|Your blood, let him drink it.|

Sylph then closed her eyes and sighed as she said her next words. |But I'll have to warn you, it's going to be painf—|

Spurt—!

Hearing the sound of flesh being torn apart, Sylph shot her eyes open, only to see Glacia stabbing her own wrist with the stinger on her tail.

|Little Cia! What are you doing!? At least listen to what I say before doing it!|

"No time." Glacia shook her head as she brought her wrist closer to Theodore's mouth.

As soon as a drop of her blood entered Theodore, Glacia could feel searing pain coursing through her entire body. It was almost as if a portion of her Mana, and more importantly, power was forcefully ripped out of her very own being.

Despite being in agony, Glacia didn't even let out a small squeal. It wasn't as if what she was doing would fail if she did so per se. She just continued to endure it silently without any reason.

And Sylph seemed to have picked up on this too.

|Little Cia... I know it's painful. You can let it all out.|

"N-o..." Glacia shook her head with teary eyes. "Da-ddy's sleep-ing... he wa-ke up if I scr-eam."

After a few minutes, the pain finally stopped. Glacia heaved out a sigh of relief as she fell face-first onto the wyvern's scaly head with sweat all over her body.

Mustering the last of her strength, she commanded the wyvern. 

"Frie-nd... go out... and don't pl-ay with any-one."

Then, she fell unconscious.

Sylph watched as the wyvern crushed the piece of rubble that was blocking the exit with ease and slowly walked out of the auction house. 

As soon as she got to the outside, Sylph could see the guards of Pyriaville standing in a tight formation right outside the auction house. However, they soon fell into disarray and panic as soon as they saw the enormous greater black wyvern staring at them with bloodlust.

-"M- Monster!"

-"RUN!"

It only took a few dozens of seconds for all the guards to run away. However, there still remained 2 people. One was an Orc who was tightening his grip on his battle axe, staring at the wyvern cautiously. The other was a pink-haired girl who was frozen stiff in fear.

No one moved a muscle due to the tense atmosphere. And it would have remained that way if it wasn't for the pink-haired girl - Alicia - realizing who was lying on top of the wyvern's head.

"Glacia?"

Hearing this, the wyvern let air out through its nostrils as if sighing in relief. It then gently placed Glacia, Theodore, and the Phoenix down as if tending to the most fragile thing in the world. After doing that, it promptly turned around and flapped its wing to shoot toward the sky, enjoying its new-found freedom.

Immediately after, Alicia rushed toward Glacia to check on her well-being. Heaving a sigh of relief upon seeing that she was still safe, she then turned to her side, only to see Theodore and the Phoenix being carried on the shoulders by the Orc.

"What are you doing with dad?" Alicia frowned.

The Orc stared at Alicia for a few moments before answering. "Kurghhh... he's my acquaintance... well, not really. But Aryl's acquaintance."

Hearing the word 'Aryl', Alicia widened her eyes in surprise. She then sighed as she recovered from her shock. "Okay then, I believe you. Just take him to wherever you want. I'm sure that 'Aryl' would also want it anyways."

Nodding, the Orc took a deep breath and ran away from the auction house.

Now left alone with Glacia, Alicia finally felt that something was wrong. She could feel that she was touching something... scaly through the robe that Glacia was wearing. Peeking inside the robe, Alicia saw a pair of scaly wings wrapping themselves around Glacia's body.

'Did the illusion run out?' Alicia thought.

Whatever the case was, she must fix this before anyone else found out about it!

<[Refraction mirage]>

With Glacia now looking like a normal baby dragon, Alicia heaved a sigh of relief and pulled Glacia inside her embrace while leaning against a tree, waiting for this incident to come to an end.

***

"Huupppp!"

Arthur tightened his grip on Excalibur and slashed at a Cultist's head.

However, the Cultist didn't die, nor was his head severed. Instead, Excalibur just passed through his neck without doing any harm. Or so it seemed...

"AHHHHHHH!" The Cultist screamed as he felt pain akin to his head being severed from his body.

As if losing all his power, he fell to the ground and fell unconscious.

Seeing this, Arthur muttered. "...Although this sword is designed for killing, it can also temporarily seal my target's power if I so desired."

His eyes then lit up as he hugged the sword happily. "This is perfect! As expected of a gift from Goddess Lumaria!"

However, his thoughts couldn't help but to drift to the actual person who delivered the Goddess' gift to him.

"But could Theodore be... Goddess Lumaria's agent?"

Arthur jolted back in surprise upon seeing the familiar translucent golden screen. "System? It's been a while!" 

Nodding happily, Arthur asked. "So, why are you here all of the sudden?"

"Misunderstanding?"

