Jake was somewhat caught off guard by this unexpected question, not really knowing how to answer it. It took him some serious effort to remember who she was talking about.
Not everyone he hung out with at the time was a Player. There were also some real natives among the gladiators from his first Ordeal. However, if he had to pick four people that he actively hung out with and that had at least accompanied him to the Colosseum battle, then the choice was much more limited.
While looking for a stout man a little fat in his memories, the image of a thirty-year-old man with short red hair and the face strewn with freckles formed in his mind. It was Hugo, and after the final showdown in the Coliseum, they had never met again.
Jake didn't know what had become of him. Maybe it was worth finding out when they got back. They didn't know each other that well, but the Scotsman was a comrade who could be trusted.
The cute guy… It could only be Kyle and both Jake and Will became gloomy again as they thought of the living hell that awaited the Playboy's soul.
Once upon a time, Kyle was indeed a cute guy, a bit of a loser, who had endured gladiatorial training before making a decent performance in the arena. That Lucia had kept this mediocre, albeit positive, impression of him was not surprising.
Thankfully, he had changed since then. They had all changed.
It was regarding the two siblings that the question became more difficult. Visualizing Lu Yan's smug, hateful face, Jake couldn't help but sneer,
"I haven't seen Hugo since then, and Kyle's situation is a bit complicated to explain. As for the siblings… If Lu Yan isn't dead she must be somewhere torturing kittens or baby seals, or whatever it is that looks innocent and breathes as long as she can get a tiny bit of joy out of it. As for her brother, he's always where she is."
Hearing his scathing reply, Lucia hastily closed her mouth, bottling up all the questions she had planned to ask him. The desire to recall the good time had completely faded away.
Only then did she remember how Jake had Hulk-smashed the Chinese woman to death after Lu Yan had kill-stolen his target. It had deeply bothered her at the time. Weren't they supposed to fight together?
Today, she knew that the action of finishing off the enemy, although seemingly well-intentioned, was literally like trying to steal meat out of a tiger's mouth.
Aether. She had learned the hard way how precious this resource was. If she had known about the Oracle at the time, this incomprehensible twist would have been crystal clear to her.
Following this, the survivors set out under the Aetherist's protection. The Oracle Shelters in the area had been largely destroyed, but the huge Black Cube orbiting hundreds of kilometers above them was pretty much intact.
This one housed many stacked layers of Oracle Cities accessible via the Oracle Playground's Orange Cubes. Cekt, Citro, Kokoon, Lucia and Gerulf had all arrived here through one of its Yellow Cubes.
As during the Dungeon exploration, Cekt used again his telekinetic shield as a means of transport. Only this time, its diameter was greatly increased to accommodate the entire group of survivors.
Once everyone was inside, the translucent sphere shot off into the sky, immediately becoming a tiny dot when seen from the ground. The Black Cube, which had lost its invisibility camouflage due to the constant sabotage of the Digestors, quickly appeared in their field of vision.
A handful of seconds later, the shield began to decelerate without a sound, the people inside feeling no counterforce despite the sudden braking. They crossed the outer barrier of the Black Cube unhindered, getting for the first time a global view of the station.
Cekt relaxedly chose the Oracle City with the largest buildings and the highest ceiling to fit everyone's body type. It was once the Oracle City reserved for giants and other bulky behemoths unsuited to normal cities.
Not to mention Lucia and Gerulf, even Jake and the other survivors looked at the buildings with interest. Although the Digestors had ravaged almost everything, they could still tell from the ruins how oversized everything here was.
It was as if they were Lilliputians or Smurfs in the middle of a human village and everything seemed huge.
If Jake and Gerulf, who were almost 3 meters tall, reacted like this, then people and creatures of more modest size could only be intimidated and humbled by these relics of a not so distant past.
The gang of three formed by Lord Phenix and his two minions, a featherless swan and a one-legged hawk, had stopped gobbling and chirping to the delight of the nearby refugees whose ears had been begging for mercy.
The landing was smooth on the Transportation Tower roof, the only building still standing, and the force field holding the spherical shield was disabled, making them free to move again as they pleased.
