“Lord Challion! Something disappeared from the store!” one of the servants raised his voice when he started counting their income and noticed a missing bottle.

Furrowing his brows, Challion asked what was it.

“It’s a bottle of Silondrophe.”

“Silondrophe?”

“Yes.”

“Strange… how come I didn’t notice it? Damn it, could it be that girl from today? I couldn’t read her stats, but she didn’t feel that strong to me. But I doubt one of the Royal Guards would rob me, so I can’t think of anyone else but that girl and her panther. Rob, what do you think why’d they need a deadly poison?” he asked his servant.

“Maybe assassinating somebody?”

Sighing loudly, Challion hung his head. “I’m afraid they want to do something they should never try. Let’s pack up for now and close the store tomorrow, just in case. I don’t want to be at the center of the shitstorm if the king was to die. These stupid demons will go around killing and beating up everyone else to show they’re the strongest and are strong enough to claim the throne.”

“B-But Lord Challion, I don’t think that the king would die. Surely, he’d notice if somebody poisoned him and would find a way to-”

“No. If it was really this girl and she manages to make Jotun drink the poison, he’ll die for sure and once that happens, the city will erupt in chaos. Now I can hope only two things. Firstly, hopefully she doesn’t want to poison Jotun but somebody else or it’s even better if she doesn’t want to poison anyone here.”

“Secondly, she wasn’t the one who robbed me and somebody else wants to kill a noble maybe… That would be the best option.”

“Shouldn’t we notify the king to take caution? We may be able to prevent something bad from happening.”

“Mhm. I’ll go now and notify Jotun, just in case. I hope that he is alright,” Challion replied and transformed into a huge bat. He soared through the dark sky in the city and arrived to the palace in just a few minutes.

Let’s hope that I can stop stupid children from doing bad things… in case they plan to.

---

“How much time do we have?” Dred whispered outside the dining room.

“A few seconds. I just coated the poison in very tiny bubbles. He ate it in very small amounts and the poison should take effect shortly,” Elena replied.

Hearing footsteps, they looked at each other and turned towards the door. Before they could open it, they heard a loud thud on the other side. Quickly rushing in, Dred closed the door behind them and when he turned around, he saw Jotun lying on the ground unmoving.

Elena turned him to his back and was surprised to see his green teeth and tongue. “What the hell is this?”

“What? Wait, he should be paralyzed only….”

“Yeah, but this guy is barely breathing. Jotun! Come on, wake up!” Elena slapped his face but the lights in his eyes slowly faded out. Scratching the back of her head, she remembered the poison Challion showed her.

“Isn’t this like what that herbalist guy wanted to sell us? What was it again? Silon… Silondrophe or something like that.”

“Uhm, yeah and this means somebody wants to put the blame on us,” Dred connected the dots quickly. “If they poisoned him right on the day we went to buy a poison with paralyzing effect, it’d definitely turn us into suspects. Let’s get on with this quickly. We wanted to kill him anyway, though not like this…”

Nodding her head, Elena quickly wiped out his memories from the time he stood up from the table and then refilled his brain with memories. Meanwhile, Dred used necromancy on him. “We should make him forget that he was able to use external magic or it’ll cause complications,” Dred urged Elena, seeing Jotun opening his eyes.

“Ugh, but what if he has memories connecting him to his spells? We don’t know anything about him and it could very well clash with his memories. It’d make him suspicious,” Elena replied a bit nerve-wrecked.

“Goddamn, this shit! Who the fuck is screwing with our plans?!”

Although they wanted to kill Jotun, they planned to use the paralyzing poison and after asking him a few things, they could have killed him without any problems. This was because when they revived him as an undead, Elena could have changed his memories accordingly. But since they were lacking information, they had to hurry up and leave him as he was for now and hope that he didn’t plan to use Magic.

“Ugh… where am I? Ah… Wait, what? Why am I on the ground?” he sat up and rubbed his eyes. He didn’t even notice Elena’s shadow that pulled back from his body, through his pores, and removed the poison from his body. His teeth returned to their former white colour and his tongue to its usual pink.

“Uhm, we were about to leave when you fell and lost consciousness. I don’t know what happened to you… Did you rest enough?” Elena raised her brows.

“Well, not really. I’ve been looking for the Ring of Wind most of the time these days and didn’t sleep a lot. Maybe I should do so now…”

The moment he stood up, Elena removed the conversation they had from his memories and made him forgot that he should sleep. Looking into his eyes, she saw his eyes turn confused. “What are you doing Jotun? Didn’t you say you wanted to-” before she could finish her sentence, the door was swung open behind her and Challion appeared.

He looked around and spotted Jotun, who was seemingly alright.

“Challion? What’re you doing here?” Jotun asked.

“Haah- thank god, you’re alright. Can I talk with you and these two in private?” as Challion finished speaking, the guards appeared behind him, pointing their weapons at him. Jotun waved his hand and the guards let down their weapons.

