"A man calls it honor when he keeps his own wife. He calls it scandal when another man does the same work for him, only better."
"What an exhausting day!"
Adrian let out a heavy sigh as he pushed the doors of his room shut and walked to his bed, collapsing on his mattress.
But while he was tired, a faint smirk played on his lips, betraying the complaint in his words.
He had just slipped back over the east garden wall, still dressed in his ruined academy clothes.
He made sure that no one saw him coming. Not the guards, not the maid and especially not his mother and sister. If anyone of them had seen him in this sorry state. War cry would have already been blown and the two of them would have marched to the Montfort estate all on their own.
Speaking of the Montfort estate, the taste of Lady Eleanor’s sweet kisses still lingered in his mouth, but more importantly, a newly formed Mana Core was finally spinning steadily right beside his heart.
He hadn’t gone down to the dining hall yet.
The rest of the house would expect the disowned, unawakened cripple to take his usual place at the far end of the table and silently swallow whatever insults and pity were poured over him.
Adrian was simply not willing to wear that pathetic face tonight, he had better things to do.
But first, pushing himself up from the bed, he began to strip. He pulled the jacket and the blood-stained shirt from his shoulders, dropping them carelessly onto the floor.
As he stopped in front of the bath, he braced his hands on the marble rim and stared down.
The battered body Julian Montfort had left bleeding in the academy was long gone.
The severe lightning burn that had cooked the center of his chest was completely gone, leaving behind smooth, unblemished skin.
The deep wind-cut along his spine had closed without so much as a ridge as if it had never happened in the first place.
He stepped into the steaming water, letting the warm water soak into his weary muscles and wash away the last traces of mud, sweat, and the dried blood.
"This feels so good!"
When he stepped out, his skin was shinny clean and glowing under the lamp lights.
He dressed in a comfortable robe and loose black trousers.
Walking back into his bedroom, he collapsed onto his mattress once more, his hair still damp against his forehead. Only then, staring up at the ceiling, did he let the smirk grow into a full, genuine smile.
Julian Montfort had put a hand on Lyra in front of half the academy and called himself a real man.
He had ganged up on Adrian and cooked his chest with his pathetic lightening.
Julian thought he had won.
Adrian coverd his face with his palms, and could not help but remember the bouncing breasts of Eleanor on her husband’s desk.
Then Eleanor on her knees on the rug. Her hair down, covering her face and the pride in her eyes broken in pieces.
He had filled her pussy twice with his seed, enough to breed her with Julian’s siblings, helping Julian spend the rest of his life standing beside a brother who wore Adrian’s face.
Just the thought of it made Adrian feel warm in the same place his new Mana core had formed.
Let Julian swagger through the halls with Lyra hanging off his arm.
Let him spark that cheap blue light for anyone still willing to watch.
If the truth ever reached him, it would not arrive as a rumour. It would arrive as a child from her own dear mother’s womb.
Adrian had walked into that Monfort estate on the verge of death.
However. he had walked out of it awakened, with a stolen S-Rank Earth Affinity.
The smile thinned.
"System... Or whoever and whatever you are," Adrian looked around the quiet room as he called out, "I know you are there. Come out. Let us have a chat."
As soon as Adrian said so, a panel opened as if it had been waiting for the invitation.
[NTR Investment System]
[Host: Adrian Ravencrest]
"There you are," Adrian said. He did not stand, "Who are you? Where you came from? What you want from me?"
[I am the NTR Investment System.]
[That is the name that will matter to you. The rest is a door you are not tall enough to open.]
"That is not an answer." Adrian frowned as he looked at the screen in front of him.
[It is the only answer you are going to get tonight, Host.]
[I am not a god you can pray to. I am not a mesuah who will free your soul.]
[I was not born in this kingdom.]
[You asked for a devil, you got one.]
[All you need to know. I am here to help you.]
Adrian waited, hoping the system would continue and give him more information. But the system turned silent.
[Correct.]
"So am I your first host? Or have you ruined a few of them before me?" Adrian tried to pry another information. But like before, the system was still tight lipped.
[Now that’s a confidential information.]
[Even if there were more. Their names would not help you sit through dinner.]
"At least tell me why it was me?" Adrian asked, "The courtyard was full of boys who failed today. The kingdom is full of men who hate the people who stepped on them. Why did you climb into my skull and not into some other discarded son?"
The panel held still for a moment, as if the thing behind it were choosing how much truth was useful.
[Simple! Because you were compatible, Host.]
[Your hatred was large enough to fill an entire ocean and still spill.]
[You had no element of your own, which meant there was room to write one.]
[You were desperate, ready to sell whatever soul you still claimed to own.]
[Most discarded sons still want a clean miracle.]
[You wanted a weapon, and you did not care what kind of filth it was cut from.]
[I do not bind to saints, Host.]
[I do not bind to men who will flinch when I tell them to take another man’s wife.]
[I bind to the one who will do it, and then ask for the next house while his seeds are still spilling out of the woman he had just claimed.]
[That is why it was you.]
Adrian looked at the panewl in front of him until the urge to argue with it passed. He had asked for a devil in the courtyard. It was late to complain when he got one.
"Fine," he said, "You are here. You paid me. Thank you."
[Always happy to help master!]
"Now would you mind explaining me how you are going to be useful to me? Or is that confidential as well?"
[As you wish, Host.]
[I will tell you everything you need to know.]