When Eve woke up the next morning, she found herself wrapped around Anabel, the latter still sleeping cozily.

Her mind was still a bit hazy, but when she realized what had happened yesterday, she was one part shocked and another part embarrassed.

Had she really done those things? No, more importantly, why was it that she didn’t really feel regret? Was it because they shared the title of husband and wife?

Eve moved, trying not to awaken Anabel.

She slipped out of bed, finding that Leonidas had prepared some silk robes for her, so she gladly chose to wear them.

When she wrapped around the dividing wall, she found Leonidas in very focused meditation.

Before him, a pile of sand lay, slowly changing its form. Sometimes it would press into a ball, at other times a prism, and still at other times a rod.

The images were far from perfect and could even be considered to be quite crude. However, Eve couldn’t quite understand how it was he was doing it.

The sand fell into a neat pile and Leonidas opened his eyes.

“You’re awake. Come sit with me.”

Leonidas seemed to be inviting Eve to sit on his lap, but she couldn’t help but hesitate. Was she really just his woman now? Just like that?

Well, they had technically already crossed that line, but she still had some apprehension. She didn’t quite understand why it was she lost her mind whenever she got around Leonidas.

Eve smartly chose a seat across from Leonidas instead, using the vagueness of his words to her advantage.

Leonidas didn’t seem to mind. He knew quite well why it was Eve couldn’t seem to act as she wanted around him.

Whenever he lost control of his more bestial and barbaric nature, his War Cry talent would amplify along with it. It made the women around him more susceptible to their base desires.

The same way wolves entered fight or flight to run when he roared, the inhibitions of women also lowered.

Of course, these women had to have at least some goodwill toward him to begin with, just the same way he had to make Beccerth fear him first. Humans were far more difficult to suggest than beasts were.

Leonidas hadn’t done it on purpose, only realizing the issue after he awoke several hours ago. But, as far as he was concerned, if this helped him better break through to Eve, it was a good thing.

“Are you interested in this?” Leonidas’ gaze shifted to the near pile of sand.

“Mm,” Eve nodded.

“It’s a practice method for perfecting the Level 3 Blessing, Mana Hand. Having to decide the form and shape of something as loose as sand takes a large amount of control. Once I master this I’ll move on to a viscous liquid, and then finally to water.”

“You already have a Level 3 Blessing?” Eve’s brows shot up.

“I do. Goddess Yves gives me two free Blessings for every Level Promotion.”

“What?!”

Eve couldn’t believe what she was hearing.

Most people had to scratch and claw for Blessings. In fact, if you were untalented in your Class, not only would Promotions cost more, but so too would Blessings!

This made sense. After all, being given a Blessing also gave one control over it instantly. So, the more difficult it was for you to grasp the talents of a Class, the more a God would charge you.

Often, Blessings could cost as much as the initial Promotion that raised you to the Level of being able to use it!

Eve had to deal with this as well in addition to her Promotion woes. To hear that Leonidas just gained free Blessings made her both baffled and not just a small bit jealous.

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Leonidas nodded. “Yes. Right now I have six Blessings.”

Eve took a breath, settling herself down. But then, she realized the implications of Leonidas’ words.

“You have six Blessings, but you only used… one?”

Eve’s eyes widened.

“Your brother might be able to know what Level I am and even know I have a Paladin, or a wife,” Leonidas looked into Eve’s eyes as he said those words, “but, what he’ll never know is what Blessings we hold.”

“You did it on purpose? Acting like a hothead, I mean.”

“A person who cannot control their emotions isn’t a threat. I’ve made everyone too apprehensive of me by hiding away for six months and shrouding my origins in mystery.

“By doing things like this, they’ll believe they know and understand me even if they don’t. Plus, I’ve been able to use my ‘hotheaded nature’ to nearly cripple and effectively cripple two of their Apostles now.

“When the time comes, it’ll be even easier for your brother to make a decision on who to side with.

“You saw it today already. I impugned on his authority, quite publicly at that. And yet, he chose to endure it.”

Eve’s brow furrowed. “But, he still saved Milon.”

“That’s true. But I know for a fact that if my blade had been aimed toward one of the Rardin Healers instead, his step would have been a measure slow.”

