Karla went to Blue's room to check if he was back but only to find him absent. For the past few days he had been visiting his orphanage a lot. She understood that he must have had some lingering attachment to that place but she couldn't help but feel a bit lonely when she couldn't find him for the entire day.

However his frequent visit abruptly stopped one day as he stayed more at home.

She was happy that her small wish was fulfilled and she got to spend more time with him. Lately she felt that both of them were getting along very well. Even a bit… intimate. Of course she was very expectant for an incident to happen that would bring their relationship to the next step.

She felt very guilty for even having such thoughts since he was her little brother from now but ever since the day he showed his attitude and determination to truly value her family she couldn't see him in the same light anymore.

She wanted him despite the clash of incestuous thoughts and morality that teared at her.

Time passed and soon the day of the awakening ceremony neared. It was now the night before the ceremony. Tomorrow at ten in the morning, she and Blue would have to be present at the city administration office where they would be told about the procedures.

Her mother had wanted to prepare a grand feast for dinner but surprisingly Blue stopped her and revealed that,

"I am actually very good at culinary arts as I was used to being taught this back at the orphanage. If you don't mind, I want to make tonight's dinner to show a little bit of my gratitude for the past three weeks."

He also asked them to stay in their rooms till he called back as he wanted to prepare a surprise for them.

Karla thought her mother would be a bit hesitant since he had never actively shown any cooking expertise before. Surprisingly she just smiled at him sweetly and agreed on the spot. She then thought back to the time when Blue and her mother first interacted.

It seemed that her mother very much appreciated him.

Karla felt that his demeanor truly made everyone drawn to him and an inexplicable sense of pride rose within her. She had already been treating him as her lover. That feeling of guilt had long since vanished within the past few weeks and she had already shared her first kiss five days ago.

Her first kiss was a gentle peck on her lips. She still vividly remembers how ecstatic she felt when they were kissing for a few brief moments. It happened in mid conversation and she still couldn't tell who initiated it first as she kept remembering his sweet lips that she tasted for the first time.

After that both of them became a bit more bold in their approach after the initial awkwardness passed as she would hug him intimately whenever they were alone and kiss some more. It turned from gentle pecks then sucking the lips to interlocking their tongues gradually. They would also touch each other's body in the process except the private parts but she felt that her relationship was progressing enough to reach that stage and soon…

Karla blushed profusely at the naughty thoughts swirling in her head. She had to say that she was now enjoying her life. With the most handsome man she ever saw in her life she was able to form her first ever relationship. She couldn't wait to take the final step but she knew that being too rash at this delicate matter might backfire. After all, they were now in a relationship behind her mother's back.

If she learned about this, Karla didn't know how to show her face at that time. Her big sister who would usually be informed of every single little detail on her life was also kept in the dark. Speaking of which, her sister once mentioned the first conversation she had with Blue.

She showed tremendous shock when she asked her just how they had been so lucky to bump into such a handsome and polite man. Clara only had praises for him and Karla obviously had a smug look on her face as she proudly said that she was the one who asked their mother to bring him in the family. Now even her grumpy big sister was happy with their decision.

When Blue called them for dinner, both of them were surprised at the dishes he had made. He even made such dishes with only the available ingredients left in the house. The dinner table at that moment could only be described with one word.

Lavish!

It was truly hard to believe that such foods weren't ordered from a five star restaurant but were homemade. However just a look in the kitchen would be evidence enough for the efforts he had put in and his high attainments in culinary arts.

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Without wasting any time they dined with great relish as they showered him with praises. This dinner was truly the best meal she had eaten. As they dined and laughed the food quickly disappeared from the table as their usually small appetite seemed to say it's farewell for now.

After much conversation about tomorrow's matter and his reassurance that both him and Karla would definitely become awakened to make her mother proud, the mood at the dinner table became even more harmonious. She really liked this atmosphere.

Soon they retreated to their room for the night as they had a big morning tomorrow.

