Chapter 242: Negotiation Between Lords [I / Bonus - ]
Inside the office, Collin tapped his desk, completely oblivious to his impending doom as he added one last detail to his phone call.
"Oh, by the way... she just came back from the Secret Realm. I think I’ve finally uncovered a probable identity for that mysterious Lord of Blessed Lan—"
Harper stopped listening.
She didn’t care about his intelligence and she didn’t care about his asset reports.
Harper didn’t care about anything coming out of his disgusting, lying mouth anymore!
BOOM!
The purple lightning coiling around Harper’s body reached an all-time apocalyptic high.
Her emotional anguish, her rage, her sorrow, and her fiercely protective devotion to Silas fused together into a volcanic explosion of raw power.
CRASH! SHATTER! BANG!
The heavy reinforced oak door was violently blown completely off its steel hinges, exploding inward into a shower of splinters and iron shrapnel!
Collin gasped, violently flinching as the heavy door smashed into his mahogany desk, shattering his whiskey glass onto the carpet.
He spun around, his eyes going wide with utter terror as he stared at the doorway.
Standing in the smoking threshold was Harper.
Her vibrant purple hair was floating in mid-air, suspended by an anti-gravitational field of pure electricity.
Her eyes were no longer human... they were burning orbs of blinding, incandescent lightning as thick arcs of royal purple energy spider-webbed across the floorboards, melting the carpet and scorching the drywall.
"H-Harper?!" Collin stammered with his face turning ghostly pale as his satellite phone slipped from his trembling fingers, hitting the floor. "What... what are you doing here?! How dare you break into my—"
Harper didn’t let him finish his sentence.
She slowly raised her right arm, pointing her open palm directly at his chest.
Her voice echoed through the destroyed office... not with her usual soft reserved tone, but with a cold fury that shook the very foundations of the building:
"Go fuck yourself."
KRA-THOOM!
Harper unleashed her power.
A massive roaring beam of royal purple lightning erupted from her palm but in that exact second of hatred, her intense emotional agony violently triggered her secondary blood magic attribute.
FLASH!
Her blood mana fused with her lightning output at an astronomical density as the roaring purple beam instantly turned into a blinding pure white column of apocalyptic energy.
BOOOOOM!
The white lightning beam struck Collin flush in the chest.
The catastrophic output completely vaporized his body’s defensive shields instantly as the blast hurled his body straight backward, crashing through his mahogany desk, destroying his leather chairs, and smashing through the massive, floor-to-ceiling reinforced glass windows at the top of the skyscraper.
SHATTER! CRASH!
The entire glass wall facing the city exploded outward into millions of sparkling crystal shards as the white lightning beam shot out into the stormy night sky, illuminating the entire downtown district of the city in a blinding flash that could be seen for a long distance.
A howling gale of wind and rain instantly rushed into the destroyed executive office through the gaping hole where the glass wall used to be, swirling dark smoke and papers across the ruined room.
The blinding light slowly faded and the crackling thunder died down into quiet static.
Harper stood alone in the center of the ruined office with her arm slowly dropping to her side.
The white-and-purple lightning around her body flickered three times before completely dissolving into fine dust.
Her chest heaved with heavy gasps.
’All of my troubles...’ Harper thought, her vision blurring with hot streaming tears as she stared at the empty, shattered window frame overlooking the rain-slicked city below. ’All the pain... all the cold nights... all the missions... they were all because of you... You... you...’
Her knees buckled under the weight of emotional exhaustion.
PLOP!
Harper fell forward onto her hands and knees on the wet scorched carpet.
She wrapped Silas’s heavy leather trench coat tightly around her trembling frame, burying her face into the broad collar as sobs began to wrack her body.
Suddenly, a strange acrid smell hit her nose.
Harper froze mid-sob.
She sniffed the air with her eyes widening as she noticed a trail of grey smoke rising from the sleeve of the coat.
The overwhelming heat from her white lightning blast had accidentally scorched the left cuff of Silas’s trench coat, leaving a small, blackened burn mark on the fine leather.
