“Where are we going?” Gulping down a mouthful of saliva in hesitation, Lucas asked.

They’ve been walking for almost 2 hours. It’s been even longer since they passed through the inner gates of the Academy City.

There were 7 Sentry class Heroes guarding the gates but none of them objected to Sam and Lucas for passing through the gates.

It was as if they were all in a daze. Like letting the students pass through the gates was nothing out of the ordinary for them.

At first Lucas thought that Sam had bought the guards with money, but then he remembered an article on the internet. It was written that because the Progenitor was able to manipulate biology on cellular levels, it wasn’t difficult for him to mind control people.

‘Did he mind control them?’ Lucas wondered as he watched the black-haired boy walking in front of him.

“At the risk of repeating myself, w-where are we going?” Lucas asked while desperately trying to stop himself from stuttering.

“We’ll be there in a few minutes,” Sam replied casually.

‘We’ll be where in a few minutes?’ Lucas thought in his mind, not daring to ask the question out loud.

They were already on the outskirts of the city. There were few houses and even fewer people. Mostly factories and workshops were the only things in sight.

Why would Sam take him here? That was the only question on Lucas’ mind.

‘Am I not trustworthy enough? Is he going to kill me…?’ blue lines appeared on his forehead as Lucas thought that.

“Relax, if I wanted to kill you, I would’ve done that in the Academy. Who would’ve stopped me anyway?” As if reading his mind, Sam stated.

“…Did you read my mind?”_.

“Lucas, mate, do you really think you’re worthy enough for me to use my ability on you on my own initiative?”

“…Wha-What does that mean?” bewildered, Lucas questioned.

“Why would I trouble myself by using my ability? You’re easy to read.”

That statement pierced right through Lucas.

‘Easy to read? Me?! Your mom was easier!’ he cursed in his mind.

“Like now, you’re thinking something along the lines “Your mother was easier!’ right?”

“…”

“Hahaha! Your face! You look like you’re about to cry!” Sam couldn’t hold back and started after witnessing Lucas’ pitiful state.

Gritting his teeth, Lucas just looked away. Maybe he really was easy to read.

Like that, the duo kept walking for another hour or two. It wasn’t around 3:00 in the morning when they arrived at their destination.

“We’re here,” stopping his feet in front of a small house, Sam said.

Lucas, out of curiosity, eyed the house they had stopped in front of with wide eyes.

The house was on the outskirts of Academy City. Behind, there were only factories and workshops. In front, there was only flattened land.

It wasn’t until at least a few hundred kilometres till the next settlement.

The house itself wasn’t in a very good shape either. The roof had a massive hole in it and the walls were all vandalized. It looked like someone had used this house as a battleground not too long ago.

Is it even safe to enter here? Lucas was questioning that in his mind.

“It is safe,” Sam answered his worry. “Now come on in.”

Following Sam in through the gates, Lucas stepped inside the house.

When they got to the hall, Lucas noticed that the crack that was in the ceiling was followed by a hole on the floor. However, that hole was now sealed by plaster.

“Come,” Sam said before opening a door to the far left of the entrance and taking the stairs down.

“Are we going down? Is there a basement below?” Lucas asked an obvious question to which he got no response.

After twirling his neck side to side for a second, he decided to follow the black-haired boy down anyway.

-Knock -Knock -Knock

When he descended down the stairs, Lucas saw Sam knocking on the basement entrance door.

‘Is there someone else here?’ shot up through Lucas’ mind.

It all was feeling a bit sketchy to Lucas but what else could he expect from following a boy claiming to be the kin of Progenitor?

-Click

With a click sound in the next moment, the door opened up.

However, after looking at the person who opened the door, Lucas couldn’t gulp down hard and widen his eyes in shock.

It was Sam. It was Sam who had opened the door! But Sam was beside him! Then how were there two Sam?!

At that moment, he remembered reading something about Progenitor’s ability to clone himself. Truly, his ability was the most broken one!

‘So he really is the Progenitor…’

Lucas looked at the Sam beside him. It was now clear to him that Sam really was the new Progenitor.

