The doting father was called Elios Linden, a cold and reclusive man who controlled the largest technology company group in the world by 2050. It was always hard to read his expression and guess what he was thinking. However, behold, his pair of purple eyes would gleam brightly whenever they looked at his children.
Before he founded a technology company group, RMI, and controlled the world in a way, Elios Linden was Alaric Rhionen. He was the most feared assassin responsible for so many mysterious deaths of prominent figures in the world.
Rhionen Assassins was the most reclusive assassin organization for decades that only special people knew of its existence. They were highly efficient and could get the job done fast and without a trace.
Why did he work as an assassin?
It was because he enjoyed killing. He used to hate humans. Not just hate, he wanted to kill many people who didn't deserve to live.
According to him, the world was already overpopulated, and not all people walking the earth now brought any benefit to mother nature. Some just wasted oxygen with their stupidity. Some destroyed nature and destroyed civilization with their evil deeds. And, so many people were burdens to society for being too weak.
In his book was his life principle, "Only the good, the strong, and the intelligent should live."
His hatred of humans was not without cause. He was born at the end of World War II in a small town in Romania. His mother was trapped in a city attack while she was heavily pregnant and had to give birth under the rubble of a hospital bombed by the Allied forces.
His mother died from the attack after giving birth to him, and he was forced to live from one orphanage to another. By the time he was 10, he had to take care of himself by living on the streets.
He blamed the war-loving humans for his mother's death. She was the only family he knew, and he loved her so much. He harbored that hatred for decades and then went on to become an assassin to accumulate his wealth and connection.
Ah ... what was another life to him?
Only a few people were worthy of living in this world, he thought.
He became the world's most feared killer for hire, along with his group Rhionen Assassin. His men came and went, but he was always there.
For the first hundred years of his life, he did not know that he was an immortal. He thought he was a freak, a victim of human experimentation under Hitler, that he was born with a genetic mutation that made his face and appearance did not change for decades. By the time he was 40, he still looked like he was 25.
His 60th... 90th birthday came... he still looked like he was 25.
He was freaked out by himself and thought he was the only one with this condition.
He changed his identity several times to dispel people's suspicion. Sometimes, he would just wear a leather mask to cover his face, claiming that his face was disfigured so badly, so ordinary people were not suspicious of seeing him never age.
He used to think he was a freak, a monster who had to hide his true self behind his mask and various secret identities until finally, he met her.
She was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen. When she came, she turned his world upside down.
And that woman ... turned out to be an immortal too, just like him. And later, he found out there was a bunch of other people like them. They were part of the immortal clan who lived among regular humans. He was no longer the freak, and he was not alone anymore.
This woman loved him unconditionally and relentlessly, and for the first time, made him feel like he had a family.
"Father .. tell me when you first met mother ..." Vega asked Elios Linden with her cute voice. She and her father were sitting together on their mansion's third-floor terrace, watching the sunset.
"I have told you the story countless times. Aren't you bored with it by now?" Elios Linden asked with a smile. Outsiders were seldom granted with such a gift from this cold man. His smile almost exclusively belonged to his family.
"No ..." Vega exclaimed happily. "I really like listening to stories about Father and Mother's love. Someday, I hope that I will find a man who will love me as deeply as you to mom ..."
Elios frowned, "Vega honey, you are still too young to even think about love. Wait until you are at least one hundred years old. How old are you now? 16 years old? You still have 84 years to explore the world, experience many things, and enjoy life to the fullest..."
Vega laughed at her father's words, which she thought were cute. She knew he often joked about letting her live on a high tower until she was a century-old before letting her meet any boys.
Rapunzel much, Father?
Indeed, as immortals who could live young forever, their people usually took their sweet time to fall in love and get married. Many clan members would be in a relationship for decades or centuries before they decided to tie the knot. Even fewer would think about having kids.
Her father married her mother when he was 94 years old. Her grandfather married her grandmother when he was already 438 years old ... Before he met her, he was never in love.
Her great-uncle was one of the clan's most eligible bachelors at almost 250 years old.
"But you married my mother when she was only 20. That is ... four years older than I am now," Vega insisted.
Elios Linden coughed when he heard his daughter's enthusiastic words.
"Your mother ... is weird. Don't follow in your mother's footsteps," he said, shaking his head. "She chased after me and was so relentless in her pursuit that I was unable to get rid of her. I don't want to see my daughter chasing a man. You should wait until your hundredth birthday before thinking about dating. And later, if that time finally comes, he must face me first."
Actually, Elios Linden was not serious about what he said. He loved his wife with all his heart and was grateful that the aggressive girl was so determined to pursue him. Otherwise, he would forever think he was destined to live his immortal life alone and never knew who he actually was.
It was true that his wife was indeed weird. He just happened to save the girl from human trafficking criminals when she was twelve years old.
It turned out that the experience was engraved in her heart that, eight years later, she became obsessed with wanting to meet again with her savior and make him marry her.
At that time, Elios Linden never showed her his face. He hid behind a leather mask and reasoned that his face was badly disfigured because of a brutal attack from the enemy. But that woman was really stubborn and would never heed his rejection.
She accepted Elios as he was, even though the man insisted that he was extremely ugly. They finally married without the woman ever seeing his face.
Until now, the perfect woman was still his wife, and they were very happy together. She had given him beautiful children who opened his heart with compassion and changed his life.
Vega was the only daughter and was also his favorite child. Whenever Elios Linden saw her beautiful eyes, he would feel that there was still hope for the world.
He was slowly feeling guilty for killing so many people in the past, from his assassin days and after he founded his AI company.
He began to think a lot about his wife's words when she advised him to move on and forgive the past, to finally let go of his mother's death.
"Your mother died from the war waged by Hitler, but you founded an AI-technology company to control human life and determine who has the right to live and who has to die ... doesn't that make you no different from Hitler?"
Elios Linden admitted that she was right. His hatred for war had turned him into a monster who was no better than Hitler. That's when he vowed to turn over a new leaf. He withdrew from his business and focused his attention on his family. He was no longer crazy about controlling the world.
Now, sitting on their mansion's third-floor terrace while watching the sunset and chatted with his children was enough to make him content.
.
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From the Author:
Thank you for reading this book. If you come here from "The Alchemists", welcome! And hope you had a nice journey with my first novel. It serves as the prequel to this novel and if you read it, you will immediately recognize some people and some scenes.
If you found this book and haven't read "The Alchemists", fret not. This is a standalone book and you will have no problems following the storyline. You will meet so many lovable characters here and be immersed in their stories.
This book has face slappings, fluffy romance, and family-oriented plot, but also some angst because the book covers revenge and redemption. Can bad people turn good? Will kindness really defeat evil? Can you forgive people who had hurt you so badly that you want to destroy the world just to make them pay?