248 Misunderstanding and Challenge

On the top floor of the Lancaster Workshop Tower, the airship was docked on one of the two spare ports of the four existing ones. 

As Amelia Lancaster was located on a higher floor, she was notified of the airship's arrival ahead of time, while Duke Ignis had zero knowledge of the envoy's arrival.

When the people disembarked the airship, the Duchess was already waiting with her people to welcome them.

"Sir Hendrick, a rare guest we have. What brings you to the Capital today, General?" Amelia greeted, as her gaze slowly shifted towards the envoys beside him. She was blown away by their appearances. "And these two are…?"

"Greetings, Lady Amelia. These two are envoys of Elvengarde, The Supreme Elder, Haldir, and Fifth Princess Faelyn. They come to seek a friendly relationship with our kingdom." Hendrick introduced.

Amelia was amazed by the elves' existence and even better, their willingness to seek humans out for friendly relations, but she did not forget her noble etiquette as she offered them her own greetings.

"Welcome to the Lancaster's workshop and Capital of Crawford Kingdom, envoys of Elvengarde. It's an honor to meet you both, Supreme Elder Haldir and Princess Faelyn."

"The honor is ours."

"Before seeking the king, the envoys are interested in touring your workshop, Lady Amelia. I wonder if that would be permissible?" 

Amelia raised an eyebrow and contemplated briefly.

"Apart from the middle floors and higher, which contain confidential research and projects, I don't mind if it's just the lower floor workshops."

The envoys had no problem with that arrangement. They were only curious about what human blacksmithing was like.

Everyone was in agreement. There was no problem.

"Very well. My husband should be on the first floor. Allow me to guide you along the way." Amelia said.

Hendrick nodded and gestured.

"Please."

The group made their way over to the elevator and entered. A button was pressed, gears began cranking, rushing steam was heard and the elevator descended.

…

After succeeding in forging the Scribing Pens, Leon was already proficient with the skills he had gained from the inheritance and moved onto interspatial storage forging. There was no more discrepancy between memory and action.

He had settled on a design and commenced work immediately. The design did not take much effort.

There were already existing designs of interspatial storages back in the Divine Realm, why bother thinking up a new one when he could use those as templates? 

As such, he had easily settled on Interspatial Rings. They were small, convenient to wear, inconspicuous, and could not be any more portable.

The only challenge in creating Interspatial Rings was the demand for high-level dexterity and sight to engrave such minuscule runes on an already small object.

The Magisteel formed the core body before it was engraved and doused in liquid hot Star Meteorite before it was cooled in cold water to form the protective outer coating for the runes on the ring.

The entire process was more complicated than Scribing Pens, but each Interspatial Ring forged took less time than the first Scribing Pen.

At this point, Leon had already integrated with the memory from the inheritance.

Five shiny Interspatial Rings are laid out on the worktable. 

Duke Ignis had assisted Leon throughout the process, but now that they were taking a break, he couldn't help but ask, "What are these for?"

"These are…"

The rotating gears of the elevating were easily heard as Leon and Duke Ignis had their attention drawn over.

In the Lancaster Workshop Tower, each person was assigned enough work that would keep them busy at their work stations throughout the day. Rarely do they have time to leave their work stations.

But for some time, the rotating gears of the elevator had been happening at irregular intervals and now it was finally reaching the ground floor they were on.

The elevator doors opened, and Amelia was the first to exit. Her gaze soon locked onto Duke Ignis in the large ground-level workshop as she knew where her husband's personal forging station was.

Her eyes lit up when she shifted gaze onto Leon, who was next to her husband and immediately made her way over.

After Amelia was the two envoys, followed by the general marquis and finally his crippled son last.

"You're back safely, my dear son-in-law!" 

Amelia embraced him, not minding his sweaty topless torso. She naturally heard the news that something went wrong when the elite hunting expedition did not return after a week.

The Duke smiled bitterly at this scene.

Embracing your future son-in-law first instead of your dear husband… this is unfair treatment…

Suddenly, the Duke froze and began to sweat.

Oh no! I hope she doesn't see it… 

Amelia's attention was not on Leon for long before it was attracted to a certain opened packaged that was left on the worktable behind Leon when the two were busy forging.

Her nose twitched twice before she released Leon and flashed over to the opened packaged to look at the contents. 

"Ahaha! My good son-in-law, how thoughtful of you! Is this for me?" Amelia said with delight.

Noooo!

The Duke was inwardly screaming. His wife discovered it after all!

"T-That's mine…!"

"What did you say?" Amelia squinted.

"Nothing…"

The fighting spirit the Duke worked up was immediately deflated with defeat. Having been married for two decades, can he not know what that look in his wife's eyes was implying?

What's yours is mine, what's mine is also mine.

Duke Ignis sighed with melancholy.

Leon smiled wryly at how much the Duke and Duchess loved their tea. 

The herbal tea leaves were only tier-1 spirit herb the first time he gifted it to them, but now it was tier-3 spirit herb. Wouldn't they become even more frenzied over it?

Thankfully, he was prepared.

"Ahem, that one is for father-in-law. This one is for you, mother-in-law."

Having said that, Leon pulled out another package of herbal tea leaves at the tier-3 spirit herb level.

"Oh my… you didn't have to." 

Amelia accepted with glee and hugged them both close. Clearly, she didn't seem to have any intention of giving back the other package of herbal tea leaves to the Duke.

The Duke felt something breaking inside.

"Can you not be so selfish?" The Duke said wryly.