“Then why didn’t you?”

Leonidas thought about his mother’s message, pausing for a moment.

“Unless you understand your opponent completely, cornering them into their last resort is inadvisable. A Rardin family with one less Healer sounds great, but I have no idea how they’d retaliate…”

‘… Or what the ogres would do if the Rardins suddenly lost their usefulness.’

Leonidas’ replayed his encounter with the rusted bronze ax. He didn’t think he was ready to face whoever had thrown it, not even close.

Despite his usual nature, he had still gotten a bit complacent. He had defeated a Level 3 Apostle at Level 1, how could he not?

But, Leonidas had to remember that he knew too little about this world. How would he fare against someone with better Bloodline Talents than War Cry and Berserk? How about someone who had mastered their Blessings as perfectly as he had? What about someone with a family even more wealthy than the Rardins behind them, who could claim as many Blessings as they wanted, when they wanted?

There was a huge world out there and he didn’t know what was waiting. He had to be more prepared.

“… Plus,” Leonidas continued, “they’ll be less likely to provoke me with things being like this. The next time they try to mess with my things, we’ll know that they’ve come with the resolve to truly end things.”

“And that’s why you didn’t allow Anabel to fight?”

“Are you asking how she’s so powerful?”

“Yes.”

“Goddess Yves gave me a free bloodline fragment unlock.”

Eve was shell-shocked, not knowing what to say for a very long time.

“… Anabel has bloodline fragments?”

Leonidas’ eyes narrowed. He hadn’t gotten a chance to look up what that really meant, but Eve seemed to have a convenient answer for him.

“Is there something I should know?”

“I…” Eve frowned. “… I’m not sure how true this is, but while I was in the Peyton family, I heard that one of the reasons Deacon Ezor has been able to hold onto so much power isn’t just because of himself, but it’s also because he has a Paladin with an awakened bloodline fragment to his side.

“I didn’t remember until you mentioned it just now. But from what I know, Paladins with bloodline fragments are very rare.”

Leonidas closed his eyes, entering the Knowledge Well once again, this time with a focus on Bloodline Talent Fragments.

Initially, he hadn’t thought that this matter was a big deal. After all, he had two complete Bloodline Talents, so he didn’t think much of fragments.

However, as he read more, he understood where his mistake had been.

Humans were different from races like his own. They often didn’t have any bloodlines at all, but they were also the most ubiquitous of all the races.

With how spread-out they were and how thin any powerful bloodlines they had would become, any that managed to appear, even in fragments, were only the strongest of the strongest.

More importantly, when a fragment was awoken, if a Paladin Promoted enough into the future, the bloodline could be made whole again, giving them access to the full strength of their bloodline!

Anabel’s Siris family wasn’t special at all, even within a small town like Violet Waters. For her to have a Bloodline Talent Fragment, it would have definitely needed to survive over hundreds of generations before finally manifesting again.

Such a bloodline wasn’t just powerful by a small measure.

When Leonidas looked at the Water Body talent again, he looked at it in a completely new light.

Initially, when he had first looked up the talent, he had only focused on the description and didn’t look to see how powerful it was. But now he knew.

‘So the Water Body talent has the potential to be a Level 12 talent…’

Leonidas opened his eyes, exhaling a breath.

Missionaries. Deacons. Priests. And finally, Bishops.

Level 12 represented the strongest of Bishops, an existence Leonidas couldn’t even fathom.

At that Level, one already had the strength to cause permanent changes to the land and earth. To think such a talent was dormant within Anabel.

And now that Leonidas thought about it, Anabel actually had two other fragments as well.

It seems that he had accidentally stumbled into a treasure.

Then again, Anabel was quite special from the beginning. For her family to not set her up for marriage as early as 16 years old, she had to have shown them something worthy to be impressed by.

Now, Leonidas had a tangible answer for what that was.

A silence fell between the supposed husband-wife duo.

Eve fidgeted with her robes, somehow feeling that she should have worn more. Eventually, she pushed herself to speak.

“… About becoming a Healer…”

“Yes?”

“I…” Eve took a breath, but it came in shaky. She felt cold and heavy, her next words stuck in her throat for a long moment. “… I will do it…”