Chapter 254: Warning of the Prince

Lumina stared at him for what seemed to be a long time, but Axel remained unflinching, without reacting in any way; he kept looking at her expressionlessly, while the princess seemed to be having her expression change like the color of a rainbow. She eventually said with a trace of disappointment, “What happened to you?”

Axel chuckled as he replied, “Too much, perhaps.”

She bit her lips and understood his vague answer as something he was unwilling to talk about. She then proceeded to ask the real question she wanted to ask: “What’s going on between you and Sophia?”

Axel tilted his head in confusion, “Isn’t that something you should be asking your supposedly best friend?”

Lumina almost visibly scoffed at the words of ‘Best friend’, but she did not elaborate further on that gesture. She shook her head as she answered, “She simply labels her interest in you as amusement. That’s all she says, nothing more and nothing less.”

Axel made the effort to look even more confused as he uttered, “Weird, very weird, with all due respect, I don’t think I have anything to interest the mighty valkyrie, though. Not that I care about her anyway.”

Lumina’s eyes took on a brighter shine, almost like a jealous child upon hearing Axel’s lack of interest in her otherworldly beautiful friend. The atmosphere suddenly became awkward as neither of them knew what to say or talk about next. Axel let out a long sigh, stepped closer towards the princess, and placed both of his hands on her shoulder. He said, “Look, what I said back then was very much the truth, and not a single part of it was a lie.”

“I cannot fall in love with anyone else, I am simply incapable of moving on from the first girl I ever loved, who had died. No matter how beautiful the valkyrie is, my heart doesn’t care about it.”

“So, if that’s what you’re worried about, that I would fall for the overwhelming charm of the so-called summoned heroine. I would not, you can be sure of it.”

Lumina swallowed hard in relief and nodded, the tension easing from her face. She knew it was extremely childish and almost stupid to do something like this, yet she couldn’t help it; her heart wouldn’t listen to her anymore at this point. Her heart was at the hands of the blue-haired and ocean-eyed mighty runecaster in front of her; she fell for him even more so at that majestic display of power when he alone eliminated the entire Section-A all alone.

Lumina’s mood finally appropriately lifted as she smiled and started talking to him cheerfully again, then began to crack jokes and talk about insignificant things, Axel also made the effort to match her lightened mood and played along with a broad smile, eventually he requested her with a sigh, bringing the main topic, “By the way, I wanted to ask something.”

She gave him a long look, “What is with that sudden formal tone all of a sudden? Just say what you want to say?”

Axel raised his eyebrow comically at her easygoing comment, “Well, have you tested the artifact, the one I gave you?”

Lumina’s lightened mood suddenly shifted, as she said with lingering hesitation, “No, well, because, isn’t it a bit too powerful? At least for me, it does seem extremely powerful, and that backlash is also quite scary.”

Axel sighed and patted her shoulder in reassurance, “I know, it’s precisely why I made it in a way that covers up all of your lacking areas and makes you strong enough. When it is necessary.”

He took a pause, looking forward in a specific direction, “I know the backlash is just as severe as the power, and you know it is something necessary to balance out the boost in power you will receive when using it. But you need to test it out. I made it precisely as a trump card of yours. When you’re going to be forced to use it, you won’t be ready for it if you haven’t at least tried it out once, and I need feedback on it as well.”

Lumina arched her eyebrows, almost unwilling to adhere to his request. However, another mischievous thought flashed through her head, and just as she was about to say it, Axel cut her off, noticing her overly bright expression, “No, I can’t be with you when testing it. You will be vulnerable after the duration of its use is over; you should ask Lucien. He’s the best person to be with you at that moment. And he would also be able to give me a more detailed feedback alongside you’re own experience of it, when using the artifact.”

She nodded in agreement after a long, exhaustive, and thoughtful moment on her own. To which Axel smiled brightly, leaning in closer to her, whispering close to her ears, “Good Girl.”

She blushed intensely and stared at him with a harmless expression of hatred. She ran off, biting her lip, her brain unable to think of any proper response to his almost flirting gesture, though it was very much a joke, which Lumina herself knew of as well. Perhaps that was the very reason she ran off like that.

Axel’s innocent smile slowly faded away, perhaps it faded away a bit too fast. Breathing in with a tired look, he started to go back towards his own apartment. Just after walking 30-40 meters from where he was conversing with Lumina, Lucien was leaning on the body of a large tree, looking at Axel with a dangerously intense gaze. Axel gave him a sidelong glance and kept walking without bothering to say anything to the prince.

But Lucien gave him a bold warning as Axel walked past him, “AXEL NOMRAD, YOU’RE CROSSING THE LINE YOU SHOULDN’T, YOU SHOULDN’T PLAY WITH PEOPLE’S HEARTS, LET ALONE THAT OF MY SISTER.”

Axel stopped in his tracks gently, his posture remained easy, his face remained without a change of any expression, turning around, he tilted his head in an almost mocking gesture and looked at the 4th prince with a subtle smile, “Don’t worry, I assure you, I don’t play with people’s hearts.”

Nodding towards the prince once more, he started walking again as he uttered internally, ‘No Lucien, I play with their souls.’

His footsteps became inaudible as he passed farther and farther away and disappeared from the field of vision of Lucien. At the same time, the 4th prince remained there unmoving, despite the words uttered by Axel Nomrad, his mocking tone, that nonchalant expression, and his provocative smile suggested the exact opposite.

That damn trash didn’t even take his warning the slightest bit seriously, despite his excellent effort not to attempt anything serious against the runecaster. Specially, considering how the entire academy seems to value him extremely highly. So, if he tried anything, the consequences would be far too severe. A foolish decision he wasn’t willing to make, too much loss for a mere short-term gain. He could only control his bloodlust with extreme will and effort.

***

The next day, horrifying news reached the ears of everyone: 20 students of the academy who had been in the beast forest for more than 24 hours had been killed by some unknown beast. Of course, it wasn’t killed by any beasts, but rather by something much more sinister, which the academy wasn’t willing to relay to the familiar students.

Even the amount of information revealed was highly modified. Due to the regulations governing the institute, they were required to provide a minimum amount of information, as it pertains to the well-being of the student body. The various 3rd and 4th phase experts have inspected and found that no living creatures of the beast forest were responsible for the killing.

There were a few guesses, which were that a new mutated creature of a new species had appeared in the forest, or that a dangerous creature from outside had entered. And the last option was that a being from the other races had entered the forest, somehow. As much as they would like to dismiss the very thought of that instantly, most of the hard evidence provided by the powerful seekers pointed to that very fact.

But the weirder part here was that the magic cards, which every single student must always have on them, were all buried in the ground at a particular place, 21 magic cards together in one strange rune-engraved pouch, which could interfere with the tracking spells within those cards. And the last time those 20 went into the forest, they were seen together with Ken Dusker. Not only that, in that pouch was the extra magic card of Ken. And the dusker heir was immediately brought in for questioning.

Unfortunately, the dusker heir seems to have not a single trace of memory of going into the beast forest with those 20 seekers. However, the dusker did recognize all of those pro-noble faction believers to be his supposed good friends. He was, in fact, very much telling the truth about never going into the forest with those 20.

That’s because he had no recollection of it, so it was true from his memory. But it was also very much the truth that whatever happened to those 20, only Ken Dusker was the direct clue to find out what precisely happened to them. Just what sort of abomination were those 20 killed by?