Chapter 154

Red Fox Castle, reception hall.

A huge crystal chandelier hung from the ceiling, the candlelight refracting dazzling rays through the transparent crystals.

A roaring fire burned in the fireplace, the firewood crackling and emitting the fresh scent of pine.

Bea stepped into the room cautiously. He looked at the figure on the sofa, bowed deeply, and knelt on one knee.

"Great sage, who blesses the entire Southern Region like the Crimson Fire of old and shines as brightly as the Morning Star, your humble servant Bea William has come to see you," he said loudly in the most humble tone he could muster.

"Rise."

A slightly familiar voice reached his ears, and Bea slowly raised his head.

Under his expectant gaze, the sage sitting on the sofa revealed his true face—a handsome young man with black hair.

Wait, so familiar... could it be?!

The next moment, the color drained from Bea's face in an instant, turning as pale as freshly washed linen, and beads of sweat the size of beans kept popping out from his forehead.

He recognized him; the sage he had sworn loyalty to was the very person who had ordered his servant to beat him up after their conflict at the Night Shadow Tavern.

Heavens, to discover that one had offended their liege to death right after swearing loyalty—is there any servant in this world more miserable than me?

"You seem very nervous."

Xia Mingyu looked at the young man before him, whose face was pale and whose body was trembling slightly, and couldn't help but ask softly.

"Liege... Liege, back at the Nightingale Tavern, I did not know your identity and was rude to you; I truly deserve death a thousand times over!"

Bea said with a trembling voice, pressing his forehead tightly against the floor, his back even bent into a semicircle.

"How did your father, Lord Belen, pass away?"

Xia Mingyu was silent for a moment; he did not respond, but instead turned to ask another question.

"A crazed Named Beast came to the territory some time ago and killed many of the commoners. My father fought it with his knights to protect the people and was severely injured. Although Lord Luo Yi and Lord Luo Lan later lured the Named Beast away, he still passed away due to the severity of his wounds..."

Bea did not dare to be negligent and answered respectfully immediately.

When he mentioned his father's death at the end, a hint of sadness inevitably leaked into his tone.

"Dying for the people, your father was undoubtedly a great lord; even I am filled with respect for him."

Recalling the old man who had gifted little Haidun a bouquet of forget-me-nots at the infant honor ceremony, Xia Mingyu said with deep emotion.

Someone he had seen not long ago was now dead; life is truly fragile!

"Bea, I hope you will not betray your father's honor and will become a lord who knows how to cherish his people, just like him."

Xia Mingyu said, pressing his hand on the young man's shoulder.

He knew that by saying a few more words now, the lives of the hundreds of thousands of people in the William Territory would be a little better in the future.

"As you command, Liege."

At this moment, although some sadness remained in Bea's heart, his body had relaxed a lot.

He knew that his liege had let this matter pass for the sake of his father's honor.

"Raise your head. I think you must also be puzzled as to why your father ordered you to swear loyalty to me before he died. Now, I will tell you the answer."

Xia Mingyu slowly took off the Starfire Ring, and the line of deep purple text emerged—Heir to the Kingdom of 1,409,670,292 Citizens.

"Ahhh!"

The moment he looked up and saw that mark of identity, Bea felt as if his eyes were about to be blinded.

He finally understood why his father had done that; he was not only a qualified lord but also the best father in the whole world!

A moment later, Bea walked out of the reception hall in a daze.

On one hand, his mind was still lingering on the shock brought by that 1.4 billion mark.

On the other hand, it was because, before he left, his liege had advised him not to go looking for Damien anymore and to honestly find a wife to avoid the William family line ending; his liege was even willing to act as a matchmaker for him.

Sob, sob, sob, my beloved Damien, it looks like I really have to leave you now!

Bea thought with immense sadness.

On the other side, after he left the reception hall, Kalen, who had been waiting outside the door, walked in.

"Your Highness, I have completed my mission. I have witnessed the execution of the evildoers in all the viscount territories of the Southern Region, ensuring that no innocent person will suffer any unprovoked disaster."

Kalen knelt on one knee and said loudly, looking at the black-haired young man he hadn't seen for a long time.

"Thank you for your hard work, Kalen."

Changing from the seriousness he had shown in front of Bea, Xia Mingyu smiled, helped Kalen up, and pulled him to sit on the sofa together.

"Your Highness, I have already heard about the Twilight Tea incident. Those damned Kelai merchants are as evil and greedy as ever. I am very sorry that I could not offer my meager strength by your side at that time, causing you to fall into a dangerous situation."

After some pleasantries, Kalen said apologetically.

Regardless of the reason, as a servant, not being by his liege's side when he was in danger was undoubtedly a sin.

"It's fine; you were also carrying out my orders," Xia Mingyu said calmly.

"Thank you for your forgiveness. Besides that, I have one more thing I wish to report to you..."

