And Daimon’s instincts were right, not even a few minutes later a rumor had spread through the royal capital of the Meliun kingdom, apparently the queen has started discussions with the rumored ally who stood on par with the strongest warriors of the kingdom, to arrange an alliance through marriage between the royal heir of the force she represented, with not only one but both of the princesses of the royal family!

The rumor spread from different information sources and was changed as it went from mouth to mouth, some said that their recent ally has brought a peerless army capable of wiping out the whole planet with a single word, right under the noses of the other two prominent forces.

Others stated that the princesses fell in love at first sight and asked their mother, the queen to initiate the necessary arrangements, and there were also some who said that the queen might be been coaxed by their ally to give away their daughters in exchange for support to eliminate the two invading forces that had been like a thorn on their side for too much time.

The point is that the rumors escalated so much that they reached the ears of those with real influence and status within the kingdom, and with that in a matter of around thirty minutes, queen Mirellia managed to make the heads of all the noble families contact her out of their own will to request an urgent meeting before such an important decision was taken.

Seeing the gentle but cunning smile on queen Mirellia’s face, Daimon couldn’t help but inwardly nod in approbation, one of Erin’s rules to choose to work with, even if it is a simple business connection, was to see whether the leader of the other party is a competent ruler or someone who simply inherited its position.

After all, as Agrak has proven, an incompetent ally is worse than a cunning enemy and no amount of material benefits it’s worth the risk of joining hands with a clown only to get killed due to some stupid mistake.

‘This way, they won’t suspect this is a purge, as they were the ones who requested to meet the queen, not bad’, concluded Daimon, he then gazed at the queen, though his eyes were covered by the mask of the Hollow Suit, their eyes met for a second as Mirellia stood up from her seat.

“The event will be upheld tomorrow morning, I’ll take care of preparing the needed military to deal with the traitors during night, however there are other preparations we need to take care of, please follow me”, she said.

Daimon nodded and then the queen guided the way to the basement of the castle, Daimon didn’t suspect of her, because Rita had already thoroughly mapped the whole place and besides the pantry which was there partly to fool others, there was only one thing hidden down there, a “pool”.

As they descended to the basement, the queen took the initiative to explain what was going on.

“Unlike the Naga race who though can still function underwater but not beath in it, we from the Lamia race can not only breath in it but found ourselves more comfortable in it, this racial trait is lost for those who descend from a mix of Naga and Lamia ancestors, which is why normally only the royal family can swim in this “pool” without dying”, she said as she pointed at the giant pool that stood in front of them.

Daimon’s eyes shone behind his mask and the seemingly normal water became a marvelous breathtaking spectacle for him.

‘Wait this water is…’, thought Daimon for a second before he listened to the queen saying.

“It seems you can see it too and here I thought it was already a miracle that miss Thea could…”, Mirellia stopped there for a second before continuing.

“The fact that our records were lost when the adult and elderly died doesn’t mean they left us completely defenseless, according to the tales left behind by my ancestor, those who survived were basically young students and civilians, but among the ones who set up the barrier that protected us back then, the one who led everything who was not only lethally wounded but at the same time the single person who had surpassed the Stellar realm among the ones who made it to Draim”.

“While practically all the valuable assets in every people’s rings included hers, were used on the barrier, her flesh and bones included, she managed to secretly leave us a bottle of her blood with a short message that said “A single drop at the time, use at most half of it”, my ancestor who was the first designated representative of the Lamia race drank a single drop of it on the spot and jumped from the Lord rank to the Arch rank in a couple of days, this became a custom but also a privilege as only the heirs who show the premise to be able to reach the high stage of the Stellar rank are eligible to obtain a drop of said blood”.

“From that moment onwards, we created this “royal pond”, basically it contains water infused with the refined essence of the blood that each queen who has had the honor to take the blood of that benefactor, the result is a small paradise for those of the royal family, if we submerge in it our healing and meditation speed is multiplied by ten times, however the most outstanding effect is that not only those of the royal family can see the real aspect of this water, but only we can interact with it, or at least that’s what I used to believe until miss Thea and you appeared”.

Daimon turned to see Thea who nodded at him.

“She offered to give me a reward for having saved Naomi, among the options there was a small crystal tube filled with water, the multiple lights I saw in it made me think it was similar to the water you gifted me, so I asked about it, unfortunately it isn’t, but it did resonate with me in a different way so I choose it, I was planning to ask you help me analyze it in order to brew a nice drin… ahem potion with it later”, mumbled the empress.

