Chapter 28: Mission Target
In an abandoned warehouse a few kilometers away from Summit Hill University, where the tragedy was ongoing…
Blergh!
Lyle coughed out a mouthful of blood as he used his uninjured left arm to push himself up, cringing with pain as his practically destroyed right arm's broken bones rubbed against each other. By the time he was seated upright, he was sweating profusely from the pain, and it was a miracle he did not scream the entire time.
Lyle took in the situation, and the pain from his arm seemed to lessen as he saw the grim situation.
Barnes was pressed underneath a giant metal beam that had detached from the roof, a small crater surrounding where he lay, partially filled with blood. The man himself had been knocked out of his power form and returned to his fat body, which was looking quite saggy.
On the other side, Leo was lying in a pool of blood, face first, all of the blood coming from his forehead, which had been cracked. It was unknown whether the man was alive, and Lyle doubted that anyone could survive that… or even if they might want to.
Even if Leo lived through this, there was no doubt he would suffer some form of brain damage.
"Fuck…" Lyle could only mutter, venting his pain and fear about the previous situation weakly.
Lyle seemed to understand what happened. Carla had preyed on this boy, not knowing that he was an esper, and after killing her, he made up a story with the officials to lure them out of hiding. They had already researched Kaizer's background and knew that he was the son of that recently famous tech giant, so Lyle did not believe that the officials of this city were unaware.
It was all a trap!
And they fell for it!
"Fuck!" Lyle cursed once more, but this time with more energy.
He helplessly looked around and rose to his feet, shambling toward a nearby wall. There, he pushed aside a box with his left hand and revealed a compartment in the wall that required a password to enter. Upon entering said password, the compartment swung open to reveal a refrigerated interior that contained a myriad of items.
Lyle ignored most of them and removed three vials containing a red liquid, then shook them to see if they were still active. Upon verifying this, he closed the compartment and opened one vial to down the liquid within right away.
His face changed as his skin began to boil all over his body, a red mist leaking from his pores that made him look quite comical, like a cartoon character that was shaking with fury and about to blow their top. However, what was more eye-catching was his broken and ruined arm that rapidly righted itself, as if time was reversing.
One could hear the loud sounds of bones snapping back into place, and from the grimace on Lyle's face, it was clear that this procedure was not as pleasant as it seemed. It also did not last long, as the moment his arm was healed, the red mist ceased to emerge, and the man released an audible sigh of relief.
He spent some time flexing his arm to make sure it was fully functional without any leftover issues, then walked to the bodies of Barnes and Leo. Lyle went to Leo first since it seemed that Leo might be in a really bad situation. After flipping him over, even Lyle grimaced at what he saw and hurriedly checked for a pulse, surprised to feel one and even saw the weak rising and falling of their squad leader's chest.
Since he was alive, Lyle hurriedly fed him the liquid in the vial, and Leo's face immediately became masked with pain as a red mist leaked from his body as well. His ruined face began to fix itself, returning to his previous average looks compared to the bloodied mess Lyle had come to meet.
Lyle walked over to Barnes and did the same while Leo touched his face and rose up, feeling slightly groggy and trying to regain his senses. Even with his features restored, Leo could still feel the phantom pain of having his face smashed into the ground by Kaizer's telekinesis, and his hands couldn't help but tremble at the memory.
Lyle came over with Barnes, who was still pale, his expression extremely ugly.
"Boss, we cannot let this go! That brat is at least an A-Rank Esper who has been hiding his identity! He could be a big problem regarding our mission here in Alpha City!" Barnes roared, unwilling to take this loss sitting down.
Surprisingly, the ever-calm Leo nodded. "Usually, I'd hate to seek petty revenge, but… we have no choice. Not only do we have to fear being investigated by the officials, we also used three vials of Ancestor's Blood. Every usage of them has to be reported to the organization, or our lives will be forfeit."
The pupils of Lyle and Barnes constricted greatly. They had already been given a negative mark by the organization for Carla's death, which they didn't even know about, and in trying to find out about it, they only made things worse and wasted a rare resource for healing.
The Ancestor's Blood was not even something that low-level D and C-Rank espers like them should be able to access, but their mission was so important to the organization that they were unprecedentedly assigned a batch.
This miracle healing drug was sourced from an S-Rank Blood Lord within the organization, whose blood could heal the wounds of any being below his rank short of death. As this Blood Lord was one of the higher-ups of the organization, his production of this blood was limited, so even the B and A-Rank espers couldn't get enough for themselves, much less trash like them.
If they reported this… their end would be very grim.
The three men fell silent and wondered how to extract themselves from this problem when they suddenly trembled. Leo especially pulled out a piece of glowing parchment that was yellowish-black and radiated a dark miasma from its form.
The parchment spontaneously combusted with a black flame, turning into a crow that cawed and flew out of the warehouse. The faces of the three men changed greatly, a mixture of excitement and relief as they knew that they were saved.
No matter what mistakes they had made, all would be clear now as long as they did not fail anymore, for their chances at redemption had come. With the burning of the ancient agreement and the awakening of the Dark Crow, the covenant made by their organization's founder and a secret entity that would change the fate of humanity was fulfilled!
To the organization, this meant that it was time for them to finally escape the shadows and come to the fore, bringing all the power and resources they had been stockpiling as well as growing to bear!
Whether it was the officials or the other notorious esper factions, and even the normal people who flooded this planet, they would all come to their knees before the organization!
For these three, though, it was much simpler.
The mission target had appeared!