As I followed her down the stone stairway, its walls lined with blazing torches that cast trembling light against the darkness, the air grew cooler with every step, and the warmth and laughter of the ballroom above slowly faded away.
After about a minute, we reached our destination
A reinforced iron door with a small viewing slit set at eye level.
The young woman in front of me leaned toward it and whispered something, perhaps a password. A moment later, heavy mechanisms shifted, and the door slowly opened inward.
"Welcome back, Isabelle," a man's voice greeted her from within.
I stepped forward to follow her inside, but a halberd suddenly descended in front of me. A knight clad in steel plate armor and a purple cape blocked my path.
"He's with me, wulf" the woman said calmly, turning back to vouch for me.
The knight raised his halberd, then bowed gently.
The path was cleared, so I stepped inside.
The room beyond the iron door stood in sharp contrast to the narrow stairway. It was spacious and elegant, its floors and walls fashioned from smooth-cut marble, sturdy oak beams supported the ceiling, and the chamber was adorned with fine silk draperies and exquisite oil paintings.
At the center stood a long, ornate rectangular wooden table surrounded by high-backed chairs.
"Welcome, Lord Victor of Vindia," a graceful voice called from the head of the table, clear and cold with a hint of friendliness.
I lifted my gaze toward the source of that voice.
And then I saw her.
My first thought was not that she was beautiful. It was that she was unsettling.
She did not possess the overwhelming presence of a battlefield commander, nor the suffocating authority of royalty, instead, she radiated something far more unnerving, an absolute inhuman unflinching composure.
Her hair, long and silver like threads of moonlight, fell neatly over her shoulders, framing a face that carried neither childish softness nor harsh severity. Her features were strikingly refined, almost as though sculpted by a master artisan. Any man who saw her would surely fall in love.
Not me, though, simply because she's a half-elf, and not human.
Her posture was perfectly straight but not rigid, her hands rested lightly upon the polished table surface, fingers interlaced with deliberate elegance, she wore a gown of white fabric trimmed with silver embroidery, subtle yet undeniably refined.
When her amethyst-colored eyes met mine, I felt as though I were being measured in real time.
In that moment, I understood something instinctively. The atmosphere she exuded alone made her suited for the throne.... as a cold-heart tyranness.
"I am honored to meet you, Princess…" My response faltered, cut short by my own ignorance. Somehow, I had forgotten princess's name.
"Her name is Gloria. Please, just sit down already" Isabelle said flatly as she took a seat beside the princess, her crimson eyes fixed on me.
I sat down in silence, and somehow, I found myself becoming uncharacteristically timid.
Silence filled the room, everyone stared at one another without speaking for what felt like ten long minutes.
Wasn't the princess supposed to be awaiting me? Why weren't they saying anything?
Another minute passed before the princess finally spoke.
"Mister Victor, where are the other members of your group?" she asked in the same calm tone and composed expression.
"Miss Valeria is engaged in an important conversation, and, um…" My mind raced. I could explain Valeria's absence easily enough, but Elena and Arina? I had no proper excuse for them.
"Just ignore that," Isabelle suddenly interjected. "Did you bring the dust with you?" Her crimson eyes gleamed like finely cut bloodstones.
"Yes, I brought it," I replied, placing a small red colored pouch onto the table before me.
Both of them rose from their seats and began examining the pouch with intense curiosity.
"How can this be used, Mister Victor?" Princess Gloria asked in a voice that was both calculating and courteous.
"Miss Isabelle, Your Royal Highness, please step aside and find cover first," I said as I reached into my pocket.
I pulled out a small cylindrical glass tube.
It was about the length of my palm, clear and thick-walled, allowing one to see straight through it. One end was sealed, while the other was open and fitted with a tightly crafted piston rod made of polished metal. The rod had a small handle at the top for gripping and a snug-fitting plunger at the bottom, wrapped in oiled leather to create an airtight seal within the tube.
Near the sealed end of the cylinder was a tiny recessed cavity, no larger than a grain of rice, designed to hold a small amount of tinder.
It was one of my many new inventions, a humble "Fire Piston". It was a device that used the principle of heating air through rapid compression to ignite a piece of tinder.
