The Genius Evolution Store

Vera entered the hall gracefully, but the atmosphere in the room was already tense.

She glanced left and right, seeing all the elders in the family. Sitting on the opposite side of the room was a bald, muscular man whose suit barely covered his muscles. There were scars all over his face and body, evidence of the thousands of battles he had gone through.

Just from meeting his gaze alone, Vera felt like she was being crushed by a massive boulder.

Vera carefully greeted her father. "I’ve returned, Father."

The man continued to stare at Vera, making her uncomfortable.

However, she had advanced to rank 3. In addition, Eric had shown her the life of not giving up.

That was why Vera raised her head and looked back at her father firmly.

Her father flinched as though he didn’t expect such a gaze from Vera.

Although he showed no happiness in his expression, his voice slightly softened. "Good work. It looks like you have evolved."

"Yes, Father. The hunting event gave me the opportunity to evolve."

"I heard you got first place."

"Thanks to my teammates, we were able to reach first place."

He fell silent for a moment. "Well done."

"Thank you, Father." Vera looked calm, but she was actually smiling in her heart. Praise coming from her father was uncommon. This time, it looked like she had done a great job.

"Family head. This is not the reason we call her here." An elder interrupted him.

"And do you think I don’t know that?" Her father glared at the elder, applying his pressure as he dared to interrupt him.

"Kh..." The elder started gasping for air. "I... am sorry. Haa... Ha..."

The elder could finally breathe again after he apologized.

Vera gulped. As expected, this was her father’s usual style.

Her father looked at Vera and asked, "The reason you’re being called here is the problem with your uncle. I’m sure you’re aware of it."

"Yes."

"So, you didn’t fight for your uncle?" Her father glared at her. He didn’t apply any pressure on her, but Vera couldn’t help but tremble from his gaze.

Vera bit her lip before she firmly took a step forward. "I fought for my uncle as well as my family."

Her father narrowed his eyes. "Explain yourself."

"The one who caused the incident this time was an organization that had been targeting me all this time. I had once reported this matter to the family.

"And to prevent the incident, an adjudicator had been dispatched to request that the event be postponed.

"However, Uncle’s principles stopped him from complying with the adjudicator, which resulted in this incident."

"That was what I said about you not fighting for your uncle." Her father raised his voice.

Vera took another step forward. "No. Just like my uncle, the person in question, Auric Elfe, was also a man of principle. Whenever there was trouble, he adhered to a single principle: Equivalent Exchange.

"Uncle didn’t even know he was being tricked by the organization when he suddenly became in charge of the event. It was Uncle’s fault this time.

"Originally, Auric wanted to cause a huge problem. I’m sure you are aware of the matter of Trevor from Kallarnos University. I knew how big a problem it would cause our family.

"If not for my good relationship with him, the narrative that spread around this time would have been Uncle collaborating with the terrorists, and people would think we were collaborating with the terrorists. The military would have cut us off to save themselves.

"You should be grateful to me for managing to convince him to stop making a big deal out of it and settle it with the current narrative. Do you know how much I’ve sacrificed to even take care of the mess that Uncle had created?!"

Vera was using the authority that Auric had given her. This way, it would look like Vera had done a lot of things in order to take care of the mess. They didn’t know that it was practically handed over to her by Auric.

The elders looked troubled. If the family were investigated because of the terrorists, even if they managed to clear their name, the stigma would remain on them.

"You should have stopped him from making it look like it was our mistake." Her father stated coldly.

Vera clenched her fists, becoming a bit agitated. "This mistake, that mistake... I don’t think our family was so cowardly that we couldn’t even admit our own mistakes."

"Watch yourself!" An elder raised his voice.

"Am I wrong? What would you do if you were there? Kill him? He was extremely close with Katarina Vasilyevna and Ellia Stroph Astler. Could I kill him? It would just pull him closer to the Astler family, allowing him to use them to launch an attack that would weaken us.

"Ask Uncle to attack him? He was guarded by Chief Adjudicator Arnie and the former Lieutenant General Lunaria. If we were to attack him, we would provoke the Astler family and the Relesha family to create an alliance against us, not to mention the Evolution Association. I’m not the one who should watch myself. It’s you who should watch yourself."

