Vasant Gorman had tried to poison William. While William could cause an assassin to disappear and nobody would ask questions, a lord was another matter entirely. There were only so many of them- and that number was much fewer than it had been.

Of course, William had the authority to execute someone for any reason. There wouldn’t be any complaints from gevai- at least, nobody would voice their complaints. The problem was William didn’t want to turn into another Demon King. Sure, he would know the lord was guilty, but everyone else would just think William didn’t like him.

Because of that, William prepared a different plan. “Joel!”

The captain of the guard came over promptly and saluted, “My king! What is it you need.”

“We’re going to go arrest a lord who tried to poison me.”

Joel looked William up and down. “You don’t look poisoned.”

William rolled his eyes, “Well obviously since I noticed it I wouldn’t drink the poison.”

“Oh.” Joel sounded somewhat disappointed.

“You want me to die?”

“I just thought… you wouldn’t have to worry about a little poison.”

“Maybe not. Next time we run into some grim clover extract we can both try a sip.”

William grinned as all of the color drained from Joel’s face, “... I’ll pass.”

-----

Vasant Gorman couldn’t do anything about being surrounded by the Eternal King’s Guard. Even without the Eternal King himself being present, each member of the guard was near his equal in combat prowess- if not equipment. His own guard was less numerous here and on a much lower level. Again, that was all without the Eternal King being present- and he was present.

“W-why have you stopped me, my king?” Vasant Gorman really couldn’t think of why he would be stopped. He had behaved perfectly during the wedding feasts, causing no trouble with the gevai or humans.

The smile of the Eternal King didn’t make him feel any better about the situation. “Why, you seem to have missed some details there. Am I not one of the gevai? More than that, you tried to poison me.”

Vasant’s heart jumped. How could the king have known that? He got in and out of the kitchens undetected- even if they noticed the poison on the goblet later there should have been no way to trace it to him. “I… don’t know what you mean.” Vasant could only rely on the new king caring about his public image… but the situation didn’t look good.

“Really? So if I open your luggage I won’t find a vial of grim clover extract?” Vasant didn’t even have any time to speak before his bag was being searched. “Oh look, there it is. A vial of grim clover extract. Not much good for anything but poisoning people, is it?” Vasant was about to protest- but then the Eternal King reached into his bags again and opened up the secret compartment inside. “Oh, two vials of grim clover extract. What do you have to say about that?”

When the first vial had shown up, Vasant was ready to claim that he’d never seen it before in his life, that it was a plant. It would even be true, because he hadn’t. He was still going to try to protest, even if he had seen the one in his secret compartment.

-----

Lorelei held out her hand, “My vial, please.”

William handed her the vial of grim clover extract, “What can it be used for besides poisoning things?”

“Not that much, but I’ve been trying to figure out how blackskin moles feed on the clovers without dying. It’s quite lethal to everything else, but their main diet.” Lorelei carefully placed it back in its stand in a heavily warded cabinet.

William shrugged, “Well, I didn’t actually need it anyway.” William shook his head, “Can you believe he actually kept the vial in his luggage? I know it’s expensive but it would have been much more difficult to deal with him if he hadn’t kept it. Well, without your help anyway.”

“Everyone is still used to the King being a fool, and nobody has proof of your eternality yet either. Nobody believes you’ll come back.”

“Well,” William shook his head, “I’d be glad to show them except… for everything. It’s not fun to die, it takes quite a long time to be reincarnated, and I couldn’t even guarantee I’d be a gevai again. Maybe if it’s still a problem in a gross of years… no, I’d really rather not.”

Lorelei nodded, “Gaining a reputation as being unkillable might be better.”

“As long as nobody takes it as a challenge.”

-----

William was walking through the gardens. They weren’t that extensive yet, but he had plans. While the climate might not support too many different types of plants, he imagined that it could be overcome with the assistance of magic. He wanted to leave behind something beautiful, and not just war. Though, William was still getting used to the idea that he didn’t necessarily have to leave anything behind for the foreseeable future. He wasn’t going to die of old age, after all, and even if he did he would probably reincarnate. William supposed that death by old age might change that but he wasn’t in any sort of mood to test it.

Then he senses Jordan approaching. That wasn’t a good sign, as usually Jordan would wait for William to be in his study. “Sir.” Jordan still saluted and spoke in a military manner, even though the position of commander was only half of what Jordan did now.

William sighed, “What is it that’s urgent enough to bring you out here, but not urgent enough that you have to run?”

“Ships are going missing off of the west coast.”

“That’s… normal isn’t it? Captains always like to try to catch the faster currents away from the shores but don’t think about what lives there, among other things.”

“Not this many ships, sir. In addition, there are a few accounts of evil smoke in the area. In addition, there’s an eyewitness account of an attack,” Jordan frowned, “The only problem is the eyewitness is a child. Not the most reliable source… but the report is very detailed in its description of some strange features. The report almost wasn’t sent to us but the agent decided it was startling enough to at least present it- saying we would need to judge its accuracy ourselves. In addition, there was a drawing… but that will take some time to arrive.”

“Well, let’s see the report then.”