Blood Nemesis
Chapter 188: Brother in law

Chapter 188: Brother in law

A few minutes later, Oliver was led inside the mansion and directed to a waiting room.

’A room full of paintings and sculptures,’ he mused inwardly, observing the lavish decor. ’Clearly designed to display their wealth. And this furniture... so grand to sit on. They’re showing off.’

Oliver’s fingers subtly tapped the edges of the sofa, his hand smoothing over the fabric and testing the cushion’s comforting bounciness.

A place of pure opulence, he silently concluded. Grand, yet at the same time, quite imposing.

Everything within the waiting room seemed intentionally designed to make anyone else feel poor by comparison.

’Ah!’ Suddenly, a thought sparked within him.

’When I have money, I should buy similar sofas.’ He decided.

He might have disliked the overt display of wealth, but he couldn’t deny his fondness for the sofa itself. It was, without a doubt, incredibly comfortable. He imagined having one just like it to watch TV from.

As Oliver contemplated the idea of lying upside down on the sofa while bingeing on shows, two maids entered the room. They carried a tray with tea and some delicate snacks.

Oliver glanced at them as they meticulously poured tea for him.

"Sir, if you desire anything, please don’t hesitate to call us. We will be waiting just outside," one of them offered respectfully.

The two maids bowed in unison and promptly exited the room.

Interesting! Oliver couldn’t help but smile.

The snacks placed before him were a kind of pastry. Oliver, being someone with a sweet tooth, was immediately intrigued. However, the actual reason for his interest stemmed from something else.

Oliver could distinctly feel a dense amount of mana rising from both the pastry and the tea.

’Very interesting indeed,’ he thought, his curiosity piqued.

He picked up the teacup, feeling its warmth.

He had heard about mana-rich teas before; these particular tea leaves were typically procured from plants cultivated on Second Earth.

However, considering the sheer density of mana emanating from this cup, he was sure it was the absolute best grade available.

’It must have cost them a few thousand creds just to make this single cup of tea,’ he mused.

A typical household could purchase a week’s worth of groceries for only a hundred creds. Yet, this mansion served a cup of tea worth thousands.

On one side of the planet, thousands lived in destitution. And yet, here, money was spent as if it held no value at all.

Oliver found himself unexpectedly amused by the stark contrast.

He knew, deep down, that he was unfit to judge others’ morality. And yet, he thought it was a waste.

’Now that I think about it, waste is literally a signal to show wealth.’

’From buying impractical supercars to buying tiny pieces of fabric of clothes and calling it a dress was all, technically a waste of money.’

’Why do they do that?’

’Because they can afford to lose money.’

’Why is it a waste?’

’Because a similar amount of money could buy you twenty regular cars. Similarly, the price of a single dress could buy you a hundred meters of fabric.’

Oliver pondered deeply for a second and finally reached a conclusion.

"I need to get better at wasting money."

When he thought about it, he realised he had never spent money without a purpose, except for buying ice cream. However, that was too little compared to the cash the Kim family was spending.

’If I want to show off like them, spending money on pointless things is the only way.’

Oliver glanced at the artworks all around him.

He was someone who appreciated art and artists, but did the artist benefit from the art they made?

Oliver wondered, as he tightly clasped the teacup and brought it to his lips.

The cup was warm. Oliver gently placed the tea on his lips and sipped it.

Immediately, a gentle wave of mana spread into his mouth along with the distinct taste of tea leaves.

After the battle yesterday, Oliver was exhausted. His blood sac was almost empty, and there was not an ounce of mana in his body.

So, as soon as the gentle mana from tea touched his body, it was absorbed into his cells, improving their vitality and recovery rate.

"Good tea. But I prefer it with milk and sugar."

Oliver muttered and quickly poured all the milk and sugar. Immediately, he felt as if he were in heaven.

The taste became a hundred times better.

Soon after, Oliver grabbed some biscuits and popped them in his mouth, chewing them with glee.

The Kim family didn’t disappoint him. The taste was genuinely great.

As he enjoyed the food, he paused slightly. Then he continued as if nothing had happened.

—

Meanwhile, the maid outside stood quietly. Beads of sweat rolled down their forehead, thinking about what they had done.

"It won’t cause any problem, right?" One of them whispered to the other.

