Chapter 53 A Honey-Covered Deadly Trap
Author: M_W Cancer
Grammar Checker: M_W Nomral
When late morning arrived, the carriage that Leo and the others were riding on had finally arrived near Honoris City, safe and sound.
On the contrary, Leo was feeling depressed.
Leo swore to himself that next time he would ask the complete information related to the chosen mission so that he could avoid a troublesome situation such as this.
Arriving in the Honoris City, fresh and sweet air instantly hit everyone's faces. The air was so fresh due to the greens that surrounded everywhere around the city, and it was also sweet, as if honey was mixed within the wind, which is somewhat reasonable since the Honoris Noble Household was a supplier of 10,000 tons of honey a year which is also 10,000,000 kilograms of honey.
Unlike the Blacksmoke City, Honoris City was flourishing with greenery. Seemingly endless fields of farmland covered almost the entire territory outside of the Honoris City.
Just by walking to the Honoris Manor, which is located in the middle of the city like the Heart City, Leo and the others could see plenty and huge plantations of wheat, vegetables, and fruits.
Moreover, they also saw a lot of farmers working around the fields. A group of kids running around while playing with each other. Farm animals and the like were being raised in batches. It was truly a refreshing and peaceful sight.
Imagine a city the exact opposite of Blacksmoke City, that is exactly what Honoris City was.
"You must be Leo Heart, the person who has accepted the escorting mission of Lady Veronica?" A Butler greeted Leo and the others as soon as they arrived at the gate of the Honoris Manor. The Butler quickly observes Leo from head to toe before nodding his head, seemingly agreeing with something in his mind.
Leo nodded his head in response, not minding the Butler's observation at all. He was used to such behavior since Butler Xiao in Heart City also does the same thing every time someone visits him. He doesn't know what they are observing about, but he feels like it's the aura and characteristic of the person, maybe... He is not an expert in such a field.
"Lady Veronica has long been waiting for you, come this way, please!" The Butler said as he motioned for all of them to follow after him.
The moment they got inside the Honoris Manor, Leo couldn't help but become astonished.
It wasn't only huge, but he could also see numerous bees and many of their hives around while walking towards the yard of the manor. Surprisingly though, these bees weren't wild and aggressive at all, they were just flying peacefully, collecting the nectars from the flowers around the manor, and delivering them back to their hive afterward in order to create more honey.
When the group arrived at the small garden in the yard, they instantly saw a person standing in the middle.
Observing closely, Leo soon noticed that it was a beautiful woman interacting with a group of bees.
This woman was as beautiful as Cassandra and Elizabeth, she has a sexy body, well-rounded buttocks, slender legs, but she has a small breast though, but it still suits her to have such small breast, her hair and pupils were green, and she has a white as snow skin like Cassandra and Elizabeth.
"Lady Veronica, sir Leo, your escort, has arrived!" The Butler announced as he bowed a little towards his master, Lady Veronica.
Hearing the Butler's words, Lady Veronica slowly turned her head around to face Leo and the others.
"Good thing you all have arrived safe and sound!" Lady Veronica's eyes lit brightly in excitement. "Rest for a bit, we will be leaving later on."
Lady Veronica suddenly motioned for Leo to come closer. She was quick to notice that Leo was the leader of the group, so she specifically called out for him.
Leo nodded his head, understanding Lady Veronica.
The moment Leo came closer, Veronica motioned him to lend her his ears before she started whispering something.
Leo keeps on nodding his head in response to Veronica's words. After listening to her, he stared in shock as he secretly took a glimpse at the Butler.
"Okay, Lady Veronica!" Leo said solemnly before going to his group to whisper the same thing. He had finally understood the reason why Veronica had given an escorting mission.
The mission of escorting her wasn't just simply protecting her along the way to the Silver City and back to the Honoris City while traveling along the brick road that her family had purposely made for her for smooth travel. Instead, she wants them to escort and protect her on the detour she will take secretly to reach Silver City.
