Chapter 20: Kafka: I'm Looking Forward to It
"Yes~"
Kafka's voice practically purred, smooth as velvet. She gazed at Leon's digital projection with a perfectly measured dose of indulgence, her eyes curving in a way that suggested she was humoring a particularly mischievous child.
Beside her, Silver Wolf's cheeks burned a furious, pixelated red. Her teeth dug sharply into her lower lip. This guy is pushing his luck way too far! But then she glanced at Kafka. If her partner was willing to make such a massive, humiliating sacrifice just to play along with this guy's twisted game, Silver Wolf couldn't be the one to drop the ball now.
"Yes..." she forced out, the word grinding through her teeth, so soft it barely registered over the ambient hum of the data space.
"Man, I really didn't expect you two to actually agree." Leon shook his head, letting out a long, exaggerated sigh of pure admiration. "Ah, I really am just too charming."
He took in the hacker's furiously burning cheeks and nodded to himself. The girl's blush said it all. He was simply irresistible. To think that after only their second encounter, these two notorious Stellaron Hunters were already completely infatuated with him.
Silver Wolf's fists clenched. Watching that utterly narcissistic smirk plastered across his face made her want to reach through the holographic interface and punch him square in the jaw. She was blushing from pure, unadulterated rage, yet this idiot somehow interpreted it as a maiden's infatuation?
"Get lost, you Masked Fool," she snapped, swiping a hand through the air to cut the connection.
"Alright, alright. I know when I'm breaking hearts." With a cheeky salute, Leon's phantom projection dissolved into a shower of golden data fragments, vanishing as if he had never been there at all.
"Hey—wait! You're seriously just leaving like that?!" Silver Wolf stomped her boot against the metal floor, glaring at the empty space. She had just swallowed her pride and made the ultimate sacrifice to play along with his sick joke, and he just bolted?
[Ding, ding, ding!]
A bright notification suddenly hijacked her primary virtual screen.
Sender: Leon.
Content: Just hit me up directly on my phone if anything comes up. I'll just be an 'external member' of the Stellaron Hunters for now...
Silver Wolf stared at the text. Her breath hitched. Total, absolute silence filled the room. She—Silver Wolf, the undisputed hacker genius, the invisible emperor of Punklorde—had just been outmaneuvered. He had silently bypassed her firewalls and slipped his contact info directly into her personal device!
Her blood boiled. Oh, it is on. There was no way she was letting this slide. She cracked her knuckles, ready to launch a counter-hack that would fry his motherboard into slag.
Silver Wolf: Fine. I'll find you if I need anything.
She hammered the keys aggressively. As much as it galled her, she needed to stabilize the situation first before launching her digital nuke.
Leon: Oh, by the way, don't even think about trying to hack my phone again.
Leon: This little brick was custom-made by Aha. If you actually manage to crack it... who knows, maybe Aha will give you a blessing and make you an Emanator of Elation.
Silver Wolf: ᗜ‸ᗜ
She slumped back in her gaming chair. No wonder his firewall felt like an impenetrable, chaotic maze. It was a literal masterpiece forged by the Aeon of Elation. But wait a second—her eyes narrowed as a discrepancy hit her.
Silver Wolf: Didn't you literally just say you weren't a Masked Fool?
Leon: I said I wasn't a Masked Fool. I never said I didn't know Aha! Hell, our meeting back then was entirely orchestrated by Him!
Silver Wolf stared at the screen, completely speechless.
Silver Wolf: Seriously, who are you exactly? You're not a Masked Fool, but you casually text on a phone made by an Aeon?
Leon: Is it possible that I'm actually Stelle? Think about it. Since Aha is obviously the strongest Emanator of Trailblaze, it's only natural for Him to have a great relationship with a fellow Trailblazer like me, right?
Silver Wolf rubbed her temples, feeling a massive headache coming on. "'Aha is the strongest Emanator of Trailblaze?'" She swiveled her chair around to face Kafka. "It seems our new 'external member' knows a lot more inside information than we originally thought."
"According to the oldest records, Aha did indeed disguise Himself as a nameless Trailblazer to sneak aboard the Astral Express," Kafka murmured softly, a faint smile playing on her lips. "He spent a great deal of time on very close terms with Akivili. In a twisted sort of way, calling Him an Emanator of Trailblaze isn't entirely inaccurate."
"However..." Silver Wolf frowned, glancing back at the chat logs. "Is he actually planning to board the Express?"
Silver Wolf: You're going to join the Astral Express?
Leon: Of course. Riding the Astral Express sounds like way too much fun to pass up. Besides, the beauties on the Express are definitely on par with the Stellaron Hunters. Plus, I get to travel to other planets and collect even more beauties. It's a win-win.
A literal vein throbbed against Silver Wolf's forehead. She slammed her keyboard. "Kafka, is it at all possible that the future Elio foresaw is just flat-out wrong?" she grumbled, crossing her arms. "No matter how I look at it, this guy is a completely unreliable degenerate."
