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Chapter 22: Loki Is An Amazon Devil?
Unknown to me, my loose tongue had just scored a painful, critical hit.
Vice Principal Lisa Swallow was the daughter of a prestigious Count Knight and a commoner maid. It was a background almost identical to my own, meaning my offhand comment about her mother had struck her absolute sorest spot.
But frankly, her psychological damage wasn't the headline here. What she said next was the true catalyst for the absolute chaos I was about to unleash on the academy. And if there is one thing Loki Sky loves more than anything else, it is a beautiful, magnificent pile of trouble.
"Nonsense," she hissed, thrusting a stack of neatly folded fabrics toward me. "I’ve brought you your uniforms. Your Northern title of Mage-Knight is not recognized as a legitimate noble rank in the eyes of this academy. Consequently, you are listed as a commoner. That dictates your rank, your resource allocation, and your teacher allotment... Take them!"
Oh, I see how it is.
The gears immediately turned in my head. The Prince was actively trying to suppress me. By stripping away the privileges of my noble rank, they wanted to strangle my image, starve me of resources, and block me from selecting any of the high-tier professors. A neat little hazing trap.
Too bad they were absolute trash at math.
Their little calculations completely miscalculated a few vital facts. First, I had a legendary 7th Circle Summoner resting comfortably inside my magic core who happened to dote on me. Second, as the husband of the Northern Duchess, I had a nearly infinite supply of raw materials to upgrade my magic core whenever I pleased.
As for raising my Vanguard rank? I could brew my own high-grade elixirs and pills. All I needed to do was train hard and find a rogue Vanguard out in the wild willing to sell me their secrets. The academy had absolutely nothing to offer me.
"Brother? What’s going on? I could hear you yelling all the way from the testing entrance."
A grin tugged at my lips. Thorin, my beautifully reliable, straight-laced brother, had arrived at the absolute perfect moment to play his part.
I dramatically pointed a finger at Vice Principal Swallow, pitching my voice so it carried clearly to the Prince and Princess standing just behind my brother. Around us, the surrounding crowd of students instantly went quiet, practically pulling out imaginary buckets of popcorn to enjoy the free drama.
"Thorin! Remember this lovely woman who crashed my wedding banquet uninvited?" I asked sarcastically. "The one who showed up with my wife, Duchess Sky? Well, she just informed me that a male Summoner Knight doesn't count as real nobility. She basically said I have to eat shit and stay at the bottom of the food chain!"
The temperature on the field dropped. The Vice Principal froze as the collective gaze of the courtyard shifted heavily onto her. She realized, a second too late, that I had just weaponized her petty hazing. By framing it as an attack on a "Male Summoner," I was escalating a minor administrative slight into a political incident that would look terrible to the King himself.
Swish!
Before she could pull the uniforms back into her arms, I snatched them from her outstretched hands. I turned on my heel and looked directly at the evaluator—a thoroughly terrified, nice teacher who was sweating through his collar.
"Teacher," I said, keeping my voice smooth and polite. "Now that I've been tested, passed, and handed my official rank and resources, I am legally enrolled in the Royal Academy, correct?"
The poor man looked between me and his fuming superior. Realizing that aligning with strict bureaucracy was safer than joining a targeted hit job on a certified prodigy, he gave a firm nod.
"According to the foundational rules of the academy, you are registered as a non-ranked, first-year student," he announced, carefully threading the needle. "That is correct, Sir Sky."
I mentally applauded. The man would have made a brilliant lawyer back on Earth. He purposefully avoided calling me a "Mage-Knight," but addressed me as "Sir"—a nod to my status as a Duchess's husband—while keeping everything perfectly within the school's legal framework.
I turned back to my brother, casually tossing the heavy bundle of commoner uniforms directly into his chest.
"Take these, Thorin," I said, sliding my hands into my pockets as I began walking away from the testing field. "That woman over there will probably try to tell you your Knight rank doesn't count either because you're a dual-element user or whatever. Keep the extra clothes. As for me? I'm going home. Peace out, losers."
"How dare you throw your uniform away?!" Lisa Swallow’s voice cracked with pure rage, echoing across the lawn as she took a sharp step forward. The Prince stood behind her, his brow furrowed in utter confusion, clearly trying to figure out exactly how his trap had blown up in his face. "Come back here, Loki Sky!"
I didn't even slow my pace. I just kept strolling, tossing my answer over my shoulder with a lazy smirk.
"Vice Principal Swallow, you really don't seem to understand the kingdom's legal bylaws regarding the Royal Academy, tsk tsk tsk. All the mandate requires of me is to officially enroll and remain within the borders of the capital city for two years."
I paused, looking back one last time to flash her a brilliant smile. "So, I’m going home for a two-year vacation. I’ll train myself, without needing a single shred of your pathetic curriculum. See you at dinner, commoner brother Thorin. Yin Meng, Taki Tsuki—let's go home."
