Chapter 242

242 Black Swan Moves

Emma huffed softly. She closed her eyes tightly as she shook her head slowly. “Levi...”

Suddenly, Levi grabbed Emma’s hand. She was extremely surprised when she felt the warm body wrapped around her, in her own car – her territory. The shock left Emma unable to move. She tried to digest what was happening; gathering her shattered sanity just like shards of glass.

“In my life, I’ve only ever begged once, which was to my mother. And now, I’m doing it for the second time to you. Begging people is not an easy thing for me, but, Emma.. I’m begging you so much. It means a lot to me, even though it looks very simple in your eyes.” Levi said without loosening his arms any little.

Levi had never felt this hopeless in his life. No matter what happened in his work, he never felt so hopeless that he had to plead like this. Feeling Emma in his arms but no reaction from her made his heart throb painfully; realizing that there was no happiness left for him. He must endure all the problems that come without having a shoulder to lean on even just for a second.

“I won’t disturb your life, Emma. You can pretend that I don’t exist. You don’t have to listen to my troubles. You just have to be there like a statue, pretending to listen. That’s more than enough for me. When you like someone, you don’t have to make him yours, do you? But that person will ease the pain in your wound even just by being able to look at him. Please just this once, Emma. I won’t ask for more,” Levi said again in a trembling voice.

What Levi had just said made Emma’s heart flutter. Did he indirectly express his feelings? But Levi’s attitude so far did not reflect those sentences at all.

It was as if he only thought of Emma as the wind that blew past him – a worthless wind that you would let go of. Emma was very surprised by Levi’s attitude now. Did it mean that he had been hiding his feelings for her all this time?

Then the incident when the two of them were trapped in the barn by the beach reappeared in Emma’s memory. At that time, Levi also hugged her very tightly like now, but he was in an unconscious state. He was delirious. At that moment, Levi said that he had experienced a very hard thing that had him give up what he wanted.

Could Levi really be in such a difficult situation? Maybe he did have feelings for Emma but couldn’t keep up with them. He had to lock the feeling inside. But, why?

.....

The figure of Levi who begged desperately like this finally made Emma’s ego lose. In the end, the girl nodded.

“All right. I’ll let this go on,” Emma said.

Emma’s answer was like a breeze of fresh air blowing away the heat of the fire that was tormenting Levi. A feeling of relief filled his chest.

He nodded and smiled gently. “Thank you so much, Emma. You can keep my word. I promise not to stand in your way. Until the end, you will only think of me as passing wind. I assure you, even when I leave later, I won’t matter anything to you.”

“About how my feeling is in my own hands. But you’d better be able to keep your word. Now, can you let go of this hug of yours? I might hit you soon,” Emma said.

Levi closed his eyes for a moment. Maybe this was the first and last time he felt Emma’s warmth. But, like what he said earlier, he didn’t need to have this girl to keep his heart beating.

Levi let go of his embrace after he had controlled his facial expression to at least look a little less embarrassing. “I’m sorry for my impudence,”

Emma cleared her throat to get rid of her nervousness. “Oh.. So you can say ‘sorry’ now?”

“Maybe I’ll apologize more often after this.. for wasting your time.” Levi smiled faintly. Then he extended his right hand to Emma. “Let’s make a new agreement,”

“What other deal?” Emma asked, rolling her eyes.

“Parasite relationship,” Levi replied in a sad tone although his lips still forced a smile.

“Parasite?” Emma repeated.

Levi nodded and explained, “In the future, I will trouble you by wasting your precious time. However, I promise, I will only take that from you. You are a tree of shade that helps this parasite to live.”

Emma sighed heavily as she shook her head slowly. But she also reached out and shook the man’s hand. “I agree,”

Emma couldn’t believe she did this, even though she knew that Levi’s promise was something that didn’t make sense. How could that man control her feelings?

In the end, it was Emma herself who had to control her own feelings; if she could. Even though she clearly knew this fact, she still accepted Levi’s request.

‘I’m sorry, Poppy. I don’t know what kind of pain you meant. But if I have to experience it later, I think I’ll be strong enough to endure it. For now, I’ll let my heart win.’ Emma said in her heart.

**

The days passed. Britney had been hiding in the base for quite a long time. She had to apply for a semester off to avoid danger. It was because the Beast Empire’s men were also spying around the university to find her.

Britney and Ava, who disappeared with no traces convinced Beast Empire that the two girls were purely kidnapped by Black without any special cooperation from the two parties.

At first, RD had thought about whether the two girls were actually planning an escape because they were forced to work. If they had the chance to escape, they would definitely do it. No one worked for the Beast Empire at their own will.

The members of the Black Swan had shown very rapid progress. From their strength, management and business; they started to develop well.

No one would realize that several Y**tube channels were staying under the same production house. In order to hide the existence of their group, all the members of the Black Swan live an extraordinary life as usual. If they didn’t know each other from the start, then they would still pretend to be strangers outside of the base.

“Here are the names of the Beast Empire and Dragger core teams.” Kathy gave Emma three pieces of paper for her to study with the others.

“Pablo Diablo. Is he a high school boy for real?” Emma had a look of shock on her face.

“I was also surprised when I found out about it,” Kathy said as she massaged her neck lightly. She worked for two full days to find out the core team of the two groups.

“A high school kid could lead such a big group to even own a business as big as Jen Marie Street,” Poppy muttered.

“If it’s just a high school kid, do we have to be that scared of him?” Linda asked.

“With such a large group and business, we do need to be ‘that careful’ with him.” Emma used her fingers as quote symbol to the sides of her head and moved them.

“We can’t judge a person’s abilities based solely on their age. Age is just a number.” Rachel said.

“Then, when are we going to attack them, Emma? I think our group is strong enough now.” Britney asked, “I can’t possibly take days off from my classes forever, can I?”

Emma nodded. “I know. We will attack them soon. But it requires the right strategy.”

“What plans do you have in mind, Emma?” Poppy asked.

“Actually, we don’t need to attack their base directly because that might be too heavy. For now, we can start moving to disrupt their business activities.” Emma answered.

“You mean; start patrol around again?” Rachel asked.

Since the Black Swan started recruiting new members and became a fugitive, Emma decided to temporarily stop their patrol activities. It was useful to prevent the Beast Empire from finding their group when they weren’t strong enough.

“We will not only thwart their kidnapping, but we will also thwart their business transactions,” Emma said with a smile.

**

In the middle of the night, a van with black-painted windows pulled up in front of an old house at the end of a quiet street. From the door of the house, came out a man with a mask and a black hat.

As the man was out of the house, another man also came out of the front passenger door of the black van. They seemed to talk for a little while occasionally looking around to make sure the situation was safe.

After finishing the short conversation, the man who came from the car opened the rear passenger door of the car accompanied by his colleague. The man who came out of the house gestured towards the upper window of the house which was covered by wooden planks.

Not long after, another man came out of there. He was escorting a line of five girls behind him. The girls walked with chains tying their hands and one of their ankles. Their eyes were covered with cloth and their mouths were taped shut.

The girls walked slowly, led by the man at the front of the line. Meanwhile, two other men came out of the house to escort them into a black van parked in front of the house.

“The girls are already in the car,” Cecil said. She was hiding in the gaps between two abandoned houses. The darkness of the place made the girl wearing a mask and all-black clothes almost completely invisible.

“Okay. We’re ready,” said Emma, who was sitting on the black motorcycle. Then she turned to her other friends who were on the other two motorbikes. “They will be leaving soon. Wait for my signal, girls.”