Chapter 636: Vassal Lord Of Blessed Land [Bonus - ]

Chapter 636: Vassal Lord Of Blessed Land [Bonus Chapter]

"Well," she said, tapping her temple with a pale fingertip, "it is my soul and my memory to influence... Let a dying woman have her secrets."

She took one more step, closing the distance until she was standing directly in front of him.

Her violet eyes narrowed slightly, sweeping across his face with sharp scrutiny.

"You made my daughter fall for you, didn’t you?" she asked, her voice dropping into a quiet murmur.

Silas opened his mouth, but before he could form an answer, an unmistakable bright pink blush suddenly bloomed across the woman’s porcelain cheeks.

Her cool regal composure completely evaporated, replaced by an adorably flustered pout that looked utterly ridiculous on a woman who had just been musing about death.

She raised her right hand, curling her fingers into a fist, and aggressively jabbed her index finger straight into the center of Silas’s chest.

"Take responsibility!" she huffed with her face red as she was glaring at him with fierce wide eyes.

The moment the tip of her pale finger touched Silas’s sternum, the white limestone terrace beneath their feet violently shuddered.

A thin jagged fracture tore through the flagstones, running from her bare heels straight out into the bay.

The sea itself cracked like brittle green ice with long fissures spider-webbing across the sky.

The woman lowered her hand, her expression softening once more as the world around them began to dissolve into drifting white dust.

"Tell me," she whispered, her voice fading beneath the rising sound of breaking glass. "What did you name her? What is her name?"

Silas looked at the fractures spreading across her shoulders and he didn’t hesitate.

A small, warm smile touched his lips.

"Aki," Silas said softly. "Her name is Aki."

The woman blinked as her eyebrows drew together in a sudden offended scowl.

"Aki?" she complained loudly, her voice echoing over the rumbling collapse of the terrace. "Just Aki?! That’s it?! Gods above, so little effort was put into it! What kind of lazy single-syllable nonsense is—"

Another massive fissure ripped clean through the center of the terrace, severing the space between them.

The woman’s complaint was cut off.

She looked down at the dissolving stone, then looked back at Silas through the drifting light with her lips curving into a gentle tender smile.

"Actually," she murmured, her voice barely a whisper carried on the dissolving wind, "it’s a very nice name."

The white terrace, the glass bay, the rocking chair, and the black-haired woman shattered into millions of blinding silent white motes.

...

"Silas! Silas, wake up! Silas?!"

The sounds of the waking world rushed back into his ears in a sudden burst as Silas gasped with his eyelids flying open.

The soft lavender-scented down mattress of the Rhyx City bedchamber yielded beneath his palms.

The golden afternoon light was still slanting through the high glass terrace doors, catching the sea-foam curtains fluttering in the ocean draft.

He sat upright, shaking his head to clear the static behind his eyes.

"Oh," Silas murmured with his voice rough. "Aki."

Standing in the center of the Persian rug, three paces from the edge of the mattress, was Princess Aki.

She was not lying down, and she was not weeping in pain either. The older woman was standing tall on her bare feet with her back straight and her hands trembling at her sides.

"Look, Silas!" Aki gasped, her voice cracking with breathless hysteria with tears of overwhelming joy spilling freely over her lashes. "Look! LOOK!"

Silas turned his head, his dark eyes focusing on her frame and his jaw slowly dropped.

Swirling around Aki’s slender body was a brilliant, radiant tempest of pure royal-purple mana.

It didn’t leak like smoke... it danced along her skin in tight crackling ribbons of crystalline violet light, weaving around her wrists, surging through the hem of her silk gown, and crowning her sapphire hair with a soft iridescent violet halo.

Her meridians were singing.

"I can use mana," Aki choked out, pressing both hands over her mouth, laughing through her tears. "Silas, I can actually feel it! It’s right here! It’s flowing through my arms! It’s warm, it’s so warm!"

She dropped her hands, her sapphire eyes blazing with sudden fierce focus.

"And look at this!" she cried, spinning on her heel toward the carved cedar side-table.

Sitting atop the wood was a heavy ornamental porcelain vase painted with traditional Khemet lotus patterns.

Aki raised her right hand, pointing her slender index finger toward the ceramic and her brow furrowed in intense concentration as her purple mana funneling down her arm toward her fingertip.

It was slow...

For two full seconds, nothing happened then a tiny, dark purple spark flickered against the glazed porcelain.

The vase did not shatter from impact, and it did not melt from heat.

Beginning at the rim, the porcelain simply began to unbind.

The molecular structure unraveled, shedding fine dark-purple ash that drifted silently downward onto the cedar surface.

Millimeter by millimeter, the vase was systematically disassembled, dissolving into nothingness until only a small pile of purple-tinged dust remained upon the tabletop.

Aki whirled back toward him, her face flushed with triumph.

"I can use Father’s Destruction!" she gasped, clenching her small fist. "It’s slow, it’s so much slower than his, and it took almost half my focus just to unbind a flowerpot, but it’s Destruction... The element of the Royal Bloodline! With enough time, with enough training in the Sovereign Realm, I’ll be able to wield it properly, Silas! I’ll actually be able to fight!"

Silas looked at the pile of dust on the table, then looked back at her radiant tear-streaked face as a wide genuine smile broke across his exhausted features.

"Congratulations, Princess," Silas said softly, his voice full of quiet pride. "You’re an Awakened now... A real one."

Aki practically launched herself across the bed, throwing her arms tightly around Silas’s neck, burying her face into the curve of his collarbone with a breathless joyful sob.

"Thank you," she wept, her small body shaking against his chest. "Thank you, thank you, thank you. Silas...."