Daimon got lost in his thoughts for a moment, the water in the pool reminded him of both the three-colored water he obtained and also the water that filled Mellie’s mother coffin, it was of course not the same but it shared the key aspect of them, it had laws infused in it!

As to why Thea could see them, that is new, since despite she and other people being able to tell the water of the tri-colored lake is special, they were unable to see anything past that, in his case it was probably because of the infinity eyes, so there must be something else going on here.

‘Mm, perhaps it’s related to her mission, I also feel a faint resonance with it but I can’t put the finger on the origin of it’, he thought. Sёarch* The novel(F~)ire.net website on Google to access chapters of novels early and in the highest quality.

Mirellia on the other hand seemed charmed by the fact that Daimon was “similar” to them just like Thea, she gently smiled at them as she jumped into the pool while gesturing the others to follow her.

The two princesses immediately followed their mother and then Daimon and Thea, both Rita and his own instincts had determined that while the water wouldn’t bring him the benefits Mirellia spoke about, it wasn’t detrimental in the slightest either, so everything would be fine.

Despite the water being as clear as a mirror, the pool actually was quite deep, around a hundred meters, after swimming to the bottom, the Lamia queen waved her hand and a portal opened for them.

Once inside the dimensional tunnel, the queen explained.

“Naturally, the blood I mentioned is my Lamia race’s most treasured resource, so besides the three of us from the royal family and you two, no one else currently knows of its existence, in fact no one besides from the royal family has entered the real royal treasury”, she said as they reached the exit of the dimensional tunnel.

What welcomed Daimon didn’t look like a treasury but more like a “secret base”, there were a few bedrooms, a garden, an artificial lake which is from where they were coming out, and in the center of the whole place there was a giant statue of a beautiful woman whose lower half was that of a snake, in other words a Lamia of the royal family.

“That is the statue of my ancestor, she was the one who built this place, everything to contain this…”, with a few gestures, the Lamia queen made small cut on her right index finger and the eyes of the statue shone, then a small portal appeared on the base of it, Mirellia’s arm passed through the portal pulling out a black metal box.

“In the whole history of my Lamia race, there has only been a single exception in which someone was given the blood of our nameless benefactor, like I previously said, my ancestor had a friend from the Naga race who was designated as their first representative as well, unfortunately they didn’t have the luck of a benefactor leaving behind something for them, but my ancestor gave her a drop of blood in secret, she of course made an oath promising not to tell anyone about it”.

“The public believes that the two ancestors found a special magic resource while they were exploring the area that became this same city, but the truth is that the two of them isolated themselves to refine the blood, the result, two exceptionally talented Arch ranked, a peak one and a middle stage one, the benefit obtained by the Naga race’s ancestor was slightly inferior, it’s worth mentioning that they were the first and only ones in the history of both races that have been able to reach the Maximum Stellar realm”, proudly said Mirellia.

Let alone Thea, even Daimon was surprised by such a revelation, back at Neptune the concept of Maximum Stellar ranks exists, yes, but those whose lineages are closer to magic beasts, haven’t been able to reach that point, Thea’s family is a perfect example of that, even she the most talented ever member of the Ryner clan, is currently at the middle stage Stellar rank, for some reason it is harder for them to reach that point.

Daimon was unsure if Calvin’s grandfather was like that as well, which would explain why none of the Maximum Stellar ranks he has met, appears to have as many laws as him, but now he knows that here there existed two Maximum Stellars in a similar situation as Thea.

The Lamia queen softly smiled, amused by their reaction, at least it meant that their race’s potential wasn’t bad even in a much larger and surely more advanced civilization.

Due to the limitation on resources that could be found in the ocean and the fact that most inland territory if not all of it, was under the supervision of the invaders, things like alchemy and magic blacksmithing were really undeveloped in the Meliun kingdom.

Thea had already told Daimon beforehand and he confirmed it already, even Karaam a high stage Stellar who was the captain of the border guards, was using a not so high-quality middle stage armor, if it was Neptune, such a powerhouse would have at least one decent high stage Stellar piece of equipment, not to mention the peak high stage treasures like Thea’s spear or the scimitar of which Abaris was so proud about.

Back at Karaam’s armor, the thing was mostly made with bones and skin of sea magic beasts, and kept together using runes, as for alchemy if they were proficient on it, they would have already made an incredible potion using that blood mentioned by Mirellia for sure, that being said, while they lacked in alchemy and blacksmithing due to the lack of high-quality resources, they focused on runes to somewhat make up for it, which would explain why they developed that strange way to engrave an array on water.

