Percy was seated opposite Sophia and around the corner of the Queen, who smiled at him. But he was tense and uncomfortable. How could he feel comfortable eating with the royal family?
The servants didn’t help him release the tension either. They treated him in an overly lovely manner, almost like he was more important than the rest of the royal family. That was enough to make his hair stand up to its end.
He was given various utensils to work with as the food was brought to the dining table.
I don’t think I can eat a single bite.
Percy thought, though his eyes lingered on the delicacies spread before him.
There were too many dishes, and it didn’t help that the [A Hunter’s Smell] Augmentation enhanced his smelling sense passively. Percy was too tense to eat, but the banquet of delicacies on the dining table tore down his defenses.
However, Sophia was the crucial piece. She tore down his hesitation when she started to eat like a starving bear. The princess was reprimanded several times for not paying attention to table manners, but the little girl acted like she couldn’t hear her parents and instructors. She flashed Percy her white teeth and devoured far more food than someone her age should be able to eat.
Percy started eating after a while. Observing the princess worsened his hunger, and he got started.
Eat slowly and try not to do anything stupid. Okay?!
He didn’t know much about table manners, let alone about half a dozen similar-looking utensils, but he tried his best. It was difficult because his urge to stop restraining himself waned after taking the first bacon bite. The bacon melted in his mouth, surprising Percy. However, it was more dramatic when mana and something else trickled down his throat.
A moment later, his body was overflowing with mana and vigor, but worse was the increased hunger that followed. The greed in his eyes was clearly visible, but Percy crushed the hunger. His hunger was like a ferocious beast, but Percy rang it down and pinned it to the ground.
He continued eating, glad nobody said anything to him.
I am doing fine, right?
Percy wondered but didn’t dare to look up, fearing the servants and everyone else would look at him in disgust. He was hungry and wouldn’t let anyone take that away.
More than half an hour must have passed before Sophia stopped eating. Percy noticed her gaze lingering on him, but he tried ignoring her. Unfortunately, that was as difficult as ignoring the King and the Queen, who had also started looking at him from the side after finishing breakfast.
Percy made the grave mistake of looking up when the entire hall was uncomfortably silent. That was when he saw the King and Queen smiling at him. They smiled seeing him struggle eating slowly. Oddly enough, their smiles were far from teasing smiles. They smiled in a different way.
“Is it okay if I ask you some questions?” The Queen asked Percy suddenly. He was still not done but put his utensils down, “Of course, Your Excellency.”
“You can continue eating if you’re still hungry. I don’t mind,” The Queen said with a tinge of sadness in her eyes, “You do not have to call me ‘your excellency’ either.”
But there was also something else in her eyes. She looked at him hoping and longing for something she had lost long ago.
Percy nodded slowly and picked up the fork again. The delicacies somehow increased his hunger, and it felt like he could eat for several hours.
“Is your name really Percy? Do you remember someone calling you a different name?”
That question was a little weird, but Percy answered it nonetheless.
“I was always called Percy and don’t remember anyone calling me differently. Other than lazy bum and the usual stuff. I apologize if the answer is not up to yo–...”
The Queen lifted her hand, “Don’t apologize. There is no reason for you to apologize.”
The King looked at the Queen and gently patted her back. He looked over to Percy with a smile.
“Do you mind telling us your story? We are curious about your life and have many questions about it. Maybe your story will help us understand.”
The meaning of ‘understand’ was more profound than it looked at at first glance, but Percy complied with the King’s request nonetheless. There was no reason to hide his past.
“I don’t mind, your maje–...”
The King stared at him just like the Queen had looked at him earlier, and Percy swallowed his following words.
The King nodded, satisfied with Percy’s response, and motioned to him to start.
That being said, Percy relayed his life in Raewood to the royal family. Yet, despite knowing that he didn’t have to hide anything, Percy couldn’t help but leave out some information about Old Greg. The pieces of information he left out might not be important at first glance, but Percy didn’t want to tell the King and Queen everything about the old man who’d raised him.
He was still unsure what exactly was going on. Percy had a rough understanding of the situation, but there were still certain things that didn’t make any sense. But the Queen seemed like a good woman. He wouldn’t imagine her abandoning her child after seeing her like this. She was an emotional woman and very concerned about Sophia.
The King had a hard and distant aura, something a king needed to rule a kingdom, but he smiled often at Percy and took great care of his wife and daughter. He was a good father.
However, what surprised Percy, and probably everyone else in the dining hall, was when the king stood up to embrace him tightly and walked over to him…to embrace him.
Percy stiffened in the king’s embrace, and he didn’t dare to breathe until the king released him from the tight embrace once again.
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“We would like to be alone for a bit,” The King said to the servants. They were star-struck after seeing their king embrace someone other than their family. Something like that had never happened. Still, they followed the King’s order, reached for the leftover food and empty plates, and left the dining hall in a hurry.
Only the King, Queen, Sophia, and Percy were left.
“I don’t think it's necessary because we are certain about you, but I think you and others need hard evidence,” The King said in the dining hall while retrieving a head-sized orb from his spatial storage. It looked like the Mana Orb Percy used in Raewood’s Guildhall.
“Oh, I know that one.”
The King smiled, “You must be mistaken this for the Mana Orbs that can be found in most Guildhalls. This one is a little different.”
Percy was still stunned by the earlier embrace but his attention was drawn to the Mana Orb.
“Hmm,” He murmured while channeling mana through his eyes. He activated [Hawk Eyes] at the same time even if that wasn’t necessary to see the mana streams of the Mana Orb conjure before him. All [Hawk Eyes] did was show him more details about the mana streams within the Mana Orb. Their thickness, the speed at which the mana streams circulated mana through the Mana Orb, and so forth.
