A portal suddenly opened in the center of the throne room; the nobles stared at it with shocked faces and gasps. The knights within the hall pulled out their swords and pointed them at the portal. They were expecting an intruder, yet the first one to come through the portal was Princess Priscilla. She quickly secured her footing and kneeled down on the red carpet.

“Greetings, Father.” She expressed in a firm voice. “Rise. Come here, Priscilla” The king replied to his daughter, to which she lifted her head and walked straight towards her seat to the left of the king. Cain walked out of the portal with Dresil slightly behind him while Priscilla was walking up to her seat. Dresil had masterfully unmerged from Cain’s clothes the moment they exited the portal so the knights by the carriage did not see her, but the nobles and other attendees saw her exit the portal as if she was already there. The knights, who were about to sheathe their weapons, immediately pointed them at Cain.

—Dms: Cain and Bob— (20ms)

Bob: You were right, they had some countermeasures against space spirits. Although it’s only effective for Spirit Colonel, the rank below Spirit Generals.

Cain: Interesting… More and more it seems like there is an organization behind the king that controls everything. It would also explain how they were able to make the populace believe that space spirits are a myth despite having countermeasures against them.

Bob: Indeed. Things are spicing up.

Cain: …Where did you learn that term from?

Bob: Rex.

Cain: Huh… Just make sure he’s creating at least 500k mana per day.

Bob: Is that the official quota now?

Cain: Yep.

Bob: Noted. I’ll pass on the message.

Cain: Thanks.

--------------------------

“Greetings, Your Majesty. Forgive me if I do not know the customs of this country. As you can guess, I’m not from around here.” Cain did a light bow, bending his right knee and moving his left foot back some. He crossed his right arm over his chest, just like he had seen in many manhwas and movies. I’ll have to be careful with my words from here on out in case there is someone here who can detect lies. Cain thinks while rising to an idle position after seeing the king’s gesture to do so.

“The courtesy you’ve shown me is enough, young lad. What did you think of my daughter?” While the king asks this question, Cain takes the opportunity to glimpse at everyone’s tags and uses them to retrieve the position names of the people close to the king. There were four thrones on an elevated platform at the end of the hall.

The king sat in the leftmost one which was positioned at the center of the room. Priscilla sat to his left, and Freya, the first princess, sat to Priscilla’s left. There was an empty chair to the left of Freya. The two princesses were talking to themselves during the exchange between the king and Cain.

The platform with the thrones had steps leading up to it, with each step there was a group of people. One step below the king, the pope and an attending priest stood silently. A step below them, and off the pope’s right some, stood the Strategic Advisor Conroy and his assistant; the latter of which had blood slowly trickling down his nose. One step below this duo stood the Dean of the guild and the king’s personal knight. Fleets of nobles flocked the side of the halls on either side of the red carpet that ran from the entrance of the throne room to the king’s throne.

“Your Majesty… Well, to put it bluntly, you suck at matchmaking. You should do some research about the other party’s type before you try to hook them up.” The time between Cain’s response and the king’s question was only a few seconds, and yet he was still able to analyze the positions and names of almost everyone in the room. I’m going to need some food later. Cain thought while preparing for the rest of the meeting.

“You dare speak impolitely to His Majesty, the king?!” The king’s personal knight unsheathed the recently sheathed sword and pointed it at Cain. Although it wouldn’t really do much good since they were roughly 15 meters apart. “Easy there, Alfredo. He speaks the truth, I should have known what type this lad, er, Cain? Yes?” Cain nodded to the king’s question. “I should have known what type of woman Cain likes if I were to think about matchmaking in the first place. So, what type of woman do you like?”

“Give me a moment to think about how to put it in words…” Cain tried his best to not laugh at the knight’s name as he replied, to which the king nodded in acknowledgement. “Yes, my king.” Alfredo sheathed his sword once more. If the sword had a sword spirit, it’d probably yell in frustration, “Just choose one! You plate of noodles!”

{Author’s note: …heck this. Try not to die. This really needs a comic to show properly}

The two princesses continued their conversation from earlier in a hushed tone. “Wow… another suitor denying you once again. Maybe you should change that personality of yours.” Freya teased Priscilla on the side. “Shut it, sister.” Priscilla replied in a harsh tone. “You’re no fun. Have you seen your brother around? He’s absent for another meeting.” Freya smoothly changed the subject to the missing sibling. “How would I know? He’s probably messing around in the garden or with the animals like usual.” Both of the sisters sigh; because the crown prince avoids his responsibilities, they usually have more work to do.

During the princess’ conversation, Cain takes a detailed look at his surroundings. In truth, he did not need to think about his type at all. However someone with a lie detecting skill wouldn’t be able to tell he lied, since he technically didn’t. The terms and phrases “MILF” and “older lady supremacy” did not exist during this point of time, thus Cain had to find a way around this language barrier. Which he did almost instantly.