The Lamia queen then opened the black metal box in her hand to reveal two crystal containers, one half filled with a red liquid mixed with some stripes of green turquoise, a color obviously similar to that of the eyes of Mirellia and her daughters, not to mention it was the same color of the scales on Mirellia’s tail when she was in her Lamia form.

The second container was completely full though, inside there was a red liquid with fewer but still noticeable brown and blue stripes.

“My ancestor’s friend had two daughters, the one who was supposed to inherit the Naga throne unfortunately died due to a magic beast’s attack, so the other one was chosen, the first Naga ancestor noticed some strange things at the end of her days, so before she reached the end of her lifespan, she passed this to my ancestor telling her to use it if a situation where both races had an unsolvable feud ever appeared, it contains the essence of her lineage which she extracted from her own body, before using what was left of her to reinforce the barrier, a common fate shared by the first ten or so rulers of both races”.

The moment Mirellia opened the black box, the sweet sound of a notification rang in Daimon’s ears as a message appeared in front of him, he looked at it and saw that it belonged to the tab of the Lineage Temple.

[Ding]

[A concentration of “blood essence” has been detected, do you wish to absorb it Y/N <!>]

Daimon clicked on the “!” symbol and extra information was displayed.

[Compatibility with the “Dracolevia” lineage: 15% (Due to the small amount of compatibility, there exists a 50% possibility for an overall minor enhancement, a 25% chance to enhance an existing trait or a 10% to obtain a completely new trait and a 1% to obtain all the previous)]

Daimon’s eyes shone behind his mask, the Dracolevia lineage was second only to his unknown lineage and the Apex predator one, even an overall minor enhancement would for sure be beneficial for him.

‘So that’s why I felt a though hard to notice, sensation of resonance, the compatibility is low and it was stored in such a special container’, thought Daimon as he saw that black metal box, which had a type of rune he had never seen before, probably something that originated from the galaxy from where the Lamia and Naga races came, surprisingly he could understand the meaning behind said runes without too much effort.

“I honestly wouldn’t have minded to give you or miss Thea, a drop of my Lamia race’s sacred blood as we had baptized it, but as far as I know only women can use it in your case and for miss Thea, besides Nagas, none other race is compatible with it, we have tested this by giving a drop to a member of the strongest magic beast race we have discovered in the sea of Draim, in a try to obtain better materials for armor and alchemy… but the result was the magic beast turning into a bloody pulp”.

“So, instead of that, I’ll give you the concentrated blood essence of the Naga’s first ancestor which doesn’t have such requirements, with the condition that you use it now, even if it takes time for you to completely refine it, the lingering aura of it will be detectable from your body, with that we’ll be able to fool the clean members of the Naga race into thinking they’ll follow someone related to them and also stop the curiosity their nobles have for a union between us and them”, said the queen to then add.

“As for miss Thea’s reward for helping us suppress the traitors, I as the queen of the Meliun kingdom will fully support her to deal with that tyrant woman”.

Daimon exchanged gazes with Thea who happily nodded, making him gladly take on Mirellia’s offer, he had nothing to lose and everything to win anyway, he would help Thea obtain an army to deal with Thalia’s one and at the same time a chance to improve his Dracolevia lineage, while Mirellia will be able to deal with dissidents and consolidate her authority over the two races, it was a win-win situation.

“I accept, let’s make the respective oath and…”, before Daimon could finish his words, he saw the queen extending her hand to hand him the crystal container with the Naga’s blood essence.

“We can deal with formalities later, in any case you have miss Thea’s trust, so you have mine as well, I’ll take you to your rooms so you can prepare for tomorrow’s event”, casually said the queen as she put the black box that now only contained one thing back into the portal opened by the statue.

Daimon inwardly shrugged and accepted the thing, in any case contracts couldn’t tie him, not like he was planning to go against his word when the other party was worth associating with.

With that, the queen made a portal on the artificial lake and everyone returned to the castle, to not raise suspicions, the two princesses will stay at the castle like usual, while Thea will be left to guard the fort and Daimon was basically free to do as he pleased, as for the queen she had to leave to prepare everything for tomorrow.

“Ferris, please guide Mr. Gabriel and his companion to their rooms…”, the Lamia queen’s words were interrupted by Thea casually saying.

“It’s fine we are used to share a room so he can stay with me, we have some catch up to do anyway, just get one room for her”, said the empress referring to Zia.

