"Actually, bringing you over there today was the head of the family's idea."
Roy sat on the bed in the center of the room, pulled out a cigarette from his pocket and held it in his mouth, speaking indistinctly.
He cast a sideways glance at Kisho standing by the door and said,
"Since you're someone the head of the family values, even if you don't go tonight, you'll definitely come into contact with these things sooner or later."
Kisho said coldly, "Oh."
Although this really was part of his plan; achieving his goal without much effort was indeed nice, but…
What he had just seen still put him in an extremely foul mood.
"So, if there's anything you want to ask, you can ask it now."
Roy lit the cigarette and took a drag.
As the cigarette slowly burned, Kisho caught a faint wisp of the scent of "raw liquid".
The reason he could smell it was because his nerves had already been tortured to the point of being abnormally sensitive to this kind of odor.
"What are you staring at?" Seeing Kisho's gaze fall on his cigarette, Roy asked in confusion, "Special supply. Want one too?"
He gave a mocking smile.
"But, well, kids really shouldn't be smoking."
Kisho: "…"
He wondered whether this guy knew that the thing in his hand was actually the same thing he had used to kill those two people tonight.
"No need—can I ask anything?"
"I won't tell you things that can't be said."
Roy blew out a smoke ring.
"But you'd better be smart and not ask what you shouldn't."
Kisho waved a hand, sending up a gust of wind that swept the annoying secondhand smoke back.
"Alright."
He pretended not to see Roy's face darken from inhaling his own secondhand smoke, gave him no chance to flare up, and went straight to the point:
"Then I'll start asking—what is the purpose of the test subjects?"
Kisho cut straight to the chase. The very first question successfully darkened Roy's face by another shade.
"Brat, you really know how to hit the key point." Roy let out a laugh of anger.
After a brief silence, he still explained,
"The 'raw liquid' produced by the Bankro family—about half of its materials come from the blood of test subjects."
Kisho: "…"
Although he had expected this, hearing the answer still filled Kisho with barely suppressed anger, along with a bit of nausea.
As much as he didn't want to admit it, from a certain perspective, his blood did indeed have some connection to that kind of… or rather, those kinds of monsters.
"Do you still remember 'Golden Snow'?" Roy's sudden question interrupted Kisho's thoughts.
"I remember. Something researched by the Saro family," Kisho replied.
"Every family has its own unique formula."
Roy said slowly, "The spice stones extract produced by Lashan Mountain can almost perfectly fuse with any kind of material, producing unique effects as a result."
"So," he paused here, his gaze sharpening slightly as he watched Kisho's expression.
"Every family that wants to seize the market will do everything it can to develop a formula of its own."
Kisho nodded slowly, then frowned and put on a puzzled look.
"So, those silver-blue-eyed monsters were developed by the Bankro family?"
As he asked this, where Roy couldn't see, he clenched his fist tightly.
If he could, he truly wanted to smash the heads of everyone here—except Anida, who knew nothing.
Roy, however, said, "No."
He seemed to feel there was no need to hide anything in this question, so he answered without hesitation.
Kisho's pupils contracted.
Roy paid no attention to his reaction and continued explaining.
"The specifics are confidential. I can only tell you that the results of modifying the test subjects all originate from a single gene brought into the Bankro family by a researcher."
Kisho: "…"
If he wanted to investigate this matter, that "researcher" mentioned by Roy would absolutely be the top-priority target!
He steadied his mind and continued asking, "Are there many test subjects?"
Worried that Roy might suspect his motives, Kisho added,
"…The one I killed—could it be…"
He finished with perfectly timed silence and a fearful expression—a worker who had made a mistake and was afraid of having his pay docked, perfectly formed.
Roy curled his lips.
Just a kid, after all.
He shook his head. "It's fine. Through genes, more test subjects can be replicated."
Kisho: "…Oh."
He felt his fist harden again.
"You've toured the factory tonight." Roy stood up, clearly meaning to see him off. "This matter is not to be mentioned to anyone."
He jerked his chin toward the door.
"You can go back."
"Alright—" Before Kisho could finish speaking, his expression suddenly changed.
His En… had been maintained the entire time since the conversation began.
Because he was standing by the door, he could sense that something had disappeared from within his En—
Not appeared, but disappeared.
This meant that someone had already been nearby before their conversation began.
Because that "someone" had been maintaining Zetsu the entire time, Kisho hadn't noticed when he expanded his En—until, within his perception, something abruptly vanished.
It was like how a person wouldn't pay much attention to a stationary object placed right in front of them, but if that object suddenly disappeared before their eyes—
That would be completely different.
"Who could it be…" In an instant, countless thoughts flashed through Kisho's mind.
"An internal traitor? But tonight, the traitor had already been executed by Roy—or were those two not all of the traitors, or perhaps not traitors at all?"
"If that's the case, then the traitor still exists."
"And most likely someone who isn't qualified to know internal information, but is qualified to live here."
"What's wrong?" Seeing that something was off with Kisho's expression, Roy lowered his voice and asked.
"…Nothing. Maybe a rat just ran past outside the door. I sensed something kind of disgusting."
Kisho said.
"…Nonsense." Roy's face darkened. "There can't be rats here."
"Ah, then I must've been mistaken. People from Meteor City are all allergic to rats."
Kisho spoke offhandedly and refused to take any responsibility.
Roy: "…"
"…I'm going back to the young lady's side." Kisho pulled the door open with his backhand, then closed it again in the next moment, cutting off Roy's line of sight.
Because he had seen a strand of hair, lying quietly on the floor.
Under the bleak white corridor lights, he could make out that the hair was dyed a wine-red color.
He silently picked it up and, as if nothing had happened, casually tossed it into a nearby trash bin.
"If it's that person…"
As he walked away, Kisho frowned deeply.
"But that person clearly—this shouldn't be possible…"
...
He walked and thought the entire way. Even after returning to his room in the main residence, Kisho still couldn't sort it out.
After closing the door and washing up casually, he collapsed onto the bed, staring wordlessly at the ceiling.
The red lines on his arm had already spread across more than half of his forearm.
—According to the time estimate Amos had given him that day, at the latest by the end of June, he had to bring this deadly matter to an end.
Now, he had added two more tasks for himself.
Find clues related to Noah Barton's origins; and if possible, it would be best to destroy this place he despised along with it.
The burden was heavy and the road long—but, in the end, things depend on people.
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Pls Drop some Power Stones
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