“My king, he broke through our defense and rushed in and since the Royal Guards were tired after their long training, they couldn’t stop him either-”

“It’s fine, just leave,” Jotun waved him off and led the three of them to a private room.

“Now then, let’s hear what you have to say that’s so important to make you barge into my palace,” Jotun crossed his arms in front of his chest and leaned back in his chair.

“I have troubling news for you. Today, your guests came to me and bought a paralyzing poison.”

“Yeah, I know about it,” Jotun shrugged his shoulders.

“But later today, my servant noticed that one of my most deadly poisons disappeared.”

Jotun looked at Elena and then Dred. “Do you have anything to say?”

“No, I still have the paralyzing poison and have nothing else. You can search me if you want, though no touchy please~” Elena replied.

“...”

Clearing his throat, Challion said “Elena, I believe you, but you must know that if the King of the Demon Kingdom was to die, the city would erupt in chaos to prove who is the strongest after him and take his place. The battle would come with many victims, which I hope you don’t want to see happening.”

“I’m not interested.”

“But I am,” Jotun raised his voice.

“What do you want then?”

“Reveal everything you have so I can see you have no relation to this matter. And I’d be happy if I could see your status window as well since it’s been bothering me for a while. What is your race, Dred? You keep switching between your panther and demon form, so I’m not sure anymore,” Jotun said.

“I can show you our stuff, but I can’t cancel the passive effect of my hiding skill,” Elena replied and pulled out everything from her storage ring and pulled it off her finger. If the ring wasn’t in contact with her body, everything inside would fall out of it because it wouldn’t be supplied with a constant flow of Mana.

Thanks to his senses, Jotun and Challion realized she really didn’t have the stolen poison on her and if she hid it in her clothes, they would have sensed it thanks to their level difference.

“Alright, you may leave now,” Jotun waved his hand.

When he saw the door being closed, he said, “They’re still suspicious.”

“Of course, they could have hidden it in their room or at another place,” Challion agreed. “But don’t close out the possibility of conspiracy either. Ah, pardon my rudeness, I was speaking so casually with his high-”

“Ah, shaddap Challion. We’ve known each other for a long time, haha. Thanks for telling me. Who accompanied Elena and Dred? Do you know by any chance?” Jotun asked.

“Hmm, I don’t know their names, but if I saw them, I’d definitely recognise them.”

“In that case, you should come over tomorrow and verify who accompanied them. I’ll have to be careful from now on, I guess. But it’s no wonder, there are only two rings to be found and the people in the dark are probably turning nervous. If they want their part from Reinald’s legacy, they must take care of me,” Jotun sighed loudly.

Patting his shoulders, Challion said, “It’ll be fine. Now that you know about it, you can easily deal with any sort of potential threat. If anything, you can still close those two into a prison and wait for the day you can finally reach your goal.”

“Shh-”

“Ah, you’re right. Hehe. I’ll take my leave now.”

His hand on his chin, Jotun couldn’t help but recall Elena’s words when she told him his servants would rebel if he continued his current way of dealing with people. Maybe it’s her after all and she is trying to prove her point to me? Damn it, I can’t trust anyone, even though I’m the King!

---

*Yawn* “Where should I look for traces…” Ekrok talked to himself as he sat up in his bed. Even after two days have passed by, he couldn’t find anything about the devourer. He checked the other planet too, but he didn’t find anything strange other than the advanced technology of the planet that interested him.

He saw how the Thivalon Kingdom started using the technology of the other planet and turned their cities much cleaner and secure. He left the palace once again and started looking for the devourers when a man covered in a black cape stopped him on the streets. “Good day to you, Lord Ekrok.”

“Who’re you?” Ekrok asked, pushing his hand away.

“I’m called Atelon. I’ve got some news for you…”

“Oh?”

“I heard you’ve been looking for a person who had strange abilities that made people rot, right?”

A strange glint flashed in Ekrok’s eyes upon hearing him. “What do you know?”

“Well, I happen to be one of the victims of this strange spell. It happened at the time of war that a group of young people with great strength interrupted my battle. I’d notice my arms slowly turning black and a strong sense of pain rush through my body. It was really terrible and I lost my battle because of it. Luckily, I was able to run away.”

“Do you happen to know who caused this? I’ll reward you definitely!”

“Well, hehe. I was the king of this kingdom not long ago, but these pests betrayed me. I’d be happy if the Lord could help me in this matter…”

Furrowing his brows, Ekrok recalled Bethor’s tale about Atelon and his way of ruling. But not really caring about a small kingdom, he nodded his head.

“The Lord is really kind. The girl was called Elena, her panther was Dred. I also know her friends who followed her everywhere.”

“Audrey, Jake, and Cor. I know these from secure sources, so this information is a hundred percent valid!”

“I’ll find you later, I’ve got to notify the Emperor now!” Ekrok turned around and rushed into the forest to contact Padinyss.