63. Cognitive Intervention (Patreon)

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Instead of anger, Feng Shen showed amusement in his slight smile. It infuriated her not to be taken seriously because of her size. But when he spoke, she understood he wasn't mocking her or about to call her cute.

"There are two reasons I let him go first," Feng Shen said and looked at the regulars' army. "First, the regulars' leader, Mark Williams, claims to be a great genius. If that's true, I want the man who just threatened me to suffer." He frowned a little. "Well, their former leader."

Evelyn looked at the army. Her E-rank sight let her barely see a guy being grabbed in the distance.

"Anyway," Feng Shen continued, "the second reason is that my friend is part of that army, and I want to let her enjoy this middle boss as much as possible." His frown deepened. "She was part of that army."

Evelyn saw a girl following behind the grabbed guy, escorted by two others

Feng Shen turned back to Evelyn. "It looks like I made a bad decision, but honor demands I keep my word."

Evelyn considered the two reasons, even if they ended up being discarded so quickly. The first was probably just an excuse to hide his fear for Scott's team, and the latter was... silly.

Well, at least Feng Shen wasn't a mindless murderer. She had feared so when she saw him kill multiple elites who got in his way.

She extended her hand. "I'm Evelyn Kora Livingston."

If he recognized the name, he didn't show it. He shook her hand very awkwardly. Not a hand-shaker, it seemed.

"Feng Shen greets Evelyn Kora Livingston," she said.

"Family name Feng?" she asked.

He nodded. "How do you know? The friend I made in the tutorial thought Shen was my family name."

"You look Chinese, aren't speaking my language, and talk weird, so I assumed. You were visiting the US when the Alliance arrived?" She started walking toward her people.

= - = - =

Shen wasn't vising the US, but he had been ordered to keep the Eternal Empire a secret. Speaking of which, he realized he hadn't talked to Alicia about it.

He had been so filled with regret when he had met her that he asked for her forgiveness first. Then Mark had appeared, Alicia and Shen had checked the Arena, and he had forgotten about everything else.

Shen also had to talk to Mark Williams about it. He would have to look for the boy later, and he had a feeling theirs wouldn't be a pleasant chat.

"Yes, I was visiting," he said while following her.

"So, what are your hopes and ambitions for Earth's future?"

Shen was surprised by the heavy question but didn't let it show. "I want to visit my family's home then join the fight against the Void."

His clan was gone, and he didn't know whether it was still with the Immortal Emperor. He would check their ancestral home on Earth and decide whether to rebuild the clan or not from there.

After that, he would decide how to best join the Primordial Bridge, whatever it was, as his Emperor had asked of him.

He almost let her talk after that. Almost. He remembered he was supposed to find allies and that he was supposed to talk to people to get to know them. Not that he had ever learned to do so.

"How about you?" he asked. Speaking of which, he hadn't talked to Alicia about her plans either.

"Who knows," she said cryptically. "You know we're gonna be famous, right? All this power, we can do a lot of things with that."

"I see," Shen replied evasively.

Cultivator diplomacy was based on respect and reciprocation. The moment she brushed his question aside, she gave him the right to do the same. The direction their talk would take from there depended on whether either party would show new courtesy to the other.

Before Shen could decide if he was willing to do so, two people approached.

"Inspect," he whispered.

| Alexandra King (E) — 115 / 115

The girl was almost as tall as E-rank Shen. Her armor hid her physique, but the thing looked larger than most people's, so she should have some muscles. She held her helmet in her hand, letting him see her short black hair, dark eyes, and brown skin.

| Elam Carter (E) — 100 / 100

Impenetrable darkness filled the entirety of the boy's hood and revealed it was not a simple G-tier robe. It hid his face, and the rest of the robe also showed none of his body's features, except his narrow shoulders. He should be a thin boy. He was taller than Evelyn and shorter than Alexandra.

Alexandra smiled widely and offered her hand as she approached. "Feng Shen! A pleasure to finally meet you!"

Shen shook her hand. So strange to make yourself vulnerable to an attack like that. Like Evelyn, her handshake was firm.

"Feng Shen greets Alexandra King."

She ended the handshake and waved her hand. "None of that Alexandra business. I'm Sandra. This is Elam."

Elam only nodded to Shen. Shen cupped his hands in front of himself in return, no bow or nod. He merely returned the lack of respect he received.

"I practiced some karate as a child," Sandra said. "Not enough to do what you do, but enough to know you're awesome. Where did you learn to do something like that?"

"I come from a family of martial artists," he quickly made an excuse. He should've thought about a false background beforehand. "Why did you stop practicing?" he forced himself to ask. Networking didn't come easy to him, he realized.

Sandra snickered. "My mom thought it wasn't womanly enough. I showed her womanly after I went to live with my dad. I hit the gym all day, every day. You should've seen her face the first time I showed her this." She took a step back and mentioned to her body, then frowned. "Well, you can't see it, but boy am I thick. Anyway, martial artist family? That's hella cool. Are you from Asia? Evelyn said Chinese, but I bet Korean."

The only thing Shen knew from Korea was that Alicia liked their music, called K-pop. China was a slightly lesser mystery. She had said they were a world power, and their capital was Shanghai.

That decided it for Shen. He had to be born in a city.

"China, Shanghai. How about you?"

"Born and raised in Austin, Texas. I visited Mexico once; never left the country for anything else. So, are you evil?"

"Sorry?" What did she mean by that?

"I mean, would you kick a random dog on the streets? Or would you take it home and give it all your love?"

"Why would there be a random dog on the streets?" he asked back. Didn't these people care for their animals? How barbaric could these mortals be?

