounds on his hands and feet in the shadows.

Even in the developed Sky City, are there homeless people?

This doubt lasted only a few seconds. As he passed the beggar, whose skin was blacker than coal, he seemed to hesitate about whether to beg or not. Rita stopped and stared at him, which seemed to give him courage. He slowly walked forward with his hunched back, opened his hands, which were covered in mud under his fingernails, and waved them at Rita.

"Waaaa... waaaa..."

His hoarse voice sounded like a leaky pipe; he was still mute, and he kept his head down, not daring to look at Rita's face.

"Here, take this and buy some food." The gray-blonde girl carried some loose change, which was her habit, after all, besides being Valkyrie, she was also a maid.

After placing the money in the beggar's hand, Rita smiled and turned to leave. The beggar behind her excitedly shouted "Wow!" and then came forward but accidentally tripped and fell on top of her.

"Smack!"

A slender, gloved hand grasped the dirty arm, and the maid's expression gradually turned cold.

The beggar who tried to pretend to fall and steal the remaining money was pinched by Rita's superhuman strength, causing him to scream in pain, "Ouch! Ouch!"

"...I hope you won't do this again." Rita looked at the trembling beggar, glanced at the wounds on his hands, which were likely from his time as a homeless man, some so deep they exposed bone, sighed softly, took out the rest of her money and gave it to him, then left without looking back.

"..."

After Rita left, the beggar, clutching his throbbing arm, sat dumbfounded on the ground, gasping for breath. After a long while, he finally shakily stood up, leaning against the wall. He gazed in the direction the maid had gone, and then...

He opened his closed rainbow-colored right eye, glanced coldly at the money in his hand, put it in his pocket, and then opened his left hand.

Vill-V once taught Lin magic tricks, which essentially involved using psychology, science, mathematics, and visual communication techniques to divert the audience's attention. The more a magician shows the audience, the less important it is.

In the palm of his left hand, there is an eyeball-shaped bio-element.

Lin wiped the black mud off his face and then walked into the Gray Serpent's stronghold.

"Class President, the information I saw about you in the archives... suggests you've lived for over five hundred years?"

As Kiana returned to her base to organize her equipment, she asked Fu Hua in her mind.

"It's much further than you can imagine." Fu Hua rested his chin on the back of his hand, his brows furrowed in the dim light. "The World Serpent behind Shencheng Pharmaceuticals, their mastermind comes from the same era as me."

"Then what you said about Lin before..."

Kiana suddenly remembered what Fu Hua had said when she first met Lin, and her eyes widened in surprise as she looked at Fu Hua.

The girl with the ancient charm nodded. "That's right. The power that man displayed came from one of the Herrscher of my era who caused irreparable damage to civilization. But right now, I can only remember information about that Herrscher and I can't be sure if he is the Herrscher himself."

"But didn't you say the Herrscher Core was already..."

"This is also a point of doubt. The most likely possibility is that he is not Herrscher, but a human who has obtained a part of the Herrscher of Binding's abilities."

But where does he truly belong...?

"Bang!"

A person jumped into the stronghold through the window. Kiana's combat instincts made her draw her gun instinctively, but she breathed a sigh of relief when she saw the familiar Prismatic Eyes.

But after she saw Lin's attire clearly, she blinked her bright eyes and suddenly laughed, "Hahahaha... did you trip and fall into a mud pit?"

Lin was still dressed as a beggar, with only his mask still free of mud. He didn't mind Kiana's mockery and went straight to the bathroom after entering the room.

"Wait, what are you doing?" Kiana's smile vanished as she took a step forward and blocked Lin's path, staring at him warily.

"... Take a shower."

"Take a shower? Why don't you shower at your own place? Why do you come here to shower?"

"Because I don't have a bathroom," Lin said casually, shrugging.

"... So how did you wash it before?"

"I haven't taken a shower before."

"..."

"..."

Kiana stared stiffly at the nonchalant man. She calculated that it had been more than a week since they met, and he... had never taken a shower.

This unkempt guy, could he have stank so badly he's been pickled?

Lin walked toward the bathroom. This time, Kiana covered her nose and hurriedly dodged away. She watched him enter the bathroom and close the door before letting out a long sigh of relief.

Strange, then why have I never smelled any stench on him?

The Journey Begins in the Sky: Chapter Twenty-Four - Sleeping...?

Lin leaned against the bathroom wall tiles, the cold water from the showerhead cascading over him, making his pores shrink. The numbing, slightly painful sensation after the water washed over his numerous wounds felt like a soft knife cutting into his flesh.

After washing away the mud, I rubbed off the clumps of dirt that had clumped up my hair. The faint traces of blood from the wounds that hadn't fully healed mingled with the water and were flushed down the drain.

He sat down on the tiles, holding his forehead, his pupils somewhat unfocused.

Lin was indeed tired.

He had barely rested for over a week, spending his time training Kiana and interfering with the World Serpent's experiments. He hadn't closed his eyes for three days, and the accumulated fatigue and injuries were almost wearing him down.

