"Pride sits highest just before it learns how to kneel, and the lesson is seldom taught in public."
By the time Adrian descended down the stairs, dinner had already been served.
The grand dining hall of House Ravencrest was filled with a silence.
But the moment Adrian stepped through the tall double doors, the silence was broken by a loud, delighted gasp.
"My sweet baby boy!" Lady Katerina exclaimed, her eyes lighting up with delight as she beamed from her seat, "You came down! I was just about to have the servants call for you. Come, sit down. You must be starving!"
Adrian offered a weak, forced smile, playing his part perfectly, and took his seat quietly near the far end of the table.
In truth, he was absolutely ravenous.
The vigorous "exercise" with Lady Eleanor at the Montfort estate had filled him vigor to the brim, combined with the formation of his Mana Core.
And now he felt like he could devour half the table.
But he kept his posture deliberately slumped and his gaze lowered to keep up appearances. The rest of the house still needed to believe he was nothing more than a moping unawakened cripple recovering from a brutal humiliation.
Before Adrian could even reach for a serving spoon, Katerina was already on her feet. She leaned over, her eyes swimming with overbearing, protective concern as she snatched up his empty porcelain plate.
"Just look at you, my poor, sweet boy," she cooed, ignoring the annoyed stares of the others, "You look so pale and exhausted. Those absolute barbarians drained all the strength right out of you."
She grabbed the silver serving tongs and began piling thick slabs of roasted meat, buttery potatoes, and warm bread onto his plate until it was practically a mountain.
"You need to eat to keep your strength up, darling. Do not worry about a thing. Your mother is right here to take care of you," she continued, her tone softening into adoration as she set the overflowing plate back down in front of him, "You are still the most handsome, brilliant boy in this entire kingdom. Now, eat up. Every last bite."
Adrian offered a small, hesitant nod, even as his mouth watered at the massive portion.
Blanca, who had been sitting silently up until now, eating her food and ignoring everyone else at the table, suddenly perked up.
Without asking for permission, she stood up, grabbed her heavy wooden chair, and dragged it all the way over to place it right beside Adrian’s.
"There is my sweet little brother," Blanca smiled, her voice dripping with affection. She grabbed a silver pitcher and poured a generous measure of dark red wine into his goblet.
Reaching over, she gently ruffled his damp hair, "Just ignore them. Eat up and let your big sister take care of you."
Meanwhile, the head of the table sat empty in the Duke’s absence. Seated to the immediate right was Adrian’s Uncle Arthur.
Arthur was the younger brother of Duke Maximus, but unlike the typically elegant and refined noble vampires, Arthur was built like a beast.
He was massive and bulky.
And like the other Ravencrest men, he possessed an A-Rank Earth element and had cultivated his power to the Gold Stage Mana Core.
Thanks to his formidable strength and ruthless tactical talent, the Duke had confidently handed him control of the Ravencrest military forces, naming him the Commander of Army Staff.
"The Human King is getting greedy," Arthur sneered, tearing into a thick cut of raw steak with his teeth, "He sent another decree this morning. He wants to put human overseers in our garrisons. It is a fucking joke."
"The humans have numbers, Arthur," Lady Katerina replied smoothly from across the table, finally returning to her seat near Adrian. She lazily swirled a glass of dark red wine, unfazed by his aggression, "They breed like rats. The King is testing our boundaries because he knows that, with our limited numbers, we cannot afford to openly revolt against him."
"Test my foot," Arthur barked, slamming his heavy fist onto the table hard enough to rattle the silverware, "If he dares push this, I will bury ten thousand of those humans in a single trench. I will swallow them all before they even draw their swords. The human military is nothing but weak, pathetic meat."
"Whatever you do, just do not make trouble for your brother," Katerina warned lightly.
"Hah," a sharp, mocking laugh echoed from the seat next to Arthur.
Sitting beside him was Aunt Beatrice, his wife.
She was the very symbol of a haughty, aristocratic noblewoman, having awakened a slightly better-than-average B-Rank Wind element.
Tonight, she wore a ridiculously tight, low-cut green velvet dress that pushed her breasts up dangerously close to spilling over the fabric whenever she leaned forward. This chapter is updated first at novelping(.)com.
However, right now, her beautiful face was twisted into a snobbish sneer.
"Speaking of weak, pathetic meat," Beatrice said, her eyes dragging down the table to lock directly onto Adrian.
The entire dining hall went completely silent.
"I heard some rumours today, Adrian," Beatrice continued, her voice dripping with venomous disgust, "I heard you got beaten into the mud by a human boy at the academy."
She leaned in slightly, sneering at her nephew, "Did you cry like a little girl?"
Adrian did not look up from his plate. He calmly picked up his knife and cut a piece of meat, "It was an unfair fight, Aunt Beatrice. It was five against."
"And even after that, you should have seen their faces after I was done with them."
"Boohoo! Cry me unfair fight!" Beatrice mocked loudly, throwing her head back and laughing so hard her cleavage heaved, "Listen to you making excuses! You are an absolute embarrassment to House Ravencrest."
"First you don’t awaken."
"And then you get beat up by a human boy."
She leaned forward, her eyes narrowing, "You should have ripped the heads off those humans with your bare hands. And hung them at the academy gates."
