Chapter 104: Recycled Strategy

[3rd Person POV]

The day had already started, yet the sun still did not reveal its majesty as if still urging people to sleep so that they could replenish as much energy as possible for another hustle and bustle, in a certain convenience store near the periphery of the city of Heimdall, near the adjacent forest.

The store owner was sleeping on the counter, snoring loudly, he had been busy all day and wanted to catch up on some rest, so he did not go upstairs to his bed but instead just slept in the nearest spot his tired body could reach.

Suddenly, as the man was snoring he heard a seemingly ethereal whisper.

"Wake up..."

The man's eyebrows knitted as he opened his eyes, alongside the obvious annoyed gesture, his nails started to morph as his pupils into a vertical slit, and at the same time his canine teeth elongated, that's right, the "owner" of the convenience store is a devil, a devil sneaked in by Hebi and designated to one of her core subordinates, Flou. This is an arrangement so that Flou can prepare against any intruder from the base designated to Flou, the other 3 subordinates also have such arrangements.

"What do you wish to be done, Flou?"

Even though they have a different standing, because of Flou's rather casual bearing, the people under him are used to calling him by his name, some say that the ambiance of Flou's team is better than the other three people under Hebi.

The man looked at his side, and there he saw a shadow that was thicker than it should have been, indicating Flou's arrival, the man who already confirmed that something serious might have happened was further confirmed when he saw the vice-captain of the operation personally visit him, he immediately asked, his voice full of seriousness and concern.

"What happened?"

Flou replied, his tone still plain.

"I was attacked by Sophia's subordinate without a single one of you alarming me, are you doing your job properly?"

The man suddenly shuddered, that is because he was acting like a genuine convenience store owner that he could not observe at night, well the man is known to be quite rash, to the point that even his devil-level stamina cannot catch up to him sometimes, good thing is that, as what he can see, the attack failed.

Just as he was about to sigh a long one because of relief, he suddenly heard his vice-captain, Flou chuckle, unknowingly, the man broke off in cold sweat.

"Because of all of you, they succeeded, and unfortunately, I want to show off to my master and use this opportunity to be given more important missions..."

Flou then suddenly went outside of the shadow, his eyes shining and his teeth could be seen because of his smile, his teeth had a rattling faint glow on them similar to his eyes, the man wanted to run, but the moment he saw the eyes of his former vice-captain that is now a grey colored walking corpse, he lost control of his body, he can only freeze in fear as Flou whispered on his ear.

"Die."

The man's heartbeat started to slow down, slower and slower until finally, he breathed his last breath without even having the chance to spout his last words. Flou sighed and then went out of the convenience store as he continued the mission given to him, for the sake of his rank and ultimately, for the sake of his new lady.

[Sophia's POV]

Hello, Sophia here, it is the 5th day of delaying.

I was looking at the sky that had just seen its first light on the fifth day of my appearance in Heimdall, I could not help but think hard about the way I had to scrap my plan, well of course, even though I scrapped the plan, my plot is still going smoothly. You see, my previous plan was to run away with the relic in advance with space magic, that way, the relic could safely go back to its rightful place while I distracted Hebi into thinking that I was fighting her for the possession of the relic, when in truth I was just using her to practice dark and space magic.

The premise of the plan is to use space magic so that Hebi will not sense the transport of the relic and chase the envoy transporting it from here to Bulawan city so that if a fight breaks out, it is not my city that will have to sustain damage. Well, as you already know, that ended in utter failure and I got to give up such a plan and have to recycle a new one.

[And you're sulking because of that? It's not like it affected the trajectory, you know.]

I mean, that's lame you know, besides it heightened the chances of failure, so it's normal for me to feel this way.

Oh, if you are wondering, the plan I recycled is the one I used against the rebel monkeys that somehow thought that attacking me was a good act of rebellion, you know, killing a lot of subordinates and all that, but instead of going out of my way to call him an idiot os he gets angry and charges headfirst without a weapon, I will wreak havoc in Hebi's ranks instead.

You will see how will I do that if it happens.

[You worry about the strangest things, you know that?]

Right, right, anyway, the implementation is not that identical, I mean mainly because Hebi is way smarter than the idiot that calls himself my opponent before.

Moving on, right now, we are here in a morgue of a certain hospital, without the consent of the hospital, besides me is a corpse wrapped in a blanket, and in my back is Eleanor crying quite uncontrollably, well I stopped calming her down because I can't calm her down at all.

Let's just say that this corpse will confirm the strangeness of the queen. Though I wondered how close is the queen and Eleanor for her to react that way, any way, I used space magic and then peaked out of the throne room of the king who was looking at the report of his spies about their latest operations to investigate recent immigrants, I then looked at the King who was startled at the appearance of my head, my serious expression however made him immediately go into the zone.

"Lady Sophia, what make you...r head come here in such a short notice?"

I ignored the hesitation in the tone of King Roselle as I replied, my expression of seriousness did not diminish for one bit.

"I request a meeting an immediate meeting with you, right now, use this portal to transport yourself immediately."

After doing that, I expanded the portal to his size, The good thing is that what he can see is a geometric escapade and not the other side of the portal, that would make him shudder on the spot, you see in his investigations there are loopholes on how Queen Khearsenbelle acts.

