Arknights: The Holy Son's Leisurely Life — Chapter 60

Chapter 60: The Saint King of the White Crown

“Little Rabbit, wait a moment!”

Lucian carefully peeled off Exusiai and Croissant, both of whom were practically glued to his sides, and let out a light cough to clear the air. “Sorry for the unseemly display.”

He straightened his posture and offered a warm, professional smile. “I am the person in charge of Penguin Logistics. Just call me Lucian.”

“Alright, Mr. Lucian. Welcome to Rhodes Island.”

The little rabbit smiled politely and reached out her hand to greet him.

Standing close, Amiya’s petite stature was even more apparent. Even with her long rabbit ears standing upright, the top of her head barely reached Lucian’s chin. Looking at her delicate features, Lucian found himself wondering once again how such a young, fragile-looking girl ended up as the leader of a paramilitary pharmaceutical company like Rhodes Island.

But setting those private doubts aside, basic socialization was still required. He looked down to accept her greeting and immediately noticed her hands.

‘Wearing rings on every single finger? What are they for?’

Amiya’s slender fingers were completely covered in dark, heavy cyan rings. They looked cumbersome, the kind of accessories that would constantly clink against desks and equipment, making daily tasks incredibly inconvenient.

Asking about a young girl’s fashion choices the moment they met would be entirely too rude, so Lucian simply reached out and grasped her small hand.

The very second their skin made contact—

“Ugh!”

“Ugh!”

A violent, sharp pain ripped through them both, striking like a high-voltage electric shock.

Lucian felt a sudden, terrifying chill, as if he had been shoved violently into an underground ice cellar. It felt as though every drop of warm blood had been instantly drained from his veins.

Before he could process the cold, a sharp, agonizing pain erupted directly from the center of his chest. The sheer intensity of the phantom strike forced him to look down in absolute shock.

The sight left him stunned.

A massive sword had pierced clean through his chest.

But a fraction of a second later, his mind caught up. He realized this was an illusion. Or rather, it was a memory—just not his own.

The perspective was wrong. Looking down past the blade, he did not see his own clothes. He saw the flowing fabric of a woman’s long dress. Before the spreading crimson stains ruined the fabric, it must have been a beautifully pristine white dress.

A flood of rapid-fire questions tore through Lucian’s mind. Whose memory was this? Why was he seeing it just by touching Amiya? And who had driven a sword through this woman’s heart?

Lucian tried to force his head up within the vision, desperate to see the face of the killer holding the hilt of the sword that had ended ‘his’ life.

But right at that crucial second, the heavy illusion shattered like glass. The sterile, normal lighting of the Rhodes Island reception room flooded his vision once more.

Amiya was having an identical reaction. She stumbled back, clutching her chest in sheer panic. She gasped desperately for air, her usually soft face drained of all color, looking deathly pale.

Blaze reacted instantly, crossing the room in a blur to catch the young leader. “Amiya, are you okay! Where does it hurt! I… I’ll call Dr. Kal’tsit right now!”

“No, no need. I am fine.”

Amiya gently held Blaze’s arm back. She kept her other hand pressed tightly against her chest, forcing herself to take slow, deep breaths to steady her racing heart.

Color gradually returned to her cheeks. She offered Blaze a reassuring nod before turning her attention back to their guest.

“It is okay, please do not worry about me… Mr. Lucian, are you alright?”

“Yes.” Lucian nodded slowly, masking his internal surprise.

That fleeting moment just now had been terrifyingly vivid. The sensation of absolute death had wrapped around his entire body, leaving a lingering, uncomfortable phantom ache in his ribs. But as long as he understood it was merely a projected illusion, Lucian could brush it off as a rather unique experience of being stabbed through the heart.

What mattered more was the look in Amiya’s eyes. The little rabbit clearly knew exactly what he had just seen.

Amiya let out a long exhale and turned to the elite operator beside her. “Blaze, could you please take everyone from Penguin Logistics to the medical department for a standard check-up first? Let me talk to Mr. Lucian alone.”

“Eh? Alone?”

Blaze blinked, looking back and forth between the pale Amiya and the calm Lucian. She frowned, her feline ears twitching with obvious trouble. “I mean, it is fine, I guess. But why? Is your body really okay to be left alone? You cannot force yourself, alright?”

Amiya offered a cute, disarming smile. “I know.”

“I can take care of myself. I just want to discuss a very special contract with Mr. Lucian. I hope you can keep this meeting confidential for now. Is that acceptable to you, Mr. Lucian?”

