Chapter 158. Our Reunion (3)

Feeling a bit irritated, I unintentionally transformed into my vampiric form, blasting a tremendous amount of pressure around me causing the two girls to freeze, “The two of you! Stop fighting over food! There is a lot of food on the table, why are you fighting over one?!”

Almost immediately, the two of them looked down in fear which made me realize what I was doing and transformed back as Crystal looked at me with a droop, “Sorry, Mama…”

Flora, on the other side, also looked away but still followed after Crystal as she spoke in a low voice, “Sorry, Aywumi-mwa…”

The two of them were honest with their apologies which made me happy as they were being responsible children who know how to take responsibility for their actions, the two of them clearly knew what their mistakes are and apologies for them.

“I am not mad, don’t worry…” I looked at them with a smile before a soft giggle came out from Kaori.

A tiny sword suddenly flew towards Flora’s plate, stabbing the steak as the sword flew back towards Kaori’s plate, bringing the juicy steak with her as it was sliced into five halves, “Now, now… don’t scare the children too much, Ayumi.”

“How about be fair with each other and share the steak instead?” she suggested before snapping her finger as the sword multiplied into five, stabbing each half and placing it on our plates before vanishing at the same time, “There is a word called ‘equality in this world which you can always do if you want.”

“You are sounding like some kind of old sage, Mama Kaori,” Crystal looked at Kaori with an odd gaze.

Immediately, all of us exploded into laughter except for Kaori who was embarrassed from the depths of her soul, she looked at Crystal with her eyes wide before pinching the girl’s cheeks as she asked, “Which part of me look old?! You brat, I am your mother! You are supposed to call me beautiful!”

“Yes, beautiful old sage,” Crystal fought back.

“HAHAHAHA! Kaori, be sure to check your status page if you ever can because how knows, maybe there is a new title called ‘Beautiful Old Sage’ on your list,” I joked before she pouted, taking my slice of steak as Flora did but unlike Flora, she blatantly ate it.

“Hmph!” her cheeks puffed up even more like Crystal did which looked adorable.

Turning my attention towards Mana who was mindlessly eating her sandwich with her lips curled a bit, I couldn’t help but become curious about how she was; she looked even more beautiful than in the past but deep inside, I could still see that she is the same Mana I loved, “Right, Mana. What are your plans from here on?”

“Hmm… I don’t really have any plans other than boosting business on my fief and earning a lot of revenue from trade taxes since my current noble influence is kind of weak,” she replied.

That reminds me, Mana does have a fief now and from what I heard, her fief is slowly becoming a major trade hub on the kingdom where she resides. It’s like the Silicon Valley of the other kingdom, new businesses bloomed over there, generating a lot of revenue that investors couldn’t help but throw their money straight on the town.

Resting my hand over the table while taking a sandwich from a plate, I looked at the cute pink-haired girl with a smile, “How many businesses do you own now? Your fief should be quite the trade hub which means you have many opportunities to build an empire of businesses, you must quite rich now.”

“Not really, the businesses I own are mainly clothing which was mainly the ones that you helped before with the blueprints from your world. Even though I say that the money earned is not small as the several businesses under me are the only ones who can produce such dresses,” she replied with a wry smile.

Showing a smirk on my face, I looked at her in the eye before asking, “Do you want me to break that statement of yours by making this town into a major trade hub with improved dresses?”

“If you want to make the lives of Flora and me harder then go ahead, though I know you won’t that do that,” she said with a grin as Kaori coughed several times.

“The two of you are pretty sweet, it seems like three months of separation does change a lot of people,” Kaori let out a loud laugh as Mana rolled her eyes.

“You are lucky you get to meet Ayumi whenever you like, my skills are pretty weak compared to the two of you, but it is more than enough to protect my town and servants,” she spoke with a smile, “I am not as weak as I am before though.”

“How about having a spar with me?” I suggested before the two of them shook their heads almost instantly.

“You want us to spar against a monster like you, please… that’s like a dragon asking an ant whether they want to be killed,” Kaori sneered as Mana nodded the same together with Fiona who was behind me, “I could spar with your servant over there though, her level is nearly the same as mine from the aura she is emitting.”

“I apologize but I am far weaker than a demigod like Her Majesty,” Fiona immediately reacted while hiding behind my back. It seems like, despite the close levels, Kaori’s innate skills would still overpower Fiona who should be overpowered herself.

“Hahaha,” Kaori laughed before looking at me with a serious expression, “Also, what’s your plan? I heard rumors from the palace about you sending twenty-six letters to twenty-six nobles which is basically a threat letter that asked to give up the villages near your town or have one of your best knights crippled.”

“What is with that rumor?! I just asked them to hand over their villages through the legal way which is a duel…. I am too lazy to go around and earning the favors of the citizens of all twenty-six villages which is why I wanted to go the easy route and duel them instead,” I refuted before she sneered.

“You sure that was what you wrote, one noble even complained to me about how blatant your letter was and even showed it to me. The first line even said: ‘Dear Noble, the Graveyards of the skies do not wish to be full yet so please hand over (x) village or expect one of your fellows to be part of the graveyard’s decoration, from Ayumi Windsor.’”

Turning my eyes away, I coughed several times before saying, “Errr… I did remember writing that because I was bored—ehem… it wasn’t that I wanted to threaten them but how else would I write a duel letter?”

“I have to admit, Ayumi does have the worst writing skills for letters… I remember the invitation drafts she wrote for Flora’s friends which one said: ‘Greetings to the lily of the land’ which can be taken as a literal death wish,” Mana intervened as my eyes lingered around while I started whistling.

