Chapter 624: Ever After (9)
“Any plans of getting married?”
“Kagh-heuk.”
This sudden question had Eugene coughing up the mouthful of alcohol he had just been about to swallow. The eruption came without any warning, but proving that all of his previous training hadn’t been for nothing, Cyan reacted calmly and immediately leaned his chair backward to avoid the splash.
“Kah-heuk, gahk....”
However, Eugene couldn’t deal with the violent coughing fit with as much grace as Cyan. The strong alcohol that flowed back up from the inside of his throat stung both his nose and eyes.
“Why would you suddenly ask me that?” Eugene protested.
“It’s not like my question is that unwarranted,” Cyan replied, allowing his tilted-back chair to slowly fall onto all fours.
They were currently in Cyan’s room. Eugene had taken the seat across from Cyan after the latter had invited him to share a late drink between brothers, just the two of them. So how could Eugene have expected Cyan to suddenly spring such a question onto him?
Eugene wiped his mouth with the back of his hand as he glared at Cyan and growled, “Who told you to ask me that?”
“W-what?” Cyan awkwardly feigned ignorance.
“I said, who told you to ask me that?” Eugene repeated himself. “Was it the Patriarch? Lady Ancilla? Or could it perhaps have been my father...?”
“Ahem,” Cyan cleared his throat as he looked away.
“No... hold on. It might have been one of the others,” Eugene muttered as he narrowed his eyes.
Glug glug glug.
Pouring out the brown spirit once more into his empty glass, Eugene considered the possible candidates.
In addition to the adults of the main family, who were the first to come to mind, there were far too many people who might have ordered Cyan to float the idea of marriage to Eugene.
There was Signard, who was currently living in the forest. Although they were of different races and were born to different parents, Signard and Sienna saw each other as siblings. He could be a bit of a doting idiot when it came to matters involving Sienna, and there were several times when he had teamed up with the other elves living in the forest to put some pressure on Eugene and Sienna to advance their relationship.
There was also Lovellian and Melkith. A few days ago, they had come to visit the Lionheart’s main family while claiming to be acting as the representatives of Aroth regarding the new city. Eugene had been present for their arrival, and they had started off their greetings with some light conversation that had included some discussion about the new city and its Academy that was soon to be inaugurated.
Next up were Alchester and Raphael. They had also arrived at the Lionhearts for reasons similar to the ones the wizards had given. One of the reasons for their visit was to convey their respective Emperor and Pope’s request to continue to maintain their current friendly relations with the Lionhearts, but Alchester had also asked, without any warning, about the age range for students to be admitted to the Academy.
Eugene had thought that this was because Alchester wanted to enroll his son, Leo Dragonic, who was just over thirteen years old, into the Academy, but that wasn’t the case. It was Alchester himself who wished to enroll into the Academy....
While they do say that the pursuit of learning has no requirements on status or age, it was still impossible for Alchester, the Commander of Kiehl’s Imperial Knights, to enter the Academy.
Fortunately, Raphael at least didn’t seem to have any intention of trying to enroll in the Academy personally. Instead, he was interested in the theology course, which was currently under consideration to become one of the subjects taught by the Academy.
Raphael had said that if the Academy needed his help, he was willing to leave his duties in the Knights of the Blood Cross behind to teach the theology course, but Eugene had declined without any hesitation. If a die-hard fanatic like Raphael were to teach them theology, his students would surely become the same type of fanatics as well.
Anyways, coming back to the current problem, it might have also been King Aman. After all, hadn’t Cyan visited the Kingdom of Ruhr accompanying Ayla a few weeks ago?
There were many other suspects apart from those Eugene had already considered. It would only be a slight exaggeration to say that the entire continent was interested in Eugene’s going-ons, particularly since celebrity marriages was a popular topic that could be eagerly discussed even in the local bar.
“If someone wanted to ask, they could just ask you directly. Why would they approach me and task me with asking you that question?” Cyan tried to argue.
Eugene snorted in disbelief, “Why? Because we’re brothers, that’s why. If it’s between brothers, well, of course, you might say things you wouldn’t say to anyone else.”