Thorin let out a long, exhausted sigh as he clutched the unranked uniforms. He turned to the two royals, his expression a mix of pity and warning.
"If you back my brother into a corner, he will bite absolutely anyone," Thorin murmured. "Now he’s going to do something entirely unpredictable, and I promise you, no one is going to be happy about it—including me. Loki is usually easygoing, but he has a terrifying mean streak the moment you provoke his family."
The Prince stepped forward, his eyes narrowing. "How exactly was his family provoked?"
Thorin pointed directly at the trembling, red-faced Vice Principal. "She showed up uninvited to a private royal wedding and insulted Duchess Sky to her face. And today, she targeted the Duchess’s sovereign right to bestow Mage and Knight nobility upon her own northern subjects."
Thorin stepped closer, his voice dropping into a cold, hard register. "Anyone with a working brain knows my brother over-qualifies for his dual titles.
Stripping them away and calling him a commoner isn't just an insult to Loki. It is a direct slap to the dignity of his wife. If you target my brother personally, he’ll usually laugh it off or handle it quietly. But she trampled on his wife's honor. Now, he's just pissed."
He held up the cheap, coarse commoner uniforms and offered the royals a helpless, dark smile.
The moment I stepped past the academy gates, a wave of profound relief washed over me. I actually felt lighter. The stupid Vice Principal had accidentally given me the perfect, legally bulletproof excuse to skip school for the next twenty-four months.
"Loki Sky, stop right there!"
I had just retrieved our mounts from the stable block, and the girls were already in their saddles when the voice hit me. It didn't just sound loud; the sheer pressure behind the words hit my chest like a physical blow.
I turned my head. In a blur of displaced air and flashing light, Teacher Ayala utilized a seamless combination of <Fleet Movement> and <Blink Teleport> to materialize directly in front of my horse.
I forced my expression to remain neutral, masking the sudden spike of panic in my chest. Up close, the crimson-haired woman was practically vibrating, desperately trying to restrain a chaotic storm of violent, deeply conflicted emotions. Through our proximity, I could feel it—a bizarre, paradoxical cocktail of love-at-first-sight warring against an ancient, hardwired hatred for male Amazons.
To her, I was a Devil.
"You know exactly what you are," Ayala said, her voice trembling with suppressed hostility. "Why do you bother denying it?!"
I puckered my lips, my mind racing back to the strict warnings my mother had drilled into my head as a child. Avoid Amazon women at all costs, Loki.
To the Amazon clans, a male born with their blood wasn't a blessing; he was an existential threat. A Devil. By their ancient laws, they were duty-bound to execute them on sight to keep their bloodlines pure of Berserkers.
And unfortunately, Berserkers weren't a myth. They were a terrifying, genetic reality—a biological defect forged through thousands of years of isolated Amazon evolution, not unlike the historical Berserkers of ancient Earth.
Male Amazons invariably lost their minds. As they grew older and accumulated more power, they became utterly consumed by a bloodthirsty, emotionally unstable madness. They would slaughter their closest friends, their wives, and their children over the slightest perceived provocation, leaving nothing but ruin in their wake.
Even though I was only a quarter Amazon, I could already feel the latent Berserker blood whispering in my veins. It manifested in the way my mouth went on auto-pilot during a confrontation, or how my desire for cold, absolute vengeance spiked whenever someone crossed me—just like it had with Vice Principal Swallow moments ago.
"Yeah, my grandfather was a genuine Devil, my mother is a half-Amazon who never unlocked her aura, and I’m a quarter-blooded Amazon with a dual mastery of magic and aura," I said, leaning casually against my saddle horn. "So what? We aren't standing in the Demonic Beast Forest, the Central Sea, or the Amazon Isles. This is the capital city of Albion. You can't openly execute me here without triggering a literal civil war with the North."
I let my eyes trail over her, offering a slow, deliberate smile. "Teacher Ayala, right? Look, if you want to kill me, go ahead and try. But you’re only going to get one clean shot. You better pray you don't fail, because trying to murder me is a fantastic way to accidentally create the exact Devil you're terrified of. I will grow stronger, I am a profoundly petty, vengeful asshole, and I will come back for your head."
Whoosh!
With a fluid motion, I vaulted cleanly onto the back of my stallion. I looked down at the oddly mesmerizing, athletic woman and gave her a parting wink.
"When I get a little stronger, I’ll give you a fair, proper challenge to a life-or-death duel. Until then, you won't have to worry about seeing me around campus, since I'm boycotting the curriculum anyway. See you later, Big Red."
Ayala stood frozen on the cobblestones. Every instinct in her genetic code screamed at her to draw her weapon and eliminate the threat. Yet, as she watched me ride away, the frantic, erratic thumping in her chest told a completely different story.
Neither Yin Meng nor Taki Tsuki spoke a word about the disaster at the testing grounds as our horses navigated the bustling streets. Before long, we pulled up to the gates of my newly acquired capital estate.
