Chapter 43: here they come (first
He knew that these light spots originated from Alke, and also understood that the energy contained in them was devastating, although he could see that Alke had converged, and when the light spot fell to the ground , the energy will be very slight, but in a federation with a very high security level, these sources of energy from unknown sources are likely to be detected by the optical network, and even a security aircraft will be sent to check.
Why do they keep fighting... Ji Ning was a little suffocated.
However, he was sure that Huo Wuling provoked first. Ark has a very good personality and will not take the initiative to argue with others.
Jining was thinking about how to get in touch with the three people in the sky, but suddenly found that there was no new streamer above, it seemed that the battle was over, and then, a pair of cold hands suddenly came from He reached behind him and wrapped his waist lightly.
"You're finally back."
A gentle and low voice rang from his ear, Huo Wuling chuckled lightly and leaned on his shoulder, the cold body temperature from the ghost made Ji Ning shudder involuntarily.
"If you don't come back," Huo Wuling said with a smile, "I will enter your dream again to find you."
"Are you fighting Alke again?"
Jining didn't take his tricks, pushed his hand away mercilessly, turned around, looked Huo Wuling's eyes directly, and asked, "Why do you always Are you bullying him?"
"You think it's my fault?"
The young man with beautiful eyebrows spread his hands, raised his eyebrows, and said innocently: "But I think this is their problem. The two of them joined hands to bully me. Can't I fight back?"
"Perhaps it wasn't you who made the move first, but before that, you must have said something." Ji Ning was expressionless, "It's not unreasonable for Herinos and Ark. people."
"That's right."
The red-haired man stood by and listened for a long time, and couldn't help defending his companion: "Alke didn't want to cause you trouble, but he endured it for a long time, it's this guy..."
Well, he got it, he shouldn't have spoken.
"Ningning, you really know me very well, which makes me very happy."
Huo Wuling frowned, kissed Ji Ning's cheek, turned and sat on the sofa gracefully, and spoke.
"But they also have an inescapable responsibility. In fact, I don't want to do it, because this behavior is a pointless waste of my recovery power."
Speaking, his eyes darkened slightly, the corners of his lips curled up, revealing a dangerous edge: "If I choose, I will wait until the strength is restored enough to kill them. Get your hands on it."
"Huo Wuling..."
With such a dangerous element lurking in the house, Ji Ning felt a headache and couldn't help standing in front of Huo Wuling, holding his shoulders and talking to him.
"You can't..." Speaking of this, Ji Ning suddenly froze, because he suddenly realized that this was absolutely impossible, but he still finished the rest of the words, "...and Do they get along well?"
"Oh? That's not impossible."
Unexpectedly, Huo Wuling answered quickly, but the next sentence revealed his true purpose: "You come and kiss me, I can think about it."
He leaned on the sofa, folded his arms and folded his lips, looking up at Ji Ning, as if he was sure he would not do this.
"That's it?"
After kissing him, Ji Ning straightened up and asked.
"..." Huo Wuling blinked, suddenly reached out and grabbed Ji Ning's wrist without warning, pushed him down on the sofa, leaned over, and said with a smile, " As if it wasn't enough."
He lowered his head to kiss Ji Ning, at this moment, the door of the villa suddenly opened, and a cold wind blew in outside. The cold air contrasted with the pure white color, like ice and snow, and there was a small bat flying next to it.
When they saw Huo Wuling pushing Ji Ning down, the angel's eyes turned cold, and energy gathered in his fingertips again, the red-haired man coughed loudly, and hurriedly leaned over and whispered Whispering beside him.
“…”
I don't know what the red-haired man said to him, Alke extinguished the light from his fingertips, quietly fanned his wings, walked to Ji Ning, knelt down in front of him, grabbed Ji Ning Ning's hand said softly.
"Sorry, it's my fault for causing you trouble."
His eyebrows drooped, his eyelashes trembled slightly, he looked docile and well-behaved, so Ji Ning couldn't help but stroke his hair, soothed him and said, "It's okay, Alke, I know this is not your problem."
Jining pushed Huo Wuling away from her body and glanced at him lukewarmly. Huo Wuling wanted to laugh or not, refused to admit her mistake, raised her lips to look at the red-haired man, Said playfully: "Retreat to advance? This trick plays well."
