"Forgive me..."
Rom's eyes were filled with guilt as he reached out and gently patted Felt's shoulder, who was currently hanging her head, afraid of making her sad.
But Felt lifted her head, without any disappointment on her face.
"Having you is enough for me! It turns out we're both very strong."
Hearing her words, Rom was slightly surprised, and then a smile appeared on his face.
However, he also knew that after this scene was broadcasted, his life with Felt might truly end, even more severely than any impact Elsa might have caused before.
He had once been one of the main leaders of the Demi-Human coalition in the kingdom's civil war. Although declared dead, everyone knew his identity after the sky illusion was broadcasted.
Although a long time had passed since that war, and relations between humans and Demi-Humans had greatly eased, there would surely be many enemies who coveted his head, and he would face many pursuits at that time.
Moreover, Felt's royal identity had been fully revealed.
Originally, Rom hid Felt's identity to protect her and didn't want her to get involved in dangerous political turmoil. But now that everyone knew her identity, there was no need to hide it. Rom also wanted Felt to stay away from the slums and live a better life.
Elsewhere in the royal capital, everyone was shocked by the flood of information on the sky screen.
The entire kingdom would face a significant and unprecedented impact.
❰❱ SKY SCREEN ❰❱
"So, Ayanokouji-sama, please protect Felt!" Rom knelt on the ground with a plop, "My only idea is to protect Felt. If she can live safely, at least she will have a better life here than in the slums. As long as Ayanokouji-sama can protect Felt, I will do anything."
"..."
Ayanokouji did not immediately agree, which would make the agreement seem very cheap.
"Please, Ayanokouji-sama! I'm willing to do anything!" Rom said again upon seeing his hesitation.
Ayanokouji pretended to think for a moment, then nodded: "Alright, I promise."
He did not reveal his lie now, to gain better support from Rom.
Seeing Rom's current appearance, he became even more convinced that the feelings in his heart were useless.
Rom had once been the ruler of the coalition, but now he seemed so humble before him. Besides the secret between him and Felt, what made all this happen was that he considered Felt like his daughter.
"Thank you, Ayanokouji-sama!" Rom said very sincerely, "Please keep this matter a secret and don't let others know..."
"Mm, now only I know about it here."
Ayanokouji nodded, and Rom's initially serious expression relaxed a bit at this moment.
The two soon left the room, and it didn't take much time. The others didn't even realize that they had just chatted.
Elsewhere, Emilia and Felt outside were now acting like close friends, talking about almost everything.
At night, Ayanokouji returned to his room, and Beatrice was already in bed, leaning beside the bed and reading a book.
"Betty, do you know what the White Whale is?" Ayanokouji also lay on the bed and asked.
"The White Whale? Why are you asking this?" Beatrice closed the book and asked seriously.
"I heard that others in the royal capital had heard of this monster before." Ayanokouji replied, "I heard that there was an expedition team to conquer it before, but they seemed unable to win."
"Anyway, it's a Mabeast created by the Witch." Beatrice explained, "More than 400 years ago, the Witch of Gluttony seemed to have created it for some reason, and it's recorded in the Forbidden Library of Mother."
"The Witch of Gluttony?" Ayanokouji was slightly lost in thought.
To be able to create such a monster, it seemed that the Witch of Gluttony also had very unique abilities.
He quickly raised his head again and continued, "But I'm curious, does the White Whale have special abilities?"
"Since the White Whale was created by the Witch of Gluttony, it was also given the ability of gluttony." Beatrice continued, "The White Whale can erase the things it touches from the world – an erasure in every sense, leaving no trace in this world and even the memories in others' hearts will be erased."
"Is it possible to alter reality and memory?" This intrigued Ayanokouji, "In what form is the modification?"
"Logic will fill itself in. For example, if someone asked you to do something, but after they were swallowed by the White Whale, you would forget that they asked you to do it. If you've already done it, your memory would be altered to say you did it for another reason." Beatrice said, "And what this person wrote and did before will disappear."
"I see." Ayanokouji nodded, "Is there a situation where logic cannot be filled in?"
"Theoretically it's possible, but who knows?" Beatrice shook her head.
This sentence also made Ayanokouji think. If the White Whale had such an ability, then everyone erased by the White Whale had disappeared from the world's memory.
At least this indicated that not everyone killed by the White Whale would be erased from existence.
However, this made Ayanokouji a little curious whether the White Whale was also worth using.
"I'm sleepy." Beatrice threw the book aside and slid under the blanket like a small loach. "Betty is very tired today."
"Betty didn't do anything today."