A moment later, a maid walked into the reception room carrying a wooden box.

Click.

After the box was opened, it revealed a head that looked as if its features had been wiped away, with almost no relief on the face.

There was no hair, not even the texture of skin; it was like water-bloated parchment perfunctorily pasted onto a skull.

"Ugh." Looking at this disgusting scene, Xia Mingyu felt a wave of nausea from his stomach, wanting to vomit everything he had eaten for lunch.

"Quick, close the box."

Seeing that his liege's expression was wrong, Kalen hurriedly ordered the maid to close the wooden box.

"Your Highness, this is the assassin who appeared to attack Luo Yi and Luo Lan after they killed the Named Beast. His profession is Demon Hunter, and his strength is indeed very strong. Even I only managed to kill him by relying on a joint attack with Black Tail," Kalen explained.

"Your Highness, judging by his strange faceless appearance, I suspect he was an assassin specifically cultivated for this purpose."

Hearing this, Xia Mingyu fell into deep thought.

It was obvious that from the crazed Named Beast that appeared inexplicably in the William Territory to the Kelai merchant Erkes who brought the Twilight Tea and the faceless assassin, this series of events was definitely a conspiracy specifically targeting the Southern Region.

And there were not many forces in the entire Socia that had the ability to cultivate a Crescent Rank Demon Hunter, let alone turn them into a faceless being.

"Has that high and mighty Gluttony King finally reached the point where he can no longer tolerate the eyesore that is the Southern Region?"

Xia Mingyu immediately thought of the Gluttony King. After all, if the other party's goal was to create a famine in Socia, then the Southern Region, which was currently the only place in the country with abundant food, was undoubtedly a thorn in his side.

The moment he reached this conclusion, Xia Mingyu suddenly felt a heavy sense of urgency.

Even though he had already advanced to Morning Star Rank with dual identity and profession marks, and had a group of exceptionally talented companions with their own strengths, he was still too insignificant in the face of the Gluttony King, who possessed a dragon.

In this world, dragons were not as pathetic as in the fantasy novels of Blue Star, being labeled with difficulties in reproduction, five-colored evil dragons, being hunted by dragon slayers, etc.

Here, True Dragons were, without dispute, the synonym for the strongest martial power besides the gods.

Every True Dragon was born from the world itself; there were almost no examples of reproduction through flesh and blood.

Even the dragons born from the reproduction between True Dragons could not be called True Dragons; they could only be called Pseudo-Dragons.

From the moment of their birth, True Dragons were given names by the world, such as Valgalon, Ignio...

And the reason why True Dragons could be tied to the word "strongest" was that every True Dragon could naturally advance to the Seventh Rank, the Radiant Sun Rank, as time passed.

One must know that even if one searched through the entire long history of humanity, the number of people who could advance to the Seventh Rank remained very few; they were all world-renowned heroes, founding monarchs, top-tier mages, or great heroes of the Age of Gods.

In other words, the upper limit of humanity and even the vast majority of intelligent races was merely the lower limit of a True Dragon.

Besides that, because of their massive size, which started at hundreds of meters, and their dragon fire that destroyed everything, the destructive power of a True Dragon in the same rank far exceeded any humanoid race.

If an adult True Dragon wanted to, it could turn a city-state of one million people into a boiling sea of fire in just a few minutes.

The reason why Socia, Milan, and Rhine could become the great human nations on the Western Continent was that the most important point was that they all possessed a True Dragon.

Socia's "Molten Gold Fire" Valgalon, Milan's "Sky Thunder" Thorlila, and Rhine's "Hellfire Sin" Ignio.

These three True Dragons all had the record of destroying hundreds of thousands of troops single-handedly, allowing the three great kingdoms to inherit their power for hundreds of years even if they occasionally gave birth to incompetent monarchs like the Gluttony King.

Anyway, there was always a True Dragon to fall back on.

Xia Mingyu suspected that it was precisely because of this that the Gluttony King could come up with such a crazy policy as the food tax without worrying about being sent to the guillotine.

"Your Highness, in order to protect your safety, I will temporarily stay in Red Fox Castle," Kalen's words woke him from his deep thought.

"Little Haidun has just been born; don't you want to spend more time accompanying him as he grows up?"

"For a child, I think what he needs more is a father with more honor. When he grows up, he will naturally understand me."

Kalen smiled slightly.

What, what if he doesn't understand in the future?

Beat him up!

Where do you think that "Godson of the King" mark on your head came from? That was something your father I had to lick to get!

Tsk, you have to beat them early; otherwise, you probably won't be able to beat them when they grow up.

After Kalen left, Youde, with two dark circles under his eyes, arrived here, struggling to carry a box.

"Your Highness, this is the potion you wanted. I guarantee its effect will not disappoint you," Youde said, full of confidence, wiping the sweat from his forehead.

