Chapter 331
Chapter: 331
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>Translator: penny
>Chapter: 331
>Chapter Title: Salon (1)
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It was late at night.
Unable to sleep for some reason, he was idly flipping through a book when one of the guild members cautiously knocked on the door.
Knock knock.
“Lord Kaien, I've brought the night snack you requested.”
“Yeah.”
The guild member who quietly entered placed the tray of snacks beside him discreetly and glanced at the boy.
“…I'll leave it here, then, Lord Kaien.”
“Got it. Go on.”
Kaien nodded roughly without even looking at him.
The moment permission was given, the guild member scurried out of the room like he was fleeing. It seemed he instinctively felt uneasy around Kaien ever since his soul had been partially tampered with.
Click.
As the door hastily shut, Kaien finally lifted his head and looked toward where the guild member had disappeared.
‘I've ended up in this halfway state. It would've been better if I could fully dominate his soul like Rodrigo's.’
Kaien had spent quite a long time taking over the entire mansion, but even so, completely dominating the guild members' souls was impossible. The Holy Emperor had placed some kind of protective barrier over the souls of everyone coming and going from the mansion.
Even if he managed to sneak past the barrier and tear out a soul, the moment the damage became noticeably large, the personnel would be replaced immediately, along with an order banning outings.
Because of that, Kaien had to painstakingly nibble away at the invisible parts of their souls bit by bit.
‘And Father probably already knows all about it…’
Still, the fact that he was leaving this level of interference alone suggested he judged it wasn't doing any major harm to the guild members.
Sending in new people anyway would just mean they'd end up having their souls nibbled on by Kaien all the same.
So rather than letting the frustrated boy attempt full soul domination, it was better to give him a bit of breathing room in this half-baked way and maintain the balance—that must have been his thinking.
‘Or maybe Father deliberately led me into this? Interfering without damaging the souls is far trickier than fully dominating them…’
In any case, Kaien's current limits were clear. He could only briefly impair the guild members' perceptions or make them carry out simple orders and forget about them afterward.
He could probably sneak poison into the Holy Emperor's meal as a prank, but escaping far away while avoiding them on purpose was impossible.
‘Pretending to give me freedom while tying me down like this… He's someone you really can't let your guard down around.’
The only soul Kaien fully dominated right now was one: Rodrigo, whom he'd been manipulating since the mountain village.
He was a man with quite a complicated backstory. To sum it up: an Ortona refugee who, after his homeland fell, threw himself into the Cartagena Duchy, underwent years of special agent training, sneaked back into the mountain village undercover, and was colluding with Plendor Kingdom agents as a double spy.
Of course, he'd caught Kaien's eye early on and ended up as his puppet.
In any case, a former agent made for a very useful subordinate in many ways. He'd been the one to infiltrate Asain's black market and procure rare poisons.
Kaien had planned to use him as a last resort to escape the Holy Emperor if needed…
‘But since Father mentioned the black market himself the other day, he already knows about Rodrigo too.’
So why leave him be?
Kaien couldn't fully grasp the Holy Emperor's intentions. Lately, though, he had the feeling that he wanted Kaien to think he was ‘free.’
‘As long as I follow the bare minimum of social norms, he won't restrict my actions much?’
To Kaien, it all seemed like a needless hassle.
‘Father's a really complicated guy the more I look at him. Hard to understand his principles at all.’
In any case, since he had no particular complaints about the current situation, Kaien figured it was fine to maintain this precarious balance for a while.
‘By the way, tomorrow's the day Father comes. Guess I should sleep now? Gotta play around with him doing this and that again.’
Thud.
As he closed the book and lay down on the bed, a pendant hanging around his neck rolled out.
A gem that reflected a clean light even under the dim lighting. It was something the Holy Emperor had handed to Kaien personally not long ago.
—Keep it safe. This is the last waypoint I can make, and the only chance I can give you.
It was clearly no ordinary item. The Holy Emperor's soul had worn an extremely serious expression when entrusting it to him.
In any case, he quite liked how it sparkled brilliantly, so even Kaien, who normally had no interest in accessories, made sure to wear it around his neck faithfully.
Nom nom.
Before closing his eyes, Kaien habitually put the gem in his mouth.
The moment he'd first seen it, he'd immediately wanted to eat it. So he'd chewed on it right in front of the Holy Emperor, who looked utterly shocked.
—Why would you try to eat that too? Is it because I failed to look after you, leaving you to starve through your childhood?
Father's reaction back then was hilarious.
‘By the way, what the heck is this gem? Doesn't seem like just a stone. It has this faintly sweet feel when I hold it in my mouth… pretty tasty to chew on…’
As he mumbled with it in his mouth, he began to drift into a light doze.
[…You little shit, watch your behavior from now on. I'm keeping an eye on you…]
Suddenly, a faint voice whispered in his ear.
‘…!?’
Chill.
Startled, Kaien bolted upright. He was certain someone's soul had approached and spoken to him.
But when he looked around the room, there was nothing. Just the bright moonlight pouring in through the open window, shattering white across the bed.
‘…What was that? Definitely a soul's voice.’
No way it was his imagination. For that split-second warning's pressure to make every hair on his body stand on end.
