Chapter 13

Lixue watched Jixue fell asleep next to him while hugging his arm. As a demon, he didn't need sleep. He carefully slid off his arm from Jixue's grip so as to not wake him. He changed his clothes to hoodie and jeans.

"Lulu, can you detect the position of every criminal on this planet right now?"

"I can as long as they are currently caught in any surveillance." Lulu answered positively.

Lixue nodded and told Lulu to proceed. He still fell short of some people to level up. He wanted to hurry up and gain the telekinetic ability to control his fire.

It is time for a manhunt.

The next morning, Lixue was surfing the StarNet in the living room when he heard footsteps going down the stairs. Jixue appeared with a sleepy face and scrawled hair. He located Lixue and quickly went to him.

Lixue stood up and rubbed his head, "Breakfast is ready."

Then, he noticed that Jixue was a bit taller than yesterday. Remembering the data he read at the research institute, he didn't find it strange. Rather, he was prepared for it.

He bought groceries on his way back earlier this morning and made simple toast for Jixue. He himself ate tomato salad without any seasoning. Seeing Jixue eating it happily, he confirmed that Jixue could eat food other than meat.

He opened the StarNet and continued his activity form earlier. Then, he remembered the matter of asking Jixue about artificial eyes.

"Little Ji, do you want to be able to see?" Lixue asked shortly.

Jixue thought for a moment and shook his head. Lixue didn't ask more and completely dismissed the idea. He continued surfing again in silence. Jixue thought he was upset and anxiously explained.

"Because Lili hates being looked at. I don't want Lili to hate me. Lili… don't be angry…" Jixue stood up and went to Lixue's side. He clutched Lixue's pants with teary eyes, "If… if Lili wants me to be able to see, I will do whatever Lili wants. Don't abandon me, Lili…"

"I'm not angry," Lixue rubbed his tears away, "How do you know I hate being looked at?"

"Lili always gripped tighter whenever someone looked at Lili. Lili also felt colder." Jixue obediently answered.

Lixue didn't know he has those subconscious reactions. He looked at Jixue and admitted that with Jixue being blind, he felt more relaxed around the boy. If Jixue had those artificial eyes, he predicted that he really would become colder and more restrained around Jixue.

He let Jixue clung to him and put everything he picked in the online shop into the cart before paying for it. It will be delivered in 1 hour while the last item in 5 hours.

When the first batch of items came, he signed the electronic receipt and brought the box inside. He went to the living room where Jixue was waiting for him. Taking out the things he bought, it was a piling heap of clothes. Some of them would fit the current Jixue, with the same amount, some of them were a size bigger. Until it was the size for young adults, each of the sizes has a portion of quantity with the young adult's clothes the most amount.

Jixue was 'watching' Lixue taking out clothes after clothes from the small box. At first, he was just curious, but gradually he couldn't help but look dumbly at the mountain of clothes next to Lixue.

Lixue picked out a set of clothes and gave it to Jixue, "Try this."

After confirming the size fits, Lixue arranged the clothes per size and separated the ones he bought for himself.

4 hours later, another delivery came. This time, the box was as large as himself. He opened it and inside was the female android he specially custom ordered. From the design, it looked like a woman in her twenties with a petite figure and delicate face.

"Lulu, try to occupy this android."

Lulu easily breached inside the android's system and activated it. There was a whirring sound for a few seconds before Lulu opened 'her' eyes.

"Master, I have successfully occupied the android's body and its system."

Current androids were super-advanced, extremely similar to humans. Not to mention, in this highly advanced capital city of the Federation. They could express feelings, has personalities, and their course of action was very natural.

But, the android he ordered was set by him to be expressionless with cold lifeless eyes. If real human looked like her, they would definitely be called a robot. Her, being a real robot, couldn't be more so, though her conduct was still human-like.

"Watch Jixue and the house. Organize the clothes while you're at it. I'm going out. Is your program in the network itself or are you an independent entity? If it's the latter, duplicate yourself into my communicator." Lixue stood up while he asked.

There was a pause before Lulu's voice came out from his communicator together with Lulu in front of him, "Duplication complete. Link established."

Lixue went to change his clothes into a set of fancy blue suit. He also didn't forget his glasses, still putting them on his head. Jixue sensed that Lixue was walking to the door and quickly caught up.

"Lili, you're leaving?" he asked pitifully.

"Going out. You can play with Lulu." Lixue patted his head before opening the door and left.

Entering the hovercar, he told his destination to the smart system. He sat on the backseat while the hovercar drove by itself using its autopilot function. He overlapped his legs and looked out the window dully as his mind wanders.

After he was thrown into prison 'rightfully' by the second prince, who at that time was the king, he was tortured night and day from inside out. He was called a fraud who tricked the king to pose as the first prince's son. They said that he wanted to steal the throne from the second prince and so they punished him with life imprisonment for high treason.

He remembered that his trial was watched by the whole empire and those people who knew nothing abused him, slandered him, mocked him, and completely believed the so-called righteous judges. They unconditionally sided with the royal family without bothering to know the truth. There were many loopholes in the trial but none of them even tried to notice.

Then, after suffering in the prison for more than 2 months, the guards started to slack off guarding his cell. In the first place, they didn't regard him much anyway. The people coming to torture him already got bored except for the first lord who diligently came 3 times a week. He came every day at first, but after becoming the first prince, he became busy with his royal duty and could only spare time 3 times a week which, in his opinion, was already frequent enough.

In his past life, he couldn't understand why the first lord was so obsessed with torturing him, going so far as to spend his free time in a prison cell torturing a half-dying prisoner instead of resting properly. Now that he thought about it cool-headedly, that first lord was probably just a sadistic pervert who relieved stress by torturing him.

So, one way or another, he somehow managed to barely escape after another month. Fortunately, his part of the prison didn't have much surveillance because the royal family didn't want to leave any evidence of their cruelty.

Well, he did say he barely escaped. He was chased by the guards and ran aimlessly focusing more to shake them off. He also never walked around the city, so he wasn't familiar with the road. Although he managed to run away from the guards, he ended up in an alleyway in the slums.

Out of the crocodile cage into the wolf den.

He was caught by a human trafficker. The trafficker knew that he was the former first prince who was imprisoned for high treason. The trafficker wanted to sell him for a sky-high price to the royal family, but the king didn't particularly care anymore since he already got his throne. Unfortunately, the first prince was out of country at that time. If he was there, the trafficker might be able to gain some fortune.

So, he was sold as a product by the human trafficker. He wore a cold metal collar containing a special chip. The collar could only be released once someone bought him and connected their communicator to the chip to unlock it.

In the trafficker's den, he lived like a dog with other products. The traffickers were not allowed to touch the products except for training and discipline, but these 2 activities were enough to break their minds and molded them into perfect products.

But there, in the wolf den filled with dogs, he met a friend with the same species as him. A human friend with star-like sparkling eyes.