Karla felt like she couldn't sleep tonight from the anxiety about tomorrow's ceremony as she laid on the bed. She decided to sneak into Blue's room and talk for the entire night before sneaking back to her room at dawn.

Alas, her plan couldn't be driven forward as her eyelids became heavy and the sleep that she thought wouldn't come appeared to take her into a blissful dream.

°°°°

After many days of rigorous efforts Blue had been able to solve the first five weaknesses that he marked before and tonight he would absolve the last one as he stood before Laura's room at past twelve at night.

He knocked on the door and waited. After getting no response he entered the room unhesitatingly and looked at the sleeping Laura who seemed to be in a deep sleep.

Obviously it was his handiwork. When he made dinner he had added plenty of mysterious ingredients on their portion of food for what was to come tonight.

Since the last weakness was the hostage situation he naturally had to get rid of the previous five weaknesses on the only two people who were deeply connected to him in his new life as they also had the potential to keep being so in the near future. After that he just needed to keep them near him or track their whereabouts to monitor if any suspicious individual came into contact with them in person or by proxy.

Blue was a severe control freak but his bitter experiences had long proved his approach to be effective.

All of this coincidentally helped into the preparation for the main quest which had to be completed after the awakening ceremony.

He promptly got to work as he still needed to do the same on Karla.

He took out two crystals with one being orb and other square shaped, shimmering with all sorts of light. These were needed to deal with the soul searching situation.

The counter for it was simple. If someone truly found themselves at such a situation that they had no choice but to get their soul searched by others then at best they should only focus on keeping the vital memory from being discovered while keeping the most publicly relevant information available for observation and reduce the damage on the mind as well as soul to the point that the harm would be temporary but gave the others such a impression that they held on with sheer tenacity. The damage should completely heal within a week at most.

The orb and square shaped crystals he took out were very rare resources even back in the Inner Area of Abyss. Obviously what others considered rare was actually more common for him. One of his women's family had a territory with a vein of such crystals and he would get her portion from time to time as he leeched off her. So he had plenty on stock. The orb one was called Soul Nourishing Crystal and square one was Memory Sealing Crystal. They plainly did as their name foretold.

He also took out three pieces of yellow paper with all sorts of words written on it and pasted two of it on the two crystals. He opened Laura's hand and put the crystal on either palm and then pasted the third piece of yellow paper on her forehead.

The yellow papers were powerful items that specified the rules for those crystals activation as well as ensuring their dormant state inside the body while merging with the mind and soul itself.

It was called "Rule Path Talisman".

Those were gained along with many other things when he invaded a certain empire's territory in his early days. He naturally modified those in such a manner to make the talismans usable in this way. He still had enough in the stock for now.

After he passed the talisman on her forehead the papers and crystals lit up as they slowly merged inside her body through the skin. Usually it would take many hours before it completely merged but thanks to all the mysterious ingredients he fed them earlier all the process he had to go through over a long time a few weeks ago now could be completed in under half an hour.

Those ingredients were such that even he didn't have much stock of it. When one considered his hoarding habit it could be seen how precious those were but alas he had to take such measures even if his wealth was depleting because of it. He always believed that wealth that remained unused would turn into trash later on so one shouldn't be stingy about it.

Blue would have got to work immediately after he was done by himself but had no choice but to postpone it until tonight because of Karla. During those days when he was out for most of the day her favorability point was slowly dropping and it got to the point that it was hanging on the 70 for a while but he couldn't just stop as he was close to finishing up his matters.

He nonetheless became uneasy as he couldn't tell whether the "infatuated" state would drop to the "interested" state very soon or not. He also feared the system would suddenly lock the [Subspace] menu because of the drop since he got the menu unlocked after completing her side mission. So he diligently worked on the relationship and eventually got it stable all the way up to 79. Just like earlier the threshold seemed to be difficult to cross over with the same approach.

Anyways, after about ten minutes the countermeasures for soul searching was done and he got to the next part.

The weakness because of blood-related matters, a blood test or anything similar.