This was honestly a battle of endurance, sort of say. You may have finished one battle, but you also have another one in the coming hours. There may be healers available at all times, but it will still be straining to the person in some ways.

Hard the last battle may be, the next battle may even be harder. Thus, the ideal situation would be to take little damage and use little effort as much as possible in the early battles to save some energy. But that was easier said than done. Everyone in this tournaments works hard and fought hard. Only the bravest would try to join this tournament.

Heh, I would not even try to join this stuff.

Anyways, there was some weird one joining in this tournament — if I say some weird one, I meant one weird one. Namely, the participant named Taneva. Like what the hell’s wrong with him? In this next battle, like before, allowed his opponent to hit him with an almost fatal attack. That guy’s insane.

Then after feeling some sort of disappointment, I guess, he starts beating his opponent no sweat. Almost like he found this tournament trivial. I don’t want anything to do with that guy. Stay away from crazy to be safe, I say. I wouldn’t even be surprised if he would just randomly ask me to stab him.

That aside, he wasn’t the only strong one here. There were plenty of contestants that “played” around with their opponents. Some with strong martial arts, while some with magic, while some with pure skills.

I was particularly fascinated by the spells being thrown around. That said, I was already familiar with what the spells they were using, I did read a lot of spells in my books. Still it was fun seeing how magic casters survive enemies that physically attacks and how the casters keep their distance. Was not easy of course, but doable.

I took grapes from the bowl near me and gracefully ate. No need for concern, these particular grapes that we were currently eating were prepared by our own servants. Besides, I let Rogan eat a few before I ate myself. Hehe, needless to say Rogan was a little bitter about being a food tester, but that was expected of his job, so he had to do it.

I did my best to comfort him though.

We have not ate the Marquis’s foods yet. They were still being food tested as they avoided procedures. Don’t think you can just do anything out of the plan pretty easily. That’s right, as I said before — Fuck you, Marquis!

Despite that, I’m still being wary about my surroundings here in this booth. Even I was still checking out the food testers if they’re doing their job properly. So far, nothing weird yet. When they were done, the testers left, not ideal to leave the booth crowded.

Alright boys and girls, looks like I’m living today! Hehehehe.

In all seriousness, the end of the day was still far ahead.

Time passed and after many battles in the arena, an hour before noon, Marquis Vekenas approached the king and queen.

“Given that the servings have been checked, I am excited to show you the finest wine in my collection. Would you be interested to have a taste, your majesties?”

“I assume that your bottle of wine has been checked as well?” Father asked.

“Of course, you majesty. Protocols must be followed after all.”

My father turned to mother, and the latter smiled and nodded her head. Then father returned to face the marquis.

“Alright, we’ll judge this wine of yours.”

“Shall I prepare a glass to each member of the family and the guests as well?”

“I have no problem with it, give me one.”

“Lillie and I will also accept your offer.”

Estevan and Eleden agreed to have a sip of the wine. Then everyone turned to look at me.

“Um…”

“Dear, you don’t have to drink if you don’t want to.” my mother said.

I looked gently at the marquis, but behind my facade, I glared at him. Fucking casual!

This game of his I am already too familiar with. Lack of evidence, but I know. Damn you.

Tch, either way, I need to be certain.

“N-No… I’ll have a little. The Marquis appears to be very confident about his wine.”

On the contrary, he seemed to be hiding his nervousness. His smile was twitching ever so slightly that no one could easily notice, his gaze seemed to be a little troubled but being suppressed. He held his palms together as he spoke and rubbing them, but I noticed they were a little sweaty.

This might be the pressure of anticipating what his hosts might think about what he was to offer, but this nervousness might be because of something else.

The marquis bowed and proceeded to head to the back of the room where the table was set. I reached out for the back of my neck and unhooked my necklace that was given to me by Eleden. I grasped the gem.

Everyone was busy with the intensifying fight in the arena, wisely timed. I poured mana into the gemstone and gave it the properties and attributes I wanted. The gemstone turned from red to white then silvery. But that was not all, the color was still shifting as I was still finding the right color. Then, I stopped when the gemstone reflected my beautiful face. It only took around three seconds.

I subtly shifted my right hand to the right and faced the mirror to the back of the room.

“... Princess—” Rogan picked up what I was doing and grew confused and was about to look back. I didn’t see that he was about to look back, but that would be a normal human response to look where I was looking, so I assumed he was about to. I raised my left hand to stop him. He understood and he froze.

I was giving the Marquis an opening he wanted.

He took the bottle from the box, and true that was checked earlier. However…

The Marquis prepared several glasses and placed them on top of a steel plate. After arranging the glasses, he opened the bottle and poured them into the empty glasses. When that was done, after placing back the bottle to the table, he paused.

