Ch.165165. A Gift, Whatever the Giver Wants to Give

The beginning of everything was when Celia bragged to Alkine.

After completely dealing with Arpatustu and the Srela that had been parasitizing it, I went to the Imperial Palace once more for a report, and I ended up openly expressing my feelings for Celia to His Imperial Majesty before returning.

She was boasting about it like some heroic tale. From Alkine’s perspective, she must have felt like she was losing somehow.

“I-I want to go home and brag about Ludion too… Celia, take me there.”

“What? Why should I?”

Celia was incredibly dumbfounded by Alkine’s statement, as if she was trying to book a high-speed ticket to the North like it was her responsibility, but what did I say?

“Sigh… Fine. But I have conditions.”

See, I told you she might act cool, but she’s more caring than anyone.

“This actually worked…”

“See? I told you it would.”

A conversation about kind-hearted Celia. With her sharp hearing, there was no way she wouldn’t hear it.

“I said I have conditions! If you’re going to be like that, I won’t take you.”

“Are those conditions for me rather than Alkine?”

“What? Of course. What could I possibly gain from Alkine?”

No… I expected this, but saying it like that makes Alkine sound worthless.

“Thank you, Ludion.”

But Alkine didn’t seem to care and just thanked me for carrying her luggage.

These women. They pretend not to get along, but they’re actually closer than anyone.

And I’m the only one losing out by being caught in the middle.

So what was the condition she imposed…

“…I recently acquired a new ability by chance. I need a test subject. You’ll help, right?”

Mind control instructor… no, wait. She wanted me to be a test subject for her ability to control human minds!

Celia! You’ve finally gone too far!

It was an extremely uncomfortable condition, but I didn’t think I could avoid it by refusing, so I just accepted.

Right. I would have had to do it eventually if she found leverage, so it’s better to make it feel like a win-win situation.

The problem was that while I was clearly the test subject, the ones winning were Celia and Alkine.

I knew that pointing this out would only get me crushed by the favorability of these two friendly women, so I just kept my mouth shut.

I should have refused and not come to the North!

Clang-!

Clang-!

Clang-!

If I had, I wouldn’t be in this situation, crossing swords with Alkine’s father!

After flying for several days, the situation suddenly turned out like this, and I felt like I was losing my mind.

‘I vaguely thought something like this might happen.’

But I really didn’t expect him to swing his sword at me so directly.

The Duke of the North. Leonil Debaran.

As Alkine’s father, he is described as an extremely powerful figure in the story.

If we’re just talking about specs, he’s on par with the final bosses of the world’s strongest lineup from the beginning.

However, due to his position as the Duke of the ambiguous northern region, his in-game presence was miserable… he wasn’t exactly a character that got much spotlight.

The North itself was a place detached from the main story.

While it was clearly described as a dangerous region, it was completely outside the demons’ range of activity, so it never appeared in the story, leading to rumors like “Isn’t the North actually safe?”

Safe my ass.

I’m about to get my head chopped off here!

Clang-!

My whole body trembles with who-knows-how-many evasions and parries.

Even though the evasions and parries defy the laws of physics and I haven’t been physically affected, I feel like I have muscle pain throughout my body just from being overwhelmed by his presence.

This is truly terrifying. To be honest, I want to slip the Duke’s sword into my inventory and declare victory, but I held back because I couldn’t predict what kind of aftermath that would bring.

Still, the one fortunate thing was that despite his threats to kill me, he was showing me some degree of mercy.

If he had swung his sword with genuine intent, my best option would have been to flee with continuous evasions.

As I was thinking this and preparing to parry another incoming sword strike, the situation ended anticlimactically.

“…Tch. Impressive.”

The sword he was swinging stopped abruptly just before touching my sword.

“Come inside. We’ll talk there.”

What’s this? Have I earned his approval?

For now, relieved to be out of the situation, I decided to follow him inside.

And so we entered.

The Duke’s residence was disgustingly spacious, but the area actually used wasn’t that large.

