Beast Gacha System: All Mine

Chapter 301: The Crown Prince’s Bad Mood

"Right." Damon asked when he was about to leave. "I’m also here to ask about something."

Angela’s eyebrow rose. "What? You only have one favor. You think I’m your intel or something? My service is not free."

"You little shit. Me marrying whoever you recommend is a favor for you."

"..."

"..."

"...fine." She said, grudgingly. "What do you want to know?"

Damon’s jaw tightened. His hands tightened until the knuckles went white.

"Arkai Dawnoro’s Luna." He said. "Can you give me everything you know about her?"

Angela’s face changed. Her eyebrows rose, her eyes slowly became amused.

"What?" She sneered, but it looked more like a tease. "You like her or something?"

"She’s hot as fuck." Damon said flatly. It wasn’t hard to admit. "But she kinda sounds old. She looks like a human, but I assume she’s not."

Angela’s composure cracked.

"FWAHAHAHAHAH—" Her laughter exploded through the dungeon, echoing off the stone walls, bouncing off the iron bars.

Damon had a bad feeling as she laughed. A very, very bad feeling.

He had walked out of the area, climbed the steps, and emerged into the sunlight. It blinded him for a moment, the sudden brightness after the dimness of the underground.

"This is why you should have listened to me earlier," Angela said before he left. "If you had, you could have had her before she was stolen by everyone else."

What was she saying? That he potentially could have had the Dragon’s Physician as a wife?

That was a crazy delusion.

But again. Angela was Angela.

She had connections that he did not understand, knowledge that he could not access.

He would not be surprised if she had connections with dragons, or gods, or the strange, impossible woman who had somehow captured the attention of the most powerful man on the north.

He shook his head and continued walking. The sunlight was warm on his face. The training ground stretched out to his left, the sand still marked with the patterns of the morning’s drills, the dummies still bristling with practice swords.

A weapons rack stood near the path, and without slowing, without thinking, Damon reached out and grabbed a sword that had just been sharpened.

The blade was cool in his hand, the edge so fine it seemed to disappear when he turned it. The people around him, soldiers, servants, the crowd of hangers-on that always gathered near the prince, froze.

Their eyes widened. Their mouths opened. Yet no one dared to say a thing.

Damon walked on. The sword hung at his side, casual. The guards at his palace entrance straightened as he approached, their faces carefully blank.

They were men who had learned not to react or question, not to do anything that might draw the prince’s attention when he was carrying a sharp thing in his hand. They did not move as he passed. Nor did they breathe.

The servants in the corridors saw him coming and scattered, pressing themselves against walls, ducking into doorways, desperate to remove themselves from his path.

Damon’s chambers were at the end of the hall. The doors were heavy, carved with the Iondora crest, and they swung open at his touch.

Inside, a few maids were working. Folding linens, arranging flowers, the busywork of people who had not yet learned that today was not a day for business as usual.

They did not hear him enter. They were chatting, their voices light, their laughter bright. They were women who felt safe in the prince’s chambers, who had been here many times and had lowered enough of their guards.

SLASH!

The sound was wet. It was the sound of a blade meeting flesh, of bone giving way, and a life ending before anyone had time to scream.

THUD.

One of the maid’s heads hit the floor. It rolled, once, twice, stopping against the leg of a chair. Her body stood for a moment before it crumpled, blood spurting from the neck, soaking into the rug, spreading across the floor in a dark, spreading stain.

"AAAAAAAAAHH!"

The other maids screamed. Their voices rose, high and terrified. They just realized that they were not safe, never been.

Guards poured into the room after finally gathering their courage, their swords drawn, their faces pale. They surrounded the scene with the body and the blood, the prince standing over it with the sword still in his hand, his face calm and his eyes empty.

"My Prince!" The captain’s voice cracked. "What—"

"Search her body." Damon said coldly. "Now."

The captain hesitated. Then he moved, crossing over the traumatized, crying maids to the headless body, crouching beside it.

His hands were shaking as he searched the maid’s uniform, patting down everything. His fingers stopped at the hidden seam on one of the sleeves. He pulled out a small vial, dark glass sealed with wax.

"Poison?" The captain whispered.

"Search her room." Damon threw the sword to the ground. The clang echoed off the walls, and he turned, walked to his bed, and threw himself onto it, his boots still on, his eyes fixed on the ceiling.

"For messages. For anything that tells you who sent her." He waved his hand to dismiss them. "Clean it up. I’m in a bad mood."

The news had spread. The crown prince, for the first time since his sister had been locked in the dungeon, had gone to visit her alone.

The servants and guards looked at the dead body, at the blood soaking into the rug, then at the prince lying just a few feet away.

They had heard the stories, of course. Everyone had heard of how bad Damon’s relationship with his full blood sister was. Every time Damon spoke with her, afterwards, he would kill someone. It was a pattern.

But this was the first time he had seen her in a long while. But why now?

"Brother, what is this commotion?"

Three figures appeared in the doorway. Two young princes, one young princess, the children of the king’s concubine. The half-siblings that Damon had grown up with, the ones who were not quite family and not quite strangers.

They took in the scene and their faces went pale.

"AHH!" The princess, Gertrude, screamed. Her hands flew to her mouth. She stumbled back, hiding in the arms of one of her brothers.

The princes, Reginald and Jove, looked at the body before looking at their elder brother on the bed. They did not run, though. Running would feel like they’d be chased down. Not to mention they had learned that running from Damon was not an option.

"Brother..." Reginald asked carefully. "Why do you meet with Sister Angela if you know you will be in a bad mood afterwards?"

Because your mother sent me assassins nonstop these days. But he couldn’t say that.

The words sat on his tongue. He didn’t need to meet Angela to know which one in his palace was the assassin. He had known before he walked into that dungeon and before he picked up the sword.

But it was a good excuse. A clean excuse. An excuse that would make sense to his father, when the questions came.

"Assassins have been sent my way these days, Father." He could already hear himself saying it, could already see the old man’s face and the calculation of a king who had spent his whole life surrounded by people who wanted him dead. "I was fed up. I went to ask Angela herself."

He didn’t care if it implied that his sister wanted him dead. He didn’t care if it implied that his sister knew who was after him. Let his father assume batshit.

"The three of you take care." He said. "Lock your chamber doors at night. Assassins like these are common these days." He paused. "Now leave me alone. I’m napping."

"But... you didn’t have to execute them yourself..."

Reginald said, uncertain. He was the oldest of the three, the one who had been born closest to the throne after Damon, who might have been crown prince himself if Damon had not existed.

His eyes were complicated. Perhaps he knew that it was his mother who had sent the assassins.

His younger brother and sister might not know. Their faces were pale, their hands were shaking, and they were looking at their elder brother in fear. As usual.

Damon didn’t have to look at them as they left. He too already knew what Reginald might be thinking.

And because he knew, he also had to maintain this cold-blooded, demonic crown prince persona.

He had to be the monster they expected, the villain they needed, the shield that protected them from the truth. He had to make them afraid, so they would not ask questions.

He had to make sure that when the assassins came, they came for him, and not for the children who were too young to understand.

Ahhhh... his bed was cold.

It was still afternoon and the sun was still high. But the sheets were cold against his skin.

Perhaps the dungeon was better after all. There, his sister could embrace her boytoy anytime she wanted. At least in the dungeon, she was not alone.