Leon frowned, now that he thought about it, the voice was almost the same he remembered. When he landed, he understood why he didn"t recognize him.

"Man, I recognized you right away," Hector put his arm over Leon"s shoulder. "You grew up a little, but you didn"t change that much."

"… You changed a lot, the Hector I remember was a womanizer who didn"t take anything seriously and had the face of a fool." Leon said.

"Hey, now… don"t talk about my embarra.s.sing past in front of my soldiers." Hector scratched the back of his head. "I"m not a teenager anymore, now I"m the leader of this city, and I"m even a father, you know."

"Good for you…" Leon said.

Although Leon felt like Hector was friendly just like he was in his memories, he couldn"t act like before. Leon couldn"t act like before when they were friends because he totally forgot about him. For the past four years, he only thought about his parents and little sister…

"All right, guys, let"s clean up this mess…" Hector looked around and sighed when he saw the corpses of a few survivors. "I want the names of those who died and the name of those related to them in my table at noon."

"Yes, sir!" A random survivor said. "Captain, is it fine?"

Although Leon had helped them, they still couldn"t trust a stranger so fast. Hector, who was their captain, was acting as if it was fine. But hearing that they didn"t meet in the last eight years, one couldn"t help but worry.

"You can relax, this guy saved your a.s.s, right?" Hector asked.

"He used several spells and even flew for several minutes, and he doesn"t look tired at all… if he wanted to do something against us, he would have done a long ago in the middle of the night without letting us notice it."

"… Yes," The survivor hesitated.

After that, Leon and Hector moved to the city. Although the survivors were protecting the borders of Las Vegas, most parts of the city were in ruins. Las Vegas didn"t get nuked, but the monsters destroyed a lot of things. Despite the piles of rubble being numerous, Leon saw a lot of brand new houses. People now had superhuman strength, and they could plant as many trees as they wanted, so building wood houses was pretty easy.

"So, Leon, where have you been?" Hector asked. "If I remember well, you went to study abroad after high school…"

Leon didn"t have time to idle chat, but considering that Hector was an old friend and he also was the leader of the survivors of that city, maybe it was a good idea to give him a brief summary of what happened to him.

"When the monsters appeared, I was in an airplane returning home," Leon said. "It was four years ago, soon after I graduated… the airplane got attacked by a dragon, and then I spent the last four years stuck in an island."

"… I think you skipped a few important parts," Hector frowned. "How the h.e.l.l did you survive a plane crash?"

"I obtained a few skills, obtained status points, and put then in health before I fell in the ocean," Leon answered.

"As always… you are quite a fast thinker… even though you are so slow sometimes." Hector chuckled. "Seriously? Did you survive a plane crash?"

"Yeah… after that, to escape the island, I learned how to use mana," Leon explained. "But as you can imagine, traveling through the ocean or the skies isn"t safe like before… so I lost a few years there."

"So… you are like a mage, my men said that you used some spells…" Hector rubbed his chin. "How did you learn?"

"If you want something, you have to give something of equal value." Leon declared. "I want information, and if you have that kind of information, I will tell you how I learned."

"Information… about your family?" Hector asked.

"Yeah… how did you know?" Leon furrowed his eyebrows.

"If you what said is true, the only reason a man would go for such lengths would be his family…" Hector looked away. "Your sister is fine; she lives with me."

"… Why would she live with you?" Leon looked at Hector suspiciously.

"Well… several things happened in the last four years." Hector avoided Leon"s eyes. "We fought alongside each other to survive, and we eventually defeated the monsters which were living here… After that, one thing led to the other and then… we ended up marrying two years ago."

"You what?" Leon grabbed Hector by the collar. "Two years ago… she was just sixteen, you b.a.s.t.a.r.d! Did the end of the world turn you into a filthy sc.u.mbag? Wait a minute… you said that you are a father…"

"Yeah… Amanda gave birth to a girl last year." Hector added. "Her name is…"

Before Hector could finish, Leon punched him with all his might. Hector flew several meters and hit his back against an energy pole. Before he could get up, Leon drew his sword.

"Ouch… are you really a mage?" Hector ma.s.saged his chin. "You have a lot of strength… calm down, Leon. Don"t do anything rash that will make you regret later."

Hector gave the sign to the people who started to run towards him to stop, they were armed, and they were ready to protect their leader.

"Shut up your degenerate… do you think this many people can stop me before I explode your head?" Leon asked while pointing a fire arrow toward Hector"s head.

"Let"s not cross the line, okay?" Hector got up and cleaned his clothes. "I can see that you can explode my head… I can see in your eyes that I deserve that. But will you do the same to these people? They will try to avenge my death… you can fly and escape, but won"t be able to enter this place and see your sister ever again."

"Shut up! I will take her out of this place." Leon declared.

"Good luck finding her…" Hector sighed. "Anyway, listen to the rest of the story, and you will understand everything."

"What is there to listen to?" Leon shouted.

"… I"m sorry for saying this so bluntly." Hector took a deep breath and then closed his eyes. "Your parents died when the monsters attacked Phoenix."