But the mental exhaustion was even greater than the physical fatigue.

He looked at his blurry reflection in the tiles, his own image washed by pale red water, his hair disheveled and soaked, looking utterly wretched, just like the close friend he had met on that stormy night.

When exactly did they begin to find themselves involuntarily walking down a path they shouldn't have taken?

"Kevin..."

Lin Kongdong's eyes quickly returned to normal, and he stood up, just like any other time before.

Lin's attitude toward all humans has also changed several times. Just like when he taught Kiana, he said that as long as the choices are left to humans themselves, whether to move towards the next stage or to stagnate is entirely up to their own will.

Before that, what he needs to do is to take back the right to choose for humanity and give it back to them.

No one can represent the will of humanity alone. May cannot, Kevin cannot, and he certainly cannot. They can only save human lives, not decide their future.

Whether the end of this road is Herrscher, a Honkai, or Kevin, it doesn't matter. Whoever it is, he will raise the banner of rebellion against them.

"Thump, thump, thump..."

He turned his gaze, and there was a knock on the bathroom door.

"Hey... did you bring your own towel?"

The answer was straightforward, "No."

"Then I'll buy it for you..."

"Aren't there towels here?"

"Wait! Don't use mine..."

"It's all wiped clean."

"..."

As Lin casually put on her underwear, the girl outside the door fell silent. After a while, she asked in a trembling voice, "Did you... did you use it to wipe your face?"

"There are two. Which one are you referring to?"

"You didn't use the white one to wipe your face, did you?"

"No, I used the blue one."

Kiana breathed a sigh of relief. That's good. The white one was what she used to wipe herself down...

"Whoosh."

Just as she was feeling relieved, the bathroom door was pulled open, and hot steam hit Kiana's face as a man with wet hair walked out.

When she saw the man who came out, she immediately covered her eyes with her hands, her ears turning bright red, and exclaimed, "You, you, you... why aren't you wearing any clothes?"

The masked, black-haired man was naked, his chest covered in haphazardly stitched wounds. His large, well-defined muscles were exposed to the light, while his lower body was covered only by a white towel...

Hmm? A white towel?

Kiana snapped out of her daze and lowered her hand, then stared blankly at the white towel on Lin's lower body.

"... What are you looking at?" Lin glanced at the towel he had grabbed. "I've washed all my clothes, can I borrow them for a bit? I'll buy you a new one tomorrow."

"You... you..."

The silver-haired girl was so angry that she couldn't even speak. She felt that she hadn't been this angry even if her chest had been stabbed through. But what was even more frustrating was that she was too embarrassed to even say why she was angry!

A wave of youthful shame rose in the girl's heart. She bit her lip, but ultimately didn't utter a curse.

Kiana, you're not a child anymore. He's just a big-headed pig who doesn't understand anything. Just let him go.

Lin glanced at Kiana, whose pretty face was flushed, but didn't bother with her and walked straight to the bed. "Go to sleep."

"Stop right there!" Kiana, her eyes blazing with fury, blocked Lin's path. "Why are you sleeping here? This is my bed!"

"Because I have nowhere else to sleep." Lin's reason was perfectly legitimate... Yeah, right!

She tapped the seemingly indifferent man's mask three times, then asked through gritted teeth, "Where did you sleep before?"

"The tents that were set up under the bridge were dismantled by the urban management officers when I went back today."

"..."

Even though this guy's tone hadn't changed much from before, she could still sense that he sounded exceptionally innocent and pitiful.

"Then you can't sleep in my bed. You have to buy your own mattress and blanket and sleep on the floor."

As soon as the words left his mouth, Lin crossed his arms and stared expressionlessly at Kiana from behind his mask. The sinister look in her dark eyes suddenly snapped Kiana back to reality, and she took a step back warily. "What? Did I say something wrong?"

"This is so troublesome."

"Ah?"

"You have so many problems. My female friends used to never care if I used their things or slept in their beds." Lin frowned. "Has the world really changed?"

"It's the same in any era!"

Kiana was so angry she almost twisted her nose. Who were his female friends anyway? No, that's not the point.

"There's only one bed here. If you sleep in it, where will I sleep?"

"... Can't you sleep on the floor?"

This man is absolutely despicable.

I thought he only had two flaws: being self-centered and having a cold attitude. But now it seems he has a whole host of flaws, almost like a sieve full of holes!

After seeing Kiana's heterochromatic eyes, which were practically bulging out of their sockets, Lin seemed to remember something and spread his hands frankly, saying, "Don't worry, I have no interest in you in that way. I only took off your clothes to make you feel ashamed."

"..."

"From a rational perspective, we need frequent activity and training in the near future, so we can't let you be distracted by other unnecessary physiological issues."

"From an emotional point of view, I don't have much personal preference for you, so there's no need to worry that I would make a move on you. If I wanted to, I would have done it already."