In simple terms, just compress the air fast enough, and fire appears.
I pushed down the rod handle with all my might.
A small burst of flame ignited at the bottom of the tube, and the tinder caught fire.
I turned to the knight guarding the door and gestured for his assistance.
"Please light the pouch for me" I said, handing him the now-burning tinder rod before immediately running for cover.
Somehow, I ended up crouching behind the same wooden column as Miss Isabelle and Princess Gloria.
Seeing how cautious we were, the knight hesitated to light the pouch. I could almost imagine a droplet of sweat running down his forehead like a river.
"It's not dangerous! You're wearing armor!" I shouted.
That was a lie.
"Yeah! Do it, Wulfgang!" Isabelle shouted, prompting him to finally ignite the pouch.
So his name was Wulfgang.
Then—
*Fizz*
And—
*BOOM!!!*
The pouch exploded with a thunderous blast, sending shockwaves and dust throughout the chamber.
The explosive force was greater than I had anticipated. For a brief moment, I worried about the knight, even though he was wearing full plate armor.
When the dust finally settled, the knight slowly stood up while removing his helmet.
"What kind of sorcery is this?! This is dangerous!" the now-unhelmeted knight exclaimed with a horrified face.
He was a burly bearded old man with a short grey hair, his amber eyes reflected the torchlight. His face was marked with many battle scars and claw scratches, a mark of the seasoned warrior.
"Sire, are you okay?" I asked anxiously.
"Well, a little disoriented, but this old man didn't hear no bell yet" he replied.
"Then what Valeria told me is true" Isabelle chimed in.
"It would seem so" Princess added calmly.
At that moment, the iron door slammed open, and three clearly female figures dressed in fine attire stormed into the room, shouting in unison with panic.
"What the hell happened here, Victor!/Sir!/Darling!?!"
-----
We all ended up sitting around the table and continued talking.
"Ahem, let us properly introduce ourselves," Isabelle said. "My name is Isabelle von Schwarz, Marquise of the Western Border Region of Middenland. Just another poor girl caught in a web of conspiracy" She finished with a playful smirk.
"I'm Wulfgang Norden, Duke of Nordenland. Apologies for posing as a guard. Keeping people safe is this old man's strong suit" he said with the gentle smile of someone who had seen far too many winters.
"I am your princess" Princess Gloria said in a plain voice.
Then everyone in my group, including me, except for Valeria, introduced ourselves in return.
After that, the room fell into silence once more. It lingered, thick and heavy, until Valeria finally spoke.
"You saw what Lord Victor's invention could do, right?" she asked, her eyes fixed on the princess.
The princess simply nodded. "I want this dust. Could you provide me with the knowledge of how to make it?" she asked Valeria.
"That is not for me to decide. It is his secret" Valeria replied, extending her hand toward me as if requesting my permission.
Seeing that my opponent this time was a princess, I responded simply.
"No"
Why would I share my greatest advantage, advanced technology, with someone I had just met for the first time? Princess or not, I did not care.
After my flat refusal, the tension in the room rose sharply, as Isabelle and Wulfgang stared at me with such hostility that my skin crawled.
In response, Arina glared back at them with equal intensity.
Even worse, I noticed Elena placing one hand behind her dress, slowly, she pulled something out.
"SMG-01!!!" My mind scream.
How in the world had she managed to hide that behind her dress?
Meanwhile, Valeria and Gloria simply stared at each other in silence.
As for me, I desperately tried to think of something to defuse the situation.
"How… how was the food?" I asked suddenly.
Every gaze in the room shifted toward me.
"Well, the champagne was good, at least" Princess Gloria answered in a nonchalant tone.
"But they should have had more red wine on standby to serve with the ham" Valeria added in an equally casual voice.
And just like that, the tension unraveled, the conversation drifted toward food, as if my refusal had never happened.
Then Valeria spoke again, steering the moment entirely away from danger.
"Why don't we discuss serious matters later? Let's enjoy ourselves in the ballroom first, and then return here after the soirée is over" she said with a smile.
Miraculously enough, everyone agreed.