"Don't you have your own room?"
Ayanokouji looked at the petite girl in front of him. Beatrice was sitting on his bed reading a book, and during the day, snacks bought by Emilia were placed on the bed.
"Correct."
Beatrice closed her book, lifted her head, and her flower-like eyes focused on him.
"It's already late. As usual, shouldn't you be resting?" Ayanokouji said calmly.
"I'm waiting for you!" Beatrice puffed out her cheeks, looking rather cute.
"Waiting for me?" Ayanokouji asked hesitantly.
"Of course!" Beatrice pouted and said, "This is not the forbidden library. Betty cannot generate magic power on her own…"
She lowered her head slightly, her voice trembling a bit, and her cheeks were slightly red. She looked like a shy girl. Because she was an artificial spirit, she could not generate her own magic power. Previously, in the Forbidden Library, she needed to absorb magic power from her contractor.
Ayanokouji was her source of magic power.
"I see." Ayanokouji nodded, "But can't magic power be absorbed from a distance?"
"No, the closer the distance to absorb magic power, the higher the efficiency of magic power absorption!" Beatrice said with her hands on her hips, "When people sleep at night, they are in a completely relaxed state, which is also the best time to absorb magic power in this condition…"
"I understand, Betty wants to sleep with me at night?"
"This is not sleeping! It's just to absorb magic power. Don't say strange words! It's just to absorb magic power! It's just to absorb magic power!" Beatrice's face turned red, and she looked a bit excited.
"Yes, I understand." Ayanokouji nodded lightly. Judging from her words, two people needed to sleep relatively close. "Betty, your magic power is stored. Is there a limit?"
"No." Beatrice immediately answered, "Betty has stored more than four hundred years of magic power in the Forbidden Library. However, if I leave the Forbidden Library, I can only release a small part of the magic power in sequence to prevent problems before they occur. So Betty needs to store more magic power! It's definitely not for any other reason!"
"I see." Ayanokouji nodded and looked at the time. "It's not too late now, so I'll rest. I still have to prepare to attend a meeting tomorrow morning. I will also sleep."
"Betty warns you in advance, don't do anything strange, don't ever think about it! Even if you are a contractor." Beatrice said seriously.
"Strange things? What do you mean?"
Ayanokouji's eyes were filled with doubt, but Beatrice stopped paying attention to him, turned her back to him, and began to sleep.
Her heartbeat increased rapidly, almost leaping out of her small chest.
This was the first time in hundreds of years that she slept outside the Forbidden Library. Although Beatrice always dreamed of leaving the Forbidden Library, when she actually left the Forbidden Library, she still felt a bit uncomfortable.
Moreover, this time she slept in the same bed with someone else. This was an unprecedented experience, making her very nervous and unable to sleep at all.
Usually, if she wanted to absorb magic power from him, she had to make physical contact in the end. But now she was naturally a bit shy. She knew that Ayanokouji was not asleep.
'What method should be used?'
Ayanokouji also wisely did not ask further. He lay on the bed and began to think about future plans.
Tomorrow, he would go to the palace to attend a meeting. He needed to meet other candidates for the throne. This was an opportunity for him to consider a 'backup plan' to find others besides Emilia, who might be suitable for seeking protection.
And it was also an opportunity for him to gather enough information.
Through this opportunity, he could learn about the other candidates for the throne and at the same time understand the composition of the Sage Association and the Knights.
Ayanokouji might be able to identify in this meeting who could be used as a tool and who might be his future enemies.
If some people could not be won over, they might become obstacles to him and need to be removed. Starting tomorrow, he had to take the next step.
Not only that, he brought Felt to the capital of the kingdom. Besides using her to gain support from the people below, there was another thing, which was Felt's identity.
On the first regression, Ayanokouji clearly saw the dragon emblem representing the identity of the candidates for the throne reacting to Felt, which made him speculate that Felt might also be a candidate for the throne.
If Felt was indeed one of the candidates for the throne, he had an additional trump card in his hand that could be used as a trump card.
After the meeting, he would use some small tricks to deal with those nobles.
For the nobles who valued their families, let Elsa disguise herself to kidnap their children, and then step forward to solve the problem to gain their trust.
As for the nobles who had evidence, they would directly use the obtained evidence to threaten and force them to side with him.
For the nobles who truly could not be won over and might be obstacles, Ayanokouji would find ways to eliminate them. Whether it was through framing or other means, he could use them.
If it didn't work, just order Elsa to find an opportunity to get rid of them all.
As long as there was an obstacle, no matter who they were, Ayanokouji would eliminate them.
While he was thinking, a soft hand gently rested on his shoulder. He turned and looked up, seeing Beatrice's sleeping face.
The girl's eyes were tightly closed, and so was her mouth—Beatrice wanted to pretend to be asleep, then take the opportunity to touch him to absorb his magic power.
