PAY IT FORWARD
"We've found him!"
The voice came suddenly and with far more speed than anything could have expected. Liana was caught off guard and immediately made a move.
They made a move to circle around the apartment. At the same time, feeling that there was something odd about this occurrence, Liana contacted her brother as well.
Vivak frowned when he received the message. Found him already? What were the odds of that? He shook his head. No, it should make sense. He had been monitoring Leonel all the while, which meant that there was no way he had swapped a Blood Clone in before the arena battle. The only time he should have had to do so was when everyone thought he was dead and the security was more lax as a result. That should mean that the real Leonel was likely heavily injured. It made sense that he wouldn't be able to make it far.
After some thought, he got up and made a move as well, giving Anselma and her butler a glance.
...
The building was yet another apartment building, but this one was full of residents. When they saw so many covert ops surrounding their building, they were immediately on edge.
Liana swiftly controlled the situation.
"Clear out the building!"
Liana wasn't very worried about the situation here. No one had seen Leonel's real strength, and in her opinion, he was currently just a heavily injured Fifth Dimensional existence. Even children of the Godlen family were stronger than that, and that wasn't even taken into account of the fact that just being born in a Complete World made you far stronger as well.
Back when Leonel was in the Fifth Dimension and he first stepped foot into what he had called the Cataclysm Zone all this time, he had come across villagers that didn't seem to have a Dimensional level at all, they should have technically been in the Third Dimension. And yet, they were so powerful that he didn't dare to meet them head on and could only observe them from afar as he accustomed himself.
Liana was logically correct to assume that the situation would be about the same here. As such, worry of casualties was quite far in the back of her mind. She didn't think that Leonel could harm people, at least not on a large scale.
Of course, she had also been informed about the disappearance of Simona and Eduardo. However, she had her own theories about how that matter had gone down.
During the acceptance of a technique, one would be fully focused on the task at hand and their mind would be completely co-opted by a flood of information. Usually, the technique room was a completely safe environment, so they obviously wouldn't hesitate to be completely at ease.
She believed that Leonel had hid and waited until that moment before kidnapping them both. This was very possible.
The only reason she was leading an evacuation in the first place was out of an abundance of caution. There was no reason to not take this extra step and cover all her bases.
Soon, large streams of people were being escorted out. With the Blood Compass in hand, none of them were worried about Leonel slipping through the cracks amongst this stream of people. If he tried to do so, then he would be too foolish.
Just minutes later, the task was complete and Liana commanded the team to close in.
They swiftly did their jobs. They had already located the exact room that Leonel was hiding in, but none of them were surprised that Leonel hadn't made an attempt to escape. He probably thought that they might accidentally pass him by.
A man kicked out with a strong black boot, shattering the door into countless little pieces of wood.
They stormed inside, only to find Leonel calmly sitting in a corner.
The wood fragmented pelted against him, tearing into his skin and even breaking his bone in some places. But even so, he didn't react.
The man, a certain Sergeant Moe as his brothers liked to call him, frowned. He had come ready for a battle, but he got this in return.
He walked forward and roughly picked Leonel up, but the latter was practically a limp doll, moving around without resistance.
Moe's frown deepened and after some hesitation, he chose to carry Leonel out.
"Head Researcher, this is him?"
Liana frowned as well when she saw the situation. She didn't understand the intricacies of Blood Clones, so she once again sent a report to her brother.
...
"It's another Blood Clone," Anselma said, her gaze flashing with a hint of killing intent.
Vivak had returned soon after and had no choice but to ask for Anselma's opinion. The answer, however, was the last thing he wanted to hear.
"Are you telling me that he can make more than one of these? How is that possible?"
They were so lifelike and real. In fact, he had thoughts of letting Leonel live so long as he could gain the method. Of course, that was only if he was under lock and key for the rest of his life as well.
"Blood Clones only need two things. Blood and someone with the skill to forge them. Technically speaking, the only limiter is how much blood a person can produce."
"Is it a small amount? Is that how he made two?"
Anselma's frown deepened. "No. The amount needed depends on the skill of the person. To make one Blood Clone that's realistic enough to fool your senses or the Compasses, it would need to be at least a 70% clone. That would likewise require 70% of your blood.
"For a normal person without Blood Force affinity or at least high vitality, this would kill them."
"Then how is he alive at all?"
Anselma fell into silence.
There were only two explanations. Either Leonel somehow had better vitality than most of the people Anselma knew, or he had a far higher skill in creating Blood Clones than she did. © content.
What she didn't know was that the answer was both.
Vivak cursed under his breath. He hadn't really begun to feel it until now, but he was starting to understand it. Mo'Lexi, his daughter, Anselma, each one was obsessed with this boy that he had only really casually wanted to take advantage of himself. And yet, his entire world for the past few days in one way or another, was revolving around this boy.
"This isn't necessarily a bad thing. He's giving us so much of his blood. Now, let alone 30 to 40 meters, it's possible for me to create a compass that can sense him within hundreds of kilometers."
Vivak nodded slowly. This should... be a good thing. It wasn't.
Soon, the situation only got worse.
The reports started to come back again and again. After creating a compass that could easily scan 10% of the Godlen city at once, Vivak found his eyes going red.
There were hundreds, no, thousands of Leonel's, each one dotted across the city, and each one registering as the real him.
The compass that should have been an easy cheat code in helping them find Leonel had quickly become a headache instead.
Vivak was even beginning to feel that Anselma was lying to him. According to everything she said, this should be impossible. By now, Leonel should have died ten times over!
His distrust in her was reaching the point that he didn't even bother to report matters back to her at all, a fact that only raised Anselma's frustration.
...
"Miss, this still isn't our territory. The situation isn't as bad as it could be. Tomorrow, the other powerhouses will arrive and it will balance it out somewhat. You can use their opinions for more leverage and control when the time comes, Vivak won't be able to do as he pleases by then."
Hearing these words, Anselma took a breath and slowly nodded. This made sense. It was impossible for Leonel to vanish in a day, he was already a fish in a barrel. Once the others arrived, she would be able to exert more pressure.
...
Anastasia passed information about this conversation to Leonel.
At first, he was annoyed by the old man calming Anselma down yet again, but when he paid attention to the contents of the conversation, he couldn't help but frown.
'Why is my luck so bad...' he shook his head. 'This... could be an opportunity, though.'
If there were people scheduled to come in tomorrow, didn't that mean that they had to open up the formation?
Of course, he wasn't naive enough to believe that they would shut down the whole thing. A formation of this level definitely had a method of opening up a small area.
The question was whether he could take advantage of it or not...
Leonel's gaze flickered.
It would be impossible for him to get out of this situation without taking some risks.
'In that case, let's move forward some of my plans a bit.'
...
In the far off distance, Leonel's Blood Clones began to set their own formations.
Soon, they would realize that it wasn't just Simona and Eduardo that were his hostages, but rather the whole city.
Leonel no longer felt himself to be some moral arbitrator of justice, nor was he the fiend that could genocide entire races.
He wouldn't go out of his way to kill, but he also wouldn't just turn a blind eye to all the useful pawns around him.
The Godlens treated the people of the Incomplete Worlds like sheep to the slaughter.
It was time to pay some of that forward.