“…”
There was a trace of unnaturalness in the red-haired man's expression, and he shifted his eyes to one side, but he insisted that he did the right thing, Ark has a simple personality, and it is too easy to face Huo Wuling At a loss, what could be wrong with him helping his friends? No one can stop him!
However, facing Huo Wuling, he was still under pressure, so he quickly changed the subject and talked to Ji Ning.
"Since everyone is here, come and tell us about the situation, little mermaid. We came to you in a daze and didn't understand anything. This is your ability ?Space transfer?"
"It is understandable, however, my ability is a special case, not under my control, and I don't know when it will appear or disappear."
Jining thought about it for a while, and then briefly explained to them, "It's more like a curse than an ability, and it will bring me a lot of trouble."
"Oh?"
The red-haired man was just asking casually, but now he is more serious: "When did you start this situation? Also, you are both a mermaid and a human being, with a double state, is your chaotic space transfer ability related to your form?"
He looked at Ji Ning with an inquisitive look in his eyes, because the more he got along with Ji Ning, the more he could feel the mystery of Ji Ning, he was sure that Ji Ning 's identity is by no means simple, and most likely not really revealed.
Whether it was the mermaid once raised by Arc, or the lover of Emperor Moring Ozer, this is most likely not Ji Ning's true identity. Can't be seen clearly.
This is dangerous and attractive.
The more he wanted to help Arke get Ji Ning—the most deadly treasures were often the most beautiful.
But it's not easy to fight with these people...
Especially when he thought of the emperor of the super empire, Ozer, the red-haired man laughed dryly. Let's not think about it for now. There are still some basic problems that he needs to solve urgently. The specific situation needs to be grasped by him as soon as possible, as well as their identities and funds, and the Republic of Anmerya has a task waiting for them.
"It seems to be related, but I don't know exactly."
Hearing the red-haired man's question, Ji Ning was a little surprised by his sharpness, which was able to link his spatial disorder with time disorder. But for this question, he only answered vaguely, after all, this matter is related to the system, and he can't explain it at will.
The red-haired man nodded, hearing that this was probably a relatively secret matter, so he stopped asking more, turned around and took out his computer from the luggage he brought, and asked, "Can you connect Do you have the internet here? I mean, if your country can connect to websites outside of its borders."
"No problem, you can connect to the extra-domain network."
Jin Ning called the housekeeping robot and let it help the man, and added: "But our country's network is controlled by the optical network, and all information will be filtered by the central optical brain. If you don't If it's too convenient..."
"Okay, I understand." The man nodded, and under the guidance of the robot, he carried the computer into the study.
There were still Ji Ning and the other three people in the house, Huo Wuling sat on the sofa and looked at Ji Ning with a half-smile: "How much do you have that I don't know? ?"
Jining averted her eyes to avoid looking at him. Huo Wuling had seen through most of his secrets, because Huo Wuling and his essence were similar. Taskers in multiple worlds also know this very well.
Fortunately, the core secret about "this is the world of novels" cannot be exposed, so if Huo Wuling uses this as a lever to blackmail him, he will not completely compromise, the big deal will be The secret that he would travel through many worlds was exposed, and Yun Yuan and Fu Qinghan already knew it anyway.
Herinos, who had been silent for a long time, landed on Ji Ning's lap in the form of a small bat and said, "I think I need you to give me an explanation, Ji Ning. Speaking of, how many things are you hiding?"
Sure enough...
Although there was no blame in Herinos' tone, he simply wanted Ji Ning to tell the truth, but it still made Ji Ning feel a little uneasy.
Because since Herinos appeared, he has been pretending to have amnesia, not remembering Herinos, using his guilt and trust in himself to let him protect himself from being caught by Huo Wuling Live, and now Herinos is so weak that he has to maintain the form of a bat.
He knew that even if he told the truth, Herinos would not blame him, but it seemed that because of this, he was even more speechless.
came out.
His expression was a little ugly, it seemed that he saw something terrible, and he had the happiness of the rest of his life. He glanced at a few people in the living room, rolled his throat, and spoke.
"I saw a news just now that the spaceship we were on was diverted in the middle, and finally did not reach the Republic of Anmerya, but went to the capital star of the Moring Empire."
Everyone looked up at him after hearing this, the red-haired man licked his dry lips and continued.
