Beep. Beep. Beep.
"Oh, cut that out," I growled.
Beep. Beep. Beep.
"All right! I'm awake! Now switch that off!"
"I'm afraid I can't do that," a gentle, feminine voice spoke up next to me sounding amused. Blinking my eyes open, I jolted upright in bed.
"Alicia?"
"Richard." She nodded, wiping tears from her eyes. "You're finally awake."
I squinted at her, barely able to make out her features, but Alicia gently helped me up when I grimaced from phantom pain that surged through my body.
"Easy now. You haven't fully recovered yet." She then reached out to the table next to my bed and handed me a pair of glasses. I put them on, and my vision sharpened back to comfortable clarity. She smiled and nodded. "Your dad brought you a pair of new glasses. He said you'll need it."
"Right." My old pair of glasses had been destroyed during my fight with the Crastrate. It was a good thing I had mastered the mind's eye, or I wouldn't be able to fight properly against that rank B monster. Not with my vision obscured by myopia.
"Your dad left for work. He's been visiting you everyday, so he'll be back here tonight."
I nodded, already aware that Dad couldn't possibly spend 24/7 by my side. Even though he was usually watching anime or playing games when I got home, I knew that he usually did some work when I was in school. The benefits of being your own boss (a freelance, solo mage-mercenary) was that you decide your own schedule. Obviously, even with that flexibility, Dad still had work to do. I had no doubt he would return in the afternoon…
…speaking of which, I didn't know what time it was. From the window, I could tell that it was still daytime, though. Late morning, early afternoon, maybe? There was a digital clock that beamed a holographic display of the time. About two in the afternoon, so my estimation was almost right on point. Unfortunately, the clock did not display the date or day, so I had no idea how much time had passed.
Glancing around, I saw that I had been hooked up to a machine, which was monitoring my vital signs and all that. An IV drip extended from a vein, feeding me fluids. I still felt a little weak, despite the enormous amount of mana spent on advanced healing spells to literally bring me back from the brink of the dead.
"How long have I been out for?" I asked uncertainly.
"A week." Alicia looked at me sternly. "You were extremely lucky. Pearl decided to go back when we all saw the gigantic explosion in the valley. She found you lying just outside the mountains. Fortunately, she was able to apply emergency first-aid treatment with healing spells, or you would have died mere seconds later." She held her thumb and finger a millimeter apart. "You were this close to dying, you know."
Actually, I was surprised that I wasn't dead. Plot armor for the win. One of the perks of being a web novel protagonist, I guess. Unless the author got bored of this story and decided to kill me off to end it quickly.
"Is everyone all right?" I asked, as the events of that night suddenly came flooding back. So many of my schoolmates were dead. "Craig…he was seriously hurt. Dong Fang Yue Chu too. Jin Hao. And the rest…what about Harvey?"
"I'm all right!"
As usual, Harvey was his bubbly, excited self, dashing into the room when he overheard Alicia's conversation with me. He practically bounced to my bedside, his eyes wide in wonder.
"Vice-president! You're finally awake!"
"Yup." I studied him, but he didn't seem hurt. Neither did Alicia, when I took a good look at her. They must have benefited from some healing spells. The last time I saw them, they were pretty banged up. "I'm glad to see that the both of you are fine. What about the others?"
Alicia glared at me sternly. "Fancy you worrying about everyone else when you're the one who suffered the worst injuries."
"Hey, at least I'm not dead." I suddenly turned pale when I remembered seeing the corpses of Stan, Wang Fei, Elliot, Nicholas, Miranda and the rest. A wave of nausea slammed into my gut like a fist. "Sorry, that was insensitive of me."
"If anyone deserves to be insensitive, it's you, Vice-president Richard!" Harvey exclaimed vehemently. The guy really thought that I was a god. "You risked your life and nearly made the ultimate sacrifice to save all the survivors!"
"No."
"…eh?"
Harvey turned to look at Alicia. So did I. she was trembling from anger, even though her voice was still calm and level.