"My mission ends here." Cekt stated happily, unable to hide how fed up he was with doing this babysitting job. "Citro, I'll let you handle the report, I still have one more disciple to check. Don't forget to embellish my exploits and glorify my importance as much as possible. I want that old party pooper Oros to cough up some of his fortune. With all the Aether from the taxes he collects, he can share a little…"
Rather than protest and get into a fruitless debate with the temperamental Wendok, Citro let out a weary sigh and replied limply,
"Sure…"
The valiant Oracle Captain left soon after, shoulders slumped as if he carried the weight of the universe on his shoulders. Without saying goodbye to anyone, he disappeared after touching the Yellow Cube.
When Cekt hovered hurriedly towards the Yellow Cube with the firm intention of leaving, Jake and the two disciples had the same alarmed reaction,
"Master, wait!"
Cekt stopped dead in his tracks with an annoyed grimace, turning around and glaring at them.
"What do you want? You're safe now. Don't bother me until you can cast an Aether Spell."
The only reason he had let Syrbarun and Siri tag along was because they were the only ones to save. Now that he was forced to work overtime, he couldn't have any dead weight with him.
Syrbarun and Siri backed off with a defeated and resigned face, but Jake did not give up. He needed to discuss something specific with Cekt.
"Master, can we at least come to you to perform a transgenic operation? I'm willing to pay for your services if I have to." He begged as he materialized a vial filled with blood, which he desperately dangled before the alien.
This was his real goal. All this time, he hadn't forgotten Tim's request and he still had his blood sample containing his Beskyrian Bloodline.
This was not a very urgent matter initially, but Jake, Will, Svara, and surely Kyle himself were fully aware of the role the Luck Aether had played in this Dungeon. Without that little nudge of fate on multiple occasions, perhaps they would have been dead long ago.
As such, Jake owed the child a debt of gratitude and he held the Beskyrian Bloodline in much higher regard.
Cekt didn't care about anything except when it came to his favorite subject, new Bloodlines to study. Snatching the vial from him before he could react, he immediately equipped a pair of glasses even more advanced than those of his disciple Syrbarun and began to observe the scarlet liquid.
"Beskyrian blood. It should be from the kid who was traveling with you." Cekt guessed as he thoughtfully smoothed his beard. "Ambitious, but perhaps a bit too much. I'll have to study all of this before I can give you a final answer. I'll contact you if I have any news. I'm going to need another sample of your blood, though."
Jake hadn't even responded when he felt a fleeting tingle in the crook of his elbow. His most bulging vein had just been drained of 100 milliliters of blood. It wasn't just normal blood, but his Blood Essence.
He immediately felt weaker, the progress of his Bloodline of the last few days completely erased. An uncontrollable feeling of anger immediately began to bubble up inside him, threatening to erupt and destroy everything.
"Don't cry." Cekt patted his head as he dropped a tiny black crystal into his hand. "Take this. It's called a Bloodline Aether Crystal and it's priceless. Your Master is no saint, but I don't mistreat my students."
The rage stirring his heart subsided at once as he felt the warm, smooth touch of the crystal in his hand. Syrbarun's jealous but not malicious gaze made him realize how precious it was and he instinctively closed his fist, stowing away the black crystal in his Space Storage.
"I have one last request to make." Jake said with renewed respect to his master.
"What now?" Cekt snorted impatiently.
Jake then materialized several canisters filled to the brim with silver blood.
"Digestor Blood?" The Wendok recognized right away. "What do you want to do with it?"
Jake thought the Aetherist would understand his intent, but the latter was apparently not as quick-witted as he assumed.
"Those Fourth Floor Digestors were practically clones of me. They had the same powers. I'd like to know if my Bloodline can be extracted from them as well and transferred to other people."
Cekt stared at him for a long time with an odd expression, then shook his head.
"You're not the first to think about it, but forget it. You have absolutely no idea what you're getting into." Cekt dissuaded him sternly. "A Bloodline transfer is possible, but on the basis of prior compatibility. These Digestors… are far too different from us."
