Chapter 117: 117
The alarm rang just as Uno took of the Virtua Helmet and rose from his bed .
He gazed at the morning sun with a light smile, stretching his body as he felt refreshed . He went over to his bathroom as he began to clean himself up, humming all the time .
After taking a long and hot shower, Uno went to his mirror and took out his barber's blade . With a steady and precise hand, he performed his routine shave after applying a liberal amount of shaving cream, Uno fine tuned his mustache and beard to a crisp perfection .
After washing his face, he checked his face thoroughly to see if everything was alright .
Nodding his head Uno left the house in the middle class district of the city . It wasn't the largest in the area but enough for a family of four in this suburban area .
He wore a nice and crisp tweed suit that was a grayish color . Such a dull tone would look extremely out of place, but with Uno's orange coloration for his hair, eyebrows, mustache and beard, it just fit him perfectly . Uno disliked bright colors . The only exception to this rule was his own beautiful hair .
Uno used his Holo-Watch to hail a cab to work . It was exactly 6:30 am of 29/03/2065 . It was incredibly strange to see someone heading to work this early, but Uno was surprisingly punctual .
He sat in the cab silently, flicking through the daily news . There was none in there aside from him and the Self-Driving AI which had already shuttled off in order to fulfill its directives .
Uno's expression hadn't changed once, maintaining that stiff indifference that was a stark contrast to his expression when he was in Boundless .
Soon, the cab had reached the business district . Uno departed from his ride with elegance and poise, staring at the building before him .
"Arcadia Business Works" - nearly 50 floors in terms of building height, almost reaching the cloud above . It was a skyscraper that was half as tall as the one Umbra owned .
Standing outside his office, Uno couldn't help but make the comparison between this building and their Rank 7 Guild Hall . Despite this one being much more advanced and aesthetically pleasing to look at, why did he feel his energy drain as he thought of entering it?
Why was it that whenever he entered the guild's skyscraper, he always felt excitement and awe deep down?
What was so different this time?
Uno sighed and entered his workplace with a light step . At the reception was an attractive woman with pale skin, black hair and brown eyes . She wore glasses and was tapping away at her computer boredly .
When she heard the glass doors slide open and saw that it was Uno, her eyes lit up as she rose to her feet and bowed with respect .
"Greetings to the Assistant Managing Director!"
Uno smiled at her gently and nodded . "Hard at work as always, Moira . Please keep it up . "
The woman called Moira felt her heart skip a beat as she was praised by the usually stoic and soft-spoken assistant boss . Was there something special about what she wore today that made her stand-out?
Let's not kid around, she knew she wasn't doing anything special when the Assistant Boss has entered and he should be aware of that . Yet to still compliment her openly…
Her mind associated many things .
It was normal, especially in the corporate section of society . While others were working hard to climb the social ladder and make a name for themselves despite being challenged at every level, others were seeking shortcuts to reach the top without paying the effort .
Uno did not have the Eyes of Caelo, neither was he much of a people person . However, her train of thought wasn't hidden with the way she cast flirty and amorous glances back .
Uno just smiled lightly as he nodded once again before continuing to his office .
He entered the elevator and rose to the 49th floor, which was where his office was located . All the while, the receptionist had been eyeing him with lidded eyes and covetous intentions .
Uno entered his exited the elevator with a step, walking through the hall of the 49th floor . This floor was shaped like a plus sign, with four large office spaces sharing it .
Each office was the same size, but had different name plates on the door .
Uno entered the one with his name on it, admitting himself into a well-ventilated and immaculate office room .
It was thickly carpeted and cool, with three A/Cs blasting away . A couple of beautiful and expensive paintings hung on the pristine white walls, as well as some flower pots here and there that added some ambience to the office .
There were two three seater couches nearer to the door of the room, with a glass table between them . On the table were some magazines and one more flower pot as well .
Near the northernmost edge of the room was a large manager's desk with a computer, a printer and a scanner on it . Various files and documents were arranged neatly on the table, giving any onlooker the feeling that the one who worked here was perennially busy .
There was also a bookcase that stretched across the wall from behind the manager's desk .
Uno walked to his desk and sat down, booting up the computer with a light press to the on button .
He checked his files and folders to confirm everything was intact and untouched . He sighed in relief when he saw that nothing had been tampered with .
Uno began to resume work from where he had left off last night .
Now… why would such an upright citizen end up in the Cartel?
Uno was a strange person .
He did not have any tragic backstory . He had been born to two parents who had belonged to the upper middle class . He had enjoyed a fulfilling childhood as his parents neither neglected him nor had made any kind of mistakes in raising him well .
He had friends in school who had respected him, and girls who had considered him to be quite handsome with his strongly tanned skin and orange hair .
He had earned the praise of his teachers for being so clever, as well as the encouragement from his sports trainer for being so athletic and strong .
All around him was positive reinforcement that most children had lacked when growing up, and was what they desired the most .
Uno had enjoyed it for a time, just as anyone would .
However, the thing with humankind was that we might be described as ungrateful creatures . Instead of being content with what was ours our time would be spent lusting after what we couldn't have . Fantasizing about it all the time . The mind would over-exaggerate the satisfaction of achieving whatever it was until we got it .
When it was acquired, it did provide relief and great satisfaction… for a time .
If you ate ice cream for the first time, it tasted like heaven . If you ate ice cream everyday for one week, it would still taste amazing, but with each passing day, there would be the increasingly nagging feeling that something was a little lacking .
If you ate ice cream every day for one month, it would become like waste in your mouth, with you eventually being unable to take one more small bite . You would begin to wonder just how anyone could like this .
Too much of a good thing was bad .
Uno slowly lost his love for the perfect little world he lived in, as the same drivel was fed to him everyday . For the entirety of his childhood, he had never faltered, not even once, leaving him to bear the burden of being praised by everyone .
It was possible for a person to become arrogant with such an upbringing, but that depended on how they were raised . Uno had been raised by conscientious parents, so such a thing only crossed his mind briefly until things got dreary .
The world had become like a silent movie, as the colors started to become duller and duller . Nothing happened to Uno's eyes themselves, but it was his mind that had begun to register everything in such a manner .
Now,when a person's world lost color, life would be difficult for them . Every day would seem like an eternity and excitement was the last thing they could muster .
Uno had been like this . A living robot going through the motions of life, until one day he found realised that he quite liked muted colors . They weren't that bad, and the peace that came with them was quite desirable .
This was what cultivated his love for dull tones in everything .
Yet one thing happened that changed Uno's life for good .
Oh, it wasn't some extraordinary event involving a tragedy . In fact, calling it an "event" may already be an exaggeration it would be more proper to refer to it as a banal thing that happened to almost everyone at some point in their lives .
When he was 17 years old, Uno had gotten involved in a street fight .
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