Chapter 286: Unexpected Finding
A week later.
*Knock!*
*Knock!*
"Come in!"
The door was opened slightly as a head poked out. "Father... May I know why you requested my presence again?"
"Come in, Theodore." The middle-aged man had neatly combed brown hair to the right. He was wearing a suit despite being at home.
His lips were twitching, making his perfectly beautiful mustache move along with it. He glared at his son.
Theodore was taken aback. When his father called his full name rather than just Theo, he knew something serious was going on.
He hurriedly entered the room and straightened his back. "Yes!"
"Have you done something to your sister?"
"!!!" Theo was startled. He thought someone had snitched on him.
As if knowing what was in his mind, his father said, "There’s no one who snitched on you. However, your reaction is more than enough for an answer."
Theo looked left and right, wondering what he was supposed to say.
"Irine!"
Suddenly, the door opened again. Irine’s head hung low, feeling like there would be another problem.
"Now that I can say it to your face, Irine, you can stop doing whatever you’re doing because of this bastard."
"Actually, Father..." She hesitated for a moment.
"Hmm?" Her father stared at her. It was rare for Irine to talk back. Because of her brother, she never talked back, thinking it would make her life easier.
She took a few deep breaths before showing the information on her bracelet. "Please take a look at this."
Name: Irine Ashavatalia
Avatar: Snow Spirit
Grade: S
Affinity: Snow
Element: Water (30%)
When both her father and brother saw her information, they were dumbfounded.
"Grade S? Wasn’t your affinity grade supposed to be..." Her father didn’t understand what was going on.
"Brother asked me to learn it, so I did. That was what I had been doing in the past week, but... I noticed something different after practicing it for five days. And now..." Irine showed the result.
"So, it’s real?!" Theo gasped. He thought what was written was rather reasonable, but he didn’t think it would succeed. He just wanted to have his sister do it to test whether it would work or not. After all, she possessed the same rating as the required element.
"It actually worked? Do you have it with you?"
"Yes. It’s in my phone. It’s a digital copy." She took out her phone and showed the technique to her father.
If Auric were here, he would be quite surprised as well. After all, she skipped Grade A and directly became Grade S.
Of course, this could also be because her absorption rate was close to Grade A. It improved her absorption a lot to the point where she barely reached Grade S. Still, Grade S meant everything. Even if she was the worst Grade S, her talent had increased.
This proved that the technique actually worked. In other words, the other techniques that store offered were also real.
In fact, Auric didn’t expect someone would be crazy enough to actually buy it. He expected it would take even longer for someone to buy it or even give a review.
But after seeing the effect personally, Irine couldn’t contain herself and gave a review.
If he looked at this family, Auric would have thought, ’Yep, only a crazy brother would ever buy that, but well, a customer is a customer, and with this, the Moon Store will become famous.’
"How are you feeling right now?" Her father asked, quite concerned about her well-being.
"Actually, I feel great. I can sense my energy much better now than usual. I haven’t tried absorbing a material, but..."
"We should test whether this bracelet is malfunctioning or if this is actually real. What material did you eat and how much did it increase?"
"The last material I ate was the Frozen Snake, it increased my element by 7%," Irine answered.
"Hans!"
"Yes, sir!" The old butler appeared in the room as though he had passed through the wall.
"Wha—! You scared me." Theo took a step back.
"Find another Frozen Snake immediately. I don’t care if you use all the servants in the mansion or how much money you need. I want the Frozen Snake within the hour."
"Yes, sir!"
The old butler disappeared. Thirty minutes later, he returned with the Frozen Snake’s gallbladder.
"Absorb it again, Irine."
"Yes, Father." She politely accepted his request and absorbed the energy from the material.
A few minutes later, she let out a long breath and opened her eyes. She checked her information again.
Name: Irine Ashavatalia
Avatar: Snow Spirit
Grade: S
Affinity: Snow
Element: Water (39%)
"!!!" This number meant everything. "The Frozen Snake was supposed to have 12% element. With the young lady’s affinity, she could only get 7% out of 12%. But this..."
Her father’s expression turned solemn. His daughter’s affinity grade had truly reached S.
If it was only 1% difference, he could use something like rounding the number as a possible reason, but with 2% difference, the only thing that could explain this phenomenon was the change in affinity grade.
Irine covered her mouth in shock. Before, she had hoped that the change was true. It wasn’t just an error from the bracelet. Now that she had confirmed it with her own eyes, she couldn’t help but fall to her knees. It was like a dream had come true.
"Congratulations, Young Lady. Congratulations, Master." The old butler smiled.
Irine was simply too happy to think of anything else, while her father turned grim.
"I need everyone to hide this news for the time being. This is a huge finding. Hans, I will need you to prepare a proposal to work together with this store. We will distribute the technique even if the ratio is 9:1 and we’re the 1."
"Understood, sir." Hans immediately disappeared.