"Thank you for your hard work, Youde; I am looking forward to it."

Xia Mingyu replied while expectantly opening the box, which was filled with a full box of potions containing pale blue liquid.

This was the mana potion Youde had worked all night to finish after he asked if there was any potion that could quickly restore mana. It could allow mages and a group of Morning Star powerhouses to quickly restore mana, and it could also help beginners successfully meditate and feel mana.

Without the slightest hesitation, he picked up a bottle of mana potion, pulled out the stopper, and drank it in an instant.

The taste was unexpectedly good; it felt like drinking Genki Forest on Blue Star.

And the moment the potion entered his throat, Xia Mingyu clearly felt a cool sensation in his head, which had been foggy from exhausting his mana every day for the past few days, and he felt much more relaxed.

"The effect is very good, but..." Xia Mingyu frowned slightly; he could feel that his mana had only recovered less than one-tenth.

"Sage, but what?" Youde asked, his face full of nervousness.

"I need about fifteen bottles to fully restore the mana in my body," Xia Mingyu estimated, looking at the box full of potions in front of him.

He had originally thought this box of potions was quite a lot, but now it seemed it was only enough for him to recover his mana once or twice, and that was based on the premise that there was no drug resistance.

"Sage, after all, the amount of mana in your body is too much. If it were a mana potion of the normal standard on the market, I'm afraid thirty bottles wouldn't be enough to refill your mana," Youde said, spreading his hands helplessly.

Thirty bottles... how many times a day would he have to go to the washroom!

Xia Mingyu's mouth twitched, feeling it was necessary to improve the quality of the mana potion.

Otherwise, he was afraid his kidneys would have problems before he had produced enough food.

"Is there any way to make a single bottle of potion restore more mana?" Xia Mingyu asked.

Hearing this, Youde fell into deep thought. He opened the potion book he carried with him and looked at it for a long time before giving an answer.

"Sage, I think I have already reached the limit in terms of the method of preparing mana potions. If you want to improve the quality of the potion further, you can only start with the medicinal materials."

"The core medicinal material of the mana potion is the Ice Crystal Flower. This is a flower that only grows in extremely cold environments, and once it leaves the extremely cold environment, its medicinal properties will quickly fade."

"Even relying on your reputation, the Ice Crystal Flowers I use to prepare the potion are already the best quality in the entire Twilight City, but they only have forty percent of their complete medicinal properties."

"If I could get Ice Crystal Flowers with complete medicinal properties, I would be confident in increasing the quality of the mana potion by more than double," Youde said.

However, after giving this answer, a sense of powerlessness inevitably appeared on his face.

After all, after the traveling merchants picked the Ice Crystal Flowers in the Northern Region, they immediately put them into special ice cellars and then rushed to Twilight City as fast as they could, yet they could only retain forty percent of the medicinal properties.

If he wanted complete medicinal properties, he was afraid he would have to live in the Northern Region and refine them as soon as they were picked.

Ice Crystal Flower... Xia Mingyu recalled that when he was traveling in the Northern Region with Dorovai, he seemed to have seen small flowers with petals shaped like ice crystals in the snow. At that time, he even praised this kind of flower for being beautiful.

He took Youde's potion book and looked at the picture on it, confirming that the small flower was indeed the Ice Crystal Flower.

If he picked the Ice Crystal Flower in the Northern Region and put it into the connection space, and then took it out in Twilight City, would he be able to retain the complete medicinal properties?

"Youde, I will find a way regarding the Ice Crystal Flowers. You go back and get a good sleep first. Thank you for your hard work."

Looking at Youde, who was turning from a monkey into a panda, Xia Mingyu felt a bit of a guilty conscience for a moment. He took a few silver Sol coins from his pocket and gently put them into the other person's pocket.

"Being able to work for you is my lifelong honor and happiness. Please feel free to drive me in the future!" Youde answered like this.

After silently watching him leave, Xia Mingyu returned to the bedroom, lay on the soft big bed, and covered himself with the quilt.

"Starfire Connection, activate."

In an instant, his consciousness spun.

Northern Region.

On the endless snow-covered ground, a blue-haired, green-eyed knight girl and a white-haired woman walked side by side.

However, the knight girl seemed to be somewhat resistant to the woman, always silently pulling away, only to be immediately chased by the woman, who would giggle and affectionately hug her arm.

"Little Dorovai, where are we going~"

"Wow, this ear clip is very beautiful. Who gave it to you?"

"Little Dorovai, do you have a man you like? Tell me, sister will help you check him out. Also, doesn't wearing such tight clothes really affect your breast development?"

Listening to the witch's incessant questions in her ears, Dorovai only felt her brain buzzing, and for a moment, she had the urge to draw her sword and hack the other person to death.

(End of chapter)