“Brothers...!” Cyan gasped, his eyes widening.
Feeling greatly moved by this affirmation of their brotherhood, Cyan raised his glass in a toast and clinked it against Eugene’s.
“So who was it?” Eugene pressed. “Sienna, Anise, or Kirstina?”
Cyan scoffed, saying, “If it’s those three, they would definitely have just confronted you directly.”
“Indeed, that does sound like them. So tell me, who was it?” Eugene asked impatiently.
Cyan hesitated, seemingly finding it difficult to give up the answer.
But his ambiguous attitude was only making Eugene feel even more frustrated.
Clink.
Eugene clinked his glass against Cyan’s as he urged his brother once more. “Just tell me who it was?”
“It was Ayla,” Cyan murmured in a low voice.
“Who?” Eugene frowned.
Cyan raised his voice, “I said, it was Ayla.”
Eugene hadn’t expected her name to come up as the culprit.
Ayla Ruhr, a descendant of Molon, the daughter of King Aman, Princess of the Kingdom of Ruhr, and Cyan’s fiancee, that Ayla? Eugene blinked as he thought of Ayla, whom he had seen in the mansion hallway a while earlier. She did bear a striking resemblance to both Molon and Aman and looked incredibly precocious for a thirteen-year-old.
— Young master.
Whenever they met, Ayla would always smile brightly and address Eugene by that formal title.
— Could you tell me where Big Sis Mer and Big Sis Mir are, please?
But her precociousness was only in terms of her appearance. Ayla’s mental age was still the same as her actual age. Perhaps that was why, in a rare case for them, Mer and Raimira both chose to act as elders in front of Ayla.
“Why would Miss Ayla ask about that?” Eugene eventually got over his shock and asked.
“She’s very interested in your marriage,” Cyan revealed.
Eugene furrowed his brow and asked, “For what reason?”
Cyan shyly admitted, “Ayla said that before we eventually get married to each other, it would be better if you got married first. It seems like she wants to take notes from it....”
“Take notes...?” Eugene slowly repeated.
“About what kind of ceremony it was, and what the bride should wear, and also... also....” Cyan hesitated for a moment, unable to continue, before finally downing his neglected glass of alcohol and finishing what he’d been trying to say, “She also wants... to catch the bouquet.”
“The bouquet....” Eugene swallowed a nervous gulp.
Cyan’s wedding was already scheduled for when Ayla turned twenty. Judging from the fact that she wanted to take notes on the wedding process and was eager to catch the bouquet, it seemed that Ayla’s feelings for Cyan were more serious than Eugene had previously believed.
In fact, if one set aside the difference in age and just judged them based on their appearances, they did look good together. For now, at least.
Ayla’s height might still be shorter than Cyan’s, but what if the Ruhr blood that she had inherited from Molon and Aman were to awaken over the course of the next few years? Eugene was reminded of Gargith’s younger sister, whom he had met in the main house at a previous family event, and how she had sported bulging muscles just like her older brother.
“What’s with that expression?” Cyan asked suspiciously.
“Ahem...,” Eugene coughed as he carefully examined Cyan’s expression. “But are you two really going to be getting married?”
“Probably,” Cyan said with a shrug.
“But your engagement was ultimately something the Patriarch and Lady Ancilla decided for you, wasn’t it? Apart from Miss Ayla, there was also...,” Eugene trailed off awkwardly.
Cyan finished what Eugene had been about to say, “The other candidate was Princess Scalia.”
Nowadays, Scalia had become a devout believer who worshiped Eugene as her god, but when they had first met, she had just finished slaughtering a group of mercenaries in the snowfield and had attacked Eugene, her eyes rolling in her head due to the stress and the constant nightmares she was suffering. At that time, Cyan, who hadn’t been able to decide between Ayla and Scalia, had immediately picked Ayla as his fiancee after witnessing the scene that Scalia had left in the snowfields.
Cyan set down his glass and said, “It seems like you might be misunderstanding something, but I am sincere in my intentions to marry Ayla.”
