The Archangel of Death

Chapter 23

A warm afternoon, with clouds in the sky, a peaceful atmosphere, the greenness of the grass, and the chirping of a few birds. A beauty of great qualities, one with whom you have a history.

All in all, a perfect combination of a perfect date.

[Only the unique nature of history]

Egg-zactly. The history I have with this black-haired beauty is quite unique. It was her kindness that she even gave me some of her time.

As we walked, I began, "I have been made aware of my sins before I lost my memory."

Her fists clenched at my mention but she didn't say anything so I continued, "Even though I don't remember doing such a thing, I am sure it must have been a traumatic experience for you."

Her fists clenched even further and I was worried she might even start bleeding soon.

"Therefore," nevertheless, I continued, "I would like to make it up to you." Pay the price and get this over with. I don't know why Allison wants to focus on her but to me, she is nothing but trouble so I will try to stay clear of her.

She turned to look at me with skeptical eyes. She didn't believe me or maybe it was something else, I was in no mood to run a deeper analysis. All I knew was that I had no idea about what the compensation would be.

And since the reason was quite big, I couldn't just make an offer of my own. Letting her say it on her own was better.

She stared at me for a bit before she, without speaking, turned and started to walk away. I, on the other hand, didn't stop her.

Although I did come here to somehow settle things between us, the real reason was that I wanted to be seen in public with her. No doubt that by now, many servants would have seen us together and rumors about us talking a leisurely walk would soon spread throughout the palace.

This would also mean that we have reconciled. Many would think so. I didn't care about the others though. I have planted an idea in Alicia's mind now about my nature. Now whatever it is, she wouldn't try to hold me accountable for our past. Or at least that's what I hoped because women are unpredictable.

[They are indeed]

=====

I returned to my room to see Rose and Max still in their meditation pose. Their smiles hadn't lessened at all.

I really hope they can wake up soon though. I went inside my room and started drawing the circuit arrays for the penta enhancement array. 

The first step's primary focus is on strength and agility and vampires are the best creatures for that. For the second step, I will require a werewolf's life essence because they have very good endurance.

All of this is available in a dragon but there is one tiny problem in that regard. Penta enhancement array has to be done in a sequence. 

Although a dragon's blood essence would have all of these qualities, I wouldn't be able to execute this exact order which would end up destroying my plans.

Anyway, I will worry about that later. It is quite difficult to find a werewolf with blood essence as there was no hint of such a being in the novel. I knew about the vampire so I was able to get it very easily but since I don't know about a werewolf, I will have to find it out personally.

[Can I take it that you are intending to massacre werewolves?]

Of course not. It is true that the only way to find out if a creature has a life essence is after its death, but once I have integrated myself fully with the first step in about half a year, I will be able to feel life essences without that.

So no, I was not thinking about massacring an entire race to get what I wanted. I will simply have to wait until I have been fully integrated with the first stage.

Once I was done with all of it, I stood back. I didn't insert vampire's blood essence yet because I don't want any of it leaking and just in case, I have prepared both of them for use if one isn't enough.

As I turned around, I saw Rose getting up on her feet. She seemed a little disorientated so I hurriedly stepped forward and held her by her arm.

"Ahh... Your Highness!" she was surprised when she saw who had suddenly grabbed her. I took her and slowly settled her on my bed. She was so out of it that she didn't even protest where I was putting her.

I stood up, leaving her to rest and get used to her new surroundings, and checked up on Max. For some reason, his breakthrough was taking quite some time or maybe it was Rose who had broken through faster even when her breakthrough was a whole rank higher.

I returned to Rose to see her sitting upright. She was about to get up when I pushed her back from her shoulder. She fell back on the bed and I ordered, "Don't get up."

She nodded at my strict order and snuggled back in the bed under the covers. "Tell me your stats?"

I asked, sitting by her side. She nodded and started telling me her stats. "Strength D+, Agility D+, Stamina D+, Mana C+, and charm is still at B-."

I nodded and replied, "For now we don't need to focus on your mana. First, we will focus on physical stats. Rest now, we will talk about this in the morning."

She didn't say anything in return and soon sleep took her. Since Max was still in his phase, I also took the other corner of the bed and went to sleep.

======

I woke up at dawn at the sound of movements and saw Max trying to sneakily leave. I looked to my side and saw Rose had come quite close during her sleep so I understood the reason why he was leaving like that.

"Are you done with your breakthrough?" I asked and he halted in his place.

