CHAPTER 920: CHAPTER 920 WHAT HE REMEMBERS

She had done everything she could, taken every precaution, even approved that experimental drug, just to prevent this exact outcome. She wanted to protect him, to make sure he didn’t fall into a coma or suffer irreversible damage.

And yet... here they were.

Her worst fear had still come true. Maybe that gnawing nervousness she’d felt earlier had been her instincts screaming a warning she couldn’t fully hear. Now, the weight of reality crashed down on her. Her tears refused to fall, as if her tear ducts had run dry, but her soul felt heavy, drained, and aching.

"Y-You don’t remember me?" Hera asked, her voice trembling, eyes glistening with heartbreak.

Leo stared at her with a serious, cold expression. "Do we know each other?"

The words hit her like a bolt of lightning. Her chest tightened, and her heart ached so deeply she could barely breathe. Tears threatened to spill, but she fought them back; crying in front of him now would only make her seem like a stranger falling apart over nothing. Worse, she didn’t want to scare him or appear unhinged, especially when he was looking at her with no trace of recognition.

Should she even tell him who she was? Would it matter?

But it wasn’t just her; Leo seemed to have forgotten everyone connected to the storyline, as if the memories they shared had been wiped clean. As if none of them had ever existed in his world. Could this be the work of the storyline itself? Resetting the script and putting everything back in place?

If so... did she still have a chance to bring him back? Could she help him recover what they once had?

A cold fear crept into her bones. What if he never remembered her again? What if their paths, once so tightly woven together, were now fated to remain forever apart?

As Hera sat there in her wheelchair, lost in her thoughts, her eyes reddened slightly. Leo, ever observant, noticed the shift in her expression. He frowned. There was something in the way she bit her lower lip, trying to hold back a sob, that unsettled him. Her lips trembled despite her efforts to appear unaffected, and her hands were clenched so tightly he suspected her nails might already be digging into her palms.

He didn’t understand why she looked so hurt, so heartbroken, over something he couldn’t remember. But for some reason, he felt his own chest tighten.

Was it just because she was beautiful and pitiful? That couldn’t be it. He wasn’t the kind of man who was easily swayed by appearances. He had seen countless women try to manipulate him with tears and fragility, and he’d never felt anything.

But this woman... she was different. She stirred something unfamiliar in him, something deep and aching.

And then he noticed the cast on her arm and leg, the paleness of her skin, the way she looked like she was barely recovering from an accident. Just the thought of it made his frown deepen. Why did her pain feel so personal to him?

He didn’t know why, but when he first woke up, there was a strange ache in his chest, a hollow, gnawing pain, as if he had lost something precious. The feeling lingered, heavy and unshakable. As far as he could remember, just before waking, he had been trapped in a nightmare. Someone important to him had died, surrounded by endless bloodshed and devastation. It wasn’t physical pain he remembered, but a deep, soul-crushing sorrow that wrapped around his heart like a vice.

Even now, he could barely recall the details, just flickers of images and the overwhelming sense of grief. It felt like his heart had been wrung dry. And oddly, seeing the woman in front of him so distressed brought that same sensation rushing back. It was as if her pain mirrored something buried deep within him.

He had tried everything to remember that dream, convinced it held the key to something important. That was why he had been so quiet these past few days, trying to piece together what was lost. But no matter how hard he tried, it remained out of reach. Aside from that haunting dream, he felt normal... or at least, he thought he did.

Still, the doctors kept running countless tests, probing and evaluating him, and he went along with it, trying to make sense of what he was feeling. There was something missing, something vital.

And then there were these men who suddenly arrived out of the blue, familiar yet unfamiliar. They acted like they knew him, like they were close. Friends, maybe? He wasn’t sure. But at the same time, something about them felt distant, as though there was a wall between them that none of them could see.

All this time, Leo had been quietly observing everyone, just as he always did. He wasn’t the talkative type; he preferred to watch from the shadows, analyzing rather than engaging. And from his silent corner, he noticed something unusual, the strange, subtle connection between the men around him.

Then a woman entered the room, and suddenly, the atmosphere shifted. All attention turned to her, as if her presence alone changed everything. They treated her like something precious, revered.

For some reason, that piqued his curiosity too.

And yet... he couldn’t remember any of them. Not the men. Not the woman. No matter how familiar they tried to act, they were strangers to him.

But what he did remember was how he ended up in this state, how he was brought down. And the memory of it burned inside him like a slow fire. He had already begun mentally preparing to retaliate, to exact vengeance on those responsible. Tenfold. No, a hundredfold.

Now, all that remained was to wait for his assistant to arrive. Once they connected, he could finally begin issuing his orders and setting his plans in motion.

"Hey, do you really not remember us?" Dave asked, his tone casual, but his eyes sparkled with barely contained excitement, like someone secretly hoping to bump a rival out of the competition.

Deep down, he knew it was a long shot, but the possibility still thrilled him. After all, someone else had recently tried to worm their way into their already crowded circle, and winning Hera’s attention had never been easy to begin with.

With more contenders, it only got harder. But if Leo had truly forgotten everything... maybe, just maybe, it was a chance to tilt the odds in their favor. Maybe Hera would start to forget Leo, too.

Wishful thinking, he admitted. But it didn’t stop that little flicker of hope from making him grin and sound just a little too smug.

And sure enough, even though Leo couldn’t remember a thing, he felt an irrational urge to punch the burgundy-haired man with the smug grin and a hair tail that screamed ’boy band rebel’.

The guy oozed cheeky arrogance, and Leo was almost certain—without knowing why—that this man was trouble. Untrustworthy. Annoying. Definitely someone who’d make a terrible first impression.

Leo narrowed his eyes, gave him a long, unimpressed once-over, then rolled his eyes and looked away like Dave wasn’t even worth the energy.

Dave felt like he’d just swallowed a fly.

His eye twitched. He wanted to point at Leo and curse him out on the spot. But then he remembered, Leo was technically a patient. A recovering one at that. So he gritted his teeth and tried to rein in his temper. He even closed his eyes to calm himself.

It didn’t help.

His blood pressure was climbing fast. ’This damn amnesiac really knows how to push my buttons,’ Dave fumed internally, glaring daggers at Leo.

The others, meanwhile, were doing their best not to laugh, watching Dave, flustered and losing ground in front of a man who didn’t even remember his name.

Luke also stared at Leo, quietly trying to read him. But Leo’s face remained unreadable, his expression flat, emotionless. The only flicker of reaction he’d shown so far was that eye-roll at Dave.

"So, Leo," Luke began slowly, "you’re saying you remember getting ambushed in the forest... but you don’t recall who rescued you?" He paused for effect, then added, "Oh, right. You were completely unconscious when the extraction team arrived."

His last few words drifted off into a mutter, more like a self-correction than a statement, but Leo heard it clearly. Everyone else had gone silent, watching Leo closely, waiting for any change in his face. But his expression didn’t budge, not even a twitch, making it impossible to tell what he was thinking.

Leo’s frown deepened, his body language subtly shifting into a defensive stance as his eyes narrowed at Luke. He had just said he couldn’t remember anyone, so how did this man know about the ambush and the extraction? The detail unsettled him.

"Were you part of the team that rescued me when my unit got ambushed?" Leo asked, his voice calm but laced with suspicion. "Or are you one of the people who set us up?"