Erica subconsciously gave a sweet, ingratiating smile, like a child facing their patriarch after getting into trouble: "God!"
Azathoth studied her in the rearview mirror. They'd noticed something was amiss the night before, when Erica hadn't texted Hugo. It took Azathoth only five minutes to realize the girl wasn't in any unmanageable danger, nor did he panic over the unexpected situation. Torn between rescuing the person and protecting Erica's pride, Azathoth consulted Igor.
Igor didn't have any ideas. As an all-round player with excellent character and academic performance who never caused trouble for the teacher, he had never experienced the embarrassment of having his parents called to the school.
Wendy, who was questioned later, had no idea what had happened. She shuddered at Azathoth's question, "I probably wouldn't want my family to know." She carefully observed Azathoth's expression, still refusing to let her guard down in front of him. "If I can help it, I don't want to cause trouble for my brother."
A hypocritical minor.
Garcia scoffed at this and said that if he or she had a child who did this in the future, he or she would break his or her legs after finding out the truth.
However, since he was an older single young man, no one took the doctor's words seriously.
Erica was able to get five hours of free time, as if she had survived a disaster... although she was caught by her parents in the end.
It is so sad that anyone who hears it will cry.
Hugo curled up in the back seat of the hovercar and sighed, "I should have been more cautious." His red eyes were filled with resentment. "The Red Line Legion's internal forum is closed to the public. I hacked into their administrator's account last time, and this time their technicians have learned their lesson and are using the internal network directly and encrypting the URL, making it much more difficult to sneak in unnoticed."
Azathoth: "So you failed in your attempt?"
"No! Failure!" Hugo's grip on his calf tightened, and he protested loudly as if insulted. "If I brute-force this, this forum will be like my backyard, accessible to anyone I want!"
Azathoth wasn't accusing, he was just being factual: "You didn't know Erica was with a member of the Red Line Legion until the news release this morning."
Hugo: “…”
It dragged this ugly, dark historical image into the Recycle Bin, tucked its disheveled black head into the collar of its oversized sweater, and muttered, "I don't want to talk to people who can't program... not even God."
Erica gave Wendy, who was observing her cautiously, an awkward but polite smile.
Although she is not yet ten years old, considering that Wendy was locked up for five years without contact with the outside world, it remains to be seen which of them has a higher mental age.
While the two girls who met for the first time were tentatively communicating with each other, Azathoth stretched his legs in the spacious co-pilot seat. With this ordinary action of his, an undercurrent suddenly rolled up in the deep sea hundreds of kilometers away.
Despite its extensive development, the capital planet still retains many of its ancient cultural and natural wonders. It is a city of unimaginable size, a political and cultural center condensed with the efforts of countless people over the centuries. More importantly, it boasts a moderate temperature, a stable atmosphere, and only one natural satellite orbiting the planet, only slightly closer to Earth than the once aquamarine planet.
Perhaps when humans first visited many years ago, they also shed tears at this familiar sight.
But similarity never means the same.
Azathoth had never taken geography classes, but he could understand the difference through his simple, step-by-step measurements. If he wanted, he could be on a snowy mountaintop, in a sparsely populated cave, in a desolate desert, or in the deep sea, teeming with fish of all shapes and sizes. And at this very moment, a figure was stepping out of the sea, facing the rising sun somewhere, its slender, pale form wrapped in a black robe like crow feathers.
There were thick dark clouds above his head, with only a little light coming through the gaps on the horizon.
Under his feet was a slowly flowing crimson slurry, carrying a heat that could burn everything, submerging the withered weeds and the reefs that had been beaten into a thick black by the tide.
In front of Azathoth was an erupting volcano.
The crater that was spewing out Mars seemed to be setting off fireworks, and the dazzling light streaked bright lines under the dark clouds like a meteor shower. Those Martian elves jumped and rolled down the cliff, looking agile and wild, but without the slightest malice to destroy everything.
Many years later, this deserted island will be prosperous again.
Life and death are intertwined, brewing little by little at the feet of Azathoth, deep in the magma.
He would be unhappy if the bath water was a little hotter, and he could just as easily hang out in this hellish scene.
If only I could bring Igor to see this scene.
I feel a little regretful.
He sat down in the crater, cupping a handful of lava in his hands like a child rolling a thermometer's mercury ball, carefully watching it spill through his fingers. The ocean in the distance seemed calm, unperturbed by the earthquake. Gazing further out, the rising sun faded beneath heavy, dark clouds, sparingly casting a few faint rays that cast a shadow of holy light on the sea, fragmenting the darkness into inconsequential fragments like a curtain. Azathoth's vision was blurred by the mist rising from the sea. The smell of volcanic ash was unpleasant, but without his followers by his side, his perception of his surroundings grew dull.
