Book 6: Chapter 365: Midnight Exploration Of The Manasvir Imperial Palace
Book 6: Chapter 365: Midnight Exploration Of The Manasvir Imperial Palace
In the capital of the Manassvir Empire, Macnadix City, Emperor Manas the Eighteenth was hosting a banquet for the Olsylvia Academy students who had advanced to the finals. The banquet in this Other World basically lasted from 5 pm to midnight, involving dinner and even supper. The evening banquet of the humans was already considered normal. Apparently, the Demon Continent’s banquets in the north started at five o’clock in the afternoon to five the next morning.
The other aristocratic banquets Bella had previously attended—for example, the latest banquet held at the Grand Duke Gould’s residence—were incomparable to the current one. The hall was so large, it could accommodate thousands of people. There was also a sumptuous spread prepared for the guests. Bella would have stayed and eaten more if something hadn’t piqued her interests.
Bella was extremely sensitive to the gazes of women. Earlier, she felt someone peeping at her from behind the pillar, and her intuition told her that it was most likely a girl. Unfortunately, whoever it was had left by the time Bella exited the hall. Bella was in a tough spot; the palace was so large that she could search all night and still find nothing unless she had an acquaintance to lead the way.
Bella’s departure didn’t arouse much attention. After all, she hid herself well. Even Kriss, who was sitting opposite her, failed to realize she was just pretending. Onlookers who watched from a distance couldn’t tell she was faking her stomachache either.
“Bella, would you like to… Oh, forget it, I’ll help you. That girl is a bit tricky. It doesn’t look like…”
“Noreya, I knew you could do it. Can you find our little peeping Tom?”
“Assassins who can’t even track their target can forget about staying in the Assassin’s Union. I have my own methods. Come with me.”
Fortunately, with the help of Assassin Noreya, Bella began tracking the girl through the palace. Although the palace of the Manassvir Empire was vast, there were few guards around. In fact, Bella hadn’t come across any other royal guards on patrol except for the Golden Armored Imperial Guards at the gates.
Not only were there few guards, but there were also no maids-in-waiting. It was almost as if all the maids in the palace were in the banquet hall. As the richest empire in the Human Continent, mountains of gold and silver treasures could be seen everywhere throughout the Manasvir Palace. Here, gold and silver had the same treatment as roadside sand and stones—cheap and casually thrown aside.
Aside from the gold and silver, all kinds of precious stones littered the floor like worthless counterfeits. From a visual inspection, Bella observed that the gems were all genuine. She couldn’t understand the practices of the Manasivir Empire’s royal family, like how the nouveau riche had trouble figuring out the ultra-wealthy elites.
With so many treasures, yet few guards, Bella wondered why the palace hadn’t been eyed by thieves. All they had to do was steal any random gem. However, unknown to Bella, places without guards were actually more dangerous than those with guards. The young thieves who sneaked into the palace hoping to steal treasures never went back. Whether they were alive or not remained a mystery.
After losing a lot of manpower, including the vice president and several elders, the Thieves’ Union was forced to declare the imperial palace of the Manasvir Empire a forbidden area for all thieves. They no longer sent their members in to die.
Therefore, Bella was lucky to have Assassin Noreya who had special tracking skills leading the way. Under Noreya’s guidance, she soon arrived at the edge of a larger platform. Her eyes fell upon the little peeping Tom. Two beautiful, exotic girls were fiddling with something on the table.
One of the beauties had long, emerald hair and emerald eyes and wore a translucent, green dress. Bella could easily see her naked body, especially those red “cherries” on her chest that almost gave her a nosebleed. Transparent clothes exposing their naked bodies, wasn’t this meant to seduce others into committing crimes?
The other girl, the one who previously peeped on Bella, gave her a flirtatious vibe. Her long hair was snow-white, but under the illumination of light, there seemed to be various colors and a beautiful luster flowing down her white hair. Like Queen Felan, she was able to change the color of her pupils and hair that draped over her body.
To Bella’s excitement, this beautiful girl obviously understood people’s hearts better than her companion with emerald green eyes and hair. The latter was wearing a gauzy dress that covered her attractive, charming body, but the former only wore a matching set of gem lingerie that showed off her curves. She even went without the gauzy slip.
The gem lingerie against her beautiful white hair seemed to have a strange harmony, as if the girl was born to wear this.
Due to Bella’s sudden appearance, the dragon horns on their heads had yet to be hidden by magic. The unique fragrance belonging to dragon beauties exposed their identities: They were the enemies of the Crystal Dragon Princess—the Gem Dragon and the Demonic Emerald Dragon.