At that moment, before Lucas could think anything else, the Sam who had opened the door spoke up.

“Which clone number are you?” Sam’s clone said from behind the door.

“You fucker, can’t you tell? I’m the real one!” Pushing him to the side, Sam entered the basement first and Lucas followed behind.

“S-Sorry sir…” the clone said in an apologetic tone while making a way for Lucas to enter.

When Lucas entered the basement behind Sam, he saw the sight he wasn’t expecting.

He expected there to be some kind of torture room or shady stuff, but it looked more like a… lab. Yes, it looked more like a science lab.

Burners, beakers, test tubes, and all kinds of cutting edge scientific tools and machinery were present there being operated by several clones of Sam.

Scent of chemicals greeted Lucas as he stood there in a daze, watching Sam’s clones doing their work.

White roof lighting lit up the white marble room and at the center of that room was present a huge container.

The container was see-through so Lucas peeked inside and found a test tube filled with some red blood like liquid present there at the center of it.

“That container is made of a material known as Hyper Glass. Even if you fire a nuke at it, it won’t break.” Sam commented after looking at Lucas’ curious face. “It’s alone worth billions of dollars, but what’s inside it is worth much more.”

“That test tube?” Lucas asked with a frown, thinking what could be in that test tube that can be worth more than billions of dollars. “What’s in it?”

Sam, who had already seen that question coming, walked up to the container and opened it by placing a finger on the fingerprint scanner.

He took out that test tube filled with the red blood like liquid before speaking.

“In my hands I contain a mystery. A mystery that, if solved, could throw this world into chaos.” A smirk appeared on Sam’s face as he dramatically held up the test tube in his hand. “Wouldn’t it be ironic? The cause of their sufferings this time would be the people that they have deemed as their protectors.”

“I-I don’t understand…” confused even more so than before, Lucas uttered.

“Of course you don’t,” putting the test tube back in the glass container and locking it, Sam said. “It’s the blood of Willburns. I obtained it from Rebekah.”

Those words fell like a bomb on Lucas, but his curiosity wasn’t settled yet. Why does Sam have a test tube full of Rebekah’s blood? What is he going to do with it?

However, it didn’t take him long to realize what’s happening here. Sam, who had the ability to manipulate biology, was experimenting on Willburn’s blood. But why? Why was he doing such a thing?

“Are you wondering why?” Sam, who still had a smirk plastered on his face, asked Lucas.

“Wh-What?” startled, Lucas shook his head.

“Don’t be afraid mate, I’ll tell you why,” the smirk on Sam’s face grew even wider.

“As you may know, I can manipulate the physical form of all life, biology. But for some bizarre reason I couldn’t manipulate the biology of anyone belonging to Willburn’s bloodline.

“At first I was frustrated. You see, I’ve lived like a God. No one in this world, no one whose biology I know of at least, can disobey me. Because, I can literally kill anyone with just a thought or twist their brain to make them work according to me.”

Sam took a pause to see Lucas trying to keep himself from showing any signs of fear. That little behaviour amused Sam.

“Now when I was faced with the reality that there were these pests! These pests who could deny my authority, made me frustrated!

“So I became haisty and tried to kill one of their family members, Rebekah. Needless to say, she whooped my ass,” admitted Sam pretty shamelessly.

“But but but, I managed to get something out of that whole ordeal. I got her blood. I got the DNA sequence of the Willburns!

“Now all I had to do was study it and understand their biology. After that, I could kill them! Pretty simple right!

“However, simple doesn’t mean easy. Studying the sample of blood that I had obtained, after quite literally trading my life for it, was different. So different that it was almost foreign. Yes, it was an alien DNA.”

Silence. Utter silence filled up Lucas’ ears as he heard those words. It felt like he had just uncovered a secret he shouldn’t have.

“So… did you complete your study?” In a shaky voice, Lucas inquired.

“No. I mean yes, I completed all the theory part, but now I need test subjects,” the smirk that Sam was wearing was now slowly starting to turn into a smile. A wide creepy smile. “Human test subjects.”