Chapter 144

I didn’t waste too much time before I moved on to the main topic. I looked at Helga. “I want you to accompany Cornelia on her journey.”

Cornelia threw a glance at me, one that was unable to settle to a decision between annoyed and happy. She didn’t appreciate the implication that she needed help, but she didn’t reject that idea either. Her reaction would have been more explosive before her close call with the death knights.

“What about my new role at the faculty?” Helga asked.

I looked at Titania, who was gently sleeping while her face was buried in Marianne’s comfortable breasts. “That might not be that hard to arrange,” I said with a chuckle, earning a similar response from Helga, making her bosom jiggle.

I pulled the girls closer to my body, enjoying the warmth of their naked bodies. “I thought you were going to come yourself,” Cornelia asked, reminding me of our previous deal. To her credit, her tone wasn’t angry, simply questioning. “Why the change?”

“Things are moving too fast. There’s no guarantee that I could get away from Silver Spires for such a long time without letting a very important thing slide,” I answered with a frown even as I let my fingers travel down, caressing their breasts, while giving a high-level explanation about the Crown Princess’ visit.

Just because we were discussing a serious topic didn’t mean we couldn’t have fun in the process.

“I see,” Cornelia murmured, carrying echoes of a moan, my fingers still caressing her skin. “And how should we act.”

I was tempted to say Cornelia just followed Helga’s every order, but even with her mellowing personality, that was a recipe for disaster. Luckily, Helga was calm and crafty enough to handle Silver Spires as a commoner, and she could handle Cornelia without triggering her completely. “The problem is the utter lack of information you’re currently facing,” I said.

“It’s not too bad,” Cornelia answered. “I still have some loyal servants back in the house, and they are keeping tabs at my uncle.”

“And you know they haven’t already been subverted by your uncle and feeding you false information, how?” That was enough to silence Cornelia for a moment, her head dipping in disappointment. She clearly wanted to argue, but her position wasn’t the best. More importantly, she knew that.

“The first objective is to set up a defensible position. When you arrive at your house, find an excuse to stay in your quarters no matter what your uncle gives. Even if he claims that there’s a deadly emergency, say that you got ambushed on the road and exhausted yourself magically. Then, go to your private wing, take down every single ward, no matter how small, and establish brand new ones.”

“Wouldn’t that tell my uncle that I was lying about being exhausted?”

“That’s actually a part of the plan. Unless he actually tries to set an ambush himself, he would assume you’re not exhausted in the first place. By setting the wards, you’ll give the impression that you were exhausted in the aftermath.”

“I see,” Helga cut in. “And I’m assuming that we shouldn’t waste more than half of our mana while setting the wards.”

“Try to spend no more than a quarter,” I said, even as I grabbed Cornelia’s hair and pulled her down aggressively, until her lips were pressing against my shaft. Her gasp of pain was laced with pleasure, and her lips opened immediately, licking and sucking. Still, even as she enjoyed the fullness of her mouth, her eyes stayed on Helga and me, showing her attention to the topic of discussion.

What a good way to handle a strategy meeting, I thought.

“But it’s hard to set up a reliable defense with only a quarter of our mana,” Helga said.

“It’ll not be the case once I finish with you two,” I said, flaring my mana at the same time to fill Cornelia’s mouth with energy noticeably, turning that to experience. Cornelia was near the limit of my empowerment, but luckily, there was still a margin to strengthen Helga. Four levels is not exactly a simple power-up, especially when it brought the target from eighteen to twenty-two.

[-1493 Mana]

Interestingly, the jump between twenty-one to twenty-two wasn’t something that was directly enabled by the system. If I stayed limited to that, twenty-one was my limit at my current level, due to the so-called fifty percent level difference, requiring me to be level thirty-three to power them to twenty-two.

Only thanks to some of the tricks I developed by examining Titania’s level structure and the headmistress’ tricks to contain the divine energy, I managed to push the barrier a bit more.

Precision: 40 Perception: 42

Agility: 40 Manipulation: 45

Speed: 39 Intelligence: 49

Endurance: 39 Wisdom: 51

HP: 6324 / 6324 Mana: 2931 / 7750 ]

SKILLS

Master Melee [100/100]

Master Tantric [100/100]

Master Biomancy [100/100]

Master Elemental [100/100]

Master Arcana [100/100]

Master Subterfuge [100/100]

Expert Speech [75/75]

Expert Craft [75/75]

PERKS

Mana Regeneration

Skill Share

Empowerment (1/1)

Teleportation

COMPANIONS

[Cornelia - Level 21/25]

[Helga - Level 19/21]