"Welcome, my humble guests," The king said in a regal tone and continued, "Today has been one of the most lively and happy days this kingdom had ever seen, especially when many notable visitors from other lands like you all decided to visit our kingdom. As the ruler of this kingdom, I couldn't feel happier, and I hope the hospitality we have provided you made you all feel at home."
The king's tone seemed to contain his happiness which was pretty evident, and the people who were sitting below felt good to hear praise from the king himself.
The king added, "I will now talk about today's event, which is something we are all looking forward to. There will be many elimination rounds to the alchemy competition, and the details would be forwarded to you all by evening since this competition will only start tomorrow. As for the rewards, we will offer a special reward for the first prize, which can only be revealed to the winner which also would be handed over to you by my daughter personally. For the subsequent prizes, we would be offering Blue Spirit Stones and Supreme Tier Pills."
"Whoa! This is unbelievable!"
"I know, right! How awesome!"
"I didn't think the king would be this generous to offer such rewards. The ones who win prizes would be striking a jackpot! Even without that special prize, who wouldn't want to be close with such a goddess?"
"I admit this was beyond my expectations. But what about marriage talks? Why is he not mentioning anything about offering his daughter's hand in marriage? I mean, having an audience with her is a dream come true, but—"
"You fool! If you had clearly read the king's invitation, you would have known that he only said that his daughter 'might' consider but no guarantee or whatsoever for the winners. But I guess you were too love-struck to notice that, pffft."
"But he did mention a special reward for the first prize. Do you think maybe his daughter is the first—"
"Pfff, you really think he is gonna offer up his daughter like that? Based on the rumors about how protective he is, I don't think so. You better not get your hopes up. Anyway, you don't stand a chance against those true geniuses. Sigh, if I had known about this, I would have started learning alchemy from my past life itself."
window.pubfuturetag = window.pubfuturetag || [];window.pubfuturetag.push({unit: "64ce79d606107d003c23ea27", id: "pf-5140-1"})Damien was also astonished to hear the rewards being offered. He was curious what this special reward was. However, he wondered where the Krisen King got the Supreme Tier Pills from.
The only way it would be possible would be if the Xeton Empire decided to sell some of the Supreme Tier Pills he made to the Krisen Kingdom.
But if that was the case, he was sure the imperial family wouldn't sit still.
'Did they give it to the imperial family as well?' Damien mused since he felt that the Xeton Empire would be trying its best to monopolize the Supreme Tier Pills instead of giving them out in large supplies.
But seeing that the Krisen Kingdom was giving away Supreme Tier Pills as rewards, it either meant that they were trying to please the nobles from other empires by sacrificing their supply of Supreme Tier Pills.
And the other unlikely reason would be that they had too many Supreme Tier Pills. He doubted whether this king would be that magnanimous to give such precious pills away for a competition.
Damien then saw Yuria finally looking at the crowd below, and he tried to see if she would be able to recognize him.
Yuria decided to take a look at the crowd since she wanted to see if the boy she saw before would be here today.
A glint of surprise crossed her eyes when they met Damien's gaze, and she saw him subtly smiling at her.
Yuria didn't move her gaze and kept looking at Damien as if she was scanning him from top to bottom, making sure of something.
window.pubfuturetag = window.pubfuturetag || [];window.pubfuturetag.push({unit: "64cc9e79c7059f003e4ad4b0", id: "pf-5109-1"})She didn't really expect the mysterious boy who tried to break in would have the guts to show up before the king himself. She couldn't think of a reason why a noble like him would even try to break in unless he was poor.
But that didn't seem to be the case since she knew her father only invited geniuses for this competition, just to make sure that she doesn't come upon any useless people.
She had no idea whether the man in her dreams was a genius or not. She didn't care whether he was a noble or a peasant. All she cared about was meeting him and finding out some answers she had been seeking for a while.
And now, looking at Damien's face, she felt as if he was eerily similar to the man she had been seeing in her dreams.
But the man in her dreams was wearing strange clothes she was completely unfamiliar with. And sometimes, she saw herself together with him in places she hadn't seen or visited before.
Other times, she saw him in robes that she was familiar with and even saw him concocting pills.
At first, she thought that her mind was too creative to cook things up, especially because of how artistic she was.
But the more she saw these dreams, the more she felt that they were real, especially when she felt as if her emotions were being affected each time she saw such dreams.
Sometimes she would feel happy, sometimes sadness or sometimes inexplicable pain in her heart which made her feel like she lost something precious to the point of making her tear up.
But the dreams become vague once she wakes up and would only retain some details of her dreams. Because of this, the mysterious man's face in her dreams remained vague as well, except for some details.
window.pubfuturetag = window.pubfuturetag || [];window.pubfuturetag.push({unit: "663633fa8ebf7442f0652b33", id: "pf-8817-1"})She thus wanted to discover who this man was, especially by meeting this mysterious boy and seeing if there was any connection between them, although she felt it impossible and that she was too silly to pursue this.
But her mind wouldn't listen to her heart which led her to persuade her father to host this competition.
She felt that the emptiness in her heart wouldn't go away unless she confronted this and got to the end of it.
Damien saw Yuria looking at him with a fixed gaze, making him wonder why she was staring at him so openly. He felt a bit weird, feeling her intense gaze on him.
Valentina also noticed Yuria's gaze towards Damien and narrowed her eyes, wondering what this girl was up to. She was feeling irked that this girl was openly staring at him.
The others also noticed Yuria's gaze towards a particular spot, and everyone saw Tristen sitting in between Damien and Valentina.
The others recognized Tristen was from the imperial family easily because of his robes. They knitted their brows, wondering if Yuri was somehow involved with Tristen.
Some even exaggerated things in their mind wondering if Tristen was having secret meetings with Yuria.
The king noticed that something was amiss, catching some of the nobles getting distracted. He then looked behind to see his daughter blankly staring down at a certain person.
But when he followed her gaze, he recognized Tristen sitting between two other people.
He knew the kind of person Tristen was, no matter how much the imperial family tried to hide his adventures.
So, he was feeling uneasy that his daughter was looking at him and wondered how she even knew him.
Yuria noticed her father's gaze and pushed herself out of her daze, looking elsewhere to prevent her father from misunderstanding things.
The king ended his speech by saying some pleasantries and sat back in his seat while another elder continued to address the crowd of nobles.
"Yuria, who were you looking at?" The Krisen King asked in a serious tone.
Yuria gulped, wondering if her father caught her looking at the mysterious boy. She said casually, "No one, papa. Why did you think I was looking at someone? I was merely thinking about some things and got lost in my thoughts."
"Oh," King Krisen nodded as he leaned back in relief, thinking why he even thought that she was looking at Tristen. He knew his daughter the best, and thus the last person she would be interested in would be someone like Tristen.
Yuria let out a sigh of relief inwardly, thinking that she dodged a bullet. But she wondered how she was going to meet Damien without letting her father know.
Her eyes brightened when she suddenly thought of an idea and was quite sure that the mysterious boy might agree to her.
Damien was feeling confused why Yuria stared at him in a dazed manner before. He wondered if it was because she was feeling aggrieved about what happened yesterday.
Still, he was thinking of a way to meet up with her and explain things. But her father proved to be quite a deterrent, and he knew he would be treading on thin ice if he were to try anything reckless.
Damien decided to think about it later after getting some other information he needed from Farah Gale.
Everyone soon dispersed as the king left after saying whatever was necessary. Most started to prepare arduously for tomorrow's competition, including Kale, who said he was going to one of the alchemy rooms to train all night.
Damien only smiled, seeing that a good opportunity for Tristen was lying in front of him.
