"Let's have a chat, shall we, Rael?"

Perfect. Of course.

Because apparently fate thought that dropping me from several thousand kilometers in the air wasn't dramatic enough and now I had to deal with this immediately after.

I looked up at the woman standing before me.

Morvana.

Mother of Arza Ashen Noctharion.

Respected principal of Noxvalen Academy.

And, apparently, my newest headache.

Her shoulder-length white hair swayed gently in the wind and her deep violet eyes glowed with amusement.

Yeah. That word again.

I swear, I am starting to hate the damn word "amusement."

Why is everyone always amused by me?

I mean, sure, I get it, being this handsome has its side effects, but come on, isn't it a bit much when everyone treats me like some walking toy?

Fuck them.

Honestly, I am so done playing to their amusement like a pawn in someone else's twisted little game.

But this cursed strength and this situation of mine… it keeps forcing my hand. Still, I am so damn tired of this shit. Sometimes, I just want to give up.

Just stop fighting the insanity for once.

But then again… human ego is cursed too.

Especially mine, the one roughly the size of the cosmos. It never lets me give up in peace.

But that doesn't mean I have to play by their rules anymore. If that damn Demon King and that smug bastard Trickster think they can keep pulling my strings, then fine.

I will show them what it means to toy with me.

Sure, I'm weak right now. Pathetically weak, even.

But I've got something neither of them has, an advantage only I can use and maybe… it's time I start using it.

As for that bastard Escanor, yeah, he can't do shit to me right now. He is not the scheming type anyway which means my family was safe for now as well.

Especially since Escanor treated my grandfather like family after all, the old man was his teacher.

At most, he will poke around a bit and maybe try to dig into my past or in worst case, he will try dragging me back to the Human Empire to "find out" why the Demon King took interest in me.

But even that won't work because Ashavar sure as hell isn't letting me go that easily.

So, I raised my head and met Morvana's gaze.

She was smiling at me, that soft, knowing smile people wear right before they decide whether to toy with you or kill you.

"Hello, Ms. Morvana," I said evenly. "I was waiting for you."

My voice was calm, layered with just enough amusement to make it sound sincere.

And, of course, my signature smile stayed right where it belonged on my face.

The Demon King wanted to play with me? Fine. I will play with him too and the first thing I'll do… is steal his wife.

…Okay, that sounded wrong.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not interested in married women. Hell, I would rather die than break the only promise I ever made to my father from previous life.

What I meant by stealing his wife was stealing her trust.

I meant that figuratively, not literally.

I am not about to start a homewrecking arc, thank you very much.

Not that Morvana was even legally married to the Demon King, she was more like… a tool he used to produce an heir. Still, hard pass.

If I ever fall in love, I would want someone just as crazy as me, not some mature lady who could probably erase me with a glare.

Though I doubt I would ever fall in stupid shit like love but oh well, life is unpredictable.

In any case, Morvana wasn't just some ordinary woman. She was the Matriarch of one of the eight main clans of the entire Demon Realm.

The main clans, those that had inherited the blood of the Primordial Kings.

Long before Ashavar's rule, the demons were nothing more than eight warring barbaric tribes.

It was said that each tribe had once received the grace of ancient Gods… beings they called "Kings."

And then came Ashavar.

He united them all, forged the chaos into a single domain and established the foundation of what became the Demon Realm.

In his first life, he crowned himself the First Demon King and made the eight tribal leaders the heads of their respective families—the Eight Great Clans.

That much was common knowledge. It showed up in every half-decent history book about the Demon Realm.

Hell, there was even a movie about it in the human domain, a dramatic, over-the-top masterpiece about the so-called "Great Demon-Human War."

Naturally, it painted humans as the noble saviors of the world and demons as the vile monsters who needed to be "cleansed."

But the truth was a bit different.

Back then, humans used to hunt demons, not for justice or peace but for profit. Their blood, their bones and their hearts were used to craft elixirs and potions.

Naturally, all of that got erased from history. Ashavar made sure of it during his first reign. He erased every family which had the knowledge about those elixirs.

These days, most people don't even know that humans once ate demons like they were some kind of exotic drug.

Ahh, fuck, I got distracted again.

So, yeah, Morvana was the matriarch of one of the eight ruling clans of the Demon Empire. Her clan had been the one supervising Noxvalen Academy

for countless generations, since the damn beginning, actually.

And her power was easily second or third in the entire realm.

…Or at least top ten.

I don't exactly keep a ranking chart.

But yeah, she was strong… strong enough to keep the vultures at bay, the ones already circling and waiting for a chance to rip me apart before I even graduate.

Because the Demon King hadn't just made an announcement. He had thrown down a challenge at me.

He had said I would be eligible for the throne of the Demon Realm… if I graduated successfully.

A perfectly worded and beautifully subtle threat as if he were daring me to try and survive long enough to claim it.

And it wasn't just a challenge for me.

No, this was aimed at every one of his so-called successors in Noxvalen… and the vultures backing them.

"If you can't even take down a puny handsome human, then you don't deserve my throne."

That was his message.

A single sentence that turned the entire academy, hell, maybe even the whole Demon Realm, into my personal death trap but that's what made it exciting.

Yeah, sure… It was stupidly dangerous but it made my blood pump and for the first time in a while, I actually felt alive.

I don't know if this was my true feeling or if the Trickster's blood in me was just thrilled by the chaos.

But honestly, who cares at this point.

I am an Arcane Trickster, there's no denying it now.

So I might as well embrace it… with love.

I looked up at the still-confused Morvana.

"But this isn't exactly the best place to talk, is it?"

I said softly, my smile as bright as I could make it. "Too many ears around."

Yeah… that was a lie. Like hell I could actually sense anyone peeking around. But if Morvana was here, I was sure a few of those shit-shot voyeurs would be lurking too.

So I just threw the words out there because honestly, it didn't matter if anyone was listening or not.

The first rule of any negotiation was to establish your place. If you sound too submissive from the start, the deal is as good as dead.

And from the way Morvana had spread her mana the moment she arrived, I was sure there were a few lurkers hiding around.

So, I used that knowledge… her knowledge, to establish myself as someone who wasn't a clueless idiot and that alone was a plus.

Because the real negotiations were only just beginning.

—

Morvana studied the boy before her, and as he had said, there were indeed a few individuals eavesdropping nearby.

Ordinarily, she would have made them pay for such insolence.

But even she was bound by politics and there were some things one couldn't simply erase without consequence.

What surprised her, though, was the boy himself.

From the way he greeted her, it was as if he had expected her… as if he had already predicted her arrival.

She had come here because the Demon King had suddenly declared the boy his successor, right in front of her and now, she wanted to know why.

What did the King see in this human?

Why did he make the decision all of a sudden?

She was a curious woman by nature and if she couldn't find the reason behind something, she would never rest easy.

And for the sake of that restless curiosity, she had come here to meet him but as the boy had said… this was not the place to talk.

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