Chapter 557: Chapter-557
The heavy wooden doors were kicked open. Samuel burst into the room, followed by four exhausted, terrified servants who were struggling to carry massive, overflowing piles of the most obnoxious, violently colorful silk robes Heena had ever seen in her life.
"Wife, you have to help me!" Samuel whined loudly, his voice echoing across the courtyard for all the hidden spies to hear. He bounded over to her, holding up a bright, gaudy neon-green tunic and a blindingly yellow sash.
"Which one of these makes me look more romantic for the banquet?!" Samuel complained, pouting dramatically as he draped the neon green silk over his shoulder. "I want the Emperor to look at me and think, ’Ah, what a beautiful, devastatingly handsome husband the Vanguard Madam has!’"
Heena stared at him, her eye twitching. The sheer audacity of his acting was almost too much to bear this early in the morning.
"Get out," Heena commanded, glaring at the servants. "Leave the clothes and get out of my sight."
The servants instantly dropped the colorful silks on the floor and bolted from the room, pulling the doors tightly shut behind them.
The second the doors clicked shut, the loud, obnoxious idiot completely vanished.
Samuel dropped the neon green silk onto a chair. The exaggerated pout melted into a mask of pure, lethal calculation. He stepped directly into Heena’s personal space, his towering frame casting a shadow over her.
Under the guise of reaching up to gently adjust her gold-embroidered collar, he leaned down. His lips were just inches from her ear.
"The rat took the bait," Samuel whispered, his voice dropping into a freezing, gravelly baritone that sent a shiver down Heena’s spine. "But it didn’t go to the Prime Minister’s estate."
Heena kept her face perfectly neutral, playing her part flawlessly. She swatted his hand away from her collar with feigned annoyance, but stepped closer, tilting her head to listen. "Where did it go?" she breathed.
"The Imperial Palace," Samuel murmured, his dark eyes locking onto hers. "The Head Royal Physician. He tested the poison on a rabbit. It works perfectly."
Heena’s breath hitched, her blood instantly turning to ice.
She was a brilliant tactician, and it only took her a fraction of a second to connect the terrifying dots. The Royal Physician brewed the Emperor’s tea every single night. Tonight was the Imperial Banquet.
"They are going to poison His Majesty tonight," Heena realized, her voice a barely audible, horrified whisper. "And because the Aurawood is exclusively ours... when the Emperor falls dead in the middle of the Great Hall, the Royal Guards will immediately arrest my family for high treason."
"Exactly," Samuel confirmed softly, his thumb gently tracing the line of her jaw—a tender gesture for the shadow watchers outside, but his eyes were completely devoid of warmth. "The Prime Minister is setting a trap to execute your entire bloodline in front of the foreign dignitaries tonight."
Heena’s hands clenched into fists, her sharp nails digging into her palms. The sheer scale of the Prime Minister’s malice was suffocating. She looked up at Samuel, her military instincts screaming at her to draw her sword and march on the palace immediately.
"What do we do?" she asked, trusting the villain’s mind in front of her. "If we stop the Emperor from drinking it, they will just hide the evidence. We have no proof it was the Prime Minister."
Samuel’s lips curved into a dark, breathtakingly cruel smile.
"We don’t stop the Emperor from drinking," Samuel whispered, his eyes flashing with absolute, terrifying brilliance. "We let the Prime Minister think he has won. We walk right into his trap in the middle of the Great Hall."
Samuel suddenly grabbed her waist, spinning her around in a highly dramatic, romantic dip, laughing loudly.
"Oh, Wife! You are so right, the black looks much better on me!" Samuel shouted at the top of his lungs, ensuring his voice carried through the thin paper windows.
He leaned in close again, his smile turning razor-sharp as he hoisted her back to her feet.
"Let me handle the Physician," Samuel whispered into her ear. "Just wear your armor, smile at the Prime Minister, and be ready to watch the civil court burn to the ground tonight."
The heavy wooden doors clicked shut, plunging the courtyard back into silence as Samuel’s footsteps faded away.
For a moment, Heena just stood there, the weight of the impending imperial assassination settling over her.
Then, with a soft, digitized pop, a glowing blue light materialized in the air beside her. The light expanded and shifted, landing softly on the wooden floorboards before solidifying into the form of a miniature, translucent blue lion. It had a thick, majestic mane and a pair of glowing, highly expressive eyes.
