Volume 6, Chapter 15 – The Seemingly Friendly God

Still dwelling on that day’s incident?

Looking at the fidgety fire cat in front of her, Fia couldn’t help but find it amusing. She hadn’t taken that day’s events to heart at all. Although Nola had reeked of alcohol back then, she had already stripped down to her underwear before entering the bathhouse, and the vomit hadn’t gotten on Fia. If anything, Fia was the one who had gotten a bargain.

Objectively speaking, Nola’s development was perfectly appropriate for her age. The elastic feel of her chest, the smooth sensation of her arms and thighs rubbing against Fia, and the feeling of Nola’s wet, slightly rough tongue licking her neck and cheek—it was all quite wonderful. Of course, her looks played a part too. If Nola hadn’t been a beautiful girl, the whole thing would have been a different story. It was realistic, but also a fact.

And honestly, once one accepted the premise that Nola was just a kitten looking for someone to spoil her, she was actually quite cute.

Directly saying I didn’t take it to heart… No, that’s not right.

Fia glanced again at Nola, whose fiery red cat ears were drooping and whose face was flushed with embarrassment. A thought of teasing her quietly arose in her heart.

Even though she wasn’t usually like this, facing Nola made her really want to bully her a little. It was probably because Nola was just too fun to bully.

An idea gradually formed in her mind. Fia pretended to be troubled.

“Hmm… indeed. If I hadn’t reacted in time back then, Nola might have vomited all over me. Although Nola is the Holy Son of Cold Night, I am, after all, the Eldest Princess of the Silvar Kingdom. The elves view of love is quite different from that of beastmen. Even between women, distance must be maintained. Furthermore, the high-ranking elf nobles are very conservative and don’t support same-sex marriage. Being seen by so many maids at the time, I’m afraid the news has already reached the ears of every noble: ‘The Eldest Princess was harassed by a new beastman maid.’ I’ll become a laughingstock…”

While speaking, Fia quietly observed Nola. She saw Nola’s expression becoming increasingly stiff, her ears flattening more and more against her head, to the point where she felt she had committed an unforgivable crime.

This girl is way too easy to fool.

I feel like with just a little trickery, I could sell her off and she’d still count the money for me.

Hearing “laughingstock,” the determination disappeared from Nola’s face. She looked up worriedly and asked cautiously.

“Then… then what should we do? For a princess of a country to be involved in such a scandal…”

“Solving it is easy. The problem lies with you.”

Fia turned around with a frivolous tone, sidling up to Nola and secretly opening one eye to observe her reaction.

Nola hurriedly asked.

“Do you need my cooperation? Just say it.”

“It’s very simple. Just like Claire, if you become my future queen consort, there won’t be a problem. Since we’d be lovers with a confirmed marriage, it doesn’t matter how intimate we get, right?”

“Huh… Huh?”

To Fia’s surprise, Nola didn’t retort. Instead, she opened her mouth wide and froze on the spot. Then she hurriedly took a step forward and asked urgently.

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“Is… is there no other choice? Just because the rumors are bad, I have to marry you? This…”

This reaction… you’re practically begging me to bully you.

Seeing Nola’s conflicted look, Fia almost laughed out loud. She tried her best to keep a straight face, looking solemnly at the valley they came from.

“Didn’t you say you’d do whatever you could? Originally, for Claire’s sake, I had no intention of making you compensate me. But since you insisted on asking, I’m telling you this method. Let me be clear upfront: although neither of us has feelings for the other, once you become a queen consort, there are some things you must abide by even if you don’t want to. You don’t need to do laundry or guard duty, but coming to my room every night to serve me in bed and cooking three meals a day for me are your obligations as a queen consort. Of course, acting affectionately in front of outsiders is also within your obligations.”

“Serve in bed…”

As if encountering an extremely profound problem, Nola frowned deeply in thought. What Fia didn’t know was that Nola was truly seriously considering the future—like what to do about her clansmen, or how becoming a queen consort didn’t fit the identity of a Holy Son. This caused her extreme internal conflict.

Seeing this, Fia added another sentence.

“By the way, if you become my queen consort, wouldn’t you be able to stay by Claire’s side all day legitimately? Of course, I won’t allow you to mess around. After all, we are just King and Queen in name. But just sitting together like good sisters, drinking tea, and researching things you’re interested in—Claire and I definitely won’t refuse you.”

“Ugh.” Suddenly, intense wavering appeared in Nola’s purple eyes, and her throat bobbed. “I…”

“Pfft.”

“W-What’s wrong?”

“Nothing, nothing. Don’t be nervous. I was just joking with you. Everything just now was nonsense I made up; don’t take it to heart. If people are going to laugh, they’ll only laugh at you, not me. Besides, I didn’t feel embarrassed or ashamed by it. Nola, don’t worry about it.”

“You—” Nola suddenly raised her eyebrows, anger appearing in her eyes. “You were playing with me?”

