"IS THIS A JOKE?!!" The Radiant Prime roared like a beast, which, ironically, he was, as he finally lost his composure.
But he couldn't be blamed.
Such a matter was just that dire.
Even the werewolves might not have reacted any differently if they had heard such a thing.
It was an unknown secret that the strongest race of their galaxy descended from giants. But after a riot which soon turned into a culling that led to their annihilation, the giants became mere legends after the passage of several millennia.
Ever since then, the Asuras ruled this galaxy with a strong hand.
With the passage of time, there have been very rare but real sightings of loose giants, and each time, the strongest of the Asura race would move, putting many of the great powers on a pincushion. In fact, their ancestor, the one initially responsible for the wipeout of the overwhelming giants, had been forced to move on a few occasions.
Such a thing was naturally not a good thing for the other powers. There was a reason why they divided the starzones among themselves, as there was just no way a race who took thrills in war and actively sought it could peacefully co-exist with the others.
The Asura were really just mad men.
Or in this case, mad women, as they were matriarchal, just like the werewolf race.
The sudden appearance of a giant could only bear bad news for the Lunar starzone.
And it wasn't like they could try to withhold this information. That would simply be madness.
With these thoughts swirling within his mind, the Radiant Prime gazed at Sylvia with furious eyes as he growled:
"Explain what happened. From the very beginning, and leave nothing out."
Sylvia nodded lightly, and she continued from where she had been previously interrupted, causing the brows of the Radiant Prime to twitch.
.....
Several hours later.
The Radiant Prime stood before Sylvia's projection with his eyes closed as he digested all he had heard these past hours, this time having learned his lesson, without interrupting her once.
No matter how he viewed it, there was no way this matter wouldn't escalate into something else, especially after hearing that the giant had disappeared from the Goldsborn world.
Also, he couldn't help but connect the child Dean and the demons that appeared to the reports he had been receiving.
With the giant included, such a matter might actually bounce back on him, and be considered negligence on his part. After all, he was yet to make a move despite the complaints of several lower worlds.
His mind kept thinking of ways to salvage the situation when his churning thoughts suddenly came to a standstill, his closed eyes flashing with a cunning glint. There were risks to this plan of his, but the benefits far outstripped the risks. In fact, the only risk was the girl before him, as he didn't want to see her grow any further.
But he would just have to take a gamble and hope she died if his plan went well.
With his thoughts affirmed, the eyes of the Radiant Prime snapped open as he spoke in a calm voice.
"Such a matter must be reported to the werewolves."
Sylvia nodded calmly, as those were her exact thoughts. But what she heard next threw her off guard; her impassive eyes finally showing a semblance of an emotion: surprise.
"This matter is too complicated and must be reported directly. That being the case, hearing the information from the source itself is paramount."
"You will have to follow me to the Lunar world to report this matter. Not only you; all those involved must be present too. The boy, Arthur, your daughter..."
The more Sylvia heard, the faster her surprise morphed into a frown, but the Radiant Prime continued without a care for her input.
"And the main figures who took part in the battle with the giant. All of them. You should be here in at most three days. The interplanar teleportation array should still be functional even if it is one-way, so that shouldn't be an issue."
Sylvia was just about to refute, as the smoldering anger she had been restraining finally reached boiling point, when the Radiant Prime abruptly cut the continuous stream of mana he had been steadily sending into the transmission crystal.
With an unwilling look, Sylvia's projection suddenly dispersed.
After Sylvia's presence vanished from the hall, a look of cunning flashed across the Radiant Prime's face.
He didn't mention that the Lunar world was embroiled in a great war, grave enough that the werewolf leader had even lost her life.
He didn't talk about the menacing new race of vampires.
A cruel smile lit his face.
'How ironic.
You cut yourself from the universe only to be thrown at the forefront of its greatest war. Hopefully you die during the war, and if you don't, hehehe....' A lecherous light flickered within his eyes.
That is right.
The Radiant Prime planned to throw himself into the danger and take matters into his own hands to ensure Sylvia was permanently taken out of the equation. Even if she could not be killed because of her talent, what about crippling her? After all, the talent will only activate upon her death; that he was sure of.
'Besides...'
A confused expression flashed on his face.
'Those kids she spoke of, why do they sound so monstrous?'
Despite Sylvia downplaying Arthur, Rita, Martin, Sophia, anr the young master of the ancient Enigma family, how could it be so simple to deceive the Radiant Prime, who had thousands of years of experience under his belt?
Just the fact that a group of kids survived the attacks of a giant was so unusual that the Radiant Prime couldn't help but feel a bit restless.
After all, even the weakest giant was not someone the Radiant Prime could easily deal with.
'It couldn't be that monsters like her still exist in that small world, right? That would just be so ridiculous.'