No, Shen stopped himself. He wasn't any better than then. He had as many flaws or more.

"Someone who makes the right questions, I see," Sandra said and nodded sagely. "Supposing there's a random dog in the street, what would you do, kick it or take it home?"

He gave it some thought. "I would likely ignore it and contact the relevant authorities when I had the time," Shen said, then added, "How about you?"

"Boring answer," Sandra said. "I have five mutts, all adopted straight from the streets."

Adopted? Were they sapient mutts? Alicia had said humans were the only sapient species on the planet.

"Now, the big question." She made a serious face. "Suppose I give you a million AP to kill Evelyn, would you do it?"

Shen's smile turned into a frown. "In the tutorial or outside?"

"Outside, obviously. Final death."

"I consider that mere question a disrespect," he said.

"C'mon, dude," Sandra said with a predatory smile. "Who're you trying to fool? I would kill her for one million AP, and she's my best friend. You barely know her."

To kill a friend for resources. How lower could someone go? How could Evelyn stand this silently and calmly?

He had thought better of those people because of Bob's presence, but he had been wrong. He wondered if Bob had changed too. Speaking of which, he had seen the boy here, but he was nowhere to be found now.

"This conversation is over," Shen proclaimed.

He was already searching for Bob when he saw Sandra's hand approach on the very corner of his vision. He moved his shoulder, and her hand missed.

Shen grasped his spear firmly, stepped back, and stared her down. "Keep your filthy hands to yourself, or you shall not keep them at all."

Sandra raised her hands in surrender. "Calm down, will you? I was just testing you. Evelyn can confirm."

Evelyn was nodding. "Yes. We wished to know—"

He cut her off. "You disrespected me; the reasons don't matter. I expect an apology."

If this was before he had met Alicia, he would've left already. But now, he understood their culture was different. He didn't know if disrespectfully testing people when you met them was acceptable, but until he could ask Alicia, he would have to assume it was—mainly because of the concept of friendly mocking.

An apology would do for now.

"Sorry, dude, jeez," Sandra said.

Shen nodded. "Apologies accepted."

"We don't know much about Chinese culture," Evelyn added. "Sorry. But we wanted to know if you want to join us. We're creating a group of ethical people. The movies were never very optimistic about what would happen if everyone gained superpowers, and we want to protect Earth."

Shen had never seen any movie, and Alicia hadn't told him the story of any. She had said he just had to watch The Godfather though. Apparently, he was a worse version of the main character—friendly mocking.

"Power corrupts," he said, understanding their wish.

Evelyn smiled. "Yes. So, wanna join?"

"I wouldn't mind hearing about your group." He liked that she was limiting it to ethical people, but her selective process was a bit lacking. He could've lied to get in. "Who are the leaders? What are their achievements? How shall you monitor undesirable power usage? What shall you do about it when detected? Where shall you establish yourselves? How wide will be your operations? How many members do you have? How do you plan to expand? How will you receive legitimacy for your actions? What would be expected of me?"

His barrage of questions made Evelyn's smile die and Sandra smile instead. "Are you always this serious about everything?"

Shen looked at her. "Yes."

An explosion sounded in the army's direction. Shen turned to see the elites clashing already. "We can discuss this later. Can I see Bob?"

He was expecting some extra elites to appear in the AP Arena after this stage, and he might be too busy with them to seek the archer. However, he had nothing to do right now other than wait for the conclusion of that battle. He would rather use his time for something productive.

"I'll get him," Elam said and left.

Shen waited while paying attention to the battle.

= - = - =

"Are you here to mock me?" Mark asked. He had been thrown outside the army's boundaries, and Alicia appeared a few seconds later.

"I came to apologize for what I did," she replied.

"Hmph," he said, stood up, and started walking away.

"That's it?" she asked, annoyed. "Where are you going?"

"I can't sacrifice thousands for the hero anymore," he said. "But I can still be the last one he'll kill. Maybe we can talk before he does it too."

Despite herself, she started following. "What if the regulars win?" She didn't believe it, but she wanted to hear what he would say.

"Impossible! He's the chosen one! With me by his said, we shall conquer the Multiverse Alliance and beyond!"

Alicia kept quiet for a while. Then she stopped following and looked at Mark's back.

"I have a question for the Stage Overseer," she whispered. "Did the system also heal mental disabilities?"

| Stage Overseer: I do not accept questions.

She thought that would be it, but she got a new notification a few moments later.

| Stage Overseer: The Multiverse Alliance has healed all human disabilities it was allowed to. Regulations demand all cognitive intervention to be agreed on by the receiver, except in specific cases. Among such cases are Skill synchronization and disabilities that break the sense of self, like Alzheimer's. Some humans have refused treatment. Some things might be considered a disability by humans but not by the Multiverse Alliance, like emotional trauma and low self-esteem.

Delusional, obsessed, and narcissistic, Mark had said people called him. Alicia wondered if those weren't professional diagnoses, and he had refused treatment.

If that theory was correct, it made her very, very happy the Alliance had treated as many people as possible within its rules. If even one psychopath had accepted getting healed, the world would be better for it.

On the other hand, how many sociopaths or psychopaths would accept treatment? How many narcissists?

Anyway, there was nothing for her to do alone out here. She didn't know if Shen was attacking with the larger group of elites already coming this way or not. She returned close to the front line—the guys there made it evident they wouldn't let her get in—and summoned her seven fireballs.

Soon enough, everything would fall into chaos, and she would rejoin the fight.

[A/N: Kinda slow chapters, this one and the previous, but now everything is set up. Only the conclusion of this "middle boss" remains.]

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