The Unrivalled Return Of Lord Valerian

CHAPTER 5 - WHERE IS CRYSTAL?

Whistle was taller than Valerian remembered, broader and soft from easy living. “You don’t just walk in here after three years and take things. That old woman cost us money. Food. Electricity. Space."

Valerian's eyes lifted slowly to meet his. "Move, Whistle."

"Not until we talk compensation." Whistle smirked, clearly enjoying himself. "Someone had to feed her, water her, keep an eye on her all this time you were rotting in a cell. That's not free. Call it — I don't know — caretaking fees. Say, fifty grand, and we'll call it even."

For a moment, Valerian simply looked at him. There was no fury left on his face now — only a terrible, quiet contempt.

"I said move," Valerian said, this time, threatening.

Whistle smirked and planted his feet wider. “Or what, jailbird? You going to—”

Valerian didn't allow him to finish his statement.

It happened too fast for Whistle to so much as flinch — a single kick catching him square in the midsection.

Whistle left his feet entirely, sailing backward across the room in a horrifying arc before slamming into the far wall hard enough to crack the plaster.

He slid down it in a heap, coughing violently, a thin line of blood sliding from the corner of his mouth.

Nirvana screamed.

She shot up from the sofa, the dish of supplements scattering. She was across the room in seconds, dropping to her knees beside her son, cradling his head while she shot Valerian a very cold stare.

"You monster!" she shrieked, tears springing instantly to her eyes. "You'll pay for this! Do you hear me? You'll pay a terrible price!"

"I already am," Valerian said quietly, adjusting his mother in his arms. "Every day I spent in that prison, I paid for a crime I never committed, just to save your ingrate daughter. This—" he glanced down at Whistle, still gasping against the wall, "—this is a discount."

Nirvana's face contorted with fury and fear at the same time.

"Even if you manage to drag her out of here," she spat, "she won't survive the night, I promise you. You think any hospital in this city will touch her? Do you have ANY idea who my daughter is with right now?"

Valerian said nothing, waiting.

"Young Master Neil," Nirvana said, savoring the name like a weapon. "My son in-law to be."

"The McIntyre family owns more than eighty percent of the hospitals in this city, and every top specialist worth a damn answers to them. Without Neil's permission, no doctor in this city will so much as look at her. You could carry her to the front steps of the finest hospital in the country and they'd let her die on the pavement rather than risk his family's anger."

She smiled, expecting fear in the broken look of a man who had just learned the walls of the world were higher than he thought.

Instead, Valerian smiled coldly.

“Eighty percent,” he repeated quietly. “Then what about the remaining twenty?”

Nirvana blinked, then lifted her chin. "The remaining belongs to places like the Royal Hospital," she said, practically preening now.

"Reserved for real elites. Government officials. Old money. Tycoons whose names actually mean something. Trash like you wouldn't even know where to find the front entrance."

Valerian didn't bother responding to the insult.

He simply reached into his pocket, drew out a small button phone, and dialed a number Alaric had made him memorise along with a warning never to use it unless he meant it.

Alaric was not only the greatest martial arts grandmaster alive but also the most legendary divine physician in existence.

Countless world-renowned medical experts had once studied under the old man, and even the slightest guidance from him was enough to transform an ordinary physician into a revered authority in their field.

To those experts, Alaric was nothing short of a god. His name alone commanded absolute respect.

The moment they heard it, they would bow without hesitation, for earning even a single word of instruction from him was considered an honor beyond measure.

The line connected on the second ring.

"H-hello?" The voice on the other end was elderly, and it trembled — trembled in a way that made both Nirvana and Whistle go still, wondering who could be talking to Valerian with such reverence"This number... is this—"

"It's me," Valerian said simply.

There was a sharp intake of breath, followed by the unmistakable sound of someone scrambling upright, chair legs scraping frantically against a floor somewhere.