Cyan’s expression was solemn as he said this, but upon seeing this expression, Eugene couldn’t help but shoot him a look filled with even more suspicion.
“Could it be... do you... no, never mind,” Eugene shook his head.
Cyan groaned in exasperation, “I told you to stop it with the misunderstandings...! Who said that I wanted to get married right now ?”
“Once Miss Ayla turns twenty, you’d be thirty years old,” Eugene pointed out.
“If Ayla really doesn’t want to marry me, then there’s no way I would go along with it. That’s not just for now; it will apply after seven years as well. But right now, she bursts into tears if I even bring up the idea of possibly breaking off our engagement...!” Cyan spat out, his shoulders shaking just from the memory of it. “She was crying like the world was about to end, so what else was I supposed to do? I had to say something to comfort her! So I told her I was sorry and promised that I definitely wouldn’t break our engagement!”
Cyan took a moment to calm himself before sighing, “However, after seven years have truly passed, Ayla might still change her mind. She might not want to marry a middle-aged man ten years older than her.”
Eugene snorted in amusement, “If a thirty-year-old is middle-aged, then what am I, a grandfather? No, maybe I would count as an undead?”
Cyan huffed, “Stop speaking in circles and tell me, when exactly are you going to get married?”
Eugene clicked his tongue at this sharp retort and took a moment to think about it seriously, “About a year from now?”
“What’s with the vague time of a year? If you’re going to do it, you should just do it right away,” Cyan encouraged.
“Is marriage truly something that you should jump into right away just because you’ve decided to do it? I also need some time to prepare myself mentally,” Eugene protested.
“Preparation, as if...,” Cyan snorted in disbelief.
“In any case, I’ll get to it in about a year,” Eugene stubbornly insisted.
“And who will you be getting married to?” Cyan asked, delivering yet another extremely sharp question.
As Eugene awkwardly avoided meeting Cyan’s eyes, his lips sealed tightly shut. Cyan clicked his tongue several times before muttering, “Lady Sienna, Lady Anise, or Lady Kristina? Which of them are you going to choose?”
Eugene hesitantly replied, “All of them... all together?”
Cyan’s face twisted in disgust at this barely reasonable answer.
Before Cyan could part his sneering lips to actually say something, Eugene quickly added, “All three of them want to marry me in any case, and I... well... I also think that it would be good to do so. Also, rather than marrying Sienna a year from now on, then marrying Anise a year later, and finally marrying Kristina a year after that, I feel like it would be better to do it all at once....”
“There’s a lot that I want to say about that,” Cyan slowly began, but instead of erupting into curses, he let out a long sigh. “You might actually... have a point with what you’re saying. But has Lady Sienna agreed to this plan of yours?”
Eugene cleared his throat, “She’s sort of agreed.”
“Why do you keep giving such vague responses?” Cyan complained.
“That’s why I said that I need about a year. That gives me time to sort out everything I need to sort out, and I can definitely get her permission with that much time...,” Eugene blurted out his excuse.
“You’re insane,” Cyan let out another sigh as he shook his head. “But even so... well... I guess it would be quite a joyous affair. Ayla would also probably enjoy it as it gives her more chances to catch the bouquets.”
“We’ll be throwing all three of them at the same time, so tell her to do her best to catch them all,” Eugene said encouragingly.
“If you’re going to throw three of them, why don’t you throw one over to Ciel,” Cyan suggested.
Eugene choked on his drink once more, “Gaghk!”
Once again, Eugene sprayed out a mouthful of alcohol, and Cyan had to quickly tilt his chair backward to avoid being sprayed.
Eugene stammered, “F-for a while now, I’ve noticed that Vermouth seems to be getting closer to Ciel. Do you know what’s going on with that?”
He was trying to change the subject to something else.
Cyan looked at Eugene with a pitying expression, then slowly shook his head, “Why are you asking me when you could be asking him? Also, you can tell just by looking at them. He’s been watching over her training every day for a while now.”
“But why all of a sudden...?” Eugene plaintively questioned.
