OP Absorption
Chapter 69: She saw through it?

Chapter 69: She saw through it?

The woman moved with silent confidence, pulling the visitor chair closer to the bed with a soft scrape against the floor. She sat, crossing her legs elegantly, the silk whispering against itself.

"We never formally met," she began, her voice smooth as polished glass, yet holding an underlying chill. "I am Rowena. A senior member of the Hunter Association’s Oversight Division."

Her sharp eyes scanned him, taking in the bandages, the IV drip, the feigned weakness. "I came to discuss the incident at the Rank 6 dungeon."

Fin kept his expression carefully blank, injecting a note of confused effort into his voice. "Incident? I... I don’t remember much, ma’am. They said... amnesia?" He looked towards where Mara had been, as if seeking confirmation.

Rowena’s polite smile didn’t reach her eyes. "Yes. The official report mentions severe trauma. Miraculous survival." She leaned forward slightly, the smile thinning. "Tell me what you do remember, Hunter Carver. Anything at all. The team? The final moments?"

"Hana’s team," he echoed weakly. "We went in... spiders? Big ones?" He frowned, letting his gaze drift unfocused towards the ceiling. "It’s... fuzzy. Pain. Darkness." He stuck to the script. The fabricated memories felt hollow, easily recited.

The room grew colder.

Rowena’s expression darkened, the polite mask cracking to reveal sheer annoyance beneath. "Stop it."

The words were quiet but sharp enough to cut.

"Stop this pathetic act right now," she hissed, her voice dropping low, intense. "My equipment doesn’t lie, Hunter Carver. Guild trackers might be basic, but Association tech is... thorough."

Her cold eyes bored into him. "I know exactly what happened to the Mana Cell Hana was supposed to retrieve. Its energy signature is screaming from inside your body right now."

His mind went momentarily blank. Tracker. Inside him? The Mana Cell? Of course. Arrogant fool, he hadn’t even considered they could track the artifact itself.

His first instinct was to drop the act. Confess? Bargain?

No. Too late. Too deep. The story was set.

He forced confusion onto his face, widening his eyes slightly. "Mana Cell? Ma’am, I... I don’t know what you’re talking about. My injuries... maybe they’re affecting your readings?" He shifted slightly, a carefully calibrated wince suggesting pain. "I just feel... weak. Confused."

He had to sell it. Utter ignorance. Baffled weakness.

Rowena stared at him, her eyes narrowed into icy slits. Searching his face. Probing for any flicker of deception. The silence stretched, thick with unspoken threats.

He held her gaze, forcing his own to remain wide, slightly unfocused, projecting nothing but painful bewilderment. He let a small tremor run through his hand resting on the bedsheet.

Slowly, agonizingly slowly, the intense pressure of her scrutiny seemed to lessen. The hard lines around her mouth softened fractionally. She leaned back in her chair, a sigh escaping her lips – not of relief, but perhaps weary frustration.

She looked away from him, staring at the blank wall as if seeing complex equations. "Impossible," she murmured, more to herself than to him. "How?"

She shook her head, running a hand over her temple. "We tested containment fields. Reinforced alloys. Even tried bonding it to high-rank beasts, veteran Hunters..."

Her gaze drifted back to Fin, but the sharp suspicion was gone, replaced by sheer, baffled curiosity. "Every single vessel ruptured. Overloaded. Detonated."

She looked him up and down again, taking in his damaged body. "Yet you... a D-rank rookie... absorb it? Survive it? How can your body possibly handle that kind of raw, abyssal power?"

She shook her head again, a look of profound disbelief crossing her features. "It makes no sense."

He needed to solidify the facade, push the ignorance just a little further.

"A Mana Cell?" he asked, his voice deliberately weak, laced with confusion. He looked down at his own bandaged chest, then back at her. "You... you said it’s inside me?"

She looked sharply back at him, her eyes narrowed again for a brief moment, searching. He held the innocent, baffled expression.

She stood abruptly, the movement sharp, decisive. The chair scraped back slightly. "It’s nothing," she said, her voice suddenly brisk, professional again. The mask slammed back into place. "Association technical jargon. Ignore it."

She smoothed her crimson dress, turning towards the door. "I hope you make a swift recovery, Hunter Carver." Her tone was perfectly polite, utterly insincere.

She left the room without a backward glance, the door clicking shut softly behind her.

---

The moment the door closed, she pulled a sleek, black communicator from a hidden pocket. She pressed a single contact.

"Report," a voice answered instantly, cold and genderless.

"Hunter Curver is alive," she stated, her voice low, urgent. "Injuries consistent with reports, claims amnesia." She paused. "The Mana Cell is bonded to him. Integrated. My readings confirm it."

"His physical state?" the voice queried.

"Inconsistent with containing that level of energy," she admitted, frustration creeping back into her tone. "He shouldn’t be stable, let alone alive. And..." she hesitated.

"And?"

"He’s good," she conceded, annoyance clear. "A damn good liar. I couldn’t break his cover, despite confronting him."

A beat of silence. "Maintain observation. Do not engage further without direct orders. We will analyze this... anomaly."

"Understood," she replied, disconnecting the call. She stared down the empty hospital corridor, her expression thoughtful and dangerous.

---

Fin continued staring at the closed door long after Rowena had gone.

’She knows.’

The thought was cold, certain. Her face had remained composed, her voice controlled, but he had felt it. Beneath the surface calm, her mana signature had churned, fluctuating wildly with suspicion, disbelief, and calculation. The amplified senses granted by his fused cores didn’t just perceive energy; they tasted the emotions tied to it.

"How annoying," he murmured to the empty room. "Guess this won’t work anymore."

The amnesia act was compromised. She knew he was lying, even if she couldn’t prove how he survived or why the Mana Cell hadn’t killed him. The Association wouldn’t just let this go.

His next plan formed with cold clarity. Wait. Heal.

His body was already repairing itself at an astonishing rate beneath the bandages, the fused power sources knitting bone and tissue. He’d play the part of the recovering victim until he was discharged.

Then he’d see what came next.

He knew, with chilling certainty, this was not the last time he would be seeing Rowena or dealing with the Association.

This was just the beginning.

Search the lightnovelworld.cc website on Google to access chapters of novels early and in the highest quality.