"All passengers must disembark the ship to undergo extremely strict inspections. A large number of troops are stationed around the ship, and their emperor Ozer is also present in person."
"Although the report did not explain the reason for Ozer's presence, but..." He looked at Ji Ning dully, "He definitely came to find you."
Ozer went to catch him...
There was a thin sweat on Ji Ning's forehead, and he was afraid for a while. If his spatial disorder didn't end at that time, he could only imagine what would happen.
Even if there are Huo Wuling and a few people around him, but their injuries have not healed, and the capital star is located in the center of the Moring Empire, if you want to leave, you must pass through the vast country , that spans the territory of several galaxies, and there are countless mental power users and aircraft carriers to intercept, and it is almost impossible to escape.
"Why?" The red-haired man was puzzled, "Haven't we erased the memories of those security officers, how did the information leak out?"
“…”
Huo Wuling remembered something, squinted her beautiful eyes, and said, "When the spaceship stopped at Moring Empire, a pair of mother and child passengers came up. At that time, I thought the woman was wrong, but I investigated There was no abnormality after that, and now it seems that it may have a lot to do with her, and she used some methods that we don't know about."
Jining spent a few years in the interstellar world, and knew that the people of the Moring Empire used all kinds of spiritual power, and it was not impossible for them to possess some hidden, strange and unknown power.
And he has no ability in this world, except for the disorder, he is completely an ordinary person, can't see anything at all, and has no impression of Huo Wuling's mother and child passengers .
This time his spatial disorder just ended, and he escaped Ozer's pursuit by chance, but after that, can he escape again?
Jin Ning felt a little uneasy in her heart, although because of the existence of the central optical brain, the Federation's security and defense mechanism is very complete, and it claims to be one of the safest countries in the entire universe, but in fact there are inevitably omissions , there must be spies from other countries in the country, and there must be those who are capable of the Mo Ling Empire.
What's more, he is still a star here. He has photos and works information on the optical network. Even if the information on the optical network is extremely complex, he is not popular all over the galaxy, and the scope of the information is spread. It's still limited, but there's no guarantee that it won't be discovered.
Jining thought about it for a while, but still contacted the optical network and used a special channel at home to partially lock his data so that it could not be sent to the extra-domain network, but he did not completely lock it, after all, after He also wants to make a movie with Gu Chen, so the images about him cannot be circulated completely, which will affect the development of the plot.
After doing this, Ji Ning was still not at ease. He touched his face and began to consider whether it was necessary for him to change his appearance and take refuge in another country before the plane returned to normal.
In the absence of ability, it is very difficult to change his appearance. It is impossible for him to have plastic surgery, but other methods are illegal in the Federation, and it is really not easy to handle.
"Leave this to me."
Hearing Ji Ning's worries, the red-haired man patted his chest and said confidently, "If you need it, I can get you something."
"Thank you, Fergie, then please."
Jining thanked him with a smile, but he knew very well that this method was not absolutely safe, because the empire could also conduct a mental power fluctuation check, and each person's fluctuations were unique and could not be Forgery, but he still left a file at the Imperial Military Academy before, if it is really checked, it will definitely not be fooled.
Anyway, let's go outside and hide...
Jining thought so, and at the same time felt depressed.
Since the plane abnormality began, the system operator has always said that it is investigating a solution, and expects to reply in about a week, but now this time limit has long passed, but the operator is still installing Damn, it's only particularly efficient when he rejects his application.
The red-haired man has been dealing with this matter since then, and the others stayed in the villa, barely maintaining a peaceful state, and did not do anything.
Being stared at by three men at the same time, even if Ji Ning wanted to attack Gu Chen, she didn't have the courage, so she could only stay at home and watch them.
Alke showed great curiosity about Ji Ning's villa, especially when he saw Ji Ning's photo album when he was a child, his attention was drawn to the past, holding this photo album, He watched without blinking, until he was called by Ning to have dinner before he reluctantly put it down.
"Which one is 'Braised Pork Ribs'?"
At the dinner table, the white-haired angel blinked his eyes and carefully distinguished the dishes on the table. The last time Huo Wuling mentioned that Ji Ning likes to eat braised pork ribs, but Alke did not know What is this, he is very concerned about it until now.
He said to Ji Ning seriously, "I want to learn it and cook it for you in the future."
"You want to learn?" Huo Wuling looked at him with a half-smile, "You really want to be a nanny for Ningning?"