"I won't allow it. Richard, you must treasure your life more. Even if your father isn't upset, he was still worried. So was I. so was everyone else." She leaned closer, her expression strict. "Don't ever do something like that again, please. Don't put your own life at risk for the sake of others."
"Tell me honestly," I countered coolly. "Would you have done the same if you were in my shoes?"
Knowing her personality, I was sure Alicia would have sacrificed her own life to save Black Rose members.
Alicia lowered her head, knowing that she wouldn't be able to hide the truth from me. She sighed and shook her head.
"Just…promise me that you won't go get yourself killed, all right?"
"I'll do my best." I frowned. "And neither of you have answered my question yet."
"Oh! Yeah, everyone's fine!" Harvey smiled broadly. "President Dong Fang Yue Chu has healed up a few days ago, and Senior Lily is helping him. Same with President Craig, and Senior Sheila is helping him." He shrugged. "And you have President Alicia helping you, so you'll be fine soon."
I ignored that last sentence and focused on garnering more information. "How about Jin Hao and Aoi?"
"They're all fine," Alicia assured me. "They got healed by Teacher Cure. You're the only one we weren't sure about. We all thought you might not make it, even though Teacher Cure tried her best with her most potent healing spells. She barely managed to keep you in medical stasis. Your life was hanging by a thread."
"You literally pulled off a miracle, though," Harvey added with a grin. "Rarely any student mage would be able to go toe-to-toe with three Crastrates and win, never mind survive." He punched the air. "Boom! You nuked all three of them to oblivion! Hell, I bet that ultimate nuke spell of yours can even destroy a rank A monster!"
"That's what it was designed for," I muttered.
"Why are you designing spells of mass destruction?" Alicia asked with a frown. "Are you preparing to conquer a country or something? You've just become a walking weapon of mass destruction. A lot of the mercenary guilds and even the Federation Military are trying to recruit you now. Your dad has been holding them off, but you'll more than likely be approached by them soon."
"Wait…" something occurred to me. "How did you guys know there were three Crastrates? When you left, there was only one."
"One of the people who came to the campfire party was from the Newspaper Society. He recorded the whole event with a remote-controlled drone." Alicia giggled a little. "He was upset when your nuke spell ended up destroying his drone along with the Crastrates." Then she turned grim. "But…you also ended up destroying the bodies of all the students who were killed. Their parents are…upset that they couldn't even get a body back for burial, but…Brother Hai and the Federation Military stepped in to explain that you had no choice. They…understand, but they still find it difficult to accept."
"Instructor Feng Hai shut them up by pointing out that they would be worrying more than just burials and funerals if the Crastrates got into the city and started slaughtering everyone else in here," Harvey added gleefully. Dude, this wasn't something to laugh about.
In any case, I wasn't surprised that Feng Hai had links to the military. I recalled that he was the leader of the Silver Wolves Mercenary group, but mercenary guilds often cooperated and received contracts from the military, so they developed a close relationship. I knew for sure that Dad often accepted jobs from the military, and headed out into the field as a solo operative (as solo as a summoner could be, anyway – he always had Angelica by his side, so technically they could be classed as a two-man team).
"You've become quite a celebrity, you know! A hero! They're thinking of giving you a medal. And your fame is spreading throughout the Federation as the first student ever able to destroy three rank B monsters on his own!" Harvey continued excitedly.
"Even Troy hasn't achieved something of that magnitude," Alicia commented softly.
"It's only a matter of time," I assured her. "He's meant to be the ultimate god mode Mary Sue, after all."
"…what?"
"Never mind." I shook my head. "Anyway, I'm more interested in finding out how and where the three Crastrates came from."
This made no sense. High ranking monsters like the Fiend class were rarely ever seen near human civilization, unless an Emergence event occurred right in the middle of a city. Usually they lived in areas of extreme wilderness, deeply hidden away from civilization. I had never heard of a Fiend class monster coming so near to Jing Tian City before, at least not those that didn't spawn out of an Emergence event.
"About that…"
The three of us looked up when Dad walked into the room. He grinned and waved at Alicia and Harvey.
"Oh, Alicia. Harvey. You're both here as well. Thank you for coming, as always."
