BXBX NOVEL Chapter 62: Deal
Chapter 62: Deal
"If you want to live, then you'll have to answer a few questions."
"What questions do I need to answer?"
"I don't know. Someone else will be asking you the questions."
Another adapter appeared in front of the winery as the warlock spoke.
As soon as Shae caught sight of the new arrival, she immediately exclaimed, "Adam!?"
"Yes, it's me."
"Why are you doing this, you son of a bitch!?"
Shae immediately became extremely worked up at the sight of Adam. In fact, she was so furious that she had forgotten the perilous situation that she was in.
"Are you a psychic mutant? You're going to kill me just because we had some minor run-ins at school? You killed Afu!"
"I wasn't the one who killed Afu. In fact, if it isn't for me, you would already be dead by now."
According to the resistance army's original plan, Shae's entire family had to be wiped out. In fact, the plan was to kill the entire family in one place all at once to avoid suspicion.
It was Adam who had asked Cowboy to spare Shae's life.
"Back at the academy, I wanted to ask you some questions, but you refused. Now, I'm going to get the answers that I want." Adam only gave a brief explanation before asking the question that had been weighing on his mind for a long time. "Do you know that you're adopted?"
"I'm adopted? What the hell are you saying?" Shae asked as an enraged and suspicious look appeared on her face. "Is this supposed to be some type of joke?"
"It's not. Did you really not know that?"
"Of course not! What proof do you have that I'm adopted?"
Even though Shae proclaimed that she didn't believe Adam, she wasn't an idiot, and she knew that there was no way that Adam would've gone to such great lengths to capture her just to play a prank on her.
"I know you're adopted because we share the same bloodline."
"Who?"
"What I'm saying is, according to DNA tests, you are my biological sister."
Adam was looking intently into Shae's eyes as he spoke, trying to gauge her reaction to determine exactly whose persona was inside her body.
In Adam's mind, there were most likely only two possible personas that Shae's body could be housing.
The first possible scenario was that Shae didn't know anything and had only been abducted to serve as the heir to the Kim Family.
The second possibility was that after being taken from the human farm, the persona of the former head of the Kim Family had been installed into her mind, which meant that everything she was doing right now was an act.
Both of these possibilities were equally as likely to be true as Shae still wasn't at the ideal age for a persona to be installed into her mind, and it was quite likely that the head of the Kim Family would've refrained from risking a premature persona installation. For the rich and powerful, it was always better to be safe than sorry, and they were certainly going to take every precaution to ensure their own welfare.
Of course, there was also another possibility...
However, after observing for a while, Adam concluded that Shae didn't seem to be faking her reaction.
"I'm your biological sister?" Shae was astonished. "That's bullshit!"
Adam was rather swayed by her reaction, but he then thought back to that elderly form that she would adopt in her transformation, and he still couldn't completely bring himself to trust her.
"If you can get the answers you want like this, then how is this different from a normal abduction?" the warlock harrumphed coldly. "Let me take over. Professional tasks should be left for professionals to handle. When it comes to interrogation, my track record is spotless. You want to know about her past, right? That's easy."
The warlock spread his hands apart as he spoke, and an array appeared in mid-air. Tiny feelers began to emerge from the array, then entered Shae's body directly through all of her orifices.
Immediately thereafter, it was as if a part of her psychic body had been extracted, and large streams of information flowed back into the array through the feelers. After that, a series of images were selected at the discretion of the warlock.
These images included memories of her childhood, the first time she saw her parents, playing with her childhood friends, arguments with her parents over the right of succession...
There were many snippets of memories where she was speaking with her family, but not once did she speak to them in the persona of the old man.
"It looks like no persona has been implanted into her mind yet," the warlock concluded.
"Are you sure?"
"Some people are good actors, but no one would constantly keep up an act even when they don't have to. Throughout all of these memories, she hasn't displayed traits characteristic of someone with an implanted persona on even a single occasion, and that's sufficient proof that she's not the old man. Having said that, there are some strange things about her."
The warlock pointed at the images hovering before him, and among them were many scenes depicting Shae taking medication.
She seemed to have suffered from chronic headaches ever since a young age, and the condition seemed to be incurable. The only thing that she could do was take painkillers to temporarily alleviate the pain. However, the condition also gave rise to her fiery personality. She had always had a very short fuse even as a child, and there were many scenes in her memories depicting her arguing with other people.
"She's nothing but trouble. We should kill her," the warlock said with a hint of disdain in his voice at the sight of these memories containing altercations. "I've heard a bit about your story. It's not like you have any emotional ties to her anyway, so just kill her and be done with it."
"Let's... not do that."
For someone like Adam, who had no family, the concept of family held special meaning in his heart, so even though he also detested Shae, he still couldn't bring himself to kill her.
"Even if we don't kill her, we can't let her go. She's only going to cause more trouble for us in the future..."
"Let's just keep her here for now and see what the others say."
After a brief discussion, the warlock set down Shae's psychic body, following which the two of them left the psychic world.
Following their departure, Shae slowly awakened. She had a vague sense of what had just transpired, and her anger was dampened, causing her fear to rear its ugly head once again.
She was just about to say something when Adam received a call from Cowboy on his communicator.
"We're done interrogating the girl's parents on our end. The second-in-command of our organization conducted the interrogation in person. Why don't you say hi?"
The image swiveled around to focus on a very strange-looking man. The man looked as if his facial muscles had completely necrosed. Not only was there not even a single ounce of expression on his face, his features were as stiff and devoid of life as those of a corpse.
He resembled a wax statue with a head of impeccably groomed and waxed hair, giving him an extremely unsettling appearance.
"Hello, Mr... Mr. Second-in-command," Adam greeted.
The second-in-command of the resistance army nodded in response.
"We've secured the information that you want."
He dragged a man over to him as he spoke, and the man was none other than Shae's father, Lincoln Kim.
"This man bought Shae Kim from the human farm, but he doesn't know the human farm's exact address. All he has is the contact information of a handler."
"Father? What's going on? What's this human farm?"
Shae was looking on from the side in astonishment, and Adam decided to let her watch this entire process.
Adam didn't want to kill her, but he was also worried that she would cause trouble if left alive, so it seemed that revealing the whole truth to her was a good option.
Even though the second-in-command resembled a wax statue, he seemed to be quite an intelligent man, and just a single glance at Adam's expression was enough for him to immediately understand Adam's intentions.
"You're probably not going to believe anything I say, so I'll let him tell you about it himself."
The second-in-command pushed Lincoln in front of the camera as he spoke, and Lincoln hesitated momentarily before finally folding under the pressure and revealing the truth.
"They're telling the truth. We bought you in order to extend my father's life. Back then, my father was suddenly struck down by a serious and incurable condition. At the time, he heard about personal installation technology, and in order to extend his own life, he tried to gather as much information on the subject as he could. Not long after that, we were contacted by someone."