"Halt! This is Lord Cromwell's private villa! Trespassers shall be met with force!" One of the two guards guarding the entrance, shouted.
SMACK**
"Idiot, that's the Lord's most esteemed guest! Did you do your homework?" The other guard smacked him in the head and warned before making way for Leon with a smile, "Please enter with ease, sir Leon." The guard said courteously.
Leon nodded and continued rushing in.
The guard's smile disappeared after Leon entered the villa.
"If you want to lose your job, don't drag me down with you, alright?"
The other guard rubbed his head and smiled awkwardly.
"Sir Leon was approaching us very quickly. How could I have gotten a clear look at who it was?" Feeling wronged.
...
Inside the villa, Leon placed Lina on a sofa. Her nose bleed had dried up from her high temperature body.
Leon shot a few acupuncture points to try directing the untamed energy out of her body through her orifices in order to ease her symptoms.
Leon proceeded to go fetch some water as to hydrate her body. Her burning body would've dried up her body fluids and make her dehydrated.
When Leon came back with a jug of water and cup, Lina was currently stripping herself.
Leon was shocked and placed his jug and cup down before rushing over to stop her.
Their presence had made quite the ruckus.
"Is that you, grandpa...?" Lynne came downstairs, wondering what the noise was all about before spotting the two.
"Huh? What the hell are you trying to do in my house!?"
Her favorable impression went bad once more when she saw the scene.
Leon was grabbing Lina's wrists, while her top was half taken off.
Leon was a bit stumped for words. Their position did look a bit ambiguous and could invite misunderstandings.
Noticing his silence, Lynne came up closer and saw Lina's red complexion and weird squirming behavior. Her soon felt disgusted with Leon as she thought she understood the situation.
"Are you a man? How can you drug her? What were you trying to do just now?" She questioned with gritted teeth.
Being a girl, she absolutely despised men who uses forceful methods to bed women. What was worse was that he had rejected her grandpa's offering of her to him and instead brought another woman to their home to do that kind of thing.
Leon felt the situation was turning bad and quickly explained the situation.
"Don't misunderstand! She is sick and needed to be treated immediately! Her life is in danger." Leon's face was especially serious.
Lynne was startled and tried to calm herself down. She needed to stop jumping to conclusions.
"What's wrong with her?"
"Her body can't absorb the energy from the beast meat and its burning her up from the inside. Where is your grandpa?"
"Grandpa? He... might still be in the pill room."
"Hm? Never mind then. I suppose he is trying to concoct the True Awakening Pill himself."
Lynne laughed awkwardly. It was indeed the case since Leon had left them the revised recipe and her grandpa still hasn't given up his dream of being a full fledged alchemist.
Leaving behind the recipe behind was a sign of immense trust between them. With the recipe in hand, they would be able to refine the pills themselves and would no longer need Leon and could break their business contract. But they weren't ingrates who burns the bridge after crossing it. They wouldn't dare to. Leon was still young and full of potential. He also had this powerful unknown 'master'.
"Is there anything I can help with?"
Leon thought for a bit writing down some herbs on a piece of paper.
"Can you fetch the herbs listed?"
Lynne looked at the list of herbs with curiosity.
"Are you going to concoct a pill to cure her?"
"Yeah, I can only resort to pills since I don't have any acupuncture needles. Otherwise it would be a simple matter to solve."
Lynne blanked for a bit.
"Did you say you need acupuncture needles?" Lynne asked in confirmation.
"Yeah." Leon was puzzled why she had to ask.
"Wait a moment." Lynne said as she scrambled upstairs. Leon could hear the sound of rummaging coming from above. Lynne came back down with a set of acupuncture needles.
Leon was pleasantly surprised she had acupuncture needles. He didn't think there were any acupuncture needles lying around.
"Here." Lynne handed the needles to him
"You had a set of acupuncture needles?" Leon asked, while taking the needles from her and preparing to treat Lina.
"Yeah. I wanted to learn how to use it to help my grandpa get better, but it doesn't seem like I need to anymore." Lynne said with some dissatisfaction at her vain efforts.
One of the visiting doctors had proficiency in acupuncture needles and had used it to treat her grandpa. Although the doctor was only able to expel a small amount of toxins, it was good enough to make the old man feel slightly better. The doctor was considered competent compared to all the other visiting doctors, whom couldn't treat her grandpa and suggested to send her grandpa to the hospital for an operation instead.
She had wanted to learn the skills as she thought it was quite profound and useful.
"You're quite filial." Leon saw her in a new light.
"Hmph." Lynne showed an expression that it doesn't make her happy to be praised by him.
Leon didn't mind as he cleaned the needles and got to work.
He wasn't able to expel all the energy in Lina's body before, but he would be able to do so now with the acupuncture needles.
It could have been a simple matter of driving the energy out of her body with his own energy, if her pores weren't blocked. But since it was, he had no way of sending his own energy in without tools.
However, if the pore were unblocked then she wouldn't be in this situation to begin with. The energy would naturally dissipate outside if her body couldn't absorb it. But since it was trapped inside, she ended up becoming a human furnace.
Seeing Lina squirming around so much, Leon gave her a chop on the neck and knocked her out.
Lynne stared at him speechless.
"It would be difficult to perform acupuncture needles on her when she's moving about too much." He explained.
"I didn't say anything."
She was looking at him with a questioning gaze, but he didn't want to start bickering with her.
He started inserting the needles into 64 different acupuncture points on Lina's body. He circulated his energy and sent it through the acupuncture needles and started driving the fiery energy in her body out through the needles.
Lynne could see the needles started to glow red as little bits of steam was rising from the top of it. Lina's red complexion receded to a pale once before Leon retrieved the needles after all the energy was dispelled.
Lina was no longer in danger as she was started breathing stably. However, Leon was still watching her as he was pondering an issue. Why wasn't she able to absorb the energy? Normal people were able to strengthen their body from eating beast meat, but it did not apply to Lina. It was killing her instead. He was pondering the issue deeply with a frown.
Lynne was at his side a little absentminded as she stared at him in a daze.
Leon wasn't considered good looking by normal standards, but she had discovered that he was quite charming when he was working seriously and thinking deeply.
It was unknown how long she was staring at him for, but Dwight had already snuck up behind her and whispered into her ears, "It looks like my granddaughter has finally been charmed."
"Grandpa!? What are you saying!?" Lynne was shocked and startled as she said in a panic.
Leon was disrupted from his thoughts by the sudden clamor.
"Old man, you're here." Leon nodded, as if acknowledging his presence.
"This is my home. Where else would I be? Little brat, you got guts bringing another woman into my home after rejecting my granddaughter." Dwight said rhetorically with false anger.
Leon laughed it off. The old man was salty and still wanted to pair him up with his granddaughter.
"Old man, matters of the heart can't be forced." Leon said with a smile.
"Which is to say, my granddaughter still has a chance?" The old man's eyes lit up.
The old man was very insistent.
"It's not impossible." Leon smiled wryly.
"Grandpa~" Lynne was shy as she shook the Old man's arm in complaint.
"What are you complaining about? I'm fighting for your happiness here." Dwight argued.
Lynne wanted to retort but she had no words and can only blush.
Looking at her behavior, Leon shook his head helplessly at how fast people change.. They have only known each other less than 2 days but her attitude already changed 180 degrees.
