Author: 年终 / Nian Zhong

Translator: Kinky || https://kinkytranslations.com/

---

Chapter 40: The Perfected

Myss pinched the Dragon Fae between two fingers. Its wings felt cool to the touch, quite different from what he had imagined.

The Dragon Fae was in terrible shape, nothing like before.

Held up by one wing in Myss’s hand, it hung limply with its arms and legs dangling. Its tiny hands were smeared with blood, as if it had chewed its nails far past the limit. The slyness had vanished from those green eyes, leaving behind only neurotic panic.

Cinnamon jumped onto Myss’s shoulder and curiously sniffed at the Dragon Fae. The little creature glanced weakly at the cat and let its paw pads pat at it without resistance.

“Back to the room first.”

Salaar glanced around, then hooked an arm around Myss and led him back to the residential area amid the chaos.

Considering the possibility that this thing was pretending to surrender, Salaar ruthlessly stacked five layers of protective magic on top of it, pinning the Dragon Fae firmly to the dining table.

Still, he politely left out hot tea and biscuits.

The Dragon Fae slumped on the tea cloth, looking like a delicate and fragile doll.

“Right, let’s continue,” Salaar said. “If you’re trying to cooperate with the people you were sent to murder, I assume you’ve prepared a sufficiently convincing explanation.”

The tiny Dragon Fae clutched its hair, looking extremely anxious. “My name is Tass Ga. I was hired by the Karns family.”

“Kendrick Karns, I want to make a deal with you. I’ll tell you everything I know about the Karns family’s side of things. In return, you won’t pursue the assassination attempt, and then we work together to escape.”

“That information doesn’t sound very valuable,” Myss remarked.

As if they cared what the Karns family was doing. Who cared what those human nobles were thinking?

Tass shuddered and started biting his fingers again, his eyes darting wildly in every direction.

Salaar tugged lightly on Myss’s sleeve and shook his head. Then he sat down by the table instead of looming over the Dragon Fae.

“Don’t be afraid. We won’t do anything to you.”

His voice was soothing, like a cool stream in midsummer. “…Your mental state doesn’t seem right. You switched sides this suddenly just because you can’t leave? Did anything else happen?”

Tass stopped biting his fingers. But he still didn’t look at Salaar. He lowered his head and picked at his bloody nails.

“Dragon Fae are born of magic. We can fuse with it by nature, like a drop of water blending into water.”

At the mention of magic, Myss leaned forward curiously. “Fuse?”

“Y-yes. We slip into the flow of magic.” Tass explained stiffly, “You follow it, confuse it, make it think you’re part of it… Then you can stir up the current from inside, or let the current overlook you and carry you through.”

Salaar tapped his fingers against the tabletop. “Gemstones are highly practical containers for magic. That’s why your kind is especially skilled at working with gems.”

Tass nodded weakly.

No wonder this creature could travel so freely through gemstones, Salaar thought, raising a brow.

That meant Tass had never brute-forced his way through Salaar’s protective magic. He had simply blended into it, becoming an impurity that induced cracks.

And when Myss used annihilation magic, Tass had redirected it into the gemstones, using those “magic containers” to weaken the effect, much like using copious amount of fresh water to wash off the poison from one’s body.

A very troublesome ability—one that, on the surface, appeared utterly flawless.

But now, it seemed to come with an unexpected cost…

“The magical environment here is different from outside.” Once he saw that they understood the premise, Tass continued miserably, “It’s actively assimilating me. I’m going to dissolve… I want to escape, but no matter what I do, I can’t leave…”

“You’re the only ones I can make a deal with. Please, get me out of here…”

Tass helplessly crushed biscuit crumbs in his hands. He was on the verge of breaking down, looking close to tears.

Myss lit up. “Hey, why don’t we stuff him into a lantern and walk in whatever direction makes him feel worse? That’ll definitely lead us to the Red Amber’s secret!”

He wore the same look of smug satisfaction once again—the look that seemed to say, “Aren’t I brilliant?”

“No—!”

Terrified, Tass burst into tears on the spot.

Salaar: “…”

Salaar sighed. “He’s still useful. For now, let’s see whether we can get out ourselves.”

“But aren’t we forbidden from leaving?”

“Let’s go find Mr. Anti. He’s been the exception once, so he can be the exception a second time.”

Myss clicked his tongue in displeasure but grudgingly agreed.

Knife and Fork wound tightly around Tass. Myss clenched him hard in his fist and shoved him deep into his pocket. Once he was sure the little thing couldn’t escape, the two of them stepped out again.

Under a servant’s guidance, they quickly found Mr. Anti.

Mr. Anti also had a private workshop.

The floor was paved with glossy white stone tiles. The cabinets and tables were all made of polished steel, their smooth surfaces gleaming coldly.

Bottles and jars were arranged with unnatural neatness. Their labels bore handwriting as precise as print. The air was thick with the bitter smell of medicinal reagents.

In the center of the room was a complex magic circle, and in the center of that stood a metal table. A human-shaped figure lay upon it beneath a white sheet… judging by the fit, muscular outline, it was probably Danton’s corpse.

It was hard to imagine that those vivid specimens, which seemed almost warm and alive, were produced in a room this lifeless.

“Good afternoon, Young Master Karns,” Mr. Anti said in that same old manner.

“We’re going out,” Salaar stated bluntly, throwing the sentence directly into his face.

“That’s not possible, Young Master Karns. You signed a contract with the Red Amber.”

“That contract has no magical binding force. Besides, when you came to receive me, didn’t you leave the Red Amber during your contract term too?” Salaar said. “The Karns family can just say they sent someone. Surely that serves as sufficient pretext, right?”

“No, it doesn’t, Young Master Karns. The Karns family’s messenger hasn’t yet arrived.”

At the same time, Tass stirred in Myss’s pocket as if shivering.

“Then I’ll find my own way out, and you’ll suffer for it too.” Salaar raised his voice. “Don’t complain when things get ugly. I gave you the chance to handle this gracefully.”

Anti shook his head helplessly and rose to his feet.

“Please come with me.”

He put on his top hat, whose butterfly wings glittered in the light.

Less than five minutes later, the group was standing by the employee-only entrance.

Mr. Anti gestured towards the door, offering a polite “After you.”

Salaar signaled for Myss to stay back, then stepped toward it first—

Bang!

He seemed to hit an invisible wall and nearly stumbled backward.

In disbelief, Salaar reached out and touched the “open” doorway. What he felt was the rough texture unique to canvas and paint.

It was a painting.

The dazzling, translucent sunlight outside, the lush green trees, all of it was painted on canvas.

It filled the entire doorframe, sealing the doorway shut. Painted carriages rolled slowly along the road. Birds made of brushstrokes hopped among the branches.

The painting was so breathtakingly lifelike that, at first glance, Salaar hadn’t even realized what it was.

Myss hurried forward and let his pupils dilate.

But he couldn’t see the “endpoint” of the magic with one look. This painting was only a tiny corner of some vast spell. It reminded him of the anomalous space in Rosha City… The fleshy membrane at the edge of that space carried the exact same aura.

Damn it.

Myss snatched up a decorative vase by the door and hurled it straight at the canvas.

The white vase instantly passed into the painting, becoming a few white brushstrokes on the lawn. But when Myss tried to push his hand through, the canvas bounced it back. His fingers throbbed from the impact.

Cinnamon was startled. It stepped one hind paw past the threshold and was mercilessly blocked by the canvas as well.

Myss: “…”

It wasn’t just the Dragon Fae Tass Ga who was trapped. He and Salaar were trapped too. Even the cats they had hired were trapped.

“You don’t yet have the qualifications to leave.”

Mr. Anti stepped easily over the threshold and stood outside the doorframe. His painted face turned toward them with a smile. “Only the Perfected are qualified to leave, Young Master Karns.”

Salaar pressed hard against the painted barrier blocking the doorway. It felt like canvas pasted onto solid rock, not giving an inch.

“‘The Perfected’? And who decides that?” he sneered. “There was nothing about that in the contract.”

Anti smiled on the other side of the threshold. The expression was perfectly proper, but the amusement never reached his eyes.

“You’ll understand, Young Master Karns.”

He said calmly, “You’ll understand very soon.”

While Anti’s attention was fully on Salaar, Myss stepped forward slightly and smeared a thread of black magic onto the canvas.

Yet his normally unstoppable power met it like a mirror, leaving no mark at all. At the instant the magic dissipated, he heard a faint laugh beside his ear.

Mr. Anti stepped back inside and straightened his hat.

The exquisite wooden door slowly closed behind him, blocking out the false sunlight.

“It’s working hours now, Young Master Karns,” he said. “You still have a Perfect Love waiting to be completed. I also have a corpse waiting to be processed.”

“Enough…”

There was a sudden squirm in Myss’s pocket as Tass struggled to poke his head out. “Enough, damn it, stop saying things like that…”

His tiny body trembled again. It was hard to say whether from rage or pain. “Antis, didn’t you always refuse to turn your own kind into specimens? You’ve gone mad…”

“Good afternoon, Lord Tass.”

Mr. Anti removed his hat in greeting. “What an unexpected pleasure.”

Tass took a deep breath. “Listen to me—I never signed any contract, and this damned place trapped me too! You told me that if I didn’t sign, nothing would happen!”

“I’m done. I’m done with this assassination. I want out!”

Still wrapped tightly in Knife and Fork, he could only stare desperately upward at the false blue sky like a man dying of thirst gazing at a mirage.

Whatever this place was doing to Tass Jia, it was clearly hurting him far more than he had let on.

“I don’t understand what you mean.”

Anti tilted his head slightly, looking at the agonized Tass with detached puzzlement.

That response made Tass’s voice grow even sharper. “Stop acting, Antis!”

“You’re not some trusted retainer of the Karns family. No one from the Karns family is coming. You’ve been working with me all along just to help me assassinate Kendrick Karns!”

“This place is killing me. Let me go. Weren’t we friends?”

“We used to be friends.”

Mr. Anti’s voice turned especially gentlemanly. “We used to be friends, Lord Tass.”

Tass froze.

A long moment passed before he spoke again. “No… You’re not Antis.”

“The Antis I knew would never make specimens out of his own kind. He would never stand by and watch a friend suffer…”

“The Tass Jia I knew never failed an assignment and certainly would never cooperate with his assassination target.”

Anti replied evenly, “Clearly, we didn’t know each other well enough.”

“You—”

“Oh my, what’s all this arguing about?”

Iver walked out of the painting and crossed the doorway with ease. The instant he heard the voice, Myss shoved Tass back into his pocket.

“Let me see, are you trying to take your lover outside, Young Master Karns?” Iver’s champagne-gold eyes swept over the two of them. “So you’ve discovered the Red Amber’s wonderful qualities.”

“You mean ‘illegal imprisonment’ is wonderful?” Salaar said.

“The door is open. We come and go freely, and you cannot leave. How can that be called illegal imprisonment? You chose to stay here yourself.” Iver’s tone was light.

Myss still glowered at the door.

Suddenly, the badge beneath his clothes gave a faint twitch. It was Father Kalen signaling them.

To avoid drawing attention, they were supposed to contact him at night. If the priest was taking the risk of reaching out first, he had probably discovered something seriously wrong.

Salaar reacted at once. “Fine. I’m going to paint that damn picture now, just so I can leave this godforsaken place sooner.”

Then he seized Myss and turned away. Cinnamon trotted after them with its tail up, but before it had taken more than a few steps, Iver picked it up.

“Oh my, look at you, you ugly little thing.”

He stroked Cinnamon with a smile. The cat flattened its ears and froze in place.

Seeing the dispute settled, Mr. Anti left first, disappearing around the corner.

Even if the Dragon Fae had temporarily broken down, they still needed to keep the cat. With a displeased turn, Myss went back to snatch Cinnamon.

At that moment, they were standing where two corridors met at a corner.

“Oh, by the way, Mr. Karns.”

At the same time, Mr. Anti’s voice came from the far side of the corner. “There are a few things I need to clarify regarding what that Dragon Fae said to you.”

He was standing a little far away. Salaar instinctively took two steps forward, and the hem of his clothes vanished past the edge of the corner.

On the other side, Iver readily handed Cinnamon back to Myss. The moment Myss took the cat, a sudden emptiness opened in his chest.

He whipped his head around and couldn’t find Salaar in sight.

They had only been a few steps apart, yet that corner had silently split them into two different places.

“Sa— hey!”

Every hair on Myss’s body stood on end. He almost shouted Salaar’s name on the spot. Taking three long strides, he rushed around the corner and caught sight of Salaar’s back as he stood talking with Anti.

The corridor looked exactly the same as before. The wallpaper bore elegant patterns. The magical wall lamps glowed warm and bright. There wasn’t a single suspicious figure in sight.

Salaar’s stance looked unchanged too, his back straight, neither humble nor overbearing.

Thank goodness. Nothing had happened to Salaar.

Myss let out a breath and inwardly fumed for a few seconds. He had never been this jumpy before. This bizarre place had to be affecting him.

Father Kalen’s communication request was still ongoing. They would return to their room and deal with it as quickly as possible. He still had to interrogate Tass properly and find out what other secrets Mr. Anti was hiding…

Hm?

Why hadn’t Salaar turned around to look at him yet?

That chill returned, like the memory of a nightmare long forgotten.

Myss broke into a run, grabbed Salaar’s clothes, and forcefully yanked him around.

The moment he saw that face, Myss forgot how to breathe.

…He didn’t see the familiar lapis-lazuli blue.

The eyes that had accompanied him for more than three hundred years were gone, replaced by a field of blood-red.

For one awful instant, Myss thought Salaar’s eyeballs had been gouged out. But that illusion lasted only a heartbeat.

Set in Salaar’s eye sockets were two lumps of perfectly translucent blood amber. Under the bright lights, the twin pools of crimson seemed to flow slowly, impossible for anyone to ignore.

Without that familiar streak of blue, Salaar’s face looked terrifyingly unfamiliar.

“Ah, my dear Myss.”

Salaar nodded to him, eyes curving in a smile. His expression was exactly the same as the original Salaar’s.

“…Come along, Mr. Myss. Let’s go to the studio.”

---

<<< || Table of Contents || >>>

Author: 年终 / Nian Zhong

Translator: Kinky || https://kinkytranslations.com/

---

Chapter 39: Tears

Salaar froze in place, his nose buried in Myss’s long hair.

Strangely enough, Myss didn’t smell the same as that slave.

In Young Master Karns’s memories, the slave had carried a sort of beastlike odor. Even after being washed spotless for sale, he still smelled of that tense, sweat-soaked animal scent.

Myss didn’t have that smell. Perhaps it had something to do with the effects of magic? Salaar wasn’t sure.

He only knew that Myss smelled warm, a little like white bread softened in milk. It was the same sort of living, vibrant scent, but instead of calling to mind some cornered beast at the end of its rope, it made people feel at ease.

“The instant you lose control, I’ll annihilate all of Semper… This, I promise.”

Myss whispered into his ear.

…That gentle breath brushed against him, and Salaar snapped fully awake.

What was he doing? He had actually been craving perfection in front of the Chaos Archdemon—

Humans had once been so clumsy, so desperate, only seeking the faintest chance of survival in the Night Scourge. Staying alive was victory enough. Salaar had never looked back.

And just now, he had been foolish enough to fuss over details and chew on irreparable trivialities.

“I’ve been affected,” Salaar judged on the spot.

Myss let go of him, his face full of disdain that plainly said you don’t say. “Yeah. Getting influenced by who-knows-what that easily is seriously disgraceful.”

“Our situations should be about the same, so why are you fine?” Salaar scrutinized Myss up and down. “No, maybe you’ve been affected too. You just haven’t noticed.”

Myss opened his mouth, intending to angrily denounce Salaar’s slander. But then he thought of that subtle self-doubt he had felt when they first moved in and hesitated into silence.

“As I thought.”

Myss’s hesitation didn’t escape Salaar’s eyes. He rubbed his chin with interest. “My mental resilience shouldn’t be any weaker than yours. So maybe it’s a matter of mindset… You don’t possess any basic sense of shame…”

Oh, now he was really getting into it, was he?

Myss threateningly spread his arms into the shape of an embrace. Seeing Myss’s intimidating pose—which resembled nothing more than a puffed-up chick—Salaar finally burst out laughing.

“Oh, let me guess.” Salaar wiped tears of laughter from his eyes. “There’s no way you’d ever genuinely reflect on yourself. Even if there were a problem, you’d think, ‘It’s all that bastard Salaar’s fault,’ and then feel perfectly at ease.”

Myss crossed his arms, righteous indignation written all over his face. “Because that’s the truth.”

“Right, right. So if I screw up next, that’s just an unavoidable consequence of being constantly intimidated by you.” Salaar smoothly tossed the blame right back. “With someone like you by my side, the fact that I’m still alive is impressive enough. How could I possibly do everything perfectly?”

“Mhm. It’s all your fault,” Myss agreed.

“What are you talking about? It’s all your fault,” Salaar countered.

“Yours!”

“Yours, all yours. Don’t be shy.”

Everyone knew that throwing responsibility onto one’s companion was a shameful thing to do. If the people involved had any sense of face at all, they would have to endure the torment of conscience.

Fortunately, enemies didn’t have that sort of moral dilemma.

The two of them muttered accusations at each other, yet the atmosphere turned strangely light.

“…Which means I really can’t leave your side now,” Salaar said with exaggerated sweetness. “If you weren’t here, who would I blame for my mistakes?”

“I was thinking the same thing.” Myss bared his teeth. “What a pity. I can only tolerate you dragging me down.”

The ragdoll cat Apple looked at the “arguing” pair in confusion. In the end, it decided to brush figure eights around them both, soothing each one in turn.

That night, Salaar sealed every gap in the bedroom, then lay back down in bed in a relaxed mood.

Curled up to the left of his pillow was Apple, fresh off duty. At his feet slept Cinnamon, on the early shift. Draped over him like a soft Archdemon blanket was Myss, comfortably nestled between Salaar and the quilt, asleep in the blink of an eye.

The orange cat Butter stood guard by the bed and had even thoughtfully prepared a ball of yarn and some dried fish on the bedside table in case boredom struck.

That night, both of them slept incredibly well.

Whether the Dragon Fae had given up or simply couldn’t enter the Red Amber for the time being, he never appeared again before sunrise.

Myss slept to his heart’s content and refused to let go of his heroic cushion. Salaar decisively used the magic menu to order breakfast, ringing the service bell so the attendants would bring it to the room. It was a perfect chance to show off Young Master Karns’s decadent excess, and he was more than happy to stay in bed with Myss.

Their breakfast was soft berry cream pancakes, omelets mixed with crisp diced vegetables, and a strongly refreshing mint tea sweetened with plenty of sugar.

The cats received carefully prepared steamed fish mash and crumbled egg mixed with fish oil. All three cats ate delightedly, their throats rumbling continuously with happy little purrs the whole time.

Still, for all their enjoyment, the two of them hadn’t forgotten the important matter at hand—

“I found a family in a strange state.” Father Kalen’s voice came from behind the badge. “I ran into a Persian cat that had only recently started living as a stray. It was the one that told me. Very similar to Cinnamon, the family that abandoned it was noble too.”

“So you’ve started looking into things like that. Looks like there aren’t that many abnormal deaths after all.”

Smack. Salaar blocked Myss’s fork. The Archdemon had just launched a sneak attack on the raspberries sitting on Salaar’s pancake.

“That’s right. There have been fewer death cases than I expected, and they’re limited to nobles.”

Father Kalen said, “According to the cats, commoners are only passionate about buying scraps of blood amber or collecting inexpensive art. None of them have died in those bizarre ways. But…”

“But?” Salaar lost focus for half a second and failed to stop Myss’s assault. His raspberry died gloriously. In retaliation, he snatched a piece of fried egg from Myss’s plate.

“But everyone is abnormally concerned with how others evaluate them.”

Father Kalen’s voice sank lower. “People who own more collections earn higher regard among their neighbors. Quite a few families have even gone into debt to buy things they can’t afford.”

Myss paused the breakfast war. “Isn’t that just paying for validation? Nobles ought to live more easily than that.”

Commoners could only ask for an artist’s signature or a model’s hair. As long as nobles were willing to spend, they could truly buy the works themselves.

And yet it was not the commoners who had gone mad and died in grotesque ways. It was the nobles.

“To be honest, that’s the part I don’t understand either.” Father Kalen said plainly. “I didn’t come from a noble background, so I don’t know how they think… In any case, I’m going to visit that strange household in my capacity as a priest. They shouldn’t refuse me.”

“Oh, right. Their son works at the Red Amber. His name is Danny—no, Danton Domini. They place tremendous value on that.”

That was rather convenient, Salaar thought. They had only just encountered that Danton yesterday.

“We’ll keep an eye out,” Salaar said. “We’ll contact you later. Please be careful, Father.”

Kalen thanked him. He didn’t sound troubled by the “Perfect Ideology” issue at all. It was hard to tell whether he had simply not been affected, or whether the Shadow God was once again blocking the contamination for him.

Salaar cut off the communication and tried to resume the breakfast war.

Unfortunately, he was too late. The Archdemon had already constructed an impregnable defense. Myss had both hands wrapped protectively around his fried egg plate, pancake clamped in his mouth, eyes full of vigilance.

……

On the first day of work, the two of them decided to keep a low profile.

The Red Amber’s work area was just as extravagant as its residential area. Salaar even had a studio with a plaque bearing his name.

The room was incredibly spacious, its floor-to-ceiling windows facing the sun, and it came with a separate dressing room for models. From layer upon layer of gorgeous formalwear to silk undergarments that barely covered the essentials, it had both men’s and women’s styles, everything one could possibly need.

Unfortunately, all of those clothes were decorated with gemstones. Myss remained in the set from Mr. Anti’s house, sitting on the model’s chair in complete boredom.

Salaar’s charcoal pencil moved in swift strokes across the paper, and his work attitude actually looked fairly convincing.

“Looks like you haven’t been affected much.” Salaar spoke while sketching a draft. “Excellent. My condition is stable too, which means we still have a fair amount of time to investigate.”

“That means the food is fine.” Basking in the warm sunlight, Myss melted into the chair. 

“That pancake was really good. Wonder if they’ll have it again tomorrow… Anyway, what are we investigating today?”

“The mail collection room? Or asking around with other people? Or maybe figuring out what that Dragon Fae is up to?”

“We—” Before Salaar could finish, a roar sounded from outside, followed by crashing sounds of easels toppling over.

That roar sounded a little familiar.

Myss and Salaar exchanged a glance, then instantly dropped their work and rushed out to investigate.

…Yes. That roar had indeed come from Danton Domini.

Unlike the two of them, who had joined halfway through, Danton and his painter occupied the best position in the work area. Their studio was semi-open and broader than the drawing room of a small noble’s house, with all its luxurious furnishings on full display.

Under ordinary circumstances, that was a silent form of boasting. At this moment, however, it left their secrets exposed beyond concealment.

To accentuate his figure, Danton was wearing a body chain of pure gold, along with a strip of white fabric loosely wrapped around himself, plus a lovely decorative short sword. A female model beside him was dressed in much the same way. She had an equally splendid figure, and lips as vivid as rose petals.

