The Magic Of Skill

Chapter 8's

“Hah? Princess Lennef is engaged?!” Emperor Valarish asked an annoyed question when the news reached his ears. So upset he squeezed the wine glass he held, to the point that the glass made of gold turned into trash.

“Yes, her fiance's name is Meffery Walter. Looks like King Loiros betrothed them because of a prophecy.” Marquis Daralo is also a close acquaintance of Emperor Valarish.

Emperor Valarish's face turned extremely sinister, his teeth were tightened and his hands clenched until his muscles were clearly visible. Daralo, who used to think of Valarish as a friend, was terrified and understood that Valarish was the real emperor.

“Meffery Walter, I haven't heard his name in years. Who is he?” ask Valarish again.

“I do not know, there is no further information about him. But. There was one of our informants who said that Meffery Walter was a vagrant.” Daralo is honest.

Emperor Valarish then laughed at that. His laughter was loud, echoing and to the point of making his private room filled with only a tickling sound. But after that, Valarish kicked the table that was in front of him. The table floated up, smashed into the wall and of course was smashed together with the wine dish on it.

“Don't joke! What's engaged to a bum, that fucking Loiros is his brain gone crazy?!!” Valarish vengeful.

Emperor Valarish was the leader of the Empire of Nazaroth which was famous for its insane military power. Valarish himself was notorious for being ruthless, but was also considered a revolutionary. It happened when he started setting regulations that required men to have high combat power, no matter whether they were soldiers or commoners.

You could say, it was not an interesting empire to live in. Its citizens are notoriously strong, muscular, and physically determine everything. It is Valarish who merely makes its citizens like this. He considers it a success.

But behind that, Emperor Valarish who is an orphan began to be attracted to the girl descendants of King Loiros and Queen Andervine, namely Princess Lennef Juliester. Contrary to Valarish's nature, Lennef is known as a woman who is peace-loving, and opposes all forms of disagreement.

There must be something other than the nature of Lennef that made Emperor Valarish fall in love with him.

Amidst his frustration at Lennef's engagement, Emperor Valarish bestowed that vexation on Daralo. Valarish strangled Daralo and lifted him up until the slippery-haired Marquis no longer stepped on the ground.  “Why are you telling me now? I should have been able to thwart that engagement if you had told him earlier.”

While holding back the urge to vomit because of strangulation, Daralo revealed, “They did not announce the engagement planning, they immediately carried out the engagement 4 hours after the plan was made.”

Valarish could not argue that. 4 hours was not the duration that made him able to find out information from the other kingdom easily. Upset, Valarish throws Daralo to the floor.

“But, Your Majesty, if you want to put up a little resistance.the festival may be the answer.”.

“Festival?”

“Yes, this is still very fresh information. The kingdom plans to hold an engagement festival in the capital. How about we—”

“We messed up, of course! Come on, help me gather the troops. Warrior, knight, or adventurer even if I don't care, I want a large army.” Valarish walked out of his room followed by Daralo rubbing his butt in pain.

“But that is tantamount to declaring war on the Kingdom of Raverine, are you sure?”

Valarish flicked his steps then looked at Daralo. Daralo thought he had offended his master, all he could do was silently goosebumps while gulping. Then Valarish with his evil gaze said, “True what you said, this is war. But the war will only start after I kill the Queen.” Valarish smile.

For the second time, Marquis Daralo felt terrified.

There's something to be remembered here, that Daralo couldn't possibly have assembled an army like Valarish said. Daralo knew full well of anything that his leader might damage, so Daralo chose not to cause war with Raverine.

He did not prepare a lot of troops, but he prepared something else.

***

“Mong-by the way Master, how much do you have?” ask Florinas suddenly.

At that time I took a walk in the middle of the city to see the preparations for the festival to be held. From the reaction of the residents, I guess they still do not know that I am the main character in this festival. But yes, it is better that way.

“Why suddenly ask that? Also, don't call me Master.”

“Isn't it good? Now you have a servant in the form of a legendary fairy who is very beautiful.” Hile mediates.

After living in the palace, Hile started wearing lacy clothes that matched his tiny body. He was like a walking puppet, especially with that flat expression.

So too with Florinas. I scolded him all-out for not wanting to change his indecent appearance. From now on he would wear more polite clothes. The dress with a simple short skirt was chosen by Florinas when looking at the contents of the royal wardrobe.

But my attention was not on the clothes, but on his annoying attitude, his arrogance not to walk on the ground. With the reason walking was tiring, he did not care if the three of us became the center of attention just because there was one of us who flew.

“Master, you didn't answer my question?”

Yeah, and one more thing, he always argued when I told him not to call me Master.

“When touching King Loiros, where am I about 340,000, and from you I get about 1,227,000. Anyway the total net amount is 1,573,228. Why?” my many.

“No, I was just wondering why Master could cast such a powerful magic against Ice Dragon even though it was only used to resurrect me, and moreover where it had been sucked in large quantities.” Florinas.

“Is it as confusing as that?”

“Yes. To resurrect me you need 1,500,000 mana. And when we kiss, I absorb 100,000 of your mana every minute. Only from that data should the Master have been drained, but in fact not. As if where the Master refuses to diminish.”

Refusing to decrease? In another sense it's just as infinite, right?

I have no skills or magic that makes my mana limitless. At first I thought that that was what work was like. I thought that by just taking a short rest then where would be fully replenished.

Putting aside my power problem or something, I'd rather focus on this festival.

Hile who was walking side by side with me started to slow down his pace when he saw a jewelry booth located by the side of the road. The booth sells various accessories, such as necklaces and brooches.

“You want that?” I asked Hile.

