"Hah~ this is the life."
On a balcony in the Royal Palace, Lux comfortably lay on a single bed, completely relaxed as he enjoyed the two soft hands that were massaging his back.
"You brat. You dare to take advantage of me like this?" the Saintess, Cleo, asked while shaking her head helplessly.
"You'll be my attendant for a year," Lux replied after sighing in comfort. "So get used to it."
A sigh also escaped Cleo's lips, but her sigh was different from Lux's sigh of comfort. Due to circumstances, she would now serve Lux for a year and would even accompany him to the Surface World.
King Septimius agreed to this setup and even asked Cleo to look after Aurora as her guardian.
Truth be told, Cleo didn't mind this mission since she did want to go to the Surface World. There were many things she wanted to know, and places she wanted to see.
A day had passed since Lux and Aurora met with the King of Agartha. The Half-Elf knew that the beautiful princess needed to spend some time with her family, so he didn't mind staying for a few more days.
'Fortunately, Aurora's father seems to have mellowed out a bit after her arrival,' Lux thought. 'I really thought that he would do something drastic, and send her back to the Pantheon of Exile.'
Lux had prepared a contingency plan just in case the King of Agartha decided to punish his daughter for returning to their Kingdom.
He was just glad that there was still a bit of love remaining in his heart for his daughter, so things turned out better than he expected.
"Right there… yes… that place is good.." Lux sighed in pleasure as two more hands landed on his back, massaging his body.
However, it didn't take long for the Half-Elf to realize that something was wrong.
The one that was massaging him was Cleo, so there should only be two hands unless she had four. Where did the other pair of hands come from?
Lux turned to look behind him and saw a pink-haired beauty, whose eyes were filled with mischief.
"Just lay down," Aurora said. "I usually gave my mother shoulder massages, so I'm pretty good at it."
The Half-Elf obeyed and closed his eyes.
"Ah… this is heaven~" Lux muttered.
Suddenly, a gruff voice reached his ears which made his body stiffen.
"I see, so you want to go to heaven, right?"
Lux opened his eyes to look at his right side and saw the King of Agartha looking down on him with a calm expression on his face.
"Are you enjoying your massage?" King Septimius asked. "Not only did you ask the Saintess of my Kingdom to massage your back, but my precious daughter is also doing the same. But let's not talk about that. I'm also free right now, so why don't I also give you a massage, boy?"
"A-Ah! My bones… are breaking! Ack!" Lux shouted as the King's strong hand rested on his shoulder, holding it in a vice grip.
Aurora and Cleo giggled after seeing this scene because they never expected the Half-Elf to suffer under the hands of King Septimius.
"Father, please stop hurting Lux," Aurora said softly. "He's done so much for me."
"Tsk." King Septimius clicked his tongue before pulling his hand away from the Half-Elf's shoulder.
A minute of awkward silence descended on the balcony before the King spoke once more.
"I visited the Pantheon of Exile this morning and took care of the Exiles who were plotting to return to Agartha. We cannot afford another civil war, so it was best to nip them in the bud before they started to take action."
Lux didn't really care about this because it wasn't his problem. However, he still asked the question that was on his mind.
"What happened to the King of Exiles as well as the Saints that were serving him?" Lux inquired.
"They died by accident," King Septimius replied.
Lux immediately propped himself up after hearing the King's words. His face became serious as he asked King Septimius another question.
"And their bodies?" Lux asked.
This was a very important question to him because the bodies of Saints were priceless.
King Septimius snorted before tossing a ring toward the Half-Elf, which the latter caught by reflex.
He instantly recognized the ring because it was a Bounty Ring, which bounty hunters typically used to store the dead bodies of their target.
Lux peered inside it and sure enough, Louis and the four Saints who served him were inside it.
He didn't expect that the King of Agartha would act swiftly and mercilessly after hearing that a possible civil war would happen once the exiles managed to escape the island.
The Half-Elf wasn't aware that Aurora's father wouldn't allow any chance of unrest to fester within the Kingdom, especially after the rebel uprising that had happened in the past.
"Blackfire, come," Lux ordered.
Immediately, the Black Coffin appeared beside him and happily opened its lid.
Lux tossed the Bounty Ring inside it. A few seconds later, the Black Coffin nudged his head as if it was a playful pet that was very happy with his Master's attention.
The Half-Elf smiled and patted the Black Coffin for a few seconds before it disappeared completely.
With the addition of Five Saints in its arsenal, Blackfire now had eight Saints under its control.
However, in order to maximize the value of their corpses, Lux would need to use Precious Artifacts or Beast Cores so that their ranks wouldn't regress when they were revived.
Lux had used most of his High-Ranking Beast Cores to revive the two Saints that Blackfire had gotten long ago and used the rest to help Hereswith's recovery.
So, as of right now, he didn't have enough resources to prevent the Saints' Ranks from regressing, but that didn't mean that he was out of options.
This was also the reason why Blackfire preferred to devour near-death creatures. As long as they still had breath in them, their Ranks wouldn't regress once they were transformed into Lux's servants.
In fact, if Lux added artifacts and Beast Cores, there was a high chance that they would even increase their Ranks and become stronger, like what happened to Lux's grandma, Vera.
"Consider that as payment for saving my daughter and preventing her curse from infecting other people," King Septimius stated. "Now, I don't owe you anything."
Lux nodded and thanked the King for his gift.
The reason why Aurora's father was feeling extra generous was due to the fact that Aurora had dispelled the Curse of Misfortune from Princess Shayna's body.
After becoming a Ranker, Aurora was able to use her power to remove the curse from other people. However, she could only remove one curse every month.
She deemed that this quota would increase after her Rank increased.
Aurora hoped that the day would come when she would be able to dispel the curse on everyone who had been infected by her bad luck, allowing them to live normal lives without ever worrying about hurting themselves or others.
"Aurora, later this afternoon we will visit your mother's grave," King Septimius said. "I'm sure that she will be happy to see you."
The young lady nodded her head and smiled at her father.
During her trial, she had talked to her mother and wondered if the talk they had was real or not.
Lux and she believed that there was a possibility that both of them had traveled through space and time and had a chance to talk to Queen Bianca when she was still alive.
Of course, their assumptions might be wrong, but they would rather believe that the loving Queen whom they had seen in that Dreamworld, was real.
