As I left the headmistress’s room, my first direction was the walls, and saw soldiers and mages, trying to mobilize for battle.

Though, if I didn’t know better, I would have thought that they were trying to reenact the actions of a bunch of headless chickens as the mobilization efforts failed utterly. Even as I watched, one soldier carried a bundle of food to a pile, but the moment he put it down, another soldier arrived and carried it back.

Yet, not even for a moment, I attributed that to incompetence. The guards of Silver Spires were not the greatest, but they were far from the level of casual incompetency they had been displaying.

There was one thing that could easily explain the situation. Conflicting orders.

Guessing the source of those conflicting orders was even easier. The spies were acting even more brazen.

I sighed even as I leaned back against the wall, pinching the bridge of my nose as if the pain would help me come to a decision faster.

It wasn’t the existence of the spies that surprised me. I knew of their existence for a long, long time, but I didn’t focus on cleaning them. A part of that decision was about the lack of time. I always had more important things to focus on.

Yet, another part had been the use of their existence. I was confident to hide my own actions and the full extent of my power from those spies, and in that case, those spies actually turned into a liability against the enemy.

As long as they survived, the enemy was under the impression that they knew what was going on. The moment those spies were lost, they would know the existence of an unpredictable factor, and start reacting accordingly.

It was that fact that was troubling me even at the moment, making it a difficult decision.

I paused a moment, letting my mind focus on all the attack reports I had collected, trying to factor in the spies acting without the fear of getting caught.

“What’s the point of trying to keep the cards hidden,” I decided. I wasn’t sure the enemy was finally using their full capabilities, but without a doubt, they were using enough force to reveal a considerable portion of the capabilities I had been hiding, enough to show them their spies had been useless for a long time.

Cleaning the spies was not hard, but it was time-intensive work, especially doing it in a way without creating a big crisis. It would have ruined my plans…

If I didn’t have a convenient assistant, with abilities and capabilities that were perfect for the task. I paused for a moment to change my outfit to the mysterious man, then I stopped by Mariel’s office to take something that would help immensely during my next step…

Before I moved toward the Royal Quarters.

With my growing familiarity, passing through the wards had been trivial, just as it was trivial for me to avoid the soldiers moving in hurriedly. Unlike the soldiers outside, they were moving with speed and precision as I saw Delia incarnation of the princess raining orders on them.

A soft caress of mana showed that it was not the princess that was disguised, but controlling remotely.

They were mobilizing, but it looked like the princess was preparing to leave rather than defend. She clearly saw what I saw with the spies, and decided that the smartest thing was to draw her own path.

It was indeed smart, but directly against my objectives. I decided to give her a better option.

The connection between the puppet and the princess was subtle, but not subtle enough to make it difficult for me to actually track her. I quickly moved, and found the princess alone, her gaze shut.

I stood in front of her, easily avoiding her wards to stand in front of her, and tapped her head. “Wake up, sleepyhead,” I said cheerfully as she jerked in fear, which was justified, as I could have easily killed her.

She was able to suppress her fear quickly as she noticed the identity of her attacker. “G-good morning, sir,” she managed to say, delivering it perfectly after the slight hitch in her tone at the beginning. “How can I help you?”

Her eyes were interesting, reflecting anger and fear in equal amounts, with a dash of arousal sprinkled in. Clearly, my earlier visit had left a mark.

“I’m here to offer you a deal,” I said, which made her eyebrow quirk considering my word selection. “Yes, you are free to reject if you want, with no consequences,” I added.

“I trust you, sir,” she said, though I could see her disbelief, which was not entirely inaccurate. Luckily for her, I was actually telling the truth, and actually wanted to entice her rather than forcing her.

After all, I didn’t know just how long this struggle would take, and it was much easier to trust her if she was fighting for an amazing reward rather than being forced. Especially with the delicate nature of the task, I was going to assign to her.

“Good, I’m sure you noticed the little scuffle that was going on outside as those annoying flies decided to target my cute junior,” I said, then reached to caress her cheek, making her tremble with the sudden pleasure, the small trick I used letting her skin flare with pleasure.

“Yes, I did, sir,” she said, but didn’t comment further.

