Chapter 428: Yes, Slap Him More!

Adrian let out a breath. "Okay. Whatever."

Unable to say anything else to that, he just shook his head and lay back down on the bed, and that was exactly when the door opened.

Aria walked in carrying a massive platter of fried chicken.

But the fried chicken wasn’t exactly the standard fried chicken that Adrian was used to making. This one was basically a sort of large chicken nugget instead, but it looked eerily similar to the silhouette of Adrian.

There were three others on the plate. One which resembled Aria, and the other two which vaguely resembled Claire and Serena.

Adrian sat up and looked at it.

"You made chicken nuggets that look like us?"

Aria beamed and nodded. "Yes. Do you like it?"

Adrian chuckled warmly. "This is probably the cutest thing I have ever seen."

He looked at the plate again, and then he looked up at Aria.

That was when he noticed Wang Lei standing right behind her in the doorway.

He was standing there quietly, but Adrian saw that he didn’t really look too happy. Then Adrian noticed something else; The guy’s face was basically slightly swollen. It was almost like someone had slapped him multiple times on both of his cheeks.

Adrian blinked twice.

"What the fuck happened to you?"

Wang Lei nervously glanced down at Aria. "Nothing."

Aria frowned. She looked up at Wang Lei, and then she looked at Adrian with a pout.

"Papa, he told me that what I made was bad. He told me that I need to make it more refined and more elegant! And that this is not fit for the refined taste buds of royalty."

Adrian looked up at Wang Lei’s swollen face, and then he looked back down at Aria.

"You did a good job," Adrian said seriously. "You should have slapped him harder."

The very next day, Adrian walked over to a set destination. It was the coastal port of the Avarice Kingdom, and although it was large, it was not exactly well developed yet.

Adrian got there right on time, and so did multiple others.

He glanced over at Roderick’s party. Roderick obviously wasn’t going himself, but representing the Crestwall Empire was a large group of knights. Adrian didn’t recognize most of them, but there was one person he did know and it was none other than his half brother Anderson, a Duke of the Crestwall Empire, holding a position similar to what Silas used to hold.

Adrian didn’t even pay him any attention. He just glanced over him and scanned the rest of the group.

He could only assume that these guys were probably around A-rank or S-rank, with maybe a few B-ranks mixed in. His reasoning was simple. When he had demanded the strongest knights as compensation, he had gotten two S-rank ones. So he was pretty sure that the Crestwall Empire did not have any hidden SS or SSS-rank knights. After all, Soul Contracts were pretty reliable.

Since he already knew that they previously had four S-rank knights total, and two were currently working under him, they could only have two S-rank knights left to send. On top of that, he also knew thanks to Roderick telling him everything recently, that the surviving royalty of the Avarice Kingdom had gone under Roderick’s wing, providing him with two more.

So the Crestwall party had a total of four S-rank knights.

Apart from that, Adrian did not have too much information on the rest of the people here, at least not yet. He gently rubbed the spatial ring on his finger and smirked as he looked at the other parties.

The other neighboring kingdoms had also sent their own elite knights.

In total, there were four different groups, not counting Adrian’s own party and the Crestwall group. These four parties had much smaller groups and three of the groups were basically just a duo with two knights each. The fourth party had four people in their group.

Looking at them, Adrian didn’t bother overthinking it. He didn’t bother trying to find out how good they were or anything like that. He just casually sat down on a wooden barrel and waited.

Almost ten minutes later, a petite woman walked over to the center of the docks where everyone was gathered and bowed respectfully.

"I apologize for the delay, but it looks like everyone here has arrived much earlier than expected." she said as she straightened her posture.

"There has been a change in plans. The headmaster has informed me that there won’t be any direct teleportations to the other continent today. I will be taking you all to the Magic Tower first, and you will depart tomorrow. We will arrange rooms for you to stay in for the time being. You will be allowed to engage in various activities as long as it is strictly contained within the outer area."

Someone from one of the three duo groups crossed his arms. "Why do we need to stay there? Can’t we just go directly? Why waste time?"

"These are the headmaster’s direct orders," the petite woman said calmly. "I don’t really know why he wants you to stay there."

Then, she swept her gaze at everyone else and continued. "Like I have been saying, you can engage in any activities that are available in the outer area. You can access the outer market. There are brothels, high-end restaurants, and there are various other areas that you can visit such as blacksmiths, apothecaries, and runesmiths."

Listening to all of this, Adrian nodded.

"That is actually a really good thing. Your headmaster is a very generous person."

The girl smiled at him and nodded. "Thank you for the compliment. He is a great person."

One of the knights from Crestwall scoffed. "What do you mean it’s a good thing? How is he being generous by delaying us?"

Anderson, Adrian’s half-brother, turned to the knight and sighed while Adrian explained.

"Well, while we have our own craftsmen, blacksmiths, and everything in our empire, the level of development that the Magic Tower has is unbeatable."