Autophagy

"Huff... Huff..." Song Lei breathed in and out rapidly, trying to revitalize his body all the while keeping as silent as possible. 'That was... Something.'

Slightly reaching his head out from around the corner, he saw nothing out of ordinary down the back alley. After watching the place for twenty minutes, he managed to breathe a sigh of relief. Raising his arm, he looked at the time. It was nearing midnight, which was their pre-determined meeting time with Aston. He had to go to their meeting location in fifteen minutes.

After gathering his breath, Song Lei once more pushed the ground and started running. He was like a cheetah that was running around the town. Even if there were people, they would at most catch a glimpse of Song Lei's blurry figure before he disappeared. Keeping this high speed, Song Lei reached his destination in no time...

...

"Fuck! All of you!?" The young man shouted. His face had gone red from shouting with veins popping out here and there. Stepping onto Hugh's corpse, he ordered the men around him to search the room. "Bloody hell! You retards can't catch a fucking child on your own!? Are you some con-man that doesn't actually know how to do their job!?" He said.

The men clothed in black didn't dare to answer. They just kept rummaging through the room to see if any evidence was left behind. Unfortunately for them, Song Lei wasn't an amateur. There wasn't a single piece of evidence left behind.

"Everything was going so great..." He muttered to himself while biting on his fingernails. Now that he was calming down, his reddened face was also turning to normal. He was actually pretty handsome with a sharp chin, yellow hair, and blue eyes. His frown gave him a slightly rebellious look. "Who is this bastard that could sneak right in front of our nose and steal everything we had..?"

"I'm really sorry your high-"

"Shut up. I'm not here to listen to your apologies," the man said. "After all, it won't matter if you don't get that thing back. If my father hears that something that could significantly increase our chances of winning was lost, he will kill me. And after he kills me, he will also kill you."

"Y- Yes," the man said anxiously.

"You don't want to die, right? Then bring that thing back no matter what," The prince said. The man kept his mouth shut, knowing that talking another word would anger the prince even more. He just returned to searching the room.

The prince passed the secret passage with a talisman in his hand. As he was passing through, the talisman brightly illuminated the place, overshining all the gas lamps that had been placed on the walls. After he got out of the secret passage, he put the talisman into his pocket. He walked up to the window and stared out of it.

"Where did you go..?"

...

"Good job," Aston said as he inspected the vial of Soulvent in his hands. "You actually managed to sneak into the palace and steal this..."

"Yes, I did," Song Lei boasted as he folded his arms in front of his chest confidently.

"Stop acting, we need to go back to the orphanage. They probably won't be able to find any clues about you," Aston said. He closed the suitcase in his hands and turned towards Song Lei before saying, "When they figure that out, they'll dispatch a lot of professionals. When that happens, it will get incredibly hard to return to the orphanage."

"Okay then," Song Lei said. They started traversing the city by jumping from roof to roof. The orphanage was on the outskirts of the city. If they managed to get there without being caught, Organization would be able to keep them safe.

The rest of the trip went without any trouble. It took them about an hour to get out of the crowded part of the city. After another thirty minutes, they saw the gate of the orphanage getting bigger and bigger in their sights. Otto was also there, waiting for them in front of the gate with his arms folded.

"You came back a lot sooner than I had expected," Otto said as he unfolded his arms and took a few steps forward. "So? Is that it?" He said as he pointed his finger towards the suitcase in Aston's hand.

"Yeah, here," Aston said. He held out the suitcase towards him. After Otto took the suitcase from his hands, Aston and Song Lei walked right past him and entered through the gate of the orphanage.

Otto opened the suitcase and took a quick look. Seeing that the Soulvent was indeed there, he closed it back and walked behind them.

"Your graduation is near," Otto blurted out. Aston and Song Lei stopped in their tracks and looked towards Otto.

"And?" Song Lei asked.

"We know," Aston said.

"I just wanted to say," Otto said while doing his best to resist the pressure emitted by them.

"It doesn't even matter," Aston said. Both he and Song Lei started walking again. "We are already like graduates. We spend most of our time going out on missions. Which other trainee is like that?"

"Yeah..." Otto muttered. Aston didn't press any further and walked towards the department head's office...

...

"So you are finally graduating..." Otto muttered. "Your brother has recently been admitted to Section A. His growth is pretty good. He takes after his brother."

"That's great," Song Lei answered blandly. He didn't have any emotional connection with Lewis' brother. The fact that he was doing good didn't really make him interested. 

"Is Aston still not here?" Otto asked. He felt a strange connection with Song Lei and Aston. He had seen these two grow up from two little kids to proper young adults.

"He is dealing with something," Song Lei explained. He, too, didn't know what this thing was. Aston had told him that he had something to do on his own. "Oh, there he comes."

"Sorry... How long did you wait for?" Aston asked.

"Pretty long," Song Lei answered. "The department head will be assigning us to our active mission area. We'll probably have to act separately from now on," he said. Aston's face soured slightly.

"I know..." He muttered. Although he didn't want this relationship he had with Song Lei to end, he had no other choice.

"You two should go inside. I won't be coming in," Otto said. There was a bittersweet smile on his face. After bidding his farewells, he turned and left.

"Let's do this..." Song Lei muttered as he held the knob of the door. Aston nodded and followed along.

The door opened with a creak.

"Come in," The department head said. Song Lei and Aston had talked with this person a few times in these last three years. However, no matter how much they tried to, they weren't able to figure out what he was thinking. There was always an empty smile on his face, making him look like an emotionless murderer.

After entering, Song Lei and Aston stood side by side. The department head saw that they weren't going to sit without him telling and gestured them to sit down.

"You've worked really hard," he started talking. "I'm impressed by your performance," he blurted out.

"Initially, I thought that you were a spy that was sent here by our enemy organizations," he continued while looking towards Song Lei. "However, after all these years, I've figured out that that's not the case."

"And you," he said as he looked towards Aston. "You were given to this orphanage by a mysterious person while you were incredibly young. Although we don't exactly know who your real parents are, we know that you are not a normal person."

Hearing the department head's words, Song Lei turned and looked towards Aston.

"Your smarts are something out of this world," he said. "I'm telling this to both of you."

Song Lei and Aston nodded as thanks.

"Well, this much chit-chat is enough," he said. "Let's get to the point. You, Lewis, you'll be despatched to Russia on your own. We are thinking of establishing a new branch there. I think you're the most suitable person for this task."

Song Lei raised one of his brows. He was surprised that he was given such a task. He had expected to separate from Aston, however, he didn't think that he would be sent out of the UK.

"And you, Aston, you'll be staying here in the orphanage for some more time," the department head continued. "After a few months of working here, we'll assign you as the head of our brand new research team. You'll have a high amount of research funds in your hands."

Hearing his words, Aston's eyes sparkled with excitement.

"Don't waste my time anymore," the department head said as he smiled slightly. "Go and get ready."

Song Lei and Aston nodded before leaving the room. They went back to their dorm room without saying anything.

As Song Lei was about to start speaking, something familiar appeared in front of his face.

[You've been pulled into a dream space!]

[You've managed to break the dream space's restrictions! System properties are back! You're back to your body! Your items are with you!]

[You've managed to befriend Earth-Bound Spirit Aston Windsor. As they have high levels of intelligence, their relationships aren't dependent on a certain set of actions.]

[As you've managed to break the dream space's restrictions, you now have to defeat the main villain of the dream space to break free.]

"Fucking finally...."