“I’m home…” The automatic door slide open and Azai staggered as he returned home.

He felt light-headed after running around the radioactive city.

“Welcome home bro” A silver-haired young boy with rather cute voice welcomed him.

“Yo, Aron.” He walked slowly towards his brother and looked at the numerous books lying on top the dining table, as well the projection from the electronic tablet he used to type.

“Military tactics??” He made a frown towards Aron.

Aron nodded in confirmation and caused Azai scratched his head and grumbled.

“It’s fun, don’t you want to try?” He took a thick book and passed it to Azai.

“No way!” He quickly avoided by taking multiple steps backward.

“Ahaha! As expected from brother. All muscle!” He made a sarcastic laugh as he continued to study.

“Whatever…” Azai was also didn’t want to disturb his brother any longer, he slowly reached for the kitchen area and opened the oven-like door labeled ‘Vacuum’ nearby.

A fizzing sound was heard as the air goes into the container, Azai looked at the content for a moment, before taking out a metallic box labeled [Salmon Box] and came back to the dining table.

Azai opened the box and inside was already filled with salmon rice set.

“Where’s mom?” He asked as he took a small bite on the fried salmon.

“Underground, doing her things” Aron calmly answered as he continued typing on the screen.

“Oh..” Azai continued eating.

A silence as the two brothers was doing their own things, there was a certain awkwardness that made the atmosphere rather tense. The two brothers was quite distant to each other despite being family. Perhaps due to their opposing personality, their conversation didn’t seem to reach the same frequency.

“Ah” suddenly, Aron made a noise and stopped typing for a moment and attracted Azai’s attention as he was puzzled.

“Mom told me to tell you to go underground when you get home” After telling him the massage, Aron continued to do his things.

As soon Aron passed the massage, the laid-back Azai suddenly straighten up as if a electricity jolted his nervous system. His face paled as soon he heard that.

“Tell me earlier, Aron!” He hasten his pace as he gulped the nutrients without savoring the taste.

“…” Aron was quietly observing his brother, unfazed.

Azai finished his salmon box within a minute and quickly moved out from his place.

Just as he stood from the chair, a huge explosion could be heard from underground. It was followed by a tremor that shook the house for a moment.

“AZAI, where are you!!” A shout comparable to serial killer was exploding below.

Azai’s face ashen as the worst-case scenario had happened. His eyes were a little bit teary as he looked back at his brother.

“Good luck…” His brother could only looked at him and gave him a meaningful smile and spoke quietly.

“Oh no… noooooo….” Azai could only cursed himself for the misfortune as his body was trembling.

…

The basement layout under Eliad’s house was relatively simple, it was nothing more but a single massive site that was separated by chain link fence into few smaller blocks. It’s size was roughly as large as the house plus the garden above.

There were automatic forklifts and small sized carts that were lifting materials in and out from the storage area. The other block were hosting many different electrical appliances for different kind of purposes.

On the entrance into this place was an aluminum signpost welded to the fences, written as “Eliad’s Research Facility”. And at the moment, Azai was looking at this signpost before letting out a sigh and went inside the fenced area.

He was familiar with the place and thus it didn’t take him too long before he could see the presence of old woman, who was holding a welding gun, in the process of repairing an armor suit..

Although Azai didn’t want to disturb her in her work, with a reluctant voice he called out, “Mom.”

The voice was small, but she quickly took off her welding mask and glared at the boy with a disgruntled face.

“How many times do I need to tell you? It’s mandatory to be in full working clothes before you step into the area?”

“Quickly change yourself and come back here” She put back the mask and look away.

Azai widen his eyes in surprise and was speechless,

He was expecting a barrage of shouts and from his mom’s unrestrained words which usually happened from his past experience.

‘What is happening..?’ He thought before he shook his head quickly

‘No matter, I am saved!’

He ran back from where he came from at haste before the old woman changed her mind.

After taking a set of rugged clothing and wore the pair of specially made leather gloves and visor, he returned back and realized that his mother had finished her task with the armor maintenance and had been waiting for him with few small-sized robots beside her.

Before long, Azai reached the place and stood in front of her, she smashed her fist to his head while shouting,

“Slow!” She furiously shouted.

“Sorry!” Azai quickly rubbed his head as tear almost came out from the side of his eyes.

‘It’s still happening despite me pushing myself to come asap.’ Azai sighed in his heart, while rubbing his head at his unreasonable mother.

His mother than grabbed a small drone and passed it to him. Azai quietly received the drone without questioning her and took a small device and plug it into the respective hole. The drone hovers on the air and a display was brought from the visors, which was filled with command lines.

He tapped index finger thrice and held it down before moving it. It caused small pointer in the display to move in harmony with the hand and slowly scrolled the lines down. Although the command line was filled with gibberish sentence which wasn’t spoken, there didn't seem difficulties for Azai to understand the meaning as his face didn't show any cluelessness.

