Chapter 155

“Let me go first, to make sure wards are working properly,” I said, even though I was able to feel the wards working perfectly. I wanted to prepare the room for someone in her ‘noble’ stature.

Her identity as a dragon clearly didn’t prevent her from enjoying luxury, and greeting her with something better than dirt floors might be the better idea. Luckily, the wards around my hideout allowed me to cast much stronger spells in the process, allowing me to make some radical home improvement at the cost of some mana.

[-1821 Mana]

Earth Elemental magic, combined with my craft skill, allowed me to work with surprising elegance, though my precision Stat certainly helped quite a bit as well. All that needed to decide was to pick the material.

After some consideration, I decided to go with a combination of marble and crystal. A part of that decision was the ease I could create those materials through elemental spells, but the other part was the way the headmistress’ room was designed.Điscover new chapters at novelhall.com

Since she was also coming from a long way away, I hoped that the fashion was at least somewhat similar. It was a long stretch, of course, but at least it was decent a choice.

For the floor and walls, I picked simple white marble, though I made sure to put several scenes of battle and other pictures etched, copied from some of the older books I had found in the library, hoping that they would be familiar to her. Several candle-holders stretched out of the wall, but instead of having actual candles, they had simple flames, connected to nothing, floating freely.

For the ceiling, I used more crystal than marble, with lights hidden behind half-transparent crystal layers to create a subtle yet intricate light show while also keeping the room warm.

For the furniture, I relied exclusively on the crystal, keeping its general structure and the texture to the crystal platform the headmistress had in her room. And as a final trick, I created a nice pool at one corner, filling it with warm, bubbling water.

And as a final touch, I added the trick I had used after the battle against Zokras, and enchanted the water with healing energies and mana, some of it slowly vaporizing to fill the room, creating a gentle, comforting atmosphere.

I paid the room one last glance, making sure it didn’t resemble a battlefield safe house in any form, and satisfied with the result. It was a miracle, especially with less than a minute spent. Only then, I opened the door again, and inviting my guest in.

“This way, your dragoness,’ I said, giving a perfect butler bow. It was supposed to be a sarcastic bow, but the nod I received in response as she walked in, letting her gaze wander on the decorations seemed more genuine than I expected.

She was even more entitled than I thought.

“Hmm, not as horrible as I expected,” she murmured even as she murmured, but I noticed her eyes widen as she walked closer to the pool, bigger than I expected. “Why can I sense that much mana here? Don’t tell me that you have a Source here!”

I never heard what a source was, but from her reaction, it wasn’t hard to guess it was some kind of natural or artificial location that radiated mana. Unfortunately, I had never actually heard something like that. The closest thing to it was the Mana Gems, radiating constant mana.

Clearly, it was important to her, enough to make her sound enthusiastic rather than her usual uncaring tone.

“Unfortunately, we don’t, but I decided to make the room more comfortable by pushing some mana, to make it more welcoming. I hope it’s not the case.”

“Yeah,” she murmured. “I forgot that you abominations receive your mana from that disgusting travesty against nature,” she murmured, before continuing with a sharp tone. “Turn your back again,” she added.

I did, but like before, it didn’t prevent me from devouring the sight of her beautiful body as she kicked off her shoes and dress, this time water slowly devouring her body. Pity that the white bubbles hid her body.

However, once again, her offhand comment sent me thinking. The apparent lack of mana on the environment, and receiving it from the System — or at least, that was what I assumed by travesty and abomination — was another interesting thing. Maybe the system didn’t only continuously devour the Divine Spark in its borders, but mana as well, before giving it back through the connection.

The system being responsible for mana distribution was not a surprise, as there had never been enough environmental mana around the environment to support my power. If there was that much free mana, there wouldn’t be a need to use the magical reagents from the monsters to power the wards.

Of course, I hadn’t thought about how the others received mana without the system, but from what she indicated, it was a resource that was available freely.

I wondered if that flaw affected the headmistress as well. Though, with the wards of the school under her control, it wasn’t very likely. She could easily siphon some of the excess mana to have an advanced version of the bath my dragon guest was clearly enjoying.

“May I turn my back,” I asked respectfully, like I hadn’t been watching her, only to receive a hum.

She was already buried deep into her neck, humming in comfort, while the mana in the pool drained noticeably. Though, considering I had barely injected two hundred points of mana, it wasn’t exactly an indicator.

I wanted to interrogate as much as I could manage before she realized that.

[Level: 31 Experience: 493210 / 496000

Strength: 46 Charisma: 63

Precision: 40 Perception: 42

Agility: 40 Manipulation: 45

Speed: 39 Intelligence: 49

Endurance: 39 Wisdom: 51

HP: 6226 / 6324 Mana: 5389 / 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 22/26]

[Helga - Level 22/26]