Lucian nodded easily. “Fine by me. I trust you.”

Interestingly, the moment he had shaken hands with Amiya, the subtle, prickling sensation of being under hidden surveillance had completely vanished from the room. Whether this meant Rhodes Island had decided to trust him, or if the physical contact between him and Amiya held some deeper significance, Lucian did not know yet.

But he could clearly sense that the waters running beneath Rhodes Island were incredibly deep. Having a private, in-depth conversation was definitely the right move.

Still casting worried glances over her shoulder, Blaze eventually gathered Exusiai, Croissant, and the rest of the Penguin Logistics crew, leading them out of the room.

The heavy metal door hissed shut, leaving only Lucian and Amiya behind.

For a long minute, the two simply stared at each other. The silence stretched out, filling the room with a thick, awkward tension.

In the end, Amiya was the one to break the ice. She looked down, her rabbit ears drooping slightly in embarrassment.

“Um… Mr. Lucian, would you like something to drink? We have milk, or perhaps some orange juice?”

Lucian smiled, finding her hesitation amusing. “No other options for a guest?”

“Ugh…”

Amiya blushed, her fingers fidgeting with the hem of her jacket. “Because Dr. Kal’tsit strictly stipulates that I can only have one cup of coffee a day. If I do not save my ration for the evening shift, I cannot help but fall asleep at my desk… Oh, right! There is black tea! We can have black tea, Mr. Lucian!”

This little rabbit was entirely too cute. Lucian felt himself instantly charmed by her earnest panic.

He offered a showy, confident smile and reached into his coat, pulling out his own personal thermos.

“Black tea is fine too. But if you are feeling adventurous, how about trying my freshly squeezed soy milk?”

A few minutes later, the quiet room was filled with the sound of frantic coughing.

“So spicy!!!”

Amiya, having taken a polite sip of the dark red soy milk, immediately stuck out her little tongue. She wheezed and coughed, fanning her mouth frantically as her face flushed a brilliant, tearful red.

Sitting across from her, Lucian casually sipped from a cup of regular white soy milk, looking incredibly smug. “The spicier it is, the better it is for your body. Keep going, drink a little more. If you really cannot handle the heat, you can mix it with some of the regular soy milk, though the medicinal effect will be a bit weaker.”

“…Please let me mix it.”

Tears streaming uncontrollably down her cheeks, Amiya immediately conceded defeat. She poured half a cup of the cooling white soy milk and carefully added just a splash of the red, then took a tiny, conflicted sip.

After finally catching her breath and soothing her burning throat, her expression turned completely serious. She lowered her voice to a whisper.

“Mr. Lucian… your blood. Can it really treat Oripathy?”

Lucian leaned back in his chair, asking in return, “You already know?”

Amiya nodded slowly.

She took another tiny, careful sip of the mixed soy milk, letting the warmth settle in her stomach before continuing.

“Blaze underwent a routine physical examination after returning to the landship. The medical staff discovered that her cell-Originium fusion rate and her internal crystal density had decreased by an incredible margin.”

She looked down at her cup. “With our current treatment technology here at Rhodes Island, the absolute best we can do is stabilize a patient’s condition and halt the spread. I have never heard of any medical technology in this world that can actively reverse and alleviate Oripathy within a matter of days.”

The little rabbit gripped her cup tightly with both hands, raising her head to gaze intently at Lucian. “We also ran a full chemical investigation on the blood-replenishing sugar cubes you gave Blaze. Those were made using your blood, were they not?”

“Why are you so sure it is my blood?”

Lucian asked the question calmly, showing no signs of panic. “Even if your medical team knew the blood-replenishing sugar cubes were made from blood and possessed the miraculous effect of treating Oripathy, your first thought should have been some rare, exotic beast from the wilderness.”

Amiya nodded in agreement. “Yes. When I first heard about this incredible discovery, I also suspected it was the refined blood of some unknown, ancient species. After all, I had never heard of any living race whose blood could not register even a single microscopic trace of Originium crystals.”

She paused, the atmosphere in the room growing heavy.

“But here on Rhodes Island, there is someone who knows exactly who you are.”

Amiya’s large eyes were bright, piercing, and filled with absolute certainty. “You are the Holy Son of Laterano. The one recorded in the most ancient, hidden teachings of the Sankta. The one who will descend to the world before the apocalypse, preside over the final judgment, and eliminate all evil—the Saint King.”