However, such acting skills were very poor in front of Ayanokouji. He knew that people looked very relaxed when they slept, their eyes not tightly closed, and their mouths slightly open.
Although he knew Beatrice was pretending to sleep, he chose not to reveal it.
This was also the first time he slept with someone else.
However, compared to Beatrice, his heart was not disturbed. For him, this was an important step for Beatrice to absorb his magic.
'Just maintain the status quo.' Ayanokouji thought in his heart, then he maintained this posture and slowly fell asleep.
The next morning, he opened his eyes and found that Beatrice was holding his hand tightly, like a child feeling insecure.
❀❀❀
"But can't we not show such a scene?!"
Beatrice covered her face with her hands and swung her slender legs vigorously. Through her fingers, her face was red and her heart was full of embarrassment.
This scene was broadcast throughout the kingdom and even the world, equivalent to her public execution.
This feeling of shame made her body tremble.
However, this scene made her a little happy because she knew that in the future, Ayanokouji would be her contractor.
This made Beatrice a little less envious of herself in the sky scene.
"Hurry up and come…"
She lifted her head, her eyes full of hope.
❰❱ SKY SCREEN ❰❱
Ayanokouji lay on the bed for a while and did not immediately wake up Beatrice. He started thinking about what would happen at the palace meeting today.
If it was announced today that the official start of the throne would be announced, he was worried that every candidate for the throne would have to speak publicly. If there was a problem with the public speech, he was worried that point would be deducted in the eyes of the public.
So now he had drafted in his mind, preparing different words to face different situations, and he could let Emilia memorize them when the time came.
Unknowingly, tens of minutes had passed, and Beatrice finally woke up.
"Is it morning already?" She stretched and yawned.
"Yes." Ayanokouji answered from the side.
His response surprised Beatrice. She had just woken up in the morning and even forgot that the two were sleeping in the same bed. She only remembered what happened after recalling it for a few seconds, reaching out to touch Ayanokouji, absorbing magic power from the other party's body, and then falling asleep without realizing it.
However, she was still a bit proud, thinking that her plan had succeeded yesterday. She did not expect that Ayanokouji had fully understood her thoughts.
"How much magic power has been replenished from the sky?" Ayanokouji asked.
"Not much." Beatrice said slowly, lifting her chin slightly, "But it's enough."
"That's okay." Ayanokouji nodded.
"We are going to the palace today, right?"
When Beatrice spoke, her eyes shone brightly, full of expectation. She had never been to the palace, only heard about it in various books in the Forbidden Library.
"Yes." Ayanokouji said, "I will prepare some speech notes that Emilia might need."
"Okay, let me prepare a bit!"
Soon he wrote the draft he had prepared in his mind on a white paper, and then sent it to Emilia, asking her to memorize it first.
"They haven't said what this summoning meeting is about. Ayanokouji, are you sure it's about announcing the official start of the candidates for the throne?" Emilia asked after taking the draft.
"What hasn't happened yet cannot be determined, but considering all factors, it's the most likely." Ayanokouji said, "The gathering of all the throne candidates must be related to the selection of the king and the death of the previous king. This has been going on for quite some time. Even though the Council of Wise is acting as an agent, it shouldn't last long. To ensure the stability of the kingdom, a new king must be chosen as soon as possible."
"I see." Emilia nodded.
"There are some other things you need to pay attention to..."
Ayanokouji then told Emilia about things that politicians need to be aware of in public, which Emilia had never thought of before. Political concepts are just one's own political ideals, nothing else.
And Ayanokouji himself had all the qualities to become the perfect politician, and he gave her some details that are difficult to notice.
"As expected of Ayanokouji!"
Emilia smiled and nodded, remembering that Ayanokouji claimed to be a member of the royal family of the Empire on which the sun never sets. It made sense that he paid so much attention to political details.
At this time, Beatrice had also changed her clothes and styled her hair, eagerly walking ahead of the two: "I'm ready! Let's get going!"
"Mm."
The scene changed, and Ayanokouji and the others had arrived at the outskirts of the royal palace.
It was a very luxurious palace, with ceilings over ten meters high, and the walls were covered with reliefs and carvings, all depicting dragons.
They reached a large iron gate with a magnificent pattern of a two-headed dragon on it.
When he was at Roswaal Mansion, Ayanokouji did a good job studying the history of the Lugnica kingdom. The country prospered due to a contract signed with the Divine Dragon Volcanica; whether it was war, disease, or even famine, all crises could be avoided under the dragon's protection. In the long history of the kingdom, the word "dragon" had never disappeared.
But he also knew that excessive reliance on the treaty and emphasis on the dragon's history had made the country too weak to survive independently. Once faced with a situation that shook the nation, they would do nothing and simply ask for help or rely on Volcanica.