Chapter 255: A Thousand Times

“How can I reach you later?” Layla Augus said, still unwilling to give up.

“Hmm…” Ravian murmured thoughtfully.

“You can come to the border and ask for me. I’m usually there, and I’ll be staying for the next few days.”

Layla Augus nodded, then gestured to her guard. Both guards promptly nodded before the three of them turned and headed in the opposite direction from Ravian and his squad.

Once they were far enough away, Malrik gave Ravian and the box in his hand a reproachful look.

“Do you care that little about your life, Ravian?” he asked.

Ravian glanced at him out of the corner of his eye, then sighed.

“No, Captain. I certainly do care about my life, and I have no intention of throwing it away.”

“Then why? Is a stone worth all this trouble?”

Ravian stared into space for a moment at Malrik’s words.

“It wasn’t about the stone, Captain. She threatened me in the middle of my own squad, in my master’s city, and she thought I was the one who wouldn’t be able to handle a confrontation,” Ravian said, his gaze sharpening with every word before he turned to Malrik. “So I had to show her enough to keep her from considering hurting me.”

“And the only way to do that with the heiress of a family as powerful as House Augus is to terrify her. What’s the best way to frighten a powerful, arrogant noble?” he asked, his mocking smile returning.

“…?”

Malrik waited calmly for him to continue.

“The best way to frighten a noble who’s stronger than you and outranks you is to convince them that you’re crazier than they are… so much crazier that they start imagining just how far your madness might take you if you wanted revenge. That makes them think a thousand times before doing anything that might annoy you, let alone hurt you.”

Malrik and the three young men and three women with him stared at Ravian as though seeing him for the first time.

“I didn’t know…” Lysandra spoke this time, looking into his crimson eyes, which were still gleaming. “I didn’t know you were this devious, Ravian.”

“That’s what it takes to survive in this world, my dear Lysandra,” Ravian said with a shrug.

“I’m not your sweetheart,” Lysandra replied immediately, her gaze changing in a strange way.

Ravian nearly choked at her response.

“Ahem, no, no, I didn’t mean it that way. Miss Lysandra, I was—” he tried to explain.

“Miss?” Lysandra asked with a raised eyebrow, looking even more annoyed for some reason.

“Madam?” Ravian tried one last time.

“Madam?” she repeated, her expression colder and stranger than before.

Ravian immediately turned to his companions, looking for an explanation of what he had done wrong and asking for help. Kael quickly noticed that things were heating up and stepped in to save the situation.

“No, Ravian, you should call her Young Lady Lysandra. That’s the least you can do for someone with the standing of a grand duke’s granddaughter,” Kael said with an angelic expression, arriving just in time to save the situation. “That’s why you need to call her—”

Kael intended to continue, but…

Bam!

“Aagh!”

A devastating punch landed squarely on his face and sent him flying, though fortunately, he did not lose any teeth. Darius had delivered it, then quickly turned to check Lysandra’s expression, which had gone from cold to murderous while Kael was speaking.

“Haha—hahaha. You know Kael likes to joke sometimes, Lysandra,” Darius said, shaking out the fist he had just used to punch him.

“Damn you, you fucking bear!” Kael shouted from inside one of the shops beside the street, where Darius’s punch had just sent him.

The elderly shopkeeper seemed to be scolding him and demanding compensation for the damage, or something along those lines.

Darius turned his massive body toward Ravian, then leaned down slightly to whisper in his ear.

“I don’t know why, Ravian, but Lysandra’s looked angry ever since that woman from House Viola started whispering in your ear. I’d suggest avoiding her until she calms down and we’re back at camp, because we don’t want to destroy any more public property on this damn auction trip.”

Ravian listened, his eyes moving to Lysandra partway through Darius’s explanation. She did seem a little angry, despite her expression looking perfectly normal. He then nodded to Darius, assuring him that he would follow his advice.

Kael finished compensating the old man whose shop he had just partly destroyed, then returned and promised Darius he would pay him back once they were at camp, before they continued toward the border camp.

As they walked, Elias approached Ravian. The two were now roughly the same height, with Ravian’s current appearance altered by the Mask of Loftiness.

“By the way, Ravian,” Elias began.

“Yes, Elias?” Ravian replied with a curious look. Elias was the least talkative member of the squad and rarely spoke unless he needed to.

