# Chapter 110
“What should I do from now on?”
Ben, who had dismissed Tade’s groundless words, muttered as he rubbed his face. Even if Kane was alive as Tade claimed, he couldn’t see a path forward.
Until now, he had done nothing but follow others’ orders. That’s why he didn’t know how to think for himself.
Though Ben wasn’t looking at him as if he didn’t want an answer, Tade considered carefully before opening his mouth.
“I’m just an ordinary employee, so I can’t give you any notable advice, but I can tell you this one thing.”
He couldn’t understand why a grown adult looked like a newborn chick. Was it because of the pure aura surrounding him?
That’s why, even knowing it wasn’t his place, Tade offered a warning.
“If you continue like this, you’ll keep regretting it in the future.”
“But…”
“You know that excuses like ‘it can’t be helped’ are just that—excuses, right?”
Ben, who was about to speak, closed his mouth as if Tade’s words had hit the mark.
“Don’t you already know? What you should do.”
Tade’s gaze pierced through as if seeing through Ben’s inner thoughts. Ben, who had been listening blankly, began to show signs of life in his eyes.
* * *
Zenon grew more anxious with each passing day. Nothing was going well. Both Kane’s situation and Alice’s.
After Kane disappeared, Alice’s health began to deteriorate. Her condition was now life-threatening enough to halt the experiments. That was also why Alice, who had been transferred elsewhere, was brought back to headquarters. This place had facilities to handle corpses.
Barely breathing, she looked so lifeless that one might mistake her for a dead person at a glance. Zenon stared at Alice as she breathed faintly, with a ragged sound. Complex emotions passed through his eyes.
Zenon frowned and roughly ran his fingers through his hair. Alice’s pale complexion looked as if she might die at any moment.
It wasn’t that surprising. Rather, it was a miracle that Alice had lived this long. Test subjects generally had short lifespans.
They could have lived longer with proper treatment, but the research team wouldn’t spend money on test subjects. Because of this, subjects who were already subjected to harsh experiments often died from common colds.
Zenon, who had handled the disposal of those who died, knew this fact all too well. The number of people who died from illness was far greater than those who died from experimental side effects.
Of course, Alice was still alive now. But it was clear that if left like this, she wouldn’t last much longer.
“Haah…”
Zenon let out a deep sigh in frustration. He had seen many people die, but seeing someone he knew dying felt completely different.
He wasn’t close with Alice. But she certainly wasn’t someone whose death he could be indifferent to. She needed to live, if only for Kane’s sake.
Yet despite thinking this, Zenon could only watch as she was dying. He couldn’t heal Alice. The most he could do was visit to check on her condition.
Zenon couldn’t help but despise himself for only being able to watch without doing anything.
He had only killed people up until now. So it was inevitable that he didn’t know how to save lives. Therefore, to save Alice, he needed someone else’s help.
Zenon briefly thought of Ben but quickly shook his head. Though his personality might make him easy to manipulate, he was still a Peace member.
He couldn’t ask such a person for help. Naturally, the only person left was Fenil. She was the only one who could save Alice without Peace’s interference.
“But…”
Could he ask her for help? Zenon chewed his lip hesitantly. He had already committed an unforgivable sin against her. And now he was thinking of asking for help? It was shameless and selfish.
Unable to decide what to do, Zenon let out what must have been his umpteenth sigh. After staring at his phone screen, he finally looked away.
Contacting Fenil was a last resort. If he couldn’t find any other method by then, that would be the time to ask for help.
With that determination, Zenon postponed contacting Fenil. He put his phone in his pocket and started thinking about what he needed to do now.
At that moment, a metal object caught on his fingers. Puzzled by the unfamiliar sensation in his pocket, Zenon pulled out the item.
“Keys…”
He murmured, looking at the car keys in his hand. Since he had given his original car to Kane, he had bought a new one. Zenon fingered the car keys, recalling past memories.
He had definitely given the car keys to Kane back then. Having a car would make it easier to go into hiding. But somehow, when Zenon returned to the scene, the car that should have been gone was still there intact.
Of course, Kane wasn’t inside. It was strange. If he was trying to hide, there was no reason to leave the car behind. Kane had even spoken as if he intended to take it.
This could only mean that Kane was unable to take the car due to some circumstance. But if that were the case, the only conclusion would be that Kane had died. However, Zenon refused to accept that.
It wasn’t that Zenon hadn’t considered the possibility of Kane’s death. But he had a baseless conviction that Kane couldn’t have died.