After Azai read the lines completely, he scrolled back to the top and then starts moved his hand as if there was an imaginary keyboard on the air. But somehow the command line quickly overwritten with characters.

On the other hand, the old woman was observing from the identical visor she was wearing. The display was also the same, with the exception of the additional window displayed another command lines which was more densely written compared to what Azai was working on.

Sometimes, she made unsightly expression as she realized there was a discrepancy between the lines. Although, she kept this feeling bottled up because she would disturb the work in progress.

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Lines after lines was overwritten, some additions in the codes were put in the middle of the writing. Then, he stopped moving his finger and the display disappeared. Azai let out a deep sigh before he took off his visor and dropped his head down.

“Im done…” he said exhaustively.

“Not while Im here” the old woman said nonchalantly.

She then threw two more small robots with the shape of a small tank and submarine.

“Take 15 minutes break and continue with the test.”

“Yes…” He gave up without retaliation.

…

Two hours passed since the conversation,

Azai had finished the task of rewriting the command lines of three drones and was sitting down on the ground nearby the units while her mother was using the visor to check his work like a teacher marking test papers,

In the middle of marking, her face was already filled with anger.

“Azai” She suddenly spoke while her hand was still moving,

“Yes..?”

“Do you have a tinge of my blood within you?”

“Huh? What do you mean mom?” Azai was confused by the sudden question

“Are you my son?” She rephrased her question.

“Of course I am!” Azai quickly answered

“Then tell me, how long did you take to do manual system repair on the drones?”

“One hour…”

She hit Azai with a wooden stick that she brought along.

“Ow ow” Azai trembled slightly due to the pain, however his body was sturdy enough to withstand a hit with no reinforcement.

“But mom… There were just too much to do there. That was my best!” He started to argue with the old woman, but he was hit once again with the stick.

She took a deep breathe, then let it out with a huge shout.

“Your best is not enough for my standards!”

“At your age, I was able to do the tasks half your time.”

Hearing that, Azai couldn’t help but smiled wryly and said.

“Of course, mom’s trained to be a military technician since she was a child.”

“Also, I am not as smart as Aron… I am not suited to learn this kind of skills”

“How could I compared to you anyway, you’re at an other level to the point they called you the [Mad Scientist]!?”

Another hit directly to the head, her face was a little bit saddened.

“Making excuses isn’t allowed. I am teaching you for your sake, do you get it?”

“I… sorry mom”  Azai realized his words might’ve hurt her feeling and quickly apologize.

“Come here” She put the stick down and then grabbed Azai’s hand.

She quickly leading him to an area which was filled a huge, transparent screen, that was also the heart of this underground facility.

“Take a seat and wait.” She released her grip and rummaged through the the metal cupboard where documents were usually stacked.

Azai could only see his mother in confusion as he had no clue as what was in her mind, but he knew it was going to be something important.

After all, his mom would rarely do things without any reason.

After she had finished rummaging the place, she approached Azai and took out a small recording device and then put a black metallic cassette and played it.

The tape rolled, a static buzz could be heard until a familiar voice was speaking in a rough,small voice.

“This is captain Hassan. Authorization ef-43679.”

“Reporting mission #6344, project black haze.”

“Sol 28, our team dispatched two personnel into the target, but hasn’t returned from the required time”

“It’s likely we’re being compromised and it’s likely there will be some retaliation to the Lux colony.”

“Following the protocol, I am going to authorize the abandonment of this project.”

“End of re—”

A huge shockwave had muffled his voice just before he was going to conclude the report and it turned into static few second after that; Azai, who was focusing at the tape, suddenly jerked up from his sitting position in anger.

The tape turned off,

Azai quickly shifted his sight towards his mom and realized that she made an unusual sorrowful expression. There was so many questions he wanted to ask but his mouth wasn’t able to spout out a sentence with her state at the moment.

However, she removed her sorrow with one heavy sigh then looked sternly toward Azai,

“Your father was returning from his failed mission and was intercepted by an enemy orbital satellite. Not soon after, a battleship plasma cannon obliterated all of the areas around him.”

“His team was instantly perished and he was left with nothing but burn scars with his life hanging on the line.”

“By the time we arrived, we quickly took him in and had to reengineer his regeneration rate as his own cultivation alone was simply not enough to keep him alive at that moment.”

“As a result, he had lost his chance in the pinnacle of cultivation”

Azai was puzzled, there were some questions answered but there was a pressing question that he couldn’t help but to ask directly,

“Mom… Why are you telling me this?”

“Simple, I just gave you a case where science beats cultivator. If it were me on the mission, I would have deployed [EMP Bomb], sent [Jammer Drone] and switch to jet-propulsion to hide my noise. They will not be able to detect me and nobody would’ve died that day.” She indifferently answered without batting her eyes.

“Azai, your father might’ve told you… No, I am sure that he said that cultivation art is superior than science.”

“…” Azai went silence in agreement.

