Rossweise stepped lightly, naturally swinging her long arms,
"Is there anything else that made me feel satisfied? Mm... probably... you."
Leon raised an eyebrow and quickly caught up, "Me?"
The queen glanced sideways at Leon, the corners of her mouth slightly raised, "Yeah, you."
"Today I went shopping with you, petted cats, ate all kinds of street snacks, oh, you humans call those little snack stalls on street corners and alleys 'street stalls,' right?"
Leon watched her counting on her fingers, listing the things they did today one by one.
After a moment, he smiled and nodded, "Yes, they're called street stalls."
"Mm... although the hygiene wasn't great, the taste was okay, very down-to-earth," Rossweise gave a sincere evaluation.
Leon blinked, teasing, "But eating street stalls doesn't really match your identity as a queen, does it?"
"When I'm out with you, I'm not a queen."
Rossweise suddenly stopped walking.
Leon also stopped, turning to look at her.
He saw Rossweise remove her wig, revealing her brilliant silver hair.
It shimmered under the moonlight, reflected in someone's dark pupils.
She looked at Leon and continued the second half of the sentence, "I'm your wife."
A night breeze happened to blow at that moment, brushing over the street where they stood. The streetlamp above emitted flickering static sounds, and a soft meow came from the alley.
Her silver hair danced in the wind, slightly covering her faintly blushing cheeks.
They stared at each other for a moment before Rossweise withdrew first—
"Oh, what I meant is, nominally your wife, mm."
The Silver Dragon Clan is all about speed, strikes fast, retreats faster, never letting the opponent catch the skill's after-delay.
And that damned "fake couple" agreement really provided a perfect fallback for every heartfelt confession.
Leon understood her, so he never pestered her with childish questions like "do you even care about me."
To know if someone cares, don't listen to what they say, look at what they do.
Everything Rossweise had done, including coming to this unfamiliar human country, was proof she cared about Leon.
Otherwise, as the noble Silver Dragon Queen, how could she have let a human tie her heart down?
"Since you're my nominal wife then...", Leon said as he stepped toward Rossweise.
She instinctively stepped back half a step, "What are you doing?"
Before she could react, Leon pulled her into his arms and gently kissed her forehead, "Then I'll give you a nominal—"
"So gross! I don't want it!"
Leon froze, "Then give it back."
"Fine, I will! Who's afraid of who!"
Rossweise stood on tiptoe and kissed Leon's forehead too.
"Returned. Now we're even!", she said, blushing.
After saying that, the queen stepped quickly toward the clocktower in her high heels.
Looks like twenty minutes was still too long.
As long as the two of them showed genuine affection for each other, it only took five minutes to make the other's heart race.
'T-t-t-this can't go on!'
'There's a war coming soon!'
Leon shook his head with a smile and followed her.
When they returned to the Lionheart Society clocktower, a few members were still on night duty.
Rebecca and Nacho hadn't gone to bed either.
Leon carried a bag full of memory stones over and placed it on the long table in the center of the hall.
There were also other memory stones that had been brought back by others, quite a lot of them, probably enough to generate the resonance effect Leon had mentioned yesterday.
"Oh, Captain, you really bought the memory stones," Rebecca was slightly surprised.
"What are you saying? Wasn't the whole point of my fieldwork to buy memory stones?"
"I thought you spent the whole day dating sis-in-law."
"Dating and fieldwork can be done at the same time."
Rebecca had a sudden realization, "Is this the time management ability of a married man? So powerful."
Leon waved his hand and didn't respond to this tsukkomi girl's nonsense.
Nacho had his hands in his pockets, standing to the side, counting the memory stones they bought today, then said,
"Tomorrow we just need to buy about one-third of this amount and that should be enough for backup."
Leon nodded, agreeing with Nacho's idea.
"But we still have a problem."
Nacho said, "If we're going to rely on the resonance effect to transmit information, then the memory stones we've gathered are definitely enough. But the problem is, how do we get the memory stones into the paper lanterns on the day of the Lantern Festival?"
A new issue had arisen.
Leon furrowed his brows slightly. That really was a tricky one.
After a moment's thought, Leon asked, "Does anyone in Lionheart Society have a family that makes paper lanterns?"