"I believe in Elio," Kafka replied, her tone gentle but carrying an unshakeable weight. "His script never deceives us. Perhaps a future entangled with Leon truly is the best possible outcome for us."
She tilted her head, a rare, genuine hint of anticipation flashing in her magenta eyes. "To be perfectly honest, Wolfie... I find myself rather longing for a life I've never experienced before."
"So, is that the real reason why you agreed to his ridiculous demands?" Silver Wolf let out a long, defeated sigh.
It made sense. If Kafka hadn't been genuinely willing, Silver Wolf couldn't imagine a single entity in the universe capable of forcing the infamous Stellaron Hunter into such a humiliating position.
But Leon? He had somehow managed it effortlessly.
Meanwhile, back on the physical plane, Leon casually pocketed his phone, ending his chat with Silver Wolf. He had a visitor. Welt Yang had come looking for him.
"Mr. Leon, I have a question I was hoping you could answer." Welt's voice was characteristically steady and polite, but beneath the refined surface, Leon's sharp senses picked up a subtle, tightly coiled tension.
"Regarding your previous... imitation of me," Welt managed to say, the words clearly tasting like ash in his mouth. He adjusted his glasses, though the gesture felt a bit stiff. "As far as I am aware, there shouldn't be any surviving witnesses to that particular era of my history."
"Oh?" A handsome, deeply amused arc curled at the corner of Leon's mouth. "So you admit that I was imitating you?"
Welt froze. Did I just willingly confess without even being interrogated?
He mentally sighed. No, it didn't matter. The young man clearly already knew the truth; otherwise, he wouldn't have gone out of his way to orchestrate such a specific, targeted performance just for 'fun'. On the surface, Welt maintained his stoic, seasoned Trailblazer persona. Inside, however, he was fighting a losing battle against a rising tide of deep embarrassment. That era was his absolute darkest history—a phase he had buried deep in the past.
"Relax, Old Yang," Leon drawled, intentionally dragging out the nickname. "If I told you that Aha personally whispered all of this into my ear, would you believe me?"
"The Aeon of Elation, Aha?" Welt pushed up his glasses once more, the lenses catching the light. "Speaking purely in terms of universal rationality, it is entirely possible that the Aeon of Elation possesses such information."
Despite his diplomatic answer, Welt didn't entirely buy it. He wasn't a native of this universe. He hailed from a completely different dimension. Even if an Aeon's cosmic authority was unfathomable, it was highly improbable that they would know the intimate, embarrassing details of his alternate-universe youth inside and out. Yet, considering the reality-bending nature of the Aeons—beings whose very existence defied mortal comprehension—Welt couldn't completely dismiss the possibility.
"However, Aha has historically only spread the kind of 'fun' that incites widespread chaos," Welt continued, falling back into his comfortable rhythm of calm, academic analysis. "I highly doubt He would be so... carefully petty about one man's past—"
Welt's voice abruptly died in his throat.
He watched, paralyzed, as Leon casually tapped a few buttons on his smartphone. A high-definition holographic projection instantly flared to life, floating right between them.
In the crisp, glowing image, a much younger, far more dramatic version of Welt stood locked in a tense confrontation with Bronya.
The audio kicked in, painfully clear.
"Why should I play the role of a failed shadow?" the younger Welt declared, his voice dripping with theatrical angst. "I have achieved what that man could not. I have surpassed him!"
The holographic Bronya glared back. "Are you crazy?"
"I'm not crazy!" Youthful Welt threw his arms wide, practically vibrating with edgy energy. "I've conquered the world! This is my own power, my own destiny—this is the real me!"
He pointed dramatically. "Enough. Get on your knees."
When Bronya didn't move, the younger Welt sneered. "You have no right to accuse me. I killed someone important to you, and you hate me. How are you and I any different?"
Complete with a stirring, overly dramatic orchestral background track and the fiercely determined, angst-ridden expression of his youth, the minute-long clip was undeniably cinematic. It hit with the impact of a supernova.
However, to the current, mature, level-headed Welt Yang, listening to those aggressively chuunibyou-filled lines was a form of psychological torture so acute it made his toes physically curl inside his boots.
"Stop, stop, stop!" Welt lunged forward, his usual dignified composure completely shattering. "Turn off the projection! Quickly!" he pleaded, waving his hands frantically at the hologram as if trying to physically swat the cringe away.
Leon obligingly tapped his screen, cutting the projection off mid-monologue. He looked up at the older man, blinking with wide, innocent eyes.
"Where... where on earth did you get this footage?" Welt stammered, pulling a handkerchief from his pocket to wipe a very real bead of cold sweat from his brow. "Tell me it hasn't been circulated."
"Oh, it just came pre-installed on the phone. It's an Aha Special Edition, you see." Leon casually shook the device in his hand, his smile utterly angelic. "Don't worry, Old Yang. It hasn't been leaked to the Astral Express data bank... yet."
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