How could Sylvia have known she had underestimated the giant's strength? After all, the bits of secrets she knew about the universe were told to her by her master.
.....
Meanwhile, in an almost insignificant lower world whose name was barely known among the other planets surrounding it:
"All hail the princess!"
"All hail the princess!"
"There is no talent like unto her..."
"Her beauty transcends time..."
"Her magnanimity brings tears to the skies of Mother Ginea...."
A stupendous scene played out in a royal courtroom as a procession of delegates knelt before the grand throne at which sat a young woman, barely in her late teens, who giggled playfully at the praises thrown at her.
"Shouldn't we stop this farce?" a middle-aged woman garbed in expensive clothing said, sounding exasperated as she watched the scene play out before her while remaining at a side of the room.
Beside her, a middle-aged man laughed nonchalantly, a smirk playing at his lips.
"Just leave the little princess be. There is no harm done."
"But still..." The woman hesitated as she watched these delegates of great status from other kingdoms grovel on the ground with no care for their dignity. It was clear they were here to bootlick, or in plainer words, "kiss ass"; it was just that the target of their actions was a young girl...
Her lips couldn't help but twitch when her thoughts arrived at this point.
Sending her a sidelong glance, the man's smirk deepened. "And how is she any different from her father?"
Looking at the speechless look on the woman's face, the man burst into another round of laughter, his voice buried beneath the countless praises resounding within the hall.
He and the woman beside him had simply been servants saved by that figure, yet they were now the ministers of the new, non-existent empire, while the figure's daughter sat on the throne. From this, it wasn't hard to tell the kind of man their master was.
All this farce playing out before them was because these delegates wanted to see the Royal Eminence — a being who came from the outside world barely two decades ago and conquered the ruling Empire in but a few days.
The best part was that no one was familiar with his appearance, as only his enemies had ever seen his face.
And without exception, they took that secret to their graves.
In fact, the courtroom they were in originally belonged to the only empire of this world, which ruled the lands with an overwhelmingly strong hand.
Yet the empire was now old news, while the person responsible didn't seem to care about ruling.
The fear the other kingdoms felt was deep-rooted within them, and they didn't dare to neglect his presence. After all, for there to be only one empire in a world, it could be seen the type of power they wielded. Yet the seemingly unbeatable emperor and his line, together with all his royal guards and armies, were wiped out in mere days, a few years ago.
Of course, while the minds of the heads of the kingdoms were clouded in fear, they also felt gratitude for this mysterious Eminence.
With power concentrated into one hand, the previous empire was the textbook definition of a corrupted tyrant.
So the actions of the mysterious Eminence were the same as delivering the world of Ginea from a great scourge.
As a result, such a scene was not unfamiliar to them. In fact, it had become quite a normal occurrence. It was just that even to this day, this figure, who had become a legend, had never made himself known to the other kingdoms who were trying to curry favor with him.
And yet, after all these years, these kingdoms never stopped trying.
One after another, the kneeling delegates presented gifts to the seated princess, who accepted them with no hesitation.
It wasn't long before the front of the courtroom was filled with gifts.
"Our great, beautiful, and magnificent young princess..." started a delegate who moved to the forefront of the others, his knees bent respectfully.
"Would it be possible for your father, his Royal Eminence, the great legend of Ginea, the sole sovereign, the unrivaled pinnacle..." The delegate seemed to have lost himself in the list of titles, as he showed no intention to stop, the praises flowing out smoothly from what the middle-aged woman was increasingly regarding to be an ass hole more than a mouth.
"Oh for fuck's sake, when will this shit end?"
Her frustration reaching its peak, the middle-aged woman stomped toward the kneeling group and cut into the spokesman's words.
"Aren't you ashamed of yourselves?! It's one thing to kneel once, but it's now as if your bodies enjoy groveling on the ground."
Being called out, the delegates blushed in embarrassment as the speaker at the front tried to justify their actions.
"But—"
"But what?" It seemed the woman was really fed-up, as she interrupted him once more. "You know what—" she began with a look of schadenfreude on her face, as she swept her gaze across all the kneeling figures before her. "You have already seen the oh-so-great Royal Eminence."
"Huh?!" A stunned look appeared on the faces of the delegates.
"Lady, you must be joking. There is no way we wouldn't recognize the great Eminence."
"Is that so?" A playful smirk suddenly danced on her lips.
At the same time, the man she had left behind suddenly raised his hand as he had a bad feeling. 'She wouldn't dare, right?'
Alas, it seemed his fear was not misplaced, as the woman's next words sent the rowdy courtroom into pin-drop silence.
*****
AN: Sorry for the delay! To make it up, as some of you might have noticed, this chapter is 2000 words long.
My current release schedule is: Wednesday, Saturday and Sunday.