By the looks of it, the painter had been creating a piece on the theme of “Perfect Love.” A draft was already outlined on the canvas: a pair of lovers meeting in a garden, the young woman lightly throwing herself into her beloved’s arms.

Yet at this very moment, the two models stood as far apart as enemies, unwilling even to let their gazes meet.

“Why does she get a full face while I only get a profile?”

Danton glared at the painter, his handsome face boiling with rage. “What kind of ‘Perfect Love’ is this supposed to be? I’m just acting as her supporting role!”

“By the Rhythm God, just look at your build!”

The female model’s voice was sharp. “You take up way more space in the composition than I do, of course I need more face time!”

Danton laughed in fury. “This isn’t about ‘more face time.’”

“Anyone can see that you’re closer to the center of the composition, and you’re wearing four more gemstones than I am! …Completely unfair. Did the two of you make some kind of deal?”

“Listen, there’s this thing called composition. This painting has to have a sense of story, and the jewelry and styling have to suit the story’s theme.”

Dragged into the fight, the old painter joined the argument too. “What, do you expect me to paint the two of you wearing identical clothes and jewelry, standing side by side and holding hands? Who would like that kind of trash?”

“You’re the so-called great ‘Master,’ not me. I’d never presume to instruct you.”

Danton gave no ground. “But I’ll state this much clearly. I will not act as a foil for this newcomer. You absolutely cannot depict her more than me.”

The old painter drew in a long breath. “You’re thirty-two years old, Danton Domini. Your figure is already going badly. I have no interest in ‘focusing on’ something like that.”

“In a few more years, no one will want to paint you at all. You will never become ‘first-rate’ in this lifetime. I’m the one who should be complaining that you’re dragging my painting down.”

Danton froze. He instinctively rubbed at the blood amber on his body chain, fingertips trembling slightly. He looked as though he wanted to deny it but couldn’t come up with a rebuttal.

The onlookers—especially the younger models—let out quiet snickers that sounded like something cracking apart.

“You mean…” Danton turned his wet eyes toward the old painter. “You mean I can never go any further… I can never become a ‘perfect model’ in this lifetime…”

The white-haired painter sneered. “Go look in a mirror. Can’t you see your own white hairs?”

Beside Myss, Salaar’s body suddenly tensed, like a beast catching the scent of blood. Myss turned to him curiously, but before he could ask—

Thwack!

Blood sprayed everywhere. Danton’s body crashed heavily to the floor. He was holding that decorative short sword in his own hand, and it had neatly opened his throat.

Everything happened with extreme speed, so fast that it didn’t even look like a moment of impulse, but something planned long in advance. Bright red blood splashed across the canvas and palette, slowly sliding downward.

Amid the screams, the female model’s anger disappeared.

Her expression went blank, then was flooded with despair. Tears rapidly filled those beautiful eyes.

“My God, he was just arguing with me a moment ago.” Her lips trembled, and tears rolled down like pearls. “This stain will follow me for the rest of my life… By the Rhythm God, everything is over…”

Her helpless gaze swept across the room. The people she looked at all stepped backward, as though she were some terrible contaminant.

At last, she numbly sank to her knees beside Danton’s twitching corpse, making a gesture of prayer. Just when everyone thought she was about to mourn him, she seized the short sword and drove it deep into her own chest.

The bloodied point pierced through her heart in an instant. Eyes slightly widened, the young woman collapsed onto Danton’s body.

This time, no one screamed. The entire scene fell silent. The two pools of blood merged into one beneath them, slowly spreading outward.

“…Oh.”

The old painter let out a long breath, the first to break the silence.

“Don’t move them, whatever you do! This is truly the blessing of the gods. This is the best composition possible—!”

The painter’s cheeks flushed with the kind of red one saw from drunkenness. He tore up the draft of “lovers’ meeting” and instead began sketching a scene of lovers committing suicide together.

“Perfect love,” the old painter muttered excitedly. “Perfect love! Why didn’t I think of it before…”

Salaar’s gaze swept over the two corpses. He pulled Myss a little closer to himself, his face unreadable.

Myss, meanwhile, stared fixedly at the bodies.

The instant the two of them died, their Magibase vanished completely, leaving not the slightest trace behind, as though they had never existed.

Mina also absorbed Magibases very quickly, but there was still a process of gnawing them away. These two… their Magibase hadn’t been gnawed down. It was more like they had been swallowed in a single gulp.

That wasn’t a good sign.

It meant that whatever was feeding on the Magibases here was far more powerful than the “Fallen Child.”

The blood on the floor gradually cooled. Human voices around them slowly returned.

Myss listened with half an ear, and what he heard were excited whispers like, “This is huge news!” “The inside story of famous people’s deaths!” “I’ve got to tell my relatives in the capital!”

Suddenly, a figure parted the disturbed crowd.

It was Mr. Anti. He stopped at the edge of Danton’s blood and looked down at the two beautiful corpses.

“I must take Danton Domini away.”

He turned to the painter and spoke in a tone of pure business. “Mr. Domini signed an additional agreement with the Red Amber. If he should die unexpectedly during his work period, I am to make him into a specimen for display by the Red Amber.”

“If he isn’t handled soon, the condition of the body will worsen. I hope you understand.”

“What about my painting?” the painter said, dissatisfied.

“You may preserve the image with a magic artifact.”

“How could one of those ever compare to the real scene?” The old painter shook his head fiercely. “Fine, then, if there’s an agreement… You’ll at least leave me the girl’s body, won’t you?”

“Yes. You have until daylight is over. Her body will be taken away at midnight.”

The farce drew to a close, and the crowd dispersed reluctantly. No one was panicked or afraid, as though the actions of those two dead models were utterly ordinary… as though those deaths, that blood, and those tears were all nothing more than delicate sweets served alongside tea.

“All right. I think we can draw a conclusion now.”

Salaar spoke in a low voice. “The people outside aren’t normal. The people here aren’t normal either. The whole of Semper has gone a little mad.”

“Yeah. The thing this time is definitely harder to deal with than Mina.”

Myss muttered, “You didn’t see it. The two of them lost their Magibase instantly, like they’d fallen into a hole.”

“It looks like we need to pay another visit to Mr. Anti. He’s clearly very familiar with ‘employee deaths.’”

Salaar lowered his eyes. “And after something like this, the administrators never showed themselves. It was him arranging the aftermath. He’s probably not just some simple taxidermist.”

And they just so happened to have the perfect excuse: the “messenger from the Karns family” Mr. Anti had mentioned. Who knew if that person had arrived yet?

Suddenly, at Salaar’s feet, Cinnamon let out a loud hiss.

Salaar instinctively twisted aside, yet didn’t perceive any attack from the Dragon Fae. Instead, Myss’s long hair twitched, and there was now an additional suspicious strand of rose gold among it.

“Ceasefire! Ceasefire!”

The Dragon Fae clung to Myss’s ear, shouting in a thin, urgent voice. “Hey, I’m requesting a ceasefire!”

Myss, Salaar: “…?”

Salaar’s fingers silently curled around Knife. “Go on.”

“The slave Myss is wrong; Kendrick Karns is wrong. Even Antis is wrong!” The Dragon Fae’s voice was full of panic. “This place—this damned place—is especially wrong!”

“I… I can’t leave the Red Amber Collection Hall!”

……

Near the Red Amber Collection Hall, noble residential district.

“You simply must try this, Father.”

An elderly woman pointed to the teapot a maid had set down. “It’s the newest fashionable tea from the capital, with the fragrance of sacred wood. You’ll certainly like it.”

Kalen nodded honestly and offered a smile of thanks.

According to the family cat, this elderly couple’s emotions were under such strain that they bordered on the neurotic. And yet at the moment, the two of them looked kindly and benevolent, their moods utterly relaxed.

“It seems you used to keep a cat.”

Kalen’s gaze flicked to a claw mark on the corner of the table.

“Yes, sadly, we did.”

The old woman’s expression shifted, then settled into one of regret. “That cat wasn’t obedient at all, and it shed terribly, so much that it made it hard for me to breathe at night. Such a pity. I used to dote on it.”

“We need a better cat. It must be nobler, more obedient, quieter, and… more suited to this household.”

She stroked the blood amber brooch pinned to her chest, a large glossy piece that was clearly worth a fortune.

She looked as if she wanted to say more, but a male servant entered the drawing room with a courier, interrupting her.

“This is the Red Amber’s dedicated courier. My apologies, but we must deal with his business first.”

The old gentleman introduced him to Father Kalen, his tone carrying faint pride.

Then he solemnly cleared his throat. “…Has something happened to Danton?”

Father Kalen held his breath and listened closely.

“Mr. Danton Domini committed suicide half an hour ago. In accordance with his final wishes, the Red Amber will preserve him as a specimen.”

The courier recited it all in an even tone. “I have come specifically to deliver permanent admission passes to the two of you. Once the specimen is complete, you may view it at any time, free of charge for life.”

Father Kalen: “…?”

The death notice was too absurd. For a moment he didn’t know how to react at all and could only look apologetically toward the elderly couple.

Almost at the exact same moment, the husband and wife covered their mouths. Their eyes reddened, and tears slid down the wrinkles in their faces.

When they lowered their hands again, a chill rolled down Kalen’s back. Their tears weren’t sorrowful. They looked more like… excitement? Relief?

“My God, I’m so proud of that child.”

The old woman wiped away tears. “Every night I worry. What if he offended someone? What if he took up with some improper lover and a scandal broke out? …What if he grew old and became a third-rate model? What then…”

“But now he has turned himself into a legend! An immortal legend!”

The old man embraced his wife and kissed her forehead. “My dear, the work Danton left behind will be a final masterpiece. Our son will live forever in praise. Tonight we’ll finally sleep soundly…”

After kissing his wife’s forehead, he began kissing the blood amber ring on his own hand, his excitement entirely genuine.

The Red Amber courier wore a comforting smile. “The painting Danton left behind is bound to become an extraordinary masterpiece passed down through generations.”

As though what he had brought wasn’t news of death, but of joyous tidings.

Kalen felt as though he was sitting on needles. The hair on the back of his neck stood up. “I won’t disturb this, ah, important moment any longer. I’ll come visit again another day.”

“Of course, Father.”

The old woman said it while choking with sobs. “May God bless you.”

“This is a small token of our appreciation. Your visit brought good fortune to this household…”

She slipped a ring set with blood amber from her finger and handed it to Father Kalen.

Yes. I certainly could use a little divine blessing right about now, Kalen thought.

He forced a smile as he took the ring. The instant the blood amber touched his skin, the ring on his left hand turned into a branding iron, scorching his flesh.

Clink. The blood amber ring fell to the wooden floor.

It spun in circles with a rattling little sound, finally coming to rest between the old couple’s tearstains. In the sunlight, the blood amber flashed with lucid, flowing light.

Like a single tear of blood.

---

The author has something to say:

Good News: The Dragon Fae has temporarily surrendered.

Bad News: He’s trapped inside the Red Amber.

Good News: There are three adorable cats at their side.

Bad News: Every human around them is insane.

Good News(?): the Archdemon and Mr. Hero might be even crazier(?)

---

<<< || Table of Contents || >>>

Author: 年终 / Nian Zhong

Translator: Kinky || https://kinkytranslations.com/

---

Chapter 38: A Sense of Wrongness

“It’s an honor to work with the two of you.”

After the contract was signed, Iver once again wore a smile fit for a lover.

Unfortunately, one of the people he was smiling at was busy petting a cat, and the other was also doing the exact same thing.

Myss was currently playing with the orange cat Butter, while Salaar was occupied stroking Cinnamon. At the moment, the ragdoll cat Apple was on guard duty. It sat solemnly by Myss’s feet, its bright blue eyes fixed unblinkingly on Salaar.

Regardless, the contract signing had gone smoothly.

The End of the World would temporarily be held by the Red Amber Collection Hall, with a weekly lending fee of two hundred gold rings, six hundred of which the Red Amber paid in advance. Salaar and Myss were both hired by the Red Amber at the same time, with the work period tentatively set at one month. Their combined pay came to two thousand eight hundred gold rings, with half of it paid upfront.

In other words, the moment they signed the contract, they received the enormous sum of two thousand gold rings. That was enough money for a commoner to live comfortably for an entire lifetime.

Compared to that, what they had to do was pitifully simple.

Salaar only needed to complete a new work within one month, with Myss as the main subject. Quality didn’t matter. If one month wasn’t enough, the two sides could extend the work period depending on circumstances.

During that time, all expenses would be covered by the Red Amber. As long as the two of them didn’t cause some vicious incident that led to injury or death, it wouldn’t count as breaking the contract. On top of that, Iver cheerfully agreed to let them move in with the cats.

…The terms were suspiciously good—so good, in fact, that not only Salaar, but even Myss began to suspect there was a catch.

So they “scrutinized” the contract in their own respective ways. Myss even let his pupils dilate and secretly looked at it that way.

Curiously enough, there was no additional magic attached to the contract itself.

Iver led them through the exhibition area and up a flight of stairs. Thick carpeting covered the steps, swallowing all sound beneath their feet.

As he guided them, he enthusiastically introduced matters related to daily life.

“If either of you has special dietary restrictions, you may inform the butler in the residential area. The dining hall provides unlimited food at all hours. Of course, the two of you may also ring the service bell in your room and have meals delivered to your door. However, for the sake of protecting the artworks, food is not allowed in the work area, so please keep that in mind.”

“There are dedicated pet servants in the residential area. They’ll prepare food for your cats.”

“…Oh, right. How are the cats to be divided between you?”

Myss had been getting sleepy, but this woke him instantly. “What do you mean, ‘how are the cats to be divided’?”

Iver turned his face to them, all innocence on his handsome features. “It’s like this. The rooms we provide are all single rooms. Models stay in the model wing, painters stay in the painter wing. It makes management easier, so I hope you understand.”

“I don’t understand,” Salaar said immediately, stopping in his tracks. “Why should I be separated from my darling?”

“No, no, please don’t misunderstand. We won’t restrict the two of you from seeing each other. It’s just that in daily life—”

“I’m staying with him. This is not negotiable. If he’s away from me, he’ll die.” Myss said it in a tone that made it sound as though Salaar weren’t an adult man, but a swaddled infant.

Salaar: “…”

Salaar cleared his throat. “…That’s right. Without my darling’s body heat, I can’t even sleep properly. If you want me to paint normally, then I absolutely need to share a room with my muse.”

For once, the always easygoing Iver hesitated.

A moment later, he forced a smile. “There’s certainly no problem with it in terms of conditions, but the two of your reputations…”

“Doesn’t matter,” the two of them said in unison.

Iver stared at them for a moment. “Very well. I’ll arrange for the two of you to stay together in the painter’s wing.”

“If the two of you change your minds later, you’re welcome to come to me at any time and ask for a reassignment.”

……

The room the Red Amber provided them was on the fourth floor. It had large floor-to-ceiling windows that overlooked the prosperous streets of Semper. The room was decorated with considerable taste. Compared to it, the guest room at Mr. Anti’s house seemed utterly drab.

Inside, a comfortable double bed had already been prepared, along with three cat beds made of printed cotton. This wasn’t the work area, but there was still an easel and painting supplies by the window, along with parchment and charcoal pencils laid out in full, just in case inspiration struck and the occupant lacked tools.

At Salaar’s request, there were no gemstone decorations anywhere in the room.

“My darling is the most radiant gem of all. No other adornment is needed,” was how he explained it.

At the moment, Salaar’s usual air of foppish indulgence vanished without a trace. He expertly drew all the curtains, making sure no one, including the Dragon Fae, could see what was happening inside.

The three pet cats wandered in circles through the unfamiliar-yet-familiar environment, looking for places they liked. Myss happily joined the cat patrol squad, attempting to dig out whatever secrets the room might be hiding.

But he still came up empty-handed.

The place still felt wrong to him, but it was a particularly vague kind of “wrongness”, like an uncertain sourness hidden in the smell of food. Myss even began to doubt himself, wondering whether they had invested too much over this “Flaw” business.

A few seconds later, though, the thought vanished like dew.

Why should he doubt himself? Salaar understood the human world better than he did. If there was a problem, then it was Salaar’s problem.

“What if we find some way to get Kalen in here? He can hide his presence, after all.” Tired from searching, Myss buried himself in a heap of feather pillows. “Send him to ambush the mail  collection room and look for clues about ‘Flaw’…”

“It’s best to leave someone outside. We can investigate the letters ourselves.”

Salaar pulled over a sheet of paper and began writing a letter to Scintilla in a perfectly convincing fashion.

Bored, Myss emerged from the pillow pile and wandered over to look.

As expected, both the style and handwriting of the letter were exactly like Kendrick Karns.

Still, the letter said nothing at all about magical theory. Instead, it rambled on at length about Semper. At the end, it mentioned that he had entered the Red Amber and might run into “Flaw.”

“Come on. Let’s go on a dinner adventure.”

Salaar flicked the hastily written letter and jerked his chin toward Myss.

The mail collection room was right next to the public dining hall. Myss carried bodyguard Apple in his arms and entered the dining hall together with Salaar.

Faced with the grand interior, Myss found himself wondering about the Red Amber’s structure. Was this stone building really that large? From the outside, it absolutely didn’t look it.

Then his attention was lured away by the food.

Each small round table held exquisite dishes, from thick cuts of beef leg to roasted skylarks glazed in honey, from fresh grapes to candied plums. The standard of the meal was no different from that of wealthy nobles.

So far, the employees coming and going didn’t resemble the bewitched civilians outside. Their gazes merely swept politely over the two of them, perhaps leaving behind a friendly smile at most.

Salaar stopped a waiter and began asking for details about mail collection.

Meanwhile, Myss surveyed every table, preemptively locking onto the night snack options. While he was doing that, his eyes happened to lock onto a face that felt strangely familiar—

He had inadvertently spotted Truman.

Without the terrible makeup, Truman couldn’t really be called handsome, but he was decent-looking enough. He sat stiffly at a table, glancing nervously around like some startled little animal.

Just like that, their eyes collided head-on.

The instant he saw Myss, Truman leapt to his feet, his face flooding with hopeful light.

Then… Then a certain someone stepped directly in front of Myss and blocked him completely from view.

Myss lifted his eyes and looked at the tall man standing before him.

This person had satiny honey-colored skin and strikingly handsome features, with long hair loosely tied at the back. He was even more heavily built than Salaar, his ample muscles stretching his clothes taut.

He was also covered in blood amber ornaments. Earrings, rings, necklaces aside, even his cufflinks were set with blood amber. He looked like some sort of human display stand devoted entirely to blood amber.

“If I were you, I wouldn’t speak to that one,” the blood-amber display stand said.

If I were me, I wouldn’t want to speak to you either.

Myss applied the same principle to everyone equally and turned to leave.

The man didn’t seem embarrassed in the slightest and simply moved around to block Myss again. “I know who you are. You’re the model from The End of the World. I’m a model for the Red Amber too. Danton Domini. I assume you’ve seen portraits of me.”

No. He had not.

Myss turned his head as far as it would go, looking for his heroic human shield. Unfortunately, Salaar was still talking with the waiter and didn’t have a free mouth to rescue him.

Noticing Myss looking toward Salaar, the man’s expression grew stern. “I heard you insist on living with that Karns. As a colleague, I ought to remind you of something. You’d best move out immediately and stop entangling yourself too deeply with him.”

“Why?” Myss finally snapped. Even Salaar didn’t manage him like this.

“Everyone in noble circles knows what Kendrick Karns’s reputation is like. His bad character can, to some extent, serve as a ‘gimmick’ for his work.”

Danton crossed his arms and spoke earnestly. “But we models aren’t the same. Being involved with that sort of person will only become a stain on your image. If it comes to it, you can sneak around with him in private, but you absolutely cannot openly live with him.”

Where had all these bizarre rules even come from? Myss picked up Apple, using the cat to restrain his urge to kill.

“That cat isn’t any good either,” Danton continued. “Its facial markings aren’t symmetrical enough, its eyes aren’t blue enough, and its fur isn’t glossy enough. Keeping a third-rate mongrel cat like that… hah. Imperfect things don’t last long here.”

The ragdoll cat Apple wrinkled its nose, barely holding back a hiss.

“Oh, and its temperament is worrying too,” Danton said, giving it a critical look.

Myss rather wanted to throw the cat straight at Danton’s face, and he was fairly sure the cat would approve. But considering that the cat was still on duty, he merely buried his face in that soft fur, hiding the savage look on his own.

A few seconds later, Myss lifted his head and flashed a grin full of teeth. “I can make your face less symmetrical, if you want to try it.”

Danton frowned. “Do you even understand? If your image worsens, then you become the flaw in The End of the World.”

“A truly professional model ought to be like that—”

His gaze pointed toward a certain round table by the window.

It occupied one of the best vantage points in the entire dining hall. At the table sat a pair of opposite-sex twins enjoying their dinner.

The two of them had delicate features and slender figures, with shining golden hair and golden eyes. They wore fashionably cut silk garments and moved with perfect grace. Their jewelry, while opulent, wasn’t overdone, and unsurprisingly, all of it was clear blood amber.

Objectively speaking, these twins weren’t as good-looking as Myss. But if one factored in clothing and bearing, Myss had no hope of competing. Just that faint smile they wore, for one thing, he couldn’t produce it and had no desire to.

He also thought their manner seemed vaguely familiar. Mr. Anti felt rather the same way.

Sure enough, not far from that table, he spotted Mr. Anti himself.

Anti was dining alone, his knife and fork moving with the precision of clockwork. His gaze remained lowered throughout, never looking at anyone, as if that little round table were the only thing left in the world.

Beside him, Danton continued prattling on, his eyes on the twins full of feverish reverence.

“Did you know? Those two never speak to anyone. Outside working hours, they never make eye contact with outsiders for more than three seconds.”

He was practically licking them with his eyes now, his tone full of a piety that made one uncomfortable.

“They always eat the most fashionable dishes, in the most standard portions… Look there, even the number of times they chew is exactly the same…”

“They never wear the same clothes or jewelry twice… no preferences, no mistakes, no flaws introduced by so-called individuality. Their works will never fade…”

By the end of it, Myss couldn’t quite tell whether Danton was lecturing him or simply talking to himself.

Danton’s speech was getting faster and faster, and fine red veins had spread through his eyes, tinting them with the color of blood amber. As he spoke, his fingertips constantly rubbed against those blood amber pieces, as though pleading for something, or trying to take it.

“Hey. What exactly are you doing to my darling?”

Salaar had finally finished talking to the waiter. He unceremoniously grabbed Myss by the waist and carried both him and the cat off in one smooth motion. Myss clutched Apple tightly and, for once, made no protest.

Danton frowned at Salaar and immediately shut his mouth, as if speaking to Salaar might bring down some terrible punishment. He turned and walked away without looking at them again.

Just like the fanatical townspeople outside, he recovered his “normal” state with startling abruptness.

The ragdoll cat’s spirits had dropped. It gave a limp little meow and clung tightly to Myss’s chest with its paws, as though afraid it would be abandoned.

“Do you know what I’m thinking right now?” Myss stroked the ragdoll cat in a solemn tone. “I think I ought to rename myself the Archdemon of Order. You humans are the truly chaotic ones.”

Salaar worked hard to hold back a smile. “As you command, Lord Archdemon of Order.”