While Cain was examining the room with his mana zone, looking down at the floor so it’d seem like he was thinking, he noticed the countless leers directed towards Dresil from the nobles. Some weren’t even bothering to hide their lustful expression. Seriously…? It’s worse than I thought. She’s not even wearing anything revealing… How’s Dresil holding up? Cain looked back at Dresil while thinking this and spotted some vines within her hair resisting the urge to lash out. Although she had an expressionless face right now, Cain could sense intense discomfort when he looked into her eyes.

[Don’t do anything reckless. I know you want to lash out at them and I’m not telling you to not feel discomforted. Just don’t do anything and know that if they try something I’ll intervene before they can even get close to you.] Cain transmitted to Dresil, rather than using the dms. Thought transmission was received the same as Telepathy, with the sender’s voice in your head, although the method was vastly different. Cain used the former fact to soothe Dresil’s discomfort somewhat.

The corners of Dresil’s lips twitched upward as she tried her best to suppress a relieved smile. Cain instantly noticed and surrounded her head with six magic circles in a cubic formation to disguise her expression. It made everyone except for Cain see the expressionless face Dresil had on before.

—Dms: Cain and Dresil— (12ms)

Cain: Why must you have an expressionless face on? You don’t have to say if you don’t want to.

Cain: As you may have noticed, the magic circles will prevent everyone but me from seeing your true face.

Cain: Express yourself, don’t try to hide it unless it's necessary.

Cain: Don’t become like me who can no longer show most emotions naturally.

Dresil: Thanks, Cain.

--------------------------

Dresil slowly smiled, and even blushed some. Cain tilted his head slightly while also turning it. To others it was just part of the action of turning his head. To Dresil, who knew Cain like the back of her hand, it was his way of saying “That’s my girl.” For a man of few words, small gestures spoke more than speeches. Cain was originally, and preferably, a man of few words, but due to the events of the past few days, he had to change his form to what it is now to adapt and achieve the best outcome. He is a social chameleon with all of the benefits and faults.

Now for this suicidal boi… Cain thought while transmitting the following to the assistant of the Strategic Advisor: [Oi. If you keep trying to infiltrate my mind you’re going to kill yourself. Why are you even… oh. That’s a cool ability, let me know what you see later.] Mid-transmission, Cain scanned the memories of the assistant to look for why he was activating the Mind Firewall’s defense mechanisms.

Telepathy? The shocked assistant thought to himself. [No you dumb nut. This is much more powerful than telepathy.] The assistant nearly fell to the ground from the repeated surprises due to Cain’s transmissions.

—Group Chat: Cain, Dresil, Bob, and Rex— (13ms)

Rex: When did you figure out that telepathy and thought communication were different?

Cain: When Sinclair, who cannot use mana, was able to use it. That and what the receptionist in the weapons shop said about “only those who can use their soul to communicate…” three days ago.

Rex: …he ain’t human. There’s no way. Are you sure you aren’t part elf or dragon?

Bob: The proper name is “Soul Communication.” We’ve been using “Thought communication” since that is what you were familiar with.

Cain: Interesting… Well let’s keep it that way for now since it’d be annoying to change it.

Bob: Understood.

--------------------------

Cain quickly programmed a simple AI to do a sweep of everyone’s memories and search for something that was related to one’s mind or personality. Massive amounts of mana were consumed by Cain’s brain as he performed a task that should’ve taken a few hours in a few seconds.

Although he tried to avoid this as much as possible due to the unknown side effects, if there were any, the princess’ conversation was coming to a close and thus Cain would need to answer soon to prevent the misunderstanding that he was making everyone wait. The nobles on the side gossiped about the most recent rumors whenever there was a pause in a meeting like the one Cain created to think.

A second later, the AI picked up another ability and reported its contents and the person who had it to Cain. Interesting… [Ayo, if you manage to get a painting of what you see then send it to me.] Cain transmitted this thought to the servant of a high ranking noble, who similarly had a bloody nose. The frightened servant merely nodded to Cain’s request. Cain disabled the Mind Firewall for the servant and assistant. He was originally going to disable it all together, but decided to experiment with letting specific people through.

Cain cleared his throat and waited a few seconds for the side conversations to die down. “I prefer older women, but not too old. They must also have big dumplings. If I were to give an example… I guess Princess Freya would suit my type out of the people here.” Cain stated his reply to the king’s question about his type. Freya did not miss this opportunity to tease Priscilla at a volume only they could hear. The king hummed and nodded.

“Anyways, let’s get down to business. I have called you here to give a reward to your master for clearing out the invasion for us. Please let him know and tell us what he desires.” The king’s voice booms across walls of the throne room. Cain sighs and states, “Yeah… about that. My master said that all rewards, merits, credit, etc. will be given to me as a gift for going down the mountain.”