"Fuck...!" Harper gasped out, her tears stopping instantly as pure panic washed over her face.
She frantically pulled the leather sleeve up to her eyes, blowing on the tiny ember to put it out, gently rubbing the scorched leather with her trembling fingers.
"I burned it...!" Harper cried out in a soft panicked voice, hugging the coat against her cheek. "Oh no... don’t burn... please don’t burn! This is Silas’s coat! If it burns... will Silas give me another one?! What if he gets mad at me?!"
She sat there on her knees in the middle of a destroyed corporate skyscraper, completely ignoring her dead father and the ruined office, frantically cuddling the slightly singed coat and praying to whatever gods were listening that Silas wouldn’t scold her for damaging his clothes.
[Meanwhile In the Sovereign Realm...]
At the luxurious mahogany meeting table set up in the mud clearing of the Umbral Basin...
Silas, currently wrapped in his single-armed, purple-eyed female disguise was sitting comfortably across from Lord Sky sighed.
"Achoo!"
Vespera suddenly let out a soft delicate sneeze with her shoulder twitching slightly.
Lord Sky blinked behind his silver-and-black alloy mask, instinctively waving his hand.
"Bless you, Lord Vespera."
Vespera pulled out a small silk handkerchief with her single right hand, dabbing her nose softly.
"Thank you, Lord Sky," she replied smoothly.
Inside her mind, Silas was utterly bewildered.
’Who the hell is thinking about me right now?’ Silas thought to himself, tilting his female disguise’s head. ’Is someone back at the Keep talking shit about me, or did Eluned start talking with a pillow again?’
Across the table, Lord Sky leaned forward slightly, resting his elbows on the white tablecloth.
His masked face looked at her with genuine curiosity.
"So..." Sky spoke up, breaking the brief silence. "Are you really a fan of my channel, Lord Vespera? Or were you just using polite words to ease the tension before we talk business?"
Vespera offered him a warm confident smile, setting her teacup down onto the silver saucer with a soft sound.
"I’m truly a fan, Lord Sky," Vespera answered effortlessly, her purple eyes sparkling under the afternoon sun. "In fact... I distinctly remember watching your stream coverage during the Vigborough Territory campaign."
The second those words left her lips—
Sky’s posture completely froze. Behind his silver alloy mask, his eyes went wide as saucers in genuine utter shock.
’The Vigborough campaign?!’ Sky thought, his heart skipping a beat.
That was a massive detail!
If Vespera had simply come straight out and mentioned his most popular, multi-million-view stream... like his legendary victory at the Red Iron Canyon, it would have been common knowledge that any casual viewer could look up on the global trending tab.
But the Vigborough Territory stream was a fairly recent, niche campaign that had taken place just weeks ago... right before Vespera herself had awakened as a Lord.
It wasn’t a viral sensation, but it was one of Sky’s personal favorite displays and Silas himself wasn’t lying at all.
’I’m not the biggest fan but I’ve seen his streams...’
Back before Silas had awakened his system and received his [Divine Sanctum] trait, he had spent countless late nights back on Earth studying Sky’s livestreams.
He had watched them meticulously, analyzing Lord Sky’s mobile fortress mechanics and command structure just in case he awakened as a regular Lord and was forced to stream 24/7 to make a living.
Who knew back then that Sky would eventually become a world-famous sensation, or that Silas would end up sitting face-to-face with him in a female disguise, preparing to negotiate terms for a Lord War?
Seeing that she truly knew his work, a bright genuine smile spread across Sky’s face beneath his mask.
"Well, I’ll be damned," Sky laughed, his voice instantly becoming remarkably warmer and far more relaxed. "You really are a viewer! That Vigborough run was one of my tightest tactical matches!"
Sky sat back in his padded leather chair, gesturing warmly toward the table. "Please, Lord Vespera, make yourself comfortable!"
He turned his head toward his logistics officers standing near the iron ramp of his mobile fortress, shouting out a merry command.
