Recovery
3 month before
Adui had never felt so helpless before. The night, when Ulaspas paid him a visit, they tortured him in ways that still send chill down his spine. After getting all the information out of him, Kaisel ordered Gizelle to slip some poison into his body and then they set the whole house on fire. He was destined to die that day if it wasn't for the foolishness of Gizelle.
That bitch wanted to torture him more, so she slipped him some paralyzing agent so that he would stay conscious as his body would burn with his house. And her plan succeeded in a way as well, the fire caught up to him and started roasting him alive, and he couldnt even scream the pain that he felt. But then like a shining ray of hope, Ben came out of nowhere and saved him.
It had been 2 weeks since he had become a prisoner of his own body, and yet the paralyzing agent wasn't showing any signs of going away. All he could do at the moment was move his eyes, other than that all of his body functions were locked. He tried his best, pumping mana through his body to remove its effects but everything was futile.
He didn't how much of his body was badly burned, how much damage he had retained. From the lack of stinging sensation in his right hand, he knew that he had lost his right hand. He remembers those monsters cutting out from the torture session. And the lack of vision from his left eye gave him clues about his face.
Those people took two fingers from his left hand and took a leg as well, making him truly a cripple…
For 2 weeks he suffered in silence, the burnt skin itched, and he wanted to scratch it so bad, but he could not move nor could he communicate with Ben. If he could speak, he wanted the old man to just end him and let this nightmare be over with. He groaned and tried to beg to end his suffering, but Ben could not only hear his thoughts, and couldnt make out anything from his groans.
He didn't know what the old man did, but after rescuing him, he somehow brought some potions that were able to help him recover in 2 weeks, from the number of potions and herbs that were used on his body, he figured that if weren't for those medicines, he would have died a long time ago.
But after two long weeks, he was finally able to get the sensation of his mouth back, he could finally move his lips, but he didn't have the same mastery of his nerves before Gizelle gave him the paralyzing agent, thus he had trouble speaking…
That morning when Ben came to change his sheets, he tried speaking to him. "Baan. U phould ab leam po bai" He wanted to say 'Ben, you should have left me there to die', but the old man didn't understand a word that he said, although he did got startled when Adui suddenly started speaking, the old man couldnt help but smile while looking at him, tears started falling down his cheeks, he was very happy.
"Phuf u" he tried to yell 'FUCK YOU'.
Ben on the other hand came and sat down beside him with a smile on his face. "I thought I lost you forever."
"Phi phar phu phame phack?" the old man shook his head. "I cannot understand you man, but I am happy to see that you are able to speak."
"Phood. Phi phill phil phy phen phi phet phup" The old man chuckled. "I didn't understand what you said right now, but it felt like you were giving me a warning that you would kill after you get up."
The old man guessed right, that was precisely what he said, and for some reason, this small interaction brought Adui a lot of joy, his anger and the memory that was full of agony vanished at that moment and he chuckled, it was painful to be laughing like that, but it was worth it…
It took him one more week, and he finally got the sensation of his neck back, his arms had a long way to go, but he could twitch them now, and the best thing of all, he could speak now…
"Ai wan tuh seea et." Ben shook his head, he couldnt accept his request. "Adui, why dont you just focus on recovery for now? You should not focus on your appearance right now."
But he was not having it. "AI WAANNA SEEA ET!" Ben clenched his hands, he didn't want to do it, but in front of his constant insistence, he had to bow down.
He wanted to see how much damage was actually on his body right now, after he got his neck back, he sat down, only to see the pretty severe damage to his body. He had become a cripple once again, but it was much worse than before. So he wanted to know the full extent of the damage, that is why he insisted Ben bring a mirror and help him see his figure, he wanted to know how damaged his body was.
When the old man brought the mirrior in front of him, he couldnt help but feel horrified at what he had become, half of his face was burned, damaging one of his eyes, most of his torso was burnt, his left leg was badly burnt, and more the 40% of his body was covered in bandages.
With such a damaged body, he could never live a normal life, he would need someone to take care of his needs every moment of his miserable life, he didn't want to live such a life, he wanted all of this suffering and pain to end, right now.
He decided to end his life, he didn't tell Ben as he would make a fuss about it, and he was in no mood to hear about it, this life belonged to him, and he should be the one to get to decide whether he wants to live or die.
If I am going to die, I should first get my revenge. I cannot let those Ulaspas fuckers get away after destroying my life. I would end them, even if that is the last thing that I would have to do…
After he started speaking, his recovery speed skyrocketed, he instructed Ben about to medicines that he would need to recover, till then the old man was giving him normal potions that could recover his blood, muscles and skin. But he started speaking, he started curing his paralysis.
It took him another week, but he was finally able to regain control of his body, he could move them on a whim, and even with all the control of his body back to normal, things didn't get any better, one of his hand was gone, the other one had only three fingers, which made doing everyday jobs a tad bit difficult.
But with his control back, he wanted to get back on his life, he started thinking about the strategy from which he could get his revenge, he was in a very weakened state right now, so he couldnt afford to send any clues to the Ulaspas family that he was alive, he wanted to keep that a secret, and have his revenge while staying in dark…
"So have you heard anything?" Ben had gone to the market to learn any new rumors about Gizelle and her weird family under his orders.
