Chapter 105: The King’s Quiet Warning

Chapter 105. The King’s Quiet Warning

The royal official finally stood, and the two knights immediately straightened.

"We should take our leave, Lord Valen."

I glanced toward the window. "What about lunch first?"

All three of them looked toward the yard.

Then back at me.

The official smiled politely. "We appreciate your hospitality, but we should return as soon as possible."

Apparently watching me squeeze blood out of S-rank monster meat had somehow destroyed their appetite.

Understandable.

As they prepared to leave, one of the servants approached carrying a neatly wrapped box. I recognized it immediately.

Lily’s flower pastries.

I took the box and handed it to the official. "Lily insisted you take these. You can eat them during your journey."

His expression softened slightly as he accepted it with both hands. "Please give Lady Lily our thanks."

"I will."

We walked toward the entrance together, but just before we reached the doors, the official slowed. Then he stepped closer. His voice dropped low enough that even the knights several steps ahead wouldn’t easily hear him. "There is one additional message from His Majesty."

I looked at him. "The Light Temple has started to move." His expression became serious. "Be careful, Lord Valen."

I paused.

The warning itself didn’t surprise me.

I already knew.

Mira had given me enough information to understand that the Temple was preparing something, and their interest in dragging me toward the Holy City was precisely why I’d retrieved the Maledict Sovereign Crystal in the first place.

What surprised me was Aldric.

The King had gone this far just to warn me. He could have written it in the letter, but written evidence could be intercepted. Instead, he’d sent the warning verbally through someone he trusted. That old man really was watching my back.

"Understood."

The official stepped away again, returning to his professional posture as if that quiet conversation had never happened.

"We’ve also notified Lumenford’s chief and the local lord of your arrival. They have the complete reports and will explain the case in greater detail."

I nodded. "Good. I’ll speak with them when I arrive."

I escorted the three men outside.

Their horses were waiting near the estate entrance, and everything proceeded normally until the official placed one foot in the stirrup, paused, and glanced toward the outer yard.

I followed his gaze.

The slaughter operation.

Servants and guards were still moving around enormous piles of S-rank monster parts while blood-filled crystal basins stood beside several dissected carcasses.

The official cleared his throat. "Lord Valen, if I may offer one piece of advice."

"Go ahead."

"You might want to reconsider doing this kind of slaughter work in the open in the future."

I raised an eyebrow.

He chose his next words carefully. "Some people may... interpret the sight differently."

I looked toward the yard again.

Severed monster heads. Blood. Bones. Workers moving pieces of flesh. And all of it taking place in the estate of a Royal Magus whom some people had recently believed was turning into the next Dark Lord.

Fair.

"Thank you for the advice."

The official visibly relaxed.

Soon, all three mounted their horses and rode away.

I watched until they disappeared beyond the estate gates.

Ariel approached from behind me. "Should we build a slaughterhouse over there?"

I glanced over my shoulder. "A slaughterhouse?"

She pointed toward the outer yard.

I considered it.

The servants were busy separating materials while several guards carried enormous pieces of meat toward storage. From a practical standpoint, having a designated processing building wasn’t a terrible idea.

But constructing an entire permanent building for something I didn’t do regularly seemed excessive.

"No need." Liora’s voice came from my other side.

I turned.

She had apparently materialized beside us and looked toward the yard. "Lily and I can handle it."

"You?"

"I can build the main structure," Liora said. "Lily can handle the wooden walls and the roof. It doesn’t need to look pretty. We just need to make sure it’s sturdy, spacious, and has enough ventilation."

That made considerably more sense.

A temporary slaughterhouse didn’t need elegance. It needed enough space for giant monster corpses, enough airflow to keep the smell from becoming a biological weapon, and walls strong enough that nothing collapsed while we were processing several tons of meat.

Liora continued, "You’re not planning to return from every hunt carrying this many corpses, are you?"

I thought about it. "No."

"Then we don’t need a permanent slaughterhouse. A large temporary structure will be enough. Something that can be dismantled when we don’t need it."

I nodded. "Agreed."

That would also prevent future royal visitors from arriving at my estate and immediately wondering whether they’d accidentally entered a Dark Lord cult’s barbecue party.