"No, it's not a problem at all," Alicia told him quickly.
"It's only natural!" Harvey proclaimed proudly. I swear, the guy was going to start calling me boss one day.
"Anyway, about your question…the military conducted its own investigation, and we found traces of an artificially triggered Emergence event." Dad retrieved his tablet and projected a holographic image into the air. I gagged when I saw the bloodied corpses of Lin Zhan Long, Adam Freeman and Terence Taylor.
"What happened to them?!" Alicia gasped, her voice filled with immense shock and horror. Her hands flew to her mouth as her complexion turned frightfully pale.
"They look like they have been eaten from the inside out…" Harvey swallowed, visibly perspiring. "Their chests…something burst out of their chests."
He was right. Their ribs were bent outward, as if something had smashed its way free of the ribcage and chewed its way out of their chests. Thanks to my prior knowledge of the Crastrates and their life cycle, I immediately understood.
"They were the hosts for the Crastrates."
"Correct." Dad nodded. "We found the eggs and destroyed them…but it was too late. The larval stage of the Crastrates had already implanted their embryos inside these poor bastards' chests, and spawned as the monsters you fought." He scowled. "Now the question was how did these three get hold of this device?"
The image flickered, and was replaced by another picture of a spherical thing. It was sizzling, burned out and half-melted, but it was evidently a manmade object.
"What's that?" Harvey asked inevitably.
"Transdimensional Key," Dad replied coldly. "It tears open the space between our two dimensions and artificially induces an Emergence event. A dreadful weapon that has been employed by terrorists and fanatics to summon monsters to wreak havoc on cities. And this particular one…is used to summon high ranking monsters."
The room fell silent.
"Preliminary investigations show that these three were merely duped and made use of. Yes, they are responsible for bringing a high ranking monster so close to the city, and also for the deaths of so many of your schoolmates. But we're more interested in who gave them the Transdimensional Key in the first place, and why."
Dad switched off the holographic display and kept his tablet. I could see his fingers tightening into fists.
"We'll track down the culprit and bring him or her to justice. This, I swear."
"…so you'll be going on another mission again?" I asked, already resigned.
"Not yet." Dad raised an eyebrow at me. "Don't worry. I'm not going to leave until you're all right and discharged from the hospital." He sighed and rubbed his temples. "While you were out cold, a lot of things have happened. Journalists clamoring for interviews. Mercenary guilds and even the military trying to recruit you. The government wanting to conduct their own interrogation and investigation." He shook his head and chuckled. "That spell of yours have caused quite the uproar. While at first you're revered as a hero, several officials have seen the danger of letting a walking weapon of mass destruction roam freely. They want…restraints to be placed on you."
"…the fuck? They want to lock me up?"
"Don't worry. The Federation is built on the foundation of universal human rights." Dad snorted as if he didn't really believe that. "And freedom. They're not going to lock you up and turn you into a human weapon. If they try anything funny, like brainwashing or indoctrinating you with drugs and whatever, I'll destroy the damned Federation itself."
"Let's hope it doesn't come to that," I muttered under my breath.
"There's so much to tell you…a lot of things have happened this week. We'll slowly help you catch up," Dad continued. "But yeah…be careful. Especially when random strangers approach you. They might have their own motives."
"Understood." I nodded. "I'll be careful."
"Oh, and another thing…"
Before Dad could finish speaking, Teacher Cure poked her head into the room, her expression thunderous.
"WHY DIDN'T ANY OF YOU TELL ME THAT RICHARD'S AWAKE?!"
"Huh? He was already awake when I came in. I thought you already gave him a checkup." Dad was staring at her blankly. Teacher Cure drew a deep breath and glared at Alicia and Harvey, both of whom quailed under her gaze.
"I…I forgot. Sorry, Teacher Cure."
"Sorry! I was so excited that I ended up talking too much to the vice-prez instead of calling you!"
Shaking her head in disbelief, Teacher Cure sighed and gestured for everyone to leave the room for a few minutes.
"Okay, everyone…out for now! Let me conduct a checkup on the patient!"