Cyan shrugged, saying, “It’s not like he’s only giving guidance to Ciel. He’s also given me some good advice as well.”
“Are you suggesting that he might be a better teacher than me? That bastard, even in the past, he had no clue how to teach someone,” Eugene complained.
Cyan sniffed and avoided answering the question. “It is an honor that he’s even willing to guide us.”
Eugene just smirked and said, “It seems like he’s still as bad at teaching as ever.”
“At least he’s a lot friendlier than you were during our past lessons,” Cyan said, clicking his tongue at those old memories as he set down his glass. “We should finish our drinks with this. Tomorrow is an important day after all, so we can’t just drink the whole night away.”
The following day, the Lionheart’s new city would finally be complete and ready to be moved into.
Since a new mansion had already been constructed in the new city, they had decided to leave the mansion that they had been residing in on its current site. Since this mansion had three hundred years of history associated with it, they had decided to use it as a villa that would also serve as a museum for future generations.
“Who did you say would be attending the Inauguration Ceremony again?” Eugene asked Cyan to remind him.
“From the Lionhearts, there will be everyone from the Council of Elders, the Black Lions, and the most influential families among the collateral lines,” Cyan recalled. “And besides the Lionhearts, there will be the general staff who served in the Divine Army, monarchs from the various countries, and other high-ranking nobles....”
Eugene raised a brow, “Is that all?”
Cyan wryly shook his head as he muttered, “Hundreds of thousands of people have already gathered to wait outside the city gates since a few days ago.”
The Inauguration Ceremony of the Lionheart’s new city was receiving a lot of attention from all across the continent. At tomorrow’s Inauguration Ceremony, those currently residing in the Lionheart’s main estate would be the very first to step foot in the city. After that, they would tour the new mansion as well as the city’s landmarks, accompanied by a few specially invited guests.
After a short ceremony, the city gates would finally be opened. The hundreds of thousands of people who had been gathering outside the city for the past few days would then be allowed through the open gates to tour the city independently.
“To think that you would actually select the new residents by lottery. Isn’t that far too radical?” Cyan asked in concern.
Eugene reassured him, “It’s not like we’re just going to pick anyone.”
When choosing the residents of their new city, they had decided to give priority to the soldiers of the Divine Army who had fought in the war. They had also decided to hold a lottery for the demonfolk and human immigrants who had previously lived in Pandemonium, as well as anyone from the rest of the continent who hoped to immigrate over.
“But you also said that you would hold a separate lottery for the crowds of people attending the Inauguration Ceremony tomorrow. If you’re not careful, a disaster could occur,” Cyan warned.
“We’ll do our best to keep things under control so that nothing like that happens,” Eugene promised.
If the hundreds of thousands of people waiting outside the city were allowed to rush in all at once, it would only be natural for there to be chaos. On top of that, if they held the lottery right in front of them, the excited crowd might cause quite a commotion.
Thankfully, they had already prepared measures to prevent that.
“It’s finally happening tomorrow,” Eugene sighed, a pleased smile on his face as he got out of his seat.
As Cyan had said, tomorrow was an important day, so Eugene also agreed to end their drinking session here and just head back to his room.
“You were pretending to be calm, but it seems like you’re also looking forward to it, aren’t you?” Cyan asked with a smirk.
The members of the Lionheart’s main family had first set eyes on the new mansion that had been built for them in the new city a few days ago. Cyan, in fact, didn’t have any complaints about the mansion they were currently living in, but after seeing the mansion that had been built for them in the new city, his heart couldn’t help but flutter in excitement.
“Of course, I’m looking forward to it,” Eugene replied with a similar smirk.
However, Eugene’s anticipation wasn’t because of the new mansion or the inauguration of the new city.
He had other plans for tomorrow.
Eugene hid his excitement as he left Cyan’s room.
As he was heading down the hallway on the way back to his rooms, he ran into Anise and Kristina.
“Are you really going to bed now?” Anise asked with a pout.
