noveltune Chapter 78: Now that I think about it, what happened to my would-be kidnappers?
Chapter 78: Now that I think about it, what happened to my would-be kidnappers?
"Out of everything that you said, I don't understand only one thing," Claire claimed as she moved her head off from my shoulder and laid down across the sofa while resting her head down on my lap. And as she looked up, right to my face, she asked, "If you despise the idea of calling your uncle so much, why did you bring him up to begin with?"
Looking down, I couldn't help myself but bring my hand up to Claire's head and then brush my fingers through her soft, brown hair. An action that instantly put a small smile on the girl's face as she lowered her eyelids and purred in comfort.
"You see, it's what my uncle did that I hate, not my uncle himself. And by now, I'm mature enough to admit that while what he did was shitty, it was still a valuable lesson I learned."
Claire leaned her head slightly to the side, as if not sure whether to enjoy the head-patting or to put an emphasis on how little sense my words made to her.
"What do you mean by that?" she ultimately went with asking the question, only to instantly close her eyes down and go right back to enjoying the slight caress.
"My uncle used me in his conflict with my father. So wouldn't it be only fitting for me to use him back?"
As much as I disliked answering a question with a question on my own... given the more rhetorical nature of my response, I could still somehow squeeze those words out of my throat.
"Wait, what?!" Claire nearly jumped up from my lap, only for her relaxed body to twitch... and then fall right back onto my thighs as she ended up being too relaxed to take any decisive actions. "You would be willing to give up on all those things that you stuck to for so long just to slap the face of some stupid bitch?!"
Claire's face painted with disbelief, holy fury, anger, and all sorts of other high-octane emotions.
A mix of expressions that I responded to by just... smiling.
After figuring out the current extent of my abilities and just what kind of insane inventions I could bring to the cultivation side of the world, I pretty much had no other choice but to accept all the risks and responsibilities that would come with it.
In that perspective, the kidnapping attempt...
It was merely the beginning, a foreshadowing of how my life was likely to look like in the future rather than just an off-case of someone who stumbled upon my stream, managed to find out who I was, and then made a move to secure my abilities for themselves.
But then again, wasn't this the fate of all those who made it big? And that thing was one of the few I was quite sure about - I was going to make it big in this broken and nonsensical world!
"Wait, now that I think about it, I never asked about what happened to the guys who tried to kidnap me," I realized and nigh instantly voiced this doubt-slash-curiosity. "Are they all dead, or...?"
Even though, in theory, I wasn't changing the topic... In reality, there wasn't much else to discuss.
Claire already made her mind clear - she didn't want me acting high-key, all in a bid to keep me a hidden card of her clan rather than a high-profile member of it. And given how I was all for this kind of approach myself, what else was there for us to discuss?
"We are holding them in one of the black sites of the clan," Claire replied without even a shred of hesitation as if she was talking about what she had for yesterday's dinner rather than a very likely highly illegal solution to equally as illegal problem.
"Why do you ask, though?" she asked herself, throwing her right hand behind my neck only to lock it on her left before hanging her entire body back as she stared right into my face.
"It started as just a curiosity when I realized I know pretty much nothing about what happened back then, especially after I collapsed," I admitted before putting a wide grin on my face. "But now, your tickling of the info only made my curiosity grow!"