Needless to say, but the two princesses and even the queen weren’t expecting such words, as their surprised expressions suggested, the younger princess was especially shocked, Daimon inwardly chuckled knowing that those three misinterpreted what Thea meant, but he didn’t bother to explain, Mirellia gave Thea a key to the room next to hers, which would be for Zia and the empress guided them to where she was staying.

As soon as they disappeared from their sight, Ferris turned to see her mother to say.

“Mom, do you think those two are… together?”, their previous conception of Daimon’s status as Thea’s general was shattered if such a young and “weak” at least realm-wise, youth could be so close to a really strong warrior like Thea, then his status must be extraordinary back at their place of origin.

“I… don’t know, they certainly look close but not to that point, a future engagement agreement of some sort perhaps, in any case we are aiming to stablish a long term mutually beneficial relationship between our kingdom and them, so the higher their status, the better for us, now you two stay in the castle and don’t give them any problems, that is for you Naomi”, said the queen as she opened a portal to then jump into it.

The younger princess softly snorted, at her mother’s reminder, which earned her a soft poke on her forehead from her older sister.

“Don’t resent Gabriel just because he called you “little girl”, let me tell you that just his aura from earlier made me doubt that I, a middle stage Archknight would be able to emerge victorious against him in a fight”.

“What are you saying sis, he was hiding his realm and I admit he is for sure stronger than me, but he is still a Lord rank, at most he is at the middle stage, with your Battle Avatar you have crushed the elite among the elite at the peak Arch ranks, and even fought on par with half stage Stellars, there is no way he would be able to defeat you!”, exclaimed the younger princess, other families where the royal heirs would be envied by their siblings, Naomi had nothing but admiration for her older sister, who is publicly recognized as the most talented knight in the history of the Lamia race so far.

Ferris patted her younger sister’s head a couple of times, to then leave towards the training room of the castle.

“Never underestimate anyone, he has fought and probably killed way more people than me, that I can tell”.

Naomi remained behind, lost in her thoughts for a moment, before her eyes locked onto the direction of the guest area, her curiosity was now picked, her sister has never found anyone in the same range of age to let alone make her doubt her capacity to win, but even fight on par with her, so it would be a lie to say she wasn’t interested on it.

‘I don’t think big sister Thea would mind if I accompany her, besides I bet that rude man also wants to know more about our kingdom’, she thought to herself before she walked in direction of Thea’s room.

…

Speaking of which, inside of the most luxurious guest room, Daimon gazed at the crystal container filled with blood essence, Thea who was casually laying down a few meters away on the same bed as him, also looked at it.

“How strange, I do feel some sort of resonation with Mirellia and her daughters, not as strong as I felt when I met you but still and yet I didn’t feel anything regarding those two crystal containers”, mumbled the empress.

“Well, in my case, the resonation comes from the lineage I obtained thanks to the Black Armored Shark’s one, but the compatibility is low, perhaps a long distant relation, nonetheless, it also means that the origin of it shouldn’t be weaker than my Dracolevia lineage”, said Daimon.

There lizardmen and other reptile related races back at the four galaxies, but none of them was particularly special, the only exception being Lana, the girl from the Ramir family who was said to descend from a beast from “ancient” times, there were snake related races yes, but not any Lamia nor Naga races were known to have existed in the four galaxies, according to the history books or at least not in the ones at the libraries of the Revy and Argent families, which included Aura’s personal diaries created after she fought every single magic beast she has found throughout her life.

That being said, there were mentions of them in the folklore of the beast races, similar to the case of sirens and mermaids, from Daimon’s point of view they were probably advanced versions of the sea related races, that did exist not only in Neptune but even in the four galaxies, so the same probably applies to the Lamia and Naga races.

“I’m going to start absorbing this thing, please watch over me just in case”, said Daimon as he opened the crystal container to drink its content, he wasn’t really worried about things going awry, since there is no way, this lineage is stronger than his Apex Predator, but he wanted to see if he could grasp something thanks to it, so meditation it is.

Thea nodded, she leisurely laid down a few centimeters away from Daimon who was sitting cross-legged, observing him and she wasn’t the only one, an intense gaze came from Daimon’s shadow, focusing on him and also on the whole castle and its surroundings at the same time.

‘Humph, that ungracious girl from earlier is coming, trying to interrupt Daimon’s meditation after being so rude to him, dream on’, mumbled Rita as she covered the door to Thea’s room with a shadow veil, making the entrance invisible for others.

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