By the time the two of them left, the beautiful twins had just finished dining.

At the same moment, they each took out a handkerchief and gently wiped the corners of the other’s mouth. Then they carefully straightened their clothes and slowly swept their gazes across the room.

The instant they saw Myss and Salaar, their eyes stopped together, but not for more than three seconds. Those eyes were beautiful and limpid, yet carried no emotion at all.

Finally, their gazes drifted quietly toward Mr. Anti.

If Danton had been there to count, he would have found that this look lasted far longer than three seconds. Mr. Anti still cut his food with elegant precision, his knife softly slicing through fish and dividing the cooked fish eye into two perfect halves.

……

On the way to the mail collection room, Myss repeated Danton’s strange theories while gesturing and cursing at the same time. The ragdoll cat meowed from time to time as if chiming in.

Salaar listened very carefully.

Danton Domini really was a somewhat famous model. Even the memories of Karns contained mention of him. He hadn’t expected to run into the man in Semper. But that wasn’t the important part.

At this point, it seemed the Red Amber’s employees weren’t mentally normal either.

Now he was beginning to understand why the pen name “Flaw” had no place inside the Red Amber.

Nevertheless, the investigation had to proceed.

A few minutes later, they reached the mail collection room without issue.

It was a very ordinary room, with pitifully few people in it. The employees didn’t seem to have much need for correspondence.

Inside sat a sweet-faced young woman. Behind her stood a mailbox wrapped in magical runes.

“I want to send a letter.”

Salaar draped an arm around Myss’s waist and casually handed over the letter.

“Certainly, honored Mr. Karns.” The young woman smiled brightly. “Please register it here. The Red Amber will arrange for a dedicated courier to send it on your behalf.”

As she spoke, she handed over a piece of gilt-edged parchment.

On it were precisely printed rows of registration fields, including time of posting, sender’s real name, sender’s pen name, category of mail request, and specific delivery requirements. At first glance it looked like some complicated contract.

“Interesting. I’ve never seen such a troublesome process.” Salaar didn’t hide the surprise in his voice. “You really keep records like this? How long do you preserve them?”

“We seal them with professional preservation magic and never destroy them casually.” The young woman said sweetly, “Please be sure to note that if any letter’s contents are leaked, the Red Amber keeps perfect records and will absolutely be able to trace the source.”

Salaar began making trouble on purpose. “‘Absolutely be able to trace it’? How frightening. What if I write someone else’s pen name? What if I change pen names?”

“This is different from the standard contract. It’s bound by strict contractual magic. If you write a lie on the paper, it will immediately catch fire.”

The young woman explained patiently.

Excellent. That was exactly what they wanted, Myss thought. “Flaw” had been corresponding with Scintilla for nearly a year. They had been worried the records might have been destroyed.

But now they were faced with a brand-new problem. If Salaar registered himself as “Kendrick Karns,” would the thing burst into flames on the spot?

Salaar narrowed his eyes at the parchment. “Too troublesome. I’ll do it tomorrow.”

Bang.

The door to the mail room closed on its own. The young woman’s smile vanished, and her large eyes stared hollowly at Salaar.

“Why?” she asked loudly. “It’s not late. You don’t look tired. Registration won’t even take five minutes. You’ve already come all the way here. Why would you do something so irrational?”

“Please go ahead and register it. We’ll deliver your letter safely. I hope you understand that your behavior makes no logical sense, and it causes me considerable distress.”

“Do you have some concern, Mr. Karns? …Or were you planning to lie on the registration form in the first place?”

Her voice grew tighter and tighter, sharper and sharper. It was starting to hurt Myss’s ears, and he rubbed one in discomfort.

Faced with these bizarre people, he was beginning to miss Rosha.

He glanced at Salaar. The Great Hero’s mouth was drawn taut, clearly concentrating on a response. Naturally, a perfect response.

Myss’s eyes shifted. A thread of black magic quietly extended outward, silently corroding the envelope and leaving claw-like scratches on it.

“The envelope got damaged by the cat. We weren’t that eager to send it in the first place, so why are you making such a fuss?” Myss patted the bewildered cat and looked at the letter on the table. “What, you’re allowed to pursue perfection, but we’re not allowed to be picky?”

The moment he said it, the young woman’s sweet smile returned, exactly the same as when they first entered.

“I see. I completely understand.”

She checked the envelope, then handed it back with both hands. “I will eagerly await your next visit.”

They had gotten all the information they wanted.

Once outside the mail collection room, Myss lifted his nose in satisfaction. This time he had solved the problem. What did that prove? That Salaar had lost to him in a battle of brains.

Myss turned his nose toward Salaar, smugness written all over his face.

But Salaar didn’t give him the reaction he wanted. The Great Hero was still deep in thought, his expression almost rusted in place.

“That’s no fun,” Myss said. “If you lose, you’re supposed to admit it. If it hadn’t been for me, just now you—”

“Yes. I didn’t do well enough.” Salaar frowned. “I should have anticipated that. I actually failed to respond in time.”

“There has to be a better way to investigate… Let me think…”

Myss’s steps slowed.

He didn’t like the expression on Salaar’s face right now. Not that he especially liked his other expressions either. But this Salaar did not quite feel like Salaar.

Even when his mind had been contaminated by Mina, Salaar had never looked like this. The feeling was like a fly landing on white cream. Myss’s hairs rose all over.

People were still passing nearby. So Myss used the newest and most covert method of attack he had learned.

The ragdoll cat gave a soft meow as it dropped to the ground. Myss opened his arms and hugged Salaar hard.

“If you rot away in a place like this, then so much the better. I won’t need to keep following any human etiquette anymore.”

He hissed the words into Salaar’s ear, mimicking the intimate whispers shared between lovers.

“The instant you lose control, I’ll annihilate all of Semper… This, I promise.”

---

The author has something to say:

Having won a round in terms of intellect, Lord Archdemon is quite pleased. [dog head]

But Salaar’s condition actually isn’t good, so the victory is incomplete, and Lord Archdemon becomes displeased once again. [dog with rose in mouth]

---

<<< || Table of Contents || >>>

Author: 年终 / Nian Zhong

Translator: Kinky || https://kinkytranslations.com/

---

Chapter 37: An Embrace

‘No,’ Myss thought.

“No,” Salaar said with a beaming smile. “Child, that sort of request isn’t very polite.”

The child’s mouth flattened, and he looked as though he were about to cry. “Oh no, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, sirs… I didn’t mean to offend you.”

Here we go again. It was that same attitude that made it feel like punching cotton.

Salaar considered for a few seconds, then revealed the fresh graze at the side of his neck. “A very dangerous flying insect landed on the pendant just now. I was only worried about you.”

The child froze on the spot. Salaar picked up the pendant, and golden magic swept over it.

Accompanied by Cinnamon’s hiss, a thread of magical fluctuation shot out and fled. There were too few gemstone objects nearby, so the Dragon Fae’s presence quickly vanished into the distance.

If it couldn’t ambush them, it ran. What a despicably slippery little thing. Myss glared in dissatisfaction towards the direction where the presence had disappeared.

“There, the bug has been chased away.” On the other side, Salaar smiled and patted the child on the head.

Myss realized that he had somehow gained a fascinating new ability. He was gradually becoming able to tell whether Salaar’s smile was genuine or not.

Take this moment, for instance, the Great Hero was absolutely putting on a fake smile. Salaar never smiled like this inside the seal.

Come to think of it, wasn’t this Great Hero just too good at acting?

Salaar played “Kendrick Karns” as though it were second nature, and he shifted his attitude toward other humans at will. Myss himself also retained faint memories the slave had, but never mind acting, he was already using all his strength just to suppress his instincts.

Is acting perhaps one of humanity’s social requirements…?

Myss was still pondering when Salaar stepped in front of him, his tall shadow brushing over Myss’s face.

“Let’s go first. We need to find Kalen.” Salaar kept it brief.

“You’ll still be needed after this, Mr. Bodyguard.” As he spoke, he scratched Cinnamon under the chin. Cinnamon purred happily, rubbing its forehead into Salaar’s palm.

Myss gave an absent hum of acknowledgement but remained standing where he was.

He had slept badly all night, so he was already somewhat groggy. At the moment, half his mind was filled with doubts about Salaar’s acting, and the other half with doubts about the truth behind Semper. He didn’t have much energy left to spare.

Salaar seemed to assume he didn’t want to go back into the Red Amber. His expression grew serious. “Listen. If you can’t handle enclosed spaces, then say so now. I still have time to change the plan.”

“If you lose control and explode inside the collection hall, this won’t end well.”

Myss finally snapped back to attention. “What do you mean?”

“It means I can sign the contract myself, and you and Kalen can stay outside and investigate. That Dragon Fae is after me, not you. You’ll be fine.”

“No.” Myss answered without a second thought. “That Dragon Fae isn’t weak. You can’t handle it alone.”

Salaar blinked. “Didn’t Iver say so himself? The Red Amber has strict internal security. I’ll bring more cats in with me. I can defend myself.”

“That’s still a no.” Myss insisted, “That thing can’t kill you. There can’t be even the slightest chance of it. Your life belongs to me.”

“Besides, it’s just a stone building. It doesn’t have the right to make me lose control. I just dislike it.”

“All right… Your words.”

“My words.”

……

A few blocks away.

Father Kalen walked contentedly down the street, biting into a rabbit meat pie. To him, today’s Semper wasn’t all that different from yesterday’s.

At his side followed a calico cat. This calico had never been kept by humans. As a pure stray, it knew every corner of the city like the back of its paw.

Its name, however, was quite a mouthful. Cats raised by humans might be called “Cinnamon,” “Cookie,” or “Sunshine.” Pure strays had longer names, like “White Kid with the Torn Ear” or “Cranky Old Tabby”*.

*Clarity: Compared to Cinnamon (肉桂), Cookie (曲奇), or Sunshine (阳光), White Kid with Torn Ear (缺耳朵的白色小孩) or Cranky Old Tabby (坏脾气的虎斑老头) has a lot more characters (and syllables) in Chinese.

At present, Father Kalen was traveling together with Miss Sharp-Claws the Calico.

After negotiation, Kalen had decided to call her simply Miss Claws.

“That shop won’t do, because humans are always arguing there? All right, thank you for the warning.”

Father Kalen passed a bright and elegant artifact shop without slowing down. Miss Claws moved gracefully along the low wall, mewing softly.

“The shop ahead gets more customers… Thank you very much for the recommendation!”

Kalen handed Miss Claws a dried little fish and strode toward the store the cat had recommended.

The shopfront was a bit old, dull and gray-looking. The owner was an elderly woman. When she heard the bell at the door ring, she looked up.

“Ma’am, I’d like to buy a few communication artifacts,” Kalen said warmly. “Do you have any recommendations?”

This was something Salaar had told him to buy, and it counted as “investigation necessities.”

The old woman pushed up her glasses and rummaged through the counter, pulling out a few odds and ends.

“This type of communication crystal has very good sound quality, works over long distances, and the magic on it lasts two years. But they’re heavy, so they’re better suited for use at home.” She pointed to a square transparent crystal.

Then she gathered up several snow-white conches set with pearls. “If it’s just for emergencies, I recommend these. They only work in Semper and last one month. But they’re light, sturdy, and aren’t affected by magical barriers.”

“Ten silver shields each. Buy more and I’ll give you a cheaper price.”

“Four, thank you.” Kalen took out his purse.

The old woman deftly wrapped up the magic conches and even threw in four handwoven cords for fastening them. “Thirty-five silver shields. Anything else?”

Kalen looked around. The little shop felt more like a combination of a secondhand store and general store. It even sold dried chicken treats for pets.

The Father picked out a small bag of dried chicken as well. As he passed the display case labeled Secondhand Ornaments and Jewelry, his steps paused slightly.

Kalen felt there was a strange kind of discordance about the display. He stepped back and looked at it several times. At last he realized the subtlety of it. The secondhand jewelry came in all kinds of color combinations, but the more red in the setting, the higher the price.

And that red setting couldn’t be garnet, red agate, or any other reddish gemstone. It had to be the standard dark red blood amber.

Kalen’s gaze shifted to the elderly shopkeeper herself. He noticed that her brooch, ring, and pendant all had different settings, yet every one of them included at least a little blood amber.

“Ma’am, I only arrived in Semper recently. Does blood amber have some special significance here?” Kalen asked. “Jewelry with blood amber seems to cost more than the others.”

“This is the latest fashion. You see, other gemstones are only stones. Amber is different. Amber is the product of life.”

The shopkeeper perked up immediately and launched right into the topic.

“Have you heard of that gem called the ‘Saint’s Blood’? How can a cold, lifeless rock be called the blood of a Saint? Only blood amber deserves a name like that. It is a proper ‘tears of God,’ a symbol of perfection.”

Tears of God? A symbol of perfection?

So this was a fashion trend of recent years. That made things troublesome. The priest’s brow twitched.

With this level of cultural influence, it would be very hard for him to judge whether the “red gemstone jewelry” Cinnamon had witnessed had any actual connection to the recent deaths.

“…So everyone buys this kind of jewelry,” Kalen continued.

The old woman’s tone grew more impassioned. “You don’t understand, child. The allure of art far exceeds your imagination. Come here.”

She stretched out a hand tipped with cherry-red nails, just about to press a blood amber pendant into Father Kalen’s palm—

“Meow—!” Miss Claws let out a piercing cry from outside.

“My apologies. My companions have come to find me. It was a pleasure talking with you.”

Father Kalen stepped back half a pace and picked up the bag containing his purchase.

“Goodbye, child. You’re welcome back anytime.” The old woman smiled kindly and waved at him.

That blood amber pendant was still pinched between her fingers, glowing with a soft halo.

Outside, Salaar and Myss were both pressed against the trunk of a tree, giving off a strangely suspicious burglar-like air. Cinnamon sat at their feet, mewing back and forth with Miss Claws about work matters.

With Cinnamon guiding them, it was no surprise they had found him. But—

“You two are here this early…?” Kalen asked in surprise.

They had arranged to meet at dusk. It was only afternoon now, and yet the two of them had already followed the cat here.

“Go buy some food,” Myss said miserably, twisting his face. “Something filling. And get some portable biscuits too.”

“Remember to buy for two, and you go alone. Sorry to trouble you, Father,” Salaar added wearily.

Cinnamon: “Mrrrow~ mm!”

Kalen: “……”

He didn’t understand, but it wasn’t an unreasonable request, so he decided to buy the food first and ask later.

Very soon, Father Kalen returned with greasy rabbit pies, grilled fish on wooden skewers, and coarse oat bread mixed with bits of dried fruit. He had also picked up two bottles of light ale along the way.

Salaar and Myss hugged the food and plunged straight into a dark alley. First they carefully checked through the meal, then they devoured it like a storm. Cinnamon buried its face in the grilled fish and ate with obvious delight.

All of Myss’s focus went into eating. His mouth was stuffed full. Salaar’s eating was relatively more refined, and he managed to free his mouth long enough to summarize the strange events they had encountered.

Father Kalen gravely raised his left hand, closed his eyes, and once again spent five long minutes sensing. At the end he sighed and gently shook his head.

“This is different from Rosha,” Kalen said. “The infected people in Rosha were points I could perceive. But here… the entire city of Semper is soaked in an even layer of ominousness. I can’t distinguish anything.”

Myss struggled to swallow a mouthful of pie. “Speaking of that, if that ‘Fallen Child’ had really been born… what would happen to the Abnormal Fruit—no, to Rosha?”

Kalen’s expression grew somber.

“To be honest, I’m not sure,” he said quietly. “I once saw a village destroyed by an Abnormal Fruit, but not because the monster was born. At the time, an astrologer from the Stargazers Society intervened, causing the Abroma Fruit to explode on the spot.”

Salaar chewing slowed to a crawl. “In other words, you don’t know what happens when the monster fully manifests.”

“That’s right. Neither my brother nor I have ever dealt with a monster that made it into the world.” Father Kalen let out a long sigh.

“But please believe me, monsters are not so easy to bring into being. Miss Scintilla from Rosha is already the most serious case I’ve ever encountered.”

‘No. I’m the most serious case,’ Myss thought, taking a vicious bite out of his pie.

Salaar gave him a subtle glance. Clearly, he had thought of the same thing.

Half an hour later, Cinnamon had eaten its fill of grilled fish and voluntarily requested overtime.

Miss Claws, who had originally been scheduled to take over, had no objections. Hearing that they were about to head to the Red Amber, she admitted she didn’t like staying in human buildings for too long. She promised she would recommend two more cats that had previously been pets.

Before they separated, Kalen handed the conch artifacts to the two of them. “Will the Red Amber really let you bring these inside?”

“We have our ways.” Salaar weighed one conch in his hand.

To Myss’s surprise, Salaar didn’t head to the Red Amber right away. Instead, he took Myss to… rent a room.

Salaar covered Myss’s head with his coat, claimed that “his friend was feeling unwell,” and booked a temporary room at an inn that looked highly improper.

Most of the people coming and going had their faces partly concealed, and Salaar used Myss’s scarf to cover the lower half of his own face as well. The innkeeper, evidently accustomed to such a sight, grinned broadly at the gold ring Salaar tossed his way and waved them straight upstairs.

The room was very cramped, with a bed that was ludicrously oversized for the space.

At the head of the bed were piled lubricating oils, heavily scented floral essences, and cloth towels of indeterminate cleanliness. Even so, the cheap floral perfume couldn’t hide the faint stench beneath it.

Myss sneezed and swiftly capped the perfume bottle. Cinnamon sneezed twice in succession and reluctantly followed them into the room.

In a sense, Salaar had chosen the room quite well. The shabby little place had very small windows covered tightly by thick curtains. There were no gemstones in the room, not even a shard of glass.

From next door came rounds of shrill cries and moans, which at least served as a form of soundproofing.

Salaar cast defensive magic over both the door and the windows before sitting down by the bed again.

“What’s your plan here?” Myss asked, plopping down on the floor. The bed linens smelled foul; he felt the floor was cleaner than the mattress.

Salaar also made no fuss about it. He sat down across from Myss. Three conch magic devices were laid out on the wooden floor between them. Just in case, Kalen had specifically given them one extra.

Cinnamon ran between the two of them and started pawing at the conches, only to get distracted by the dried chicken Salaar handed over and devote itself fully to chewing its snack.

“Your eyes can see the critical nodes of magic.” Salaar picked up one of the conch devices. “That means you can also identify the ‘non-critical’ parts.”

“You could put it that way.” Myss stared at the conch in Salaar’s hand, his pupils gradually losing its focus.

Sure enough, he quickly found the vague “terminal point.” The communication magic on the conch wasn’t complicated at all. It was easy to see through.

Salaar gave a low hum of acknowledgement and handed the conch to Myss. “Try annihilating the least important part.”

Myss lifted a brow and did as instructed. He could already vaguely guess what Salaar was thinking.

Black magic washed over the device little by little. The magic conch visibly melted down like ice in midsummer. Before long, only about a third of the original shell remained, looking utterly hideous,

“That’s the limit. If I strip away any more, the magic won’t function properly,” Myss said.

Salaar picked up the remains and examined them carefully, then handed them back. “That’s fine. Keep going. Preserve only the core.”

Myss pursed his lip, then took a deep breath. His magic became fine black threads that carefully devoured everything around the core of the device.

He had to admit, this was delicate work, finer even than what he had done with Scintilla. Myss held his breath completely, carving away at the shell with total concentration. Until—

Salaar: “Stop.”

Myss came back to himself. In his hand, the shell had been reduced to a thin little slice. The core of the magic array still remained, but the formation as a whole was incomplete and could no longer operate.

“This thing’s ruined,” Myss said with a shrug.

“No. You’ve done it perfectly.” Salaar took the little hard slice from him. “Now it’s my turn.”

Under Myss’s curious gaze, golden magic wrapped around the shell slice completely. It followed the pattern of the shell itself, carving delicate new traces into it.

…Interesting.

Using the intact core as a base, Salaar was reconstructing the communication formation from scratch, like restoring a damaged pocket watch.

The new array was smaller, denser, and much more mind-boggling than the original. The carved lines spread across every remaining part of the shell, and the finished product looked bizarrely compressed.

But it had exactly the same effect as before. As a result, the communication conch had been reduced to perhaps one-twentieth of its original size, or even less.

Then Salaar removed the openwork silver clasp from his belt and the badge from the Red Amber Collection Hall. Golden magic distorted the silver and used the shell slice as a backing, setting it into the rear of the platinum badge.

The shell slice and the spiral-shaped badge became one seamless whole, even more elegant than before.

“You’re using the badge’s strong magical fluctuation to hide the communication magic, aren’t you?”

Myss turned the newly made badge over in his hand, seeing straight through his archenemy’s little trick at a glance.

“In theory, a shell piece this small shouldn’t be able to hold a communication array, so they won’t inspect it too closely.” Salaar tossed Myss another conch magic device. “And we can simply say it’s to make the badge a bit more distinctive. After all, the relationship between you and me is one of a kind.”

“That much is true.”

Myss skillfully began trimming the second conch device. The first time was practice, the second was mastery. This time around, he could already spare some attention for other things.

“Hey, Salaar. Is there anything in this world that you can’t do?”

Salaar was well-versed in the lifestyle habits of the nobility, possessed talent for painting, and excelled at interacting with all kinds of people. Myss could begrudgingly accept all that as part of human “elite aristocratic education.”

But being able to redesign jewelry too? That was rather too much.

The year Salaar sealed himself into darkness, he had looked under thirty. How could he possibly have learned so many things?

“…Something I can’t do? Of course there is.” Salaar propped one hand against his cheek and smiled.

Myss’s ears perked up. “Like what?”

“I can’t bear children,” the Great Hero declared gravely.

Myss: “…”

Myss: “…I’m not joking with you.”

That one didn’t count. He couldn’t do that either. In fact, Myss thought about it quite seriously for a while and concluded his original form had no reproductive instinct whatsoever.

“Besides that. I can’t eat spicy food, I can’t perform court dances, I can’t judge cheese…”

Salaar scooped up the drowsy Cinnamon and kneaded the cat’s paw pads while its tail swished in contentment.

Knife had, unusually, left Salaar’s side. It was coiled at Myss’s feet, watching him work on the conch. Fork circled around it, eyes fixed on the tip of Knife’s tail.

Salaar went on listing the little trivial things he couldn’t do, all of them were just mundane minutiae of daily life. The more Myss listened, the more he frowned. The mood was starting to feel a little strange.

Indeed, something was definitely off.

Rather than “learning the enemy’s weaknesses,” this atmosphere felt much more like an exchange about personal habits before moving in together.

“Stop.” Lord Archdemon bared his teeth. “Not those. I mean something more serious. Something that actually matters.”

“…I don’t know what to do with you.” Salaar said, “Does that count? That’s all I can think of.”

Myss clicked his tongue. Fine then. In the end, the Great Hero had still told him nothing.

The second modified badge was finished soon after. Using the remaining shell and silver, Salaar made Cinnamon a pet tag with a tracking function. It had no communication capabilities, so the Red Amber wouldn’t interfere with it.

With a snap of Myss’s fingers, all the silver filings and shell fragments on the floor were devoured by black magic. Everything looked exactly as it had when they first entered.

