When Josef woke up, he found himself completely paralyzed. It was as if every muscle and tendon in his body had been severed, leaving him with no strength at all. He couldn’t even bend his fingers.
His mind was clear, and his eyes could move, but the rest of him felt like a lump of meat tossed onto a wooden board.
Panic washed over him, then suddenly he realized it was Leo.
Seeing his situation, Josef understood everything. The ZS serum had been tampered with by Leo. The one Leo gave him must have been fake, and there were Leo’s informants in the Bayer family’s institutions. Someone had already tipped Leo off before he even sent the drug in for testing.
“Leo, get out! Get out here, you bastard!” Josef yelled, his voice hoarse with rage and desperation as he realized he could still speak.
Leo stepped out from behind at a leisurely pace, pushing up his glasses. His face twisted from gloomy to downright menacing, looking nothing like the friendly man he used to pretend to be.
“Josef, if you want to blame someone, blame yourself for sticking your nose where it doesn’t belong. All I wanted was to make a little money. The measly salary your family pays me isn’t enough for anything. And your father! He’s even more old-fashioned. I brought him several money-making opportunities, but he turned his nose up at all of them, acting like he’s above it all. What a joke.” Leo spat, his anger rising with every word.
The more Leo spoke, the angrier he got. If Calvin had just teamed up with him from the start, Leo wouldn’t have had to tiptoe around, constantly watching his back and pretending to play nice.
Leo fumed. “Would it really have been so bad to just be in it together? But no, the Bayer family just had to act all holier-than-thou, always bragging about their so-called integrity and clear conscience. It honestly made me sick. If they’d just dropped that fake sense of morality, they could’ve been swimming in cash by now. It’s just a bit of fake medicine, what’s the big deal? It’s not like it’s gonna kill anyone, anyway. Expensive stuff means big profits. How does he not get that? Still clinging to some laughable idea of “humanity“?"
“Leo, where’s the Z5 serum? What did you do with it?” Josef demanded, his voice shaking with anger and regret.
“If only I hadn’t trusted Leo from the start. If I’d just used the Z5 serum right away, he never would have had the chance to stab me in the back,” Josef thought bitterly, overwhelmed with regret.
“Josef, the serum’s gone. You and your old man are both idiots. I never planned to hurt you, but you just had to stick your nose in. Too bad for you. This is goodbye,” Leo sneered, his voice thick with mockery.
Josef’s face went ashen as he looked back at the cliff behind him. “You… Leo, you want to kill me?”
Leo threw his arms wide and burst out laughing. He loved nothing more than seeing the agony on people’s faces when they were about to die.
“Don’t throw around wild accusations, sir. Your death has nothing to do with me. You came here for some fun and slipped and fell off a cliff. Who else can you blame but yourself, right?” Leo taunted, his voice dripping with mockery.
Josef’s face went dark with rage, his jaw clenched so tight his teeth ground together. His glare could have killed Leo a thousand times over. He never thought Leo could be so cold-blooded. The helpless pain made his face grow even darker, his teeth audibly grinding together.
He forced out each word, “Don’t you fear my father will find out and make you pay?”
Leo laughed again. "In twenty years from now, I’ll have changed my name and become filthy rich. Who knows if he'll even live that long! As for you, just accept your fate. It’ll be a tragedy for your father to bury his own son, but who knows...Maybe I’ll even visit you soon enough,” Leo laughed, his voice dripping with mockery.
With that, Leo slammed his foot down on Josef’s face, then raised his leg as if to kick him right off the edge of the cliff.
Josef’s fury and unwillingness blazed inside him, but his body was limp and useless. He couldn’t summon a shred of strength.