The Alchemists

When Aleksis, Lauriel, Terry, and Nicolae disappeared into the private room, they became the talk of Sky Bar. The four very attractive young people looked like they emerged from a novel and so many muffled sighs could be heard following their steps. They didn't realize how they attracted so much attention, all of them were busy thinking about the recent events and the fact that Aleksis was in danger.     

They ate while talking about what happened. Nicolae mostly listened, more focused on fiddling with various networks on his laptop and gathering all the news from his informants.     

An hour later he closed his laptop. Satisfaction could be seen from his face when he took his glass and finished his wine in one gulp.     

"Found anything?" Aleksis asked attentively.     

"Yeah. People won't call me Wolf if I can't collect the data I need in a short amount of time," Nicolae answered with a big smile. "They think they can cover their dirty tracks. But it just so happens that there have been several big cases in the past connected to them. The police must be very happy to receive this much evidence to imprison many of the members of this little mafia group."     

"You're awesome!" exclaimed Aleksis in admiration. "Can you teach me how to hack?"     

"Of course. When you want to learn, just say so. I'll teach you."     

Nicolae was very happy because his hacking ability managed to impress Aleksis.     

"I only have one class tomorrow morning, I'll spare some time afterward to meet you."     

"Eh ... do you really want to learn information technology?" Nicolae furrowed his brow in puzzlement. "I thought you didn't like your major."     

"It's not like that ... I randomly chose my course because I'm originally fine with anything as long as I could study in Singapore. But after seeing what you can do, I become interested in it and want to learn for real."     

Terry then remembered that Nicolae was indeed Aleksis' senior in the Information Management department, but he knew that his sister didn't care at all about her studies. The girl had studied personally with various great scientists in the world. She was very smart. She didn't need to come to class and study on campus like what she was now doing.     

Terry wondered if Aleksis began to notice Nicolae as a man and was interested in getting to know him more. If that was the case, everyone would feel happy for them.     

Terry personally preferred Nicolae to be with Aleksis. That was despite Nicolae being his mortal enemy. He did not know what Prince Siegfried was like, but since there was such a smart and kind man like Nicolae nearby, not to mention he was also Lauriel's son, why would she pursue an ordinary human who was not only much older than her but would also soon age and die?     

Terry hoped Aleksis would recover her common sense soon.     

"Uhm ... okay. I can teach you. I will come to the penthouse tomorrow," Nicolae couldn't contain his joy in his voice.     

"Thank you!" Aleksis bobbed her head happily.     

From one corner of her eye, she could see Lauriel hiding his happiness upon the thought that she was getting closer to Nicolae. Aleksis could only apologize to her godfather in her mind.     

'I'm sorry, Uncle Rory. If I had met Nico first, maybe I would have fallen in love with him ... Your son is amazing. But I fell for Alaric first and we're already married. I can't let my father take me home before my husband returns. I have to make all of you think that I like Nico...'     

She drank her wine then asked her glass to be refilled. She was still upset from earlier. She never thought that there would come a day where just to divert the attention of her family from Prince Siegfried, she would have to pretend to be getting closer to Nicolae.     

In a few days, her father and mother would come to Singapore. She must dispel their suspicion of Prince Siegfried ... Otherwise, they would definitely force her to come home.     

"Oh my God, it's almost 11 pm. We better go home now. Tomorrow I have a lot of work to do," Terry announced. He spread his arms and yawned widely. "Today is really very tiring."     

Everyone agreed with Terry. Ten minutes later, they were back in the penthouse. Aleksis escorted Terry and Nicolae to the door while carrying her dog.     

"Be careful on the road. See you tomorrow on the campus."     

"You better get some rest too," Terry ruffled Aleksis's tidy hair and ran off to the elevator. His sister could only purse her lips in annoyance.     

Aleksis entered her bedroom and played some music before turning off the lights. She laid Little Prince Siegfried on his bed in one corner of the room then threw herself on her bed. Aleksis took out Takeshi's cellphone from her pocket and started to dial the only phone number there.     

Alaric picked up the phone after the second ring.     

"Hello, Honey. Why did you call just now? You're sleeping so late ..." Alaric said in a worried voice.     

The girl giggled, delighted that her husband was worried about her. "Yes, I am about to sleep. It's been a long day and a lot of terrible things happened."     

She then told him what initially caused the problem with Rosemary and how she had been very worried that something would happen to Terry. The latter was her brother and she could not imagine how sad she would be if she loses him.     

"Your brother ..?" Alaric remembered some of the photos he had received this afternoon when Aleksis was with two young men. He could guess that one of the men was Aleksis' brother as their faces had some similarities.     

Hmmm ... a smile appeared on Alaric's face.     

Now he understood why Aleksis was very friendly towards the two young men. One was her brother, and the other was the son of her godfather ...     

Now he could see how things were connected. He didn't need to worry about feeling jealous or anything...