—Group Chat: Cain, Dresil, Bob, and Rex— (9ms)

Rex: You sure you can lie like that?

Dresil: Oh? Is Rex finally smart enough to tell when Cain is lying?

Rex: :proud:

Cain: I also included lie detection in the AI that did a scan of mind abilities.

Rex: Oh… smart.

Cain: :nod:

--------------------------

Cain’s statement shocks the surrounding nobles. “How can we be sure that’s what your master wants?” One noble states on the side. Numerous nobles murmur in agreement. Cain points at the noble, his action causing slight fear to rise up. “Good question! Here’s a cookie.” Cain created a fake spatial gate in front of the noble followed by a cookie made of mana. The consecutive appearance made it seem as if the cookie fell from the gate. He then used the mana within his mana zone to force the noble’s hands to catch the cookie.

“My master passed down a technique to me during these moments.” Cain drew his signature symbol with his finger in the air. During this moment, he added a new function to the spell. After he was done drawing, he created the updated Symbolic Spell along the path that he drew, the one that serves a token of authenticity. “This is my master and I’s crest, I guess you could say. If someone draws this with mana and they are not acting on my master’s or my own orders, then they will receive a punishment. Likewise, if they are, nothing happens.”

Once Cain was done explaining how the symbol works, he pointed at a random noble. This noble was among one of those who did not hide their lustful expressions towards Dresil. “You there. You will be my guinea pig. Try to perform an action, but make sure to say it out loud so the audience knows. For the record, I do not approve of whatever he will try to do in the next 5 minutes.” The noble looks at the king, almost begging with his expressions for the king to deny Cain’s “suggestion.” Sadly for the noble, the king merely nodded.

The noble then stepped forward from the crowd and onto the red carpet. “I will now try to touch Cain’s familiar’s ass.” The noble walked towards Dresil, but before he could even get 10 meters from her, Cain froze the noble’s every muscle using his mana zone. The crushing weight of the mana forced the noble to stop and nearly made him collapse in front of everyone. In a panic, he decided to try and draw the symbol to get out of this desperate situation. Once he chose to do so, the pressure was instantly released.

The noble drew Cain’s symbol with mana in the air. Upon completion, the symbol solidified and became the Symbolic Spell. Interesting… Is this because the noble saw the spell earlier? No… it can’t be just that. Must be because he had the intention to create the spell and everything else was done subconsciously… Cain interrupted the punishment execution of the symbol to enact something harsher. He already got proof that the spell works when someone else creates it and that was the only thing he needed from the guinea pig.

Cain created four magic circles. One forced an erection by supplying lots of blood directly to the nether regions then created a few hundred tiny cuts along the shaft. The second one created water from mana, then transmuted the water into lemonade. Lemon juice would have been optimal, but Cain knew more about lemonade thus making it more efficient. The third and fourth magic circles created a force on top of each ball, equivalent to a grown man slamming a hammer down as hard as he could.

The moment Cain enacted their tasks, Dresil forced the noble to stay awake. Unable to faint due to the extreme pain, the noble fell to his knees. He hollered blood curdling wails that echoed off the walls. Even if one were to cover their ears, his wails would still penetrate their soul. Every man in the room subconsciously covered their nether regions, be it with a spear handle, papers, or their hands. The noble stayed conscious for a few minutes then Dresil allowed him to faint.

“This is why you shouldn’t be so lustful in public, folks.” All of the nobles who were leering at Dresil earlier instantly looked away when they heard Cain. They feared something similar could happen to them at any moment. “Anyways, as you can see, when I created the symbol nothing happened so my master approved of this.

“Lastly, this symbol can be used to check your standing with me so you don’t have to bug me with gifts and messengers to see if I’m mad at you.” Cain’s last statement brought many sighs of relief. Not many nobles wanted to meet with Cain after this incident. Yet some still had to, to probe if they would be next on Cain’s hit list.

“Everyone gets one warning and one threat. After that is the punishment. Depending on what you did, it’ll vary from losing some of your valuables to being erased from existence. If the arrow is notched, that’s a warning. If the arrow is pulled back slightly, that’s a threat. If it’s pulled back all the way, count your days because the moment that arrow is released your lives will be forfeited.” Cain’s cold tone sent chills down everyone’s spine. The king and the princesses were completely stunned due to his demonstration.

“Let’s get off that grim subject, shall we? So the rewards. I assume I can ask for anything?” Cain’s question brought the king back to reality. “Yes, you may. So long as it’s within my capabilities, I will grant it.” The king confirmed Cain’s assumption. The nobles shuddered in fear and anticipation, wondering what Cain would ask of the king. Depending on how it would play out, they could attempt to get some benefits from it, unaware of what they were about to witness. They only made one mistake, and that was thinking that Cain’s movements could be predicted.

And thus began his next play.