Chapter 201
Chapter 201: Let's Play Something Different With Big Sis~
Seeing Owaise walking slowly toward her, Heni reflexively began to bow.
She of course knew who Owaise was.
The Empire's Second Prince.
Back at Viktor's Public Lecture, countless nobles had been in attendance.
And both Princes had been seated right at the center of the Lecture Hall, drawing no small amount of attention.
"Your......Your Highness."
The Second Prince looked at Heni with a smile, and before she had even finished bowing down, he spoke first.
"Stop."
Hearing the Second Prince say that, Heni froze for 2 full seconds, her body suspended halfway into the bow in an awkward halt.
"No need to bow. No one knows I've come here."
The Second Prince said with a smile.
"I simply wanted to come and see this place that holds such significance."
Heni slowly straightened up, her hands clasped tightly together, pulling out a stiff smile.
A Prince was a person of the most exalted status imaginable—the idea of him taking the initiative to speak with common people like them was something she would never have dared to dream of.
But right now, all Heni wanted was to leave.
Aside from Professor Viktor, she instinctively had no desire to interact with any male.
But the Second Prince had not told her she could go, so naturally she didn't dare to leave on her own.
She might as well stand quietly to one side.
Then, all at once, the Second Prince directed a question at her:
"I heard you mention Demons just now."
"How much do you know about Demons?"
Hearing the Second Prince's words, Heni bowed her head and responded with a somewhat faint voice.
"I don't know all that much......"
"Is that so?"
The Second Prince studied Heni, eyes narrowing slightly.
He could sense it.
Yes—he could sense it with perfect clarity.
Hiding inside this girl was a Demon.
That extremely wrathful aura unmistakably emanated from the girl before his eyes.
The Second Prince knew that upon seeing Heni, his suspicion had already been confirmed.
He naturally knew who Heni was.
Viktor's former Teaching Assistant, someone who shared a tangled web of connections with Viktor.
And the Wrath that should have appeared in Jess—the precious gift he had originally prepared for his Imperial brother.
Why, of all inexplicable reasons, had it ended up in her?
'Greed—do you have any idea what happened?'
That viscous, rasping voice gradually echoed from the depths of his mind.
'Never seen this little girl before. Don't know her.'
For a Demon, lying through its teeth was the easiest thing in the world.
The Second Prince paid it no mind.
After all, the first time he had encountered Greed, it had already been inhabiting the body of that poor pig-headed wretch, Dewen Rether.
At that moment, the Second Prince let out a soft chuckle.
He was very interested in the Heni before him.
Viktor must know something—which was why he had used this girl to forcibly take away the Demon of Wrath.
If he could learn the secret behind her ability to attract Demons......
While he was still looking at her, he reached out a hand toward Heni and continued:
"Perhaps we could find somewhere to have a proper talk. What do you say?"
An invitation from a Prince.
An ordinary person wouldn't refuse.
The Second Prince likewise believed that Heni would make the correct choice.
But what he hadn't anticipated was—
The girl before him gave him a deep bow, and then spoke words that left him genuinely stunned:
"I'm terribly sorry! Your Highness!"
"I can't leave with you."
With those words spoken, the Second Prince froze.
Even the hand he had extended went rigid where it was, as he forgot to pull it back.
He had been rejected?
As a Prince of the Empire, this was the first time he had ever been refused by a woman.
The Second Prince had some difficulty making sense of it. He looked at Heni, his smile not quite reaching his eyes as he said:
"I mean to say......"
"May I ask the reason?"
Heni took a few steps back, because from the Second Prince, she could sense an inexplicable hostile intent.
It was as though a sharp, pointed emotion was slowly brewing in the depths of his heart.
Heni was highly sensitive to emotions. She hastily bowed again and continued with her apology:
"I'm sorry, Your Highness—it's because I truly have something very important to do."
Hearing this, the Second Prince's brow furrowed slightly.
"What could possibly matter so much that you can refuse even a Prince?"
Was it because of Viktor?
The Second Prince looked at Heni, then took several steps forward, pressing steadily closer.
Inside Heni's body, a red crocodile slowly lifted its head and scrunched its brow.
"Dense smell of envy."
"Blegh. Tastes absolutely awful."
Heni kept stepping back, while the Second Prince kept advancing.
The Second Prince was beginning to grow impatient.
He had to get to the bottom of this.
Why was a Demon concealed inside the woman in front of him?
But just then, he noticed that standing beside Heni was another person.
【Threat to protected target detected—】
【Initiating protective measures—】
In the blink of an eye, the Second Prince only felt a flash before his eyes.
Boom!
A tremendous impact slammed into his chest. The crushing force was so immense that several of his ribs snapped.
The next instant, his whole body shot through the air like a meteor, limbs splayed wide.
Completely without warning, he plunged into the deep lake below.
Sending up a beautiful spray of water.
Heni stared with wide eyes at Safirose—1 leg forward in a bow stance, the other stretched out straight behind her, arm suspended in the air.
She stood there, completely frozen.
"Threat eliminated."
A voice sounded from beneath the Cloak.
Heni pressed a hand over her face, looking as though she had just witnessed something she couldn't bring herself to believe.
A Prince had been beaten up.
"We're done for."
"We've gone and caused a disaster now......"
