Standing at the entrance were four maids dressed in crisp black-and-white uniforms, their heads slightly bowed, seemingly waiting to welcome him home, just like a scene out of a movie.
Kyoji sighed when he saw this scene. This was Butler James' doing.
The old man was so old-fashioned and liked things like that — calling people "master" and all that formal stuff.
Even though Kyoji didn't appreciate it that much and felt it was too excessive, according to Butler James, it was necessary.
According to him, Kyoji had to always remind those who worked for him who the real boss was, or else they might start thinking they ran the place and act out of line.
Kyoji couldn't really protest. It sounded like a legit reason. But that didn't mean everything wasn't suffocating sometimes.
Taking another deep breath in, Kyoji walked forward.
The maids, seeing him approach, immediately bowed deeply. "Welcome back, Master Ren," they chorused respectfully as Kyoji passed by.
Kyoji offered a curt nod before heading inside.
Inside, the mansion felt exactly the same as he remembered. It even smelled the same.
With an unchanged expression, he began making his way upstairs toward his room. From behind him, he could hear Butler James ordering the maids to bring in the clothes they had bought from the House of Stellan.
Kyoji ignored it and continued upstairs.
Everything was exactly the same. The paintings, the sculpted art pieces decorating the mansion — all breathtaking. But Kyoji didn't pay them any mind as he walked directly to his room.
Without saying a word, he went straight into the bathroom to freshen up.
Halfway through, Butler James came in and informed him that dinner was ready. Kyoji instructed him to have it brought to his room, and Butler James immediately went to arrange it.
Moments later, Kyoji finished refreshing himself and stepped back into his room.
The strong smell of food hit his nose the second he came out of the bathroom, causing his stomach to rumble with hunger.
Hunger... the only thing that still made him feel human. The only thing that reminded him he was still alive, even after losing most of his emotions.
Without a word, Kyoji walked over to his bed, sat down, and began devouring the food like a hungry wolf.
The food was very delicious, thanks to the great chef Butler James had hired to take care of his meals.
It wasn't until the last morsel was gone from the plate that Kyoji finally felt satisfied and energized.
Standing up, he picked up the empty plate and placed it in front of his door — something he was used to doing, since he mostly preferred eating in his room instead of sitting alone in the unnecessarily large dining room.
Once he was done, Kyoji returned to his bed and immediately slumped onto it, exhausted.
His body was still recovering and needed a lot of rest, so he decided to push aside any plans of experimenting with the strange energy and the chaos energy inside him for now. Sleep came first.
——
Meanwhile, at the same time Kyoji was preparing to sleep, in another corner of the mansion, Butler James was meeting with someone else — a man robed in black from head to toe, with a hood casting a shadow over his face.
But even from the shadows, one could faintly make out some details. A deep frown was visible on the man's face.
"But Master, the kid got in contact with a lot of mutant blood recently. What if that's why he has the aura of chaos energy around him?" the hooded figure said after a while.
"No, I don't think so," Butler James muttered, his face serious. "The energy I sensed is too controlled to be random chaos energy running wild in his body. I think... he controls it," Butler James said, a deep frown etched across his face.
A silence followed Butler James' words.
"So what are we going to do?" the hooded figure asked after a moment of silence.
The frown on Butler James' face deepened upon hearing the question.
"I don't know for now. We'll just have to keep an eye on him and see how things develop," Butler James said after a while.
"Hmm," the hooded man grumbled. "He'll be leaving for the academy pretty soon. Do you want me to put someone to keep an eye on him?" the hooded man asked.
"There will be no need for that," Butler James muttered. Not that he didn't want to, but because he knew it would be useless.
He had known Kyoji for years now, and he knew that if Kyoji wanted to keep something hidden, even if he placed someone close to him, they wouldn't be able to find anything.
Kyoji had grown up not trusting anyone. Not being able to trust had been deeply rooted in him, making him extremely cautious, so putting someone on him would be of no use, at least for now.
"I just want you to gather information about the beast horde. Something happened during the beast horde that allowed him to control chaos energy. If we can find out what happened, we might be able to figure out what's going on with him," Butler James instructed.
"Sure, I'll get right on it," the hooded man said with a bow. "Anything else you want me to do?" he asked.
"Yes, I believe there will be a bunch of Human Alliance officials keeping an eye on him for a few days. I want you to make sure they don't find anything. I want all of this kept under wraps," Butler James instructed.
"Sure, I'll get right on it," the hooded man responded quickly.
"Good, you can go now," Butler James said, waving his hand dismissively.
The hooded man bowed once again, and without a word, disappeared into the shadows like he had never been there at all.
Butler James stood there, staring towards the direction the hooded man left, a deep frown etched on his face.
---
Meanwhile, at the same time, not too far from Kyoji's mansion, a utility truck with a worn exterior was tucked into a parking spot, with bold letters "City Infrastructure Service" written on the side.
To any passers-by, it would look like a normal truck, but that was just the outside. Inside, the back of the truck had been stripped of its normal cargo functions and turned into a tight, functional surveillance hub.
Two medium-sized monitors were mounted on a fold-down desk, showing live feeds from nearby security cameras and sensors from Kyoji's house.
There were also many other gadgets inside, all screaming spying equipment.
Two people were inside the truck working away. If Kyoji were here, he would recognize them as the two agents who had come to question him in the hospital.
Agent Rhys was sitting rigidly before one of the monitors, adjusting frequencies and tapping into the feed logs.
A cold, half-finished cup of coffee rested on top of the desk beside his monitor, vibrating slightly with each tremor of the truck.
Beside him, in a more relaxed posture, Agent Luro was slumped in his seat, fanning himself with a folded printout with a bored expression, his occasional grumbling breaking the silence inside the truck.
"Could you keep quiet? I'm trying to work here," Agent Rhys snapped as Agent Luro grumbled once again.
"Man, it smells like shit in here," Agent Luro complained.
"Yeah, I told you to take out the trash from our takeout meal, but you were too lazy, so enjoy," Agent Rhys snapped back without even looking away from the monitor.
Agent Luro just sighed in response.
"Still can't believe we're the ones babysitting him. We could've pawned this off to the rookies," Agent Luro mumbled with a bored expression.
"If we pawn it off, we lose control. You want some greenhorn noticing the implant we slipped into the kid and blowing the whole op?" Agent Rhys said, still not turning his head.
His sharp eyes stayed locked onto the monitors, fingers dancing over the laptop's keyboard, shifting camera angles every few seconds.