CHAPTER 70: CHAPTER 70: A MYSTERIOUS DEPARTMENT AND THE VERITAS SNOW GROUP

After leaving [Tower of Fates], Ethan was planning to look around near Safe Zone 9527 to see if there were any monsters left that hadn’t been killed yet. But just then, Leo logged on and sent him a message.

[No Sneak Attacks]: [Got time?]

[Windchaser]: [?]

[No Sneak Attacks]: [Come attend my funeral with me. I also need to talk to you in person about a few things.]

[Windchaser]: [You’re going to your own funeral too?]

[No Sneak Attacks]: [Of course. Not everyone gets to experience this! Relax—no one can recognize me. Not even my mom.]

[No Sneak Attacks]: [I’ll come find you in a bit. I promise I’ll give you a good scare!]

About ten minutes later, a stranger in a black suit, with a cold look and a face full of stubble, appeared at the door of Ethan’s hospital room.

He knocked and said in a hoarse voice, "Hello, are you Mr. Ethan?"

Ethan opened the door, looked him over carefully, frowned a little, and asked, "And you are?"

The man said, "I can’t reveal my identity for now. I just need you to answer a few questions and cooperate with an investigation."

Ethan nodded and led him into the room.

The man kept his eyes on Ethan the whole time. Under that stare, Ethan sighed and said, "Alright, cut it out."

The man asked, confused, "Mr. Ethan, what do you mean? I don’t really understand."

Ethan said slowly, "Pay attention to the details. Since you came in, your eyes have been on me the whole time. You didn’t look around the room at all.

"That’s not how a normal person acts in an unfamiliar place. It means you’ve been here before."

Leo scratched his head, sat down on the sofa helplessly, and said, "I knew you’d see through me. I just thought I could keep it up a bit longer."

"Other than that, did I mess up anywhere else?"

Ethan shook his head. Leo’s disguise was beyond anything he had imagined.

His looks, height and weight, voice, way of walking, even his smell had changed.

Ethan had never seen disguise work like this.

Seeing Ethan shake his head, Leo let out a breath and smiled. "So? I’m basically a different person now, right?"

Ethan asked: "How did you pull this off? It’s only been a few days, and you’re already almost someone else."

Leo didn’t answer. Instead, he took out a pair of black sunglasses, set them on the table, waited for a moment, then put them away.

Ethan looked at him, puzzled. Leo sighed, lowered his voice, and said:

"You definitely don’t know what kind of department I joined."

"It’s a department you can’t find in any official records, budget plans, or documents... it doesn’t even have a proper name."

Ethan frowned slightly. Seeing that, Leo quickly added, "Don’t worry. I haven’t gotten too deep yet. No one’s watching me."

Ethan looked at Leo and said, "Get to the point."

Leo took a deep breath and said, "I found something. It’s about the pitch-black flames."

When he heard "pitch-black flames," Ethan’s pupils widened. He stared hard at Leo.

After more than ten seconds of silence, Ethan finally asked, "What is it?"

The pitch-black flames were something Ethan had been investigating for a long time.

In Ethan’s memory, he had always been an orphan, raised in an orphanage.

But he often dreamed of strange things: a birthday party full of laughter, a few kids who seemed like his younger brother and sister playing around him.

A woman whose face he couldn’t see, but with an unusually gentle voice, holding him and softly humming a lullaby.

But soon, everything changed. In the next moment, the party was covered with bodies, and the air was full of cries and wails.

That gentle woman’s voice disappeared, replaced by a hateful voice that kept repeating to him:

"Live! Ethan, live!"

"Do whatever it takes. Grit your teeth and live!"

"Revenge! You must take revenge!"

"These people are from..."

Whenever the dream got to that point, all the sounds would vanish. Only the roar of flames filled Ethan’s ears, and he kept burning in the black fire.

From a very young age, Ethan tried to gather information about his dreams, but they were too short and broken.

He couldn’t find anything useful.

When he finally tried to learn how he ended up at the orphanage, the head of the orphanage had already died.

But after he got into college through his own effort, he began to investigate the black flames from his memories—and he really did uncover quite a bit.

The photos and files on the basement walls were all about the black flames.

Now it felt like a puzzle. Ethan was just missing the key piece. With it, he could figure out what the black flames in his dream really were, who the people in it were, who his parents were, and how he became an orphan and ended up in the orphanage.

Ethan took a few deep breaths, trying to stay calm. He looked at Leo and waited for his answer.

Leo slowly said: "A special weapon."

"I saw a special weapon that can release black flames. It’s made to fight so‑called supernatural forces."

"I know that’s hard to believe, but..."

Ethan nodded and asked, "Supernatural forces—do you mean monsters?"

Leo’s eyes went wide. He stared at Ethan and said in disbelief, "You don’t think I’m joking?"

"How could there be monsters in the real world? Shouldn’t you be more doubtful?"

"I remember you’re an atheist!"

Ethan let out a slow breath. Before, he would have thought Leo was joking. But after the events caused by the [Blue Ice Potion formula intel], he had started to suspect the real world wasn’t as simple as he thought.

What Leo said now only backed up that guess.

But the black flames in his dreams—could they really come from a weapon made to fight supernatural forces, monsters?

Could there have been a monster in that scene from his dream? Is that why a weapon made to fight monsters and the supernatural showed up?

Then why did the woman holding him tell him to live and take revenge?

Ethan’s usually calm, logical mind turned messy and started to ache, and the pain kept growing.

His hand tightened on the hospital bed rail, the veins on the back of his hand looked like they might burst any second.

But his face barely changed.

Leo noticed something was wrong and hurried over to steady him.

"Is it acting up again? I thought your condition had gotten much better. What’s happening!"

He spoke fast, tense and flustered, and was about to call a nurse.

Ethan shook his head and said slowly: "No need. It’ll pass in a bit."

Leo clenched his teeth without thinking. He eased Ethan back onto the bed, then poured a glass of water and set it on the bedside table.

Leo asked, serious and firm, "Ethan, is your illness getting worse again? Tell me the truth. I could find out if I looked into it."

Ethan nodded in silence. His head hurt, and his thoughts were a mess.

The case he’d been chasing now had new leads, but instead of progress, everything felt even more confusing.

Who was he, really? What had happened in that scene from his dream?

While Ethan was thinking, Leo asked in a heavy voice, "How long?"

"How much time is left?"

Ethan answered calmly, "About three months. Still a lot of time."

Silence. Leo didn’t speak again. He just stared at Ethan without a word.

After a while, the pain eased a lot. Ethan sat up, smiled, and said, "Dr. Axel said there’s still hope. You know Veritas Snow Group, right? They’re working on a new drug..."

Leo snapped his head up, eyes wide.

After joining the new department and holding his own funeral, he was supposed to use his new identity to get into Veritas Snow Group. But he still didn’t know what he was meant to do there.

Hearing Ethan bring up Veritas Snow Group now, Leo suddenly realized: maybe his secret unit planned to do something to Veritas Snow Group?

If so, would the new drug that could cure Ethan be affected?

Leo slowly told Ethan the situation, and Ethan also sensed something was wrong.

By his guess, the unit Leo joined was meant to deal with the supernatural—monsters.

And Veritas Snow Group had been working on a new drug. Was there some link between the two that he didn’t know yet?

But since they didn’t know what Leo’s mission inside Veritas Snow Group was, Ethan had nothing to analyze.

All he could do was wait—wait for new Intel from Leo.

Whether in games or in real life, Intel is the most important thing. Without it, you can’t do anything, and you can’t analyze anything.

Right then, Leo’s phone suddenly buzzed.