“PFFT—! What the heck, Ayu-chi?! Are you some kind of natural potato that grows on a rock?” Kaori started laughing super hard, “You really wrote a proposal letter for a party invitation?! AHAHAHAHAHAHAA!”

Now that is a letter I do remember writing—I thought lilies were a nice flower, but I didn’t realize that calling someone ‘lily of the land’ was equivalent to proposing to someone which did embarrass me inside.

“I didn’t even know that ‘lily of the land’ was equivalent to proposing!” I refuted with a pout before she started laughing even more.

“You really should read more books in the library. I should ask the librarians to send ten bookshelves to the manor over here before you start embarrassing the legendary Windsor family, who knows whether you will write ‘The reaper of flowers’ on your letters the next time you start challenging people?” she said.

“Anyhow, what are you even planning on using those villages for?” Mana looked at me with a curious gaze as she took a sip on the tea before Crystal suddenly appeared beside me, pulling on my dress as she reached her hands towards me.

I understood what she wanted and picked her from the ground, placing her on my lap as I continued to pat her endlessly, “I do plan on merging the villages onto the town to expand the legal land of the town and then do major changes on all villages with the money I earned from dungeon hunting.”

“My plan consists of modernizing the villages and looking for any products that can sell well like how I found the wasabi or hora-radia plants. After that, I plan on strengthening the military power of the town which would be helpful for the war in the future,” I answered before the atmosphere turned a bit dark.

We will need to quickly gain power on the entire continent and strengthen the entire continent before the other continent can reach us. It’s a serious issue that has been on my mind for the past few months now.

“You sure are crazy to turn a town like this into a mega town which is a status that most cities couldn’t achieve, do you want me to speed up the promotion process for this town to become a city to stop you?” Kaori looked at me with a mocking gaze.

“Well, it’s better if you speed up the process for me since I want the benefits of a city more than a mega-town since I want to make a city that would contend the capital city with a custom system of power that would stray from the kingdom,” I sliced off the steak on my plate and bit on it, “You can think of it as a small kingdom inside another kingdom.”

“You do understand that what you are saying is treason, right?” Kaori laughed.

“Feel free to arrest me if you like,” I teased, “It’s not like you could arrest me if you ever wanted and also it’s not like I could escape from being affiliated with the kingdom since the people on the Windsor family is also my family now after I received the personality and memories of the original Ayumi Windsor.”

“Not to mention, you already placed heavy reins on me from the start. If I wanted to escape from the reins, I would have to disobey the Goddess’s wishes and stop working on protecting the continent which is not a nice-sounding plan.”

As if having her mask peeled off, Kaori revealed a grin as she rested on the chair, “You are going to be the Queen of this kingdom anyway. You have the political power to do whatever you wanted in the first place as long as you asked me.”

“I did hear about Ayumi marrying you which I detested a lot but hearing it again makes me feel a bit irritated that I want to smack you on the face,” Mana looked at Kaori who showed a smirk.

She looked at Mana before covering her lips as she flashed a villainess smile, “Ara, is the second wife possibly jealous over the first wife? You do know that isn’t allowed within the hierarchy of power, right?”

“The two of you are really fighting over that position?” I sighed.

I already understood from a long time ago that the two of them had been battling over that position ever since that future version of me told me to place Kaori on the first seat which ended up happening anyway since it might have been destined for her to be there.

Unlike the two of them, Leisha has been pretty quiet but deep down, I also know that she wanted to smack heads with them which is why she went on a solo adventure to become strong herself. I haven’t heard much from her other than the letters she sent via Kaori.

“You don’t know how important that position is since you are the person we are fighting for,” Kaori let out a laugh, “The role of a first wife is pretty important in this world since that means the person is recognized as the person who is being loved the most.”

“Well, the most important part about being the first wife is the fact that the heir wouldn’t have to battle out for inheritance but that isn’t important to us since I already know Crystal and my Flora wouldn’t fight over inheritance,” Mana sighed, “It’s all about the pride I had!”

I felt another headache listening to them as Fiona’s voice echoed inside my head, “You have quite the harem, my lady. I suddenly feel like my life back then was much peaceful than yours, how many other members do you have on your harem?”

“Please… I only have three,” I replied before she laughed.

“Three multiplied by fifteen thousand, maybe?” she teased as I flicked her forehead.

“The two of you should just stop fighting over that… it’s not like I can do anything. If I want to protect the continent, I will need to gain control of a kingdom, and doing it like how Kaori did doesn’t really suit me…” I sighed before the two of them nodded simultaneously.

“How about doing a dual marriage instead?” Kaori suggested while leaning on her chair, “I mean it is not odd for a noble to be marrying two people at the same time which basically makes the two equals… we could also do three since there is still that Leisha who recently killed a dragon somewhere.”

“That is fine with me,” Mana nodded as the two of them looked at me in the eye, “Though I wonder if our Ayumi is happy with that.”

“Why would I not be?” I materialized my scythe and smacked both of their heads with the soft end of the scythe, “The two of you are really fighting over me, it’s not like I am some kind of princess to fight for… I love all of you equally anyway.”

Suddenly, both of their cheeks blushed as Kaori suddenly stood up with a blush, “Anyway! That’s enough talks for now… I have found something fun while coming here, something that might interest Flora and Crystal a lot.”

“And what is that?” Mana and I looked at her before she replied.

“We’re going treasure hunting! And not just any kind of treasure, we are going after the Dungeon of Travis where an Orichalcum mine was found!”