Chapter 602: The Investigation
Inside Shatterstar, several blue beams shot out, sweeping over the hard drive in rhythmic pulses.
[Beep beep... Ancient-grade hard drive data retrieval successful.]
Within seconds, Ethan received a response. He frowned. Ancient-grade hard drive? That didn’t make sense. This was an M.3 high-speed drive—the latest model on the market.
A soft whoosh filled the air as a light screen materialized in the cockpit. Ethan stepped closer and began scrolling through the data with both hands, his eyes scanning the holographic interface until he found the segment involving Kiara.
"Shatterstar, can you enhance the image to high definition?"
[Affirmative...]
The screen flickered several times before sharpening to an almost unnerving clarity. Every detail was visible—down to individual pores.
Ethan couldn’t help but marvel at the ship’s technology. The footage seemed ordinary at first glance: two people entering the small noodle shop, sitting down, and eating. Kiara’s fried noodles were served by a little girl. But Ethan could tell instantly that this was the real girl—the one whose body now lay lifeless in the kitchen corner. The imposter he’d encountered earlier had been someone else entirely.
In the video, Kiara ate in silence, her movements slow and mechanical. Across from her, a man ate while scrolling through his phone.
"Stop," Ethan ordered. "Zoom in on what that man’s looking at."
He pointed toward the screen.
[Beep... Recommendation: utilize four-dimensional holographic simulation projection to reconstruct the full scene for immersive investigation.]
"What?" Ethan blinked, startled—and then a grin spread across his face. "You can do that?"
[Beep... Initiating holographic virtual reality mode... Construction progress... 1%... beep... beep... beep...]
Two minutes later, the cockpit transformed. The metallic walls of the Shatterstar faded into the familiar layout of the noodle shop. Ethan looked around, momentarily disoriented. The illusion was perfect—every table, every reflection, every faint smell of oil and soy sauce felt real.
Before him sat Kiara and the unknown man. The man wore a baseball cap, his head tilted down so that the surveillance footage had only captured the top of it. His face was hidden.
Ethan crouched and looked up from beneath the brim, trying to get a better view. The system attempted to reconstruct the missing details, but the man’s face appeared as a blurred, featureless void.
"Damn it," Ethan muttered. "And here I thought Shatterstar could rebuild facial features."
His brief excitement faded. Still, he straightened and stepped behind the man, focusing on the phone in his hand.
The man’s finger was moving, scrolling idly up and down. The phone’s screen, rendered with eerie clarity, showed the home page—no apps open, no messages, nothing. It looked as though he was waiting for something.
Then, suddenly, a message notification appeared. Ethan’s pulse quickened. There it is. He had noticed this moment in the video and now watched as the hologram faithfully replayed it.
The man tapped the notification and opened the message. An image filled the screen—what looked like a faxed photograph of Kiara.
Below it were two long strings of numbers with decimal points.
Ethan froze, his mind racing. He recognized the format instantly. They weren’t random figures. They were longitude and latitude coordinates.
Ethan immediately instructed Shatterstar to trace the coordinates. Within moments, the ship’s systems completed the analysis. The results confirmed his suspicion—the coordinates pointed to the small island where he had discovered Lyla’s phone.
So that was it. When Lyla had been carrying out her Shadowstrike mission, she must have stumbled upon a fax inside the Dissenters’ office building—a fax that contained Kiara’s photo. She must have realized the numbers printed below were coordinates and decided to investigate.
The chain of events was clear now, yet the trail itself was cold. What had Lyla found on that island?
He recalled the reports: Lyla and Astrid had been taken to an island more than two thousand kilometers away. From there, they were handed over to locals who transported them by fishing boat. But then, just ten kilometers from the island, the boat had been attacked. After that—nothing. They had simply vanished.
Ethan clenched his fists. He refused to believe Lyla was gone. She still had the protective necklace his mother had given her. And his mother wasn’t just anyone—she was the Lord of the Underworld. Anything she created for protection would never be ordinary.
The only problem was that the necklace didn’t act unless Lyla was in direct danger. It wasn’t a passive shield; it needed a clear, targeted attack to trigger. Ethan grimaced at the memory. The last time he’d been on the receiving end of that necklace, the impact had launched him across the room and nearly split his backside in two.
Back in the virtual simulation, he replayed the footage of Kiara and the mysterious man again and again, searching for anything unusual. Eventually, something caught his eye.
In the side pocket of Kiara’s backpack was a small teddy bear. It had a keychain ring attached, and dangling from it was a metal tag engraved with a flying dragon logo.
Ethan’s gaze shifted to the man across from her. The logo appeared again—embroidered on the pocket of his pants. The same design. Kiara’s keychain looked brand new, as though it had been given to her recently.
That wasn’t a coincidence.
Ethan pulled out his communicator and dialed a number. "Aunt Melody, do you know which ship Kiara was on?"
"The Flying Dragon," Melody Quinn answered almost immediately. "Amber already investigated it. That ship checked out fine. The crew was thoroughly vetted—no issues at all."
So she already knew why he was calling.
"It’s already been investigated? No irregularities? Nobody left their post, no one went missing?" Ethan pressed.
"Amber said... no," Melody replied, though her tone wavered slightly.
"Alright," Ethan said after a pause. "Then I’ll keep digging. I’ll let you know if I find anything."
He hung up and stared at the logo again. "The Flying Dragon... and no problems? I don’t buy it."
His instincts rarely failed him. And right now, they were screaming that something about that ship wasn’t right.
"Well, whatever," he muttered. "It’s the only lead I’ve got. I’ll check out the Flying Dragon myself."
Decision made, he opened another line. "Amber, get me a ticket for the Flying Dragon," he said as soon as the call connected.
"Alright," she replied without hesitation. "Where are you now?"
"I’ll be at the port soon. I’ll send you my location."
"Got it."
"Oh—and one more thing," Ethan added. "You handle this yourself. Bring it to me personally. Or I can come pick it up from you."
There was a short pause. "What’s that supposed to mean? You think my subordinates—"
"It’s not what I think," he cut her off. "Can you guarantee every one of them is clean?"
Silence stretched for several seconds.
Then came a sharp beep beep beep—the line went dead.
Ethan exhaled through his nose, half amused, half annoyed. "That woman..." he muttered.
After the beating he’d given her, her... unexpected reaction—she had been oddly cooperative. Too cooperative, maybe. Was it genuine, or was she just waiting for a chance to strike back?
He shrugged. Whatever. Although he had smacked the shit out of her a bit too hard, she’d earned it to begin with. Whatever came after wasn’t his fault.