Realizing that I was paying attention to him, Hile became embarrassed. “M-Where possible! I don't want that thing, what for anyway? We better just continue!” lying was useless, Hile's tone actually revealed that he was interested in buying it.

“Then I will buy it for Florinas only.” My lead on Hile. As I expected, Hile felt jealous when his wish was granted to someone else. Even so, Hile still insisted and did not want to be honest.

The three of us came to the booth, which was apparently guarded by a friendly-looking old grandmother. He welcomed us and let us look around. Florinas happily chose, while Hile who did not want to be caught could only glance.

“Fine necklace only.”

“Hah? When can I not choose? Comeon! Master, please!” Florinas whined like a child, he tugged at my sleeves and it made us laugh at the shopkeeper's grandmother.

I let Florinas stay in his whimper, until I saw Hile nailing his gaze to a flower-shaped hairpin. It was obvious that that was what Hile wanted, when I thought he wanted something more special like a necklace or a bracelet.

I took that hairpin, “You want this, right? Let me buy it.” Hile panicked, and was embarrassed at the same time. “How much is this price?” I asked the grandmother. For this hairpin, I took out four bronze coins, what a very cheap price.

“T-Thank you.” Hile received a gift from me with a reddened face.

“Master, how about my ring?” Florinas did not forget his wish.

Since I didn't want him to carry this whimper along the way, I was a little forced to take the ring for purchase. “This ring, how much does it cost?”

“For that ring I won't lie, it costs 3 gold coins. You see ‘there's a diamond in the ice carving?”

3 gold coins? It was too expensive for a ring. If the wedding ring is not a problem, is it just for gifts?

Florinas looked at me expectantly, he didn't even care if I was in trouble or not. Once again, I took out 3 gold coins from the bag and gave them to Grandma.

Luckily King Loiros gave me hundreds of gold pieces when I said I wanted to take a walk in the preparation of the festival, it was indeed too much, but for the king of gold pieces was just a collection of valuable toys.

“Then put the ring on my ring finger, Master!” Florinas shows the ring finger of his right hand. I who have been too affected by his stubborn will can only obey. But I'm glad to see Florinas smiling because on his ring finger there is now a ring.

As we continued on, the two girls walking with me no longer cared about what they were going through, they only cared about their new decorations. Florinas stroked his ring finger like a starving cat, while Hile continued to justify the position of his new hairpin.

Although I bought Florinas an expensive ring, Hile was not jealous at all. The happiness that emanated on his face was comparable to the happiness of Florinas. I think women like Hile are the most targeted men in the future.

“Hey, don't you have eyes?”

“M-Sorry.”

“Do you want to find trouble with me?”

Not far from where we were walking, there was a crowd of people blocking the other side of the road. And the dialogue was heard among the dense crowd. There must be trouble, I thought. I immediately barged into the crowd, while Florinas saw it from above.

And unknowingly, I killed Hile.

Apparently the crowd was looking at the humiliation done by three burly men to one old man who looked very weak. Next to the grandfather was a wooden basket lying on the ground along with a rolling apple.

The three big-bodied men looked very scary, they all had the same tattoo on their chests, which was a tattoo with a lion head symbol.

One of them madly hit the grandfather. A very violent collision hit the grandfather right in his face. The grandfather was lying on the ground, limp, and no one was helping him.

I ventured to where the grandfather was, and gave him Cure Heal magic so that his wounds would heal. Despite his recovery, the grandfather was unconscious. Yeah, I'm grateful he didn't die after being hit that hard.

“Hey, what are you doing? Want to act like a hero?” the one who hit the grandfather asked me that arrogantly. “Damn it, you ignored me?”

I who had turned my back on him had to be the target of the next attack. He hit me right on the back of the head. Which this time was even louder than the punch of the grandfather, his impact sound alone sounded very similar to an explosion.

But what a pity, that blow didn't hurt me at all. My endurance points were already at a level far above him, with the strength of two knights, one king, and a legendary elf, such a blow was nothing but a pat for me.

Realizing that his punch was not effective, he continued by doing a sickle kick in the same direction as before, namely my head. This time, I stopped the kick with only one hand.

“What the heck?!”

He retreated after his second attack failed as well.

I turned around, and saw the three of them in deep confusion. The people around started to bustle questioning my strength, and only they seemed to be afraid.

“Because you hit me, your ability is now mine. Impossible for you to single-handedly defeat me.” I said.

“Don't be arrogant!”

Those who felt humiliated advanced simultaneously. Before I was ready to do boxing, I used a very dangerous ultimate technique.

“Enclosure Engineering, Soul Wiper.”

In just a split second, I hit the chests of the three people with my palms. Soul Wiper is a killer technique that allows the user to push the spirit out of the target body.

My attack ended even faster than the blink of an eye. And after that, they were lying limp on the ground because they were dead.

Florinas flew over the crowd, but no one noticed. Our eyes met, and then he gave his thumbs to me with a smile.

***

Outside the crowd, a girl in a pretty dress tried to look out among the crowd. He tiptoed, raised his head, but his efforts were unsuccessful because his body was too short.

Upset at not being able to enter, the girl named Hile boasted, “Walter is brash, she left me here.” Clearly Hile was angry, the man who took him for a walk left him just like that.

Then a pat was felt on Hile's shoulder, as he felt someone trying to call him Hile turned his head, “Ya?” but instead of seeing someone calling, Hile was smothered by a dense cloth.

I don't know who did it, which must have been the guy wrapping Hile's head in a sack, leaving him unable to see and speechless.

Hile's gaze was dark, his mouth was mute and his nose stuffy. The only thing he could feel was that his hands began to be tied to a strong rope, and slowly his body was lifted on the shoulders of people he did not know.