He turned his head slowly as if looking out of someone, or anyone. Then he turned in our direction. As he did so, I closed my fist for a moment. Afterwards, I looked at the reflection. He seemed to be pulling something out of his coat pocket.

Shortly, with his back on my direction, I saw his arm motioned as if he was pouring something into the drink. Sneaky fuck. He was using his body as a cover, but I saw through it. Poison wouldn’t work on the royals because we have anti-poison spells.

However, this reminded me of the time when my chef tried to poison me.

I noticed that he seemed to be pouring on different glasses.

No way…

I closed my fist and stood up from my seat. I cocked my head forward in front of Rogan, and he nodded. As I walked, I locked my necklace back to my neck.

Then when I got close to the Marquis.

“Marquis, do you have a moment?”

He froze for a moment before slowly moving his hand to his coat pocket. He turned around and I leaned a little to the side, there was a different color slowly mixing into the red wine. They have already blended too well, but saturation differs to a couple that I presume to still be clean.

“Princess, how may I serve you?”

“Nothing really, I just want to talk to you.”

I walked over to the side of the table and looked at the covered dishes. I raised a lid and inhaled.

“You have prepared quite an impressive group of cuisines.”

“Thank you, your highness…”

He was restless a little, but he was suppressing it. Despite that, he couldn’t get past my eyes.

“That aside, I just want to speak with you, and perhaps get to be acquainted.”

“... Oh, that’s a surprise. I didn’t expect this,” he said as he stole a glimpse at Rogan.

“Well… you are Lucious’s uncle. Um,” I blushed a little. “I want to hear what you think about him. And knowing that you are related, I think it is best to hear it from you.”

“I see… so what do you want to know?”

“Do you think I can rely on him?”

He smiled. “You are quite close, aren’t you? Don’t have an answer yourself?”

“I have strange feelings… I want to hear the thoughts of others.”

“Well, he seemed to be serious about you, if that is what you want to know. Seeing how important you are to him, I’m sure you can rely on him.”

I touched my fingers together. “Does… Does Lucious have other women that…”

“You mean, ah, if I remember correctly, yes there are women that have an interest in him in their family’s neighboring domain.”

“I see…”

“But don’t worry princess. He hadn’t pursued anyone else, in the past or the present. Honestly, to think he would fall in love with the princess and try to aim for your heart.”

“Is that bad?”

“Not bad, but rather difficult.”

“Of course…”

“To make things easier for him, he would need to reach a higher rank. But I guess anything is possible, the choice falls to you in the end.”

“I understand… Thank you, Marquis.”

I gazed at the wine of glasses and reached out for what I recall were the clean ones. The suspicious substance had blended with the wine leaving no traces, but I have memorised which one’s which. With a clean wine in my hand, I timidly swirled it.

“This is a bit hard for me… Oh, as thanks, what about we drink together, Marquis?”

“Huh?”

I picked up one of the tainted wine glasses and offered it to him.

“Come on, take it, please drink with me.”

“Uh…” he hesitantly took the glass.

“I’ll let you take the lead given that you are more experienced in liquors.”

“Um, princess, shouldn’t we drink with—”

“That’s fine, everyone else is still busy. Come now.”

I extended my hand and waited for him. He hesitantly clinked with my glass and I stared at his eyes with a friendly smile.

This was supposed to be the part where he starts drinking. However…

“Marquis, what’s wrong? Come on, drink. Is there a problem?”

He looked at the glass of wine in his hand then at my innocent face.

“... P-Princess I…”

“Hm? You seem troubled, Marquis.”

He held his stomach as if in pain.

“Pardon me, princess, my stomach doesn’t feel well.”

“Just a little won’t do?”

“Um… no I mean that I will need to excuse myself for a moment.”

I deliberated whether to kill him right here and then, or expose him. However, I cannot think of a motive why he would kill the royal family. He didn’t seem to be treated harshly, my family were not cruel. In fact, he was even given the chance to be the supervisor of the festival.

So why?

Should I expose him? However, if he was pressured to do so, it would complicate things. I looked around at my surroundings. If he was exposed and captured, he might be killed before we get anything from him. Hard to protect him without knowing where the enemy might strike if all things fail.

That aside, I have a desire. A desire that has been slowly gnawing me down.

Besides, I believe a one on one session would be the most ideal and safest. Not only would the hidden opponents that might be there would not expect it, people should be a little more honest when in private. I need to be careful. He might be being blackmailed for all I know, depending on the value, he might be a hard nut to crack. I also don’t want to suddenly lose him.

The safest route… I wonder… I need to choose one route.

The best route… to handle this myself.