“…”
Alke pursed his lips and looked at Ji Ning silently. Ji Ning sighed and shouted helplessly, "Huo Wuling... Could you let us have a good meal?"
"Then you need to stop my mouth." Huo Wuling smiled, "Why don't you come and feed me?"
Jining didn't even look at him: "You can't eat it now."
Huo Wuling behaved very modestly: "I can't accept the way of kissing."
"Anyone?"
The little bat standing on the edge of the glass drinking artificial plasma raised its head and glanced at Huo Wuling, a few bats composed of black mist suddenly appeared in the air, flying towards Huo Wuling Past: "I think these kids would love to serve you."
"It's still free."
Huo Wuling waved his hand and smashed the bats back into a black mist. Looking at the bats and the blood in the cup, he couldn't help raising his eyebrows.
He could perceive that the power of the vampire was recovering, and the speed was not slow, and that the artificial man, the two together were very difficult to deal with, and it was difficult for him to get any benefits from it.
As he told Ji Ning before, attacking these two people now is just a waste of his strength, it is better to return to Ji Ning's shadow to recover, before the vampire fully recovers Kill him first.
"I really don't like guys with wings."
Jining looked down at her shadow, not knowing why Huo Wuling suddenly returned, according to his character, he should not have acted like this, in the end it can only be attributed to Huo Wuling being tired , after all, the people who had to control the entire spaceship before, and then fight with Ark and the others, must consume a lot of power.
Don't talk about him, even Ji Ning felt very tired. He went to rest early after dinner, but before he lay on the bed for a long time, a strange thing appeared on his body. Feel.
Like a flame burning, a strong longing rose from the depths of his soul, as if something was calling him and attracting him.
It is the blood pact of Herinos that strikes again...
Jining grabbed the collar of her pajamas, gasping for breath, sweat dripping from her forehead, stumbled out of bed, and walked out of the bedroom, wanting to seek help from Herinos.
A small bat flew out from the dim corridor. Herinos had already sensed it and came over to look for Ji Ning.
Jining became weaker and weaker, and fell staggeringly forward. His eyes suddenly turned black, the black cloak turned a wave in the air, and a black gloved hand supported Ji Ning Then he fell into Herinos' strong embrace.
The handsome blood prince looked down at the man in his arms, cut his wrist, let the blood flow out, and fed it into Ji Ning's mouth.
With the influx of blood, the pain caused by the blood contract quickly dissipated, and Ji Ning fell into Herinos' arms, covered in sweat, and weakly said in a low voice: " thanks…"
"I'll take you back."
The horns stopped him from leaving.
"Are you okay?" Ning asked, "You can **** my blood to restore your strength."
Speaking, he sat up, opened his collar, and exposed his white neck in front of Herinos.
“…”
Herinos made a move, he was willing to respect Ji Ning, but also, he had no reason to refuse Ji Ning's initiative, so he sat down by the bed and hugged Ji Ning body, lowered his head and pierced his fangs into his skin.
Being sucked by a vampire has never been a painful thing, on the contrary, there will be a light and psychedelic feeling, which is very addictive. When Herinos raised his head, Ji Ning was still immersed in that feeling, a little dizzy, and it took a while for him to regain his senses.
Herinos gently wiped the blood from his lips, smiled at Ji Ning, and gently kissed his forehead: "Thank you."
“…actually I should be thanking you.”
After a brief silence, Ning said, "And I'm sorry, Herinos, I used you."
After thinking about it, Ji Ning still told the truth, including that he remembered his past with Herinos, and the things he had reached in many worlds, but he expressed it in the way of reincarnation , just saying that his way of life is relatively special, and he will change his body every once in a while to have a new identity and life.
Herinos can understand this expression, because some vampires like human beings very much, and if they want to live with human beings, they will disguise their identities and integrate into human beings, but because they are almost immortal The existence of immortality will bid farewell to the old land every few years and change to a new city life.
However, Ji Ning's way of life is different from these blood clans. According to him, these identities are not chosen by him, he can only accept them passively, and he has to play a corresponding role.
"I don't really hate you."
Jining said, "But I can't help myself, so I can only treat you with that attitude, and later I hid the truth from you. I'm sorry."
At this time, his feelings were very complicated. He did not expect that he had been kept in the dark by Ji Ning.