_I noticed it on the first day and he just noticed it yesterday..._

As I thought of that, the King went out of the other side of the portal and when Roselle saw the place we were, plus the fact that Eleanor was biting her lips as she tried hard to stop her tears made the King's eyes turn wide, I can imagine that the beating of his heart started to increase by the second. However, I did not show it on my face as I wore a very solemn expression.

"Queen Sophia... What... Who is this...?"

I looked at the King as I consciously gulped my saliva and sighed, with a "serious" tone, I started to talk to the increasingly nervous King.

"Roselle, you have to promise me that whatever you see beneath this sheet, you will maintain a bearing fit for a King, you will not shout, you will not go berserk or do anything that will destroy the hospital and affect the patients here, do you understand!?"

I have to do this in advance because I still have a conscience and Roselle is not Eleanor who has a calmer demeanor she was so calm that after almost murdering the prince of Gjallarhorn, she started to worry about the condition of the Queen like nothing happened.

The King nodded at my plea as I solemnly nodded too, I and Eleanor then moved aside for the King to flip over the sheet covering the corpse aside, and when he did so, the vicinity turned silent, and a corpse that already turned grey surfaced below the sheet, she has red hair that is still silky despite being a long time corpse, The King's mouth opened and closed, and finally after a minute of Roselle seemingly on a standstill with his vocal cords, he muttered silently, alongside his mutter was the tears silently flowing down his eyes.

"...Khear... Khearsenbelle...?"

That's right, the current Queen of Gjallarhorn, the spouse of King Roselle, the protector of the Royal palace, Khearsenbelle Gjallarhorn I is dead. I did not say anything further and silently watched the King scrutinize the corpse while crying, well he has been pretty suspicious of the recent condition of the queen lately, so Queen Khearsenbelle's corpse confirmed his suspicion, how cruel of a confirmation that is.

Even Eleanor is crying, though because she already bawled her heart out earlier, it is more silent now, I beckoned Eleanor to get out of the morgue for a moment of silence for the King, of course, I am using illusion because we are trespassing on a hospital, I mean out of all places.

[In any case, are you sure you won't take advantage of King Roselle's devastated mental strength?]

Hey, hey, do you take me for a person without conscience?

[Yes.]

HEY!

Anyway, even though I am doing something for my own sake, I still won't manipulate someone who has just got to know that his spouse is dead.

Sigh, in any case, I have to cheer up Eleanor so I am not making any sound, she had to initiate the conversation, and if I do, I might just exacerbate the pain she is feeling, more so because I don't know who is Khearsenbelle on a personal level. As I was thinking of such things, Eleanor finally spoke.

"Say, how strong heroes are? Are they really as strong as my mom?"

I looked at her slightly confused but was soon enlightened by what she wanted to convey, people do tend to be euphemistic when they are in extreme emotions.

"As strong, no? But as mysterious?"

As I said that I took a stride that was louder than the others and immediately, all our surroundings morphed and changed to that of a park, there was a statue of a man holding a sword, and in his other hand was a flag on his back that says KKK (no, not THAT one for Americans out there) (1). Yes, I went back to the previous world using illusions, of course this is so that I can divert Eleanor's attention by wondering where such a statue can be found, though there is a slight chance that Urduja told her children about Gat Andres, anyway, as I was thinking of things like that, I continued.

"Every single one of us is."

As I said so, the surroundings turned back to that of the hospital, but Eleanor's eyebrows were still tightly knitted against each other, while silently walking for 5 seconds, my wife suddenly said.

"As long as they are not that powerful, I think I can solve their mystery..."

As I heard those words, I could not help but frown, girl do you think that mystery is something to be taken lightly, and you call yourself the native of this world? You indirectly saying to me that you want a shot in the life of Hebi Tsukaiza will not make me convinced in the slightest, you know? As I sighed, I decided to be a little euphemistic in my approach to cheer her up too. We finally found a row of seats, we still have the illusion I cast earlier so we are invisible to the eyes of the scarce patients and relatives.

"Well, the question is, after solving their mystery, are you confident in being able to pierce through their power? Mystery is a cloak, a cloak used as a first layer of defense, to make it simply, it is like how your personality is structured, you are usually easily embarrassed, but beyond your cuteness is a calmness that will not flinch even if you endangered the future of a Kingdom."

"I am repeating my question, are you confident of yourself, of your experience, and your luck to be able to bypass the self-preservation of super powerful people?"

My last words were said while looking at my wife so that I could emphasize the meaning of the thing she wanted to attempt, I don't want my wife to attempt a Hinata, more so if it's for a friend who most definitely wishes for her not to do so, and good thing that it worked as she finally shook her head, after seeing this, I patted her head as I said.

"See, if you are not confident enough, miracles that you want to attempt will most definitely not happen, also even if you are confident, I would still stop you with everything I physically can."

Eleanor just silently stared at the paved floor, her eyes still sunken but I could tell that she had finally understood my point.

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1: Bantayog ni Bonifacio or "Bonifacio National Monument" is a monument that commemorates Andres Bonifacio, the father of revolution, he decided to revolt when he witnessed the death of GOMBURZA. (search his name for more details.)