Can’t rely on anyone else. Father? Things would need to go through process and protocols, will open a gap and expose the situation to a lot of people. Also too slow. Rogan? What’s he going to do? Estevan? No. Eleden? Useless, too soft to do what’s necessary and occupied with his love life. Mother? Out of the question.

I’m doing this my way. I believe in myself more than anyone.

“Oh, is that so? Then, you can go ahead.”

He returned his glass to the steel plate and left the booth in a hurry.

The marquis… is my prey.

I looked at the trey of wine. Best to get rid of them before someone accidentally drink them.

“Princess? What’s up with that?”

“I have no idea, Sir Rogan.”

“Princess… what are you thinking?”

“Nothing.” I smiled at him. “Now then, I’ll take these to everyone.”

I picked up the plate and took a step forward. But I made a misstep and almost slipped to the floor, but that in turn cause the entire contents of the plate to fall to the ground, the glasses shattered and the wine scattered to the floor.

“Princess!”

Everyone turned at me while Rogan assisted me up.

“Oh no, I made a mess — I…”

My father immediately rushed towards me. “What happened?”

“I’m sorry father, I was intending to bring the drinks to everyone. I, I was only trying to help.”

Father sighed and then patted my head. “Important thing is that you’re alright. Where is the Marquis anyway? I thought he was the one make the serve.”

“He said his stomach was not feeling well.”

“Huh… Well then, let’s just go back to our seats. Let the servants clean this up, okay?”

“Okay… And I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be.”

***

There was a couple of battle after lunch, then after that was the finals. At lunch though, we left the booth and went to a private room for the royal family right around this colosseum, so basically the food in the booth were a bit wasted — or completely wasted, can’t really say when we can eat them whenever we want still.

As for the Marquis though, he came back after lunch, he seemed demotivated. But still, I wouldn’t give him another chance. Thus, after having our lunch, I instructed Rogan to stand by the wall that can oversee the entire booth, this of course counts the back part. There should have been a guard or something that can see the entire booth — but perhaps the Marquis did some work on that, or that the guards were a little distracted. Could be both to be honest. In any case, the Marquis’s attempts were unexpected to everyone, so that could be understood.

As for the tournament, the suicidal man Taneva reached the finals and was on his way to battle his final enemy. Taneva was disturbingly strong. Heck I don’t think I even saw him fight someone with a struggling face. Could it be that his enemies were just a bunch of sticks? I have no damn idea.

But let’s see, there sure was a bit of challenge the more enemies he fight, meaning his enemies were getting stronger. Now in this final duel of his, I assume his opponent would be no easy guy.

Honestly, we should have mic right near them so we can hear what they’re saying, that would have been interesting.

They started fighting, but everything went on the same as before. Taneva deliberately received an attack, only to heal himself afterwards then start fighting back. But it would seem this wouldn’t be an easy game for Taneva compared to the others.

His opponent was actually giving a good fight. They attacked, they blocked. Magic emerged from Taneva’s opponent’s weapon, raw magic from using armament magic. The opponent seemed to be using physical enhancement as well judging from the way the ground cracked and rattled when he leaped back or forward.

Taneva was handling his opponent very well, dodging them with no problem. That’s the troubling part, Taneva was able to dodge the attacks easily, but he seemed to be having trouble getting through his enemy’s defense. But he appeared to still be pretty chill about about it, can’t tell if he was playing around or just that he had a pretty good poker face.

As time passed, the battle intensified, Taneva’s opponent seemed to be slowing down. Getting tired most likely. Taking this opportunity, Taneva ramped up his attack and slammed the blunt of his spear, hitting his enemy at multiple spots. His opponent tried counterattacking, but Taneva would evade or parry them.

Until eventually, after all of those hard and painful hits, Taneva’s opponent kneeled in pain. Taneva pointed his spear at his enemy’s face and spoke — he must be saying admit defeat or something.

After that, his opponent dropped his weapon and raised both hands, signifying his surrender.

The crowd cheered deafeningly loud. Taneva got himself hundreds or perhaps thousands of supporters. The presenter stood beside Taneva and lifted his hand declaring him the victor. Taneva smiled proudly at the audience then looked up at us.

Father stood up from his seat and received the sound amplifier crystal from the servant.

“Congratulation, Mr. Taneva. Truly your show of strength and skills baffled yet impressed us all. Your reward awaits! However, before that, another challenge awaits you. Will you accept this challenge? If you do, know that your enemy will be a monster, one of the fiercest in our land. It is the monster hailed as the Steelreaver!”

A great number of the crowd gasped audibly.

Um, what’s that? Should I be scared and disturbed as well?

I’m sooorrryyyy for being ignorant — shut it.

The presenter gave the amplifier to Taneva. Then, for the first time, I heard his voice.

“Of course, I’ll take on the challenge.”