Weird Or Special?

"Ahem! Miss Sasha, please continue with your questioning." Raymond gently reminded Sasha who was lost in her thoughts.

"Ugh, yeah right!" Sasha took a deep breath to calm down. She would worry about Ray later. Saving her brother was the priority now.

Her gaze landed on Mobi, who had a smirk plastered on his face.

"Wipe that stupid smirk off your face!" Sasha spat. "Tell me if you know of anyone who would dare to do such a thing."

"Look, missy. I don't know anyone like that, alright?" Mobi spoke calmly despite his fear of Raymond. "Maybe some guy who was desperate for money did it! How am I supposed to know these things when I am locked up here?"

"Tch, that's the thing! It has been a day since the kidnapping happened and no one has asked for a ransom!"

"Hmm, that's strange!"

Mobi thought aloud. Since the guy was high-profiled then the best bet would be that he was kidnapped for money. If not…

Mobi's eyes widened as the realisation hit him.

"That's it! If it is not for money then there is a high chance it is done by some powerful cultivator who has reached a bottleneck!" He said and the more he spoke the more sense it made.

"Wh-what do you mean?"

Sasha's voice shook at his words. An ominous feeling took over her body as she thought of the worst. If her brother was abducted by some evil cultivator then he was probably dead by now.

Their Phoenix bloodline was highly sought out by the rest of the world due to its regenerative and healing abilities. Not to mention the significant cultivation boost the bloodline provided.

Even though her third brother didn't inherit their bloodline to the greatest degree like Sasha, he could still be considered a valuable cultivation resource by evil cultivators.

"Haha, don't act like you don't know! He might have been sucked dry by now." Mobi chuckled looking at Sasha's pale face.

"Hehe, you seem to be enjoying this!" Raymond raised his eyebrows at Mobi with a thin smile on his face.

Mobi quickly backed off from the door, with a forced smile, he said:

"Hah, haha, definitely not!"

"Say, if you kidnapped someone for nefarious reasons, where would you take them?" Raymond asked seeing as Sasha was deep in thinking.

Mobi felt like he was being compared to some slimy old evil cultivator. He was far more handsome than someone like that. If he wanted, then women would line up to become his wives, he wouldn't resort to kidnapping.

"Stop preening your beard and answer my question!"

Raymond bellowed. This bastard was daydreaming in the middle of their conversation. Raymond felt like smacking him across the face.

"Well, if it was a woman, hehe, then I would take her to my hideout," Mobi smiled lecherously while rubbing his hands together.

"If it was some bloke then I would take him to the west side forest where it is easy to perform dark rituals!"

"Err…which one?" Raymond asked.

"You know, there was an incident a few days ago." Mobi gestured for Raymond to come closer to the door. "Apparently, the whole inner forest region disappeared for some reason!" He whispered.

"Hey! Isn't that—"

"Yeah, it's the same forest." Raymond was cut off by Mobi's voice. "There were many rumours about a strange creature living there, I used to hear it from my mother when I was a kid!"

"People say that its presence made it easier to perform dark magic!"

-Gasp!

Sasha gasped remembering the demonic wyvern they had encountered last time. But she soon calmed down looking at Raymond. With him by her side, she didn't have to worry about anything. If her brother was still alive then Raymond could save him easily.

"Miss Sasha, I think that's a good place to start looking for your friend," Raymond suggested. "You go on ahead, I have some important matters to discuss with this guy. I will catch up with you on the way."

She looked between Ray and Mobi a few times before nodding her head.

"Alright, but please be quick."

With that, she walked towards the exit of the corridor. She was really curious about what Ray wanted to talk about with Mobi, but she held back from asking anything.

Since she had kept some secrets from Ray, she would appear as a bossy girl if she pushed her nose into his personal matters. This could be considered a first step towards getting back in his favour, Sasha thought.

Mobi grimaced as Sasha left. He felt like a prey that was locked under its predator's gaze, as Raymond's eyes landed on him.

"B-brother, we don't have anything to talk about. Why don't you follow that missy?"

He tried sending off Raymond with Sasha. To his horror, Raymond squatted down near the door and beckoned him to come closer.

"I am sure, we do!" Raymond spoke softly. "Why don't you come here? We need to discuss how much of a shitty thief you are!"

"What do you mean?"