Since the place where we just caused a commotion was right in front of the building they actually used, it didn’t take long to get inside.

We arrived at a room that resembled a reception room. The extremely luxurious interior caught my eye.

Leonil took a seat at one side of the round table, and on this side…

“Since this is your family home, I’ll give you the seat.”

“…No, you’re still sitting next to me.”

“Am I on the outside again?”

As always, they engaged in the same repertoire of conversation over the seat next to me.

And as always, Lilith was completely pushed aside.

Leonil had an expression like he was seeing something very strange.

That makes sense. It would be surprising enough to see his daughter bickering with the Imperial Princess, but if the center of it all was an unknown commoner man, I’d be wondering what was going on too.

I shifted my attention away from the two of them and carefully faced Leonil.

He too noticed my gaze and revived that solemn atmosphere from earlier.

I wonder what my image is like right now. I couldn’t gauge it at all.

But at the very least, it’s probably not a good one. From his perspective, I’m a rolling stone that came to take away his daughter.

Somehow I feel like I’ve earned some recognition after crossing swords a few times, but that recognition feels different from this.

In this situation, talking too much would likely backfire.

So I’ll just pour out what I’ve prepared.

With that thought, I emptied out what I had frantically stuffed into my inventory before coming here.

All kinds of ingredients that are hard to find in the North. I don’t even know how many types there are because I lost count halfway.

I just remember that I brought enough to fill a food storage warehouse and then some.

“What.”

In an instant, the reception room transformed into a food storage.

…This will be hard to clean up. Should I have asked first and emptied it in the food storage warehouse?

Such thoughts crossed my mind, but it was already too late, so I decided to just brazenly continue.

Well, I’m not giving anything strange. A gift is the giver’s choice.

///

There are countless sword techniques in the world.

But in the end, they’re all techniques for swinging a sword. Even if they differ in detail, many sword techniques look similar when viewed broadly.

Even if it’s just swinging from top to bottom, there’s no end to variations in wrist angles and connections with previous movements.

Therefore, Leonil Debaran could be called the optimal talent for breaking through such techniques.

While his swordsmanship was excellent, his true specialty lay in the very act of swinging the sword itself.

His sword, specialized for destruction, was literally poison to those who trained in swordsmanship.

In fact, even the sword itself wasn’t that important. Anything that could be held and swung would do.

Therefore, few people in the world have survived facing his sword strikes head-on.

At best, perhaps the former Sword Saint, or the current Empress who came with all sorts of strange magic.

Even they never tried to clash with Leonil’s sword head-on after experiencing it once.

But now someone appeared who blocked all of it.

Ludion.

The impudent fellow who brought back expressions that had disappeared from his daughter’s face since she was ten.

The shameless guy who had the nerve to bring two other women along with him.

He didn’t just block the strikes; he deflected all of them. This was… truly astonishing.

The last time his sword had been deflected was nearly a decade ago.

And now someone casually deflected his sword, which had grown even stronger over the years?

What a bizarre individual. Where on earth did they find such a person? It was truly maddening.

Sincerely, this felt more frightening than impressive.

But he didn’t show it. Because he was a father.

Because he wanted to show only his cool side to his daughter!

But that didn’t last long.

“This is a gift.”

The bizarre man who had deflected his sword multiple times now began pouring out all sorts of ingredients from thin air.

Even with magical preservation, managing such things throughout the journey to the North is not easy.

That’s why people in the North usually eat only Northern food.

Want to eat something else? Then you have to prepare thoroughly and go somewhere else.

But what were these ingredients pouring out now?

A mountain of ingredients that are difficult to eat in the North. All in a completely fresh state.

For a moment, the concepts of magic and spatial pocket crossed his mind, but he shook his head. Those could only store items, not preserve them this perfectly.

Leonil slightly erased his image of a proud father and carefully called out to Alkine.

“…Alkine.”

“Yes, Father.”

“What on earth did you bring home?”

Seeing his daughter just smiling happily next to such a person, he felt something akin to resentment toward his daughter for the first time in his life.