***
The vast mountain range jutted with strangely shaped rocks, a scattering of green draping a thin covering over the mountain's face.
This was the Back Hill beyond the Royal Capital—an expansive stretch of terrain that would take a long walk to reach the summit of.
Kavra teasingly remarked to Viktor beside her:
"Hey, hey—doesn't this feel exciting?"
"What does?"
Viktor asked casually.
Kavra said with a cheerful smile:
"A date with Big Sis, of course—don't you find it exciting?"
"Little Gwen knows about this, you know."
She extended a finger and pressed it to Viktor's chest, hooking it around the pendant hanging there.
"You~"
"Are spending a whole day with Big Sis."
Viktor had both hands in his pockets. He glanced down at Kavra's alluring eyes, then his gaze dropped lower, and he let out a cold, contemptuous snort.
"I'm not so starved that I'd stoop to this level."
"You old fossil."
"???"
Kavra snapped.
Although she hadn't quite grasped what Viktor's slightly odd downward glance had been about, that final remark—"old fossil"—had well and truly cracked her composure.
The Demon Hunter bloodline extended her lifespan, leaving her face essentially unchanged.
But her age was a secret that could never be mentioned.
Kavra's face twitched slightly as she forced out a brittle laugh.
"Viktor, you really haven't changed at all since you were little—just as insufferable now as you were back then."
Viktor glanced at her, then returned his gaze to the path ahead.
"But I have a Fiancée."
"......"
Kavra fell silent, withdrawing her hand, and walked forward without a word.
The world was finally quiet again, and Viktor continued following behind Kavra.
Before long, the 2 of them stood before a cave entrance.
Deep within the cave was an enormous stone gate.
Even the height of the mountain seemed to have been naturally formed around the sole purpose of accommodating this colossal door.
Kavra stopped walking, entered the cave, and raised her head to look at the stone gate.
"We're here."
She placed her hand on the stone gate and pressed down hard.
The enormous stone gate began to tremble with a deep, resonant groan, dust cascading down through the gaps in steady streams.
The 2 great doors slowly swung open, and a gale of wind came rushing out from the dark tunnel within.
Bang!
The doors gradually came to a stop, standing open on either side of the cave entrance.
Kavra set off, stepping inside.
Viktor followed slowly behind her.
The pitch-black tunnel was thick with a damp and musty smell.
Enduring the odor, Viktor continued forward.
But soon, the tunnel abruptly opened up into a wide space.
The lighting throughout blazed to life all at once. The surrounding rock walls had been polished to a mirror-smooth finish, and the entire space was so vast it felt as though it extended beyond the mountain itself.
The rock walls were plastered with all manner of ordinary illustrations, each figure beneath them densely annotated with text.
The surrounding chunks of rock had been carved flat, looking as though they could be used for sitting and resting.
The entire massive space resembled something like the base of a Heretical Cult—a place built for lectures and gathering Followers.
Kavra slowly turned to face Viktor and said:
"This is the Demon Hunter chapter nearest to the Royal Capital. Because it was only recently established, it's somewhat sparse."
"For now, I serve here as the chapter head."
The moment her words fell, Kavra's aura suddenly surged dramatically.
A long bar appeared, and Viktor noticed it with sharp attentiveness—he could see Kavra's Health Bar.
And her Level.
Lv40.
Kavra had leveled up.
Before, she had been Level 39.
In the game, there were only 2 situations in which a Health Bar and Level appeared.
The 1st was physical contact. The 2nd was entering a combat state.
He had not touched Kavra.
Which meant......
The Kavra before him had already entered combat readiness.
At that moment, several figures slowly emerged from the darkness of the surrounding rock walls.
They wore the insignia of Demon Hunters and bore animal masks of various designs across their faces.
From beneath those masks, only their eyes fixed unblinking on the man before them.
Viktor had both hands in his pockets, his expression barely shifting—as though everything was exactly as he'd expected.
"So, you brought me here for a test."
"To test whether I truly have ties to the Demons. Am I right."
Kavra's brow was tightly furrowed, and the gaze she directed at Viktor was one of visible inner conflict.
"I want very much to trust you, Viktor."
And so she had handed him that pendant—that token she valued as dearly as her own life.
"I know I cannot defeat you."
"If I die, that pendant will drive the Demon out of your body."
"The power of the Demon Hunter's bloodline will protect you so that you will never again be corroded by a Demon."
The Demon Hunter bloodline and Demons were incompatible as fire and water, so the power of the Demon Hunter bloodline would forcibly purge Demonic power.
"I will not allow any Demon to come near Gwen."
"Consider it for Gwen's sake, Viktor."
Kavra slowly drew a silver-white dagger from her waist, and the Demon Hunters surrounding them uniformly drew blades of the same design.
"All right."
"If it's a test, I have no objection."
Viktor suddenly smiled, narrowing his eyes.
"However, to keep the test from being too dull."
"Starting now, I won't use any Magic."
Viktor's left hand came out of his Coat pocket. A thread of white wind energy condensed into a blade and wrapped along his forearm.
A turbulent gust of wind began churning endlessly through the space, tearing sheets of paper from the walls and sending them whirling through the air.
Viktor's Coat flapped and snapped loudly in the wind.
He held the blade in 1 hand and said, without particular inflection:
"Consider it my response to the trust you've placed in me."
"Come and try—to defeat me."