Imperium

Chapter 15: Promise

CLive scratches his neck and grumbles, clearly not liking to think about what he knows Regan had to go through on more than one occasion, especially since it was typically CLive's fault in some way. "...All Unity scientists were given implants in their necks that, when activated by one of their superiors... Would shock them for however long the person giving the punishment felt was appropriate..." he clears his throat and sees Edith's brows furrow in concern.

"And... that happened to Regan often...?" she asks timidly, and CLive nods.

"Yeah... it did. And it's not easy to remove implants from yourself, so he wasn't able to get it out after he left. He was too afraid of the potential consequences being death or madness. He just tells people it's broken, but really he just doesn't want anyone to know it's still there... So uh... Let's just keep this between us, alright?" he asks.

Edith looks down and slowly nods. "Yeah..." she leans back in the bench and whines. "Fuck, now I really want to see him again so I can give him a hug or something..." she mumbles and CLive reaches over, gently rubbing her shoulder.

"We'll see him again, doll. I know we will. We just have to figure out how..." he says and takes a bite of ramen.

Edith watches him eat and she bites her lip as she considers a question on her mind. Figuring it might as well be worth it to ask while the topic is on Regan, she opts to just go for it. "Speaking of Regan... I wanted to ask you about what you and Kylen were talking about back in the compound," she says.

CLive pauses his eating and looks over at her, seeing the curiosity and concern in her eyes. He sighs and nods, leaning back a bit from the table. "I... figured you were gonna ask at some point," he clears his throat. "You're talkin' about the 'Lost Descendant' thing, right?"

Edith nods as well. "Yeah... What did all of that mean?" she asks.

He considers taking another bite of ramen, but he figures this is going to be a kinda heavy conversation so he slightly moves the bowl away. "Okay... Basically, from what I understand, the founder of the Dev'al Ordon of Aramora was a woman named Ophelia Dev'mar Angevell. She was said to be the most powerful Mar—" he clears his throat. "...Mage, in the world," he says and sees her eyes widen and her head tilt.

"...Mage? As in, like... magic?" she laughs a little, but stops once she sees the serious look on his face. "...You're being serious...?"

He nods. "I am... Ophelia first founded the Dev'al Ordon, then after some time, she moved on to try expanding her reach to different lands. She found Utopia before anything was even there, and she built up the city of Sage," he explains. "But, she still had family in Aramora, which continued her bloodline as the most powerful mages in the world, but... For some reason, Regan was the only one of the bloodline to be born without magic, and it seems that this has made him catch the attention of The Director, as well as—" he stops himself from saying her name. He's not ready to think about her yet.

Edith's eyes widen more and her mouth opens agape. "Wait... Did you just say that Regan is from Aramora?" she asks, too distracted by everything he just said to notice how his eyes went vacant for a moment.

He clears his throat and nods. "Yeah, but he was too young to remember it. Aramora is a lot like Sage, so I guess the memories of his childhood just blended together. The city he lived in with his family, Eelry, was destroyed a few years after they went to Utopia and no one knew they left, so the world believed they all died, but..." he sighs and looks down, then turns and looks out the window at the walls of the tunnel zipping by. "But now they've found him... And if... if Sara knows how strong his bloodline is..." he closes his eyes and bites his tongue, feeling both fear and anger boiling in his EPC at the thought. He blocks it out.