"Hey! Bring out the luxury cookie spread! The fresh butter biscuits!"
Hearing that command, Vespera smiled slyly inside her mind.
’Jackpot...’ Silas thought triumphantly behind her purple-eyed smile.
Through his extensive late-night research of Sky’s stream archives, Silas knew every single one of Sky’s personal quirks.
Lord Sky only brought out his private, high-tier butter cookie spread when he genuinely liked and respected the Lord he was meeting.
Bringing out the cookies meant that diplomacy was going swimmingly, and that Sky was viewing her as an equal rather than a random target to be steamrolled.
A logistics officer hurried over, placing a silver platter filled with warm, golden-brown butter biscuits and fruit preserves in the center of the table.
Vespera reached out with her single right hand, picking up a delicate cookie and taking a light, elegant bite.
"Mmm. Delicious," Vespera praised softly, setting the biscuit down and looking into Sky’s masked eyes with a sharp glint in her violet gaze.
Now that the ice was broken, the real game was about to begin.
Silas knew how Lord War pre-negotiations worked.
Before two Lords clashed on stream, they sat down to set the stakes. It was a subtle high-stakes game of verbal sparring and with Sky already thoroughly charmed and thoroughly buttered up, Silas was fully prepared to list off a massive, astronomical demands sheet for what Blessed Land would claim when they won.
Vespera picked up another one of the warm, golden-brown butter biscuits between her slender fingers, turning the delicate pastry over in her hand.
The rich aroma of baked vanilla, sweet churned butter, and refined sugar drifted up from the biscuit, filling her senses.
She looked across the white tablecloth at Lord Sky, nervously scratching her cheek with her single right hand as a slight embarrassed blush touched her smooth pale face.
’To act like a woman... I must be a woman!’
"Um... Lord Sky?" Vespera began, her smooth voice dropping into a soft hesitant one. "If... if it isn’t too much trouble... do you think you could distribute some of these cookies to my people as well?"
Sky tilted his silver-and-black alloy mask slightly, taken aback by the request. "To your troops?"
Vespera let out a soft bashful sigh, looking down at the silver platter with a sheepish expression.
"To be completely honest with you," Vespera admitted quietly, rubbing the back of her neck in a cute gesture, "it has been a very long time since I last crossed over into the real world back on Earth. Things have been so hectic in our territory that I really haven’t had much time to go shopping or bring sweet treats like these back through the portal. Seeing my girls look at these pastries with such curious eyes... I feel a little guilty."
Inside her mind, Silas was silently praising his own acting skills.
’Flawless,’ Silas thought smugly behind the female disguise. ’Play the caring, gentle leader who feels bad for her hardworking troops. It completely shatters the image of a bloodthirsty Lord.’
Sky smiled behind his mask, charmed by her endearing concern for her subordinates.
He turned toward his logistics officers standing near the iron ramp of his mobile fortress, waving his hand generously.
"You heard the lady!" Sky called out. "Go into the primary mess hall vault and bring out a full crate of fresh butter biscuit packages for Lord Vespera’s girls!"
"Right away, My Lord!" the logistics staff responded immediately.
A few moments later, a uniformed officer hurried back down the iron ramp, carrying a heavy sealed wooden crate packed to the brim with individually wrapped luxury cookie boxes.
The officer stepped up to Tasmin, offering the package to her with a respectful slightly nervous bow.
Tasmin didn’t touch the crate at first. Her dark, silver-streaked eyes flickered over to Vespera, silently waiting for confirmation.
Vespera nodded gently at her.
"Go ahead, Tasmin. It’s okay."
Only then did Tasmin step forward. She took one of the cookie packages from the crate, bowing her head slightly toward the logistics officer and Lord Sky.
"Thank you," Tasmin spoke formally.
Having seen her Lord take an elegant bite of the biscuit just moments prior, Tasmin carefully opened the paper wrapping.
She picked up a golden biscuit, opened her mouth, and took a small crisp bite, chewing thoughtfully.