The System shook out its glowing fur, sat back on its haunches, and looked up at her in absolute disbelief.
"What, you really married a psycho again this time?" the lion asked, its voice a strange mix of a young boy and a metallic echo.
Heena paused, her hand freezing on the hilt of her ceremonial dagger. She slowly turned her head, her fox-like eyes narrowing.
"What exactly do you mean by ’again’ this time?" Heena asked, catching the subtle slip about her past transmigration cycles.
The lion awkwardly shuffled its front paws, giving the closest thing a feline could to a shrug.
"Well," the System deflected quickly, avoiding her gaze, "you always get stuck with an unusual piece of trash every time we do a mission. So, I just think it’s another unusual thing. Standard procedure, really."
Heena didn’t buy it, but she let the slip slide for now. Instead, she looked at the glowing blue lion with a perfectly calm, deeply mocking expression.
"How comical, huh?" Heena mused, crossing her arms over her crimson Vanguard silk. "Whenever he is actually in the room, you miraculously never come out. What? Are you scared of him?"
Hearing that, the lion instantly puffed out its translucent chest, trying to look as fierce and majestic as an ancient beast. It scoffed loudly, swishing its glowing tail.
"How can you say that, Host?!" the System defended, sounding deeply offended. "Why on earth would I be scared? I am a highly advanced multidimensional entity! He cannot even see me, let alone touch me!"
Heena just stared at him, entirely unamused.
"That is exactly what I do not understand," Heena said dryly. "If he can’t see you, then why the heck do you actively hide under the bed every single time he steps foot in my courtyard?"
The lion raised a single glowing paw, trying to look philosophical. "You know, Host, it is all about risk management. I just don’t want to take a chance! Like... he is a villain, you know? A designated antagonist."
"So," Heena deadpanned. "You mean you are scared."
The majestic lion act instantly shattered.
The glowing beast deflated, its ears drooping flat against its head as it threw its paws up in the air in sheer, panicked exasperation.
"Okay, fine! I am scared!" the System broke down, pacing back and forth on the floorboards like a stressed housecat. "Do you have any idea how dangerous these types are?! You know, the last time a villain in one of these worlds reached his blackening point, he literally destroyed the whole world! Just snapped his fingers and poof, apocalypse!"
The lion stopped pacing, looking up at her with wide, terrified eyes.
"I don’t want that!" it whined. "Plus, in System years, I am technically still a child! I do not want to take this kind of chance! You know how he is! He acts like a lovesick, tail-wagging puppy one second, and then he acts like a bloodthirsty, man-eating tiger the next!"
The lion shook its head rapidly, the glowing mane flying everywhere as it kept ranting.
"He is a complete psycho, Host! Honestly, he is even more screwed up than you are!"
Silence fell over the room. It was a heavy, suffocating silence.
Heena slowly turned her body fully toward the glowing blue lion. The temperature in the room seemed to plummet to absolute zero. Her eyes, already sharp and calculating from planning a treasonous war, went completely dark.
"What did you just say?"
Her tone was heavy. It didn’t sound like a question. It sounded like an execution order.
Hearing that voice, the System completely froze. The glowing blue lion slowly looked up, meeting Heena’s terrifying, murderous gaze.
Damn it, the System realized, its digital heart dropping into its stomach. I screwed up.
The majestic, multidimensional entity instantly shrank back, its tail tucking firmly between its legs as it began to violently tremble.
"I... I..." the lion stuttered, taking a slow step backward as Heena took a slow step forward. "I... meant... you are so perfectly sane and rational, Host...?"
Heena didn’t say a word. She didn’t yell, and she didn’t draw her dagger.
She simply took one more step forward, her hand shooting out with the speed and precision of a striking viper. Even though the System was a multidimensional entity made of pure blue light, Heena was its bonded Host. Her hand made solid contact.
She grabbed the glowing blue lion directly by the scruff of its neck and hoisted it up into the air until they were at eye level.
"Eep!" the lion squeaked, its four glowing paws dangling uselessly in the air. Its majestic, intimidating mane completely deflated.
"Screwed up, am I?" Heena whispered, her fox-like eyes narrowing into beautiful, terrifying slits. "Is that how my designated support system views me? As a screwed-up psycho?"
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