"O- Okay then. It was just purely speculation on my end. But did you really show up after so long just to say that?"

"I've already told you, system. He's my rival. I'm bound to clash with him sooner or later."

After that, the system went silent. Even after a few minutes, Arthur still couldn't see the screen popping up anymore. As he was about to call out to the system again, he suddenly heard a chilling voice coming from behind him.

"Arthur..."

Shocked, Arthur turned around, only to see a woman with blue eyes and vertical pink pupils. Her eyes was cold, chilling cold. And the fact that she was carrying a scythe, and that her entire body was covered in blood and gore didn't make her seem less scary.

"AH!! REAPERRRR!!!" Arthur screamed in fear as he swung Excalibur toward the creepy woman!

In response though, the woman merely took a step to the side to dodge his swing. She then struck his wrist, knocking Excalibur out of his hands.

"What are you doing?" The woman frowned.

It was then that Arthur finally realized who the woman was.

"Sylvia?"

"Who else did you think I am?" Sylvia glared at Arthur as she brushed her blood-stained hair to the side.

Before Arthur could say anything else—

<[Portal]>

—Sylvia teleported behind him and brought her scythe close to his neck.

"S- Sylvia!" Arthur stuttered in fear. "What are you doing?"

"I should be asking that!" Sylvia shouted in anger. "Where's Glacia!?"

'O- Oh... I'm dead...'

Sylvia had now really became the Reaper in Arthur's eyes.

In fact, Arthur was so excited at the prospect of passing the Goddess' trial and gaining a new power that he completely forgot that he was supposed to protect Glacia. 

Seeing Arthur's expression, Sylvia sighed.

"So you left her alone after all. I knew I shouldn't have trusted you."

As Sylvia was about to cut into Arthur's neck just a little bit to vent out her anger, the wall beside them suddenly crumbled. 

"Halt! Blasted Void fiend!"

***

"Halt! Blasted Void fiend!"

As the dust settled, the source of the shout was revealed to be a middle-aged man donning white priest attires.

Frowning, Sylvia hurriedly spoke.

"Wait, sir priest. I'm not a Void fiend!"

"Nonsense! That gore-covered body along with the malevolent-looking scythe you're carrying! There's no doubt you're a Void fiend! Not to mention, you're holding your weapon against the Hero's neck! Unforgivable!"

'Well, he's partly correct.'

Even she wasn't shameless enough to get mad at someone for mistaking her for the bad guy here. However, it would be bad if this misunderstanding continued and the priest called for reinforcement. Thus, Sylvia lightly nudged Arthur, hoping that he would get the hint.

Luckily though, Arthur still had a few functional braincells left and thus, he covered for Sylvia. 

"Sir priest! Sylvia is not a Void fiend!"

"Why is she holding a weapon against your neck then?"

"Th- That... we're just sparring."

"In the middle of a battlefield?"

"Y- Yes! That's right!"

'I take it back...' Sylvia thought as she kicked Arthur face-first to the ground. '...His braincells are all defective.'

Crouching down to meet Arthur's ears, Sylvia whispered. "You deal with the priests. I'm going to find Glacia. But if I find even a scratch on her body, you'd better be prepared for a good beating."

***

It took a while but Sylvia finally managed to find Glacia. And when she did, she hurriedly rushed to hug her, ignoring the surprised Alicia. 

Glacia, feeling her mother's Mana, slowly woke up and stared at Sylvia with wide eyes.

"Momm—"

"Shhhh..." Sylvia covered Glacia's mouth as she glanced behind her where Marie and Ria was. "...I know, I know. It must have been terrifying, huh?"

While Sylvia was busy patting Glacia's head, Marie and Ria suddenly walked up to her. Tapping Sylvia's shoulder, Marie asked.

"You're awfully close to that child, huh?"

"That's right. She's a distant relative on my mother's side after all." Sylvia replied without any shift in her expression. 

Hearing this, Marie turned toward Ria with a smirk. "See? I told you!"

"That doesn't mean what you said was true." Ria retorted with a frown.

"I'm sure of my guess!" Marie exclaimed. "If 'she' had to choose, 'she' would definitely choose Glacia over the Royal court! Seriously, what did those bastard think, not letting their Princess have fun like that."

"Nn! Fuck those guys!" Glacia suddenly interjected into Marie and Ria's conversation with a smile.

Instantly, everyone clamped their mouth shut and gulped in fear as they felt an indescribable chill coming from Sylvia. 

Sylvia, not caring about the fear she had inflicted upon her friends, gently placed Glacia down and knelt to meet her eyes with a smile; A smile that, although dazzling, carried traces of rage and coldness in it.

