1102 Infiltration
Using his powers simultaneously, Varian didn't have much of a problem remaining hidden from the guards.
However powerful the Drug Lord himself might be, the guards were at best high awakeners, level 9s, and a handful of Sovereigns.
While that itself was alarming enough, Varian found himself advancing with ease.
The palace complex was huge, coated with precious metals like gold and platinum. Even the tiles on the floor were precious enough that a family could live off a year by selling a tile. It didn't feel like the residence of a Drug Lord at the first glance.
But try however one might act as something they're not, their true self would still slip out from time to time.
For Varian, the thing that stood out the most in this palace was the staggering amount of 'hunt'.
All the curtains, however mesmerizing and colorful, seemed to be made from the skins of wild beasts. There were many weapons hanging on the wall—all made from the horns and spines of monsters. There were numerous heads of beasts, some he knew but most he didn't, displayed on the wall as prized hunts.
It was well and good until Varian encountered the first humanoid head hanging on the well. It was a cat man's head. Then a unicorn woman's. A four-armed race. A serpent race.
And…
Varian paused in his place abruptly and scanned all the hunts he had seen once. His face contorted in disgust as he realized the truth.
Half the curtains were from the skin of beasts, the other half were from the skin of people. Same for the weapons forged from bones as well as the hanging heads.
'A sick man indeed.'
Varian didn't feel any fear. If anything, compared to that absolute monster of a woman, this guy felt like child's play.
Thinking back to his encounter with her, a jolt of fear shot up his spine. Carefully, he craned his neck and looked around.
He knew it wasn't true, but his body was scared that she was right behind him, her hand about to pass through his back and grab his heart.
'I need to beat her black and blue or this trauma won't go.' Varian used his water power to dry up his shirt which was now drenched in sweat.
Nothing he ever experienced could compare to the helplessness he felt in front of her.
She didn't even lift a finger. But his body froze up, his power stopped working and he started to die. Varian rubbed his hands and confirmed his next target.
The palace was divided into three sections:
The Compound, the outer part where the drugs were sold.
The Quarters, the inner part where the important members of the drug gang resided.
The Tempe, the core part where the drugs were stored and where the Drug Lord lived.
The guard he's disguised as could only enter the Quarters. Only someone living in the Quarters could enter the Temple for meetings and to bring out the drugs. All of them happened to be celestial rankers.
The treasure he wanted, the Water Of Life, should be in the treasury with the drugs.
After extracting the useful information from the brains of some Sovereign guards, Varian fabricated a fake memory in their minds and left the complex.
But before he did, he added a special drug he brought from the market into the latest wine collection that's about to be delivered to the Quarters.
'Poison against poison. Diamond against diamond. Drug against the drug. Heh.'
— — — —
"Tristan? What happened?" Inside the Temple, Drug Lord Hex exhaled a long smoke and asked.
Tristan, a middle-aged three-eyed man, squinted his third eye in the direction of Varian before shaking his head. "Must be my illusion. It felt like someone was using mental power here."
"There's no one else here. You are the only three-eyed in this city." Hex injected the crystalline drug powder into his arm and his body began to relax.
What Hex implied was that if any other race did use mind power, they wouldn't be able to hide from the three-eyed. These people had a notorious reputation for their extraordinary mind powers, even more so when they reached the Celestial rank.
"I guess." Tristan nodded and said. "The scientist we commissioned the modification of the drugs with, disappeared. There are no clues as to where he went. It's almost as if he vanished, right then and there. There are no signs of fighting, no trace of his aura, not even a trace of his blood—he vanished."
"He's killed. Killed very expertly." Hex's face, no, the face mask he was wearing began to come off and his true, wrinkled face, slowly revealed itself.
Tristan's three eyes shook at the sight and looked away.
Hex adjusted his skin mask back and Tristan turned back to him again. "Why killed? I can't find a trace of powers there. It's all empty. Maybe he just escaped."
"You don't know that old fool, do you?"
"No, only five years since I joined here."
"That mad old man experimented on his own wife and children until they died. He likes what he does. For him, this slum is a paradise with unlimited humanoid livestock. He won't leave this place even if you threaten to kill him."
"…" Tristan's eyes flashed with disgust and it showed on his face.
"Ah, come one. None of us are clean here, yeah?" Hex said in a mock tone. "You killed your own master because he tried to rape your wife and fled every damn area because of the bounty on your head.
But guess what? Your wife already remarried and your kids are calling some other guy their dad. Sometimes, maybe all times, wife and kids are just not worth it. They're a stupid burden."
"I don't think you'll ever understand, boss, what it feels like to have a family." Tristan shook his head.
"Hahahahaha! A family? I have my siblings with me. They're more than enough. We don't need any outsiders." Hex laughed.
Tristan shook his head and walked out with a large box of drugs.
As he's about to exit, Hex said. "About that mad man, bring all the subjects he was experimenting with. They might know something."
