Chapter 436: The Underworld (XII)

The princess instantly noticed Gray’s expression.

"What?" she asked, already cutting into the steak. "If you are going to sit there looking pleased with yourself, say it."

"I am hungry."

"That is not what that face was." She pointed at him with her knife. "You look like someone who got exactly what he wanted."

Gray took a bite.

The meat was better than it had any right to be.

"I wanted a meal, and I got a meal."

"Correction! You wanted a fight, and you got a draw. Now you are eating my food and smiling." She chewed, swallowed, then leaned forward a little.

"So talk... That body of yours is clearly not at the mid-level of a inucubs. I felt it when you locked my neck."

"You felt a man who did not want to die."

"I felt someone who has been in more fights than he admits." She tapped her glass.

"Incubi do not wrestle princesses in the mud... they entice, spread their pheromones... They make people walk into their own mistakes, and you barely used any of that."

A server knocked once and entered with a second tray.

This time, it was none other than warm bread with a strange dark sauce. It was sliced so thin it looked expensive on purpose.

The princess did not look at him.

"Put it down and leave."

"Yes, Princess."

The door closed.

Gray tore a piece of bread anyway.

"Maybe I am just bad at being an incubus."

"No." She watched his hands, not the bread.

"You are good at pretending you are worse than you are. This necklace of mine blocks sight techniques, and yet... I somehow could feel you prying into my power. Besides... I can feel your cultivation aura at the peak Saint Realm... but it seems way stronger than that... weird."

Gray drank.

"You are guessing."

"I am eating and guessing. It is the same thing tonight." She cut another piece of steak, then pointed at his shoulder.

"That hit should have put an ordinary mid-level succubus on the floor, and yet, you stood up, spat blood, and kept talking. Who taught you to fight like that?"

"Losing."

"That is not a teacher."

"It is the most honest one."

She made a sound that was almost a laugh and hid it in her wine.

Another knock.

A different server this time, younger, carrying a bowl of roasted roots glazed in something red.

He saw the mud on both of them, the torn coat, the cut on her shoulder, and nearly dropped the bowl.

The princess glanced at him.

"If that falls, you pay for it with your job. Set it down."

He set it down and fled.

Gray looked at the new dish.

"You ordered this too?"

"I ordered everything that costs money. Eat." She took a bite anyway, then went back to him as if the food were only there to keep her hands busy.

"Your sword art is clearly not ordinary; the footwork is too clean for a street incubus. The pursuit thread you used on my wrist... that was a real technique, not a trick you picked up in a market."

"You remember that...?"

Gray gave her a scared look.

"I remember people who make me use both hands." She set her fork down, ignoring his ’terrified’ expression.

"So. Isolated tribe. First time in the city. That is the story you gave the gate, yes?"

Gray did not ask how she knew.

"It isn’t a story."

"It is a thin story." Her ruby eyes stayed on him while she drank.

"Tribes that far out do not produce incubi who can drag a monarch with a royal bloodline into a draw. They produce corpses ready to be sold to rich demons."

"Then I got lucky."

"Luck can’t change a person’s battle experience."

Gray smiled despite the split lip.

"You can keep asking. I can keep eating."

"That is fine." She pulled the wine bottle closer, arrogant even about that.

"I have more courses coming. You have more answers you do not want to give. We will see whose patience ends first."

.....

Their dinner only ended two whole hours later.

After the steaks were gone, after two more bottles, after a dessert she ordered out of spite and barely touched.

Gray answered enough to stay polite and not exactly reveal hints about where he came from.

By the time the last plate left the table, the princess’s smile was gone.

She stood so quickly the chair scraped.

"We are finished."

Gray looked at the unfinished dessert.

"You paid for that."

"I paid for answers. I received chewing." She snatched her coat from the servant without thanking him.

Mud still marked the hem, but she did not care at all.

"You talk like a man with a locked door behind his teeth."

"I told you my name."

"Gray." She uttered it as if it offended her.

"...You didn’t exactly tell me anything about you."

One of the guards opened the private-room door.