"Hmph! What do you know? These are for our daughter. We already ran out back at home." Amelia scoffed.

Hearing this, the Duke turned serious and no longer complained.

Leon noticed this and felt that the situation wasn't right. The herbal tea leaves he last gifted them was already finished? Even if they drank tea every day, it shouldn't be finished so soon, no?

Recalling his future mother-in-law's words, he realized something and asked, "Did something happen to Rachel? Right, which pill did she decide to take? Is she at the workshop right now?"

"That girl… Haiz, she is too stubborn. She's not here today. In fact, it's been a while since that girl left the house. You should visit her sometime." Amelia sighed.

Leon was taken aback by the vagueness, but he nodded.

At this time, the general marquis made his way over with his son and the envoys. He greeted them both as they both returned his greeting.

"We meet again, General." Leon smiled and offered a handshake. 

"We meet again, Your Highness." The general accepted. 

Leon swept his gaze past the general marquis and landed on the Princess Faelyn. His eyes lit up for a brief moment, but he recovered and refocused on the general marquis. "And these are?"

The general marquis secretly praised the prince but sighed when he compared his son, who had his eyes glued on the elven princess.

The conflicted look only appeared for a split second before the general marquis began another round of introduction for both sides.

"As the prince of Crawford, I welcome you both, envoys of Elvengarde." 

Leon was surprised that there was a sudden elven race rocking up, but recalling that there were Elder Trees in the world and the World Tree Ascension event, he was no longer surprised and welcomed them both naturally without losing his bearing.

"We are honored to."

The Supreme Elder had learned the human etiquette in their short interaction in the Human Domain and took the initiative to give Leon a handshake.

He had been silent gauging the strength of humanity all this while. A 5-star General, 5-star Duke, and 6-star Duchess, but the prince?

No energy fluctuations could be felt, just like a mortal that never cultivated.

However, instincts told him that the prince was the strongest human out of those he had seen.

Sure enough, the Human Domain was not simple.

The Supreme Elder's action naturally piqued Princess Faelyn's curiosity as she studied the human prince while sneaking a few glances at his bare chest muscles. 

This person was royalty just like her, but he was hardworking as one could see from the sweat oozing from Leon's body and he was also unmoved by her beauty.

Is he genuinely unaffected, or just feigning?

Princess Faelyn curiously thought. She was used to people's gazes and had an accurate read on their level of infatuation, but for some reason, she could not see through the human prince. 

It was also Rowan's first time meeting the prince, but he was already disgruntled like he was meeting a love rival. 

When a person becomes jealous of someone else, they start to look at all that person's shortcomings and flaws.

Rowan had heard from his father that the prince was heroic and a genius, who fought on the frontlines during the Capital Crisis, but why can't he see it?

Sensing the nonexistent energy fluctuation from the prince, Rowan silently sneered. Everything was a pack of lies. A person with zero cultivation can fight against those spiders? Bullshit!

The way he saw it, the prince was a vain person who spread false rumors to uphold his image when he was just a useless mortal who can't cultivate and can only turn to blacksmithing.

Feeling the Rowan's hostile and contemptuous stare, Leon was dumbfounded. What did he do to earn this person's hostility? It's not like he stole his wife or something.

"And this person is?" Leon asked quizzically. 

The general marquis saw the look in his son immediately wore a dark look.

"This is my useless son, Your Highness. Don't mind him and just treat him like fart." Hendrick tried to respond calmly, but he was completely disappointed. He didn't mind too much when his son insisted to accompany the envoys but to be hostile against royalty…

As a hot-blooded youth, who was ready to show off in front of Princess Faelyn, Rowan could not stay quiet after hearing his father's words.

"Father! My limbs might be disabled but I am not useless! I am already a 9th step Awakener! At least compared to a useless someone who can't even cultivate but spread lies of his heroic deeds, I am much better!" Rowan retorted. 

Boom!

Rowan's words were like a thunderclap in the general marquis's mind as he almost exploded on the spot. 

No names were mentioned, but anyone could guess who the general's son was referring to. Amelia and the general marquis were shocked to realize that they could not sense Leon's cultivation, with the exception of Ignis.

Bastard!

Hendrick gnashed his teeth furiously. Without his guidance, how could his son even dream to reach the 9th step so quickly? 

Not to mention up until three months ago, the prince was still missing and had been living in the Lower Districts that was no different to a slum! 

Cultivation or no cultivation, to disrespect royalty, was treason!

My face has been completely lost because of you!

The envoy didn't express opinion towards this sudden situation, but the Duke and Amelia both wore ugly expressions.

"What a good son you have, General!" 

One could hear strong sarcasm in the Duchess's voice. 

Hendrick's expression grew worse. He looked at his disgraceful son and roared, "Apologize! Apologize to his Highness right this instance!"

The general marquis was trembling with anger. 

"I won't!" Rowan said defiantly. 

Just you all watch! Even if he is the prince, I tear down his façade and show you all his true colors. You're all being fooled by his fake reputation and deeds!

Rowan looked Leon directly in the eye and said, "Do you dare accept my challenge to a duel?!"

Leon looked the general's son that was barking like a mad dog and understood the heart of the matter. There was some misunderstanding between them due to his unique situation.

However, he was a prince. He could explain to those close to him, but did he need to explain to everyone too? 

Looking at the person's cultivation, Leon wouldn't even need to lift a finger. The other person wasn't strong enough to harm him, while he could finish the other person with one slap.

However, the other person was still the general's son so he should at least give the general some face.

Leon suddenly smiled and said, "I… refuse!"