"Betty just answered so many of your questions patiently!"
"Not enough for just a few words."
"I don't care!" Beatrice pouted, her puffed-up cheeks looking like a goldfish, "You have to repay me well!"
"Letting you extract magic power every day should be considered part of the reward."
"That's what you should do!" Beatrice said immediately.
"So what should I do?"
"Tell Betty a story." Beatrice turned, her eyes like petals and butterflies fixed on Ayanokouji, "Tell Betty a story."
'Is it storytelling again?' Ayanokouji said in his heart.
Beatrice and Meili were very similar in this regard. Although Beatrice had spent a very long time, her psychology was actually just like a regular child.
"But first I must state that I'm not good at storytelling." Ayanokouji said calmly.
When he told a story to Meili, Meili said that he was very emotionless while telling it.
"What does that matter? Let's start!"
Ayanokouji nodded.
There were no fairy tale books around, but compared to Beatrice, he had essentially read all the books in the mansion over the past few hundred years. So talking about the story was also not sensible.
He thought for a moment and recounted the contents of a book he had read in the original world as a story.
However, it was no different from the story he had told Meili before. Ayanokouji's tone was like a robot's and sounded emotionless.
He quickly finished the first story. He thought Beatrice should have been asleep long ago, so he turned to look at her, only to find that Beatrice's bright eyes were staring at him.
"I'm not good at storytelling." Ayanokouji said.
"No, you said it very well!" Beatrice said quickly, she said this from the bottom of her heart.
This surprised Ayanokouji a bit because he could feel that Beatrice was telling the truth, but he also knew that his storytelling skills were very average, and Meili couldn't even listen to them.
But Beatrice liked it very much?
Was it because his storytelling style touched some of Beatrice's strange hobbies—
Or was it just because the storyteller was himself?
Ayanokouji became a bit confused.
"Tell me another story!" Beatrice said with a smile, with a bit of hope in her eyes.
"Didn't I just tell a story? What I said should be more than what you answered before."
"It was interesting! If you tell another story to Betty, Betty will treat it as if you've repaid her!"
"This is really like a capitalist transaction." Ayanokouji said, looking a bit helpless, but still told another story to Beatrice.
Ten minutes later, he finished the story. He turned. Beatrice's breathing became regular and slow, and she seemed to have finally fallen asleep.
Ayanokouji moved his joints a bit, and now he finally had time to think about the throne candidates.
His initial idea was to examine the strength and abilities of the other throne candidates to determine if he needed to prepare a backup plan or jump directly to another camp.
The first to be eliminated was Priscilla. Her arrogance was different from Beatrice's pretended arrogance. It was deeply rooted, which meant she came from an important noble family, but much lower than the Karsten family.
Anastasia's subordinates had a large chamber of commerce with very strong funds, and her subordinates also had a strong mercenary team. For Ayanokouji, Anastasia might be a good supporter with a very shrewd mind. Although it was not impossible to control her, it was not an easy task, and her main scope of activity was in Kararagi, and she had no control over the interior of the royal capital and the number of supporters in the royal capital was also very few.
So in his eyes, Anastasia was a good partner for the time being. She might use her extraordinary knowledge to create something that does not exist in this world, and then use Anastasia or Russell to enter the market and make a lot of money.
Anastasia is still useful for now, but if possible, Ayanokouji wants to take over all the merchants as his own.
And the one who needs to be dealt with the most right now is Crusch.
Crusch is the strongest among the few throne candidates, and currently the most likely to take over the throne. If Ayanokouji had met Crusch earlier, he might have joined her camp and they could have won.
But the situation might be different now. If he switched to Crusch's side, Mell and Elsa might follow, but Beatrice might become an enemy of Puck, and her emotions would prevent her from performing. If that happened, he would not be able to gain the magical power from the Forbidden Library, and would only be able to take it slowly from Ayanokouji.
Moreover, the Forbidden Library in Roswaal's mansion and what is called the sanctuary are very valuable to Ayanokouji, and Emilia is easier to control than Crusch. He would not easily give up the cards in his hand.
If this is the case, then Crusch is the biggest threat to him for now.
As Ayanokouji was thinking, he felt a warm feeling coming from his hand – it was Beatrice's hand. As she slept, she unconsciously held his hand out of fear that he would leave, and Beatrice's sleeping face looked very relaxed and even seemed to smile happily.
'Just because you believe the lie that I am that person?' Ayanokouji shook his head slightly, but some new thoughts also came to his mind.
'Maybe my storytelling skills need a bit of improvement.'