“You were the one who said you wanted to compensate me. If I directly said not to worry about it, wouldn’t you feel guilty? Giving you a difficult problem on purpose and seeing your troubled look counts as repayment.”

Fia’s serious tone left Nola unsure of how to rebuke her for a moment. Fia was right. With her personality, if she felt she owed someone and the other party didn’t exact some punishment, she would always feel indebted and inferior.

It was just that, for some reason, when she learned Fia was only joking, Nola suddenly felt a sense of loss, an emptiness in her heart—the loss of the opportunity to be with Claire made her feel dejected.

Reading Nola’s thoughts from her stunned expression, Fia reached out and patted Nola’s shoulder. Taking a joke too far would make the atmosphere awkward; she had to stop while she was ahead. She deliberately lowered her voice, tilted her head to observe Nola’s expression, and said slyly.

“You’re not actually tempted, are you? Even if you are, I can’t possibly save the position of queen consort for you, you know?”

“Hmph!” Realizing what happened, Nola turned her head away with an ashen face, puffing up her cheeks as she continued on her way. “I still have my own people to take care of. How could I be your queen consort? Don’t even think about it! If you married into my family, I might reluctantly accept you for the sake of being Claire’s ‘gift’!”

Despite her harsh words, Nola’s hand still obediently held Fia’s. This made Fia smile.

“Rather than saying that for me to hear, it sounds more like you’re saying it for yourself. If you really want to see Claire, you can come to Blossom anytime. I won’t stop you.”

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Nola didn’t answer Fia, only applying a little more force to the hand holding Fia’s, which counted as a response.

So dishonest. Not cute at all.

Joke time over, the two fell silent. Along the way, there was only the rustling sound of feet stepping on the muddy ground.

Fia noticed that the level of the illusion barrier here was quite high. It affected not only hearing and vision but also touch. Take the ground, for example. When [See Through] was active, she could clearly feel the sensation of stepping on sand. But when [See Through] was off, the feeling changed to stepping on soft soil. Similarly, when cutting the blocking “branch,” with [See Through] on, she clearly felt she was cutting hard bone, while with it off, the feedback was only of a tough branch.

Generally speaking, once an individual’s rank reached a certain level, illusion magic would fail to affect them. For example, if a first-rank magic caster used illusion magic on Nola, Nola would only be curious about what this first-rank magic was doing, not bewildered by the illusion. But now, even she was affected by the illusion. Aside from a god, Fia couldn’t think of anything else that could set up a barrier capable of affecting her.

Then the remaining question was: why would the Goddess set up a barrier here? In the first place, the fact that the Goddess lived in a place full of undead was puzzling in itself. Undead, Netherworld, and necromantic creatures were all concepts of the same category. The undead belonged to the Darkborn faction. It was really hard to understand why the Goddess chose to make her home here.

“Mm.”

A sound like she wanted to speak but stopped came from Nola’s throat. Nola glanced back at Fia quietly from time to time. This action repeated three or four times until Fia finally couldn’t help asking.

“What do you want to say?”

“…Just checking what you’re doing.”

Nola looked away guiltily, obviously lying. She actually wanted to say, “Why aren’t you talking anymore? The silence is awkward.” But remembering she was the one who ignored Fia first, she felt too embarrassed to say it.

She cleared her throat, clumsily searching for a topic.

“When you allowed me to go to Blossom with you before, I was worried you would take the opportunity to lock me up in Blossom… It was despicable of me to think that, wasn’t it?”

“It’s nothing.”

Fia shrugged and continued to catch the blind ghosts around them. As they went deeper, the rank of the surrounding ghosts changed from less than first-rank to all being first-rank ghosts. This made Fia think that if killing ghosts could increase magic power, having Liti use healing magic on such a massive amount of ghosts would definitely bring a huge improvement.

“Nothing? Even though I judged a gentleman’s heart with a villain’s mind?”

“You are the Holy Son of Cold Night. It’s normal to worry that I might take advantage of the situation to harm you. You haven’t accepted Tilulu as queen yet, and I am determined to promote Tilulu as the Queen of Cold Night. This is an irreconcilable conflict in itself. Besides, Cold Night and the Silvar Kingdom are still at war. As the Holy Son, it’s reasonable for you to think you might be captured after going deep into enemy territory alone. Not to mention you once raised your sword against me, the Crown Princess of the Kingdom.”

“You… your rationality makes me feel afraid. Being doubted and misunderstood, anyone would feel somewhat uncomfortable in their heart, right? Have you always been like this?”

Fia paused, her exquisite, doll-like face full of indifference.

“If you mean ‘always,’ I think the past me definitely lacked emotions more than the current me. If it were me before losing my memory, I wouldn’t have said that was a joke just now. I would have just tricked you into becoming a queen consort and started using you, probably.”

