Leon spent the next few minutes in a half-daze, and when he fully regained himself, he found himself seated at the dining table of a cosy apartment.
He heard the familiar voice of Camellya grumbling as she, in the living room, used a first aid kit to treat her mother's wound.
In front of him, Cameron poured a drink from the fridge and set a glass down while saying, "Thanks for helping my mum out."
"It wasn't that much of an issue. Not like I had anywhere I was heading anyway," Leon replied quietly.
He was surprised at how calm his voice sounded, and even more surprised that he wasn't giddy like a fan meeting their favourite celebrity, considering before him was one of his favourite video game characters and his favourite Deity Rising character besides Leon.
As he calmly sipped the drink, his gaze shifted toward the living room, and seeing Camellya packing up after tending to her mother's wound, he couldn't help but think, 'Wow, she's even prettier in real life.'
It was an objective fact anyone would have to agree with.
'I used to think the black streaks in her hair were something she added later, but it seems she had them before the events of the game began,' Leon thought, silently staring at her for a few seconds before averting his gaze, before she noticed.
Quick reminder: Camellya's identity aside, it should be noted that both Alex and Leon had a thing for redheads.
Camellya, having just finished handling her mother's wounds, left to throw away the cotton wool and return the first aid kit to its proper place.
While she did that, Genevieve finally came over to the dining room and took a seat in front of Leon as she spoke.
"Sorry for the delay."
Leon just nodded calmly. "Don't worry about it."
After Leon spoke, Genevieve opened her mouth to speak, paused, then turned toward the living room and called out to her son.
"Cameron, can you get me something from my room?"
He got up, nodding. "Yeah, what?"
"In my dressing room. Check beside the clothes in the fourth drawer. There should be a little briefcase there. Bring it over."
As Cameron headed off to get what his mother asked for, Leon looked at Genevieve and asked, "What's the briefcase for?"
"I'll explain in a bit," she replied. "You may not believe it, but it has a lot to do with our meeting today."
"Huh? How?" Leon asked, his tone filled with confusion.
Genevieve glanced behind her to make sure none of her children were nearby before turning back to Leon, her expression turning stern as she began to explain.
"I possess a rather rare Core Skill. I won't bore you with the specifics, but just know it's a skill that can answer virtually any question I have, whether it concerns the past, the present, or even the future."
Leon's eyes immediately narrowed at Genevieve's words, and seeing that she had his full attention, she continued.
"I mentioned being a mage before, didn't I? Well, my family didn't exactly support me being in that line of work. They leaned more toward the merchant side of things, and with what I just told you about my Core Skill, you can understand how valuable that would be for merchants."
Genevieve described her skill as a 'Question Answerer,' but since it could answer questions about the future as well, it could be considered a skill that granted her the power of foresight.
"Of course, there were limitations to the kinds of questions I could ask. For one, I can't ask about people completely unrelated to me, or those whose connection to me is too distant."
Genevieve got up to get herself a drink from the fridge, and as she did, Leon pondered what she'd just told him about.
"Even with those limits, this skill of yours would still be very useful to any businessperson. You can always use it to know the outcome of taking a deal, making an investment, or launching a product line."
"Exactly," Genevieve replied, picking a glass from the shelf as she continued, her tone threaded with a hint of sorrow. "That skill brought equally good and bad fortune. While it helped my family prosper, it made me far too valuable to the family head, and my siblings, who had their eyes on the heir's seat, did not take kindly to that."
"The classic succession struggle, huh?" Leon muttered, drumming his fingers on the table. He could already imagine how the situation must have spiralled.
Genevieve nodded at his words and responded,
"Indeed, the classic succession struggle. It was one of the reasons I learned magic: to protect myself from the assassination attempts of my siblings.
I continued using that skill for my family even after marrying, but somewhere along the line, word leaked, and my family, which naturally had many enemies because of our success, some out of envy, was targeted. The goal was to eliminate me."
She paused, returning to her seat with her drink before resuming her tale.
"Thanks to the skills I developed as a mage, I was able to defend myself and protect my children. But that was the most I could do."
Her voice dropped lower at that point, and for a moment, her expression shifted slightly. There was a soft shadow of sadness on her face, a melancholic look she didn't hide quickly enough for Leon not to notice.
Still, she tried to mask it with a smile, one that didn't quite reach her eyes.
"In the end, the same power that made me a target was the same power that allowed me to find a way out," she said. "I used it to escape the ambush with my young children and keep them safe."
Leon, still drumming his fingers on the dining table, studied Genevieve in silence for a moment before finally voicing his main curiosity.
"I don't know," he said. "This doesn't really sound like something you should be telling someone you just met a few minutes ago."
Genevieve smiled at his words, this time without any trace of sadness.
"Indeed, it's not," she replied. "But you remember how I said my skill always answered every question of mine?"
"Yeah, I do," Leon nodded.
"Yeah," she said again, more quietly this time. "That skill also came at a price. Using its practically wish-granting abilities even once drained me considerably. Because of that, my lifespan is rather limited, you could say."
Leon raised an eyebrow, wondering where she was heading, and Genevieve continued without him needing to ask.
"With death drawing nearer every day, I began to worry about my children, how they would manage after I was gone."
The tone of the conversation turned suddenly sombre, leaving Leon almost astonished at how quickly the atmosphere had shifted.
Still, Genevieve continued, "I used my skill, despite its steep costs, to determine the best possible actions I could take for my children, actions that would ensure the best outcomes for them when I'm no longer around."
"And what did the skill tell you?" Leon asked, suspecting that Genevieve expected him to.
"It told me to take them to another country," she replied.
Leon blinked in surprise. "Take them to another country?"
That wasn't the response he had been expecting, and Genevieve could see it on his face.
Chuckling lightly, she explained, "My skill instructed me to go to a specific city in another country, and that was all it revealed. It wasn't the first time I'd received only partial information like this, so I realised it was a chain situation. I had to reach that country first and then use the skill again to get further answers."
This was one of the limitations of the skill Genevieve had mentioned earlier, and considering that each use consumed part of her lifespan, Leon could see just how dangerous this Core Skill truly was.
"Secretly, I had already started preparing for quite a trip, but yesterday, I used my skill again just to confirm that the response remained the same.
If there's one thing I've learned with this skill of mine, which deals with Time and Fate, it's that the future is always changing. Who knows if something could happen that would alter the outcome and make going to another country no longer the best choice for them?"
Leon nodded, understanding her reasoning. Then he asked again, "And what did it tell you this time?"
Meeting Leon's violet eyes, she replied, "My skill told me, clearer than ever before, that if I went out today, the only encounter I would have on my way back home would be with someone who'd ensure the best outcome for my children."