There was no evidence of Kane’s death even when he examined the factory district. So Kane wasn’t dead. That’s what he wanted to believe.
Originally, he hadn’t wanted Kane to die. That’s why he had agonized so much over killing him. But after the thought that Kane resembled Kay had once occurred to him, that feeling had grown stronger.
It felt as if Kane’s death would be like Kay’s death.
Though that shouldn’t be possible, why wouldn’t this uncomfortable sensation disappear?
Though it was his own emotion, Zenon simply couldn’t understand it.
He couldn’t properly understand anything—neither the current situation nor his own feelings.
* * *
The man drinking tea coughed dryly several times as if in pain. Finally, he collapsed while vomiting blood.
“Kuheck!”
Seeing the man collapsed pathetically on the cold floor, Raymon, who was sitting across from him, raised one corner of his mouth.
“This one is no longer usable.”
“I will take care of it.”
Though it was a brief statement, the secretary understood what Raymon wanted and answered with a bow. Seemingly satisfied with this response, he spoke.
“It would be better to replace this idiot with someone more intelligent.”
“Understood.”
Originally, he hadn’t planned to kill this man today. But he was so stupid that he hastened his own end.
Dispose of the useless. That’s why Raymon killed this man much earlier than expected. But now that he had done it, he also felt it was a bothersome thing to have done.
It would take quite a bit of time to train someone new. Moreover, he was now fairly close to achieving his desired goal.
Having such a hindering change at a crucial time wasn’t very welcome. Though having an idiot running around would be even more unpleasant.
In the room, after the unsightly corpse had been removed and the secretary had left, Raymon quietly murmured.
“How many more do I need to capture to kill them all?”
Thinking about it now, it was truly a foolish goal. If someone learned of his plan, they would probably laugh at him. But it couldn’t be helped. People are inherently foolish.
To the point of setting such an absurd goal.
* * *
I tried to bear it. But in the end, I couldn’t hold back and opened my mouth again.
“Are you really going to leave things as they are?”
No matter how I thought about it, I couldn’t understand Boss’s apparent lack of intention to take any measures against Raymon. Both for Haylen’s sake and from a villain’s perspective, that man was someone who needed to be dealt with.
“What… are you talking about?”
Haylen, who surely knew this fact, noticeably avoided talking about it. It was the same as last time. Haylen had rejected my help, but he didn’t seem to have the will to seek revenge himself either.
It was just an excuse to avoid me. But today was different. I spoke in a resolute voice, as if to say there was no escape.
“I heard about the disappearance of barrier ability users from Fenil.”
“Ah…”
At those words, Haylen smiled awkwardly, apparently troubled. I didn’t stop there and continued.
“For your information, I was the one who killed the non-ability user among the corpses.”
“I see.”
“The identity was a Peace researcher.”
Though Haylen showed signs of discomfort with the topic of this conversation, I had no intention of stopping as he might wish.
“And as you probably already know, the culprit behind the disappearances is Raymon.”
While telling me about the incident, Fenil showed me a certain individual. Someone I knew well. The man I had encountered in the conference room before.
Fenil said he was Raymon, the director of Peace.
The experience that day was strange, but I hadn’t made the connection to Raymon yet. The person who had instigated my death and the one who killed Haylen’s family were the same person.
I saw corpses with ability overload at the factory. They were all barrier ability users, and Zenon said it was Peace’s doing.
In the end, the culprit behind all these incidents was the Peace director, Raymon.
He was the only suspicious person among those related to Peace with considerable power. Moreover, since Fenil also pointed to him as the culprit, it couldn’t be anyone else.
“…I suppose so.”
In response to my words, which were essentially confirming what he already knew, Haylen finally spoke as if admitting defeat.
“And yet you’re just going to leave him be?”
What on earth was making Haylen hesitate like this? While Peace was certainly a formidable enemy, they weren’t unbeatable.
With thorough preparation, our side had a decent chance of winning. So there was no reason for Haylen to avoid confronting Raymon.
“Is there another reason you can’t deal with the director?”
After considering briefly, I carefully asked. Haylen, who had been pausing, finally nodded. Then, as if he had made up his mind to speak, he gently opened his mouth.
“It’s not that I can’t kill Raymon.”
“Then what is it?”
“I’m afraid Kay might be endangered.”
“What?”
It was something I hadn’t expected to hear. I hadn’t noticed that Boss was considering this point at all. But when I said I wanted to rescue Alice, he had worried about the same thing.
Thinking about it, it made sense that he would have similar concerns this time as well.