From the first moment he saw Ji Ning, he had a good impression of Ji Ning, so he never doubted Ji Ning, even if he had noticed the incongruity more than once , would also choose to subconsciously ignore the past because of his emotional bias, he was willing to trust Ji Ning.
His suggestion also lost its effect on Ji Ning—remembering that he had modified Ji Ning's memory several times before, Ji Ning clearly remembered it clearly, but he pretended that his memory had been modified, Without expressing anything, Herinos' mood was even more complicated. At this moment, he really wanted to give himself a hint to make himself forget these things.
the person I like.
"Although you've been lying to me, but... I'm very happy."
After a moment of silence, Herinos still smiled and looked at Ji Ning tenderly: "At least you haven't forgotten our past."
He paused for a while, then said: "I should also apologize to you, in fact, didn't I use the same method? I thought you had forgotten me after your reincarnation, in order to make you accept I, I choose to insinuate you, let you treat me as your friend and stay by your side in a way that deceives you."
"I'm sorry, Ning."
He solemnly apologized to Ji Ning.
"Of course I won't blame you, Herinos." Ning said, "Then will you forgive me?"
Herinos smiled: "Since you still have memories, then you should know that I will never be angry with you."
Hearing him say this, Ji Ning felt a sense of relief, but also felt that she was a little sorry for Herinos, as if seeing through her thoughts, the blood prince suddenly held his He put his hand on his chest, looked into his eyes, and asked in a low voice.
"I want to know how you really feel about me."
"..." Ji Ning was silent for a few seconds, then responded, "I like you very much, but it's just my appreciation for my friends. I treat you as my friend."
"Really..."
Herinos showed a hint of disappointment, but quickly laughed: "Friends are also very good, at least I know that you don't hate me, I should be satisfied."
Hearing him say this, Ji Ning felt a little unbearable. In fact, in that world, he had absolutely no opinion on Herinos. The reason for this was because of his identity. .
In the world of Herinos, his identity was a blood race hunter, and the whole family was killed, only he and his sister depended on each other, so his role was not only to hate Herinos, Actually hated all the vampires.
This world is very special to Ji Ning, because this is the first world he has experienced, and he should not attack Herinos, the hero, but the heroine Fu Lola.
This western blood novel is called "Queen of Moonlight", it tells the story of how Flora, who is a mixed blood of human and blood, grew from a weak noble girl to a queen of blood, while Ji Ning The original role was the third male in the novel.
After Ji Ning met the "Future" of the system, he initially regarded him as a very ordinary person. He should have attacked the heroine and made the heroine fall in love with him, but something serious happened because of Herinos The deviation caused him to have to embark on the road of attacking the male protagonist in the future.
At the beginning of the novel, the heroine Flora was a noble girl who met the prince of the human race who was the second male. The prince fell in love with Flora, and later learned that her physique seemed to be It is very special, and it is very easy to be attacked by low-level vampires, so he used the privilege to assign Ji Ning to Flora as her bodyguard to protect her from being attacked by vampires.
The third male is the youngest top genius hunter of the Blood Hunting Association. He is cold as ice and has a strong hatred for the vampires and the low-level vampires they have assimilated. Naturally, he also hates the mixed-race Flora. See, hated her very much at first.
This is the first time for Ji Ning to do a mission. He has a very low level and no authority. He can only play the role of a person who hates Flora in the early stage.
It's just that his acting skills were still a little green at that time, Flora was gentle and smart, he didn't hate her, and Flora also vaguely felt Ji Ning's true emotions, so much that she and Different from the original book, she was not afraid of Ji Ning's cold face at all. Every time she saw Ji Ning, she was always smiling, which made Ji Ning feel a very subtle sense of frustration.
But in any case, this is a good thing. His relationship with Flora is getting closer day by day. .
The first time he saw Herinos was at a night party. In the original plot, this is also the place where Flora first met Herinos. At the banquet everyone dressed up and no one could recognize anyone, so Flora danced with Herinos, who was disguised as a human. dance and impress each other.
As Flora's bodyguard, Ji Ning naturally wants to attend the banquet with her. He has no right to prevent Flora's first encounter, so he hugged his arms and watched Flora sitting Drink in the corner and wait for the arrival of Herinos.
