Strongest Nova: Path of Vengeance

Chapter 230: The Man

Stanley looked at the man as closely as he could from where he was. He couldn’t turn his head due to the way he was seated, but he could see the man through the reflection in the mirror in front of him.

It was a slightly older man in his early 40s. He was tall, nearly a head taller than Nova, and had slightly gray hair. He had narrow eyes and a pointed nose.

He wore a blue suit; a different shade of blue than Nova’s hair.

And they were talking to each other.

Well... not exactly talking. The man seemed to be the one talking. Nova simply nodded and gave a one-word answer from time to time. It seemed like that as Stanley couldn’t hear a single word they spoke.

He shouldn’t have been far away and yet no sound came from that direction.

Then, when the snipping sounds of the scissors started, it became even harder to discern what was going on.

The man was definitely suspicious for sure. Not only did Nova recognize the man, but his barber seemed surprised to see him walk in as well.

’He definitely doesn’t look like he needs a haircut,’ Stanley thought. ’Why is he here?’

Stanley was obviously not sure if it was this man had anything to do with what he was here for, but the suspicion was definitely there for him.

The man talked with Nova for a while and then left.

At some point, the barber came to the front and blocked his view for a good 5 minutes. When he moved away, the man was gone.

Stanley was surprised and looked around the room, only to not find him anywhere at all. He wondered why he left so early, and why he decided to come here in the first place.

A few minutes later, the barber was done with Stanley. "What do you think?" he asked, standing behind Stanley.

Stanley looked at the mirror in awe. "Woah!" he couldn’t help but let slip out. "This looks awesome."

"Isn’t it?" the barber asked.

Satisfied, Stanley walked away from the seat. He paid the price of the cut, which surprised him at how expensive it was. However, at this point, he had the money to buy most of whatever he wanted, so he wasn’t worried.

"Not bad," Nova said, looking at his hair. "You look way better than before. More handsome, and... more confident."

"Thanks," Stanley said. "We should go back now."

"Go back?" Nova shook her head. "Sol and Fred are already gone. We can spend a few more hours before we go back. Let’s go around the city."

Stanley didn’t have any reason to disagree, so he went along with her.

Unfortunately, due to the police who were still looking for him, he couldn’t go to the many places he would’ve loved to go to.

They entered a restaurant and got themselves some food. As they ate, Stanley asked Nova about the man.

"That man in the blue suit you talked to today, is he someone you know?" he asked.

Nova paused for a second and looked at him. "Why do you ask?" she asked.

"Just curious. It looked like you knew each other," Stanley said.

"We... do know each other but not really," Nova said. "He was one of the sponsors of the cult."

"The one your parents were from?" Stanley asked.

Nova nodded. "The same one," she said.

"Oh, and you know him enough to have a conversation?" Stanley asked.

"He was close friends with my parents, so he naturally knows me as well," Nova said.

"What’s his name?" Stanley asked curiously.

"I don’t know," Nova said. "And you shouldn’t ask it. Not much good comes from asking about that man."

"Oh," Stanley said with a hint of surprise in his voice. He didn’t expect her to get so stern all of a sudden.

"Don’t worry about him though," she said. "You will meet him when the time comes."

"When the time comes?" Stanley repeated her words. "What do you mean?"

"Remember what I promised you if you helped me kill someone?" she asked. "For that, you have to go through this man."

Stanley paused for a moment, making sure he wasn’t remembering it incorrectly. "Your promise," he whispered. "It was to evolve my skill."

"Yes," Nova said.

Stanley’s eyes went wide in surprise. "You mean... he is the one who can improve my powers?" he asked in surprise. He couldn’t believe that he met the person he had been on a mission to search for.

Was it going to be this easy?

As he wondered, Nova quickly answered. "No, that’s not him," she said. "He’s just the guy that can take you to meet the person who will actually do the thing."

"Oh, and who is that person?" Stanley asked.

Nova paused for a moment as her face grew serious. "I don’t know," she said. "I was sedated at the time. Everything that happened... happened while I was unconscious."

"Oh," Stanley said.

"Anyway, don’t even talk about this man," she said. "He has his hands in too many things and is quite scary. If he wanted to, he could destroy our little gang in a single day."

Stanley feared the words when he heard them. Still, he found a lead. How could he send it back to the headquarters though? That was a problem he hadn’t thought about.

Should he just consider the mission completed? That wasn’t right. He didn’t even know the man’s name. That couldn’t be considered a mission completed.

"He has his hands in so many cults and secret societies that you really don’t want to mess with him," Nova said off-handedly while eating a bite of her meal.

Stanley paused and looked at her. "Many?" he asked.

"Yup," she said. "Quite a lot."

"How many?" Stanley asked.

"No clue," Nova said. "Now stop talking about him."

Stanley wanted to learn more, but he stopped asking. Just knowing that he found a man who had a connection to the group that was responsible for the evolution stuff was enough for now.

He was going to meet him again when he was done with helping Nova achieve whatever it was anyway.

"Oh right, when are we doing this thing you made collected the gangs for?" Stanley asked.

"Shouldn’t take much longer," Nova said. "Just need to grab the attention of someone important. We’re big enough now that it should be any day."

Stanley nodded. "Sounds easy," he said. "Do we go for other gangs too then? Outside of the city?"

"We could," Nova said. "That would certainly improve our chances, but I believe we’re big enough now. That explosion from half a month ago gave us quite the notoriety."

That made sense.

They finished their meal and left the restaurant. Sometime later, they were done touring the city as well and returned back to Fourex City, going directly to the Low.

After that, there wasn’t much for them to do at all.

Since Stanley and the rest were being looked out for anywhere other than the Low, he remained back in the place, training as much as he could.

They had already switched their home to a better one with better facilities as well as a training area, so Stanley had nothing to be bored of.

There were people who had seen him fight in the battle 2 weeks ago and were more than willing to train with him.

Stanley found quite a few fun people to hang around with during that time and got close to some of the leaders who came to train as well.

The one he talked the most with was Aleone, the girl who could increase the size of things, increasing its weight along with that.

He had her increase the weight of his sword and trained his physical body with that.

Nova and Sol were busy making deals with the outside cities, improving the standing of the Low.

As for Fred, he was busy with his own girlfriend as well. However, since he never had her meet anyone, Sol believed that he didn’t even have a girlfriend and was instead lying about it.

"He probably has some 2D girl he spends his time with," Sol said. "If it was really a girlfriend, he would’ve let us meet with her already," Sol said during one of their dinner.

Fred got angry. "What do you mean?" he asked. "My girlfriend is damn real. Don’t get jealous just because you’ve never been with a girl, old man."

"Say whatever you will to make yourself feel good," Sol said. "Didn’t you say that your girl wanted to join us? If she was real, she would’ve found a way to meet with us already."

"She is a polite girl," Fred said. "She just doesn’t want to bother us right now. She says she will join when we are settled."

Sol chuckled. "Excuses," he said. "I can’t believe I thought you were telling the truth a week back."

"I was telling the damn truth," Fred said. "It’s only been 2 weeks. Have some patience."

"I’m gonna call your bluff until you bring out some proof, I’m afraid," Sol said.

"Proof? I have proof," Fred said. "Here’s her picture." He showed the phone to Sol.

"Woah, that’s a beauty," Sol said. "No way that girl is real."

"She’s real!" Fred said, turning the phone to Nova and Stanley. "You guys tell me she’s fake."

Stanley looked at the picture and nearly coughed out everything that was in his mouth.

"You okay? No need to get surprised," Fred said, putting away the phone.

Stanley could only watch him put away the phone in surprise as he recognized the girl in that picture.

’Ulia!’