Michael was a little bit surprised. He didn't expect the Will of the Origin Expanse to allow Tiara to speak about her race and how she ended up in the Origin Expanse. She had been restricted before, which meant that something must have changed. However, Michael was not sure what that might be.
Even though she didn't reveal many secrets about the Silverfang Tigerfolk, Michael was intrigued by the little pieces of information she shared with him. They decided to spend more time with each other to talk more about the Beastfolks, her pasty, and if she desired revenge.
Michael was curious whether Tiara's hatred made her desire revenge, or if she would rather try helping the Silverfang Tigerfolk to find another place to live and call home. After all, the home they'd been given by taking asylum in the Origin Expanse was not quite like the normal areas in the Origin Expanse.
Tiara wanted to tell Michael more about the place they took asylum in, but a splitting headache overcame her when she tried to speak about the asylum in detail. Nonetheless, Michael got enough information from Tiara to tell that revenge was not her highest priority. If possible, she would use her future achievements to free the Silverfang Tigerfolk from the asylum and find another home for them.
After all, they were currently forced to obey the Will of the Origin Expanse, no matter what order it issued. If even one of the Silverfangs rejected the Will's order, everyone else would suffer and be thrown out of the Origin Expanse – if they didn't have a War Rune.
Michael tried to put Tiara at ease when she tried to force herself to reveal more secrets to him. She tried to fight the splitting headache, just to tell a few facts about the asylum and other places controlled by the Will.
"You don't have to tell me more. I understand what you're trying to say. And…I understand how hard it must be for you to continue with your attempts. Thanks," Michael tried to reassure her with a subtle smile forming on his lips.
He stood up, patted Tiara's shoulder, and left the room – his emotions in a chaotic mess.
For the next three days, Michael didn't leave the Origin Expanse. He spent most of his time with the subordinates that were bustling through his territory, completing one task after another. Michael chose to help with labor first. Physical exhaustion distracted him the most.
Unfortunately, Tiara and the Forest Elven of the EmeraldLeaf Adventurer team had to inform him that his Summons were uncomfortable working side-by-side with their Lord and Master.
They trusted Michael and liked him a lot as their Lord, but that didn't change a particular fact; He was their Lord, not their friend. Michael's responsibilities were different from theirs, and so was his strength. Most Summons were given basic or simple tasks. They had to do what their superiors asked them to do. Most of these tasks were focused on labor and the expansion of the territory.
Meanwhile, Michael had to control and supervise everything. He was the heart of their territory and the strongest combatant. Everyone, who had seen Michael fight was fully aware of his terrific combat prowess and knew that he was far from ordinary. He was special, and so was his status as the Summons' Lord.
Since he didn't want his Summons to feel uncomfortable, Michael decided to focus on something else. He began to spend more time with Tiara, the EmeraldLeaf Adventurer team, and his monster subjects. Sun Demos, his tamed Blood Oath Demon Monkey King, was included in this small list.
However, Michael didn't take the time to train or to go out to hunt. He spent most of his time talking and thinking about lots of things. This included the bitter fact that he had to accept the cruel reality of his brother's death.
Michael didn't want to bother the others at first, but he ended up talking to them for hours nonetheless, and it helped him quite a bit knowing that he had people to talk to by his side.
Nonetheless, Michael was low in spirits. Everything was a little different compared to before. It was just a little bit too hard for Michael to accept that there would be nobody to look forward to meeting upon returning home.
"...I should message our parents as well…shouldn't I?" Michael mumbled after spending three days in the Origin Expanse doing nothing more than talking, eating, and sleeping a little.
At first, Michael considered not messaging their parents about Danny's death, but he dispersed that thought quickly. No matter what happened between them, their parents were still their parents – whether Michael and Daniel liked it or not. They should know.
They deserved to know.
Thus, Michael collected the Agriculture-type blueprints stored in the warehouses before he left the Origin Expanse with a weary heart.
He manifested the Runic Gate and stepped through it the next moment.
Emerging inside his tiny room, Michael slumped down on his bed. He sighed deeply and opened the holographic screen of starnet messengers.
His eyes widened slightly seeing dozens of messages popping up on the holographic screen. Alice had sent him a few messages, and so had Kaleb. Even the Barbaric Couple, Zeke Lavita, Lincoln Piedra, and the Barscht triplets had messaged him.
Michael didn't open their messages, but he could guess what the messages were about. It was not hard to grasp the situation. Hence he first decided to talk to his parents. For that, he had to open his chat with his parents where he found a deciphered audio that had been sent to him three weeks ago – on the same day the AI wrote a message about the error of Daniel's Lord ID, and that he was dead.
The audio message was deciphered, and it had an auto-delete function installed. Five minutes after the audio had been listened to it would be automatically deleted and the content destroyed on the starnet messenger's server.
In the chat with their parents, Michael and Daniel had never been able to send text messages. Such messages were always deleted seconds after they had been sent, and the same happened to audio clips as well. Thus, Michael would have to listen to the deciphered audio and reply to it using the same code.
It was a hassle and something Michael would rather avoid if possible. He still listened to the audio message, nonetheless.
["We noticed that Daniel's Lord ID has been destroyed. There might have been an error, which deters the golden time, but we can still make use of this. If we hurry up, we should have enough time to complete the Resurrection Ritual to ensure that Daniel will be summoned in one of our territories – even if it's as a Summon. Message us as soon as you can. We need some of his stuff to complete the Ritual!"]
The content of their parents' audio message was weird. Michael listened to it a second time, causing his eyes to narrow, and his face to turn red.
'They don't even sound sad. What resurrection? Summoning him as a Summon…I did that already without realizing, you s….'
Michael felt conflicted staring at the deciphered audio. His finger hovered above the replay button but he hesitated to press it again. He didn't really care about his parents' voice or anything like that, but the nonchalant tone of his father was grating on him, making him feel nauseous.
In the end, three minutes of utter silence passed before Michael sent a reply to his parents' audio message.
"I summoned him, and I saw him die…right in front of me… I summoned him…and I didn't even know that it was him. He…sacrificed his life, just to protect me…" Michael said, feeling that a knot formed in his throat as he forced the words out.
Tears trickled down his cheeks and he realized only after he sent the audio to their parents that he was sitting on the ground, sobbing.
Even if the time spent in the Origin Expanse with Tiara and his subjects had calmed Michael a little bit, his parents' emotionless message broke him down once again.
He didn't have a great connection with his parents after they abandoned them – neither of the brothers had – but he couldn't think of them as good people anymore, not if they were that unaffected by their oldest son's death. Wasn't it already bad enough to abandon the kids with nothing but a deciphered chat and some money behind?
Nothing made sense anymore, and Michael wanted nothing more than to scream and shout at his parents, tell them how miserable he and his brother had been because of their decision, and what they had gone through.
Maybe, if they hadn't been abandoned, Daniel wouldn't have died…twice at that. Michael was sure that they could have done something to help them prepare for everything that awaited them as descendants of a cursed bloodline. Was that too much to ask for?
The anger and frustration that had accumulated over the years began to surface. Michael, who had always hoped that their parents abandoned them because they wanted to search for their lost sister, or that they had to abandon their children because they were hunted, began to hate his parents.
He was always very patient when it came to relationships, and he always hoped for the best outcome when it came to relationships with other people – no matter what race –, but his parents had pushed beyond the limits of his patience. They made him not just hate them but despise them!
