Pretending to Be Human Is Exhausting Again Today - Chapter 59

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com

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Pretending to Be Human: Episode 059

I called out to Liribel, who had been watching me with keen interest.

“Liribel, Princess Chloe seems fatigued. Would you mind supporting her?”

“Oh, of course!”

“I apologize, Your Highness. My condition isn’t quite well either. I do hope you won’t take offense.”

At my gentle refusal, she nodded repeatedly.

“Well, I suppose there’s no helping it.”

With that, she exhaled a sigh of relief and took Liribel’s hand. The petite Princess Chloe and Liribel holding hands looked like a younger sister leaning on her elder sister.

When she had asked to hold my hand, her eyes had pleaded silently for me to refuse. Yet now that she held Liribel’s hand, she withdrew with an expression of gratitude.

‘What is this about? Did someone order her to befriend me?’

However, I detected nothing unusual about Princess Chloe’s servants. Rather, they kept their heads down, watching our servants nervously.

What could be driving her to such lengths?

‘I feel like I’ve been drawn into another strange situation.’

I was beginning to long for the Separate Palace. Even if it were suffocating, the quiet of the Imperial Palace seemed preferable to this chaotic journey.

* * *

Whether her claim of fatigue was genuine, Princess Chloe and her entourage fell into a deep sleep the moment they entered their quarters.

In the dead of night, with everyone asleep, I received a visitor.

“Forgive my intrusion.”

“Come in.”

The man wearing a deep hood—his identity was none other than Grid.

He stretched the moment he entered the room, finally announcing his arrival.

“It’s certainly far. Even with Coco’s help, it took this long.”

“How long did it take?”

“Roughly four days have passed.”

That was incomparably faster than our journey by carriage. The spirit’s mobility was remarkably impressive.

I asked him as he sprawled across the sofa.

“So, what did you come to transport? Is there something important?”

A few days ago, Grid had sent a letter through a spirit saying he needed to move something special and asking to meet at the port.

When I asked what it could be that Grid would move personally, he shrugged and pointed toward the door.

“See for yourself.”

I turned my head, thinking he’d left something outside the door, and discovered another person standing there.

“I have arrived, Your Highness.”

It was Ruslara who appeared. She smiled shyly and knelt on one knee before me.

“Knight, Ruslara greets Your Highness.”

For a reunion after so long, her greeting was far too formal. I helped her to her feet.

“There’s no need for such formality.”

“But I have received your kindness, so it is only proper.”

“Kindness?”

“You gave me your blood.”

I recalled giving her blood before leaving the Imperial Palace to aid her recovery.

I was about to say it wasn’t such a remarkable deed to warrant being called a favor, when I felt her mana radiating from her skin and my eyes widened in shock.

“Ruslara, your mana….”

Ruslara’s mana had grown to an absurd degree. Compared to Baban Si whom I had met in the Demon Realm, she was no less formidable. In terms of sheer quantity alone, she had become more than five times stronger than before.

Ruslara nodded and spoke.

“That’s correct. It’s all thanks to the Princess.”

“What are you talking about? Are you saying my blood caused your mana to grow?”

Baban Si possessed blood-draining characteristics, but achieving growth at this pace would have been impossible. If it were possible, the Demon Realm would have been ruled by Baban Si.

Ruslara smiled at my bewilderment.

“Yes. Though I suspect it was less the blood itself, and more the mana contained within it that aided me.”

“Mana… Ah! Human mana!”

In that moment, the incident that had occurred in the City of the Baron of Golden came to mind.

While absorbing the residents’ mana, I had felt an immense vitality surging through my body.

At the time, I had concluded that the mana passing through a human body and the demon soul had created a synergistic effect.

Yet there was one thing I had overlooked—this body was human as well.

‘So Ruslara benefited from human mana just as I did!’

But a question arose.

Unlike me, Ruslara did not possess a demon soul. Baban Si was a fairy of the Demon Realm, not a demon.

‘Was it because I’m a demon that human mana was so compatible? In truth, perhaps the target’s race didn’t matter at all….’

In that moment, a thought flashed through my mind.

What if the ability-enhancing effect was the very essence of human mana itself?

And what if there existed a human who could draw out that magical power like an inexhaustible spring and inject it freely into others?

‘That’s me, isn’t it.’

Then perhaps… wouldn’t it be possible to create an army wielding formidable magical power?

“…No, no.”

“Your Highness?”

As I shook my head vigorously, Ruslara called out to me with a bewildered expression.