"I am, your highness." He replied, still turned away from me. I was in no mood to make this an issue so I also ordered him to come to my room in the morning. He left without turning to me and I also went back to sleep.

I again woke up when it was bright inside the room. Rose was still sleeping beside me, well, almost sleeping from how her cheeks were quite red.

"Good morning, Rose." She flinched when she heard me. She still tried to act asleep before I said, "It seems she is still sleeping. Should I wake her up? Or should I…." I softly whispered in her ear but didn't finish my sentence.

She slowly turned to me, beet red, and replied, "Good morning, Your Highness."

Even from here, I could feel her fast heartbeat, probably because of how close we were.

"Let's have breakfast. We have a long day ahead of us." And when I say we, I mean them.

======

"Morning, maggots," I said loudly while we were in a garden. The courtyard of the imperial family was quite vast and we simply took a corner of it closer to the outer wall.

In front of me stood Rose and Max, straight like a pole, both of them dressed in training clothes. They were a little awkward when I called them maggots but said nothing in return.

"From this day forward, you are not warriors, knights, or maids. You are maggots. Understood, maggots?"

I kept calling them maggots. Rose didn't reply but Max was a little more ashamed of being called like that so he started to protest, "You're Hig---- Kughh"

Of course, he was interrupted by a head-butt. He fell on his knees in front of me and said while looking down on him, "Maggots don't speak unless they are allowed to."

I returned to my place and said, "Now stand up maggot."

He stood up begrudgingly but had learned his lesson to stay quiet.

"Now, maggots. This is the beginning of your journey. I will make sure that you become the strongest beings in this universe but for that to happen, I will make you suffer. You will suffer so much that you will want to die but I won't let you die. From this moment onwards, you are my responsibility, so now drop on the ground and give me five hundred."

I shouted loudly but received no response. They were about to drop when I said, "Stop."

They stopped. I went closer to Max and said, "Lean in Maggot." He knew what was coming but still did it with a face like he was about to leak.

Wham! Another head-butt landed on his forehead and he fell on the ground.

"From now on, you maggots don't need words. You don't know any other words other than 'Yes, Sir.' Anything else you say, you will be punished." I said with a sinister smirk and both of them shivered.

=======

In front of me sat Max and Rose, both groaning in pain and their foreheads red. It was just the first day of their training yet they made so many mistakes that even my head was starting to hurt after head-butting them so much.

They were slumped on the floor like they had their life snuffed out of them. Since it was their first day, I took it easy on them yet it seemed very difficult for them.

[You call that easy?]

'Of course it was.' Just a thousand pushups, pull-ups, sit-ups, ten thousand swings of swords, and twenty kilometers of running were taking it easy on them.

But I worry for the future. Just this simple exercise took them a whole day. How are they going to manage when the real training starts?

[Congratulation]

[Your party member Rose is now level 157]

[Your party member Maximillian Specter is now level 106]

Tch! Lucky bastards. I could have easily leveled by a fifty if I could grow like that as well. From today's training, each of their levels had risen by five.

I bought two stamina potions from the inventory and threw them at them. They didn't catch it because they couldn't move their arms so I had to feed it to them.

They became completely refreshed after drinking potions so I got serious and straight to the point, "Listen to me now, both of you. I will be going to closed training from now on. You two are to do the same training for the coming days until I come out of the training. It could take a week or more than a week. Until then, guard this place, and don't slack on your training."

"Yes, Sir." They both loudly replied and I nodded contently. But it wasn't over yet. To make sure they wouldn't slack, a perfect motivation and a punishment was necessary.

"If you slack off, I will know and you won't like the punishment," I replied with a sweet smile and both of them shivered.

"Yes, Sir." They still instinctively replied after getting head-butts all day.

=====

'Purchase it.' I asked Allison and half of my coins went poof from the inventory. I had about 800000 coins and 350000 coins were used to purchase an artifact.

A defensive artifact. It was a one-time use artifact and it lasted for several weeks. Except for the attacks of someone of divine grade, I was confident it could block attacks from anyone below that.

I placed it around the array and took my spot in the middle of the array. I inserted the blood essence of the vampire in the array.

The red drop of essence quickly integrated with the array and the whole array lit up with red color. Soon after, the pain came. Only pain and nothing else.

"Kuaaggghhhhh!!!!!!!!!!!"

I yelled loudly. Pain that was enough to damage my brain and my will to live. Pain that no one else could endure.

'Activate it.' I said with great difficulty and Allison activated the second thing I had prepared.