"What would? We don’t know anything."

"But?"

"The young master did it on his own. We don’t even know what he did."

"That’s true. But we could have brought fresh pastries."

"Do you want to offend the young master?"

"No." The girl said, looking down at the ground.

None of the maids who offended the young masters of the family had a good ending. All of them were fired and later met with unfortunate accidents.

While they were talking, Oliver opened the door and came out of the room. He was chewing a biscuit as he exited the room and walked towards the maids.

"Hello." He called out in a pleasant voice. "If you don’t want to die, explain why my food had poison?"

His voice was just as pleasant and jovial as he threatened.

The maids panicked. They backed away and hit a wall.

"Hm..."

Oliver was oozing a threatening aura, and they felt fear they had never felt as he walked closer.

With nowhere to turn, they closed their eyes, expecting to be slapped.

"Hey, can’t you hear me?" Oliver took out a biscuit from his pocket. "If you don’t want to eat it, please say."

Oliver moved the biscuit to one of their mouth while smiling at the other.

"The young master did it?" The maid who said she didn’t want to offend the youngmaster was the first to crack.

As she felt the biscuit move towards her, hearing it contained poison, she caved.

"Oh! Which young master?"

"He is young Miss Jiah’s brother. His name is Woojin." The maid prayed to god in her heart and said.

Oliver didn’t seem like a good person. Both the maids were in fear for their lives.

"Yes, he might be in the training area right now. We didn’t know it was poisoned. He did it somehow, without us seeing."

"Yes, We didn’t see it clearly."

"We saw him come out of the kitchen before we went to get the pastries."

"Sorry, sir, we didn’t know."

The maid mumbled jumbled sentences in fear. Oliver pieced together the information he needed and realised Kim Jiah’s brother had tried to poison him.

"Wait a minute, if you didn’t see. How do you know he did it?"

"Hm...He was the only one there."

"He is known as a troublemaker."

Two of them simultaneously answered.

"Great, then give me directions as to where this young master is?"

—

Oliver threatened the young maids a little before finding the general direction on where he should go to teach his possible brother-in-law some manners.

Thus, he followed their direction closely and ended up in a large open yard on the back side of the mansion.

There, he could see a dozen youngsters, as old or older than he, training with different weapons.

Oliver saw some familiar faces among the youngsters. The three idiots who wanted to beat up his brother were also among them.

’Did they poison me? Who among them is Kim Woojin?’

Oliver wondered and strolled into the training ground.

Immediately, all of them stopped what they were doing and gazed at Oliver.

By now, most of them knew who Oliver was. After all, they had seen him a short while ago.

Oliver ignored their piercing gaze and walked a little forward.

"Who among you is Kim Woojin?" He asked.

"I am."

He received an immediate answer as a young handsome man standing next to the three he knew raised their hand.

"Do you have something to say to me?"

The young man asked as he pulled his sword from its sheath.

The metallic swords created a sharp, grating hiss.

Oliver walked towards the young man.

"Did you poison my food?"

The young man frowned.

"What if I did?" He challenged Oliver, lifting his sword up and pointing it at him.

"Did you or did you not? I don’t care about what ifs?"

Oliver stopped right in front of the sword.

As Oliver approached, mana was steadily flowing into the sword, making it glow in a pale blue sheen.

"I heard you are the golden fiend. Someone who showed off killing a bunch of weak mana beasts a few months ago. Do you think you can question me with strength like that?"

The young man ignored Oliver and pushed his sword a few centimetres forward, touching right in the centre of Oliver’s chest.

"I am not here to argue with you, nor am I here to question you. I want to feed this to the kind young man who fed me poison. So, let me ask you again, did you feed me this?" He took out the biscuit he had in his pocket.

For once, Oliver was being extremely reasonable.

If it were the past, Oliver, he wouldn’t have cared about confirming anything. Collateral damage was just part of his life.

Hearing that, the young man named Kim Woojin smirked. He lifted his hair up and wiped his sweat.

"I did it." His smirk deepened. "What are you going..."

"THUMP!"

Before he could complete his sentence, Oliver slid away from the sword, crouched and punched him hard on the stomach.

Grimacing, Kim Woojin hugged his stomach and jumped back.

Fortunately, he guarded himself with mana, or else, the punch would have given him organ damage.