“It’s nothing. I was merely casting off some troubling thoughts.”

What use did I have for military matters now? Until the moment such necessity truly arose, I would bury this notion in the depths of my memory.

After organizing my thoughts, I cleared my throat and turned my gaze toward Ruslara.

“Anyway, how are your legs? Gregory mentioned you’d need several weeks of rest.”

“Thanks to the magical power, I’ve recovered completely. They’re even stronger than before.”

Apparently, she had healed all her wounds in a single day. Gregory had advised her to convalesce longer, but she was so eager to be of use to me that she intended to travel alone. In the end, Grid stepped forward and promised to escort her here.

That’s when Grid offered to bring her along.

“What’s this? I never expected you’d help out of pure goodwill.”

At my question, Grid shrugged his shoulders.

“Of course I was paid. Ruslara, you’re quite wealthy, aren’t you?”

Ruslara smiled wryly as she spoke.

“I had considerable prize money left over from the tournament. My mother said she didn’t need it and told me to keep it…”

“Right, how are Mihilda and the others doing?”

I had heard about the conversation with Asmo-rina from Grid, but I hadn’t learned about the situation with the Baobhan sith. I was privately worried something might have happened, but Ruslara assured me everything was fine.

“She has been freed without incident. Grandmother says she must find the traitor, and she mustn’t burden the Princess….”

She relayed to me, in brief, the conversation she had shared with Baobhan sith. More than hearing that she would return as my subordinate, my heart found peace knowing they were safe.

After the conversation ended, Ruslara asked me cautiously.

“…So, I would like to serve as the Princess’s Guard Knight going forward. Will you permit me?”

Now that I thought about it, Ruslara had gone straight to her hometown after winning the Arena, so perhaps this was her first proper knightly duty.

I had promised to accept her as a knight back then, so I had no reason to refuse.

I smiled and patted her shoulder.

“Of course. I was already lacking in protection with just Ivan, so this is most welcome. I look forward to working with you.”

“Yes!”

Ruslara saluted with a face so moved she seemed on the verge of tears. I tried to dissuade her from such formality, but Grid, who had been sitting on the sofa, began clapping as though he had just witnessed some grand theatrical performance.

“What a touching scene. Knights truly are magnificent.”

“Grid, if your business is finished, you may leave.”

“How cold. And here I’ve brought the Princess some valuable information.”

‘So that was his real purpose.’

True to his merchant nature, he never missed an opportunity for profit. When I gestured for him to speak, he formed the shape of a coin with his fingers and said:

“It is rather expensive information, I’m afraid.”

“I’ll pay you later.”

“Hmm, very well. The Princess has excellent credit, after all.”

Grid rose from the sofa and withdrew a small note from his pocket, handing it to me. Upon it were several words and a short sentence written in messy scrawl. When I laid them all out, they read:

[Three Free Mercenary Troops assembling toward the Port. Target: Princess Chloe. Backer: Jins Kingdom.]

Such a message had been crafted.

I furrowed my brow.

“So you’re telling me that three Mercenary Groups gathered to capture Princess Chloe?”

“That’s correct.”

“Does that even make sense? The Imperial Army isn’t foolish.”

Regardless of why Princess Chloe had become a target, there was no way the Imperial Army would have turned a blind eye to Mercenary Groups crossing the border to hunt down the Empire’s guest.

At this point, it was as if a foreign military had set foot on Imperial territory.

Grid nodded in agreement.

“Exactly. I found that detail suspicious as well. But here’s the amusing part—all those Mercenary Groups crossed the border completely legally. By coincidence, around the same time.”

“Coincidence?”

That was a word I couldn’t simply overlook.

“For instance, beasts appeared in the border region and they were urgently summoned, or a disaster struck the nearby Neutral Zone and they came for relief efforts… pretexts that made it difficult to deny their entry.”

“So after entering that way, they received a contract to target the Princess?”

“Well, they’re mercenaries. Money comes first.”

‘Here we go again.’

Mercenary Groups who had coincidentally entered around the same time. Their target was the very person I was meant to guide—Princess Chloe.

Already sensing the troubles ahead, I sighed and looked toward Ruslara.

“Should we just raise an army?”

“I… I beg your pardon?”

It was far too bothersome. I found myself thinking it would be easier to simply sweep them all away with military force.

Upon hearing those words, Grid muttered in disbelief.

“Why, at this rate you’ll become Emperor yourself.”

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com

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