Chapter 70: A Plan To Save Nyx
Chapter 70
"It smells kind of like... Candy? Peppermint if I’m being exact."
"It’s a mall you idiot," Cecile snapped while walking past him toward the exit. "The ventilation probably just kicked in from the candy store upstairs. Now stop being paranoid and move. We have a plan to perfect."
Gnash lingered for a moment longer as his eyes roamed around the ceiling, but Alex didn’t blink, he just stayed quiet, maintaining that position. Finally, the burly man grunted and followed the rest.
Alex waited until the sound of their footsteps vanished completely before he dropped down to the ground. He was drenched in cold sweat and his amount of Desire Points was painfully low, but he had done it again. He was officially in the dark while they were in the light.
*****
By the time Alex got home, the city had already began settling into the warm mellow rhythm of the evening setting sun, but his mind remained anything but calm. He closed the door behind him, locked it, and stood there for a moment as the weight of everything that had just happened today pressed down on him.
Every word of the conversation he had overheard was etched into his mind, from the seven snipers with high penetration rounds to the signal jammer meant to turn Nyx into a sitting duck.
For a second, he had thought of telling Nyx about the betrayal of her closest confidant but he dismissed that thought almost immediately. He knew he couldn’t just walk up to Nyx and point fingers at the baby-faced girl, saying that he saw her plotting something really bad about her.
First and foremost he’d even be lucky if Nyx doesn’t dismiss him at that moment right away. And besides would someone like Nyx even believe the words of a man who she met a week ago, over her trusted bodyguard who had been with her for a long time, through various life and death situations?
The answer was no.
Moreover, in the world of the underworld, loyalty was often more valuable than truth, and a newcomer’s warning would likely be seen as a clumsy attempt at a power play, so telling Nyx anything was out of the question.
But maybe, just maybe if he could send an anonymous text, informing her about what was coming, then there should be a slight chance that she would take the news with suspicion.
After all Nyx was an extremely smart person, so that anonymous message should be able to plant that seed of doubt and make her more cautious.
With a sigh, Alex walked further inside and dropped onto the bed, and stared at the ceiling. The idea of an anonymous warning wasn’t bad per se, but it just wasn’t enough either. If he relied solely on a message, then he would be leaving Nyx’s life to chance. And chances right now was something he couldn’t afford.
Alex sat up and rubbed his face, still feeling the faint, cooling tingle of the peppermint extract on his skin which served as a constant reminder of how close he had come to being discovered.
He moved over to the old desk by the edge of the room, that he hadn’t used for quite some time now, and pulled out a thin sheet of paper. Since this was 2009 where digital footprints were smaller but the physical ones were just as heavy, and the southern docks were basically like a labyrinth of rusted irons and massive containers that he needed to master before the sun went down tomorrow.
Alex began to sketch the layout of the abandoned shipyard from memories of when he had visited there in his past life during an important event. He grew more and more shocked with how good the sketch he was working on matched his original memories perfectly, proving that becoming an enhanced human really helped in all round development.
He made sure to mark the towering cranes that loomed like skeletal giants over the water. Those cranes would most likely be the primary nest for the snipers, offering them a three hundred and sixty degree view of the zone where Nyx would most likely be cornered.
His plan couldn’t involve a direct confrontation with all of them at once because even with his enhanced body, there was no way in hell that he could dodge the simultaneous firing of seven high penetration rounds without being turned into a sieve.
So his best approach would be to arrive at the shipyard hours before the seven pm deadline. He would make sure to utilize the waterway to bypass the perimeter guards they would inevitably set up.
If he could swim across the harbor channel under the cover of the afternoon tide, then he could use that chance to scale the underside of the piers and enter the heart of the shipyard without ever crossing a single line of sight.
Once inside he would stealthily sabotage the sniper’s positions by knocking them out cold and disabling the signal jammer. As he worked, the chibi floated silently over his shoulder with an unusually serious expression on her normally cheerful face. She would occasionally nod her head while looking at his makeshift map.
