Chapter 196 --196
The System had been hovering around her for the past twenty minutes. Circling. Fidgeting. Its tiny tail curling and uncurling with obvious agitation.
Elara continued writing—cross-referencing merchant contracts with patrol schedules, looking for patterns in who had access to the palace kitchen when her tea had been poisoned. Her pen moved with mechanical precision across the paper.
Finally, she set it down.
"Is there anything you want to say?" she asked without looking up. "Just say it. Stop disturbing me."
The System didn’t hesitate.
"Are you perhaps the noble lady type? Like, saving yourself for your first man—your husband or something like that?"
Elara’s pen stopped.
She continued writing after a brief pause, her tone completely flat. "Why would you think that?"
"Well," the System said, floating closer, "the way to make this poison less painful is to have sex. But you’re not willing to do it, no matter how much pain you’re in. Even now, you act like you’d rather die than agree to it."
Elara’s pen stopped again.
She looked at the System like it was a particularly stupid piece of malfunctioning equipment.
"Are you crazy?" She set down her pen with deliberate care. "I used to be a CEO. A wealthy woman in a cutthroat industry. Do you ’really’ think I lived my whole life staying ’pure’ for some so-called husband?"