Veronica's reason was simple.
Last week, when she was sneaking from her room to secretly gaze at the stars with the queen bees in their manor, she unexpectedly found out that her Butler was talking to three unknown people in black hoods in the yard. She obviously wanted to hear their conversation since it was done so secretly, hence she slowly approached them until finally arriving in a spot far enough to hear their conversation while still being hidden.
It was at that moment that Veronica found out the horrifying truth that her Butler was planning on kidnapping her along with the three unknown people's groups on the same day of her visit to Silver City.
Veronica had thought of reporting to her family about her findings so that she would be able to stop the kidnapping plan. Unfortunately, though, her parents were away for a trip to another Kingdom because of an important business, and all the trusted subordinates she could trust were also away doing some important missions around the Silver Kingdom. So, she has no people to ask for help. Of course, she cannot just report to anyone since there might be more people that the kidnappers had paid aside from the Butler. Even her Butler has already betrayed her, someone her family has trusted to protect her, thus there's a high possibility that they've tempted more people who work for the Honoris Family.
In the end, she decided to only keep it to herself. Nevertheless, she doesn't plan to just allow herself to get kidnapped, so she considers canceling her visit to Silver City. It was that simple. After all, the moment she cancels her journey, the kidnapping will also be canceled, or perhaps they have to think of another method, which would buy her more time to make preparations for how to counter. However, Princess Tiana told her that she missed her so badly since they hadn't been able to meet for more than one year already, and also she had already given her the promise to visit her, hence she was stuck in a dilemma.
Given that situation, she carefully thought, "Why not go in a detour to avoid the kidnappers?"
She couldn't only avoid the kidnappers in that way, but at the same time, visit her friend too. Hence, she could hit two birds with one stone. Oh, actually, three birds with one stone, since she will also be able to catch her Butler the moment her parents or the other trusted subordinates return from their important business.
With that brilliant idea in her mind, she quickly made a rough guide on a map for which path she could possibly take. But unexpectedly though, she found out that she was unfortunately not able to go alone because all the detours leading to Silver City needed her to go through the Yellow Forest, hence she needed people to protect her.
Veronica cannot use her guards, as it would possibly blow her plan off, and she also couldn't go alone as it would surely kill her.
So...
"Why not hire trustworthy people to protect me?"
With that sudden idea in mind, she quickly created a mission, using the excuse of escort, and passed it to Sword and Magic. She needed someone trustworthy to come along with her on the detour, so she specifically gave the mission to Sword and Magic since their Sword branch people were known for being trustworthy when executing missions. Moreover, she has a good relationship with Madam Silva, so obviously they would treat the mission very seriously.
With all of those things prepared, she was then only waiting for someone to accept the mission from Sword and Magic. She was confident too that someone will accept it soon since the reward was a whooping 1,000,000 gold coin, which is also equivalent to 10,000 points. (Author's note: 100 gold coins are also equivalent to 1 point.)
At this moment, Leo realized that what he had said before was spot on, it was indeed a deadly trap, a honey-covered deadly trap!
Not only were they protecting her from the possible kidnappers but also from all the Magical Beasts that they would surely encounter along the detour.
Leo also didn't expect that the Butler, one of the trusted people of any Noble Household, and also a subordinate that Veronica's parents trusted the most for the safety of their daughter, was actually intending to kidnap her along the journey.
He was having a hard time accepting that Lady Veronica's Butler was going to do such a despicable deed to her. After all, he had always lived with Butler Xiao from a very young age until he enrolled in the Silver Mage Academy.
Suddenly, Leo remembered something that he had heard before, "Even a brother would betray his own brother out of greed."
He doesn't know what was offered to Veronica's Butler, but it is surely something big since he dared to betray the Honoris Noble Household, the third Major Noble Household of the Silver Kingdom.
Leo could now see just how lucky he was to have Butler Xiao as his family's butler since the latter was a person who had dedicated his entire life to serving him with loyalty and trustworthiness.