When Anise, who had successfully transferred her soul into a doll’s body, stood next to Kristina, the duo looked like twins. Aside from the slightly different air that each of them gave off, the only differences between them were Kristina’s teardrop mole and the style of clothes that they wore. Eugene could recognize who was who without any problems, but they looked so similar that other people couldn’t help but get them confused.
It had been suggested that at least one of them should tie up their hair so that it would be easier to identify who was who, but Anise had firmly refused the suggestion. Given her teasing nature, it seemed like she enjoyed being able to confuse others.
“Where’s Sienna?” Eugene asked.
“She’s still out in the forest,” Anise answered. “She said that she had to check on the teleportation spell she’ll be using tomorrow.”
Eugene nodded, saying, “Well, it would be a big deal if that spell were to fail.”
Even if they were leaving the mansion on its current site, the main family still had an extraordinary amount of luggage that needed to be moved. On top of that, Sienna also had to warp the entire forest as well as the dwarven workshop all the way to the new city.
During this last month, while the city had been under construction, Sienna had been obsessed with refining and double-checking her huge-scale warp spell. Since everyone living in the main estate would be moving to the new city by going through the usual warp-gates, there was no need to worry about the possibility of any casualties. Still, if any of the luggage or the trees of the forest—especially the saplings of the World Tree—were lost due to warp failure, it would be an irreversible disaster.
Kristina shook her head, “But there’s no way that Lady Sienna’s spell would actually fail, would it?”
“Still, I feel like I should go and help her out a bit,” Eugene argued.
Anise said with a snort, “When you went over to help last time, didn’t Sienna end up chasing you away? Instead of needlessly going over there to bother her, you should just get some sleep.”
“Then what are you two up to instead of sleeping?” Eugene pointed out.
There wasn’t really any need to wait for an answer because they were absolutely reeking of alcohol. Ever since Anise had possessed her doll, the two of them had spent every day drinking together. Sometimes, Ciel would be dragged away to join them once she was done with her training.
Anise cheerfully grinned, saying, “We’re just getting a bit more to drink....”
Kristina sighed, “I don’t really want to drink tonight, but Sister says that she still hasn’t had enough wine yet....”
“That’s a blatant lie,” Anise accused. “The one who tempted me to head down to the kitchens because we didn’t have enough drinking snacks was you, Kristina, isn’t that right?”
While the two were bickering, Eugene stealthily tried to sneak away. Because he knew that if he stayed here any longer, the two were sure to grab hold of him and force him to come and drink with them.
“Sir Eugene should come with us,” Kristina suddenly suggested.
Anise complimented her, “That’s a great idea, Kristina. Since Sienna isn’t here right now, the two of us can monopolize Hamel.”
Before Eugene could back away any further, Kristina and Anise grabbed hold of Eugene’s arms. If they were still limited to a single body, he would have been able to shake them off somehow, but now.... Eugene gulped as he felt the soft pressure of their chests enveloping both of his tightly held arms.
Just as Eugene was about to be dragged down the hallway by the two Saints, the door of Vermouth’s room cracked open slightly as he peeked out to ask them, “Why aren’t you all sleeping yet?”
Vermouth took in the look on Eugene’s face, which was pale and locked into a frightened grimace, and then turned to Kristina and Anise, whose faces were red from tipsiness but with a gleam of desire shining in their eyes before clicking his tongue in disapproval.
“Hey, why don’t you come and drink with us,” Eugene quickly called out, looking to Vermouth for help.
“No thanks,” Vermouth said without giving it a second thought.
Vermouth had the gut feeling that if he got dragged along to wherever they were going, he would be forced to drink until morning, and it would also place him right in the firing line for Anise and Kristina’s eventual revenge. The two Saints’ smiles deepened at Vermouth’s response.
“Good night, Sir Vermouth.”
“Sweet dreams, Sir Vermouth.”
The two Saints left with these greetings as they continued to drag Eugene away.
“Hey.”
Just as Vermouth was about to close the door behind him, a sudden shout had him turning back to look at Eugene.
Eugene glared at Vermouth with narrowed eyes as he continued speaking, “You should look forward to tomorrow.”
“...?” Vermouth frowned, unable to understand the intention behind these words.