"You..." The elder stood up as if he wanted to berate her. The elder suddenly froze as he could sense a chilling pressure coming from the opposite direction.

"Am I the one leading this meeting or are you?"

"I... I apologize, family head."

Vera’s father paused for a moment before asking, "What is your relationship with him?"

"We? We are friends, but because of this incident, I’m not in a position to ask him anything else for the time being." Vera specified the time. This way, they wouldn’t be able to touch her for a while.

"Very well." Her father waved his hand. "Good work. You may return to your room."

Vera closed her eyes before politely bowing to him. She took her leave with a slightly pale face as though she had finished fighting a hard battle.

This was the first time she could actually snap back at an elder. It was a bit satisfying. At the same time, she realized that Eric’s way was truly correct.

She had been passive all this time because she had accepted her fate. All she needed to do was refuse her own fate and search for a way to do it.

On the other hand, the room’s atmosphere changed slightly.

"So, what do you think?" Her father asked.

One elder said, "The military has released a statement, so we can’t continue any longer. We lack the justification, and it’s not like the Relesha family is going to let us do anything."

Another elder added, "I believe we should stand down. It’s true that Marcel was at fault. Besides, the other party’s identity was a bit special. Not only was he close to the Relesha family, but he was also favored by Chief Lucasta."

Suddenly, an elder slammed the table and raised his finger with a serious expression. "Why don’t we do this? Should we tell her to seduce him? Stop him from joining hands with the Astler family, our rival. Besides, her advancement this time must be related to him, since he’s an evolution master. He’s also good enough to find artifacts."

The elders were staring at him as though he had just given a brilliant idea. "An enemy can be an ally in the future. That might actually work."

"What about that kid from Renivans? We’ve been considering him as her spouse."

"Who cares about him? His family might be good, but he is not that good. If we’re thinking about the long-term gain, Auric Elfe is a much better choice."

"We don’t know that. A dead genius is useless after all. He has provoked a lot of people, so he might die sooner or later."

"Still, he’s close to the Relesha family. Killing him will be easier said than done."

"Why don’t we do this instead? Let’s postpone the matter regarding the marriage, at least until her graduation. Two years should be enough time to let Auric Elfe grow, and we will be able to see his true potential. However, we will tell Vera to get close to both sides so that we have choices when that time comes."

"Family head. What is your decision?"

Everyone was staring at the family head, who had been silent the whole time.

The family head opened his mouth, telling them his decision.

...

In another family, Katarina couldn’t help but look at her screen while furrowing her brows.

She still remembered the two requests from Auric.

"I have two requests. The first one is related to the organization. There’s also a chance that this organization is related to the Apocalypse, a terrorist organization from the past. The second request is information about my dad."

Katarina had expected the first one, but she was a bit surprised by the second request. "Your father?"

"Yeah."

"Well, I won’t ask you why you requested it, but I will accept your requests this time. I’ll ask my people to investigate the organization, since it’s been public. However, the second request is a bit personal, so I’ll search for it myself. It will take a bit longer, but at least, fewer people know about this request."

Katarina’s answer regarding the second request showed her consideration for Auric.

Auric smiled and nodded. "Okay. Let’s do that."

While she was in the Alps ruins, she had done some preliminary investigation, from what could be found on public forums and social media.

Now that she had returned home, she could finally earnestly investigate things that weren’t supposed to be released.

"I don’t know why he wants this information, but there are times you just need to do it instead of being suspicious about everything. Let’s see... Gran Elfe."

She looked at the screen, trying to see what she could find.

However, it had only been a few minutes since she began her investigation before her computer suddenly erupted in flames.

"W-What?!" Katarina was taken aback. She jumped out and tried to protect herself, trying to figure out what had happened.

The flame was gray in color, so she mistook it for smoke earlier. But once she took another look, it was actually a gray energy that symbolized one thing.

"This is... a unique element?" Katarina widened her eyes and gasped. "Is this why he wants me to investigate his father? A unique element that actually catches my computer on fire when I search for him?

"Wait. This is not the time to be impressed." Katarina hurriedly reached out for the cable and pulled it off.

However, her computer continued running as though nothing had happened.

"Ah, this..." Katarina was sweating heavily because the gray flame grew bigger. Her body started to disappear as her consciousness was sucked into the screen.