"But instead, you let them put you in the dirt. You let them burn you. What a useless man you are. You should learn something from your uncle."
Clang.
Blanca’s heavy silver fork hit her porcelain plate hard enough to ring through the massive hall.
Sitting right beside Adrian, her shoulder practically guarding his, she had already turned fully toward Beatrice, her crimson eyes glowing with barely contained violence.
"Shut it." Blanca whispered and the atmosphere in the dining hall tightened around those two words.
"He walked home. That human boy needed shoulders," Blanca said, her voice sharp and intense, reacting as if Beatrice had just threatened something that belonged exclusively to her.
"You, on the other hand, are nothing without my uncle. So you dare not call my brother trash. You do not get to do that. Say it again, and I will make you regret even muttering my brother’s name with your mouth. I dare you."
"Beatrice, that is enough," Katerina warned, her voice dropping cold as well.
"Is it?" Beatrice snapped back initially, her eyes flashing with arrogance. But then, a sly gleam flashed across her face, and her tone suddenly shifted into a sweet apology. "Oh, my apologies! Perhaps I was too harsh. We should be pitying the poor boy, shouldn’t we? Let me make it up to you, dear nephew."
Beatrice stood up from her seat at the far end of the table and reached for the bowl sitting in the centre. It was filled to the brim with a boiling hot, thick beef stew.
Carrying the steaming bowl, she slowly walked all the way down the dinner table toward where Adrian sat.
Both Katerina and Blanca frowned deeply, their muscles tensing with immediate suspicion as she approached.
"Here you go, Adrian," Beatrice said, her voice dripping with fake sweetness as she stopped right beside his chair, and was about to pur him soup, "Have some nice, warm..."
But just then with a flick of her wrist, Beatrice intentionally tipped the heavy bowl sideways. The boiling liquid splashed straight down toward Adrian’s lap.
Adrian did not try to dodge. He sat perfectly still and let the soup splash all over his trousers.
"Oops," Beatrice said, a nasty smile spreading across her face, "I am so sorry! My hand slipped."
"Beatrice..." A murderous, inhuman growl erupted from Katerina’s throat.
The matriarch shot up from her chair instantly, her eyes turning blood red. Her fangs extended, and a suffocating pressure flooded the dining hall, cracking the stone beneath her feet. Visit g.com for the full chapter.
Beside her, Blanca was just as fast. Her chair scraped against the floor as she rose, dark mana coiling dangerously around her trembling hands. Her crimson eyes locked onto Beatrice with pure bloodlust.
Both women were completely ready to lunge across the room and physically rip Beatrice apart.
But Adrian moved faster.
He reached under the table, his hands darting out. He forcefully grabbed his mother’s thigh with one hand and caught Blanca’s knee with the other, squeezing their soft flesh hard enough to snap them both out of their fury.
Katerina and Blanca froze. They looked down at him, their chests heaving with rage, but under the firm pressure of his grip, they stopped.
"I am fine, Mother. Blanca, it is nothing," Adrian said meekly. He kept his head bowed, playing the part of the pathetic, submissive cripple perfectly. "It was just an accident."
"But..." Both Lady Katerina and Blanca tried to protest, but Adrian just squuezed his fingers and assured them.
"It is fine. No harm was done. Sit down,"
Under his commanding gaze, they slowly sank back into their chairs. Their eyes, however, continued to burn holes into Beatrice’s skull.
Meanwhile the boiling soup soak into his pants while Beatrice smirked in triumph and turned to get back to her seat. Arthur did not even bat an eye, continuing to stuff his face with meat as if nothing had happened.
But beneath the table, Adrian was smiling.
The very second the boiling liquid had left the silver bowl, Adrian had silently channelled his newly stolen S-Rank Earth element.
He did not cast a visible spell or summon a barrier; he simply manipulated the elemental properties of the heavy wool fabric of his own trousers.
Instantly, the fibres hardened, becoming dense like the ground.
The boiling stew hit the hardened fabric and very slowly seeped through his clothes, not affecting his skin in the slightest.
Adrian absorbed the heat and directed it straight into the stone floor beneath his boots, dissipating it harmlessly.
He felt absolutely nothing but a warm tingle against his thighs.
[DING!]
The loud, mechanical bell rang inside his skull.
[New Quest Generated: Make the Aunt Bark.]
The amused voice of the NTR Investment System echoed directly in his mind.
[Look at that arrogant bitch. Sitting there with her massive tits pushed up to her chin, acting like she owns the world just because she married your uncle.]
[She thinks you are garbage, Host. Prove her wrong. Break her haughty pride and make her beg for the trash on her hands and knees.]
Adrian picked up a cloth napkin and casually wiped his face, using it to hide his dark, predatory smirk.
[Target: Aunt Beatrice Ravencrest.]
[Objective: Infiltrate her quarters, expose her weakness, and make her beg you to take her.]
[Reward: A lottery spin; +2500 NTR Points.]
Adrian slowly lowered the napkin and looked down the table at Beatrice as she leaned over, whispering something to Arthur, completely ignoring Adrian’s existence once again.
She had mocked him. She had tried to hurt him just for a cheap laugh in front of his family.
And for that, she was going to pay for. Tonight.
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