“Do you want me to reach the obsidian-colored fragment in the center of the Mana Orb? That doesn’t look too difficult,” Percy nearly added ‘Your Majesty’ but suppressed it before it was too late.
The King realized Percy struggled with leaving the formality aside but didn’t comment.
“You can see the dragon scale?”
“So that’s what the fragment is,” Percy nodded.
The royal couple looked at each other again and spoke to each other with their gazes. Percy glanced at the Queen and noticed she was already having difficulty expressing her emotions.
“That makes it easier. I want you to channel your mana into the dragon scale.”
He handed Percy the Mana Orb and watched him intently.
Percy was a little nervous, but the Mana Orb quickly occupied his full attention. He accessed his mana and willed it to surge into the orb with a simple mental command. His mana reserves, overflowing from breakfast, boiled, and an immense amount of mana surged through his arms and fingers into the Mana Orb.
He willed the mana to take the most efficient mana streams to reach the dragon scale. Nothing special happened to the orb up until his mana fused into the dragon scale.
Percy shuddered involuntarily when the orb started glowing vibrantly, and he nearly let go of it when a massive hologram conjured above the dining table.
What in the seven hells…
Percy swallowed hard as the atmosphere in the dining hall intensified. But that was no surprise. The hologram showed a massive lizard with razor-sharp fangs, pitch-black claws, and emerald horns. Its massive leathery wings spanned across the dining hall, shrouding the royal family in shadows for a second.
The hologram of a massive dragon with azure-colored scales suddenly filled the room above them.
The massive creature circled over Percy, unleashing a primal roar that shook the dining hall’s walls.
“You…have a vigorous one,” The King had to gather his thoughts for a second. The royal couple had been talking about this event the entire night and was certain of the unspoken truth, but having hard proof for their claim changed everything. He looked over to the Queen, who had already burst into tears, and added, “Only a few people in the kingdom know of the Kain household’s bloodline. Our bloodline is said to be special.”
He cleared his throat.
“We are said to be special because our mana is incredibly pure. That is also why everyone can tell the members of the royal family apart from everyone else. We have unique eyes, after all. But the truth is not that simple. There is more to it,” The King announced to Percy, “We are the offspring of a powerful dragon. A dragon’s blood flows through my veins…but also through the veins of my offspring.”
“That’s me! I am the daughter!” Sophia exclaimed, and the King swallows hard before adding.
“And you, Percy. You are my son.”
Percy had known about this since he saw the king. They looked too similar for there to be no relation. The King and the Queen had been treating him too nicely, and there had been too many similarities between him and Sophia.
Nonetheless, there was another doubt flashing through his mind. A doubt that had been torturing since he encountered the Queen.
Am I the king’s bastard? Is that why she has been crying so much since yesterday?
“No. You are not the child of an affair,” The Queen, as if she could read his thoughts, terminated his biggest worries right away, while the King nodded, “The holograph is always a little bit different, you know.”
He retrieved the orb, and Percy’s vigorous azure dragon disappeared. A similar-looking dragon replaced his dragon. It was the king’s dragon, which was larger but also calmer. However, the azure dragon’s claws and horns were the most apparent differences. The king’s claws were pitch-black, but a eerily gloomy hue shrouded the dragon claws, while its horns were also azure, just like the rest of its body.
“My mother manifested a powerful Ego that allowed her to transform her hands into demonic claws. It was a powerful Ego, but it corrupted her mind the more she used it. She liked fighting, but the more the corruption progressed, the more she started loving – obsessing – over fighting. She died on the battlefield.”
Percy didn’t know what to say, but the King shrugged lightly, “My point is that my mother’s bloodline affected the dragon’s appearance. You remember your dragon’s claws?”
He nodded slowly.
At last, the Queen spoke up, trying to control her emotions as the words escaped her lips, “My Ego is related to herbs and nature. It isn’t considered one of the strongest Egos in the kingdom but it is strong enough to alter my mana, granting me emerald green eyes. That’s why Sophia’s dragon has emerald horns…just like…”
She couldn’t finish the last words, and Percy needed distraction. He feared the final words, as if they would seal something. Or unleash the seal of something.
“I have seen someone with your eyes before,” He blurted aloud, seeking distraction.
“Do you mean me, by chance?” A familiar voice rang out.
Everyone spun around, revealing a very familiar elderly woman who’d just entered the dining hall. The Queen jumped up from the chair, “Mother!”
What the?!
Now Percy’s head was spinning for real.
“It looks like I should have waited with my arrival. I’m confusing my grandson,” the elderly woman apologized, and Sophia rushed over to her. The princess squealed excitedly and embraced the elderly woman.
It was the same alchemist who’d sold cheap potions to him several times.
Percy stared at her with wide eyes, only for her to snicker loudly, “Don’t look at me like that. I heard about you from Knight Liam and was very interested in the child with azure eyes, especially after hearing about the barracks explosion. I heard you were involved in them.”
She winked at him, “Little troublemaker. Looks like my guess about you was right!”
Percy’s jaw dropped to the ground. This had to be some kind of joke.
“You are my grandson. I’ve already completed my tests,” She pointed at the dragon, “And the royal family must have concluded their test as well.”
“You are the crown prince.”
Percy shuddered, his hair standing up to its end.
Was he actually the King and Queen’s child? The same child who was supposed to be dead, sacrificed to a Devil by the Synther household?
Percy felt like vomiting.