"Glacia, where did you learn that word?"

Oblivious to her mother's intent, Glacia immediately answered. "Daddy said it!"

"Theo!?"

Although Sylvia was surprised that Theodore was here in this auction, she was more angry that he dared to teach his daughter such a foul word!

'She's only 3! M- Maybe... or 3 months... This is too complicated...'

Unaware of Sylvia thoughts, Marie whispered to Ria.

"See? She's Theodore and Eleanor's kid. Even Sylvia - her cousin - confirmed it."

"I see..." Ria muttered as her eyes turned cold. "...But what if she's Sylvia's kid?"

"That shouldn't be possible." Marie shook her head. "The only sentient race that can grow to Glacia's age in such a short amount of time is Angel. So she should be Eleanor's kid... Unless he impregnated Sylvia 3 years ago..."

Ria sighed. "You're right. I'm sure that the trash met Sylvia for the first time when he entered Avaron."

She then continued. "...He's even a bigger trash than I thought. Teaching a child profanities and playing with 2 maidens' feelings."

"I know, right?" Marie exclaimed happily as she patted Ria's shoulder. "Anyway, you should keep it a secret. Although I don't like Theodore, I don't want that cute little girl to get hurt. Who knows what the royal court will do if they find out that their princess had a child..."

Oblivious to what her friends were saying behind her back, Sylvia whispered to Glacia.

"Sweetie, what did daddy do?"

"Nn! He played with me!"

"Play...?"

"Nn! He wrapped me in a robe and played with the robed men that came to play!"

Sylvia frowned at Glacia's words. But eventually, she remembered that Glacia substituted 'kill' or 'fight' with 'play'. As such, she heaved a sigh of relief.

'So you do care about her after all, Theodore...'

What kind of person would go as far as to risk his life to escort a child out of what was a battlefield full of blood and gore if he didn't care about her? Certainly not Theodore! And Sylvia knew it best.

'Even I only gave people directions to escape, not accompanying them and guarding them!'

However, Sylvia reconsidered her thoughts as she glanced to her side, where the beastkin slave girl she saw earlier in the auction house was talking to Arthur with a love-struck face.

'I forgot... there's that kind of person too. The kind that only rescues pretty girls.'

However, she soon shook such thoughts off her mind and focused back on the important things.

'Maybe... just maybe, I can leave Glacia to him... As long as he doesn't teach her any more bad words.'

***

In a makeshift tent a few hours after the incident at the auction house, duke Freywright Pyrian was filing report about the incident to the Emperor and all the Churches.

"Shit! I'm a duke! Why do I have to do all of this!?"

"Isn't it because your secretary died in the incident?"

Freywright snapped his head toward the owner of the voice, only to see the captain of one of his knight orders standing at the entrance of the tent with his arms crossed. However, upon seeing that the captain had silver hair and purple eyes, Freywright frowned.

"Lebowski... what are you here for?"

"Damn, that hurts..." Lebowski acted as if he was offended by his words. "...Is that how you treat your best friend?" 

"Best friend my ass!" Freywright shouted. "Evanos is my best friend! And you... you're just a random soldier that cucked Evanos! FUCK! If it wasn't for the fact that I'm indebted to you, I'd have let him torture you to death! Now I have to deal with Evanos constant nagging me to hand you over to him!"

"..."

"Shit! You made him so paranoid that he even tested to see if Sylvia was his child... when she's a fucking dragon and you're a human!"

"Hey!" Lebowski shrugged. "It isn't my fault that demoness uhh... Anna something fell for my charms. Though, I do wonder what my little Bob is doing in the Ecertold duchy."

"I've told you, his name's Noah, not Bob!"

"Whatever. I just hope my little Bob is doing fine." Lebowski waved his hand dismissively. "Anyway, I'm here to tell you that the Time mages from the royal court came. You should go greet them or something. It's your job, not mine."

After saying that, Lebowski yawned and promptly left the tent.

Calming down his rage. Freywright exited the tent to go greet the Time mages.

...

Freywright followed the Time mages through the remains of the auction house to watch them reconstruct scenes. However, something was strange.

"How peculiar, my Temporal reconstruction is full of statics in this particular part." A Time mage uttered. He then called out to one of his colleagues. "John, can you try in this spot?"

"Sure!"

However, the result was the same. Every Time mages present also tried doing it, but to no avail.

Seeing that the Time mages were all flustered, Freywright approached them and asked.

"Is there any problem?"

"Yes, actually."

Freywright widened his eyes in surprise. He didn't expect the elite Time mages of the Empire to have any problems identifying the culprits... And if they did, he certainly didn't expect them to be so open about it.

