Chapter 232: The Last Queen

"Me?" Sensing the animated wooden planks on his body suddenly go limp, Ron hastily tore them all off. "Who am I?"

"You’re the one who broke my seal!" The head flew over until it was almost touching Ron’s face. "Those pathetic demons sealed me in five different locations, but two of them have been opened recently—and you, you smell of my other parts!"

’That sounds so strange...’

Ron frowned, leaning his head back slightly to put as much distance between them as possible. Though the powerful head had released the restraints on his hands and mouth, Ron still wasn’t completely free.

At this distance, Ron had no doubt that the slightest wrong move would mean his immediate end.

"Just who are you...?"

"You don’t recognize me?" Now it was the head’s turn to be shocked. Its already prominent cheekbones seemed to jut out even more sharply. "You defeated the demonic lapdogs guarding my tomb, destroyed my seal, and took my bones, yet you don’t know who I am?!"

"Not to mention, you also sent people to break into the tomb sealing this very head, disturbing... Wait a minute."

The head abruptly stopped its tirade. The two flames in its eye sockets turned a deep purple, sweeping back and forth across Ron. "You... you don’t have the blood of the Farama Kingdom. You’re not one of those rebels?"

"You’re the Last Queen of the Farama Kingdom?" Ron finally understood her identity. He stared at the head in amazement. "You can still move on your own?!"

Upon discovering Ron was not a descendant of her subjects, the Queen’s head softened its tone slightly. "Her Highness Gracia blessed me with a vitality unimaginable to mortals, allowing me to serve her at a moment’s notice, no matter how much time has passed."

"Now it’s your turn to answer my questions. You are not a descendant of Farama, so why come here and unearth my seal? I am a betrayed queen, and I have nothing to offer but curses."

The Queen’s head, which had beautiful, long golden hair but otherwise plain features, turned away. Two red beams shot from her eyes, instantly piercing the chest of Sibach, who lay on the lab table. As a wisp of black smoke drifted upward, Ron could feel the curse that had been festering inside the Shapeshifter’s body vanish without a trace.

"Did you anesthetize him?" The Queen raised an eyebrow. "No wonder he didn’t wake up right away. I was beginning to think my power had weakened that much."

The Queen, imprisoned for centuries, seemed to have a desperate need to express herself.

"Initially, I had no intention of getting involved in these affairs," Ron explained. "But your ’Her Highness’ made an offer—a reward in exchange for your return to her service."

"As for me, I don’t want any unpredictable, dangerous elements on my lands. You are no longer the master of this land, and I would be more than happy to see you leave."

The flames in the Queen’s head flickered. "Gracia... Of course. She would certainly want to reclaim her property. As for me, I have a score to settle with the Abyss."

"You’re the new Lord of this land? How interesting. When you die is none of my concern, though. Tell me, which of my parts have you collected? I can only sense that the seals have weakened, but I can’t determine which two."

"One of your legs and one of your arms. The Watchers were a Pollution Worm Demon and an Undead, as well as a Red Copper Dragon and a Ratman Tribe." Ron tried to recall the name. "Datina. Are you familiar with it? It belongs to a Pollu—"

"The Pollution Worm Demon, yes!" Ron mentioning her was one thing, but at the name "Datina," the raging flames in the head’s eye sockets nearly erupted, threatening to burn the entire cabin to ash. "Datina, Datina, DATINA! I could be cut into six hundred and sixty-six pieces and I would never forget that name! That venomous gossip! That fickle whore! Killing her a thousand times over wouldn’t be enough to quell the hatred in my heart!"

"If it weren’t for her and her Pollution Worm Demon legion inciting my foolish subjects to rebel against my policies, my kingdom never would have vanished so easily! She was the mastermind behind my entombment! It was her idea to seal me away in pieces, leaving me unable to live yet unable to die! Where is she? Tell me, where is she now?!"

"Calm down! You need to calm down!" Ron was taken aback by the sheer hatred the head had accumulated over centuries. ’This queen must have been incredibly powerful when she was alive.’ Even now, the intensity of her emotions alone was terrifying. "That’s not what Datina said. She claimed to be your loyal supporter—"

"That bitch dares say such a thing?!" Even without eyeballs, Ron could see the widening of her eyes in her expression. "How dare she?! While I was battling the demon armies seeping up from the underground, she and her legion were corroding my kingdom! My poor, few remaining supporters were all taken by her, their fates unknown—and she has the audacity to claim she was loyal to me?!"

The head let out a sound somewhere between a sob and a laugh. "Tell me. Tell me where she is now!"

"She’s living in seclusion in a remote mountain village with those supporters of yours," Ron said, unsure of what else to say. "She claims to have betrayed the demons to preserve the Farama bloodline. And recently... Gracia has taken a liking to her. They’ve signed a contract."

"I’m not trying to provoke you, but if you go back to serving under Gracia, you two might end up as..." Ron made a complicated gesture.

The head suddenly fell silent. The flames in her eyes dimmed to faint embers, like a candle flame guttering in the wind, about to be extinguished at any moment. "No... you’re lying to me, aren’t you? You’ve had an egg planted in you by a Pollution Worm Demon. You’re lying. You—"

"Even as just a head, you can still easily defeat me," Ron said with a helpless look. "You can tell in an instant whether I’m lying."

"Frankly, I think the problem lies with both of you. A demon’s words can’t be trusted, of course, but her actions seem to support her claims. But what about you?"

Ron let out a soft sigh. "There’s a legend about two brothers. To quell a rebellion, the younger brother willingly allowed the elder to seal him in a sarcophagus. But when the seal was broken a millennium later, the newly freed younger brother went mad, blaming his older brother for everything."

"You’ve been sealed away for centuries. Your body was torn to pieces, and you’ve been stewing in your hatred for demons. Are your memories really still that reliable?"