"Young Master." The old man's voice had transformed entirely, reverence bleeding into every syllable. "Forgive me, I couldn’t believe it for a second — it's been so long since — please, whatever you need, it is already done. Simply give the order."

"My mother is in critical condition," Valerian said, his tone leaving no room for negotiation. "Multiple infected wounds, severe fever, possible sepsis. I need the Royal Hospital's top VIP ward prepared immediately, and every senior specialist you have on standby the moment she arrives."

"Consider it done, Young Master. I will personally oversee her care myself. Once the address is sent, the helicopter will be dispatched in few minutes."

The call ended and the room went silent.

Nirvana's mouth opened, then closed, then opened again, no sound emerging.

Whistle, still slumped against the wall, stared at Valerian with something between disbelief and dawning terror.

It took several seconds for either of them to convince themselves it had to be some kind of bluff — he was definitely acting.

"Do you think we are fools?" Nirvana said, though her voice had lost most of its conviction. "He is obviously bluffing. The Royal Hospital doesn't admit anyone without proper channels. You expect me to believe—"

"Believe whatever helps you sleep," Valerian said, already turning away from her, then all of a sudden he paused.

His eyes glanced around the room.

He just realised he hadn't seen his sister once since he walked in.

"Where is Crystal?"

Nirvana and Whistle exchanged a glance.

"Crystal?" Nirvana said too quickly. "I believe she is fine. We don't keep her confined here. She went out on her own — chasing after some wealthy man, probably. You know how girls her age are."

"Where is my sister?" Valerian's voice dropped low and powerful.

Neither of them answered.

Valerian crossed the room in three strides and seized Whistle by the collar, hauling him bodily off the floor, his grip tightening around his throat until Whistle's face began to purple, his hands scrabbling uselessly at Valerian's forearm.

"I—okay—okay!" Whistle choked out, terror finally overriding whatever pride he had left. "Keeya— Keeya and Neil gave her away! As a gift! To some executive running the Vallencourt investment project — she's at the clubhouse, the one on Iverside, that's all I know, I swear!"

Valerian's grip did not loosen.

"But it won't matter," Nirvana said quickly, desperately, as though the words might somehow save her son. "Even if you go there — the people involved with the Vallencourt Group are untouchable. Someone like you charging in there will only get you killed. You should be thanking us for the warning."

Without another word, he drove his heel down onto Whistle's leg.

The crack of bone was audible even over Whistle's scream, and before the sound had fully died, Valerian brought his foot down again on the other leg, exactly as merciless.

"Take that as your compensation," he spat, glaring at Whistle, whose shrieks tore through the villa, Nirvana's hysterical sobbing rising to match them, but Valerian was already walking away, his mother cradled gently against his chest.

By the time he stepped outside, the thrum of helicopter blades was already cutting through the afternoon air.

The medevac unit descended onto the villa's front lawn, uniformed paramedics spilling out before it had even fully touched down, moving sharply and urgently under the direction of a silver-haired man who all but sprinted to meet him.

"Young Master." The old dean of the Royal Hospital bowed so low his forehead nearly touched his own knees, sparing not a single glance for the mansion or the screaming coming from within it. "Please, allow us."

Valerian laid his mother gently onto the stretcher, brushing a strand of damp hair from her forehead.

"Save her," he said quietly. "Whatever it takes."

"On my life," the old man said.

Valerian watched the helicopter lift off into the sky toward the one hospital in this city that money like Keeya's could never touch, and only once it was safely gone did he allow the fire in his chest to fully surface again.

He turned toward the street, and began walking toward the east side of the city, toward the clubhouse where his sister had been delivered like a present.

Behind him, inside the villa that still smelled of rot and blood, Nirvana knelt beside her broken son and stared at the open door with wide eyes.

“Don't worry Whistle, he's walking to his death,” she whispered, trying to help the screaming Whistle back to his feet. “Keeya is going to deal with him baby. She is already connected to Vallencourt. If that animal causes trouble there… they will erase him.”

But Whistle only moaned, clutching the ruins of his legs.