Chapter 160: A reason behind it...
After getting one core, Neil unfortunately needed to leave the fishmen territory right away since something big had happened there.
He soon arrived at the boundary, the guards there were also acting strange.
’Why now? Tsk’ if he exits openly then they would interrogate him just like they were doing with all the other humans, and none of them were getting immediately released.
But if he just leaves then he would be even more suspicious, so Neil hesitated.
"Master, let me take care of this. I can tamper with the footage, you can leave." Nemo as always came to his rescue.
’Thanks Nemo.’ Neil thought as he quickly activated the Escape skill and sprinted towards the teleportation room.
Unfortunately, the teleportation process had also been stopped temporarily, this really put him in a tight spot.
"Sigh let me take care of this." Freya spoke, she wouldn’t want Neil to get caught either.
If things go wrong she would be implicated as well, and in her current state she didn’t want to let her enemies find her.
’...okay.’ Neil hid away from the crowd of panicked guards, and returned to normal state.
He allowed his essence to regenerate as Freya scanned the surroundings and soon found her target.
"Get close to that guy and I will handle the rest." She spoke.
"Hmm" Neil disappeared and got close to the said man, he was the one controlling the teleportation room earlier.
Freya used her sealing ability to take control of him, and within moments he began to do exactly what she wanted.
Soon Neil was standing inside the teleportation room, while the controller human started the process of teleportation and by the time others noticed it was already done.
A bright light consumed the room and Neil was teleported away, though as soon as they all discovered it, the guards informed people on the other side.
Everyone would think that the criminal was trying to escape so a lot of officers and guards quickly gathered right outside the teleportation room.
As the process of teleportation finished, they waited for the door to open and got ready to subdue whoever was inside it.
But when the door opened, all they saw was emptiness, Neil had already left the place as he could pass through solid things.
Neil escaped quickly and only after he was out of the base did he finally turn off his skill and breathe in a deep breath.
It was suddenly too tense, it seemed problems really followed him around, he just went there to get two cores and something had to go wrong at this time.
Neil quickly merged into the street with normal people but soon he noticed that something big was going on in the settlement too, there were too many officers around.
Few places were even sealed off and no one was allowed to enter. This was all so normal earlier, what had happened in such a small period of time?
’Sigh looks like I have to get out of this settlement quickly too.’ cursing his luck, Neil began to move towards the exit.
But only after arriving there did he find that the exit gates had been blocked and many lords stood there.
They had stopped people from entering or exiting the place.
’The Escape skill sure is coming in handy today.’ Neil shook his head, as he activated the skill again and moved toward the wall instead of the gate.
Since the wall was pretty thick it took a bit more time to pass through it but Neil succeeded before his essence ran out.
After he was on the other side, he started running towards his domain.
Somehow things were getting hectic, unknowingly Neil was the cause for it, again things were moving too fast.
First he found that the Analyzer skill was not actually completely free but had such a big price, it was too absurd.
Why did he not notice anything before this? Why did it trigger all of a sudden? If he had noticed it at all before, Neil would have been careful.
But it occurred only when he was at the last stage, if it’s not someone trying to mess with him Neil didn’t know what it was.
Such a big thing shouldn’t just happen all of a sudden after all.
But there was no time for it right now, running at full speed Neil arrived near his domain without any further problems.
He was breathing heavily, only once he was close enough did he finally slow down.
He looked at everyone from the distance, some siege golems were roaming around the domain, there were some giants too.
Some cloud vultures were flying around and scouting, while the elven archers were either walking around or guarding.
Soon he saw a beautiful figure who stood right beside the domain, she seemed to be practicing something.
Only after seeing her did Neil feel calmer, this gorgeous sight really gives the feeling of home.
"Hubby!" Ileana too noticed him, she smiled then her hands lowered, her palms pointing towards the ground.
The land under Neil’s feet trembled suddenly, startling him a little as he was absent-minded and wasn’t paying attention to anything but her.
Neil though did react as a large vine broke through the ground, he stood over a leaf and balanced himself as it rose to a height of over forty feet.
Her control had certainly grown so much, with her current strength growing such vines would be too taxing yet she did it quite normally.
This druid princess was certainly very special and was capable of far more than just being a healer.
After seeing the surprised look on Neil’s face Ileana smiled, she jumped from leaf to leaf and was soon standing right beside him.
"Hubby!!" The beautiful healer directly jumped into his arms, her soft and warm body made him feel healed and comfortable.
"I am home." Neil said as he embraced her tighter, inhaling her sweet natural scent.
"You have gotten better at controlling your skills." He muttered, his lips tickling her neck.
"Hmm I just remembered more of my previous life and my comprehension of my skills. In that life, I had managed to reach the apotheosis stage so my control will keep getting better." She replied, craving more of his touch.
But then she frowned, and took a step back, she looked him up and down and took hold of his hand, letting her energy scan his body.
"Hubby, why do you... suddenly appear so weak? What happened?" Her smile instantly disappeared, she looked at him with worry.
’I knew it, that sudden collapse of health wasn’t just slow degradation, it was too sudden. If it was just slow degradation then Tess shouldn’t be able to sense anything wrong right now, she noticed it means something big happened.’
One of Neil’s doubts instantly got solved.
But that left him with other questions.
It was certain that the life force was being devoured by Analyzer but why is it only now that it showed effect.
’So deterioration isn’t because of an outside factor but the sudden change is, but who did it? But more than that, if I didn’t find out about it now, wouldn’t I just die directly one day?’ Neil felt chills just thinking about it.
If not for that collapse, he wouldn’t have noticed and might have just died one day without ever knowing anything.
So it was a good thing, no?
"Sigh actually it is because of Analyzer, the more I use it the more life force it consumes..." Neil explained it to Ileana.
Also not giving too many details since Freya was also listening and Ileana also knew what Analyzer is.
Although she would be worried but it was better than hiding it, maybe she might even help him somehow.
"Ah..." After hearing the whole thing, Ileana’s eyes were filled with tears, she felt pain.
How could she not after knowing her husband only had a year or so to live, or maybe less.
She hugged him tightly as if afraid he might disappear, and sobbed, the news was really very bad.
"I will be fine, don’t worry. There are many things that can be of use, we just need to plan things through." Neil spoke, caressing her head.
"Y- Yes, no matter what, hubby we will find the solution for this." As her emotions calmed down, Ileana realised she couldn’t break down like this.
She had to be strong and help him, this wasn’t an unsolvable problem.
While holding Ileana, Neil pondered the strange situation, but just then the shadow under his feet trembled, moved away from him and soon disappeared completely.
But none of the two noticed it.
"Oh right, I remembered more of my previous life." While staying in his arms and looking at the sun which had almost sunk by now, she began to speak.
"Hmm you are okay, right?" He asked, those memories were unpleasant and her well-being was what mattered the most to him.
"Hmm I am. This time I even saw the face of my brother who betrayed me and our territory, and the monster who destroyed everything and killed everyone." Her tone grew heavy as she spoke.
Neil held her tighter and asked: "Who was it?"
"A Phantom..." Ileana replied, her voice low and serious.
Hearing this Neil was pretty shocked, she was aware that he was a phantom too, one of those violent creatures that create chaos wherever they go and kill everyone.
Will she hate him or even unconsciously start to resent him?
"Oh..." Neil didn’t know what to say, but before that Teresa spoke.
"Hubby, I love you... I can never hate you, even if you were to one day stab my heart, I would still not hate you and just believe that there must be a reason behind this. I believe you and far more than that, I just love you."
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Thanks for reading...