The grandeur, tragedy and beauty of nature left deep and shallow marks in his eyes, but could not shake his mood in the slightest.
After an unknown amount of time, when even the eruption of the crater seemed to be weak, Azathoth walked onto the deserted beach and stepped into the steaming sea water.
The sea was reflected in the depths of his dark eyes.
This young man, with a look of decadent and desolate beauty, walked down the beach step by step. Gradually, his feet beneath the sea level transformed into slippery, dark tentacles. From his black robe, swirling, entwined, and warbly creatures emerged. Only his expressionless, beautiful face remained the same. Then, Azathoth adjusted his hood, and the last trace of his humanity vanished.
He completely turned into an indescribable monster - under the dark clouds, in the light of the rising stars, in the rolling magma, slowly sinking to the depths of the ocean.
**
Gresham gave Margarita an awkward salute.
He looked less like an official and more like a rugged mercenary. He was wearing an ill-fitting suit, and to Margarita, he looked like a brown bear wrapped in human clothing. He was holding a half-eaten apple and approached her with a familiar air: "Hey, Rita, do you have any inside information?"
Margarita rolled her eyes, her beautifully shaped legs draped over the table, her high-heeled feet slightly raised: "No."
Gresham rolled his eyes and said flatteringly, "I didn't mean to put it in the paper this morning."
"Do you know how much trouble it will take to deal with the aftermath? The federal capital isn't your home."
"I know, I know." Gresham raised his hands. "But what can I do? It's all the fault of those kidnappers. They were so smug about revealing their cards when they were causing trouble. Now the whole world knows that there's a group trying to cause trouble for us during the celebration. The Zerg diplomats must be so happy."
Margarita smiled and said, "Be careful. Their royal mimicry abilities are so strong that even if they were standing right in front of you, you wouldn't be able to tell they weren't human."
"…They are in the capital now?"
"What else?" Margarita rolled her eyes again. "They've already arrived. They live next door to Fort Maan. There's an extra regiment of troops protecting the Archon."
Gresham sighed, pulled out a stool and sat down opposite Margarita: "Then why did they transfer us back?"
“Make sure it’s safe.”
"What?"
"Wendy Sullivan's gone. Viscount Joyce, our head of mecha R&D, is still in the hospital. Little Saint Anne is in a trance. This research institute is now leaderless. The holy relic kept by Bishop Gilbert slipped away right under his and Antonio's noses... Isn't that enough? The federal government doesn't even want to help us clean up this mess."
Gresham frowned. "I thought we were on the same side as the Federation?"
Margarita shrugged. “How united can you expect a group of politicians to be when there’s no external enemy?”
The burly man sighed and muttered, "None of this is my business. Just tell me what I need to do."
Margarita didn't answer him, but instead asked, "How does it feel to be alone with a little Omega for five or six hours?"
"Hey! She's not even ten yet!"
"Of course I know. I'm asking you what you think of her as a person."
"Isn't she a friend of little Saint Anne? I thought you had checked."
Margarita drummed her fingers on the table. "We did check, and Anne vouched for her friend...but she had a fight with Langman Griffin's kid. You know what Langman is like. I've asked him several times, but he won't tell me why he gave up on revenge against that girl."
"Well, what did he say?"
"Contribute to the future of the flowers of the Federation." Margarita imitated Langman perfectly, flashing the Griffin family head's signature fake smile. "How dare that scumbag say such things? But that girl named Erica is indeed very talented. It was right to send her to the capital. The educational resources in Port Alple are burying her."
"Huh?" Gresham asked in surprise, "Such a high evaluation?"
Margarita: "Her teacher and I were college classmates. We talked about it once at a party... This child is a true genius."
"Omega." Gresham muttered in awe for some reason.
"Omega." Margarita nodded in agreement. The two Alphas looked at each other and changed the subject with a sympathetic look.
"If possible, you should keep an eye on Erica," Margarita added before the conversation ended. "She's still a child, but her adoptive father is quite famous."
"who?"
"Ford Hill. A shrewd commentator."
"Oh." Gresham rubbed his big head with a headache, "I hate this job."
"We suspect he may have received some bad information in Port Alpre," Margarita suggested, "or he may have come into contact with some people."
Gresham didn't ask her how she came to that conclusion.
"I'll investigate." He saluted Margarita again, carefully lowered his head in front of the door frame to avoid hitting his forehead, and then strode out of the institute.
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