The Master of Cards Chapter 78: Clues

Later Nia bid farewell. Alex began packing his things. He was planning to test the white sand in the Card Dimension to see if it led him to something useful.

As he was packing he tried calling Old Ren, but he seemed to be out of network area. He sighed, took his bag and closed the dojo before leaving.

As he was about to leave, he saw an aging couple run towards the dojo with desperate eyes. Alex heart beat raised a little when he saw the two people.

"Uncle? Aunty?" Alex said with a question voice.

"Alex, thankfully we found you." The man said.

"You must save him, please, help us save him!" The woman began crying on the street.

Alex was stunned and didn't know what to say. Eventually he reopened the doors to the dojo and led them in.

"Aunty, what happened?" Alex asked.

"I saw him, I saw Luke!" The woman cried. "When I saw him, he was crying!"

Alex was stunned. What was the woman saying? Indeed, the two were the parents of Luke.

Luke's father sighed and spoke. "Yesterday night, both of us had a dream. In the dream, Luke was crying and begging for help. Asking us to save him."

"...Luke?" Alex asked with bewilderment. But then he remembered the red haired Luke, who didn't recognize him, but tried to summon the being to create a blood rebirth... even though Luke had earlier died in his very hands.

"Alex, you must believe us. We tried going to the police, but they dismissed us as being crazy. We know the difference between a fantasy and reality. This wasn't an ordinary dream, it felt real!" Luke's father begged for help.

Alex was stunned in shock and wasn't sure whether to believe the two. But he momentarily considered the possibility that the parents were not delusional. "What did ...Luke... say?" He asked.

"He said... he was kidnapped. By cultists and he was being tortured. They were using him without his will... He said a monster was controlling him!" Luke's mom shrieked in tears.

Alex sighed... what did this mean? How was Luke still alive? "Is there anything else you can tell me?"

"The dream was all red. It felt like I was swimming in blood. But then Luke appeared, but he didn't look real. Like he didn't have a body, and the blood was trying to enter him as he called us out to help, but he was trying to push the blood away." Luke's father said.

Alex breathed out... There were three words stuck in his mind. "What... the... F.." His first intuition was to disregard this, but his mind kept ringing with the red haired Luke...

However, another question sprung in his mind. If, if this was really the truth, how did Luke contact his parents through a dream?

"Uncle, Did Luke ever show you his base card?" Alex asked off tangent.

Luke's father was confused, but nodded. "Luke's card, we got it specially tested so we could try to help him early on. His card was brown in color and we wanted to verify if it was the Earth Attribute.

However, in the testing, he also had an unidentifiable attribute of about 50% along with 50% earth attribute. The type was mist type."

Alex raised his eyes. "Why didn't you tell the school about it? Unidentifiable attribute is usually given priority in training."

Luke's father shook his head. "He was already suspended when the results were finally submitted. He had already beaten up some people after the test."

Alex sighed. The first time Luke turned evil, he had seen him as a scarlet tide initiate, and the second time as red haired Luke was also with scarlet tide. If Luke is really alive, he is somehow linked to Scarlet Tide.

Alex sighed. "Uncle, Aunty, I will try my best to find out if Luke is alive." He decided to look deeper into the Scarlet Tide in the future.

Luke's parents left after some assurances, but they didn't seem convinced Alex could really help them. Alex himself wasn't too convinced. If Old Ren was here, he could perhaps have asked for help. But the old man had disappeared.

Alex then thought of a person who might help him. He thought about it and eventually contacted Will, the head of the special department.

Surprisingly Will accepted the call and heard Alex's claims, about Luke at school, incident in the card dimension and finally what his parents said.

Will nodded. "Alex, I'll be honest, I do get that there is something suspicious here. However, as a special department leader, I cannot mobilize the force on flimsy circumstantial evidence. I will try to send an investigative department to investigate the situation, but beyond that I can't do much."

Alex sighed and understood. Just doing this much was in itself a pretty big favor for Alex.

Alex was starting to see a weird conspiracy shape around Luke, which was so weird in his eyes. He decided to look into Scarlet Tide himself in the future.

For now, he decided to lock up the Dojo and then made his way to the portal for the Card Dimension.

At the portal gate, Alex was stopped by security personnel when his ID was flagged. He was taken to a room.

In the room, there was only Alex sitting, but after a while a holographic image appeared. It was Qianyu.

"You didn't contact me earlier, so I had to use this method to contact you." She said.

Alex didn't mind. "Is there some work i can participate in?"

Qianyu smiled. "Actually there is indeed something. We need someone who doesn't have suspicions and also detached from the army alliance to handle a subtle job."

Alex nodded. "I'm listening."

"We suspect that the Negima Corporation is planning something big at the Highland shelter. We need someone to spy on them." Qianyu said.

"How am I supposed to do that?" Alex asked, stunned. Negima corporation? What were they planning now?

"Negima is looking for free agents to perform a mission and asked for reliable people from us. However, we suspect this mission will probably result in tremendous losses, which is why they are asking for suggestions from us instead of sending their own team." Qianyu said.

"So you want to send me on a death mission?" Alex asked bitterly

Chapter end