Unaware of Freywright's thoughts, the Time mage continued. "The problem will prevent us from reconstructing certain scenes so investigations will be called off. We will leave the rest of it to the Churches since it involves Void fiends. But before that, do you want any specific scenes reconstructed?"

Freywright fell into thoughts. After a while, he remembered eyewitnesses claiming to see a little girl riding the <A> ranked Greater black wyvern. 

'Yeah, that's definitely not normal however I look at it.'

Thus, he gave the Time mage his answer. 

"I do."

...

Since every other locations that the wyvern went through was either uninformative or not reconstructable, they moved to the last location the wyvern was reported to have been in: The exit of the auction house.

Freywright waited as the Time mages prepared for their spells. As he was waiting, however, Ria suddenly walked up to him with a glass of water in her hand.

"Father, what are you doing?"

"...Waiting for the Temporal reconstruction. I have to find out about something."

Ria nodded. Although she should have gone back to whatever she was doing right now, she still stayed out of pure curiosity.

'Well, there's no reason to chase her away.'

Thus, Freywright paid no attention to his daughter anymore and watched as the Time mages finally succeeded in reconstructing the scene.

When they did, both the Time mages and Freywright couldn't help but to look at it in confusion.

"What is the meaning of this?" Freywright frowned.

The scene... it was more strange than he thought. A girl who had not even awakened her Status commanding an <A> ranked wyvern like it was a pet dog wasn't something one could see everyday.

Just like her father, Ria was also confused and shocked. But of course, it was for an entirely different reason.

Spitting out her drink, Ria stuttered. "G- Glacia!?"

However, she soon realized her mistake and quickly covered her mouth.

Unfortunately, the Time mages and her father had already heard what she had just inadvertently said.

Rushing toward Ria, Freywright shook her shoulders. "Ria, do you know that little girl?"

"N- No! I don't! Why would you think so?" Ria said as she tried to back up.

As she took a step backward, however, she bumped into a Time mage that was blocking her retreat.

"Young miss Ria, please tell us. Do you know who that little girl is?"

"I- I don't! Stop asking me!"

Hearing this, the Time mage sighed.

"Look, young miss Ria, this is a matter that concerns the safety and security of the Empire. You should be truthful with us. And... we won't hesitate to call over 'Judge' Evanos Ecertold if you don't want to comply with our orders."

Hearing this, Ria quickly glanced at her father with pleading eyes. However, Freywright merely averted his eyes away, not daring to meet his daughter's gaze.

Left with no choice, Ria sighed. "Fine... but this is a sensitive matter. Only the leader of the Time mages here and my father can hear about it."

Nodding, the same Time mage answered. "What do you know, I happen to be the leader of this bunch here. Now, let's go somewhere private and have a talk, shall we, duke Pyrian and young miss Ria?"

...

The Time mage leader spat out his drink, and so did Freywright.

""Wh- What!? Can you repeat that again?"" They simultaneously asked in disbelief.

Wiping the disgusting water that had just came out of their mouth off her face, Ria grumbled.

"Did you not hear me? That little girl is Eleanor Salvant's child."

"H- How can this be..." The Time mage stuttered in disbelief. "...No, assuming that it's the truth, wh- who's the father?"

"Theodore Gray." Ria answered immediately.

"Theodore Gray? Never heard of him."

"Of course you haven't." Ria scowled. "He's weak, pathetically so. He was still at <F-> rank at the start of the midterms."

Calming down from his understandable shock, the Time mage weaved his fingers together and asked.

"Okay... now I will confirm the validity of the information. For what reason did you think that the girl is princess Eleanor's child?"

"Sylvia Ecertold confirmed it. She said that the child was a distant relative of hers. Well, I think that she mistook 'distant relative' for nephew."

"...And what's stopping you from considering the possibility of the child really just being her distant relative?"

"That's where contextual clues come in." Ria sighed. "The child had silver hair. However, no one on her mother's side, not even the Empress, had silver hair. No one but... Eleanor."

"..."

"Furthermore, it's confirmed that Theodore's the child's father. Marie Evien had heard the child call Theodore 'daddy' several times. And... you can probably confirm this with Eleanor's shadow guards later but I'll tell you now. Theodore... he has been coming in and out of Eleanor's dorm room very frequently lately."

"I see..." The Time mage nodded in understanding.

He then turned toward Freywright. "Duke Pyrian, I request that you follow me to the Capital. We need to have an audience with the Emperor as soon as possible."

"Alright then, let's go."

Now left alone in the tent, Ria heaved a big sigh of relief and muttered.

"Sorry Glacia. Although your dad will most likely 'go missing' in a few weeks, I can at least guarantee your safety."