She walked through it first, jaw tight, her crimson hair swinging with the same irritation she had worn in the Domain.

The restaurant staff bowed, but she ignored them.

Outside, the night was cooler. She stopped on the steps just long enough to look back at him.

"You sat there for half the evening and gave me nothing."

"I gave you dinner conversation."

"You gave me scraps." Her eyes were bright with leftover pride and leftover curiosity, both of them sour now.

"Peak Saint Realm... some kind of soldier habits. A swordsmanship that many swordsmen would be jealous of... And still you sit there saying luck."

Gray came out after her, yawning a little.

"Hargh... mph. You asked the question, and I answered it. That was what you proposed to me under the pretext of dinner, no?"

"The deal was that you would stop being interesting or start being honest." She clicked her tongue.

"You did neither."

The guards formed up around her. For a moment it looked like she might order them to drag him back inside, but fortunately, she didn’t.

She turned away instead, irritated enough that even the street seemed to get out of her path.

"Do not disappear," she said over her shoulder.

"If I see you at the academy and you are still this empty-mouthed, I will not bother with a restaurant."

At this, Gray smiled and waved goodbye.

’Success!’

[...It’s crazy how the only real thing that she really learned about you was your actual name.]

Gray simply smiled at Jasmine’s words.

[Though... why did you give her your real name? You were about to say a fake name at first, didn’t you?]

’Yeah... but there’s something that I need from the Underworld... and to get that, I really cannot be using a fake name.’

[Something you need? Isn’t it your first time in here?]

’Yeah... but I got some intel about some kind of treasure, and for my plan to get that treasure to work, I really need to use my human identity.’

[... A treasure? What’s your plan?]

’...You’ll see.’

[Haiz... borinngggg!]

Step...

A figure stepped out from the side street before he reached the next lantern, blocking the narrower path back toward the lower market.

A dark embroidered coat and silver-thread cuffs. A family crest on the collar that looked quite exquisite.

He was the kind of young demon who had grown up in an obviously prestigious family.

’This stalker finally decided to come out?’ Gray mused inwardly.

He had been followed for a few moments since the moment he first left the restaurant.

’...Mhm? Maybe one of that princess’s pursuers?’ Gray raised an eyebrow.

The young demon looked Gray up and down, lingering on the ruined coat, the dried blood, the fact that an incubus had walked out of a private room with the Crimson Moon Princess.

His smile was clearly sharp, containing hints of killing intent.

"You... how dare an incubus like you sit with the Crimson Moon Princess?!"

’...Yep, on the dot.’

Gray waited.

"I am talking to you."

"I heard."

The young demon’s eye twitched.

"Do you know who I am?"

"No, not really."

That landed worse than an insult.

"I am Cael Veyth of House Veyth." He said it as if the street should bow.

"My family has served beside the Crimson Moon Court for six generations. The princess’s path is not a place for stray incubi to put their hands."

Gray tilted his head.

"I merely sparred with her, and then she invited me to dinner out of curiosity."

Cael’s face darkened at how ’ordinary’ Gray made their encounter feel.

"You think that draw makes you special? You think eating at her table means you can walk this city like you belong near her?" He took a step closer, aura pressing out in a clumsy show of Sovereign force.

"She was bored. That is all... I will remove the boredom myself."

[...Even Demons can get jealous?]

’You should know that better than me, Jasmine...’

[Pfft...]

Gray did not raise his own aura.

Compared to the Domain he had just climbed out of, this felt like someone shouting in an empty hall.

"Move," Gray said.

Cael laughed once.

"You do not give orders to me. You will leave Vhar’Zul tonight. You will not speak to her again. You will not appear at the academy if she is there. If you refuse, I will break that pretty incubus face and send what is left back to whatever tribe spat you out."

Gray looked past him, then back.

"Are you finished?"

"I have not even started."

"Then start. I have an inn to return to."

Cael’s pride took that as permission.

Demonic Energy instantly gathered in his palm, creating a few cyclones of it. It clearly was the kind of technique meant for witnesses.

A few demons in the corner had already slowed down to watch the drama.