Rena didn’t reply as tears continued running down her cheeks. Ryu looked around and found a small quiet café nearby so he decided to bring her there so she could calm down first.
A few minutes later
Ryu had put on a mask to cover half of his face so that others wouldn’t be able to recognize him. Rena had calmed down considerably so he asked her once again, “What exactly happened?”
“After you started going to work for the organization, I felt that things were a little suspicious, so I tried following you to work one day. However, before you even reached your workplace, I was suddenly kidnapped. They inserted some kind of drug that made me confess what my motive and identity was.” Rena said as she sipped on the cup of hot cocoa that she had ordered when they entered the café.
“That was when I told them who my boss was, and they discovered that my boss was one of your boss’s targets. After that, they threatened me to harm my boss in any possible way, be it poisoning, planned accident, attempted murder. They said that they could kill you anytime if I didn’t obey them.” Rena confessed as her eyes became watery once again.
“Luckily, my boss figured out that I was being threatened before anyone could really be harmed. He told me that as long as I was able to locate your boss, then I’ll be able to find you. It seems like I don’t have to wait until then.” Rena then paused before she looked at her husband pleadingly, “Ryu, come back home with me. The person you’re working for isn’t a good person. He’s planning to annihilate my boss’s entire family. Surely, people like you who were involved won’t be spared. We need to run away before he becomes any more powerful than this.”
Ryu looked at his wife who was on the verge of tears and felt his heartache. If he could, he would quit this organization too since he felt like something was very fishy about it. However, he probably couldn’t. When he first entered the organization, they had injected various drugs into his body system and apparently, one of them was a GPS tracking bug. The reason he knew of this was because he had heard the rumors from his colleagues after he had entered the organization.
“Reina, I’m sorry but I can’t go with you.” Ryu said as his face darkened. If he left with her, the organization would still be able to locate him and that may bring even more danger to her. As he was one of the head scientists in the organization, he held many of the organization secrets and they wouldn’t leave him be for sure, if he had escaped.
Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.
“W-Why?” Rena asked as her hands trembled.
“I… I know too many of the organization’s secrets. They’ll definitely hunt me down if I escape. Not only that, they injected a *cough**cough* into my system.” Ryu replied as he coughed uncontrollably. However, he didn’t actually mean to cough at that moment.
Trying to talk again, he said, “They injected a *cough**cough* into me.”
The fact that he coughed every time he tried to say the word ‘tracking bug’, he ended up coughing every time. This was surely not a coincidence. Not only that, the more he tried, the more violently he could cough.
On the third attempt, he coughed up blood. Alarmed, he quickly tried to hide his blood-stained hand from his wife. However, as Rena was from the beast men’s clan, her nose was exceptionally good. She could immediately smell the metallic smell of blood from her husband’s hand.
“Ryu! Are you okay?!” Rena became alarmed as she quickly gave him some tissue paper to wipe the blood off.
“I’m fine. As long as I don’t try to say the two words, I should be fine.” Ryu replied, wiping his hands before continuing with a sigh, “This is why I said I can’t leave with you.”
“You mean that they drugged you, making your body condition deteriorate if you try to talk about their secrets?” Rena asked as her hatred for the enemy grew even more.
The man then nodded his head before drinking his drink, in hope to make his coughs better.
Rena became distressed as she tried to think up ways that she could bring her husband out of the organization.
“You don’t need to think of ways to help me. Just flee from this place, as far away as you can. As long as you’re safe, I’m happy.” Ryu said when he saw her frowning face. They were a married couple who had known each other for a long time already after all, just looking at her expression and he knew what she was thinking about.
“But…” Rena trailed off, as she looked at her husband, her heart filled with worry. She couldn’t just leave him alone when she knew that he was in danger.
“I promise you that as long as the organization doesn’t need me anymore, I’ll return to your side.” Ryu said before he continued in his heart, ‘That is if I am still alive by then.’
“Really? You can’t ever go back on your words, okay?” Rena asked as she thought, ‘I have to find the quickest possible way to destroy this organization.’
“Yes.” Ryu replied back with a smile, trying to reassure her.
“Okay. By the way, I think they’ll be a girl around 18 years old that is to be sent to your organization today or tomorrow. That girl is actually your boss’s daughter, though I doubt that anyone in the organization knows. My boss deducted that she is probably being sent there to reduce the amount of drug in her body to avoid people suspecting about her puppet-like behavior. Can you help me with something regarding this girl?” Rena asked earnestly.
“If it is within the scope of my capabilities, then sure.” Ryu replied.
“Can you completely extract all the drugs in her body? Such a young girl shouldn’t be drugged at such a young age.” Reina asked. At least, she felt like Ellie deserved to know the truth about the horrible things her father had done.
“Alright, I’ll try to. But I can’t guarantee that it will work since there are probably going to be other scientists working on her too.” Ryu replied as he touched his wife’s hand to reassure her.
“Thanks.” Rena answered him with a smile.