Salaar looked around, tugged the bedclothes into greater disorder, and used a cloth to wipe away a large patch of lubricant.

Then he discovered that his constitution was too strong, and the marks on his body had already begun fading considerably. He stopped Myss. “Bite me a few more times. Don’t break the skin.”

Myss happily stepped forward.

Then he realized the positioning this time was a bit inconvenient. Salaar didn’t want to sit on the bed of dubious cleanliness, and Myss didn’t want to touch it either.

So he wrapped his arms tightly around Salaar and rose onto his toes so he could leave bite marks in more obvious places.

Myss liked this.

He liked marking his enemy. He liked the warmth of the other man’s body, the sensation of his fangs scraping along Salaar’s skin, and even more, the satisfaction of dominating it all.

Salaar’s body was always like a fully drawn bow, as though he had never truly left the battlefield. At this very moment, that bow had to lay down the arrow it had already nocked and could do nothing but strain uselessly. A strange urge toward destruction rose in Myss.

Not that he wanted to snap the bow. He was suddenly curious what it would look like slackened.

Myss’s embrace came too suddenly, and far too naturally that Salaar’s breathing hitched for a brief instant.

This wasn’t sleeping while leaning together in a carriage, nor was it like their ambiguous sprawl across a bed. Myss’s chest was pressed against his, both hands wrapped steadily around his back.

Without question, this was a standard embrace.

Salaar’s body froze in place, as if Myss hadn’t hugged him but stabbed him. For a second, he almost reflexively shoved the other away.

“You really did hide something from me.” After finishing his assault on the Great Hero’s neck, Myss licked his teeth with lingering satisfaction. “You obviously have something you’re extremely bad at.”

“You’re bad at being hugged by humans, Salaar,” he said, still holding him tightly.

Salaar was silent for a few seconds, then smiled with curved eyes. “That’s right. You got me… So, are you going to use hugs to attack me, Myss?”

“Believe me, I’ll consider it,” Myss huffed.

As he said it, he couldn’t help imagining Salaar’s death again.

Only this time, in the fantasy, he was holding Salaar’s body in a tight embrace until the other let out his final breath.

……

By the time night fell, the two of them were once again standing outside the Red Amber Collection Hall.

The communication conch devices, or perhaps “communication shell slivers” now, had already passed testing. They had successfully contacted Father Kalen and also brought over Cinnamon’s shift replacements: a ragdoll cat named Apple and an orange cat named Butter.

Fortunately, the Dragon Fae hadn’t attacked again. Who knew what kind of trick it was planning.

Two people and three cats still looked tiny before the stone building. Every window in the place was lit, and the silhouette resembled a crouching beast, its countless eyes wide open and staring down.

Myss blew out a breath at those windows. He had discovered that he disliked this place even more now.

…And, faintly, he had a bad feeling.

“Salaar.”

“Mm?”

“Once we go in, don’t stray far away from me.”

“I understand.”

“No. You don’t.” Myss muttered toward the windows, “No matter what kind of ridiculous rules are inside, no matter how human etiquette is supposed to work, you’re not allowed to compromise.”

“Swear it. Don’t leave my side by even a single step.”

---

The author has something to say:

Salaar: ? Is that… really how this works?

Myss: It is, it is. [hugs]

————————————
Happy Mid-Autumn Festival, everyone—!!! [fireworks]

Also, something I wanted to say:

I hope everyone can keep the comments friendly. People are naturally going to have different interpretations of the plot and characters, and that’s fine, as long as it’s not the kind of comment that attacks my CP (ship-bashing, anti-shipping, self-inserts/reverses). [prayer hands]

In any case, please be tolerant of differing opinions. Conflict between these enemy-lovers’ positions is unavoidable. The two lovebirds will work out all their contradictions themselves.

Let’s all keep things civil and harmonious… Pretty please? [begging] [begging] [begging] [begging] [begging] [begging] [begging] [begging]

---

<<< || Table of Contents || >>>

Author: 年终 / Nian Zhong

Translator: Kinky || https://kinkytranslations.com/

---

Chapter 36: Subtle Abnormalities

“The two of you really are very sweet together,” said Mr. Anti.

In front of him, the entire bedroom looked as though a hurricane had swept through. The large bed sat crooked and askew, the carpet had been kicked into folds, lamps and small pieces of furniture lay scattered on the floor, and here and there were traces of blood.

At the center of the disordered bed, “Young Master Karns” was lying on his back, his sleep-robe collar hanging wide open, his upper body covered in bite marks and claw scratches. His beautiful lover was sprawled over his chest, his long legs draped across the young master’s, both of them wearing that groggy haze of insufficient sleep.

A cat with a ribbon around its neck hopped onto the padded headboard and curled itself back into an oval.

“We suddenly felt like trying something more exciting. That’s a bit troublesome to do outside.”

Salaar raised himself slightly and said it in an especially smug tone. “Have the room cleaned before lunch. Change the fragrance to sweet fruit. My darling likes it.”

As he spoke, Salaar’s gaze stayed locked on Anti.

Even if that Dragon Fae was an assassin from the Karns family, there was still no way to say for certain whether Mr. Anti knew about it. He could indeed be collaborating with the Dragon Fae, but he might also simply be a pawn being used by the Karns family.

Unfortunately, Mr. Anti showed no special reaction.

“Someone will come clean the room at once,” he said. “It seems the two of you intend to take breakfast in the dining room. I’ll give instructions for Mr. Myss to be served something easy to digest.”

Salaar: “Did you, the master of the house, come all the way here at this ungodly hour just to play butler?”

“Next, I need to go to the Red Amber for work, and I won’t return until midnight.” Mr. Anti’s mood remained extraordinarily steady. “I merely heard that you came back early last night, so I came to greet you and say goodbye while I was at it.”

“Speaking of the Red Amber, I happen to have a fresh bit of news.”

Salaar reached out and stroked Myss’s long hair. The latter choked on a yawn and stiffened in silent resentment. “Mr. Iver from the Red Amber will be coming to visit this morning. He’s taking us to tour the Red Amber. I gave him a verbal promise last night, so I now count as half an employee of the Red Amber.”

“I specifically invited him to dine with us. Oh, and that will be in half an hour. Make breakfast more lavish and prepare two suitable formal outfits for us.”

“And don’t forget our little cat. Prepare the freshest goat’s milk, half-cooked egg yolk, and steamed fish for it.”

Even faced with such fussy and troublesome demands, Mr. Anti’s gaze stayed as placid as ever. “Understood.”

…The one who wasn’t placid was Myss.

For no other reason than that the formalwear Mr. Anti sent over was a huge nuisance.

The ranger outfit he had been wearing before had been loose and comfortable, like a warm nest. What now lay before him—

“What is this thing?” Myss said in disgust, tugging at a swath of silk.

The edges were covered in exaggerated ruffles and dense gold embroidery, the buttons were set with eye-searing gemstones, and the whole thing reminded him of that detestable Truman.

Fortunately, the servants had delivered more than one set of formal clothes. After picking through them, Salaar chose a restrained and elegant combination for Myss: a loose white shirt fastened with silver buttons, paired with a cobalt-blue cravat embroidered in gold thread. The trousers were a classic high-waisted cut, drawing in the hem of the shirt and making the waistline look clean and graceful.

Most importantly, this outfit was decorated only with white pearls and contained no gemstones.

The clothes Salaar chose for himself were much bolder.

He picked a deep V-neck dark blue shirt with laces, exposing most of his chest, and a belt slung low at an angle, decorated with openwork silver pieces. The brooch Myss had given him was pinned to his chest, and the entire look came across as free-spirited and dashing.

With a black outer coat thrown on casually over it, he transformed from a “gloomy scholar” into a “brooding artist.” Naturally, aside from that glass brooch and the hidden Red Amber badge, Salaar also wore no gemstones.

Fork resumed its disguise as a silver bracelet, while Knife once again became a snake-staff, held firmly in Salaar’s hand. The calico cat Cinnamon let out a little meow and expertly leapt onto Myss’s shoulder, puffing out its chest with imposing dignity.

Everything was ready. It was time to march into battle, or rather, to the breakfast table.

“I still like loose clothes better. Why are your pants so relaxed while mine aren’t?”

Myss stretched his legs awkwardly. If it weren’t for annoying human manners, he would much rather have gone out in sleepwear.

“Because you’re playing the model, and I’m playing the artist,” Salaar replied. “If you can paint in my place, I’m willing to wear tight trousers.”

Myss gave a snort and stepped out first.

……

Mr. Anti’s dining room was as perfect as Mr. Anti himself. Never mind the fresh flowers and spotless tablecloth, even the placement of the cutlery was extremely deliberate.

Kalen had gone to perform his morning prayers and was eating breakfast in his room, so only four place settings had been prepared at the table.

Myss sat pressed close to Salaar. The two of them crowded together at the host’s place and shared one set of utensils. On Myss’s left sat Mr. Anti; on his right sat Iver.

The breakfast spread was abundant: thin slices of tender venison, cured cod, fresh berries, and cheese. The pale fruit wine was at just the right temperature, and the white bread came with a bright, savory meat sauce.

“Long time no see, my Anti.”

Iver greeted him openly, his smile as moist and fresh as the flowers in the vase.

“Good morning, Mr. Iver,” Mr. Anti replied politely, his eyes lowered to the food.

Salaar casually cut a piece of venison and placed it in front of Myss. “So the two of you know each other.”

“Yes. We used to be very good friends.”

Iver elegantly speared a piece of cured cod. “Did you see the little dog in the yard? Its name is Pinecone. I gave it to him.”

Mr. Anti merely smiled and didn’t answer. His knife and fork moved soundlessly through the venison.

Myss suddenly had a strange feeling.

This man’s demands on “manners” bordered on the pathological. Compared with a flesh-and-blood human being, Mr. Anti was more like a carefully tuned mechanical pocket watch: refined, proper, carrying a human body temperature, yet utterly devoid of a human liveliness.

If Salaar were like this, then three hundred years of sealing probably would have been even harder for him to bear. It was hard to imagine that such a person had once been friends with someone as smooth-tongued as Iver.

Using Salaar as cover, Myss stole a glance at Iver. Iver’s Magibase was a golden retriever, quietly lying at its owner’s feet.

“…The two of you were more than just friends, weren’t you? After all, Iver has never called me ‘my Kendrick’.”

Salaar teased shamelessly, his knuckles brushing past the corner of Myss’s mouth in a suggestive gesture. “Everyone can relax. Look at me. I have no prejudice whatsoever against same-sex lovers.”

Myss had to draw on every scrap of self-control he had not to bite that hand.

“Haha, we really were just friends.” Iver laughed aloud. “I just like teasing him. Our perfect Mr. Anti is destined to marry a noble and beautiful wife, then have a pair of adorable children, one boy and one girl.”

“Just being friends with someone like me is already more than he can stand for very long. After all, my ancestors were slaves. He can’t accept that.”

Even Myss could tell that was a cutting remark. And yet Mr. Anti neither confirmed nor denied it. He simply continued eating breakfast in silence.

“I think we can go to the Red Amber together.”

That was the only thing he volunteered during the meal.

…And then Myss gained a profound personal understanding of what humans meant by “awkwardness.”

Inside the large carriage compartment, Anti sat primly dressed, dozing with his eyes closed. Iver sat with his arms folded and one leg crossed over the other, turning to look out the window.

The two of them radiated a terrifying atmosphere of silence, so much so that even Salaar had trouble playing “Karns.”

As a result, Salaar pretended to have developed an intense fascination with Myss’s braid, while Myss busied himself playing with Cinnamon’s fluffy tail. Only Cinnamon was completely carefree, sitting in a dignified little loaf on Myss’s lap.

That stiff air felt strangely familiar. When they had been traveling with Truman, the carriage had felt much the same.

This time, though, Father Kalen wasn’t here suffering alongside them. According to the plan they made at dawn, they were splitting up today.

The priest and the cats would investigate the deaths in the city, while Salaar and Myss would make the first move in probing the Red Amber. It was simply more efficient that way.

“By the way, what happened to that Truman? The one who got us thrown in jail,” Salaar asked Anti, making conversation where there was none. “He confessed yesterday, so there ought to be some outcome today.”

“Ah, that young man who swapped out the Saint’s Blood.”

Before Mr. Anti could speak, Iver cut in. “His family didn’t bail him out, if that’s what you wanted to know.”

“Pathetic wretch,” Salaar remarked indifferently.

“But he isn’t in prison anymore either.” Iver smiled. “The Red Amber vouched for him and took him away last night.”

“…You what?” Salaar uttered incredulously.

Even Myss, who had been busy playing with the cat, turned his head and stared at Iver in surprise.

“Believe it or not, that boy has excellent taste in gemstones. Lady Avril happens to be one of our long-standing clients. After negotiations on our part, she agreed to let him make amends by crafting a brand-new set of jewelry for her.”

Myss cast a look of pity toward Salaar. You hauled me around through all this trouble just to get the Red Amber’s attention. Look at miraculous Truman over there. He didn’t do a thing, and the Red Amber pulled him out on its own.

“Is it, forgive me, only because he has ‘good taste’?” Salaar said, avoiding Myss’s stare and sounding genuinely stunned. “I thought the Red Amber had high standards.”

“Haha, Lady Avril told us herself that the substitute ring was good enough to pass for the real thing. If she hadn’t set tracking magic on the genuine ring ahead of time, even she wouldn’t have seen the difference.”

Iver spoke in a measured tone. “Apparently the imitation gemstone was chosen personally by ‘Truman.’ Maybe he has no sense at all when it comes to schemes, but he really does have top-tier craftsman’s taste. The Manning family has held its position in the capital for generations because of its jewelry business. It’s not surprising he inherited that talent.”

It seems we’re destined to cross paths with that powder-faced idiot again, Myss thought, burying his nose in Cinnamon’s soft fur. Cinnamon let out a soft little purr and pressed a paw pad against Myss’s forehead.

The carriage rolled onward with a creaking rhythm, and quite a few people noticed Salaar and Myss inside.

Whether it was the aftershock of “The End of the World” or not, glances shot in one after another like arrows, carrying a heat that felt distinctly uncomfortable.

Salaar had no choice but to lower the carriage curtain, cutting off those feverish stares. Iver gazed fixedly at the two of them, the smile at the corner of his mouth growing slightly wider.

“Oh, the people of Sepati have an especially intense longing for beauty.” His voice was slow and soothing. “Believe me, you’ll get used to it.”

At his side, Mr. Anti remained utterly silent

Fortunately, the Red Amber Collection Hall wasn’t far from Mr. Anti’s residence, so this exhausting journey soon came to an end.

The Red Amber Collection Hall was a freestanding stone building located in the central district of Sepanti City.

The building was much larger than Myss had expected. The main entrance was grand and beautiful, without the gaudy decadence of a place given over to indulgence. At the moment, the great doors of the Red Amber were shut tight, with a “Closed” sign written in gold ink hanging outside.

Iver led them to a narrow side door, saying it was the entrance used by employees.

…The instant they stepped into the Red Amber Collection Hall, even Myss nearly let out an audible gasp of awe.

The interior of the collection hall looked even more vast than the outside. The enormous space seemed capable of swallowing all amazement whole.

The walls were all painted a dark red that was neither too vivid nor too dull, and they were covered with huge paintings. Beautiful sculptures and vessels stood along the walls, while brilliant lights illuminated rows upon rows of jewels.

The lofty ceiling was covered in an elaborate mural of the cycle of the four seasons, and the floor was polished marble bright enough to reflect a person’s face, overlaid with finely patterned handwoven carpets.

Lord Archdemon had no understanding of human aesthetics, but the force of those colors went beyond “beauty” and pierced straight through him. An ordinary person might very well have their soul seized away on the spot.

Myss instinctively glanced at Salaar.

Oh, as expected, his mortal enemy hadn’t been captivated by the artwork at all. He was openly looking at Myss instead.

“That’s enough. I know those things are valuable. I’m not going to touch them,” Myss muttered.

“Mm-hmm.” Salaar chuckled softly.

At the moment, there were no outsiders in the collection hall. Everyone coming and going was an employee of the place. Each one was handsome or proper-looking, dressed impeccably, and looked no different from nobles at a ball.

Whenever they noticed Myss and Salaar arriving, the people passing by all nodded in greeting, their smiles as perfectly measured as Mr. Anti’s.

Mr. Anti straightened his collar, bowed to Salaar, and then simply disappeared down the corridor.

“Welcome to the Red Amber Collection Hall.” Iver drew his gaze back from Anti, the smile on his face never changing in the slightest. “As agreed, today the two of you may wander the exhibition area for three hours, and I will accompany you the entire time.”

“The employee area is relatively restricted. You’ll have to sign the contract before you can enter. I hope you understand.”

“Mm. If my darling enjoys himself, I’ll sign sooner.” Salaar said lazily, then steered the subject elsewhere as if casually. “But when you say the employee area is restricted, does that mean once the two of us go in, we won’t be able to come out again to enjoy ourselves?”

“In principle, yes.” Iver put on a regretful expression. “Before the contract term ends, we cannot tolerate our employees coming to harm, nor can we bear the risk of details about their works leaking out.”

“I know that’s hard to endure, so rest assured, we’ll provide very generous compensation.”

Myss scrunched up his face. “Mr. Anti can clearly go out.”

He had had enough of being locked up, whether in that pitch-black seal or in the glaring red cage before him.

“The only reason Antis Crosien is allowed to leave as an exception is to receive Mr. Karns. Otherwise, even with his flawless record, he wouldn’t be permitted to go out.”

Iver explained patiently.

“All right,” Salaar said, smoothly guiding the conversation elsewhere again. “Then what about letters? Surely you don’t ban people from writing letters too?”

“Nothing that extreme. As long as they don’t mention work-related matters, letters and parcels are fine. We have designated agents to receive them, along with special detection magic that can inspect them without opening them.” Iver smiled. “Believe me, the privacy of correspondence here is very well protected.”

In other words, security was tight. They weren’t going to be able to sneak in and rummage around.

Myss and Salaar exchanged a glance.

Salaar: “Oh right, I just remembered. A friend of mine has a pen pal here. The name was… let me think… something like ‘Flaw.’”

“Ahahaha!”

Iver burst into laughter as though he had just heard the funniest joke in the world. “Heavens, your friend must have met an impostor. There’s absolutely no one at the Red Amber who would use a name like that!”

“Flaw, Blemish, Imperfection… Those are all words the whole of Sepanti despises. Just as a gourmet wouldn’t use ‘maggot’ as a pen name, no artist at the Red Amber would ever call themselves ‘Flaw.’”

“Perhaps it’s some rebellious, unconventional artist,” Salaar said.

“In that case, one of us ‘Gold Prospectors’ would never have discovered them,” Iver said, still smiling as he shook his head. “All right, enough of that. Please come this way. This is the hall for landscapes…”

The collections of the Red Amber Collection Hall’s were astonishing indeed, and Salaar looked with a fair amount of focus.

Myss, however, couldn’t hold out. Lord Archdemon didn’t have much of a human artistic soul, and once the initial novelty wore off, he started yawning nonstop.

If Cinnamon’s lively bouncing about had not been so refreshing, Myss would definitely have found a bench and taken a nap. After two and a half hours of wandering, he finally couldn’t stand it anymore and returned fully to his role as a “spoiled lover.”

“Hey. I’m hungry. I need something to eat.”

Iver responded with perfect courtesy. “I’ll take the two of you to the VIP dining room at once.”

“I want to go outside and get some air,” Myss insisted. “I hate being shut up in this damned place.”

Hearing the keyword “shut up,” Salaar gave a visible start and immediately turned syrupy-sweet. “Is that so, darling? Then let’s go get some air by the river. You worked hard last night.”

“You know it,” Myss retorted entirely without modesty.

Iver touched his chin. “Mm, I wouldn’t personally recommend it, but if the two of you insist…”

“In any case, I’ll wait here. You’re welcome to come sign the contract at any time.”

He shrugged and made an inviting gesture.

……

Very soon, Myss understood exactly what Iver had meant by “I wouldn’t personally recommend it.”

Even wearing a mask, he could feel people’s gazes sticking to him from all directions. Those gazes clung like spider silk, making his whole body uncomfortable.

“Heavens, you two are the artist and model from ‘The End of the World’!”

They had barely sat down in a small restaurant when they were swarmed by waiters. “That painting is so beautiful. Could you sign something for us?”

Even the chef burst out from the back kitchen, brandishing a sharp little knife. “Use this, please! Sign it on me!”

Identical smiles were plastered across all their faces—ingratiating, bashful, and held at exactly the right distance. A perfectly polite smile no one could possibly dislike.

Salaar grabbed Myss and bolted. Cinnamon was nearly flung off and had to cling tightly to Myss’s shirt with its claws.

The moment the two of them left, everyone reverted to normal. The chef put his hat back on, the waiters smoothed their hair, and everyone resumed being perfectly composed.

Watching from the corner of his eye, Salaar fell silent.

“Myss…do you feel like something’s wrong?”

Myss shook his head.

Truth be told, he had been startled too. But he hadn’t detected anything strange like “Mina’s magical red threads.” Everything looked completely normal.

“All right. Maybe they just… really love art,” Salaar ventured, though he sounded doubtful even to himself.

But when they tried the next restaurant, the situation was exactly the same.

This time even the owner came running out. Waving a canvas and brush, he begged Salaar to paint a few strokes on the spot, promising to hang the result in the most prominent place.

While Myss was secretly laughing at Salaar, the owner had the audacity to stretch out a pair of scissors toward the ends of Myss’s pale hair.

If Salaar hadn’t been quick enough, Fork would have bitten the owner’s nose right off.

…After fleeing that place too, both of them fell silent.

Those spiderweb-like gazes were everywhere. Myss was almost beginning to feel confused. Barely one night had passed, and every person in Sepanti now knew “The End of the World”. He and Salaar had become more popular than the king and queen.

Merely walking down the street, their presence seemed to become like a wind passing over a sea of wheat, causing gaze after gaze to bow toward them. And yet every single person remained exquisitely polite. The moment Myss or Salaar showed the slightest sign of refusal, the people backed off faster than they themselves moved. No one forced them to do anything.

Stranger still, those gazes weren’t envy, admiration, or jealousy.

They were something more basic, akin to the instinctive need to breathe or eat, like moths at night chasing light.

After a while, Myss was exhausted. Salaar had successfully stepped into the spotlight, yes, but the spotlight was roasting them dry.

The Dragon Fae hadn’t shown up yet, but the citizens of Sepanti were already sniping at them from all directions. So last night’s spectacle really hadn’t been a coincidence. There was something wrong with everyone here.

Lord Archdemon scratched at his head in bewilderment, nearly ruining the hairstyle Salaar had carefully arranged for him. This time he deliberately focused his senses but still detected no abnormal magical fluctuation at all.

“Salaar… I’m really hungry.”

Having failed to think of anything, Myss said it miserably. Even Cinnamon let out two dissatisfied meows.

A young mortal body got hungry fast, especially after they had spent half the day running around without so much as a drink of water. It was already past lunchtime by now. Myss’s stomach was growling and snarling, and even Salaar was beginning to feel lightheaded.

With the strange events in Rosha fresh in mind, even though the locals hadn’t actually done anything too excessive, neither of them dared eat the things handed to them by these people.

