Unsealing Emptiness

Chapter 186: Bitterness along with sweetness.

With Ozul’s new orders, Irvin and Haley began to work things out.

First, she gathered the few people who were actually capable and had some important position to inform their organization’s name.

An organization’s name might not seem too much of a deal, but just a simple name could affect many things.

Without a name, the people working here were just grinding to get paid. However, with a name, they would feel a belonging to this place. These feelings are the foundation of their loyalty and the hard work that they would put here in the future.

Without a name, they were a group of people working together for their own interests. Now, they were truly an organization.

Days began to pass as Ozul told Haley to make some method of communication at longer distances.

Although Irvin was trying his best to find capable men, it would definitely not be easy in the initial stages. That is why they would need help to speed up the process. If the communication was established, they would be able to make good use of the Order of Dusk.

.....

A week or so later, Irvin had already hired quite a few people. Although their loyalty was yet to be tested, they could only do with what they had right now.

Meanwhile, the little bit of money they had was quickly getting used up. Not only had Haley started ordering to add new things to the base, but the new people also required advanced pay.

It was just too much right now. But Ozul knew that it was only because they had just started the organization. Once it was properly established and grows, people would want to join even without Irvin looking for them.

Irvin had just thought to stop recruiting people when Haley kicked out every incompetent person. She also reassigned their previous duties if she saw that the person had the ability.

Irvin thought that it might upset Ozul, but the latter was perfectly fine with it. If Haley had not done it, he would have ordered it sooner or later.

They needed more people, but not at the cost of quality.

After a week, there were no suspicious people on the streets staring at others from a distance.

Although the Mages and Fighters could still feel the eyes on them, their system was slowly improving. It couldn’t be helped since some of the new recruits were only Fighters of the lowest rank.

Meanwhile, Ozul spent the days either lazing around or roaming the city at night.

Today, Haley looked for people who would be kind enough to sell an artifact used for long-distance communication, but she was disappointed since she had no luck.

Fortunately, she did not have to worry about that when two men knocked on the door. These two were Rank-7 Mages sent by people from the Order of Dusk to provide the initial funds.

As they entered their office and pulled out the things that were sent to them in advance, Haley could not help but stare agape at the pile of shining items.

In her younger days, she had seen things like these. But it had been more than decades, so the memory was not so fresh in her mind now.

The two Rank-7 Mages did not say a word more and left the building hurriedly. Irvin was out, and only Haley and Ozul remained in the office.

Ozul was nonchalant even in front of the pile of rare items, but it could not be said to be the same for Haley.

After eloping with Irvin, she had endured many hardships and had almost forgotten what it’s like to have such expensive things lying around all day.

However, Haley quickly controlled herself as her eyes went directly to a book in the pile of material. Haley instantly ran and approached that book.

As Haley held it in her hands, she turned towards Ozul and said, “The first part of the long-distance communication is already done. We just need two of these. We have one, and the other should be with them.”

Ozul gave another glance to the pile of things on the ground before walking away. She understood it better than himself, so it was better all left to her.

There were all sorts of things there. Most of them were Platinum Coins, and the rest were resources used for formations and stuff.

Haley stored it all in her Spatial Ring as it was all a great help. Although she also doubted that the Ashin Family would keep their cooperation once they learn about Irvin.

After Irvin came back, Haley had other things for him to do. Now with funds in her hand, Haley decided to secure this base more and hire more capable men.

Irvin particularly looked for Mercenaries as they could be of great help. Not everyone needed to become an exclusive member. They could only be the informants who would get rewards for each piece of information valid and worth something.

As for Mercenaries, they already wandered around everywhere. They surely wouldn’t lose the opportunity to get free stuff.

. . .

Over the days, the number of people working directly for the organization kept increasing. Only a month had passed, and there were already over a hundred members of the Three-Eyed Strangers.

And it was all without counting the people who only sold valuable information on a daily basis for rewards.

Haley did not forget to weed out the bad apples among the bunch. If these people seemed sincere in their work but were not talented enough, she only changed their duties.

During this time, Ozul would occasionally go out in the nights to roam around the Royal Palace. Since he did not have Mana, people were not able to sense him around the palace.

He wanted to see if he could observe and find out what formations were used behind the walls in the meantime.

Talking about formations, he had already started reading that book. Although he hadn’t yet become an expert, it let him get some ideas that were not there in his mind before.

The book was too thick and long for him to finish it in one day.

‘Well, these aren’t really hard to understand...’ Ozul thought inside his mind as he stared at the book.

Even after reading a few pages, Ozul had slowly started to learn about the formations. It let him understand the usual workings of formations, which would be really useful once in battle.

. . .

Meanwhile, at a faraway distance.

In the mansion, Alver was having the tea again in the garden. Ever since then, it had been like this for him. He could not concentrate on other matters at all.

Just at that moment, Raymond seemingly appeared out of thin air with excitement visible on his face.

Alver stood there in a daze since he had never seen his elder brother smile so brightly after the death of their sister.

“My men came back! They spent almost an entire month searching for anything relating to the Ashfall family, but there was nothing. Nothing at all!”

Alver also smiled at his words. It meant that Ozul could really be the child of their sister. He could not contain his curiosity but patiently listened to everything.

“You see, although there is no definite proof. My men confirmed that the name of Ozul Ashfall had indeed been there. Some people testified to know a young Ozul in cities far away from the capital. The ages match as well. It could only mean that he really did grow up in the Silverbird Kingdom.”

Raymond explained with unusual enthusiasm. This was his own nephew! How could he not be excited at this news?!

“What about his cultivation...” Alver muttered. He was not the only one with this question. Even Raymond had questioned the same thing.

“What else could it be? Our nephew is just a genius!” Raymond said while puffing up his chest with pride. At the same time, he reminisced about the time with their sister. It turned his mood around, but the happiness from finding his nephew to be alive was greater than anything else right now.

“A monstrous genius. Now we only need to tell him...” Alver said, making Raymond quiet down as well. Even with both of them being monsters in their own league who almost no one dared to offend, they did not think that it would be easy telling everything to Ozul.

“Who will tell him about this, how he survived, and what happened to him in these past years... These questions will have to wait once we meet face to face again. For now, just don’t let the information about this get out.” Raymond said, making Alver nod his head.

It might cause trouble for Ozul if they publicly announced something like this.

Alver turned around and looked towards the woman in uniform and said, “This won’t leak out. Whatever happened here will remain here.”

The woman hurriedly nodded her head to indicate that she understood and he did not have to put so much Mana pressure on her.

‘If it is so sensitive, why do you even do something like this in an open garden where just about anyone can eavesdrop!?’ The woman thought in her mind, but her expressions did not change even a little bit.

The two brothers remained silent for a few moments before a few smiles broke out on their face as they thought about being uncles again.

At the same time, along with the sweetness, there was also a bitterness that their sister was not with them today.

‘If you were alive, you would have been proud of him...’ Raymond thought while looking at the sky.