New Eden: Live to Play, Play to Live

After a few minutes of talking it out, Mr. Gu left Alexander's penthouse with a new objective. Getting the Zhong Kui to back off.

He originally was against the idea. But a voice in his mind kept bugging him about something.

What would happen if Jack discovered that the Zhong Kui attacked Alex and Kary? What would his reaction be?

The only answer Gu Fang could think of was mad. Extremely mad.

Even if Mr. Boudreau had been worried about Alexander's transformation, he never wanted more than to keep an eye on him. They were still partners, and having him suddenly killed would not benefit him in any way.

So, he needed to keep this under wraps. Alex, David, and Kary agreed to keep mum about this in front of Jack, the latter reluctantly so.

Now, he needed to pull all the strings he could and cash in some favours from all his old contacts to get in touch with his family. His only foot in the door was them.

How they would react was anyone's guess at this point. But he owed them to try.

After he left, Kary pouted for a while, as she would have preferred to drive into him, given this was all his fault. But Alex wanted the matter to disappear, so she laid it to rest.

But this cost him a few brownie points, as far as she was concerned.

Once breakfast was over, David took his leave as well, as he had things to do during the day. He couldn't hang out with them.

Alex sighed as the house became quiet again.

"So many things to do, so little time to do them… And I still haven't seen the mess that New Eden has become. How has that been?" he asked, turning his head toward Kary.

She bit her lip, thinking about what part to bring up first.

"It's been… hectic. A lot of things happened. Between the duel with Aces High and the Inter-Alliance Military Exercises, a few incidents also happened. It's been a busy month. And I don't think the pace of things is even close to slowing down."

Alex looked at her with a curious gaze.

He grabbed her from her seat, lifting her like a princess, as she yelped in surprise, and brought her to the big sofa, which was surprisingly undamaged from all the fighting of earlier.

He laid down on the sofa, holding Kary in his arms, and started stroking her back.

"Tell me all about it. We have all day," he said, taking a soft tone.

Kary's head had landed on his chest, and she could hear his calm heartbeat. This soothed her.

"I missed you," Alex whispered in her ear before kissing the side of her head.

"I missed you too," she replied, digging into his embrace.

She started in chronological order, with the incident of the infiltration and rescue attempt of their prisoner, explaining how they still had almost no leads. She even told him how Blue Peacock had taken the case away from her, promising answers.

After that, she told him how the Military Exercises proceeded and how Knight of the Sun had won, as he had predicted. He made a smug grin when he heard that.

"The Natives underestimate our growth speed. Some of these nobles, royals, and whatnot are too stuck in their worldviews. It'll cost them in the long term."

Kary chuckled at his statement.

She had been thinking the same, but was surprised he could have political thoughts.

After telling him this, she continued with the duel and how Leon had pulled in his owed favours, assuring them of a crushing victory. She also told him how she doubted this would be the last they saw of Azamus.

"I still don't understand why that guy is so hell-bent on being the best. What does he gain by being first? Is it just misplaced arrogance?" Alex asked.

Kary tilted her head, placing a finger on her chin.

"I don't know. I never got along with him since he's kind of a dick. But I feel like something is driving him to be that person. But it's irrelevant."

Alex nodded. He agreed that it didn't matter, but he was still curious.

Next, she explained to him the trouble that annexing Aces High had brought with all the contracts and desperate players. This was still an ongoing issue, and she was glad Alex was now back to help her.

But he looked at her with a frown.

"Can't we break those contracts forcefully? We have access to the most powerful contract mage in New Eden. Did you ask Aravelle for help?"

Kary gave a disdainful smirk.

"I tried contacting him more than once for many reasons. I can't seem to find him. It's like he doesn't care about us and doesn't want to help us."

Alex frowned.

"That doesn't seem right. Maybe he's busy?"

Kary gave him a look of 'Are you dumb?' before rolling her eyes.

"Never mind. I didn't say a thing. I'll look into it tonight when we log in. There has to be a reason he hasn't helped."

Kary laughed, imagining it would be a waste of time. But she continued her report.

"We also found traces of demonic presence within our borders. But we haven't found a tear or portal yet, which is strange. I can now detect on an extremely long range and still can't find a trace of it. Not even miasma."

Alex looked at the top of her head, wondering how far she meant by extremely long range.

But the subject was more important than that detail.

"What kind of traces?"

"Mostly reports. Torn monsters, strange behaviours from Natives. We even had players report that they were killed without seeing what attacked them. Not many things can take down a player fast enough for that, these days."

"Hmm. I can see why this would seem like a demon roaming. But it is strange that you haven't found anything. I'll look into that, too. Maybe my new forms can help."

Kary nodded.

"Yeah, about those. Care to tell me what happened on your end for a month?" she asked, looking up at him.

With a sigh, Alex replied, "Yeah. I can do that. But it's not a pleasant story…"

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