“That is giving me a bit of a problem. You see, I don’t want to intervene directly and show her my lack of trust, but I also don’t want her to fail.” I made a show of shuddering. “You see, I don’t want her to get sad.” She nodded. “That’s where you come in. You’re going to help her to the best of your abilities, and make sure the school doesn’t collapse under attack.”

She stood still for a moment, giving me a chance to continue before finally speaking. “And, since you said that you’ll give me an option, I’m assuming there’s a reward,” she said, softly yet confidently.

Just not confident enough to hide the fear she was feeling. Still, I was impressed. It was not as easy to actually challenge someone with such a power imbalance, and it was even harder to do so with the soft manner she had done.

Her political instincts were truly impeccable, which made me confident about the next task.

“I’ll have two tasks for you, and as a reward, I’ll have two rewards,” I said as I put my hand on her shoulder. “The first task is the simple one. I want to you stay in Silver Spires, and help my junior direct the defensive efforts, and the resettlement of the refugees,” I said.

“Refugees? What refugees?” she asked.

“There will be a general retreat, but it’ll probably take a while to be declared officially, but start preparing for it. As a princess, you have the reputation and required the ability to actually command that many people,” I said.

“And the reward?” she asked.

“The thing you want,” I answered.

“The throne,” she murmured in fascination.

“Exactly, the lesser reward is the throne,” I said.

“L-lesser reward,” she stammered. Her emotions started from anger, which I didn’t take seriously considering my words could easily be taken as an insult to her family. Then, it clicked with her that, when someone as strong as I was displaying had the qualifications to position that. “And, what do I need to do for the greater reward?”

I looked toward the window with obvious distaste. “This place is infested with annoying cockroaches that are constantly troubling my junior, and management is not her forte. I want you to get rid of all those annoying bugs that feed information to others, no matter which organization. Guilds, other princes, royal family … and most importantly, those annoyances that dare to call themselves Eternal, even if they spawn like frogs and die as easy as flies,” I said, deliberately letting my tone fill with emotion.

Yet, I deliberately showed annoyance rather than hate, showing that it was just the numbers that troubled me, and not the power they represented. It wasn’t true, of course, but the more the princess believed my power, the more committed she would be to proving herself.

“I can do that, but it would not be easy. I will make too many enemies,” she said, but this time, she didn’t mention a reward. Smart.

“Second reward is very simple. I’ll give you power enough to make it very problematic to actually exact revenge,” I said.

She looked at me, clearly unconvinced. But even as she opened her mouth, I leaned and captured her lips, flooding her body with mana.

For some of it, I used my simple trick and gave her as Experience. It was enough to make her eyes widen, as she was already at her modest level cap of six, which was particularly bad for someone in her position.

Of course, her abilities with the Darkness spark allowed her to compensate for that, but if there was no need to compensate, things would have been much more different.

[-1380 Mana]

[+1 Tantric]

I didn’t have the luxury to spend mana, but it had been a long while since I had been leveling up someone that weak, and the efficiency was simply impressive. In a moment, she had climbed to level ten, gaining four levels.

“I-impossible,” she gasped as I pulled back.

“Oh, if you think that’s impossible, I wonder what you’ll say about this,” I said as I leaned again, amused that, this time, she had jumped to meet me halfway. But this time, my mana didn’t target the borders of the soul space, but the little corner that was hiding the Darkness Spark.

[Level: 36 Experience: 631374 / 666000

Strength: 46 Charisma: 63

Precision: 40 Perception: 42

Agility: 40 Manipulation: 45

Speed: 39 Intelligence: 49

Endurance: 39 Wisdom: 51

HP: 7334 / 7334 Mana: 7821 / 9000 ]

SKILLS

Grandmaster Tantric [115/140]

Master Melee [100/100]

Master Biomancy [100/100]

Master Elemental [100/100]

Master Arcana [100/100]

Master Subterfuge [100/100]

Master Craft [85/100]

Expert Speech [75/75]

PERKS

Mana Regeneration

Skill Share

Empowerment (0/1)

Teleportation

COMPANIONS

[Titania – Level 35/38]

[Cornelia – Level 22/26]

[Helga – Level 22/26]

[Marianne – Level 21/29]