Silas’s arms wrapped naturally around her waist, pulling her onto his lap as she nestled against him.

He held her securely, letting his chin rest against the top of her blue head, breathing in the clean scent of her hair while her tears soaked into the terrycloth of his stolen bathrobe.

A pale translucent notification slate flickered to life directly before Silas’s eyes.

He blinked, his gaze traveling across the text:

[Target: Princess Aki Has Transitioned To Awakened Status.]

[Because Target’s Core Was Awakened Directly Via Host’s Sacred Mana Transfer, Target’s Future Territory Shall Be Formally Registered As A [Vassal Territory] Beneath The Primary Dominion Of [Blessed Land].]

[Authority Clause: Host Retains Command Over Target’s Borders... All Heroes And Troop Formations Summoned Beneath Target’s Banner Shall Simultaneously Operate As Secondary Units Of Blessed Land’s Core Armed Forces.]

Silas’s hands tightened slightly around Aki’s waist. His dark eyes narrowed, his brow furrowing as he read the clauses over twice.

’A Vassal Territory?’ A cold pang of hesitation struck his chest.

Silas could understand... It was with the help of the System of course but he had somehow managed to make Aki a Vassal Lord to Blessed Land.

In the brutal hierarchy of the Sovereign Realm, a ’Vassal Lord’ was essentially a subordinate governor.

You answered to the Supreme Lord, your borders paid tithes to the central treasury, and your troops could be mobilized at your master’s whim.

If someone had stepped into Blessed Land and informed Silas that his hard-earned territory was being placed beneath another sovereign’s boot, he would have drawn the Dawn Blade and severed their head before the ink on the treaty was dry...

’Would she hate this?’ Silas worried silently, his stomach knotting. ’She’s a royal princess and she’s the daughter of the World King... To awaken her core only to bind her territory to mine, she might think I tricked her.’

He gently patted her back, leaning back slightly so he could look down into her face.

"Aki," Silas said, keeping his tone careful, measured, and transparent. "There’s something you need to know about how the awakening."

Aki sniffled, wiping her eyes with the sleeve of her gown, looking up at him with innocent trusting curiosity. "What is it?"

"Because your core was jump-started directly using my Gold Core mana," Silas explained, watching her expression closely, "Your future domain as a Vassal Territory... It means your land will operate officially beneath the banner of Blessed Land. You’ll still be the ruling Lord of your own borders, but legally and militarily, your territory is subordinate to mine."

Silas braced himself for the shift.

He waited for the pride to flare, for the furrowed brow, for the indignation of a Princess learning she was legally a vassal.

’Hopefully she doesn’t get too mad...’

Instead, Aki’s sapphire eyes went wide as dinner plates.

"Wait," she gasped, her hands clutching his lapels with sudden excitement. "Does that mean our territories are going to be connected?!"

Silas blinked, caught completely off-guard. "Well, yes... Troops and resources can cross borders from what I think at least."

"Yes!" Aki squeaked aloud, bouncing up and down on his lap with enough force to make the bedsprings squeak. "That’s amazing! That’s literally the best possible outcome!"

Silas stared at her, completely dumbfounded. "You’re happy about being a vassal?"

"Of course I am, you giant idiot!" Aki beamed, twirling a loose strand of blue hair around her index finger with her cheeks turning a charming shade of pink. "Why on earth would I want an isolated lonely territory out in the middle of nowhere where Lords raiders can harass my borders?! If I’m a vassal of Blessed Land, our forces are combined! I can visit your orchards whenever I want! Lady Eluned and Lady Aeliana can come over for tea, we can share defensive garrisons, and if any slimy Lord tries to do me anything, I can just tell them to take it up with Lord Vespera!"

She puffed her small chest out with immense satisfaction.

"I am officially an executive commander of Blessed Land..."

Silas sat frozen for two seconds, staring at her beaming face then a quiet, helpless laugh tumbled from his throat.

’I really overreacted,’ Silas thought, shaking his head with an amused sigh. ’I forgot who I was talking to.’

Still, a stray specific thought flickered through Silas’s mind as he looked down at her.

’I do wonder... will the passive domain aura of Blessed Land carry over to her vassal borders?’

Blessed Land operated under the blessing of the Divine Sanctum.

Due to the specific traits of his initial territory roll, the territory possessed an overwhelming passive harmonic affinity that attracted female champions, boosted female unit stats, and discouraged male recruitment.

Silas didn’t have a personal hatred for men as he wasn’t on some ideological crusade against testosterone.

’But still,’ Silas reasoned, ’does Blessed Land really need men around? I’m already doing the work of a hundred men... Maybe a thousand. The girls are disciplined too and an all-female territory is remarkably tidy.’

He cleared his throat, pulling his wandering thoughts back to reality.

"Alright, Princess," Silas smiled, resting his hands on her hips. "Now that you’ve got an active core, you have to prepare for the Novice Trial which is for a week. Do you have supplies ready? Descending for the first time is brutal... You need troop tickets and building materials or the wild beasts will overrun your perimeter before your hall even renders."

’Oh right, the Sovereign Realm does give you ten daily tickets...’

Aki’s eyes lit up with sudden remembrance.

"Oh! The gifts!"

She scrambled off his lap, her bare feet hitting the carpet with light rapid slaps as she scurried across the room toward the ornate cedar vanity.

She dropped to her knees, reaching deep into the dark space beneath the central drawer.

"Mm mm..."

Aki’s fingers found a hidden latch, and with a soft click, she dragged out a heavy rectangular chest forged from solid enchanted star-iron.

"Here it is."

Aki hoisted the heavy chest onto the edge of the bed with a breathless grunt, flipping the twin brass latches open.