He asked this because he remembered that earlier, Teacher Caroline had told him the orphanage was preparing paper lanterns to sell on the Lantern Festival for some money.
So Leon thought, maybe he could contact the suppliers of those lanterns and work something out from the source.
Nacho thought for a while and shook his head, "No. Paper lanterns are only sold around the Lantern Festival. No one specializes in making them."
"I see..."
Leon scratched his temple and said, "I might be able to get some lanterns, but definitely not enough."
He was referring to the batch of lanterns he had ordered from Teacher Caroline.
But just as he'd said himself, relying on the orphanage's production capacity alone couldn't possibly produce enough lanterns.
Nacho scratched his hair, looking a bit frustrated, "Ah... let's think of another way. Go get some rest for now. Rebecca, remember to wake me up at midnight."
Saying that, Nacho walked toward his resting room.
"Why are you going to bed so early today?"
Nacho waved without looking back, "Got pestered by that brat Will again. So annoying."
Then Nacho returned to his room and closed the door.
"Will... who's that?", Leon asked.
"Oh, a kid who hangs around the streets of the middle district. Somehow he heard the urban legend of the Lionheart Society and became convinced that Nacho is the leader. Every time he sees Nacho, he pesters him to join."
"Then why not let him join?"
Rebecca shrugged, "First, he's too young, not even of age yet. Second, the kid's hands aren't clean, he's a well-known street punk around here. Sharp as hell too. It's hard to dig into his background, so we've never let him in."
"I see..."
"Mm."
Rebecca jumped off the long table, "Captain, sis-in-law, you two should rest early too. Let's figure out the paper lantern problem properly tomorrow."
"Okay, good night."
"Good night, Rebecca."
"Good night, sis-in-law! Oh right, Captain, can I sleep with sis-in-law?"
"No."
"Why not!"
"Your sis-in-law has social anxiety."
"Hmph! Stingy married man!"
———
There were two days left before the Lantern Festival.
Although the Lionheart Society didn't have paper lantern suppliers, they did have a few members with influence in the Empire's business circles. Calling in a few favors to get some lanterns wouldn't be an issue.
But that alone probably still wasn't enough.
Leon's plan was to use the Lantern Festival to spread the memory stone's message across all five districts of the Empire.
If they only acted in the Imperial City or Upper District, the residents of the other districts would remain completely in the dark.
That wasn't the outcome Leon wanted.
He wanted all the commoners oppressed by the Empire to personally see the true face of their lofty ruler;
And to let them experience the greatest revolution in the Empire's human history.
On the other hand, the more people who knew the Empire's dark truths, the better it would be for Leon and the Lionheart Society.
They needed the power of the people to fight back against the filthy, decaying rulers.
So the paper lantern issue had to be resolved quickly.
After thinking it over, Leon decided to ask Claudia for help. Maybe his well-read "aunt" would come up with something.
Rebecca said Claudia had been staying at the library in the middle district lately.
There was only one library in the middle district, so Leon took Rossweise and headed there at once.
At the entrance of the library, just as Leon was about to go in, he heard a newspaper boy enthusiastically shouting beside him, "Midtown Morning Post! Midtown Morning Post!"
"Collapsed arch bridge at the border of two districts, who's to blame?"
"Large warehouse finally unveiled, what's really inside?"
"Lantern Festival approaches, but crime rates remain high, hundreds of pets stolen! Is it a twist of human nature, or a collapse of morality?"
"All the answers in the Midtown Morning Post!"
"Sir, want a copy?"
Leon had his mind set on finding Claudia, so he wasn't interested in these clickbait headlines. He waved his hand and hurried past.
The paperboy didn't mind and kept shouting through the street.
The couple entered the library and searched around for a bit, finally spotting Claudia at a window seat in the second-floor reading room.
She sat by the window, sunlight pouring onto her sea-blue hair, making the elegant woman's skin glow like polished jade.
Claudia sat upright, a few thick ancient texts and a stack of newspapers on the desk before her.
The couple approached.
Hearing footsteps, Claudia looked up and glanced at the "black-haired strangers" before her. She paused briefly, but quickly recognized them.
"Nice disguise. But I still prefer the silver-haired Rossweise."
The couple sat down across from her at the table.
Leon glanced at the books on the table, they were all about human history and culture.
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