“We’re going to find Father Kalen.” Salaar’s patience was clearly worn down. “Change of plans. We need to enter the Red Amber early—”

“Hiss!” Cinnamon suddenly let out a sharp hiss.

Salaar dodged on instinct, and a streak of light flashed past, slicing open the side of his neck.

“How sly. You even brought a cat!”

The Dragon Fae hovered in midair, his delicate face twisted in irritation. Yet he only complained aloud and made no attempt to attack Cinnamon.

Myss stepped in front of Salaar. Fork coiled on the back of his hand, poised to strike.

The moment the Dragon Fae saw Myss, a very obvious trace of fear crossed his face. He clicked his tongue and vanished in a blur, diving into the pendant worn by a child passing nearby.

The child was wearing one of Sepanti’s very fashionable “multicolored discs,” a pendant set with scraps of gemstones in every color imaginable. Myss had no idea which one the Dragon Fae had entered.

“Little one, could we take a look at your pendant?” Salaar called the child over in a warm voice.

Surely a child would not be too fanatical about art.

The child, who couldn’t have been more than ten, looked up at him and suddenly smiled.

Ingratiating, bashful, and held at exactly the right distance. A perfectly polite smile no one could possibly dislike.

“Of course, sir,” the child said obediently. “As long as that big brother model gives me one strand of hair. If you do, I’ll be very happy, and so will Mama and Papa!”

“Can he?”

“Can he?”

“Can he?”

---

The author has something to say:

Salaar: Absolutely not.

Good news: becoming famous worked very well.
Bad news: becoming famous worked too well.

I think everyone’s been pretty sharp about it. There is something jussst a bit off with the people in this city. [dog head emoji]

---

<<< || Table of Contents || >>>

Author: 年终 / Nian Zhong

Translator: Kinky || https://kinkytranslations.com/

---

Chapter 35: An Eventful Night

Myss and Salaar returned to Mr. Anti’s residence without any warning.

Unfortunately, it was already quite late, and Mr. Anti himself had gone to bed. The one who opened the door was a temporarily hired valet. The servant observed proper professional etiquette and merely asked the two of them with utmost courtesy, “Good evening. Is there anything you require?”

“A late-night meal. Meat included,” Myss said. The effects of those little chocolate treats had worn off, and he was hungry again.

“Iced botrytized wine, roast veal, almond milk chicken soup, and seasonal fruit pudding, preferably with raspberries.” Salaar dutifully played his role as a spoiled young nobleman. “For two. Bring it to the bedroom door. We won’t be eating in the dining room.”

The string of nouns drifted through Myss’s brain like sleep-talk, but he caught the word veal and didn’t object.

The servant nodded obediently and withdrew with elegance. Myss returned to the guest room and immediately hurled himself onto the soft, spacious bed.

“I’m exhausted,” he groaned, stretching his limbs as far as he could.

“Wash up first, then rest,” Salaar said.

“You’re not exactly running low on magic, are you? What happened to your cleansing spell?”

Myss refused to move no matter what. Fork had already slithered out of his pocket and was happily coiling itself on the pillow.

“Kendrick Karns can’t use magic,” Salaar said cruelly as he reached down to haul Myss up. “Either you bathe first, or I drag you in to bathe with me. Your choice.”

“The Karns family would never tolerate themselves eating while filthy.”

Salaar clearly had his mind made up, so Myss had no choice but to leave the bed in misery.

The real Kendrick Karns spent all day indoors, probably with enough hair grease to squeeze out by the pound. Did “turning over a new leaf” really require acting the part this far?

But the moment Myss saw the bathroom attached to the guest room, he brightened again.

The bathtub was made of white porcelain, smooth and warm to the touch, with plenty of room. The brass faucet had been enchanted, and the flowing water came out at exactly the right temperature. On the edge of the tub sat fragrant spherical magic devices that released dense foam as soon as they touched water.

Myss poked every button around the tub one by one and discovered a mechanism that produced massaging streams of water, as well as a warm-air enchantment with different built-in scents. He even found a music function. It was controlled by a dial, and he could choose from four different kinds of music.

On the wall beside the tub was a swan relief. The swan’s eyes were carved from obsidian, and the workmanship was exquisite, exceptionally detailed.

Truly big cities were a different breed. Compared to this, the bathtub in Ring Town had basically been just a somewhat oversized bucket.

Myss chose a sweet fruit fragrance he liked and rolled around in the warm water. Then he created a huge amount of bubbles and buried himself completely inside them.

He was reveling in his fun when suddenly a chill breeze brushed past him.

The current of cold air was extraordinarily faint, as light as a breath, and carried a trace of magical fluctuation.

Myss instantly ducked beneath the water, exposing only half his face as his emotionless gaze swept toward the source.

The fluctuation came from the relief swan on the wall. More precisely, it came from one of its obsidian eyes.

The magical fluctuation was almost nonexistent, but Myss would never mistake it. His first instinct was to blast it with black magic, but the Salaar in his head shouted No! Don’t exposed too much at the start of an investigation, and so on.

So Myss simply flicked his arm, sending a mass of foam flying over to cover the obsidian eye completely.

Whoosh.

The fluctuation paused slightly, then slipped quickly out of the obsidian like a startled fish. A few seconds later, one of the crystal bottles on the platform gave off an almost imperceptible tremor of magic.

…Interesting.

Smack!

Another glob of foam flew out and engulfed the little bottle of essential oil.

Smack! Smack! Smack!

The gems on the statues, the crystals on the chandelier, even the glittering inlays in the floor… White foam pursued that strand of magical fluctuation, attacking every corner of the bathroom with equal vigor.

Lord Archdemon’s string of actions was anything but small. Water splashed all over the floor, and bottles and jars were knocked askew all over. At last, after that relentless hunt, the fluctuation disappeared completely.

The taste of victory was sweet indeed. Myss stretched lazily in satisfaction and blew a string of bubbles into the water.

“Myss, dinner’s here…”

Salaar pushed the door open, and the chaotic wreck of the bathroom came into view. A huge lump of foam slid off the chandelier and plopped down into his hair.

Salaar: “…”
Salaar: “You seem to be enjoying bathing quite a bit.”

“That’s what you get for not knocking,” Myss said gleefully, flinging a handful of foam at him.

Salaar dodged with practiced ease, looking as though he wanted to sigh again. “As though you’d have let me in if I had knocked.”

Then, right there in the open, Salaar cast a cleansing spell on himself.

Myss objected on the spot. “How can you use magic? Didn’t you say Karns doesn’t—”

“With the state you’ve turned this bathroom into, they’ll only think we bathed together.”

Salaar wiped at his face. “Hurry up and put on your nightclothes. Come out and eat.”

Myss grumbled, climbing out of the warm embrace of the bath only to catch the towel Salaar threw at him straight in the face. This bath had actually been rather fun, so he decided not to argue with the Great Hero this time.

The meal Salaar had ordered was delicious. The beef was tender and fresh, the wine sweet and crisp. Myss ate and drank his fill, his whole body still warm from the bathwater, wrapped in a blissful haze of satisfied dizziness.

He flowed onto the bed like syrup and didn’t bother fighting Salaar for territory this time.

Of course, Lord Archdemon wasn’t voluntarily playing the role of a “lover sharing a bed.” In reality, he had already mastered the key to fighting Salaar over sleeping space. As long as he could turn the Great Hero into a cushion, sharing one bed was perfectly acceptable. Salaar himself didn’t seem to mind, so why not?

Come to think of it, should he tell Salaar about that magical fluctuation?

Myss thought drowsily, settling his face onto Salaar’s chest with practiced ease. The muscles there were warm and springy, much better to sleep on than an ordinary pillow.

Forget it. The fluctuation had been so weak. Maybe it was just some kind of bug… and now he couldn’t sense it at all anyway. Telling Salaar in the morning would be fine, right…

…Less than two hours later, Myss regretted that decision.

In the middle of the night, he was sleeping soundly when that same presence woke him again.

Myss opened his eyes in annoyance and frowned at the jewel lamp by the bedside. The lamp was giving off a faint but irritating fluctuation, like a mosquito buzzing by his ear.

“What is it?” Salaar stirred awake at Myss’s movement.

“A strange presence,” Myss muttered. “There’s something wrong with the gems in this room. They keep giving off weird magical fluctuations.”

“It could be the craftsman’s work,” Salaar suggested. He had heard that gems cut with magic sometimes retained traces of the artisan’s own magical signature.

Myss rubbed his eyes. “No, that’s not it. I know what residual fluctuations feel like. This is different… but I don’t know what it is either…”

He had only just woken, and the presence on the lamp had already vanished again. Now he had no idea where it had gone.

Salaar touched the front of Myss’s sleep shirt, confirming that the Red Amber protective badge was still there. “It’s fine. Go back to sleep.”

Myss made a sleepy sound and buried his face into Salaar’s chest again.

He had been asleep for less than an hour when that maddening magical presence drew near once more, flicking at his nerves—

Crash! A burst of annihilation magic shot out and shattered the jeweled flower vase on the table.

That was enough. It was too irritating.

Myss sat up off Salaar, grabbed the half-asleep Fork in one hand, and decided to drag out that damned “mosquito.” Salaar was jolted awake again, and this time he simply turned on the light.

“Deal with it before going back to sleep. Don’t use too much magic. You pin it down, and I’ll seal it with defensive magic.”

The moment he finished speaking, Lord Archdemon began ricocheting wildly around the room.

Myss lunged toward the gem lamp at the bedside and snatched it up, only to hurl it aside the next instant and throw himself at the agate-inlaid clock on the wall. He had barely snapped off its hands before he slammed open the balcony door and seized the silver tray with the colored glass decoration. The tray went flying downstairs, and Myss bounded up to the ceiling to tear the ornamental crystal from the top of the bed curtains.

Salaar watched the Archdemon darting all over the room with an expression that defied description. He kept a wooden face and, one-handed, shoved the bed rhythmically as if providing accompaniment.

But the longer he watched, the more serious his expression became. During the chase, quite a few injuries had appeared on Myss’s body.

The Archdemon was too worked up to care, and because the wounds didn’t do much real damage, he didn’t pause for even half a second because of them.

But Salaar saw them clearly.

There were bruises like impact wounds, bloody gashes like cuts from blades, even a few droplets of blood on the carpet. Myss’s sleepwear was loose, and his skin was exceptionally pale, making the wounds stand out starkly.

…And yet Salaar could see only the injuries, not the “thing” that had inflicted them. Even the hostile presence he had sensed during the day had vanished. The whole situation was indeed strange.

Whatever had slipped into their room was absolutely no simple matter.

Finally, with lightning speed, Myss tore the citrine crystal from the floor lamp shade. “Now!”

Salaar’s protective magic activated at once, wrapping around the citrine from all sides. With a shriek, the mysterious being finally revealed itself.

A beam of light shot out from the citrine and condensed into a humanoid shape.

The thing was only about the length of a hand. At first glance it looked like a tiny person with wyvern-like wings.

He—or she—wore light armor and had an extremely slender build, with no visible sexual characteristics at all. That beautiful face was just as androgynous, youthful, exuding an aura of adolescence.

The tiny figure had short rose-gold hair, and from within it protruded a pair of miniature draconic horns. His eyes resembled emeralds, and his limbs were covered in beautiful jewel-like scales… In his hand he gripped a citrine blade, and there was blood on its edge.

“What kind of thing is that? A fairy?” Myss stared at it in confusion.

Yes, the magical fluctuation had been coming from this creature all along. Now it had gone stiff-faced, looking so terrible it was almost frightening.

But when it came to fairies, they existed only in tales spun by bards. At least, Myss had never seen a living one.

“I’m a Dragon Fae!”

The tiny figure was furious. While shrieking in a high voice, he hacked furiously at the magical shield with his citrine blade. “Damn it, damn it—why is this thing so hard—”

Myss turned blankly to look at Salaar, only to find the Great Hero equally bewildered.

“A Dragon Fae?” Salaar murmured, stepping closer. “Truly the world is filling up with stranger and stranger things…”

The moment Salaar drew near, the Dragon Fae’s mouth twitched.

Myss’s hair stood on end. He slammed bodily into Salaar.

At the same moment, Salaar’s defensive barrier shattered into dust.

The Dragon Fae shot out at astonishing speed, like an arrow aimed straight at Salaar. Fortunately, the Archdemon had reacted fast enough. The two of them fell back onto the bed just in time, and the Dragon Fae merely sliced through the back of Myss’s pajamas.

Fork opened its mouth wide. Myss fired a black beam backward with one hand.

The black magic pierced through the Dragon Fae’s wings. He immediately dove into the jewel lamp by the bed. The next moment, the gem there crumbled to ash, as if it had taken the damage in his place.

By the time Myss came to himself again, the presence had vanished completely. The Dragon Fae had fled in a flash, leaving only a complete mess of a bedroom behind.

Stepping over overturned furniture and shards, Salaar sat down by the bed. “Very likely an assassin sent by the Karns family.”

“The End of the World is in Iver’s hands, and I just agreed to paint a new work for him. Even if the Red Amber wanted to murder us and steal our belongings, they wouldn’t pick such an idiotic time.”

For once, Myss didn’t mock Salaar. He could tell that even though the Dragon Fae was tiny, he was by no means weak.

That creature had hidden his presence almost perfectly and moved at terrifying speed. So far, he also seemed able to conceal himself inside gemstones and possessed a high degree of magical resistance. Salaar’s defensive spell wasn’t something that should have been so easy to break.

A highly dangerous assassin.

Whatever the actual quality of the Dragon Fae’s magic, speed alone would let him punch straight through Salaar’s chest. Myss had protected him this time, but he couldn’t stare at Salaar every minute of every day.

Salaar’s face was grave. He appeared to be thinking exactly the same thing.

Since sleep was clearly no longer an option, Myss’s eyes shifted, and he decided to drag Father Kalen out of bed too. The priest knew a great deal of modern information. Maybe he had some strange trick.

But just as Myss was about to go, Salaar grabbed him.

“Bite my shoulder,” Salaar instructed, pointing to the area between his shoulder and neck. “Then scratch my arm and back a few times.” 

Myss blinked in confusion. “?”

“This is for the performance. It’s a rare opportunity for you to strike without me fighting back. Don’t you want to try?

Oh, he definitely wanted to try.

Myss braced one knee against the bed and happily bent down, biting into Salaar’s shoulder and neck. Salaar’s skin was smooth and firm, actually rather satisfying to bite. Myss bit very slowly on purpose, applying slight pressure with his teeth as his sharp canines leisurely pierced the skin. A few tiny beads of blood welled up, and he couldn’t resist licking them, tasting a faint sweetness tinged with iron.

True to his word, Salaar offered no resistance; he merely gave a slight twitch as Myss licked the wound.

Golden magic floated lightly into the air, healing the small wounds on Myss’s body.

Then Myss set to work with his fingernails. Unfortunately, not long ago Salaar had thoroughly groomed him. The slave’s long nails had been trimmed neatly and smoothly, so all he could manage were a few faint bloody marks.

“That’s enough.”

Before Myss had scratched to his satisfaction, Salaar had already thrown on a loose sleeping robe. He deliberately left the neckline hanging open, exposing the bite marks.

“Now we can go visit Mr. Kalen,” he said softly.

……

“A Dragon Fae attacked you?”

Kalen looked deeply shocked, as though he had just heard that Salaar had been bitten by a rabbit.

The priest was wearing his sleepwear with rigid neatness, as if he had only just woken. For some reason, there was also a calico cat asleep on his bed with all four paws in the air.

“This is highly abnormal. Are you certain the attacker was a Dragon Fae? As far as I know, Dragon Fae abhor killing. They’re famous for gemstone craftsmanship. A well-known ‘artisan race’… much like the dwarves.”

Father Kalen poured a cup of herbal tea, his brows tightly furrowed. “A Dragon Fae assassin sounds about as absurd as a dwarf model.”

“He called himself a Dragon Fae.”

Realizing that the priest actually knew what Dragon Fae were, Myss quickly began demonstrating with gestures, carefully describing the attacker’s appearance. “…And he can hide inside gemstones, and his weapon was made of a gem too.”

“He even shattered my defensive magic,” Salaar added.

Father Kalen glanced at Salaar, his gaze touching the bite marks only briefly before averting it.

The whole story sounded deeply unreasonable, but not long before this, he too had heard strange sounds. Now that he thought back, there had always been a gemstone nearby each time.

“What you described are indeed Dragon Fae traits. They claim to be ‘born from magic, buried in magic,’ and they don’t even reproduce like other living beings. They are praised as ‘the purest magical beings’.”

Kalen sank into thought.

“That only makes it stranger… Dragon Fae clearly possesses formidable magical talent and would never struggle to survive. Why would one go into the business of assassination?”

“Oh, I don’t care about his motives.”

Myss said, “I just don’t want that thing bothering me again. It ruined my entire night’s sleep.”

“Perhaps we could inform Mr. Anti—”

“No!” Myss and Salaar said in unison.

“…Then the two of you had best cover any gemstones on you and stay as far from jewelry shops as possible.” Father Kalen advised, “Ah, and I can also introduce the two of you to bodyguards.”

Bodyguards? Myss raised a brow.

Kalen had just described Dragon Fae as almost impossibly formidable. What kind of bodyguard could stop one?

In response, Father Kalen turned around and picked up the sleeping calico cat from the bed. The cat let out a soft sound, stretched long in his arms, and let out a wide yawn.

“Allow me to introduce Mr. Cinnamon,” Kalen said. “He knows many sharp ladies and gentlemen, and their eyes can follow the flight path of Dragon Fae.”

“Dragon Fae have strong magical resistance, but insufficient physical endurance. That means they can only attack at close range. Cats, on the other hand, have exceptional dynamic vision. If the cats help keep watch for you, then the moment a Dragon Fae approaches, they’ll be able to warn you.”

The calico cat sized up the two of them for a moment, then let out a sweet little “meow.”

“Of course, the two of you will need to cover the additional bodyguard fee.” Father Kalen looked slightly embarrassed. “One fat sea bass per day, or two tender chicken breasts.”

Myss and Salaar: “…”

Who would have thought Father Kalen actually did have a trick up his sleeve? Although, admittedly, it was a rather eccentric trick.

After an hour of negotiations, the calico cat Cinnamon officially became the Great Hero’s honorary bodyguard. It stood on Myss’s shoulder with dignified poise, a pretty pale green ribbon now tied around its neck.

“He can provide eight hours of security.” Father Kalen nodded in satisfaction. “And there are two others rotating shifts, which guarantees that Mr. Salaar will have bodyguards twenty-four hours a day.”

“Meow!” said bodyguard Cinnamon. “Hiss—”

“When they notice an extremely fast-moving creature approaching, they will immediately hiss a warning. That sound just now was a demonstration,” Father Kalen translated solemnly.

“Why is it sitting on me? Isn’t it supposed to be Salaar’s bodyguard?” Myss protested.

Fork, coiled around Myss’s wrist, eyed the cat with dissatisfaction. Cinnamon purred and narrowed its eyes from Myss’s shoulder. “Meow.”

The priest translated, “It means that in case they accidentally misjudge things, this arrangement makes it less likely they’ll get caught in the attack.”

Myss and Salaar: “…………”

Was this fluffy bodyguard really reliable?

Still, all things considered, this did currently seem like the most effective defensive measure available.

After briefly discussing the situation, Myss returned to their room with the cat still perched on him and decided to get some more sleep.

But the moment he turned Salaar into a cushion and settled down, the cat jumped onto his back and turned him into a cushion as well. The three of them were stacked together like some bizarre sort of plating arrangement.

Still, the cat was warm, Salaar was warm, and Myss found that, barely, acceptable. Accompanied by the bodyguard’s rumbling purr, Myss fell asleep at once.

…And this time he slept very soundly.

Yet only two hours later, Mr. Anti came knocking at their door.

---

The author has something to say:

The cat is lying on Myss’s back, and Myss is lying on Salaar’s chest. In the end, the Great Hero bears all the weight.

---

<<< || Table of Contents || >>>

Author: 年终 / Nian Zhong

Translator: Kinky || https://kinkytranslations.com/

---

Chapter 34: A Cat Tea Party

Father Kalen was feeling a little hungry, but he still decided to return to Mr. Anti’s residence first and deliver the message that “Young Master Karns and his lover would be staying out overnight.”

He picked up some roast meat from a street stall on the way and ate as he walked. It looked appetizing enough but tasted rather bland. Fortunately, Father Kalen wasn’t particularly picky about his food.

“Meow~”

A cat’s cry sounded nearby.

Father Kalen looked up and saw a calico cat crouched on a low wall. Its coat was patchy and dry-looking, and its body was all skin and bone. Staring with yellow-green eyes, it fixed its gaze directly on the roast meat.

The priest kindly pulled apart the roast and took out the least-seasoned portion. “Here, little one.”

The cat watched him for a while, then quickly dropped its guard. It leaped down from the low wall and devoured the meat in a few gulps. After that it began rubbing itself against Father Kalen’s feet, mewing continuously.

A few more cat heads popped up over the wall, curiously peering at Kalen.

The thoughts of small animals were more like those of young children: simple ideas, direct emotions. Father Kalen crouched down and stroked the warm little head of the calico cat. “Yes, I’m happy to meet you too.”

The calico cat began purring amiably.

When Kalen’s hand reached its neck, he paused slightly. Around the cat’s neck, he felt a strip of rotting soft cloth, like the remains of a collar.

“I see… You were abandoned.”

Kalen sighed. “Would you be willing to chat with me? As payment, I’ll treat you to sea bass. You can bring a few friends too.”

“But you’ll have to wait until midnight. I need to make some preparations first.”

“Meow-ow-ow—!”

Kalen scooped up the skeletal cat and carried it all the way back to Mr. Anti’s residence. Only when they reached the entrance did he set it down again.

“This is the place. I’ll be waiting on the balcony then.” Kalen pointed toward his room. “There’s a dog in the courtyard, so don’t disturb it.”

Night was deepening, yet the little dog still slept soundly beneath the trees, a butterfly settling lightly onto its nose.

…When Kalen delivered the message, Mr. Anti showed no sign of surprise. He merely nodded. “I’ll have the cook prepare less food.”

“If possible, I’d like fifteen nice fat roasted sea bass, no seasoning. I’m willing to pay,” Kalen said.

“No need. They’re only sea bass.”

Anti smiled. His irises were a very deep reddish-brown, nearly black in the night. “You’re a friend of Young Master Karns, which means you are my guest as well.”

Kalen nodded gratefully and lightly touched his chest with his right hand. “By the Lord of Shadows above, may His veil shroud you, unseen and unharmed.”

Anti: “Thank you. If you need anything else, please do let me know.”

With that, he turned and left, his departing steps just as proper and measured as before. Kalen watched his retreating figure from the corridor. The hallway was utterly silent, the shadows swallowing up those lifelike specimens and reducing them to thin silhouettes.

Crk.

A faint sound suddenly came from the corner.

Kalen thought perhaps the cats had arrived early, so he leaned over to look. But he saw nothing at all. There was only a small round table in the corner, with an exquisite crystal globe ornament on top.

Was it just his imagination? Father Kalen scratched his head and went back to his room.

Considering the, ah, special relationship between those two, Father Kalen had been given a guest room of his own. The room had been cleaned thoroughly, and the aged wooden furniture shone warmly in the lamplight.