Fia’s guess wasn’t unreasonable. The past Eldest Princess gave her a feeling of absolute rationality, willing to use any means to achieve her goals. Judging from the internal system of Twilight Flower, she felt the past Eldest Princess didn’t treat Erin Slate and the others as subordinates at all, but merely as tools. This included the underground organization in Blossom.

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Not only did they run a slave trade, but even contract killings weren’t prohibited. Although this could be interpreted as “since crime cannot be eliminated, it’s better to control it within a relatively acceptable range,” given the wisdom the Eldest Princess displayed, these ugly deeds could have been eliminated to a near-nonexistent level. Considering the Twilight Flower members’ operations required a large amount of funding, she felt the Eldest Princess controlled the underground organization purely for money.

Even using her own blood to treat Erin Slate and the others, who suffered from Darkborn sickness, was likely out of utilization and experimental considerations—for example, exploring why her blood could treat Darkborn sickness and what Darkborn sickness itself was. The loyalty of Erin Slate and the others was just an unexpected gain.

If there was one part that showed the Eldest Princess’s sentimentality, perhaps saving Anastasia was the only thing not done out of interest.

Of course, these were all guesses Fia derived from reality. The truth was unknown.

“So why didn’t you lock me up then? Generally speaking, that would save the most trouble.”

“You wanted me to do that?”

“Of course not. I’m just curious about your considerations.”

“It’s not hard to understand.” Fia thought for a moment, then nodded her chin toward Nola’s hand holding hers. “If you let go of me now, wouldn’t I get lost in this thick fog? Then I wouldn’t be able to stand between you and Claire anymore. But you didn’t do that.”

Fia’s words caused dissatisfaction in Nola. She raised her eyebrows.

“I have my principles.”

“I have my principles too. You and I are the same on this point.”

Nola was stunned at first, then gradually realized. She revealed a relieved smile.

“So that’s how it is. Forget it, let’s not talk about these issues. Speaking of which, you’re completely different from others. After others know I’m the Holy Son, their next sentence is to ask me which god I believe in. But you’ve never asked me about it.”

Since Nola had brought her here, saying more sentimental words would be too cheesy. Fia asked with a smile.

“Then I’ll ask now. Which god does Nola believe in?”

“I don’t know.”

“You don’t know? You’ve been the Holy Son for several years, right?”

At first, Fia thought Nola was joking, but Nola’s expression was very sincere and full of helplessness. She sighed with extreme weariness.

“I’ve never seen the Goddess’s appearance. The Goddess is always hidden in light. Even when I ask directly whether she is the Polar Night Goddess or the White Night Goddess, she won’t answer me. All I know is that she is a goddess and is very gentle to people. I remembered Claire because I possess Divinity; that was the answer the Goddess told me too.”

“The Goddess wasn’t unhappy knowing you knew Claire?”

Fia straightened her back, becoming serious. From the elf god’s attitude toward Claire, it was clear that all gods in this world couldn’t tolerate outsiders like Claire. But Nola’s god didn’t react that way, and even gave Nola the correct answer. She seemed to be a god who could be communicated with properly.

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Seeing Fia get nervous, Nola also became serious.

“No. She just said it was interesting.”

“Then when you see the Goddess later, you can ask her how to lift the curse on Claire.”

“I know. But the Goddess won’t answer just any question. I can only guarantee I’ll try my best to get an answer.”

“It doesn’t matter. After you ask, I’ll go ask too. There’s no time to lose. Let’s use flight magic to go over. Even flying close to the ground is faster than walking.”

Originally, Nola wanted to ask, “How will you go ask?” But Fia had already taken the lead to fly up, forcing her to chant the incantation and use [Flight].

However, just a few seconds after the two flew up, the ghosts that had been routed by Fia’s healing magic gathered again with unprecedented density, as if commanded by something. At the same time, a bloody wind strong enough to blind people blew through the mountains, forcing Fia to use her [Spatial Hand] to hold down her skirt.

Something is about to appear. Probably a monster. Fia vaguely sensed it.

Nola stopped immediately. With a serious expression, she blocked Fia behind her, facing a formidable enemy. She gripped her Flame Greatsword tightly, as if ready to fight at any moment.

“Tsk, it’s a Fog Demon. Trouble.”

“Is it hard to deal with?”

“That’s the most difficult monster to deal with in this area—”

Before Nola could finish, an ear-piercing, treacherous laugh reached their ears.

“Jie jie, you’ve come again, Holy Son. Last time I fell for your trick. This time, don’t think about escaping my palm. Honestly, give me enough amusement, or don’t think about passing through here!”

Although she hadn’t seen the person yet, just from this entrance, she knew it was a complete gag character.

Fia quietly used [Wind of Exploration] to scan the surroundings. Soon, she found the Fog Demon Nola spoke of. It was a seventh-rank ghost, five or six stories tall, hiding among countless ordinary ghosts, less than twenty meters directly in front of her.

At this distance, a single [Mind Blast] can solve it.