“I knew it… that idiot thinks that cultivation art is the heaven and earth in this world.” his mom sighed

“Isn’t it true? Dad wouldn’t get his title in the army if it weren’t for his cultivation!” Azai reluctantly agreed with his father’s point of view and argued.

“Azai, Didn’t you just hear the tape?” Sarah gave a hit onto his head and caused it to ring in pain.

“He almost died because he underestimated the power of science!”

“I…”

Azai was speechless, the sound itself didn’t shock him too much but his mind dazed when he heard that.

His mom let out another sigh,

“Do you know the weakness of a cultivator?”

Azai was still dazed, but he managed to shook his head even though he had some answers in his mind. His mother continued her speech,

“[Ancient Cultivation Art] is a tedious process that absorbs the energy of the nature to nourish their body and mind, the fruit of their training could only be seen after a long time.”

“Therefore, a cultivator will always have a constraint of time and if they happen to meet with someone who is stronger than them. They will probably die.”

Then his mother looked sharply to him,

“Science, on the other hand, doesn’t have to be in the mercy of time. As long we have the resources, we could always create weapons to overwhelm the enemy. Even if your body is fragile and could be killed by a touch, you could still have a chance to win with enough preparation and knowledge.”

“Your mother just want to help you, precisely because your road is not a simple one. Succeeding the family will eventually require you to travel all around the place, in search for insights of the nature.”

“In the journey, you will definitely face a lot of dangers. Learning some knowledge about science will benefit you, it might even life-saving. Do you understand?”

“… Yes mom” Azai nodded.

“Then… lesson is finished for now” She waved her hand slowly, signaling that he could go.

“Huh? Usually at this time you’d… never mind” Azai unintentionally blurted what was on his mind before he realized it.

“Go to sleep. I can do it by myself.” Her authoritative manner emerged as she waved her hand roughly.

‘Less work for me…’ Azai thought, before he nodded to his mom and quickly moved away from the area. His mom was looking from a distance as the body getting smaller until it was completely disappeared from her sight.

She made a small sigh while looking at a direction, with a tender voice she speak.

“You can come out, dear.”

The air beside her was twisting and sparks was occurring and steadily forming into a shape of an old man with an armor-vest.

With a rather cheerful voice he made a casual remark,

“You sure lost it this time. Sarah.”

She quickly retorted as she angrily looking at him, “Even if I am, it’s because he really resembled you when you didn’t rely in science at all.”

Hearing that, he could only respond with a wry smile.

“I’m sorry that I had chosen Azai as my successor. Even though he had the talent.”

She turned her face towards Hassan and answered flatly, “We have discussed to let our sons decide on which path he took. Azai had showed his interest as a cultivator since he was a child. While Aron determined to become a noble. Our task is only to feed their drive.”

“If he didn’t show any interest as an inventor, I had no qualms about it.”

Hassan made a smirk,

“Then what’s with all of these training you’ve been giving to him? Your standard test could even make those elite engineer in Lux Colony cry in sleeplessness.”

With a meaningful smile, Sarah brushed her hair and closed her eyes while speaking innocently, “What? This is just for his development.”

“Really? It sounds to me you do not want to give in.”

Feigning an angry expression, she complained,

“Hmph, Even if he had enough talent to take on my legacy, he couldn’t nurture it at his passionless state. The least I could do is to drill him the necessary skills while I can and hope he take a change.”

“As long I am not affecting his cultivation, it’s fine right?! He’s literally has half of my chromosomes anyway, so I have the right to teach him this!”

‘How unreasonable…’

Hassan went quiet after that as his mind was reeling from her words,

He had been observing the things that she had taught Azai ever since he could read and write and was worried that her teaching might be detrimental for his cultivation growth. Therefore, there was many times he wanted to stop her from teaching him, but he bottled it in due to the fact that Azai was improving steadily.

However, at her last statement. It seems she really wanted to pass on her legacy towards him but their  agreement held her from doing so.

‘Our Eliad clan is traditional, we had never relied much on external help as we believed only in the power of our body and mind. This confidence and stubbornness was the seed of perseverance and discipline…’

‘But…’ he then looked at her, she was fidgeting a little bit while her eyes was worrying about something.

He then made a light sigh, then grabbed her shoulder,

“No implant, no injections. If you agree on me on these two rules. I will permit you teach him further…”

The statement caused Sarah to widen her eyes, while her old mouth turned agape,

“You mean it dear… You really really mean it?”

Hassan wryly smiled, then he nodded in affirmation.

Sarah hugged her husband filled with excitement,

“Thanks dear! To think you would do this for me… This is the best day of my life. I can start teaching him ‘real stuff’ from tomorrow onwards… I can’t wait!!!”

Hassan received his reward gratefully, while his head looked up to the underground ceiling with blank expression.

‘Azai… I hope you will not break down.’

He prayed for the future of his child after he had unleashed the devil in his wife’s heart.