There was a specimen decorating this room as well: a red fox posed in a remarkably lifelike, agile stance. Its fur was fluffy, its tea-colored eyes bright and alert, as though it might dart away the next instant.

Father Kalen didn’t particularly like this kind of preserved creature. He frowned at the fox, then opened the balcony door. His guest room had a small viewing balcony with a round tea table on it, and it was fairly spacious.

Fifteen roasted sea bass took up a full eight plates. Father Kalen carefully arranged them on the balcony floor and sprinkled over a very small amount of catnip as flavoring. Then he poured out two large basins of clean water and waited quietly for the cats to arrive.

At midnight, the calico cat came as invited. Nine other cats came with it, sitting on the balcony railing and curiously observing Kalen.

“Go ahead and eat, everyone. Don’t be shy,” Father Kalen invited them softly.

The cats leaped happily down from the railing, devouring the deboned fish, their purring rumbling nonstop. The calico cat was especially bold and jumped right onto the table, eating from the plate in front of Kalen.

“Has anything strange been happening in the city lately?” Kalen asked quietly.

“Meow meow… ow-ow!”

“The number of stray cats has suddenly increased?” Kalen was a little surprised. “What about humans? Have there been any odd changes on the human side?”

The calico cat swallowed a large mouthful of fish and gave a quiet mew that sounded like a negative answer. Kalen stroked the cat’s bony back and fell into thought.

Commoners rarely kept cats shut indoors. They preferred letting cats wander freely around the neighborhood. If there had suddenly been more strays on the streets, it was more likely that noble households had abandoned them.

But for nobles, keeping a cat wasn’t much of an expense. Even if they could no longer keep one for some reason, they would usually give the pet to a servant rather than abandon it outright.

“If you don’t mind, please tell me your story.”

The calico cat licked Kalen’s hand lightly, then began to express itself with some difficulty—

Its former owner had been a lovely little boy who liked cinnamon rolls, so he had named the cat Cinnamon.

Humans said Cinnamon was ugly, but the little boy didn’t care in the least. He would save pieces of chicken breast and egg yolk from dinner, cut them into small pieces, and feed them to it. Sometimes Cinnamon also helped him drink his goat’s milk, since its young master disliked the smell.

But as Cinnamon grew older, the atmosphere in the household became increasingly strange.

The master of the house became inexplicably volatile, while the mistress shut herself alone in her room, crying day after day.

Whenever his parents went into their frenzies, the little boy would hold Cinnamon helplessly and curl up in a corner in silence. Cinnamon didn’t understand what was happening, so all it could do was purr softly, trying to comfort the child.

The child buried his face in its soft fur and cried ceaselessly.

But after some more time had passed, the boy too gradually lost his affection for it.

He began screaming that it was ugly: its fur pattern was unattractive, its eye color not special, its features not cute enough. He never gave it chicken breast or egg yolk again and even poured away the goat’s milk instead of letting it drink.

Cinnamon was bewildered. It couldn’t understand what had happened to this family. Fortunately, they still spared it a few mouthfuls of food, their reasoning being that “the neighbors all know it’s our family’s cat and throwing it out would be too embarrassing.”

Then, half a year ago, Cinnamon went out for its usual nighttime walk and smelled something warm, metallic, and sweet. It more or less understood what it was.

It was animal blood.

Even though it was the middle of the night, its mistress was dressed in elaborate clothing and lying in a pool of blood. Her face had been hacked apart with an axe until it was a ruin of flesh and gore. Around her neck hung more than a dozen necklaces, their jewels glittering brilliantly amid the bloodstains.

Its master was similarly dressed in formal clothes, hanging in midair. The bloodied axe lay at his feet, while his own body was just as soaked in blood. He was covered with exquisite jeweled brooches, so many that they nearly hid every inch of exposed skin, each pin fixed deeply into flesh.

Beautiful moonlight covered the two corpses, while the prismatic shimmer of gemstones danced ceaselessly over dead flesh.

What followed was several days of chaos. Cinnamon disliked strangers, so while people came and went, it hid beneath a cabinet the whole time. And when it finally came back out, the little house was already empty.

Its young master had been taken away by strangers.

But he had not taken Cinnamon with him.

“…And after that, you became a stray,” Kalen said, sounding a little sad.

“Meow.” The calico cat Cinnamon licked one paw and washed its face a couple of times.

The other cats had nearly finished eating by now. They gradually gathered around Father Kalen’s feet, letting out low meows one after another.

Two more former pets shared their own experiences, though none were as bizarre as Cinnamon’s. They had simply fallen out of favor and then been secretly thrown out by their owners, with nobody dying in the process.

“I’d like to make a deal with you,” Father Kalen said after a moment’s thought. “If you notice any humans who die in strange ways, tell me immediately, and I’ll prepare milk and meat for you.”

“Meow?” “Meow…?”

“I’m excluding ordinary accidental deaths, deaths by illness, and deaths by old age. As for the rest… if you think it’s unusual, I’ll reward you.”

“Meow!”

The stray cats cheered. A few especially bold ones jumped onto Kalen’s lap, while the rest scraped their tongues over the plates, cleaning up every last flake of fish.

The calico cat Cinnamon began rubbing hard against Father Kalen again, mewing nonstop. Kalen listened for a while. “You think your master and mistress’s deaths were strange in another way too? …The decorations on them were unusual?”

“They all had grayish-yellow stones in the jewelry? Wait, we don’t perceive colors the same way. Can you describe it?”

“…You mean the same grayish-yellow as ‘human blood’.”

Cats could not properly distinguish red in the same way humans did.

Which meant those jewels were very likely set with dark red stones.

Crack.

Another odd sound came from the corner, interrupting Kalen’s thoughts. Father Kalen stood up and cautiously approached to investigate.

His hearing was excellent. He was certain he hadn’t misheard. Unfortunately, if only he had Mr. Salaar’s knack for sensing hostility. Kalen looked around in every direction yet still found nothing.

Wait, no. Had the fox specimen’s eyes always been that bright?

Kalen leaned closer to the fox and examined it carefully for quite some time. The specimen’s eyes were clear and cold, crafted from flawless smoky crystal, and there was nothing odd about them.

…Perhaps the night breeze had merely stirred something.

Kalen returned to the balcony and sat down once more in the moonlight, the bone ring on his left hand reflecting a dim luster.

Something had to be lurking in the shadows beneath this prosperous city. Merely “more stray cats” or “scattered strange deaths” would never provoke that level of ominousness.

And if Cinnamon’s instinct was right, what exactly were those dark red stones on the victims’ jewelry?

…Forget it. There were far too few clues right now. An investigation couldn’t be rushed.

The priest lowered his eyes in silence and gently stroked the calico cat on the table. The cat narrowed its eyes and purred contentedly.

……

“Stop touching me!” Myss hissed.

“This isn’t touching. I’m helping you fix your hair.”

Salaar’s fingers smoothed through Myss’s hair. “Your hair’s gotten messy, and a model’s styling is crucial.”

Not long ago, they had accepted Mr. Iver’s invitation.

But instead of taking them into the Red Amber, Iver had brought them to the VIP room of the Goldsand Market. It was luxuriously decorated, excellently soundproofed, and meant specifically for large-sum transactions.

Iver provided them with warm spiced wine and expensive chocolate pastries.

He had them rest for a while on the sofa, while he himself laid “The End of the World” flat on a long table and brought out an appraisal lens covered in magic circles.

After Salaar finished tidying Myss up, he popped a chocolate into the disgruntled Lord Archdemon’s mouth. While Myss’s attention was captured by the chocolate, Salaar finally had room to speak. “This is?”

“Ah, please don’t misunderstand. This is a necessary inspection.”

Iver smiled at him. “The market’s appraisers are highly professional, and your technical skill is beyond question. Personally, I’m extremely fond of this painting.”

“It’s simply that its allure is so astonishing that I must confirm whether any mental magic has been applied to it.”

“Who would adulterate a portrait of their beloved?” Salaar sighed in a manner that was quintessentially “Karns”. 

“Do as you like. If it weren’t for the sake of the Red Amber…”

Meanwhile, as Salaar put on his performance, Lord Archdemon devoted himself to devouring the chocolate pastries on the table.

He really was a little hungry, and those little sweet things were surprisingly filling. As for all the messy talking, he could leave that to the Great Hero.

In truth, on the way here, Iver had already given them the basic explanation.

Behind the Goldsand Market stood the Red Amber Collection Hall. The Red Amber was devoted to discovering young talent and providing them with an ideal creative environment.

Once hired by the Red Amber, the pay and treatment would be no worse than in the capital. Even more enticing, being a “Red Amber artist” was no ordinary identity. If used properly, it could bring quite considerable wealth and fame.

Upon being hired, the Collection Hall would directly cover all their food, lodging, and daily needs. Inside the Hall were comfortable residential quarters and workspaces, with extremely thorough security measures.

“After all, when a creator dies, their works tend to appreciate significantly,” Iver had explained. “We simply don’t want certain lunatics taking risks and harming our employees.”

Myss had no interest in this supposed wealth and fame. The only thing he cared about was the Red Amber Collection Hall’s physical location.

At this point, it seemed highly likely that the man called “Flaw” was one of Red Amber’s employees.

Even so, up to now Myss had noticed nothing abnormal about the city, nor smelled the scent of an Abnormal Fruit. The only discovery he had made was that chocolate, in fact, was delicious.

“…The inspection is complete. There are no magical traces at all. Your skill and emotion are truly breathtaking.”

Who knew how much time had passed before Iver finally put away the appraisal lens. “I heard you are unwilling to sell this piece. In that case, would you allow us to keep it on loan for a while? On behalf of the Red Amber, I can offer a borrowing fee of one hundred gold rings per week.”

“As for safety, please rest assured. We will not allow so much as a speck of dust to fall upon it, and it will be returned to you in exactly the same condition.”

Thud. Myss froze mid-motion. The chocolate in his mouth nearly fell out, and even Salaar’s breathing stopped for a moment.

One hundred gold rings per week?

Myss dug a finger into his ear to make sure he had heard correctly.

He and Salaar had spent half a day in that damned church, exhausting themselves performing, only to get five gold rings in the end. And now a single painting, a painting of him, was worth more than his actual labor. What an absurd world this was.

Salaar: “I…”
Myss: “We accept—”

“—Not a chance!” Salaar pinched Myss in the waist. “My darling is only worth one hundred gold rings? What kind of joke is that?”

“I assume you know that I’m Kendrick Karns. A member of the Karns family doesn’t lack for a mere one hundred gold rings.”

Iver looked up and fixed his gaze on the two of them, one brow lifting slightly.

Objectively speaking, this “Gold Prospector” was extremely handsome, especially those eyes. When those moist champagne-gold eyes swept across someone, they could give the illusion of being in love.

Unfortunately, the destination of that gaze was two complete blockheads.

Salaar’s expression didn’t shift in the slightest; his face was openly spelling out you’ll have to pay more. Myss mechanically swallowed his pastry and began helping himself to the chocolate pastry on Salaar’s plate.

“You’re this eager to hire us, and willing to pay so much to borrow my painting. Let me guess, you want it for more than just an exhibition.”

Salaar said this with ruthless precision. “I heard the Red Amber has closed its doors to the public, yet its employees still have to report to work… You’re organizing some kind of event, aren’t you?”

Iver let out a long breath, his smile deepening a little.

“Heavens, you are much sharper than rumor suggests, Mr. Karns.”

Though the words were mildly insulting, the way he said them felt almost intimate. “Yes. We’ve been extremely busy lately, so busy that we had no choice but to close the Hall to visitors.”

“We are preparing a special exhibition, and your work fits its theme perfectly: ‘Perfect Love’.”

Myss spat out the pastry in his mouth, and even Fork in his pocket went rigid and made a strange noise.

…Perfect love? Perfect love?! Who, him and Salaar???

Perfect hatred would be more like it. Was something wrong with Iver’s eyes?

“Wha—”

Even Salaar was having trouble enduring this. When he opened his mouth again, he bit his tongue, and only after several seconds did he recover enough composure to speak. “What a truly… … … … … … …extraordinary coincidence.”

“However…”

Iver pivoted beautifully. “The emotion in The End of the World is intense, yes, but too complex. That love is mixed with rather too many imperfections. If possible, I would like you to paint a new work specifically for us.”

“We will give you a price that satisfies you, and we will hire your beloved as well, paying him the rate of a top model. Of course, depending on the situation, that amount can be doubled.”

“As for “The End of the World”, we can raise the loan fee to two hundred gold rings per week. What do you think?”

Salaar and Myss fell silent at the same time.

What did he mean, that love is mixed with rather too many imperfections? If one really had to put it into words, their relationship consisted entirely of flaws, with about as much love in it as Salaar’s ruby brooch contained actual ruby.

…But Iver was offering an awful lot.

Besides, they had already intended to infiltrate the Red Amber, and refusing too hard wouldn’t be ideal.

“Can you do it?” “Can you do it?”

The two of them practically whispered the questions into each other’s ears at the same time. For the first time in their lives, they reached a consensus this quickly.

“’The End of the World’ can be lent to you.”

Salaar spoke as arrogantly as he could manage. “However, my creative process requires inspiration, and I will not accept anyone rushing me. And my darling and I have only just arrived in Semper. We haven’t had our fill of enjoying ourselves yet, so you will need to provide spending money and security.”

“As for payment for the second painting, we can discuss that after we’ve had our fun.”

Iver agreed with remarkable ease and took out two exquisitely made badges from his pocket.

The badges were crafted from platinum, shaped into delicate spirals that perfectly reproduced the golden ratio. At the center of each spiral were set three perfectly round gemstones.

A vivid sapphire, a transparent yellow crystal, and a rounded blood amber.

The blood amber had been polished beautifully, displaying a mesmerizingly deep crimson hue. The magical fluctuation from it was astonishing enough that Myss narrowed his eyes instinctively.

“These are the Red Amber employee badges.”

Iver said, “They are imbued with extremely powerful life magic and can perfectly block one fatal attack, even poisoning.”

“Oh? That’s a magical artifact of Royal Security caliber. You’re giving them to us without even signing a contract first?” Salaar raised a brow.

“Your work is worth that much.” Iver smiled. “And if you are willing to forgive my initial error in pricing, so much the better.”

Myss casually pinned his badge to the inside of his ranger jacket. It looked very possible that Salaar was being watched by people from the Karns family, and Myss had no objection to another layer of protection.

Seeing Myss pin his on without hesitation, Salaar picked up his own badge and reflexively moved to pin it to his chest.

Then he realized that the place was already occupied by the “ruby” brooch Myss had given him.

His movement paused briefly. Then he pulled open his collar and fastened the badge lower down beneath his coat.

That ruby brooch remained pinned over his chest, the teardrop-shaped glass swaying lightly.

He knew that such restraint wasn’t very much like “Kendrick Karns.” Still, a tiny inconsistency shouldn’t matter too much.

After all, sweet love can completely change a person.

“So then, what are your arrangements for tonight?” Iver asked warmly. “If you wish to stay at the Red Amber, I can arrange everything at once.”

“No need.” Salaar touched the incredibly powerful badge. “We have somewhere to stay tonight. I imagine Mr. Anti will understand my ‘fickleness’.”

“Of course. Your pleasure takes precedence,” Iver said readily.

“Exactly. I believe we shall find our collaboration quite agreeable.”

Salaar draped an arm around Myss’s waist and took the opportunity to pull him back slightly, thereby saving the last chocolate pastry on the plate.

…Now that they had obtained the protective magic artifact, this was the perfect chance to see what exactly Mr. “Anti” was truly plotting.

---

The author has something to say:

In this city, Father’s little helpers aren’t crows—they’re cats. And yes, cats are color-blind*… [calico cat head]

*Not quite color blind but they have dichromatic vision, similar to red-green color blindness, so they perceive shades of blue, yellow, and grey, while struggling to distinguish red and green.

Summary of this chapter: Mr. Iver has paid heavily to commission Hero × Demon ship art.
(Just kidding.)

---

<<< || Table of Contents || >>>

Author: 年终 / Nian Zhong

Translator: Kinky || https://kinkytranslations.com/

---

Chapter 33: A Masterpiece

“You work at the Red Amber?”

Salaar asked directly. It had to be said, “Young Master Karns’s arrogance” made for a very useful mask.

“The Red Amber employs many artists. I’m one of them.”

Anti adjusted his top hat and turned away. “Yes, I must work. I’m merely an ordinary nobleman of modest family means. My residence may not live up to your expectations.”

…How to put it? After seeing Anti’s residence, Myss genuinely couldn’t tell whether that was an act of genuine humility or not.

Anti’s home truly wasn’t large. It was a three-story house with a courtyard—a dwelling that many wealthy commoner merchants could easily match.

But his residence was, to put it mildly, unique.

The three-story house was completely symmetrical from left to right; even the garden mirrored itself with absolute precision. The hedges had been trimmed into neat squares, the trees around the garden had all been pruned to the same height, and the arrangement of their branches was eerily similar. The climbing vines had been fixed in place with metal wire. Rather than natural decoration, they looked more like some sort of artistic pattern.

In the shade, Myss spotted a sleeping terrier. The little light-brown dog was napping in the sun, completely unaware of their arrival.

The interior decor was elegant but rigid, though at least spotless. Old paintings hung on the walls, and each vase held a fresh bouquet but there was no mixing of varieties; each vase contained only a single type of flower.

Notably, the rooms displayed quite a few taxidermized specimens.

Butterflies perched on flowers, small birds standing in gilded cages, a deer’s head hung on the wall… They looked no different from when they had been alive. The deer’s fur shone like satin, its eyes were moist, and its nose gleamed with dampness, as if it might exhale in the next second.

Myss couldn’t help glancing several more times, making sure there was no strange magical fluctuation around them. These specimens weren’t products of arcane magic, but genuine handcrafted works.

“I don’t stay here often. Previously, there were no butlers and no servants. A cleaning maid and a gardener come once a day, so please don’t order them to do anything extra. I still have work tomorrow, but if anything comes up, you may contact me through the communication crystal.”

Anti introduced the house as he walked. “There’s no need to worry about daily life. I have already hired a temporary cook and servant, and dinner will be ready soon.”

Salaar nodded absentmindedly but didn’t let the Red Amber topic go. “Work? Didn’t you say the Red Amber is closed?”

“It’s only closed to the public. Work still needs to be done.”

“Oh? Then what kind of work do you do at the Red Amber?”

“Taxidermist.” Anti kept it brief, with no intention of continuing the conversation.

Well, that explained it. Myss shifted his gaze to the lifelike canary inside the cage. If these were all Anti’s work, then even an utter layman like him could tell Mr. Anti was exceptionally skilled.

Myss quietly glanced at Anti’s Magibase. A huge and beautiful white peacock slept inside him.

However, just as everyone had put down their luggage and were preparing for dinner, Salaar, no, “Kendrick Karns,” began his scheming antics once again.

“I want some alone time with my darling.”

Salaar hooked an arm over Myss’s shoulder again. “Oh right, and we’ll need to bring Father along too. We agreed to go try the local specialties.”

“That’s right. He said he’d treat me to a grand meal, so naturally he has to pay for it himself.”

A vein twitched at Myss’s temple. Not willing to be outdone, he wrapped an arm around Salaar’s waist and quietly put some force into it. Salaar’s expression remained calm and unruffled as he discreetly squeezed back. To an outsider, the two of them looked practically inseparable.

“That’s the spirit, darling,” Salaar said tenderly.

“Don’t mention it, love,” Myss replied with a fake smile, flashing his sharp teeth at him.

“And besides, the soundproofing here may not be very good. My darling is always very… passionate.” Salaar looked at Anti again. “I checked the beds earlier. They’re rather too small.”

“What are you even saying? You’re the ‘passionate’ one obviously.”

Myss worked hard to maintain his smile. “Not only do you forcefully keep me locked up, you provoke me every single day, at all hours, and every time you insist on dragging it out for half the day.”

…For more than three hundred years, even.

“What can I do, darling? I certainly couldn’t just let you loose to wreak havoc on other people.

Salaar answered in a thick syrupy voice. “Besides, you have no idea how attractive you are. It makes me want to study you thoroughly from head to toe…”

…And then find a way to destroy you, to end the Night Scourge.

The two exchanged a meaningful glance, and each found a faint trace of killing intent in the other’s eyes.

Father Kalen looked at them in confusion, unable to understand how their relationship had suddenly heated up so dramatically.

After the two of them finished their performance, Mr. Anti raised no objections. He simply gave each of them two gold rings.

“If you intend to stay out overnight, remember to send me word,” he said calmly. “There are many errand-runners in Semper. Delivering a message only costs ten copper teeth.”

And just like that, before their backsides had even warmed the seats, the three of them left the residence again. Without Mr. Anti nearby watching them, the neurotic expression vanished from Salaar’s face at once.

Meanwhile, Myss recoiled away from Salaar as though he had just been bitten.

“Mr. Salaar, what exactly is going on?”

Kalen asked, thoroughly bewildered. “Are you really that Kendrick Karns? …And if you have to return to the Karns family, what happens to our investigation?”

Salaar replied with a question of his own. “What, you know Kendrick Karns too?”

“Yes, the Karns family is very famous.” Kalen said, “But I heard the Karns family’s youngest son is unable to use magic…”

As he said this, the priest’s tone turned uncertain. After all, he had personally seen Salaar use magic, and quite skillfully at that.

“You see, you already know the answer. I’m not that notorious Kendrick Karns. Well, there are some rather complicated reasons behind it.”

Salaar shrugged. “In any case, you don’t need to worry about the investigation. I have no desire to get tangled up with the Karns family.”

Father Kalen still looked extremely confused, but he politely kept silent. Strong allies like these were hard to come by, and he didn’t want to pry too much into their private affairs.

It was evening now, and the streets of Semper were bustling.

Vendors crowded both sides of the road, their handicrafts dazzling to the eye. Poor painters displayed their work all over the place, hoping some passing wealthy merchant might take a liking to it.

The passersby were fashionably dressed, and every one of them wore at least one piece of jewelry. Even children had lovely jeweled pendants hanging from them.

Salaar bought a relatively plain half-mask and handed it to Myss. “Put it on.”

The mask was made of wood—lightweight and quite unadorned in design. Its surface had been painted with a layer of silver paint that gave off the smell of cheap coating.

Myss wrinkled his nose at it. “Why?”

Salaar didn’t wear one himself, nor did he buy one for Kalen. Yet he had gone out of his way to make Myss wear one. Myss suspected a trap.

“There are very complicated reasons,” Salaar replied again with his all-purpose explanation. “Just wear it, unless you want to be approached by that crowd of painters…”

His eyes swept over the painters by the roadside, all visibly itching to act.

“…Because if that happens, don’t expect me to step in and save you.”

Myss slapped the mask onto his face as though it had naturally belonged there all along.

The mask was like a refusal hanging from his face, and the street painters retreated in disappointment. Salaar curved his lips slightly, then bought paints and drawing tools from a stall, stuffing them into a bulging satchel.

Before the sun had fully set, Myss was dragged by Salaar to the riverbank in Semper.

Salaar deliberately picked a corner where almost no one was around. He skillfully set up an easel and gestured for Myss to remove his mask.

