Chapter 697: A Shocking Handshake

Third Person’s POV

She immediately ran toward him.

But when she was only a few steps away, she suddenly stopped.

Her expression became awkward, especially when she noticed Eleanor and Aurelia standing behind Ethan and looking at her with surprised expressions.

Only then did Arlene seem to realize what she had just done.

Running toward a young man like this hardly suited the image of a dignified princess.

Her face instantly turned crimson.

For a moment, she seemed unsure of what to do next.

Fortunately, Ethan noticed her embarrassment and immediately stepped in to save her from the awkward situation.

He extended his hand toward her with a gentle smile.

"Thank you, Princess, for everything. I will remember it forever."

His crimson eyes carried genuine gratitude as he looked at the otherworldly girl standing before him.

Arlene’s cloudy blue eyelashes trembled at his words.

She stared at Ethan’s outstretched hand for several seconds, seemingly needing a moment to recover from his sudden words and the warmth contained within them.

Eventually, she calmed herself and reached out, gently grasping his ice-cold hand and shaking it.

Neither Eleanor nor Aurelia could see Ethan’s expression clearly from behind him, but they could see Arlene’s.

And something about her reaction immediately struck both of them as strange.

Why did she look like a young girl meeting her crush for the first time?

Eleanor was older and more experienced than Aurelia, so she immediately recognized the expression on Arlene’s face.

This girl was clearly inexperienced in such matters.

She seemed almost completely incapable of hiding what she was feeling, and the slight trembling of her lashes, the redness on her face, and the way she looked at Ethan betrayed thoughts she probably wasn’t even aware she was revealing.

Eleanor couldn’t help thinking that, objectively speaking, Arlene was a very good prospect for her son.

She was a princess, possessed considerable talent and status, and had genuinely saved their lives by warning him when they were in danger.

Yet despite all of that, Eleanor still felt a faint discomfort that she couldn’t quite put her finger on.

Perhaps it was simply the strange feeling of seeing another girl look at her son with such obvious affection.

Aurelia felt something similar.

She had genuinely wanted to like Arlene because of the life-saving favor she had done for both her and Eleanor.

She was grateful to the princess, yet seeing the way Arlene was looking at Ethan still irritated her slightly.

It was an emotion she didn’t particularly want to acknowledge, especially when she knew that Arlene had done nothing wrong.

Nevertheless, Aurelia kept her expression perfectly composed, refusing to let that faint annoyance show on her face, and behave immaturely in front of Ethan.

"Was that release of dark mana your doing, Mister Eryndor?"

A slightly shocked voice suddenly sounded from behind them, breaking the tender moment between Ethan and Arlene.

Arlene was startled by the sudden interruption from her usually silent and cold cousin.

Only then did she seem to realize that she had been standing there for several moments with her mind completely occupied by the handsome smile on Ethan’s face and those warm crimson eyes looking at her.

Her face became slightly red again as she quickly stepped aside.

She glanced at Ethan from the corner of her eye, seemingly wanting to see how he would react.

Ethan, however, was still smiling as he looked towards the one who spoke.

"Yes, it was me, Mister?"

The blond young man walked forward.

"Edhan IceHeart. A pleasure to meet you."

He extended his hand.

Ethan shook it.

The moment their hands met, Edhan’s lightning blue eyes suddenly flashed with tiny sparks of white lightning.

The next instant, a violent current of lightning surged through his body and into Ethan’s arm.

Ethan’s arm instantly became numb.

The lightning traveled rapidly from his palm toward his shoulder, carrying a strange sensation that made even his muscles momentarily stiffen.

It was only when the lightning reached his shoulder that it was finally suppressed by the powerful ice energy naturally residing within his muscles and bones.

Ethan’s expression remained completely unchanged.

Internally, however, he was quite surprised.

’This guy is strong.’

He hadn’t expected such a casual lightning charge to contain this much power.

That faint aura in Edhan’s eyes and the lightning that had surged through his body were enough for Ethan to understand that this man was not someone who could be underestimated.

From what he knew about this guy, Edhan was the second-ranked talent of the elite Violet Batch.

Based on this brief exchange alone, Ethan couldn’t help but speculate that Edhan might even be capable of defeating Elis, the Sky Realm wood elf.

Perhaps he could have defeated that sheep-headed demon as well.

Edhan was in the same major realm as Ethan, and unlike most of the people he had encountered till now of the same realm, he seemed to possess genuine combat strength that could compare to his,

For the first time in a while, Ethan felt a faint excitement at the thought of fighting someone like him.

However, one question immediately surfaced in his mind.

What the hell was that handshake supposed to mean?

Was this man testing him, but wasn’t this method too rude and uncouth?

Or was he simply reckless?

Edhan seemed to notice the faint change in Ethan’s gaze and immediately smiled.

"My apologies. It wasn’t intentional."

He casually withdrew his hand and continued explaining.

"You see, my lightning is rather wild and difficult to control.

I merged my lightning with the lightning soul of a rare Rank Four White Tempest Hawk, so its wild nature sometimes activates instinctively whenever it senses a potential threat."

He explained all of this with a completely natural smile, as though revealing such crucial information was nothing particularly important.

Ethan nodded slowly.

"Ah, I see."

His expression remained calm, but inwardly, he couldn’t help wondering whether the man standing before him was incredibly confident or simply stupid.

’Why is he casually revealing his secrets to me?’

A lightning soul was an extremely precious treasure.