Probably good for public relations.

I turned back toward the yard. "Well, let’s finish today’s work, then."

Ariel came with me.

So did Liora.

The moment we returned, I saw that the servants had already made impressive progress with the S-rank materials. Nia was supervising the monster heads with frightening enthusiasm, while Lily had apparently claimed the blood section as her personal kingdom.

Seris stood among the guards, directing the heavier work.

Most of the outer yard had already been cleared, which meant there was absolutely no reason to stop now.

So naturally, I continued with the A-rank monsters.

Then the B-rank ones.

My Dimensional Ring continued vomiting corpses into the yard like the inventory of a psychopath who had mistaken a dungeon for a grocery store.

Meanwhile, the temporary building began taking shape around us.

Liora handled the main structure using her crystal magic, thick pillars rising from the ground before connecting through reinforced beams overhead. She didn’t waste time making anything decorative. Everything was wide, sturdy, and deliberately spaced to leave enough room for large monster carcasses to be moved around without constantly smashing into support pillars.

Lily followed behind her, using nature magic to grow and shape wooden walls between the crystalline framework. She deliberately left multiple entrances and broad ventilation gaps along the upper sections before creating a simple wooden roof overhead.

It wasn’t beautiful. It was spacious, sturdy, well ventilated, and capable of containing the mess.

Perfect.

Nia and Seris reorganized the servants and guards while the construction continued. The enormous blood basins were gradually emptied into smaller sealed containers that could actually be carried, labeled, stored, sold, or distributed without requiring someone to wrestle a bathtub full of monster blood through the mansion.

Ariel handled the meat.

Water flowed around her hands in controlled streams, washing away residual blood, dirt, and dungeon grime before each section was taken toward storage. Watching a Mermaid Princess delicately wash several hundred kilograms of monster flesh while servants waited with carts was probably not the romantic royal life she’d imagined when marrying me.

Yet somehow she still looked elegant doing it.

I concentrated on processing.

Dark blades moved continuously around me, cutting, separating, trimming, and sorting while I alternated between different spells whenever necessary.

Eventually, another familiar notification appeared.

[Evolution Progress: 86%]

Apparently turning my estate into an industrial-scale monster-processing facility was also productive for my magical development.

The actual cutting didn’t take long. With dozens of magically controlled blades and enough precision to perform surgery from across a room, separating a monster into useful materials was easy.

The annoying part was everything afterward.

Carrying.

Sorting.

Carrying again. 𝒻𝘳ℯℯ𝑤ℯ𝒷𝘯ℴ𝓋ℯ𝘭.𝑐ℴ𝑚

Then storing.

Watching servants and guards walk back and forth repeatedly started irritating me after approximately five minutes.

There had to be a more civilized way to exploit magical labor.

So I simplified everything.

Hides went together.

Bones went together.

Meat went together.

Organs, horns, claws, scales, teeth, and every other valuable material received their own categories.

Once everything had been properly sorted, I swept almost all of it directly into my Dimensional Ring.

Problem solved.

The blood was the exception.

Unfortunately, storing dozens of containers filled with different monster blood while maintaining proper separation was more trouble than it was worth, so the servants still had to handle those manually.

Good luck to them.

I headed toward the estate’s storage facilities instead.

The storage building had been divided into several specialized sections, including something surprisingly similar to a massive freezer. Large Ice Crystals embedded throughout the walls continuously maintained a low temperature without requiring anyone to cast Ice Magic every few hours.

Another section functioned as a drying chamber, using controlled airflow, heat crystals, and moisture-absorbing formations.

Perfect for herbs.

Preserved meat.

And, apparently, mummifying enormous S-rank monster heads so rich nobles could hang them above their fireplaces and lie to dinner guests about killing them personally.

I started unloading the sorted materials into their appropriate sections.

Looking around, I had to appreciate this era’s magical technology. No electricity. No compressors. No modern machinery. Just crystals, formations, elemental magic, and generations of magi deciding that civilization desperately needed better ways to keep meat cold.

Primitive in some ways.

Brilliant in others.

And after today, considerably more full of monster parts.