At this point, even an idiot could see what Salaar was planning. Kalen exclaimed in surprise, “You’re going to paint Mr. Myss?”

Myss yanked off the mask in one motion, impatience all over his face. “That’s enough already. What kind of fit are you throwing now?”

“Look at me. Yes, that expression.”

Standing before the easel, Salaar raised a charcoal pencil at Myss. “…I don’t mean anything else by it. I just want to make things bigger.”

“Mr. Anti’s residence isn’t exactly ‘clean’. I felt a trace of killing intent. I suspect he isn’t waiting for someone from the Karns family to come see us, but for someone from the Karns family to come send me to my death.”

“If that’s the case, then making a big scene will at least be a way to throw a wrench in their plans.”

Myss gave an only half-comprehending “Oh.” Once the subject turned to intrigue and scheming among humans, his brain automatically entered a half-dormant state.

Especially that trace of killing intent. Myss was only used to sensing Salaar’s killing intent. As far as he was concerned, hostility from anyone else felt about as significant as a light scratch.

“…And stepping into the spotlight first will help us get close to the Red Amber.”

Salaar continued, “The Red Amber likes artists and models, and there is only one thing in this world that can increase the value of both at once.”

“A masterpiece,” Kalen said, understanding at once.

Salaar smiled and picked up the brush. “Exactly. I will paint a masterpiece the Red Amber desperately wants. If things go well, they will come to us themselves.”

“Aren’t you a little too full of yourself?”

Myss raised a brow. Surely the Great Hero couldn’t actually be good at absolutely everything—that would be too absurd. “Can you really just paint something on that level whenever you feel like it?”

“I happen to possess the rarest model in the world.”

Salaar replied, “And tell me, what do you think is the most important thing in a painting?”

Myss honestly shook his head.

Salaar lifted his eyes. The setting sun illuminated those lapis-lazuli eyes.

“It’s ‘emotion’,” he said.

The brush swept across the canvas in quick strokes. From where he stood, Myss couldn’t see what was on it. But he could read Kalen’s expression. Father Kalen’s face first showed confusion, then surprise and admiration. As time passed, his expression settled into one of sheer, unadulterated shock.

“…Finished.”

By the time the moon rose, Salaar finally set down the brush.

Curious, Myss went around to the other side of the easel and finally saw Salaar’s work. For one second, he understood Kalen’s shock.

The composition was simple. There was only Myss, the blazing red sky, and a river reflecting the sunset glow.

Myss’s position in the painting cleverly obscured the setting sun, as if all the radiance in the sky poured down from him. The wind stirred his ash-gray hair, covering the lower half of his face and giving the figure in the painting a strange, ethereal sense of weightlessness.

Stranger still was the fact that Myss in the painting wasn’t looking straight at the viewer, but had turned his face slightly aside, casting a fleeting glance.

Myss didn’t know how to describe that glance. It possessed a fatal, mesmerizing power—

The painted version of him gazed beyond the frame, that stare piercing outward from those blood-red eyes. It was as though heaven and earth, all things in existence, had ceased to matter— as if the only true reality, the one thing truly alive, was the object of his gaze…

How contradictory. That glance was as sharp as a blade, yet it also felt like some sort of absolution, or perhaps, a benediction of glory.

The model looked toward the painter. And was the painting itself not equally the painter’s gaze made manifest?

With an intensity as deep as the abyss, the artist had captured and imprisoned this feeling moment, mixing it into pigments, then fixed it in place with the tip of his brush. Two gazes devoured one another, distorted one another, ultimately achieving a precarious equilibrium upon the canvas.

…It was hard to imagine all of that had been born from a few ordinary tubes of paint.

Myss drew in a sharp breath. “Is this really how I look at you?”

Salaar surveyed the painting with a look of deep satisfaction. “More or less.”

“What nonsense. Clearly there’s something wrong with the way you look at me.” Myss absolutely refused to admit it.

“Say whatever you like.” Salaar rolled his shoulder.

Then he dried the painting using golden magic, carefully applied a protective varnish, and dried it with magic again once the coating was done, making sure the final surface was flawless.

At last, he placed it inside an ordinary wooden frame and wrapped it in a piece of soft dark-blue cloth. The oil painting was not very large, making it fairly convenient to carry around.

“Aren’t you going to give this painting a name? It will surely become immortalized,” Kalen asked in admiration.

Myss’s steps paused for a moment, and he quietly pricked up his ears.

“I already decided on one long ago,” Salaar said. “It’s called ‘The End of the World¹’.”

Myss relaxed and lowered his ears again. That title he could accept. Though really, The Apocalypse¹ would have been even better.

¹Clarity: Two different terms are being used here. Salaar named his painting (世界的尽头) while Myss thinks (世界的末日) is better. Salaar uses The End (尽头) of the World, which can be ambiguous and metaphorical, so it’s kind of more poetic and artsy. while Myss uses The End (末日) of the World, which is more literal.

“…” Kalen was silent for a moment. “The bond between you two is truly wonderful.”

Salaar didn’t correct him. “Come on. Let’s go make a name for ourselves.”

He carefully held the painting against his chest and rose to his feet.

……

Semper’s Goldsand Market was somewhat famous throughout Aufon.

It was neither a hidden trade within noble clubs nor the noisy hawking of a mixed-quality street bazaar, but something in between. Participants only needed to bring a handicraft or gold, silver, or gemstone piece of sufficient quality to enter the market. As for whether they wished to sell, buy, or trade, the market imposed no restrictions.

With that standard in place, the only people who could participate were nobles, wealthy commoners, and those with truly excellent works. For artists with astonishing talent but not yet enough fame, the Goldsand Market was undoubtedly the best possible platform.

“If you wish to sell it, I can offer you an excellent price right now.”

When the appraiser at the Goldsand Market saw “The End of the World”, his eyes lit up. The old man looked at Salaar with eager anticipation, reluctant to let go of the painting in his hands.

“I’m not in urgent need of money. I only wish to show it to everyone.”

Salaar rested a hand on Myss’s shoulder. Myss had already put the mask back on, but once people saw those rare red eyes, anyone could guess who the model in the painting was.

The old man sighed regretfully, reluctantly set down the painting, and handed them two badges.

“One for you, and one for the model, sir,” he said. “I’m very sorry, but this priest hasn’t brought any artwork of sufficient quality, so he cannot enter.”

Kalen hurriedly held up the pair of bone rings. “Wouldn’t this do?”

The old man frowned at the two raised middle fingers. Father Kalen instantly realized his faux pas and began to profusely apologize.

Sadly, he failed to soothe the old appraiser’s mood. The latter snorted through his nose. “No means no! Never mind the shape. This pair of rings doesn’t even have gemstones set in them.”

“How about this? You go back to Anti’s place first and tell him that Myss and I are staying out by ourselves tonight.”

Salaar said, “If Mr. Anti asks about anything else, just say you don’t know. You’ve only known me for a short time, and you have official kingdom religious credentials. They won’t do anything to you.”

Though considering Father Kalen’s highly abnormal self-healing ability, Salaar suspected that even if someone did do something to the priest, he would probably still be fine.

Father Kalen readily agreed. “That works perfectly. I should check in with the animals too. If you two discover anything, you must tell me.”

Salaar nodded, and together with Myss crossed the barrier into the open-air market. The old appraiser’s eyes followed the dark-blue bundle until the pair disappeared into the lights, and only then did he withdraw his gaze with a mournful sigh.

“Next!” the old man called sternly.

On the other side.

The lights of the market nearly hurt Myss’s eyes.

Countless magical lamps floated in midair, illuminating the market as brightly as day.

The market had specially prepared display platforms for people’s works. As long as someone stood on the specially enchanted platform and placed their treasure in a designated spot, the object would float into the air by magic, where no one could snatch it away.

The platforms were spaced far enough apart, and each came with just enough soundproofing magic. If the exhibitor wished, they could even arrange an auction on the spot.

Myss’s eyes darted from one display stand to another. The goods here truly were of a higher class. Whether jewelry, paintings, or sculptures, none of them could be compared to roadside stalls.

Someone was selling perfume right there. More than a dozen exquisitely made glass bottles floated in the air, sparkling like gemstones beneath the lights. When Myss passed by the stand, the dense floral fragrance nearly made him faint.

Naturally, he also found people selling specimens.

To be fair, the specimens weren’t bad. But compared to what he had seen in Anti’s residence, the ones here seemed stiff and rough. At a glance, one could tell they were “corpses.”

There were astonishing numbers of young painters nearby. Each had carefully selected seven or eight of their best works to fill up their displays in a full and attractive way. Most of the paintings were classic portraits or beautiful landscapes, the sort of subjects upper society liked best.

Quite a few nobles paused before painters they fancied, discussing whether to commission a portrait.

“This place will do. Let’s begin.”

Salaar paid no attention to those “competitors.” He quickly found an empty display platform and hung “The End of the World” there.

Then he pulled Myss up onto the platform too. The two of them stood on that small stage, looking down at the passing crowd.

With Myss in a mask, Salaar dressed almost entirely in dark colors and blending into the night, and only a single lonely painting on display, they looked entirely inconspicuous.

Still, Myss’s ash-gray hair was unusual enough to catch a few people’s eyes. And once those eyes turned to The End of the World, they could no longer look away.

“Is this your work? How much for it?”

A gorgeously dressed noblewoman stopped in her tracks. She covered her lips with a fan, her gaze passing between Salaar and Myss.

“It is indeed my work.”

Salaar smiled and shook his head. “But this painting isn’t for sale. It’s for display only.”

The noblewoman sighed softly. “Then what about commissioned portraits?”

“I have no time for that at the moment, I’m afraid, beautiful lady.” Salaar answered politely. “I only wish to show the world my work, nothing more.”

The noblewoman sighed again and snapped her fan shut. She stared fixedly at the painting in the lights, unwilling to leave for a long time.

“The model is this charming young man, isn’t he?” Her gaze swept over Myss once again as she murmured, “At least tell me the name of the painting.”

“The End of the World,” Salaar answered promptly this time.

“I thought you would use the model’s name,” the noblewoman said. “Everyone uses the model’s name.”

“To me, my darling is the end of the world.”

Salaar lowered his gaze and drew Myss closer by the shoulders.

The noblewoman had gotten the answer she wanted, yet she still didn’t leave. She only stared fixedly at the painting. It was hard to say whether she was captivated by it or intimidated by it.

Then another person, and another…

The crowd gathered faster and faster, like ants discovering a lump of sugar. They kept asking the same three questions over and over.

“Is it for sale?”
“Can you do commissioned portraits?”
“What is the title of this painting?”

In the buzzing mass of voices, Myss started getting sleepy. The lights before his eyes blurred now and then into soft glowing clumps. Fork slept soundly in his pocket, utterly unbothered by the noise.

Just as Myss’s eyelids began to droop, Salaar suddenly squeezed his shoulder. At some point Knife had crawled into Myss’s clothes and pressed its cold body against the side of his neck.

Under the double jolt, Myss barely managed to recover his senses. When he saw the tightly packed sea of heads below the platform, he nearly jumped.

In the blink of an eye, the crowd beneath the platform had become packed solid. They silently stared at the painting, their faces full of astonishment mixed with a trace of fear, as though under some kind of curse. Their eyes kept straying toward Myss’s own, trying to find the gaze from the painting there.

Unfortunately, they failed miserably. The model’s glance toward them was empty, as if they didn’t exist here at all, utterly different in force from the figure in the painting.

And at the very front of all those watching eyes stood an unfamiliar young man.

The moment Myss saw him, his eyes shifted. He now understood why Salaar had woken him.

The young man was dressed magnificently, yet not gaudily, and gave off exactly the right degree of romantic flair.

He was quite handsome, with smooth light-brown curls loosely tied back with a ribbon and beautiful champagne-gold eyes. Even compared with the surrounding crowd, even compared with the nobles, his bearing was entirely different, as if he stood beneath an invisible spotlight.

“Good evening, gentlemen. I’m Iver, a ‘Gold Prospector’ from the Red Amber Collection Hall.”

He smiled at them warmly, and the enthusiasm in his tone felt genuinely pleasant.

“…Time is precious, so I’ll ask directly. Would the two of you be interested in working for the Red Amber?”

---

The author has something to say:

The End of the World (literally)

Father Kalen: And you’re still saying you’re not in love?

..Arch-rivals ought to target each other obsessively. [heart]

---

<<< || Table of Contents || >>>

Author: 年终 / Nian Zhong

Translator: Kinky || https://kinkytranslations.com/

---

Chapter 32: A Half-Day Tour of the Dungeon

Myss wasn’t sure whether he had been knocked senseless by the saddle or had simply fallen asleep, but by the time he was properly awake again, he was already sitting inside a dungeon cell.

Yes, a dungeon cell. The cavalry hadn’t bothered with any interrogation at all. They had simply thrown them straight into prison. Most importantly, that cavalry captain hadn’t kept his word at all—

He, Salaar, Kalen, and that damned Truman had all been locked up in the very same cell.

The cell door was made of thick oak planks, with a viewing slot set with densely packed iron bars so narrow that not even a gecko could squeeze through. Through the tiny opening, they could see two guards standing outside the door.

All four walls of the cell were stone. Near the edge of one wall was a vent narrower than an arm, and the air inside was somewhat stale.

The floor was covered in straw. In the corner sat a clay jar capped with a wooden lid, presumably the chamber pot. Fortunately, the cell itself was fairly dry, and there was no unbearable stench of waste.

…But Myss still found it unbearable.

This hellhole wasn’t comfortable in the slightest. The dust in the air made him sneeze several times, and his ribs ached faintly. If he didn’t want to become a fugitive again, he would have torn that offensive prison door right off and walked out.

He could be flexible about lodgings, but only when he was the one choosing them, not when he was being dragged down by some imbecile.

So the very first thing Myss did after recovering from his sneezing fit was seize Truman viciously by the collar and hoist that damned white-powdered fool into the air.

Truman cast a glance at the two guards outside and raised his voice. “I’m nnngh, I’m innocent! That gem was given to me by Lady Avril when she was drunk… Mmph!”

His face was still badly swollen, and he spoke as if his mouth were full of spit.

“When my father finds out… He’ll definitely come take me away… You just wait and see…”

Myss let out a cold laugh and lifted Truman even higher. Fork stared at that mouth with keen interest, as though considering which teeth to destroy next.

“Calm down, Myss.” Salaar rested one hand on Myss’s arm and pressed down gently, his gaze indicating the guards outside. “Things are troublesome enough already. We can’t become murderers too.”

Knife poked its head out from Salaar’s collar and nodded solemnly along with him.

“You talk as if you got a solution.” Myss clicked his tongue and finally let go. “What was it you said earlier? ‘Prisons are excellent sources of information’? Well? This place has nothing in it except this useless pest.”

He glared at Truman, slumped on the floor, and enunciated each word carefully, making sure every syllable landed squarely on Truman’s head.

Kalen, on the other hand, remained quite optimistic. He sat on the straw in a relaxed posture. “We just came from Rosha City, so we’re not short on witnesses. The misunderstanding will definitely be cleared up.”

“No. We have to find our own way out.”

Salaar glanced at the guards outside the door, then at the listless Truman. “…And as luck would have it, we happen to have a very good key. It’s growing right there in our friend’s mouth.”

Curious, Myss pinched Truman’s mouth open, but found nothing except faint bad breath and an irritating tongue.

“Where’s the key?” Myss turned to Salaar irritably.

“Come here. Let me show you a magic trick.”

Salaar cleared his throat twice and stepped close to the cell door.

“Honored gentlemen.”

Pressing himself right up against the viewing slot, Salaar addressed the two guards outside. “This place never sees the sun and it’s cold as hell. Terrible for the joints. You two are wearing such heavy armor. No trouble with your health?”

“Shut up and get away from there!”

One of the guards barked, pounding the viewing slot with his gauntleted hand. A layer of dust drifted down from the oak door.

“If I get that punk to confess, that ought to count as merit for the two of you, shouldn’t it?”

Salaar stayed pressed to the little window, his tone turning even more frivolous, his smile split into countless tiny squares by the frame of the opening.

“I don’t want my darling to suffer in a place like this. I specifically brought him to Semper to buy jewelry and cheer him up. If this keeps up, he’s absolutely going to break up with me.”

As he spoke, he deliberately pointed at Myss, as if worried neither the guards nor Myss would notice.

Kalen immediately shot Myss a look that plainly said, I knew it. Myss covered his face in despair, utterly baffled as to what sudden fit of madness had suddenly seized the Great Hero.

But Myss didn’t say a word. When one interrupted Salaar in the middle of one of his antics, the person who suffered for it was usually oneself.

Hearing that they might get a confession, the guards exchanged glances. They didn’t chase Salaar away again, but neither did they answer him directly.

“That brat’s a noble, so I know it’s inconvenient for you to lay hands on him. I can do the dirty work for you. I guarantee I won’t leave any marks… that way I can get out sooner, and you two might even get transferred to better posts. Just imagine that glorious sunshine waiting outside…”

Salaar’s voice dropped lower, full of a cool, creeping temptation. Coupled with that face of his, the whole scene was so wicked it sent a chill down the spine.

Perhaps the thought of warm sunshine was simply too enticing. In the end, the guards failed to resist.

They coughed twice and deliberately turned their backs. Their metal boots scraped harshly across the stone floor with a clacking sound.

Against that chilling background noise, Salaar kept smiling as he slowly turned toward Truman.

Truman shuddered on the spot. He scrambled backward on hands and knees until he hit the corner, his swollen face twisting. “I mmmph… really am innocent…”

“If you dare lay one finger on me… the Manning family won’t let you off…”

Salaar crouched down in front of him, turning his back to the viewing slot.

“Shh. Quiet now.” Salaar pressed one finger to his lips and spoke softly. “Trust me. It’s not frightening at all. You just need to relax.”

Tears streamed down Truman’s face as he shook his head frantically. His pleas and threats slurred together into an incoherent mess that sounded more like an animal’s wail.

Myss instantly came alive.

While Salaar was certainly detestable, at this particular moment, Truman was far more a greater nuisance. He darted behind Salaar in a single step, helping the Great Hero block the viewing slot.

Salaar gave him a faint smile and quietly extended his left arm.

Under Truman’s terrified stare, Salaar conjured that lute of flesh and blood once more, its strings glowing with a faint red light.

Myss was a little surprised. He had almost completely annihilated Scintilla’s magical core, yet Salaar still retained Mina’s magic somehow. There was no telling how much power it still held.

…In the end, the Great Hero had only plucked three soft notes before Truman broke down completely.

He burst into tears on the spot, sniffling and trying to throw himself into Salaar’s arms, only to be stopped in place by one of Myss’s fingers. There was a good chance Myss would have to use Salaar for warmth again tonight, and he certainly didn’t want this brat’s snot getting on him.

“Waaah, Mommy, waaahhh!”

Unable to get his hug, Truman seemed to forget all about his toothache and cried like an oversized infant.

“Tell me. What exactly happened?”

Salaar played another stretch of extremely soft melody, making sure not a single sound could pass through the oak door.

Myss felt the caution was a little unnecessary. Truman was already bawling so loudly that it was starting to hurt his ears.

“Wahhh, I-I was just confused for a moment…!” Truman wailed as he sobbed, recounting the whole story in broken pieces.

Truman’s family, the Manning family, was an old aristocratic house from the capital. Not a major one, but reasonably wealthy.

At a salon gathering not long ago, Truman had met the famous “Queen of Society,” Lady Avril.

Lady Avril happened to be wearing the renowned Saint’s Blood, a priceless ruby ring said to possess miraculous effects against curses and amplify magical power.

That day, Lady Avril had been in a good mood. She drank a little wine and dozed off in the garden.

Coincidentally, Truman happened to have brought with him an exquisitely made imitation of the Saint’s Blood.

Such things were rather popular among the capital’s noble circles. Their workmanship was far better than ordinary jewelry. But compared with the original, those rubies always had one subtle flaw or another, which greatly reduced their value.

Truman had only just acquired his imitation. The gem’s quality was quite good. He had meant to admire it together with friends and hadn’t yet worn it on his finger.

At that moment, he saw the sleeping Lady Avril, and in his own words, he “lost his head.”

Truman gently slipped Lady Avril’s ring off and replaced it with the replica, so similar that the switch was almost impossible to detect.

…He had intended to use the stolen Saint’s Blood to create a top-tier magical artifact and attract the attention of the Stargazers Society.

Yet he had underestimated Lady Avril’s sharpness and influence. On the fourth day after leaving the capital, he was caught red-handed by an investigative cavalry unit that had been lying in wait here.

The entire affair was full of stupidity and shortsightedness. The more Myss thought about the fact that he had been dragged down by someone this idiotic, the angrier he became.

“There’s still a way to fix this… right, Mommy?”

Truman whimpered pitifully, the powder on his face long since washed into streaks by tears. “As long as she knows which family we are, Lady Avril won’t go that far… right, Mommy?”

“I’ll say… I’ll say she was drunk and wanted a little amusement… and swap the Saint’s Blood with mine…”

Salaar gave no reply. He merely withdrew the lute strings with cruel finality.

Truman came to himself as if waking from a dream. He dimly realized what he had said and began gasping in despair. Father Kalen had just started to move toward him when Truman went limp and fainted onto the straw.

“He’s just badly frightened. Nothing serious.”

Kalen checked his condition in passing, then dragged him into a corner of the room and symbolically covered him with some straw.

“So, that’s how things stand.” Salaar rose to his feet and brushed bits of straw from his coat. “You two gentlemen heard it. The kid just had a complete mental collapse and screamed all his secrets out.”

“Now that you know the exact time of the switch, it should be easy enough to find witnesses and physical evidence.”

“You’ve got some skill after all.”

One of the guards said this, his tone softened considerably. The other had already hurried off, eager to report the matter to the investigative cavalry.

“Just a minor little trick.” Salaar leaned back by the door again.

“If things go smoothly, you should be able to leave very soon,” the guard said. “Still, I’m afraid you’ll probably have to spend the night here. Even if that confession proves useful, the higher-ups always have procedures and formalities. Tomorrow is the earliest possible.”

In other words, if they endured today, they would be fine. Myss let out a breath of relief. He had no desire to have Truman as a long-term cellmate.

Even from this distance, Truman’s body odor was reaching him. In comparison, Salaar smelled practically fragrant.

That said, Salaar’s behavior had been rather strange. Compared to the great hero Myss knew, the mannerisms had actually resembled that crazed Kendrick Karns much more—

“It’s good enough that the matter’s settled.” Salaar grinned toward the guard. “Say, brother, are there any places with a bit more style in the city? I’d like to take my darling around somewhere nice.”

“The bigger jewelry stores are all good, just outrageously expensive, so that’s your own problem.”

The guard was in a decent mood now and actually chatted with him. “No need to look at those messy little shops. They’re all apprentices’ practice pieces, not worth the money.”

“Thanks, thanks. Anything else? I heard there’s a place called the Red Amber Collection Hall…”

“Oh, Red Amber. Whoever told you about it really knows their stuff.”

A trace of pride entered the guard’s voice. “That place houses the finest works of art in all of Aufon, with a huge variety. Paintings, sculptures, specimens, jewelry… Everyone says if there’s a perfect masterpiece in Semper, it must be at the Red Amber.”

