Chapter 1020: Admiration
Chapter 1020 – Admiration
She studied Lux more carefully, as if that could undo whatever strange reaction had just happened.
He was not in his best dress, not wearing his polished political armor.
He looked like a walking scandal. A vacation playboy. His robe was too loose at the collar. His damp hair refused full discipline. He had shadows under his eyes that no noble portrait would dare preserve.
And yet beneath all that, he looked more dangerous than before.
Because power that only ruled through coldness could be challenged.
Power that had people willing to drag it back from self-destruction?
That was harder to break.
Cyrinne’s fingers curled slightly under the table.
Envy stirred again.
Not Vira’s kind, the kind that wanted to tear down what shone because she could not become it.
This was older. Closer to admiration.
Ah.
Cyrinne almost laughed at herself.
How poetic.
Her mother would have mocked her for it.
Sira noticed.
Gula leaned toward Cyrinne and whispered loudly, "You are staring."
Cyrinne’s spine stiffened.
The betrayal came from her left.
From Gluttony.
Of all sins.
Cyrinne slowly turned her head toward Gula with the expression of a woman who had survived assassination politics and servant humiliation, only to be stabbed by a girl eating dessert with cream on her cheek.
"I am not," Cyrinne whispered.
Gula blinked. "You are."
Cyrinne looked away immediately, because looking away was not suspicious if done gracefully.
Unfortunately, she did it one second too fast.
Sira’s lips curved.
Fiera’s tails swayed with quiet delight.
Mira leaned back in her chair as if dinner had finally become entertainment again.
Lux, who had been watching the whole thing with his chin resting lightly against his knuckles, leaned onto the table.
His smile returned.
"No," he said. "You were staring."
Cyrinne’s eyes snapped back to him.
"That’s—"
"I’m a Greed heir," Lux interrupted smoothly, "but also an incubus."
Her mouth closed.
Lux’s smirk widened by a degree. "I can detect who is staring at me," he said. "Who is interested in me. Who is afraid of me. Who sees me as a walking calculator."
Naomi lifted her cup. "That last one is very specific."
"It happens more than you think."
Sira muttered, "Mostly because you behave like one."
"I behave like a financial weapon."
Cyrinne gathered her composure by force.
It was impressive, really. She picked up every scattered piece of dignity in her chest, stacked it neatly, put a crown on it, and stared Lux straight in the eyes.
"You are a half," she said. "Not an incubus."
Lux tilted his head.
Cyrinne pressed on, because retreat now would be worse than death. "You are more like Greed."
Lux’s smile softened, but not kindly. "That’s what they said."
His voice became quiet. "A Greed. Or half Lust, half Greed." He leaned back slightly, and the chandelier light caught the gleam in his eyes. "Actually, I’m both."
Cyrinne frowned.
Lux tapped his own chest once. "I’m carrying both sins. As a whole."
Cyrinne’s brows drew together. "That’s impossible."
Gula raised her fork. "He does many impossible things."
Sira added, "Then pretends he is fine."
Lux pointed at her without looking. "Unrelated."
Cyrinne ignored them, though it took effort. "A demon cannot carry two complete sins as one whole authority. Lineage mixing is different from sin embodiment."
Lux’s eyes gleamed. "Correct."
"Then—"
"I said I’m both."
He leaned onto the table again.
Slowly.
That lazy smile returned.
Lux barely shifted his shoulders, robe loose at the collar, damp hair still falling with scandalous indifference, one hand near his coffee like he was discussing tax law instead of sin physics.
But the air around him changed.
Greed first.
A quiet pull.
The kind that made value stand out. Gold. Secrets. Desires. Possession. The invisible weight of everything someone wanted but had not dared name.
Then Lust.
Warm under the skin. A dangerous awareness. The kind that made someone suddenly remember they had a pulse, a body, a mouth that could say the wrong thing if left unsupervised.
Cyrinne felt it.
This was simply Lux allowing the truth to breathe.
"Wanna try?" he asked.
Cyrinne froze.
Lux smiled like a demon who knew exactly where the trap ended and where her pride began. "I can show you."
-Ba-thump!
Her heart committed treason again.
Cyrinne’s face warmed.
Not slightly.
Noticeably.
Her skin betrayed her before her expression could smother the evidence. Heat climbed to her cheeks, and she hated it. She hated Gula for noticing. She hated Sira for definitely noticing. She hated Fiera for already smiling like she was writing poetry about it in her head.
Most of all, she hated Lux because he looked amused, not surprised.
As if her reaction had been predictable.
As if he had filed it under Envy Heiress: vulnerable to controlled sin demonstration.
Cyrinne inhaled once.
Composed herself.
Looked away with the proud dignity of a woman fleeing a battlefield while pretending she was admiring curtains.
"Those girls," Cyrinne forced herself to continue. "I see some of them are older than you. Older than us."
Her gaze moved, carefully now, to Yue.
Then Aela.
"Where did you find them?"
Lux leaned back in his chair.
The teasing faded.
But his smile became sharper, quieter. "Guess."
Cyrinne stared. "Just tell me."
Lux picked up his coffee and took a slow sip.
He knew suspense had value and spent it like currency. "You know about the rumors," he said. "Their rumors."
The warmth in Cyrinne’s cheeks vanished.
Her posture changed immediately.
Gone was the flustered Envy princess trying to recover from an incubus-greed demonstration. In her place sat the heir candidate again, eyes sharp, mind ruthless, instincts scraping every word for implication.
"You mean..."
Lux set the cup down. "Yes."
The room stilled.
"They are sources of the king’s power."
Cyrinne turned toward Aela first.
Aela held her gaze.
Simply honestly, with the tired steadiness of someone who had spent too long trapped beneath false obligations and had no energy left to decorate pain for outsiders.
Cyrinne’s throat moved.
Then she looked at Yue.
The sort of calm that said kingdoms had already disappointed her before Cyrinne’s grandparents had names.
Cyrinne’s fingers slowly tightened on the edge of the table. "That is not a metaphor."