The Gem Dragon and Demonic Emerald Dragon had tall and slender bodies, with measurements close to the golden ratio and moderately-sized breasts, not large but big enough to fill her palms. As her thoughts drifted to the purple-haired Crystal Dragon loli, Demon King Bella started to picture the three dragons’ fight to the death. Three beautiful, exotic girls wrestling with each other was truly a sight for sore eyes.
Nonetheless, Bella was surprised by the appearance of the Gem Dragon and Demonic Emerald Dragon. These two beautiful yet powerful girls were secretly eating here regardless of their appearances. Using cognitive impairment magic, the Gem Dragon had obviously sneaked into the banquet hall to steal food. It allowed the humans to ignore the beautiful girl dressed only in gem lingerie, who was so seductive, she could induce them to commit crimes. Since Bella wasn’t human, cognitive impairment magic was useless on her.
Out of curiosity, the Gem Dragon peeked at Bella. Unexpectedly, she was discovered and tracked all the way here. Right now, the Gem Dragon was carrying delicious food in her arms while the Demonic Dragon had already begun eating. She tore a drumstick off the golden roast chicken in front of her and tucked in.
Having been caught red-handed, the girls froze in place. Assassin Noreya had entered stealth mode in advance. This scene was too embarrassing for her to handle. It was better left to Bella, who was more experienced.
The room fell into silence as Bella stared at the arms of the two pretty but greedy dragon girls. The Gem Dragon had the same queen’s mark as the Thunder Dragon, while the Demonic Emerald Dragon’s mark resembled the Purple Crystal Dragon’s. Bella was rather baffled. These two weren’t low in status, so why steal food?
“Your Majesty, Your Highness, why sneak food from the banquet… If you really have nothing to eat, you can count on me to provide for—I mean to fill your tummies.”
“No… I wasn’t sneaking. I was rightfully taking food. Oh, it’s all your fault. There’s something wrong with the cognitive impairment magic you used on me. Now we’ve been discovered… She told me to do it!”
“How can you blame me? You were obviously so slow that you were discovered by her. It’s because you’re so stupid! My magic works fine!”
Bella casually found a place to sit and chat with the girls. She initially assumed the Gem Dragon and Demonic Emerald Dragon would be difficult to get along with. But after conversing with the two, she discovered that they were actually just adorable foodies, simpler than the Thunder Dragon Queen and Crystal Dragon Princess. The Demonic Emerald Dragon was too afraid to sneak food out of the banquet hall, so she cast the cognitive impairment magic on the Gem Dragon instead.
Since Bella had taken in quite a few beautiful dragon girls, she had begun to take on the breath of a dragon. Thus, other dragons sensed their own kind in her and shared an inexplicable intimacy. This was the case with the Gem Dragon and Crystal Dragon as well. The sense of closeness she felt towards Bella gave her the courage to share some of her secrets.
She only hunted the Crystal Dragon after being ordered by her master. They couldn’t reveal anything since their master was monitoring them the entire time. This palace was under the control of another master, so they couldn’t be under observation all the time. Only then did they reveal their natural form. Because of the special master-slave contract, the Gem Dragon and Demonic Emerald Dragon couldn’t even share their real names with Bella, much less their master’s identity.
Although they often thought about changing masters, their master was so powerful that they couldn’t break free. However, from their conversation, Bella managed to obtain an important piece of information: There were two people behind the scenes, which should be Creator Gods from other planes. Upon noticing the disappearance of the original Creator God of this plane, they wanted to take advantage of the situation.
Like the Divine Creator God Bella once fought, the two Creator Gods who dominated from behind the scenes should also be attached to human substitute bodies in this Other World, using these bodies to control everything. In that case, Bella had the opportunity to drive these Creator Gods back to their original plane by killing their substitute bodies, much like her previous attack on the Divine Creator God.
As long as she could ascertain what kind of Creator Gods these two were and what abilities they had, she would know how to deal with them. After saying goodbye to the Demonic Emerald Dragon and Gem Dragon, Bella and Assassin Noreya, who had been in a stealth mode, left the rooftop. They left the two foodies with their delicious food.
In fact, Bella wanted to take the girls away with her. Unfortunately, she could only temporarily put away that idea because of the damn master-slave contract. The Gem Dragon and Demonic Emerald Dragon were precious and scarce varieties in the legends of the human knights. Once she found a way to break their master-slave contract, she would return for them.
On the way back, the palace was still as quiet as before. Compared to the excitement at the Emperor’s banquet, the rest of the palace was somewhat cold and deserted.
Bella had no plans to continue exploring for the time being, mainly because she was short of hands now. Although she already knew the location of the Empress’s bedroom from Empress Manya, it wouldn’t be easy to find it in the dead of night.
