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Chapter 344 Retribution

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"..."

/Silence…/

As Dale looked down, reality began to shift.

The world seemed to slow down, the wind stopped blowing, the sky darkened, and the earth rumbled with his heartbeat…

On the cold hard ground, lying atop a flimsy mattress, those he shared blood with, family, were now motionless, unresponsive.

Then, as quickly as that came, the world was tainted red as something indescribable, a primal form of rage and anger began to consume him, driving him to the edge of his sanity.

Dale found difficulty seeing anything other than rage as chaotic thoughts crept into his mind, one twitch at a time as his fingers contracted constantly.

It was as if he had developed Parkinson\'s.

/Inhale…/

However, only a step away from being consumed by his wrath, Dale felt the weak but continuous breaths of his parents.

They were alive, breathing weakly on the ground.

With this realization, light shone at the corners of his mind and Dale recovered from his stupor, coming to sense with reality.

This wasn\'t the place to grow emotional, at least not his.

As long as they were okay, there was little to mourn, his house may be in shambles, but a house could always be rebuilt, but the dead could not be pulled back from its embrace.

Calming down, he took a look around, the first thing he realized being that Roger stood on the side, looking at the horizon, a way for him to give him some privacy...

And in a way, from the angle he stood towards Dale, it was as if he was ready to get a punch in the face… Which, in truth, was likely what he would\'ve done were it not for Sarferato\'s classes on managing his emotions.

Either way, he took another deep and long breath before crouching down next to his father, the man he respected so very much, and his mother, who used to play with him every day when he was younger.

He didn\'t know why so many memories decided to unlodge themselves from the corners of his mind, but he did not mind, he welcomed them, even the bad ones.

With a quick glance, Dale noticed, to his utmost relief that they were uninjured, and apart from some dirt here and there, they could easily pass as just being asleep, which he so desperately desired to be the case.

But he knew things wouldn\'t be so simple.

He stood up from the ground, shaking slightly before taking another glance at the crying people around him before turning to Roger, saying:

"... What happened?"

His voice was heavy, but it was not one of desperation or anger. Dale was still in control of his own actions and thoughts...

For now.

There was no way to know when anger and wrath would take hold of his actions.

People have committed crimes for simpler reasons than such atrocity.

"... It was a terrorist attack, at least that\'s what the press will say." He replied as he turned back to face Dale

Roger seemed to want to say something but couldn\'t quite pull the words to do it.

Not that he didn\'t know what to say, he just didn\'t know how to say it in a way that wouldn\'t quite make the man in front of him lose his hard-earned calmness.

But after hesitating for a single moment, Roger decided to be blunt about it and say how he trully felt.

"I\'m…"

"Don\'t... Not now. Just... Tell me everything, I\'ve already calmed down."

"I need to know what happened." Dale said slowly as he kept his sight firmly on Roger\'s eyes

Being angry at Roger would bring him nothing aside from a sickly sense of self-satisfaction, which, albeit necessary for one to keep their sanity, would do nothing to mend the situation at hand.

He could punch Roger for failing with his promises later.

"... Do you remember the people that attacked you a few weeks ago?" Roger asked as he moved his hands to his pockets

"How can I forget? There\'s still construction going to repair what happened just a street away… There was at least, it\'s all in vain now." Dale replied with some melancholy

All of the reconstruction signs were now buried in rubble, a grim sight to behold.

"Are they related? The same people mayhaps?"

"No, not quite… The people that attacked you are... International mercenaries, naturalized in Russia, they usually take on illegal assignments, mostly related to this side of the world."

"Assassination, espionage, sabotage, and so on, not much different from what traditional mercenaries do in these modern times."

"And of course, kidnappings too."

"..."

That in itself already painted Dale a picture of what happened to him. However, for him to come to a close regarding that incident, he still had one person left to ask and converse with.

The Assassin girl he met inside Babylon, a member of the same organization.

From her words, actions, and expressions, it seemed she belonged to another faction within the Organization, nonetheless, it would be foolish to believe her based solely on that.

Either way, now was not the time to discuss such things.

"Still... They\'ve got nothing to do with what happened here today, they\'re just a product of necessity, there\'s nothing to be gained in blaming them for this, not that I\'m defending them." Roger clarified as he closed his eyes for a moment

"We should focus on their contractor instead."

"That much I am aware, to me, whatever happened that day has already been settled, nothing will change if I go after their leaders."

"But I haven\'t forgiven them, just because they were being commissioned, it changes little, they still possess the same guilt. And I will go after them to clear this debt one day." Dale said as he crossed his arms

"I agree, you should show them their place, someone should." Roger said as he pulled a cigar from his chest pocket

/Lit…/

"Huff…"

"But first... Can we even talk about such a thing here?" Dale asked as he looked around momentarily

Although it seemed no one was really interested in them, there was still the fact they were amidst dozens of civilians.

"Do you think that matters now? You say that because you\'re unaware of what\'s happening on the internet right now."

"... Was it all recorded?" Dale asked as his expression grew heavy, disbelief in his tone as blood drained from his face

He could already imagine, videos spreading on the internet and chaos springing due to doubt and confusion.

He expected this matter to be shelved of course, but if the government was unable to solve this peacefully... Then they would do it forcibly.

Ordinary people had no idea of what was going on, and to the modern man and women who have grown accustomed to peace and modernity, they had no qualms demanding truth.

People would begin to disappear in no time at all, leading the world further into a spiraling disaster.

It would happen eventually of course, but now was not the time.

"Recorded... From a few dozen different angles…" Roger mumbled as he took a poof of his cigar

"Phew… Whenever such a thing happens, it\'s always a pain to resolve it."

"It\'s not easy to take things off the web."