"Irine."
"Y-Yes." Irine was still having a hard time regaining her composure.
"Actually, I think this is a good time to talk about it. When I saw the name of the store, it reminded me of a store from Esfrata that had just become popular recently. I thought about buying a technique for you, but it hadn’t released a gathering technique for your element, so I couldn’t give it to you yet."
"Oh, I know that store. It must be the Sun Store. Besides, you should praise me, Father. I discovered the Moon Store because I was curious about the Sun Store and thought it would be funny if there was an opposite of it." Theo puffed out his chest proudly.
His father just stared at him.
"Okay, I’m sorry. Go on."
The father turned back to Irine. "I think this is a good time to ask you about this. Would you like to go to Esfrata? Since the number one university, Kallarnos University, was where the gathering techniques became popular, I would like to send you to Kallarnos University. You could improve there, but I want you to investigate the Sun Store while you’re there."
If an outsider were to be here, they would think her father was ruthless. His daughter had just become talented, and he was planning to send her away so that she wouldn’t harm her brother’s future.
However, her father was actually thinking that since she had become talented, it was time for her to leave. This time, she wouldn’t be bullied because of her talent.
If she continued to stay at the house, her brother would continue to bully her. So, it would be better for her to go to another country where her brother couldn’t bother her under the pretext of investigating something.
In other words, this was an opportunity for her to get away from her brother.
Besides, unlike her lazy brother, Irine worked hard. She was also meticulous in her tasks.
"I understand, Father. When shall I depart?"
"The paperwork will be done in a week."
Irine nodded politely. "I accept the assignment."
"Very well."
"Wait. Irine can’t do it alone! Why are you sending her away?" Theo protested.
"This is not your problem."
"Father! I was the one who discovered the Moon Store. Without me, Irine wouldn’t even achieve this."
"Do I need to repeat myself?" The father glared at him. "Besides, I haven’t even punished you for forcing your sister to practice something that is not proven yet. While it’s true that the result is good, do you think I will accept this as an excuse? I will be a bit lenient because of the result, but you’re still going to be punished. You even forced the others to keep this a secret."
Theo froze.
"Irine, you can go out now."
"Yes, Father." Irine politely bowed to him and her brother. "Thank you, Brother. Irine will be grateful to you for helping Irine obtain an S grade affinity. I can now finally overcome my greatest weakness, and I’ll continue to work hard."
Without waiting for his reply, Irine immediately left. This way, there would soon be a competition. She might be one year younger than him, but she wasn’t his competition because of her affinity grade.
Now that she also possessed an S grade affinity, she thought she could work harder than her brother and surpass him. This way, her father might not have to worry about her brother anymore as she became the true heir of the family.
And if she could achieve something in the Sun Store investigation, everyone would recognize her.
As soon as she left, she muttered, "The Moon Store. And this Sun Store is also quite unique. Do they have the same owner? But if they have the same owner, why separate the two stores? Besides, the Moon Store is located in this country. If they have the same owner, putting both stores in the same country will benefit that country a lot.
"Or maybe these gathering techniques and artificial heart methods originated from the same person, but they broke up. Maybe this person had two disciples. One disciple opened the Sun Store, while the other opened the Moon Store. Because of friction between them, they settled down in two different countries, but their rivalry continued. That was why they made the Sun Store and the Moon Store.
"They were opposite to each other, but they were still linked to each other. If we could recruit the person behind the Moon Store, our family would rise to the pinnacle. If I could also investigate the Sun Store and win over the owner of this store as well, our family would become the strongest in the world.
"This is a big opportunity. However, there’s one big question. Why didn’t the owner of the Moon Store advertise this technique? Should we really hide the news? We could show a bit of our sincerity by promoting it first." Irine shook her head helplessly.
She didn’t know what her father was thinking.
"Well, I will just let Father take care of the Moon Store. He’s more experienced and knowledgeable than I am, so I know he won’t make a mistake.
"Besides, from the looks of it, the Sun Store from Esfrata has a big following. No, a fanbase called Sun Temple. Maybe as the first customer, I should also make the Moon Temple go against the Sun Temple. This way, it will support the store owner..."
She hesitated for a moment, but she reached out for her phone and tried to create the group called Moon Temple, only to receive a notification.
[Your "Moon Temple" already exists.]
"What?" Irine was dumbfounded. She searched for the group and found it, with only one person inside. "This... Is this Moonlight?"
Irine took a deep breath before joining the group.
Meanwhile, the butler was preparing the proposal for cooperation between the family and the Moon Store. Now that they knew it was real, they would spare no effort in recruiting the owner of the Moon Store to their side. As long as people knew there was a store that could enhance one’s talent, people would flock to it.
It was true that the price was quite high, but the benefit was more than enough for everyone to ignore the price.
However, when Auric saw the proposal, he only had one answer.
"No."