“What did you mean about staying here for a few days? Are you planning to leave again?” Elias asked, his few words conveying everything he meant.

‘There’s that sense of belonging I accidentally planted in them with my powers again…’ Ravian thought.

The Sovereign Pride in his soul had uncontrolled side effects, as the System had previously told him. One of them was that the more time he spent with people, the more his soul and its properties instilled a sense of responsibility toward him in those around him. Since he was already a naturally charismatic person, or so Ravian thought, at least, those properties only increased his influence further and further.

But he did not want to reveal more than necessary, particularly to keep anyone from linking what had happened in the capital to him again.

“No, Elias, I’m just going on a mission my master assigned me. It’s nothing major, and I’ll be back in a few days,” Ravian explained.

Elias nodded calmly, then continued walking beside him without saying another word for the rest of their journey back.

…

By the time they returned to camp, Ravian thought the discussion about the stone had ended in the city, but he realized his mistake as soon as Malrik stopped before they could disperse and gestured toward the box he still carried.

“Where are you taking it?”

“To my tent, Captain. I don’t think anyone wants to keep it in theirs for me.”

“Ravian,” Claria said, without smiling at his remark. “I told you that not feeling anything now isn’t enough.”

He stopped and looked at her, then at the rest of the squad. Even Kael, who had spent the journey complaining about Darius, was looking at the box this time instead of the massive man’s face.

“I know, and I haven’t forgotten what the auctioneer said either,” Ravian replied. “But I haven’t asked any of you to touch it, and I won’t. As for me, I have a way to resist the power inside it.”

“A way?” Evelyne asked. “Then why didn’t you say that before taking it out in front of everyone?”

“Because I was trying to convince someone else I was crazy. Explaining why it wasn’t dangerous to me would have spoiled that a little, don’t you think?”

Evelyne did not seem convinced that this made what had happened any less troubling, while Claria folded her arms and looked at his hand.

“And you can’t tell us what that way is?”

“I’d rather keep it to myself.”

There was no humor in his response this time, and he raised his eyes to Malrik.

“I’m not asking you to ignore the danger to other people, Captain. I’ll keep the box closed while I’m around you, and I’ll handle this myself. All I’m asking is that you stop worrying about me, leave this to me, and trust me. The stone isn’t as dangerous to me as you think.”

Malrik regarded him for a moment, then said, “You’re asking us to believe something you won’t explain, after we watched you wave around something that’s supposed to have killed hundreds of people.”

“Yes,” Ravian admitted. “And I know that little display didn’t help my case much.”

Darius sighed, while Lysandra, who had remained silent until then, asked, “Did you know this before you touched it?”

Ravian looked at her, but made no attempt to resume the banter that had ended with Kael being punched into a shop.

“I knew what I could do,” he replied. “And I won’t repeat what happened in the street here in camp. Don’t worry.”

Malrik finally nodded toward the box

“All right. It stays closed outside your tent, and you keep everyone away from it while you examine it. If anything happens to you, tell Claria and me immediately.”

“I will.”

“And your master too, if we don’t know how to deal with it,” the captain added. Ravian did not object.

Claria was not entirely at ease, but she stepped out of his way after another look at his face, as though making sure he was not hiding any pain before letting him go. Elias simply gave a small nod, then left with the others.

“And if you decide to give someone another free gift, remember I don’t want it,” Kael said as he walked away.

“I was planning to save it just for you.”

Kael raised his hand in a rude gesture without turning around, leaving Ravian smiling as he headed toward his tent.

Once inside, he set the box on the table and closed the tent entrance, then stood for a moment looking at the lid. He had spent half the money he had received from Earl Viola on something the System could not identify from a distance, then found himself holding it in front of two Sixth-Rank guards to stop their young lady from continuing to pressure him.

That was not how he had planned to end his visit to the auction, but he had left with the stone, and that was what mattered now.

He pulled out the chair and sat down, resting a hand on the lid before carefully opening it, without taking out the contents this time. The red stone remained in its place, and his first look at it offered no explanation for Layla’s interest or the guards’ fear.

The sensation that had drawn him to it in the auction hall, however, was still there.

Ravian reached into the box and rested his hand on its surface, then called on the System in his mind.

‘All right, I have it now. Examine it.’