"That was scary." Lynd wiped the sweat off his brow. Seeker did easy work with the remaining paralyzed students. Lynd stared in amazement at Seeker, who was now positioning Cliff to an inclined position.
"Zeek! Stop! You did enough!" Meryl cried.
"I'm not going to hurt him, Meryl. I need to wake him up. I still have a business proposal, remember?" Seeker then proceeded to perform an ancient method of awakening a sleeping soul.
SLAP!
"Hey, wake up!"
A ringing slap was delivered and awoken Cliff from his stupor.
Cliff panicked and started to struggle but couldn't move as Seeker was pressing his hands on him. Seeker lifted his hands once more.
SLAP!
"Please don't kill me!" Cliff cried.
"Relax. I'm not going to hurt you. I have a business proposal for you, Cliff."
Meryl and Lynd stared dryly. Wasn't Seeker going to hurt him? What about the Muay Thai knee strike he just did?
Cliff was shaking but listened carefully at Seeker.
"Answer me honestly, do you sell drugs?" Seeker's asked the leader of the gang.
Cliff gulped. He slowly nodded his head in confirmation.
"Great! That makes it easier." Seeker smiled.
"Where do you get your drugs, and why haven't the school taken any action to deal with you despite the circulating rumors?"
Cliff was sweating profusely.
"It's Mr. Yun! Mr. Yun is my supplier!"
"Professor Yun." Seeker corrected.
"What?" Meryl was shocked.
"Nutterballs! Of all the teachers, it's that timid International Language professor?"
"Well, what did you guys expect? Ms. Cipril won't dirty her hands in doing this. Remember that she is a General's daughter. If anyone fishes out information about her activities, it will create a riot in the Pangean Nations military."
"Now, little Cliffy, you will contact Professor Yun and tell him that you just had a contact who plans on purchasing in bulk. You have to get the contact details of his supplier. Do you understand?"
Cliff stared at Seeker with a confused expression. Seeker then took out a piece of paper in his pocket.
"I need you to accomplish this by the end of this week. Go to this address if you have the information. Oh, and Cliff."
Seeker then immediately choked Cliff with one hand and carried him high.
Cliff was gasping for breath. The intense emotions of terror and fear returned.
"Fail to do so, and I'll kill you." Seeker threw Cliff down to the ground.
Cliff was gasping for breath and was crawling away from Seeker.
"Let's go." Seeker calmly called out to his two friends as he walked away.
Seeker didn't even turn back to take a look at Cliff. Meryl and Lynd, on the other hand, kept turning their heads to observe Seeker and the crawling Cliff.
"I'm tired. Let's get something good to eat." Seeker casually mentioned. He led his two friends to the nearby food district and went to the more prestigious shops in the district.
"Seeker, where are we eating?" Meryl wondered. She was not used to the dishes being served at the area they went to as her allowance could only afford cheap meals.
"Trust me, guys. I'm doing you a favor. You better list down which dishes you want to eat as most of these may not be available in the future." Seeker smiled.
The two silently followed, making Seeker decide which restaurant they were to dine in. Seeker led the two to a classy buffet restaurant.
"This looks promising. I could eat all those long-lost dishes." Seeker smiled.
"We're eating here?" Lynd asked in shock. He had no experience of dining at such a restaurant.
"Yeah. Might as well, right? If I want to eat the variety of foods that this world has to offer, this place is a great place to start. Western, Eastern, Mediterranean, you name it!" Seeker immediately dove in without waiting for the two.
Meryl and Lynd looked at each other and followed excitedly.
Seeker immediately went to gather the delicacies he aimed to devour as soon as their seat was assigned. The two followed ignorantly as they experienced what they felt to be paradise.
Seeker's dishes covered the majority of the table. Lynd and Meryl only had less than a fourth of the table for their own.
"Are you sure you can eat all of that, Zeek?" Meryl asked worriedly.
"Don't worry. I need to take in more food. It may not seem much, but I burned a lot of energy earlier. Plus, I need to prepare for the planned activities that I have scheduled." Seeker continued to munch in the various dishes around his seat.
Meryl stared in wonder at Seeker, who happily devoured the meals before him.
"You know its times like these that I think the future won't be as bad as you say it will be." Lynd sighed.
"How bad is the future?" Meryl asked with a serious expression.
"Pretty grim. It was very hopeless." Seeker recollected.
"How? We had people like you, right? I mean, nutterballs Zeek! You mowed those bullies like they were rodents!"
"A shot at victory? Wrong. What we had was simply the capacity to strike back. That didn't mean we were winning. So what if we can dodge bullets? Lightspeed weapons, strange biological gases, cloaking technology, advanced computer hacking, and weapons hijacking. Those were the least of our worries."
"Sounds pretty bad." Meryl looked grim.
"It's worse than it sounds. We had problems with almost everything. Food, water, manpower, weapons, you name it. Everything was lacking. This is why every small thing we accomplish now could vastly change the future."
"Is that why you're turning us into Unlocked humans?" Meryl finally had the courage to ask.
"Obviously. And it won't end with you." Seeker smiled.
"Why not start with someone else, Zeek? We can't do what you do!"