"System show me my inventory panel. There is something I want to check."
[Alright]
[Desire Shop: Status Opened]
• Minor Luck Boost for twenty four hours — 50 Desire Points
• Body Recovery Water (Heals injuries) — 50 Desire Points
• Charm Amplifier Lvl.1 (Temporary increases attraction towards the opposite sex) — 80 Desire Points
• Sleeping potion (within two hours) — 80 Desire Points
• Random Gacha spin — 100 Desire Points
• Aura Of Seduction Lv.2 — 500 Desire Points
• X-ray Vision — 500 Desire Points
• Time rewind (Only within one minute) — 700 Desire points
[Total Desire Points: 310 DP]
His eyes lingered on the remaining Desire Points. Though It wasn’t much, it was still enough to make a difference between life and death situation if he used it correctly.
So he decided that he would save the points for a last second emergency where he could perhaps use a sleeping potion to make most of the enemies sleepy or the recovery water in case he got injured while protecting her.
Speaking of Nyx, he wondered why he was even doing all this again in the first place? Why was he even risking his life to save hers? After all, all that woman had done was threaten him. But then he realized something.
Even though they might occasionally have their differences, from the moment he had added Nyx to his harem slot, she was officially his woman. And it was his duty to protect those women. Besides they were basically the power source that he needed to reach a new level, so losing even one of them would be a loss.
And though he had constantly tried to deny it, there was still that part of him that was beginning to care about Nyx. Alex shifted those thoughts away and leaned back against his seat as he finalized his plans for tomorrow.
First by five in the evening he would be in the water, then by six, he would be in the rafters watching as the conspirators arrive to set the stage. He would make sure to wait for the exact moment that the signal would be activated, for that would be the signal that their plan was about to start.
Alex eventually lay back down on the bed and fixed his eyes to the ceiling as he went over everything, just to make sure that nothing goes wrong tomorrow.
Hovering inches away from his head, the chibi tilted her head as her oversized eyes blinked with concern.
[You know, Alex, for someone who keeps claiming that he’s only doing this for leveling up, you certainly are putting a lot of heart into a plan that could most likely get you killed before you even reach the next rank]
Alex didn’t bother looking away from the ceiling, but still a wry smile formed on his lips as he responded.
"It’s called an investment, system. If one of my sources of desire energy gets turned into swiss cheese by some shady people, then it won’t be good for me."
[Is that all? Because I think I remember a certain person’s heart rate spike up the second you mentioned her being ’your woman.’ Are you sure you aren’t just falling for the underworld queenpin’s dangerous charm?]
"Go to sleep or whatever it is you do," Alex grumbled while turning onto his side to hide his face from her inquisitive gaze. "I need my rest if I’m going to swim across a harbor in the middle of spring."
[Fine, fine! Be a grumpy protagonist]
She giggled, her light dimming as she prepared to settle into his mental space. [So that you can save your wifey. Goodnight, Alex. Don’t let the snipers bite]
"Goodnight," he whispered, while closing his eyes, but then groaned while clutching a pillow to his face after five minutes.
"Why the hell can’t I sleep? .Sigh. I guess it’s because I’m worried about tomorrow. But who wouldn’t be?’ he sighed again. "It looks like I have to drink some milk if I plan to catch some sleep early. Hopefully it should work just like how it usually helps me in the past."
So summoning a carton of milk from his spatial storage space, Alex uncapped it and drank in huge gulps till the whole thing was almost half empty. After drinking to his fill, he placed the milk carton of the floor and waited for the milk to do its work.
Not too long after, the warm familiar feeling of sleep began to tug at his mind. Surrendering himself to that warm, fuzzy feeling, Alex closed his tired eyes and drifted into the darkness.
....
A/N: Hey my wonderful readers so I got some good news, I have now uploaded Nyx’s photo so please do check it out. And don’t forget to tip our cold mama. (^_^)