“That said, it’s a place only the nobility can enter. Forget commoners like us. Even minor nobles can’t get invitations… though…”

The guard turned his head and looked toward Myss, whose face was full of something he clearly wanted to say but couldn’t. In all the murky shadows of the cell, only that beautiful young man stood out in perfect clarity. It was difficult to look away.

“Though?”

“Besides the top nobility, top craftsmen and models can get in too.” The guard lowered his voice mysteriously. “You could go in under the pretext of ‘recruiting models’ and take a secret look around while you’re there.”

“What an excellent idea. Thank you so much!”

Salaar exclaimed in a tone of perfectly measured gratitude and delight.

The guard laughed amicably. “Hope you all enjoy yourselves.”

Myss: “…”

He had an extremely ominous feeling.

Was there really no simpler method? Why did every path somehow lead back to him getting mixed up with humans?

Perhaps heaven heard the Archdemon’s prayer. Before night fell, the gloomy cell received a new visitor.

A set of elegant, brisk footsteps, utterly out of place in a prison, approached from afar and came to a stop right outside their door.

Truman, who had only just woken up, seemed to seize upon a lifeline and craned his neck desperately to look.

…Creak.

The heavy oak door slowly swung open.

Standing in the doorway was a gentleman in his thirties. He was handsome, clean-shaven, and carried himself with considerable refinement.

He wore a severe yet elegant black formal suit, white gloves, and a top hat decorated with unusual gemstones. Only when Myss looked closely did he realize they were carefully inlaid butterfly wings.

The two guards from earlier in the day stood behind him with their heads bowed respectfully, their postures humble.

“Kendrick Karns,” the man called in a deep voice, his gaze locking immediately onto Salaar.

“…Y-you, you’re that Kendrick Karns?” Truman screamed.

Apparently the so-called Karns family was quite a bit stronger than Truman’s, Myss thought. Truman looked even more panicked now.

Salaar sighed and nodded. “If you intend to take me away, you must take my companions as well.”

The gentleman smiled faintly and swept his gaze over Myss and Kalen, lingering on Myss for quite a while.

“Friends? That is somewhat different from what I heard,” he said, gesturing to the guards.

The guards blocked Truman so the other three could leave the cell at leisure. Before long, the heavy wooden door closed again, shutting Truman’s sobbing behind it.

The gentleman stepped in front of Salaar and gave a slight bow. “Antis Crosien, a friend of the Karns family. Just call me Anti.”

“All right, Anti.”

Salaar’s tone turned lazy. “I thought the family had forgotten all about me. Those damned bandits burned down my house. I nearly ended up sleeping on the street.”

“You were supposed to wait for assistance in Ring Town.”

Anti spoke in a soothing, de-escalating tone. “But as far as I know, you ran off to Rosha City first.”

“Oh, my new friend wanted to go home for a visit.”

Salaar reached over and draped an arm around Myss’s shoulders, his thumb brushing lightly over the side of Myss’s neck in what felt like deliberate reassurance.

“…Besides, Ring Town wasn’t especially friendly to me. You know how it is.”

Anti looked him over with an appraising gaze, clearly aware of just how many vile things Kendrick Karns had done. “You really have changed a great deal.”

“It’s the power of love.”

Salaar said this with feeling, tightening his arm around Myss. “The bards all say sweet love can completely transform a person. I didn’t believe it at first, either.”

Their skin touched, and so did their goosebumps.

In a desperate bid to escape this hellhole as quickly as possible, Myss struggled hard to suppress the urge to roll his eyes.

In truth, Myss understood that this time Salaar wasn’t deliberately trying to disgust him.

Even though Salaar was doing his best to imitate “Young Master Karns,” he had changed too quickly and too much. Under those circumstances, it simply wasn’t believable that he had merely “suddenly become close friends with some slave.”

Claiming the two of them had fallen in love at first sight was already a comparatively reasonable explanation.

Anti’s evaluating gaze shifted toward him at once. Myss lowered his eyes and instantly transformed himself into a statue.

Calm down, Myss, calm down. A misunderstanding at this level is nothing. That book “Sweet Trap” was far more outrageous than this.

Thank goodness Anti didn’t pry into their “earth-shattering love story.” “The Karns family will be sending someone soon. Please bear with it and stay at my residence for two days first. Naturally, your companions as well.”

“Oh? We can go out?” Salaar asked in a tone so neurotic it was almost provocative. “You’re not planning to just switch us into a prettier cage, are you?”

Anti didn’t take offense. “Now that you are no longer prisoners, of course you may move freely.”

“Also, if you have any other needs—reasonable ones—I’ll do my best to provide support.”

“Wonderful!” Salaar clapped his hands once. “Then I want an invitation to the Red Amber Collection Hall. Right now.”

“…” Anti fell silent for a moment. “I’m sorry. That’s not possible.”

“Why not?” Salaar said in dissatisfaction. “By Saint Salaar above, is the surname Karns not enough to qualify?”

“This guy promised to take me to the Red Amber Collection Hall,” Myss cut in. “For Chaos Archdemon’s sake, we’re not giving up on that.”

“The Red Amber Collection Hall has been closed for three days already. No one knows when it will reopen.”

Anti explained this calmly. “I know this very well, because I happen to work there.”

---

The author has something to say:

Happy National Day, everyone—!!! [panda head][panda head][panda head]

Salaar: Since I’m being wildly misunderstood anyway, I might as well seize the initiative! [eating melon]

Myss: Could this possibly be worse than “Sweet Trap”? [propping chin on hand]

Some thoughts of the gong shou dynamics…
(Yes, that phrase is correct.)

---

<<< || Table of Contents || >>>

Author: 年终 / Nian Zhong

Translator: Kinky || https://kinkytranslations.com/

---

Chapter 31: Accident

Myss frowned at the picture book resting on his knees.

This copy of “Brave Salaar” looked quite new. Scintilla had probably bought it specially for him.

Who knew whether it was the very same copy he had seen in the bookstore back then. Mina had twisted his memory, so who knew whether that book had really been bought or not.

This merchant caravan carriage was a spacious “four-person cabin.” Besides the three of them, there was also a fashionably dressed young man drenched in perfume.

With an outsider present, Myss couldn’t very well use magic to destroy the picture book, so he had no choice but to tolerate its presence on his lap.

“May I take a look?” Salaar asked.

Myss immediately perked up. “Take it—and be quick about it.”

“Ah, Brave Salaar.”

The fashionable young man glanced at the cover and spoke in a singsong tone. “I truly don’t understand why people glorify such a useless pest—a mere puppet of no substance whatsoever…”

Before he could finish, Myss narrowed his eyes, and a black shadow shot forward.

Damn, it was Fork!

Salaar reacted quickly and caught it in a flash. The little snake writhed furiously between his fingers, hissing nonstop at the fashionable young man. Knife hurried over and wrapped its body tightly around Fork, just short of tying itself into a knot.

Myss rarely even spared other humans a proper glance, but now he fixed the man with an icy stare. “Shut up.”

“Oh my, did I ruin your childhood memories?”

The man blinked as though he thought himself witty. “The truth is always hard to accept, darling. By the way, your pet snakes are absolutely adorable.”

Myss stared expressionlessly at the human. His knuckles cracked sharply.

Fork struggled wildly in Salaar’s grip, its hissing growing shriller and shriller, to the point Knife could barely hold it down.

Salaar, helpless, covered his mouth and whispered to Fork, “Why are you so angry?”

…He had thought Myss would be delighted to hear someone badmouthing him.

“He actually dared call you useless? He actually dared call you useless! Then what does that make Myss, who’s been harassed by you for three hundred years?”

Fork bared its tiny fangs. “Only Myss in this world has the right to call you useless! If he insults you, he insults all of us!”

Knife sucked in a breath and hurriedly slithered to Myss’s ear, jabbing the tip of its tail hard against Myss’s neck. “Calm down. Don’t kill him. If something happens to him, we won’t get to stay on the carriage!”

Myss blew out a breath and turned his face toward the carriage window, no longer looking at that peacock-like fool. But the lines of his cheek remained tight, and anger still lingered on his face.

“And you are?”

Seeing that the man was about to open his mouth and court death once again, Salaar hurriedly redirected the conversation.

“Me? You can call me Truman, Truman Who Speaks Only the Truth.”

The fashionable young man declared loudly, “Of course, that name is a pseudonym, haha.”

Truman cackled endlessly at his own little joke, and the fragrance in the carriage grew even stronger. Unfortunately, no one humored him, and the atmosphere instantly turned awkward.

Truman let his laughter die, then looked at them with displeasure for a while. After that, he unhurriedly took out a perfume bottle and sprayed some on both sides of his neck.

Myss sneezed angrily, while Salaar silently observed him.

Truman’s nails were round and neatly trimmed, and his hair bore traces of having been curled. But he had applied far too much white powder to his face, and his brows had been drawn into what he clearly thought were stylish thin arches, making him look rather awkward.

His clothes used a great deal of glossy satin. The collar and cuffs were piled with ruffles, and every button was adorned with a gemstone. The moment he moved in the sunlight, the reflected sparkle was enough to blind a person.

Considering that their destination was Semper, the “Capital of Crafts,” Salaar could more or less guess Truman’s identity: an idle rich boy, insufferably full of himself.

People like this were easy enough to handle. All one had to do was laugh along and go with their opinions. The only question was whether Myss could stomach it.

Salaar was still considering his response when Father Kalen spoke first. “Why were you laughing just now?”

There was no finesse whatsoever in the priest’s question—only sincerity.

Truman: “Huh? The name Truman means ‘a true man.’ I said I only speak the truth, but it’s also a fake name… get it?”

Kalen looked puzzled. “But doesn’t that just mean you lied?”

Another stretch of awkward silence followed. Truman took a deep breath. “It’s only natural for a country bumpkin to not understand refined jokes like this.”

“I really was born in the countryside.” Kalen nodded. “My apologies. If you could please elaborate…”

“I don’t want to!”

Truman snapped irritably. “Listen, I don’t know what sect you belong to, but I have no desire to talk to pretentious windbags like you.”

Kalen froze. The smile on his face stiffened slightly.

The moment Truman realized he had landed a hit on Kalen, he pounced like a shark smelling blood. “If you ask me, among all these messy religions and organizations, only the Stargazers Society looks halfway respectable.”

At the keyword “Stargazers Society,” the smile vanished entirely from Kalen’s face. He frowned at Truman, and faint anger showed in his aquamarine eyes.

Seeing the mood turning sour, Salaar stepped in again to put out the fire. “The Stargazers Society? This is my first time hearing of it. Would you mind telling us about it?”

Myss kept his head turned toward the scenery outside, but one ear twitched slightly.

Truman swept his gaze over them all with the look of someone thinking country bumpkins really are ignorant, then cleared his throat. “Of course. It’s an extraordinary esoteric organization, entirely invitation-only. The Stargazers devote themselves to studying the essential nature of magic, exploring its deepest mysteries…”

“…A group of lunatics preaching doomsday prophecies, spending all day researching incomprehensible nonsense,” Father Kalen cut in sharply, a rare edge in his voice.

Truman let out a derisive laugh. “Of course, of course. Naturally the Stargazers wouldn’t be popular with the clergy, considering none of them believe in God! They don’t blindly submit—”

As Truman continued his passionate speech, Salaar raised his brows slightly. He didn’t interrupt again, only shook his head toward Kalen.

Leaving aside whether the Stargazers Society’s doctrines were absurd, Truman’s tone was wrong from the outset. Rather than sincerely agreeing with the Society’s views, he seemed to regard them merely as “fashionable” —as though the Stargazers Society were just another one of his flashy gem buttons.

A person like this could never be persuaded. Trying to reason with him was completely pointless.

When Truman finally finished his lofty lecture, Salaar smoothed things over. “Perhaps God really does exist. They may simply be different from what we imagine.”

“I’ve heard that Semper is fairly tolerant toward religion and doesn’t have any particular taboos…”

Truman’s powder-white face immediately swung toward Salaar, completely ignoring the graceful exit Salaar had prepared for him.

“Aha, God really exists? You don’t mean the Chaos Archdemon, do you? That was clearly fabricated out of thin air by the Karns family to push that clown Salaar forward.”

“Come to think of it, your eye color is rather interesting. Could it be that you… ow!”

Truman suddenly clutched his face, his features scrunching together as tears burst from the corners of his eyes. Salaar noticed a thread of pitch-black magic slipping out from the corner of Truman’s mouth, quietly dissipating into the air.

Without Truman’s shrill voice, the carriage instantly became much more peaceful.

“Hmph.” Myss let out a short, contemptuous snort.

Salaar looked at Myss with some surprise. The strange plague in Rosha had clearly given Myss more than a little inspiration. This thread of magic had been used with extreme stealth, almost without producing any magical fluctuation at all.

“What did you do?” Salaar asked under his breath.

“I drilled a hole in one of his teeth,” Myss said darkly. “Serves him right for never shutting that filthy mouth.”

As he spoke, he cast Salaar a wary glance. “You’re not about to heal him, are you?”

“Oh, no, not at all.” Salaar smiled. “After all, I’m just a useless pest—an empty puppet with nothing but a pretty face. How could I possibly know healing magic?”

“I hate that way of putting it.” Myss looked back out the window. “Maybe a thousand insults would suit you, but ‘useless’ and ‘empty’ definitely aren’t among them.”

Myss’s voice was all mutters and grumbles. It was hard to tell whether he was afraid Truman might overhear him, or afraid Salaar might hear him too clearly.

“…Go read your children’s picture book,” the Archdemon said at last, with exceptional clarity.

Salaar lowered his head. Fork, finally quiet in his hand, was dozing in the warmth of his palm.

“Your snake?”

“Just keep it with you for now. It’s a bit hard to control,” Myss said without turning around.

Salaar smiled and shook his head, then opened the picture book. He gently turned the pages and lowered his eyes to the simple drawings rendered in soft strokes.

When he reached the page where Salaar brandished a sword and charged toward the giant bedsheet ghost—or rather, the Chaos Archdemon—his movement paused slightly. Fork stretched lazily and plopped down onto the picture of the “bedsheet ghost.”

Salaar stared fixedly at the “himself” holding the sword, and at the “Myss” pierced through by that sword. His gaze lingered on the page for quite some time.

Then suddenly, a warm, damp breath brushed the rim of his ear. Salaar instinctively turned his head, only to find that Myss had leaned over at some point, his nose almost touching Salaar’s face.

“You’re way too calm. How boring,” Myss muttered, then sat back down.

“It’s only a fairy tale.” Salaar picked up the lazily rolling Fork between his fingers and closed the book.

Over the next several days, Mr. Truman’s cheek swelled high as a bun. Every time he opened his mouth he hissed in pain, and even exchanging greetings took effort.

The carriage stayed remarkably quiet. Myss happily ate, slept, and then slept and ate again, looking forward to whatever new Abnormal Fruit might appear next. Salaar continued reading the books he had bought in Rosha City. The atmosphere turned unexpectedly harmonious.

The only flaw was that the weather kept getting colder.

Perhaps the climate near Semper was unusual. The place had a ghostlike chill to it, the kind of cold that could creep into the carriage and gnaw on their toes. All three of them had packed lightly, so the nights were somewhat hard to endure.

For the first few nights, Myss pretended everything was fine, but his snake betrayed him first. As yet another night fell, Fork zipped straight into Salaar’s collar.

Myss stared in exasperation. “Get back out here!”

“No.” Fork coiled itself over Salaar’s chest. “I’m freezing him. This is an att… yawn… ack.”

Myss thought about it and decided that made sense. Who would have thought his snake was a genius too?

So Myss moved over himself, wrapping around his enemy like an octopus. True, his body temperature wasn’t as low as Fork’s, but if he thought Salaar felt warm, then conversely Salaar must surely find him cold.

Salaar offered no resistance and simply conceded defeat. He let Myss wrap himself all over him and slept quite soundly.

Kalen had somehow summoned several plump wild chickens and let them perch on him for warmth, while completely ignoring Mr. Truman’s protest that wild birds were filthy.

That night, Myss had a strange dream.

He dreamed of that lifeless Salaar, on the verge of aging into oblivion.

The great hero’s brilliant golden hair had become mottled and dry. His misshapen back was curled like his fingernails. His breathing was weak and hurried, his frail chest rising and falling like a bellows.

Myss could smell the rot unique to old age, and the cold air that accompanied approaching death. Amid the tangled hair, those lapis-lazuli eyes gazed at him in silence.

Salaar, soon to become nothing more than a withered husk, destined to perish in a darkness known to no one.

Salaar, what were you thinking then?

Salaar, why were you smiling?

But Salaar was about to vanish. He could no longer answer any questions.

Whether it was the meaning behind those provocations, or the lyrics of those wretched songs, Myss would never know again.

A sudden, nameless fury surged up, tearing at Myss’s insides. It came with incredible abruptness, and terrible violence, like some malicious intruder.

…Myss’s eyes snapped open.

It was the middle of the night. Outside the carriage window was nothing but darkness.

His face was pressed against Salaar’s chest. A solid, full chest, with a rather pleasant feel to it, utterly unlike the dry-skinned ribs from his dream.

Salaar was still asleep, his head tilted slightly downward. The corners of his eyes slanted sharply upward, and the ends of his black hair curled faintly, like strands of seaweed wet from seawater. Together with that dark navy coat, he gave off a coldness like sea fog.

…And yet there was no question that Salaar’s body was warm. This human had become young and healthy, and death was, for the time being, far away from him.

What a strange dream, Myss thought groggily. Why would Salaar’s death make me angry? Exultant, maybe.

Come to think of it, the last thing that had puzzled him this much was the “trust” Mina had forcibly implanted in him…

Myss gave a massive yawn and tightened his arms a little. Then he burrowed his head farther into Salaar’s collar to steal a few more traces of warmth. Fork was still nestled on Salaar’s chest, stretching itself contentedly.

That inexplicable anger dissipated like mist.

By sunrise, Myss had forgotten all about it, as if it had been nothing more than an ordinary dream.

And besides, he had no time to dwell on it anymore. Their carriage came to a sudden halt, as if someone had stopped it by force.

“Everyone get out!”

The carriage door was yanked open, and a rough shout stabbed into their ears.

Fork bounced inside Salaar’s clothes and poked its head out unsteadily.

Myss also craned his head to look. A troop of cavalry had stopped outside their carriage, the horses blowing out clouds of white vapor. The rest of the caravan’s wagons had stopped too, and people were watching from a distance, not daring to come closer.

Well, this felt like trouble again. Myss, half awake and utterly baffled, followed Salaar out of the carriage.

Truman was the last to leave, moving even slower than a ninety-year-old man. His legs shook so badly he could hardly stand, and his face was as white as lime. Myss was quite sure that wasn’t just the work of the powder.

“Search him.” The cavalry captain swept his gaze around and fixed it directly on Truman.

Two riders immediately seized Truman, and a middle-aged man dressed like an artisan stepped forward and frisked him from head to toe.

“Found it, sir!” He tore off a glittering gemstone button. It had been sewn to the hem of Truman’s shirt and tucked into his trousers the whole time. Myss had never seen it before.

It was a huge ruby, or at least it looked like one. Even the thin morning fog couldn’t conceal its brilliance. Compared to the “ruby” on Salaar’s brooch, it was as different as heaven and earth.

“Lady Avril’s ruby, without a doubt,” the artisan said. “It’s absolutely the stolen one. There’s no way I could mistake it.”

“I’m from the Manning family! I’m a genuine nobleman! …Lady Avril gave me that gem herself!”

Truman shouted. Half of his face was still swollen, making his words come out somewhat comically. “If you dare throw me in prison, my father absolutely won’t let you off—”

The cavalry ignored him completely. “Take him away!”

In the morning fog, Myss wiped his face and poked Salaar beside him. “Hey, looks like you judged that one wrong. He really is just a thief…”

“Take these three as well. They might be his accomplices.” The cavalry captain swept them with a glance.

Myss: “?”

Kalen hurriedly stepped forward and displayed his kingdom religious credentials. “Sir, these two are my companions. I am willing to vouch for them.”

The cavalryman snorted and tugged on the reins in his hand. “How do I know whether that thing’s real or fake? This isn’t a small case. You’d better cooperate quietly.”

Kalen: “…”

Salaar glanced over the tightly packed crowd surrounding them and asked, “Are you all from Semper?”

The cavalryman said, “What kind of stupid question is that? Is there any other city nearby? Count yourselves lucky. Semper’s prison is much better than the ones elsewhere.”

“All right, we’re willing to cooperate.”

Salaar agreed obediently, then winked at Myss. “After all, we really are innocent.”

“Hard to say.” The man across from them sneered. “He stole a ruby, and you happen to be wearing a ruby. Who knows whether that isn’t some kind of contact signal…”

“What bullshit are you spouting? I gave that to him!” Myss bared his teeth.

The cavalryman arched his brow and let his gaze travel back and forth between Myss and Salaar several times.

“Oh, all right then. How touching,” he clicked his tongue. “I’ll make sure to remember to lock you two in the same cell.”

……

Myss was extremely dissatisfied. They had booked a perfectly decent carriage, and yet they still ended up suffering on the road.

At this very moment, all four of them had their hands and feet tightly bound with coarse hemp rope, lying face-down slung across saddles like four sacks of potatoes.

The main culprit Truman and the broad-shouldered Kalen each had a saddle to themselves. Only he and Salaar had been stacked together on one, and it was hard to say whether this counted as the cavalryman’s “special consideration.”

The only mercy was that perhaps the cavalry feared Salaar might crush him to death, so Salaar had been placed underneath him. Thus the Chaos Archdemon and the Hero had become two sacks of potatoes, jolted half to death by the trotting horse.

“I should’ve killed Truman from the start. Why did you stop me?”

Myss, jostled so hard he felt dizzy, fought down the urge to vomit. “See? There goes our carriage.”

Salaar said, “Don’t you think this is kind of amusing?”

“Which part?”

“The Chaos Archdemon doing jail time.”

“…”

Myss squirmed and bit Salaar’s shoulder. Unfortunately, thick layers of cloth stood between them, so the bite had rather limited destructive effect.

“Alright, jokes aside.”

Salaar chuckled softly. “If our innocence is proven, I’ll make this group of cavalry owe us a hefty favor. That will help a lot with the investigation.”

“And taking a step back, even if they really do throw us in prison, a prison is still a very good source of information.”

“Is there really nothing you care about?”

This ‘Great Hero’ really was too easygoing, Myss thought. Then again, this was someone who had eaten salt-roasted mushrooms in the darkness for three hundred years. His tolerance truly was astonishing.

“You know, there actually is one thing I care about.”

Salaar closed his lapis-lazuli eyes. “If we get dragged into something like this, news of ‘me’ will most likely spread.”

“I wonder how the Karns family will react… I just hope they don’t cause too much trouble.”

---

The author has something to say:

Myss: If I think Salaar is nice and warm, then he must think I’m chilly too. That’s one win for me!
(Physics knowledge: zero.)

Salaar: Such a warm Archdemon blanket. Nice. [approved]

Kalen and the enthusiastic birds incubating him: zzzZZZ

A world where only Truman gets hurt has been achieved!

---

<<< || Table of Contents || >>>