Beyond the Bloodline

The projected Miranda then looked around at the rest of the Estate, momentarily considering shifting the other buildings but ultimately deciding against it.

[We used to play here when we were kids…those were fun times.]

When she spoke, one could see a single fang peeking out from within her parted lips, giving her an endearing charm. Her gaze turned to the two buildings that were on either side of the Castle and she began walking towards the one on her left.

[I’d just wake up those two sleepyheads Jamie left beside him, and then go back.]

Right after she said that, the projection paused, not because that was the end but simply because Jamie stopped it.

He then walked up to the projection of Miranda, a wry smile on his face as he held up his hand above her head.

The man made a motion to pat it, but his hand phased through seamlessly as it was nothing but a projection, an echo of the past.

“But using this Echo of the past…”

**THRUMM!!

“…and accessing the records of the planet…”

Jamie’s eyes began glowing and his knowledge origin core started pumping out law energy which he let flow through his body.

His energy circuits glowed under his skin and he held up both hands to Miranda’s projection, with the golden tendrils of causality law energy snaking around them.

The Causality Index of the existence he was trying to interfere with was just too high, but Jamie didn’t care as he parted his lips and revealed his intentions.

“…I’d find the location of the present.”

No one but him heard the last line he spoke.

He was trying to locate where ‘Miranda’ was, using the projection of the past her in front of him. As far as she was on planet Estea, he could find her.

If she wasn’t, however, there was nothing he could do about it.

‘But if Miranda was the one who spread rumours about my location, then there’s a high chance she’d be on Estea right now.’

“Wanete, you still with that Dragon Blood?”

“…y-yes, Lord Jamie.”

The teenage Runemaster replied in a fluster, quickly moving over to where Jamie was and pulling out the drum filled with the blood of the dragon who attacked them on Brentlet Island.

“Thanks.”

As he spoke, the blood in the drum flowed out and coalesced into an orb that floated in the air, from which a stream of the crimson liquid flowed straight into his parted lips.

With the blood of a Legendary Realm Dragon recovering his energy, Jamie continued parsing the records of the Neutral Continent from a few weeks back, around the time Davina told him the rumours about his location started going around.

“Gosh, this is going to take a wh-!!!”

Jamie’s words abruptly cut off mid-speech and his eyes widened in shock.

“Lord Jamie, is there a problem?!”

Wanete’s inquiry went in through one ear and out of the other, as the Hybrid was still processing what he had just sensed with his spatial perception.

It was only for a split second, but Jamie could never mistake that energy signature.

His lips curled up into a grin and he chuckled lightly, placing both hands down and cutting off the flow of law energy.

“Guys…”

He looked at the Vampire trio in front of him and with a bright smile that left them dazed, he spoke.

“I’d be right back.”

*VUP!

The instant he was done speaking, he vanished.

◇ ◇ ◇

A Few Minutes Earlier.

Estudiam’s Clock Tower Roof.

4.3km from the Blue Moon Castle.

A young woman sat atop the handrails of the roof balcony, swinging her legs while gazing in the direction of a certain blue-eyed Hybrid.

She had beautiful fair skin, long silver hair with purple accents and a case of heterochromia reflected in her purple and blue eyes.

Without a doubt, she was the exact same woman whom Jamie was watching in the projection of the past he had generated in the spot where the Blue Moon Castle stood.

The only difference was that, unlike her projection counterpart, she was wearing a black long-sleeved jacket, white shirt, purple tie, black skirt and similarly coloured tights.

In the same moment that Jamie motioned to pat the head of the projection, she also raised her hand up to her head and did the same.

“I knew Jamie never did things normally, but this? Brute forcing things with the law of knowledge and scanning the records of the past for centuries in a single go?”

She heaved a soft sigh and shook her head, but she could not stop the smile that blossomed on her face as she did that.

Immediately after, she sensed another presence on the roof with her, turning her gaze towards the new entrant.

It was a man dressed in a tieless suit, with a long black overcoat draped over his shoulders, and black leather shoes on his feet.

As he walked towards the purple and blue-eyed woman, Miranda, he tossed on a pair of black leather gloves and fixed a gold chain watch onto his wrist.

The man’s facial features evoked the words ‘refined elegance’ when one looked at him, and his hair was jet black, just like his clothes.

Like Miranda, this man had a case of heterochromia, with his left eye being pure noble gold, and his right being a clear blue colour.

“Richard…”

If it wasn’t obvious after Olivia, John, and Miranda, then with this man called Richard, it should be obvious that this heterochromatic trait of having a right iris with a clear blue colour was something that the Hybrids shared.

All except the Perfect Hybrid Jamie, who had both irises blue.

“Sup Miranda, you seem lonely. Want me to pet your head for you?”

In contrast with his elegant and sophisticated looks, his tone of words was quite casual. He held up his hands towards Miranda’s head, intending to pat it, but just when his hands were no less than five centimetres away, the woman’s pupils darted in his direction.

*POP!!

Everything from his wrist to the tip of his fingers suddenly blasted apart with the sound of a balloon being popped, with blood splattering on the floor.

“I’d blast your hand to bits.”

“Woman! Say that before you actually do it!!”

Richard retorted with a loud voice, while Miranda only covered her ears like what he was saying didn’t even matter.

In the end, the man only heaved a soft sigh before muttering to himself.

“I guess I’d keep my hands to myself.”

He rubbed his hand, which had long since regrown itself, along his other arm as he spoke, taking a step back from Miranda in apparent ‘fear’.

“You knew what my reaction was going to be and yet you still did it. You have yourself to blame.”

Richard chuckled lightly upon hearing her words, putting on a new glove over his regrown hand as he replied.

“I only wanted to see if Olivia had a chance, but judging from the way both you and Jamie just acted, she clearly does not. A pity.”

“How many times have I told you that your little sister has been fighting a losing battle from the start.”

Miranda’s words revealed another identity this man possessed; he was the eldest child of the Witch of Chaos, and one of the Six Hybrids she created, Richard Douglas Cathedral.

“Well, I just came by to see what my younger siblings were up to this time, and then I caught onto your presence on my way out.

Now that I’ve seen you’re still the same as usual, I’d be taking my leave.”

Richard’s body began fading away as he spoke, and Miranda took her gaze away from Jamie and turned towards him before saying.

“Where’re you going?”

“To check and see if ‘the reason you woke Jamie up’ is trying anything fishy again.”

“I see, be careful.”

“Oh, are you worried about me? Don’t worry, Miranda dear, I’ll be careful.”

The silver-haired woman barely resisted the urge to punch Richard in the face, only shaking her head with a sigh as she turned back in Jamie’s direction.

However, her eyes widened in shock as she saw that the Hybrid was not standing in the spot where he was a few seconds ago.

He had completely vanished.

“Huh?”

Miranda let out a voice of confusion, but she quickly calmed herself and analysed the situation.

“I was looking at Jamie.

I looked away for a few seconds.

But when I looked back, Jamie had disappeared.”

The moment she got all those facts down, she instantly figured out what had happened.

Her body vanished from the balcony she was sitting on, and a good five seconds later, the sound waves from her movement finally hit.

**BOOOMM!!!!

Leaving aside the fact that more than half the rooftop had been destroyed, Miranda was already kilometres away from her previous location by the time the sound of her movements hit.