As Ardum entered the meeting room, everyone else stopped what they were doing and sat in their chairs silently.
The strong reaction of the room showed the deep respect everyone held for Ardum.
Ardum looked at everyone and nodded once with a serious expression, which was unusual since Ardum was mostly rather casual with everyone.
While Ardum was sitting down, everyone showed different reactions.
The young woman looked worried.
The older woman and the tall man furrowed their brows.
The red-haired man and the black-haired man showed interest.
The man sighed.
After sitting down, Ardum sighed.
"As some of you know, I have a younger brother called Wyntor," Ardum started.
Some of the people nodded.
"Just like me, he's currently going through that entire potential heir thing, but compared to me, he's having more issues."
Ardum sighed again.
"I always doted on him, but his towering pride made it impossible for him to accept even a little bit of help from me."
Some of the present people frowned.
They thought that Ardum was talking too nicely about his brother.
Many of them had talked to Ardum about his brother in the past, and while Ardum always tried his best not to talk badly about him, he always hesitated when it came to talking about his brother's bad aspects.
Obviously, Ardum was simply too nice to say anything bad about his little brother, even though it seemed more than appropriate.
Ardum released a bitter chuckle. "I noticed that he wasn't very careful with his Extractors recently."
"His Extractors showed signs of constantly being tired and disoriented. Obviously, that's because of their main Specter, the Dreamer."
"I think their Chief Zephyx Extractor is telling his employees to use their working time with the Dreamer as their resting period. After all, they are sleeping, right? Why would they still need to sleep after sleeping in front of the Dreamer for so long?" Ardum said with a sigh.
The others didn't show any reactions, but the change in the atmosphere showed everyone's opinion.
It was idiotic.
Working with a Specter could and should never be viewed as resting time.
"But due to my brother's very healthy self-confidence, I doubt that he would have accepted any of my advice."
Ardum sighed once again.
"Which was why I made a very foolish and selfish decision."
The two women looked at Ardum with sympathy.
Ardum was always so hard on himself.
"I thought I could help my little brother's employees by sprinkling some Restoration Dust into their company in secret."
This increased the curiosity of everyone present.
That was an unusual course of action.
But it would work.
And it also wouldn't tarnish Wyntor's image in front of his employees.
Sure, it was unusual, but it was also effective.
Ardum took a shaky breath.
"I had Sarah take care of that," he said.
Immediately, the atmosphere in the room tensed up several degrees.
The present people were not naïve children.
They could see what was coming, and they did not look forward to it.
At all!
"Tell me she's still alive!" Kiara, the young woman, shouted with nervousness and anger as she jumped up from her chair.
A moment later, the older woman pulled Kiara back into her chair, but her expression showed a tremendous amount of suppressed rage.
The man looked to the side.
The huge man's brows furrowed.
Jonathan's brows rose in surprise.
Everyone was looking at Ardum intensely.
Several seconds of silence passed.
"Sarah didn't report back," Ardum quietly spoke.
"She was supposed to report to me yesterday morning."
"Her husband said that she didn't come home."
"I can only assume that she is no longer with us."
Silence.
Stunned silence.
Sarah?
Dead?
Sarah's image shot through everyone's mind.
She had always been smiling.
She had always been the happiest and friendliest member of Cycle.
She had always taught two of the present people about how to work with Cycle's Specters.
While she had only been a normal employee like everyone else, she had somehow always been at the center, talking to everyone.
Due to her ideology, she had even refused to train in any offensive weapon, and she had only trained in stealth and running away.
And someone as kind as she had been killed?!
How?!
Why?!
This was unfair!
This was so unfair!
"Who was it?" the man with black hair asked emotionlessly.
Ardum looked at the young man.
The young man looked back.
For just a moment, the two of them looked at each other.
"I can't be entirely sure," Ardum said, "but I assume it was one of Dark Dream's three Zephyx Extractors. Most likely their Chief Zephyx Extractor."
Ardum furrowed his brows and gazed at the table.
"He has been seen carrying corpses into Dark Dream several times already."
The image of a cold, ruthless, and cruel man holding Sarah by her throat appeared in everyone's minds.
The rage and hatred in the atmosphere intensified.
"How are we going to get justice for Sarah?" the bald woman asked with suppressed rage.
BANG!
A part of the huge table broke due to Jonathan hitting it with his fist.
"Justice?!" Jonathan shouted in absolute rage.
"Revenge!"
"How do we get revenge for her?!" Jonathan corrected.
The bald woman looked at Jonathan.
Those two rarely saw eye to eye, but that didn't matter right now.
"Revenge, then," she echoed.
Everyone turned to look at Ardum.
Ardum had a troubled expression on his face. "We don't know whether or not it truly was one of Wyntor's employees," he said.
"For now, I just need your cooperation and help."
"If this situation is not handled correctly, this might turn into an actual war, which would mean even more deaths for us."
"We can't make any hasty decisions," Ardum explained.
"I doubt it," the huge man said with a neutral voice. "They have three Newbies. We have six-, five Newbies and two Johns. They won't dare to start a war with us."
Ardum looked at the huge man for a while.
"Maybe you're right," he said, "but I still need all of your cooperation."
"I want to hold a meeting with Wyntor to address this issue, but I want it to be public between our companies."
"Because of that, I would like to ask a couple of you to accompany me to the meeting."