According to Bella’s latest intelligence, the places without any Royal Guards were areas where a large number of demons were hidden. If she wasn’t careful, she might be exposed to strange creatures.
At a certain corner, Bella bumped into the fake princes of the Manasvir Empire. Under the lure of their good looks, quite a few inexperienced beauties were seduced by them. They were beautiful girls who wore pink roses, probably virgins.
Experienced beauties, those with deep red roses on their chests, basically refused to hook up with the princes. It wasn’t about the price, but the aftermath. The risk of dealing with the royal family was much greater than the nobles. If they weren’t careful, they might be killed. Moreover, the royal family had their fair share of women and would soon get tired of the old once they were done playing with them. In view of the long term, they weren’t as good targets as the nobles.
Bella and Assassin Noreya were hidden behind a pillar, so the princes didn’t notice them. In truth, it was difficult for the beauties who wanted to climb the ranks. In recent years, with the rise of the Philosophers and the Fraternity, most of the royal children of the Human Empire had either joined the Philosopher’s camp or both sides in a winner-takes-all mentality. These beauties sometimes paled in comparison to men!
It was tough to meet princes who were looking for beautiful girls. Hence, most of these inexperienced beauties were easily fooled. They didn’t even know where these fake princes were leading them to.
Upon careful observation of the princes under the light, Bella could see they were all ferocious demons. Unfortunately, those beautiful girls who indulged in this easy-to-reach splendor hadn’t noticed the fatal trap at all.
The fake princes now looked like winners in life, with a beautiful girl in each arm, followed by several others. If they were humans, Bella would let them go, but they weren’t. Thus, she planned to intervene since she just might benefit from all this. At least, she wouldn’t have attended the banquet in vain.
“Noreya, please sneak in and meet Kriss. Take her out of here first. I want to follow them and find out where these fake princes came from.”
“Bella… don’t force yourself. I’ll join you immediately after meeting up with Kriss. Be careful. Although your strength isn’t a problem, you’re not an assassin, after all. Your ability to track others…”
Bella decided to follow them. Among the girls who went with the fake princes, several were beautiful presenters of the magic broadcast during the tournament. Although they were students from the Antoinette Academy next door and had no intersection with Bella’s academy, she was worried that these beautiful presenters would be made into puppets. Due to certain reasons, she had to control these presenters.
Bella took out her invisibility cloak from her storage ring and put it on. Then, holding her breath, she stealthily walked in the direction of the princes. Assassin Noreya had left a special tracking mark on Bella before, so it wouldn’t be difficult for Kriss and her to meet up with Bella later.
Outside the secret hall somewhere in the Imperial Palace of Macnadix City, the capital of the Manasvir Empire. The layout seemed to suggest it was the royal kitchen and imperial dining hall. Bella almost missed this place while she was following the princes.
In Bella’s opinion, the kitchen shouldn’t be of interest. However, the half-open door aroused her suspicions. She leaned over and took a sneak peek at the scene in the kitchen under the faint light. At a glance, she could tell there was something wrong.
Despite the kitchen sign hanging at the entrance, this wasn’t a kitchen at all. Instead, it was more like a dark slaughterhouse, with all kinds of bloody chains and metal hooks hanging from the ceiling. The rich scent of blood assaulted her nose, nauseating Bella. With how strong the smell of blood was, it was apparent many people had died here over more than ten years.
Those beautiful girls were most likely in trouble. Bella stared at an area under the metal hooks. There were blurry figures covered with blood spirits formed from the mutation of the countless murdered victims. At the sight of them, Bella was tempted to turn tail. These blood spirits weren’t powerful, but they looked extremely frightening, the type that could scare a person to death even if it couldn’t kill you.
While Bella hesitated, a white figure floated past her, almost bumping into Bella, who was in stealth mode. Upon turning to look at what it was, she discovered it was Emperor Manas the Eighteenth, whom she had seen in the banquet hall earlier. Since Bella was invisible, she managed to escape her enemy’s discovery.
Emperor Manas the Eighteenth now showed his true colors, unlike the amiable old man she saw in the banquet hall. Like a corpse that had been rotting for a long time, he reeked all over. Bella endured the urge to vomit and carefully observed him. In the end, she determined that the emperor was a fake. He was a corpse-type demon covered with the skin of the real emperor. The real emperor had already turned into bones, and the skin might have been stripped off and used.
Behind the fake emperor was a large group of royal family members, who were also imposters draped in human skin. On every demon’s shoulder was a gray bag that seemed to contain something alive. Bella couldn’t tell its contents for the time being.
Upon seeing this group of demons, the blood spirits disappeared due to fear. After donning the equipment she had put in her storage ring, Bella went after them.