"Nothing good, from what I have heard, the house seems to be empty."
"Empty?"
"Yeah, the giant knight that used to stand by the gate was gone, people had not seen it for the last week or so."
"Andreas is gone?" This got him thinking, maybe all of them went to the Rose Valley. "Did they all go the Rose Valley?"
"It is hard to say. I could send some people to look at it."
"Dont bother. You will be sending those guys to their certain death."
Ben sighed. "So what do you have in mind?"
"Well, we cannot fight them head-on. That would be suicide, but we could let their enemy fight with them.."
"What do you mean?"
"We know that Ulaspas family had done something to the Prince. We could use this knowledge and enact my revenge with the help of the royal family." He remembers it correctly, he heard Kaisel sending Patrica after the Prince.
"Are you sure that they had attacked Prince? Because I have not heard anything about such an attack"
"Royal family probably would have hidden the fact, an assassination attempt on the Prince could create unrest amongst commoners."
"That makes sense… So how would you make the royal family attack them?."
He groaned with frustration. "That is the thing, I dont have information that I could use against the Ulaspas family."
"Why dont you fabricate one? Royal family is probably looking for the culprit right about now, they are like a hungry lion right now, you just need to point them towards the prey."
"No, that would be too risky." He said, "Think about it, if they caught the wind that there is a chance that my information is false, I would be killed immediately. So no, I can't do that"
"So what will you do then"
"I have no idea."
He then started wrecking his brain, trying to come up with an idea, but in the end, he realized that to sabotage their plan he needs to know exactly what they are trying to achieve, and the truth was that he didn't know shit about their plan.
So started decoding their plans, he started thinking more critically about them, he started remembering everything that he knew about them, started remembering all the interactions that he had with them, and started making sense of all the information that he knew.
They are trying to do something in this kingdom. At first, I thought that they were trying to get the inheritance, but now that I am thinking about it, they did come here for the inheritance, the day Gloria tortured me, she was doing something in the ruins.
It was clear to him that they wanted something from the ruins, that is why he met Gloria that day, but then he faced the dilemma about their actual. He came up with the theory in the past that it would have made more sense to just go to the ruins, dig whatever they wanted, and get the hell out of there. But instead, they recruited Gizelle, who made him go buy the land from the Barons, putting her on the radar.
Okay, let's assume they were looking for the cube, which is in their hands right now. So why go and try to kill the prince? What did Rupert ever do to them? They could have just peacefully extracted the inheritance and then vanish, no one would have even known that they were there in the first place.
But they didn't do so, they attacked the prince, but why? Did the prince have some sort of treasure that they wanted? That could be true, the royal family could have had an ancient artifact, and may not know its worth. So they came here for the inheritance and for that artifact.
He started realizing that maybe their plan, they were here for the inheritance and the artifact, he thought that he had understood what their plan was, but it is then he remembered one very crucial detail, he remembered his interaction when Kaisel branded him with the Rose, the interaction with Gizelle.
She said that negotiations were never part of their plan. So if she wasn't going to acquire the land with bureaucracy, then that means she had planned to acquire the land with some other trick. Was she planning to against one of the Dukes? If I employed power like her, then I would have thought about going against Dukes as well.
He then started rubbing his head, if Gizelle wanted to use her power from the start and resources from the start, then why sent him?
Wait, she wanted me to fail. Yes, she wanted me to fail, she wanted to throw me out of her shop, and the job was one way to do so, without looking like a jerk in the society.
He then started thinking about what would have happened if he had failed, many scenarios came to his mind, but in the end, he couldnt think of one single thing that could be beneficial for the Ulaspas family or Gizelle, he started rubbing his head, he was having a very hard time discerning what these guys were doing here.
His gut was telling him, that something isn't right, these guys were looking for something particular, and he was not just able to grasp what they were after.
KNOCK KNOCK
"Come in" Ben came with a jug full of water, and a bowl full of porridge. The old man passed the bowl to him, he smiled back, he was very thankful for what the old man had been doing for the past few days. Somehow, the old man was bringing all his medicines and herbs that he was asking for, even when he knew that these stuff were pretty expensive.
"Ben, I never thanked you for what you did, thank you, my friend."
"It is alright."
"No, it is not, you have been taking care of me, burning so much money on me. I know you are not financially independent, and I just… express my gratitude in words."
"You dont have to express anything. I should be grateful to you because technically I am your employee. And you have been very generous with my salary."
"I am? How?" Then Ben took out his spatial pouch from his back pocket and threw it at him.
"How did you get your hands on this?"
"It was lying beside you when I rescued you from your house."
"Really?" It was then Adui remembered some glimpses of Kaisel saying,
'With your betrayal, i will burn down everything that you own, hence finishing your legacy forever.'
And then he remembered the man threw the pouch and cube at him. He was in so much pain at that moment, that he was not able to understand what happened back then.
"Yeah, this pouch and a weird-looking cube were right beside you. The cube is in the pouch by the way." Ben said, making him smile.