Gulp.
Tense, Kaien pulled the covers over his head and quietly swallowed dryly.
Fear from an unknown entity. It was a somewhat unfamiliar sensation for the boy who could easily manipulate people's souls.
‘What the hell? Who was that?’
Thanks to it, Kaien spent the whole night on alert and couldn't get proper sleep.
* * *
Tweet tweet. Tweet tweet.
Hearing the birds cry at the usual time, Seongjin barely lifted his heavy eyelids.
Even then, not fully awake, he lay in bed rubbing his eyes for a while. It wasn't like him at all.
‘What’s this? My body feels weirdly tired…’
Lately, he'd been sleeping soundly without even playing games, so why was his whole body so sluggish?
[Had a bad dream or something? You were mumbling vicious stuff in your sleep last night.]
Just then, the Demon King's soul stretched and asked.
‘Really?’
[Yeah. You've been visiting other parallel worlds for fun lately, so you hadn't sleep-talked in a while. But last night, you sounded seriously murderous.]
Oh, right. Maybe a nightmare. But since he didn't remember it at all, it probably wasn't a big deal.
Yawning as he finally got up, Seongjin thought.
‘By the way, will Logan show up at the training grounds today too? If he does, I should have him blast me with some holy power nice and refreshing.’
[Oh? Now you're treating people like automatic massagers?]
Not much difference when you think about the benefits. But how does this Demon King know about automatic massagers?
As he got up and started loosening up, he felt the Demon King buzzing around energetically in his head.
‘What’s up? You're distracting.’
[Hold on a sec. I'm rolling a 24-sided die right now.]
‘…You’re still playing that?’
[This isn't just play! After trying it a few times, my soul feels lighter and healthier, I swear!]
‘Oh, yeah?’
As he prepped for morning training with a vague reply, the Demon King added proudly.
[You do morning training every day, right? So from now on, I'm gonna do steady morning exercises like you.]
‘What’s that even mean for you?’
[I'm making it a habit. They say starting exercise is easy, but keeping it up is hard. So I'll turn this into a full habit and keep my soul healthy forever!]
Seongjin clicked his tongue.
A soul isn't a muscle—what nonsense.
By the time morning training ended, Logan really did show up at the training grounds.
Seongjin naturally headed to the monster squad with him. Of course, not forgetting to receive a dose of holy power first.
“Ah, that's refreshing.”
He rolled his sluggish shoulders and let out a small groan, prompting Logan to ask with a baffled look.
“What's with the old man noises, Seongjin?”
“Like I've said a million times, I'm a seasoned senior citizen.”
You young whippersnapper wouldn't understand the aches and pains.
They arrived at the squad to find Sir Sharon waiting with an armful of reports, right on time.
The investigation of the workshop Seongjin and Logan had found revealed traces of something buried underground. Digging deeper uncovered various tools along with a corpse.
“It seemed to have been dead for quite some time.”
The body had already begun decomposing, but that didn't erase the scars covering it.
Wounds accumulated slowly over a long time, inflicted at different periods.
“…Remnants of the Penance Order?”
“Yes, Your Highness. Definitely their marks of asceticism. We confirmed he was wearing a Penance Order medallion. From the possessions found with him, we suspect he was a high-ranking member.”
“Hm.”
Seongjin flipped through the report carefully.
‘So rather than it being a Milo Trading Company workshop from the start, it was probably a site the Penance Order already used as a rendezvous point, where they also brewed the drug.’
That would explain why Belinda went there too.
Of course, this corpse wasn't the one who opened a portal to rescue her. He seemed to have died long before she escaped the Heresy Tribunal.
‘Belinda herself didn't even seem aware she'd used a ‘portal.’’
So who was it? The one who brazenly sprung a prisoner from the Heresy Tribunal using an item from the parallel world?
As Seongjin pondered deeply, an out-of-place grumble came from beside him.
“What progress are we gonna make investigating a corpse now? Everyone who could give answers is already dead.”
“……”
It was Sir Valerie, looking unusually sulky ever since Belinda's death.
And just a few days ago, hadn't he clashed with Seongjin over that salmon restaurant ad?
“What’s up, Sir Valerie? Still mad?”
At Seongjin's question, the red-haired inquisitor shook his head firmly.
“No. How could a lowly knight like me dare such irreverence toward Your Highness?”
“Then what?”
“I'm just feeling slighted! I gave that advice out of worry that other priests might criticize Your Highness. It was all for Your Highness's sake!”
“Oh, right.”
Seongjin replied vaguely and turned the page.
“But what did Your Highness do to me? Shoved salmon in this loyal retainer’s mouth without a word!”
What, so he is mad.
“So the salmon wasn't tasty?”
“…Of course it was, but then you said you'd charge me for it! And it wasn't even a proper single serving!”
“Ingredients are expensive. Normally worth its weight in silver.”
Grumbling back, Seongjin watched Sir Valerie glare at empty air and mutter.
“Tch! Your Highness truly has no idea. How much help I provide on the regular!”
“……”
“You can't even imagine! If it weren't for me, how much you'd be suffering under the Heresy Tribunal's scrutiny by now…”
Yeah, yeah, got it.
I won't charge you, so shut up already!