Mobi asked somberly. In all his years as a thief, nobody had dared to call him a failure as a thief. Yet, this man disguised as a weak brat was calling him as such.

"I mean, what kind of a freak are you? Why do you have a fetish for stealing fake things?"

Mobi's face darkened upon hearing Raymond's accusations. He didn't know where he got the courage from but he got closer to the door and yelled in Raymond's face:

"You are the freak! Your whole family is made of freaks! Your father has a fetish, your grandfather has a fetish!"

-Bang!

"What the hell did you say?"

Raymond grabbed his neck and yanked him towards the door causing his head to smash against the thick iron bars.

"I don't care even if you kill me! No one is allowed to question my credibility as a thief."

Mobi soldiered on despite the pain in his head. His dignity was being questioned here, he was not going to take it lying down.

"Do you know who I am?" He sneered. "I am the greatest thief in this whole empire! Noble lords wet their britches hearing my name! How dare you question—Aack!"

Raymond silenced his ramblings with a quick chop to his head. Mobi rubbed his head furiously trying to quell the pain.

"Would you believe me if I say I can kill you and walk out freely before anyone notices!"

Raymond asked in a threatening tone. He was keeping his temper in check to find answers. If not, he would have punched this guy to death for talking shit about his father.

"Now behave yourself and answer my question," Raymond said as he took out a broken jade slip from his pendant. "If it's not fake then why did it break so easily?"

He threw the broken pieces in Mobi's face. Mobi quickly caught it and examined it carefully.

"Brother, did you use your mana on this one?" Mobi asked with a strange expression on his face. He could still vividly remember the absurd effect of this demon's mana.

"Yeah, what about it?"

"See, that's the problem! Your mana is weird! That's why things break as soon as you use it!"

Mobi spoke calmly recalling the events of that fateful day when he was caught by Raymond. The disparity between their mana refinement was simply staggering. There was no comparison between them.

"Really?" Raymond thought sceptically. He didn't feel any difference in his mana. But soon he remembered an important detail he had overlooked.

Raymond had never used mana in another's presence till now except for Mobi. Sure, he may have circulated it inside his body but he had never bought it out in the open. At most, he had inserted it into some artefacts which broke instantly.

But he had used it all the time when he was training, he was sure his mana was normal back then.

'Is it because of that strange phenomenon where I felt my body become lighter?'

His thoughts wandered to those painful memories he had experienced on the mountain. He had never felt so closer to death as he had felt that day.

Without wasting a second, Raymond started circulating his mana that was pooled at the bottom of his core.

"Hey, hey! What are you doing?"

Mobi backed off from the door and huddled in a corner. He had a feeling something bad was about to happen as he looked at Raymond's seriously curious face.

-Zwingg!

Air hummed with a dangerous cadence as a bone-breaking, soul-shattering pressure enveloped the whole prison.

"No, no, no, don't do it! Stop— Arrghh!"

Mobi fell with his face pressed against the ground— a mountainous weight on his back. He felt his life slowly slipping from his grasp.

Raymond didn't care about Mobi as he was engrossed in gathering his mana at the tip of his forefinger. Ever so slowly, his mana pooled at the tip, becoming a thick viscous liquid in the shape of a teardrop.

-Crack!

-Rumble!

Visible cracks appeared on the walls and chains as the entire population of the prison was under immense pressure and found themselves pressed to the ground.

There was no discrimination. The guards in their majestically shining armours and the prisoners in their stinking rags were scared out of their wits. They felt like an almighty being was judging their lives, sitting atop his lofty throne.

"Huff…that was hard!"

Raymond absorbed back his mana. It was taking all of his concentration to keep the drop of mana in place. He had cultivated for a whole day in order to gather that much mana and refine it. He didn't want to waste it by dropping it on the ground.

What he didn't know was that his stinginess had spared the lives of half of the people in the Capital City.

"What the hell is going on here?"

A guard shouted with panic evident in his voice.

-Clink! -Clank!

As if awoken by his voice, the other guards quickly stood up from the ground with their bodies drenched in a cold sweat and started looking around in fear.

Raymond took one look at the unconscious form of Mobi who had froth leaking out of his mouth and understood what Mobi was talking about.

His mana was weird.

No!

Why would he call it weird? If anything, it was special. Raymond decided as such and bolted out of the prison.