Two heavily armed Knights wearing the crest of the Northern Sky Duchy stood guard at the entrance. The moment they recognized me, they snapped crisp, synchronous salutes.
"Welcome home, Sir Sky," they chimed in unison.
A genuine smile finally broke through my irritation. They opened the heavy iron gates without a single question, and as I guided my horse past them, I leaned down to give the guards a quick instruction.
"If a woman named Lisa Swallow shows up here trying to force school uniforms on me, reject her at the gate," I ordered smoothly. "Tell her I’m incredibly busy training, or sleeping. Or better yet, tell her I’m upstairs making passionate love to my wife."
The guards grinned, nodding in understanding.
We stabled our three mounts along the massive, ten-foot-high white stone perimeter wall before approaching the main structure of our new urban residence.
Real estate within the royal capital city of Albion was notoriously scarce, meaning out-of-city factions like the Northern Sky Duchy had to compromise on land. To make up for the tight footprint, our capital mansion was designed as a luxurious, five-story white marble townhouse.
While it was technically a temporary residence—usually occupied for barely two months out of the entire year—the Duchy certainly hadn't spared any expense. The building was deeper than it was wide, mimicking a high-end storefront to maximize the premium plot of land, expanding strictly upward toward the sky.
As we reached the entrance, a pair of impeccably dressed maids pulled open the ornate, double wooden doors, bowing low to welcome us home.
Stepping inside, the ground floor opened into a sprawling architectural layout. A long, grand hallway ran straight from the front entrance all the way to the back doors, which offered a view of a manicured private courtyard.
To the left, a heavy archway led into a massive, formal dining room dominated by a polished table designed to formally seat twelve guests. To the right, a matching doorway opened into an elegant sitting room, its grand fireplace already glowing comfortably thanks to embedded Fire Cores that automatically regulated the room's temperature. Behind the dining room sat a state-of-the-art kitchen taking up the rear corner, balanced on the opposite side by a discreet wing dedicated to the servants' quarters.
While grand flights of polished stairs wound upward through the center of the house, the estate featured a true marvel of modern magitech: a fully functional passenger elevator. Powered by a specialized array of Gravity Magic Cores, it allowed us to float effortlessly between floors without ever lifting a foot.
We took the lift to explore the rest of the layout:
The Second Floor: Dedicated entirely to luxury and leisure. It featured an entertainment lounge complete with a grand piano, a private alcohol bar, a custom billiards room, a card table for high-stakes games, and a massive, quiet combination library and office.
The Third Floor: Configured with four expansive guest bedrooms and dedicated storage vaults. This was where Thorin would be staying.
The Fourth Floor: Designed for immediate family members, boasting four even more luxurious bedrooms, a spacious family den for children, and a private suite for a live-in nanny.
The Top Floor: The master suite. It was an absolute fortress of luxury, containing an enormous master bed, a private den with its own Fire Core fireplace, a massive walk-in wardrobe, and a sprawling marble bathroom equipped with a rainfall shower, a four-person soaking tub, and two separate toilets. There was even a smaller, adjacent bedroom meant for a personal maid—or, as I realized with a chuckle, a husband who found himself in the doghouse.
The Roof: A breathtaking, secure sky garden specifically engineered to cultivate exotic, fragile magical plants, completely separate from the practical vegetable garden on the ground. It was the ultimate sanctuary to sit back, relax, and look down over the sprawling skyline of Albion.
To top it all off, the entire perimeter was saturated with a highly complex, top-tier security matrix. The magical wards actively jammed all forms of auditory eavesdropping, held an active perimeter alarm grid, and were tied directly to several dormant stone Gargoyle Golems instructed to tear any unauthorized intruders to pieces.
The defensive measures were extensive, though I didn't care to memorize the technical minutiae. Marquess Sky’s personal battle mages had recently swept the property and discovered that our security lines had indeed been compromised—almost certainly a parting gift from the Prince’s intelligence network. Fortunately, our boys had completely purged the bugs and patched the holes before our arrival.
The head butler concluded his quiet tour, politely informing us of the exact hour dinner would be served before bowing himself out of the room to grant us some privacy.
Mwah!
I leaned over and planted a swift, loud kiss directly on Taki Tsuki’s cheek. "Taki-chan, when you stepped up to back me up out there on the field, it made me incredibly happy."
Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed Yin Meng's shoulders drop slightly, a faint look of disappointment crossing her features because she hadn't gotten a chance to intervene.
Mwah!
Moving with a burst of speed, I leaned across and kissed her cheek as well, letting out a soft tease. "And Meng'er? You were the only person on that entire field strong enough to keep a straight face while looking at the Mud Princess. Truly spectacular work."
Both women instantly brightened, their cheeks flushing a pretty pink at the praise. Even if they occasionally found it annoying to be teased by a younger man, they couldn't entirely hide their smiles.
With the political drama locked firmly outside our walls, the three of us finally set about unpacking our gear, washing away the dust of the road, and preparing to enjoy our first proper dinner in the capital.
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