"Of course you can! If I can do it, you can!" Zeek confidently boasted and started munching over his meals.
Lynd had an angry glare. Meryl also shared a frustrated grunt. Those words were what Seeker would usually say to give them a boost of confidence. However, those words never managed to accomplish that.
"You can! But WE can't! Here we go again!" Meryl angrily grunted once more.
Seeker was surprised at the sudden turn of emotions of his friends.
"What's wrong with you guys! Of course, you can!"
"You really don't know, do you?" Lynd asked with an exasperated expression.
"Know what?"
"We aren't like you! You're not even supposed to be a Rising! Heck, for all we know, you could even do better than those chummy Royals!"
"What are you talking about?" Seeker stopped his dining and paid full attention to his friends.
"Zeek, I've known you for about two years. And it didn't take me long to notice what Lynd, who has been your friend for ages, noticed long ago!"
"Noticed what?" Seeker stared at Lynd.
"You're a genius, Zeek. You always were. You don't belong in the Rising classes."
"What are you talking about? My grades were always subpar."
"Really? Was it? Or did you intentionally do that? You're always asleep at classes, you always don't listen, yet if you chose to, you could have aced all those tests. You would even intentionally make a few mistakes in order to get a low grade."
"Zeek. Let me put it this way." Meryl interrupted before Seeker could even start to defend himself.
"We're not on the same level. You have always been ahead of us but chose to slow down for our sakes. And we were always fine with that. Until now. You say we can do it. We can be like you. Unlocked. But that is not true. We were never on the same level. If you push forward and give it your all, we won't be able to catch up."
"I can help you-"
"No, you can't, Zeek." This time it was Lynd who drew the line.
"Not this time. You never understood how Meryl and I would do our best but always remain mediocre. We know. We've seen it in your eyes all these years. You claimed to be mediocre, but we knew you were doing it because you are confident that you could easily surpass everyone. Even the best of the Royals. You never understood what it meant to fail."
Seeker was silent. Things started to make sense for him. His untapped potential, him being one of the very few people on Earth that could achieve the unlocking, even his capabilities to stand to support the World Champions. He was a genius. He recalled the secrets of his bloodlines and then thought of something else. Was it because of that? Was that his ticket to the Ranked Hero's realm?
"Looks like you finally get it, huh? You can't push us, Zeek. Not this time. Not because we are unwilling. But simply because we can't. Don't put us on the same level as you." Meryl harshly spoke and clarified their position to Seeker.
"Especially now. You're no longer the Zeek we knew. You're far more powerful and far more amazing. Yet the standards you hold towards us didn't change. We'd break Zeek. So please don't burden us."
Seeker's eyes suddenly sparked a different light. There was intense raging anger hidden deep in his eyes.
"You are right. I am no longer the Zeek you knew. That Zeek encountered a world of terror. Those memories did change me, and that's why I'm trying to change you! But let me ask you two something. Is this why you are afraid of the future?"
Meryl and Lynd avoided Seeker's eyes at the question.
"Why is it that out of all the questions that you have or could ask me, you never once bothered to ask if the two of you are alive in the future?" Seeker glared back.
There was silence. The eyes of Seeker's two friends grew more and more depressed.
"We know we died, Zeek." Meryl started to cry.
"We didn't ask because we already knew. We can't live in that kind of world." Lynd continued.
"What I don't get is why the two of you don't want to take any actions to change that future," Seeker responded calmly. But an angry storm was behind his soft voice.
"We're not like you. Even if we tried, we would fail." Meryl sobbed started to grow stronger. People around the room were noticing the crying looks in the eyes of two students in this table.
Lynd chose to remain silent. But tears were also filling his eyes.
"So, instead of fighting, you simply accepted your fate?" Seeker stopped observing the two and turned his attention to one of the dishes in the table.
Meryl and Lynd couldn't look Seeker in the eye. They were helpless.
"You're not the only ones afraid. Will I be able to protect you two this time? Will I be able to save my family? Will I be able to save her?" Seeker gave a frustrated laugh.
"In this table, the one whose most afraid of the future is me." Seeker paused as he continued to smash open his delicacies.
"But despite my fear, I was willing to fight. But now, now that even you can't have confidence in yourself. Then I guess I really won't be able to protect you." Seeker started to angrily crush open a lobster.
"If you want to give up, you may."
Lynd and Meryl silently stared at their plates. Tears continued to gather in their eyes.
"I'll let you quit." Seeker finally broke the silence.
"But only after the power walkthrough. I still need you to help."
It was a strange moment for Meryl and Lynd. Though Seeker spoke of abandoning them, the intense burden and fear were finally lifted from their hearts. They gazed back at Seeker with an apologetic look. This was who they were. Rising's to their very blood. And at that moment of intense emotional depression, the weak ones lost the appetite to eat while the strong remained undaunted from the overflowing emotionally stinging pain.
They gazed at Seeker, who continued to eat. Truly he was as they always knew. A champion amongst weak men. He always has been. And the intense memories that he has inherited only served to make him stronger.
"But we'll still do the workouts. At least I could say I tried."
Meryl and Lynd cringed as they heard that statement.