"Now… For the people who contracted these fuckers…"

"They\'re known as the "Perch", the people who wait for the \'new world\' to come."

"They began appearing sometime before the second Generation debuted and ever since then, they\'ve been causing trouble everywhere."

"Everything I mentioned above and much more, they\'re extreme religious fanatics that follow a strange and highly erratic set of rules… Information about them is scarce too since they operate in rings, each independent from each other."

"They do not seem to worship a God but more of an idea in itself, believing they can achieve or bring salvation upon others by preparing for the inevitable downfall of the Era, further details are sporadic and highly questionable."

"The only ones that know more about the real Church are the \'Ring Cardinals\', but they\'re more like relayers than actual leaders. They merely transfer the main Church\'s wishes to the followers linked to their respective rings."

"I left more about them on the document Mei sent to your Pod, but for clarification, we believe this is an operation led by the Russian rings of the Church."

"And their target…"

"You don\'t need to say it, I can understand the gist of it." Dale interrupted as he reached for his head

It wasn\'t hard to imagine, an operation in the makings for months, they probably decided to proceed with it after Dale\'s victory as the number 1 in the Arena, climbing high atop all challengers, representatives of major powers around the globe.

That was the moment he shone the brightest, the moment all noticed his existence.

Not only them but dozens of people likely have ideas about him as well.

The problem was that there was no way to figure out Dale\'s and Roger\'s rodeo to South America, as such, despite their preparations, on the very same day they acted, their target left somewhere else.

So to some degree, Roger can be happy that there are no spies on his side… Or can he?

Why target anyone but himself? Dale couldn\'t quite understand their reasons... Shouldn\'t there be penalties for them to act in broad daylight?

Medling with the ordinary world before the promised time... Did they have a way to avoid it? Or were they playing with its ambiguousness?

… This is where it gets confusing.

How can both teams avoid each other so perfectly?

There is no way to explain it unless there is a leak of information. But if that was the case… Why attack his home of all places?

Did they think of using his family as leverage against him?

Did they mistake Dale for his brother? Which would be amusing, but the thought itself gave Dale no pleasure.

Or maybe… Assuming that he was the target was wrong from the beginning?

What if his brother was the target all along?

"Still… Something is missing here."

"Why would they want to attack me? I don\'t remember ever making any enemies… Aside from the players I killed back in Azimuth, still, the chances of any of them having realized my identity and plotted some overused revenge plot would be…"

"Minimal." Roger interjected as he took one last puff of his cigar

"But now zero." He added as he extinguished it against a rock on the side before putting the cigar in a small metal box

"Then why? What value does a bring dead? Am I a treat alive? But I don\'t see myself as being worse than whatever hides in the shadows already."

"... This entire operation is likely very confusing if looked at from your perspective, but it\'s not as messy when you see it from their perspective, given what we know."

"Aside from everything we discussed before about the Generations, and the fact capturing and manipulating one of the candidates that\'ll possibly instigate the next change, the Perch is known for having an unusually precise divining ability."

"Divining? Like in predicting future events by reading stars, breaking tortoise shells, and whatnot?"

"How they do it is a mystery to us but yes, something like that I\'m afraid. The world is vast and weird, it is not too unlikely to imagine someone can predict events based on certain parameters and conditions."

"To strengthen this theory, they have been seen moving and dispersing their forces whenever big events were about to happen, as seen by how they appeared and began to spread their influence moments before the Second Generation appeared in the world."

"The other possibility is that they have one of the most advanced information networks on the planet, allowing them to move with extreme precision at the same pace as large countries and private corporations, sometimes even causing disputes internally due to the fear of spies and leakage..."

"But even after a few decades, no one has taken even a slight glimpse at it, so I find it hard to believe it does exist at all."

"What likely happened is that they did foresee something related to you, maybe our entire trip was within their calculations from the beginning."

"Together with information from spies and informants, they prepared this operation with the sole goal of targeting your family when you weren\'t there to resist, likely because they saw something in them that made them worthy of their concern."

"The destruction you see is enough proof of that… There were a total of thirty highly trained agents scattered around your home at all times to ensure their safety, but even so, this destruction came to be."

"Your parents and many around us were affected by the aftermath of the chaos, your family and some others were particularly affected by a strange power I\'m not acquainted with, inducing a Coma in them."

"It doesn\'t look harmful, but it\'s hard to say if that\'ll be the case... Maybe this was their goal from the beginning."

"They did not hold back in their deployment, they were aware of what they had to do and in what order to ensure the maximum effect… They had foreseen resistance or at the very least expected it."

"You can be sure that they\'ll all receive proper medical care, not the ordinary kind mind you, this isn\'t something modern medicine will solve."

"Mei will be in contact to update you on everything regarding that... Though we can leave such discussions for another time."

"... Thank you." Dale said deeply as he took a deep breath

"..."

Roger\'s eyes opened slightly for a moment in surprise, but the moment he was about to respond, Dale interjected, saying:

"Were it not for you and your people, things would\'ve been many times worse… And above all, I would\'ve been unable to give these people the treatment they deserve."

"But... This, together with everything else... We can leave them for later, and I\'ll thank your people all personally as well."

"I\'m not a Hero, but I understand that I\'m responsible for what happened here today to some degree, so I\'ll take it and work alongside it."

"One thing is to attack me for their goals, another is including civilians in the bloodshed."

"If they\'re unwilling to treat people as people, I see no reason to treat them like it either."

Dale tightened his grip as he held the edges of his shirt while Roger smiled slightly, understanding what he implied.

"Let\'s get to work."

His eyes gleaned in faint purple light as blue and red whisps sparked across his skin.

It was time for retribution.

…

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