Perhaps he looked at Flora so seriously that it attracted the attention of others. Before the music was officially played, a low and pleasant voice suddenly came from his ear, with a smile ask him.
"Aren't you going to invite that beautiful lady?"
Jining looked back and saw that he was talking to a very young nobleman, dressed in a black tuxedo and a cloak, handsome, wearing a half-face mask, only showing the lower half of his face, But you can also see that he has a handsome appearance, black hair and black eyes, as if smudged by the night sky, mysterious and elegant in temperament.
The young noble came to him and smiled.
"I noticed you've been looking at her, do you want to invite her to dance? Then why not? She's a very attractive lady, if you don't act in time, she will You will be invited by others, won't you feel unwilling?"
Jining glanced at the nobleman, did not speak, just continued to look at Flora in silence, because what he was waiting for was Herinos inviting her, he could not change the established plot, just I can only think of other ways to express myself "jealous".
He didn't know what Herinos looked like, but he probably knew that Herinos invited Flora just before the ball was about to start.
After a while, a young man wearing a mask suddenly stepped forward and invited Flora, Ji Ning observed the man's appearance, black hair, and clothes were very similar to the description in the original book , black dress, cloak, half face mask.
There should have been a dark red coat of arms, which was tied on the chest of Helinos, which was also the proof that Flora recognized Helinos afterward, but the man was wearing a cloak, Ji Ning couldn't see where the coat of arms was, so he could only guess that it was Herinos.
It's time for him to step forward to show his presence and express his dissatisfaction with Flora dancing with other men.
Jining was brewing her emotions, but suddenly someone grabbed her wrist. It was the young noble who spoke to him.
"
"It's none of your business."
Jining said coldly, and walked in the direction of Flora, but suddenly found herself unable to break free from the young noble's hand and was blocked, and she was shocked.
As a blood race hunter, his skills are very good, and he will never be stopped by ordinary people, but now he can't get rid of this man's hand at all, which makes him instantly alert and aware of A man's identity is anything but ordinary.
"Don't go," said the young noble.
"Why did you stop me?"
Jining frowned slightly, thinking that this is the force majeure of the plot, he wanted to interrupt Flora and Herinos, but was stopped in the middle, so he simply stopped, Looking blankly at the young nobleman: "Do you want to be her next dance partner?"
"No." The young noble smiled, "The person I want to invite is you." After that, he bent down slightly and extended a hand to Ji Ning, "I hope you can appreciate the honor. , dance with me."
"Stop joking." Ji Ning said, "We are all men."
"I'm not joking." The corners of the young nobleman's lips curved slightly, "Please come with me."
He took Ji Ning's hand, dragged him through the banquet venue, entered the winding labyrinth of shrubs, and led him into the center of the labyrinth, which was a quiet and open place , you can faintly hear the music coming from the banquet.
When he got here, the young noble took off his cloak and took off the mask on his face, revealing his face clearly, and he was extremely handsome.
He brushed up the loose hair, revealing his smooth forehead, smiled and said to Ji Ning, "If we dance here, no one will disturb us."
Jining didn't answer, his eyes were all focused on the nobleman's chest, because there, a dark red coat of arms carved with roses was emitting a halo in the moonlight.
.
Now seeing this coat of arms, Ji Ning's heart suddenly had a very bad premonition.
Could this strange man be Herinos?
If he is Herinos, who is dancing with Flora?
Ning's expression changed slightly, she immediately grabbed the sleeve of the young nobleman and asked, "What's your name?"
"Dan." The young nobleman said with a smile, "You can call me that."
This is the pseudonym given by Herinos when he first met Flora.
This man is indeed Herinos.
It's over!
Jining felt cold all over, if Flora didn't know Herinos, then all the plots would have a series of crashes, which would cause him to be obliterated by the operator!
No, he can't just accept his fate, he must take Herinos back and let him and Flora meet, before the banquet is over!
"Follow me."
He couldn't help but grab Herinos' hand and drag him out of the labyrinth, but even if he was a genius hunter in the Blood Hunt Association, he couldn't match the power of the blood prince. Even when Herinos struggled with a little force, he pulled Ji Ning back, and was hugged by the lower back.
"A new song is about to start."
I'll send you away."
Jining couldn't figure out why Herinos didn't invite Flora, but turned to him. He refused to let him go and insisted on dancing with him, which made him unable to help but ask: