Chapter 640: The Palace and the New Song

Another week slipped by in the blink of an eye.

Rod pushed off the ghoul Pan Ni, who was sprawled across him.

After a whole night of roughhousing last night, this one had clearly been dead asleep, yet while sleeping she insisted on biting Rod's shoulder as if trying to tear off a chunk of meat.

Just hilarious.

Rod gently picked up the tree spirit Vivian, who was curled up on the bed, and fished out the pants pinned beneath her bottom.

Then he peeled off the tiefling Sehir and the female beastman Amy, who were clinging to his thighs and refusing to let him go, before finally managing to escape the room.

He stepped out to the corner by the door.

Rod spotted Tally, curled up asleep in the corner.

This one was willing to host the 【Extreme Bliss Party】, but no longer took part herself.

Every time she would stay just one door away, facing the wall with her ears covered, playing dead.

Rod squatted down and poked her cheek.

Collagen maxed out, soft and springy.

This week's attempt to re-seduce the succubus still failed, though you could say there was some progress.

After all, she'd gone from passing out the moment her top was stripped, to dropping dead the instant her pants came off.

At least simple contact was now possible—holding hands and the like.

Rod felt he'd been a bit too soft on the current Tally.

His longing for the old Tally had also reached a fairly high level.

"How about just giving it a try while she's asleep?"

No sooner said than done.

Rod tossed the pants he hadn't yet put on to the floor, and cradled Tally's slender back in his arms.

She was wearing a rather conservative long nightgown, not easy to strip off.

So Rod simply flipped it up.

Mm.

Rod sighed.

Sure enough, she wasn't the old Tally anymore.

The old Tally could start the battle within three seconds of meeting him—one second would have been more than enough.

"Mmnn—"

Tally let out a soft, coquettish moan in her sleep and curled up even tighter.

Moving on.

All in all, a succubus's body always gave one an appetite.

Even though her flat, childlike figure didn't quite match Rod's tastes.

Of course—

Things clearly couldn't go that smoothly.

"Click—"

The villa's door was pushed open, accompanied by the light tapping of hooves on the wooden floor.

Rod, who had his head down, saw a broad swath of white sunlight pour into the living room on the other side of the partition wall.

"I-I'm not worried about you going hungry at all! If Watching Yuna hadn't begged me to come over, I-I'd never set foot in your filthy room, not even if I died!"

The half-deer girl Miss Xiao Ke hadn't even appeared yet, but her tsundere voice had already drilled into his ears.

She crossed over the partition, her graceful figure carrying a tray, and arrived at the false door between the living room and the kitchen.

And so she naturally caught sight of the scene of Rod pressing Tally down on the table and going at it.

Rod let go: "Would you believe me if I said I was having breakfast?"

"Aaaaaaaaaah!!!!"

"Wh-why aaaaaaaah—"

Tally was woken by the screaming.

Groggy, she looked up, saw the position she and Rod were in, and let out a shy shriek of her own.

Then she passed out on the spot.

"Miss Xiao Ke. Good morning."

At that moment—

Vivian, who had woken up at some unknown point, pushed open the bedroom door, stark naked, her figure lithe and lovely, and walked out dripping wet.

Screams bloomed ever louder through the room.

"Pervert! Scum! Stinking dog shit! Horny dog!"

Miss Xiao Ke, tears in her eyes, hugged the unconscious Tally and the half-asleep Vivian, sheltering them in her arms, and shrank pitifully and fragilely into a corner.

Although the succubus had teased her plenty of times.

Tally's appearance after taking the Desire-Severing Pill had triggered her maternal instincts, making her unable to resist wanting to protect her.

As for Rod—

After finishing breakfast, he was promptly kicked out of Henry Farm Villa.

No big deal.

He had to head to Coral Bay anyway—pink-haired siren Reef had something to discuss.

After that, it would be time to keep his appointment with the star-spirit Hayley.

The shore of Coral Bay.

The cloud spirit Layla·Star Speech kicked a roadside pebble in frustration.

"What gives, it's not like I want to be unable to write a new song, I need inspiration too! Stinking Camille, always rushing me for manuscripts!"

She wore the cropped hunter trousers currently in fashion in Coral Bay's Shi Ying Town, exposing her delicate, fair knees and calves.

Her upper body, on the other hand, was wrapped in a tightly fitted long-sleeved hooded garment, making it impossible to tell what she looked like.

She couldn't stand Camille's nagging and had snuck out for a stroll.

It wasn't long since dawn; in the distance one could see ships docked at the pier, with workers bustling tensely.

The stretch of coast where she stood had few people and was closer to the commercial street.

It was noticeably cleaner and tidier, clearly having been repaired.

"I heard this place is going to be turned into an open beach later, for people to play in the water during summer. Wonder how they'll deal with the sea monsters when the time comes."

The ocean's unknowns were more terrifying than the land's; very few people on the continent were willing to travel to the seaside for fun.

Layla gazed at the boundless ocean in the distance and felt inexplicably low.

The unwritten new song still echoed in her mind, like a storybook novel cut off mid-sentence, an unimaginable continuation.

"Layla? Is that you, Sister Layla?"

At that moment, an excited voice came from behind her.

Fans again, everywhere and always.

Sometimes she couldn't help missing the days before she was famous—at least she didn't have this constant feeling of being watched.

Layla sighed inwardly, but had already immediately switched on her working smile.

She turned her head with a graceful flourish.

"Good morning~~"

The moment the words left her mouth, she nearly froze.

Before her stood a slovenly man, travel-worn and dust-covered, wearing a patched-up mage's robe.

He strode forward, waving his arms in excessive excitement, eyes wide, pupils dilated.

"I'm in luck! I can't believe I ran into you the moment I arrived at Coral Bay! May I record, Sister Layla?"

"Ah, sorry, our company doesn't allow recording stones with just the two of us alone."

"Then can I hold your hand? I love you, Sister Layla, I go to every single one of your concerts."

Layla took half a step back.

Forcing herself to stay calm: "Thank you for the support, sorry, I still have some things to do, I have to go."

"Go?"

The man's smile suddenly twisted.

"Why didn't you reply to my letter? Sister Layla, why did you throw away my letter? You said you'd love your fans forever."

The smile froze on Layla's face; a flash of silver-white blade light swept before her eyes.

She instantly recalled the threatening letter from not long ago.

And Layla herself actually had rather poor aptitude, and she had chosen the path of musical instrument and song—hardest among cloud spirits to advance—and in the early stages she had almost no combat ability.

She instinctively reached for the necklace around her neck—a protective magic treasure she usually kept on her.

She grasped at empty air.

Layla realized in horror that she had snuck out and hadn't brought anything with her at all.

The blade flashed; a slit opened in Layla's outer garment, revealing snow-white skin.

"Don't be afraid, Sister Layla, soon we'll never be apart again."

"No—"

*Smack! *

A large hand had reached in at some unknown moment, gripping the dagger as it swung again.

The dagger was as if it had suddenly been fused into a massive rock—no matter how the man wrenched at it, it stayed utterly motionless, frozen in midair.

"What's going on? Playing with that sort of thing in my territory?"

Layla·Star Speech looked up in astonishment and saw a tall man with hard, chiseled features and excessively handsome looks appear at her side.

A gradient-gold long sword and a porcelain-white long sword hung at his belt, giving off hardly any magical fluctuation, looking utterly unremarkable.

Yet this very person radiated an overwhelming, weighty presence; one glance was enough to know he was no ordinary man.

"It's you!?"

She cried out joyfully.

The memory of singing for the dragon-slaying squad in Deep Water City surged up—the face of the man who had rushed onto the stage and squeezed out the fierce bomb hidden in the backdrop overlapped with the person before her.

"Who the hell are you! Get lost! She's my girlfriend!"

"Look at the state of you, a wild mage—you think you qualify?"

Rod twisted the man's arm back hard; the dagger instantly slipped free of his grip.

With a light toss upward, he caught the hilt in a backhand grip and, with a *puchi*, drove it into the man's waist.

The man didn't react at all.

Not until the searing pain reached his brain did he let out a scream, clutching his wound and turning to flee.

But under the agony, after only two steps he slowly collapsed, drained of strength, bleeding as he weakly cried for help.

"Ah! You can't just kill him like that!"

Layla shouted in panic.

She tried to reach for the magic stone to contact her manager Camille—and again grasped at empty air.

Rod, however, looked at her coldly: "Layla·Star Speech, right? I didn't intend to save you, but in Coral Bay I have no choice. Behave yourself until the concert is over."

"But you're killing people! How can you, as a lord, just kill someone on a whim?"

Leila hurriedly grabbed his clothes, refusing to let him go.

Rod had no intention of paying her any attention. He pushed her aside without the slightest courtesy and strode toward the sea.

Beside the reef was the siren sea-demon Ref, who had long been waiting there.

As always, her pink hair fluttered, her peach-blossom face and crimson lips radiating an intoxicating allure.

She licked her lips and, watching the man on the beach who was about to die, swallowed a mouthful of saliva.

The seawater rose and fell at her chest, carrying with it the rise and fall of her fleshy mounds.

"Lord Rod, why don't I just eat him for you?"

"Cut the nonsense. What did you call me here for?"

Ref shrank her neck, not daring to talk back.

Obediently, she explained: "Our sisters discovered a large palace in some sea trench. There are clearly more Mutant sirens there, and also a large number of Sahar fish-men. We didn't dare go in."

"A palace? Discovered? You've lived in the Monster Sea for so many years, and you still need to 'discover' something?"

"Isn't that so? We found it strange too. I used to go to that trench often, but there was no palace. It was as if it had popped up out of nowhere. Ah, my lord, that big star is coming over."

"You know her too?"

"Of course. We often sing her songs to lure people into the sea."

"."

Leila Star-Tongue walked over hesitantly.

Just as she was about to speak, she caught sight of the incomparably gorgeous pink-haired siren by the reef—and the hateful fat on her chest—and couldn't help being startled.

Her savior Rod, who had rescued her twice in a row, wore an indifferent expression, showing not the slightest guilt over killing.

Under the sea breeze, the light of the rising sun fell upon the two of them.

A handsome man and a beautiful woman.

The bewitching siren, her beautiful eyes raised and her face full of grievance; the cold, heavy-hearted, ruthless lord of the underworld.

Watching this scene.

Leila Star-Tongue couldn't help being stunned.

The inspiration that had stalled in her mind for a long time began to turn once more.

A new song depicting a love between different races, born to oppose each other and unable to unite, gradually took shape.

(End of this chapter)