CH 342

The carriage rattled as it headed west with the distant canyon faintly visible.

The coachman Lin Xiao was tired and yawned nonstop while being hurried by a certain lady.

Inside the carriage, she stared fixedly at the road ahead with an icy expression. Her eyes contained a hint of anticipation and nervousness, and she kicked the coachman from time to time to perk him up.

“Hm… strange, you would never dare to treat me like this before.”

The coachman rubbed his swollen bum while holding onto the reins and hurrying on.

Elena was indeed different recently, a good change was that she didn’t treat him as coldly as when they first met, but the bad thing was that she became more and more disrespectful and violent.

How dare you kick me, it seems like you’re itching for a beating, right? How about I use my dragon claws to give you some good loving!

Thump!

“Ah… ow, Elena, why do you keep kicking me for no reason? Did I do something wrong?”

“Pervert, stop thinking about disgusting things while drooling and get to driving.”

“Hah? D-drooling? … Slurp… uh, sorry, my bad.” Lin Xiao wiped off the drool from the corner of his mouth and quickly changed the subject, “I say, how come I’ve never noticed how tyrannical you were before, you’re a straight slave driver.”

“There’s only violence for a disobedient coachman like you.”

“Hm, you were a violent demon king as expected, using violence to suppress your subordinates… when you were in the forest of the end, your subordinates must have hated you, right?”

“Hm?” Elena took his words seriously, and stopped to think about it, “They didn’t hate me, but their attitudes towards me was strange.”

“Strange?”

“Yeah, I don’t know how to explain it….” Elena had complicated feelings when she was thinking about when she was the demon king.

At that time, she just wanted to be a good demon king and was concerned about her subordinates, but they all treated her strangely.

Every time she wanted to help a subordinate, they would always avoid her with a red face like they disliked her, and every time she disciplined someone who made a mistake, they would happily accept it and even wanted her to continue.

Was it the way she spoke that caused ambiguity?

“Truly strange.” Lin Xiao scratched his head and never thought that Elena would have those kinds of worries and asked with interest, “Did you communicate with them back then like you do now?”

“Now?” Elena noticed Lin Xiao’s gaze and looked down at her own body, “Un, father wanted us to maintain our human forms, so that we wouldn’t get controlled by the instincts of our bloodline, so that we were more cool and rational to become a qualified leader.”

“Oh… so did you also have a good figure back then as well?”

“… yes.” Seeing as that he was earnestly asking and not teasing her, she endured it and honestly responded, “It was better when I was younger, but after I hit twelve, it didn’t stop growing, I also didn’t want it to end up like this…. if it was smaller, it would have been a lot more convenient.”

“No way!? That’s the monarch’s oppai’s! The gift to me from the goddess, so how could it get smaller! There are so many things you can’t do if it’s smaller! No, definitely not, I won’t agree! … Hey, why are you getting closer?… Wait! Don’t kick me! … Ah, no pinching either! Owwww, calm down, it was just a joke!”

“Cough, let’s get back on topic.” After they messed around for a while, Lin Xiao raised his hands in resignation and got serious again, “I’m curious, how did you speak with your subordinates before?”

“Um…”

As she recalled her past, she didn’t know how best to explain it. So, she cleared her throat to give him a demonstration.

“Come over here… why are you so down lately, did anything happen? … Don’t worry and tell me, hehe, no matter what it is, I’ll do my best to help you… hm? Why is your face red, are you afraid of me? Don’t be scared and come closer, I won’t hurt you… hey! Don’t run!”

“Uh…”

He understood that she was ‘helping’, but anyone else would probably mistake it for her seducing her subordinates!

The demon king is so beautiful and if she’s whispering that next to your ear, they would probably think that she was going to eat them up.

Elena continued her performance.

“How could you do something like that yesterday? What a bad boy! … Hm, you won’t do it next time? Idiot, is there still a next time! … What? You want to be called an idiot again? … Is there something wrong with you? … What? … You also like that? … Y-you really are incorrigible!”

After her performance, Elena spread out her hands and gave Lin Xiao a helpless look.

“I help them, yet they’re scared, I scold them, yet they’re happy. I really don’t know where I went wrong.”

“Elena, you really are beautiful.”

“Pervert! W-what are you saying?”

“Uh… nothing, I was just testing my conjecture.”

Being called a pervert by Elena made Lin Xiao feel so refreshed, so the idiots back then probably also felt the same way.

Elena’s cat form was nice, but her human form was too beautiful and too cute. Her gentle treatment would be mistaken for seduction and her scoldings would be enjoyed….

Elena was undoubtedly an outstanding woman, but as a ruler, she wasn’t that qualified. The main reason being her figure!

That was her natural weakness as a leader.

Think about it, if you have to see a boss as beautiful as her walk around you all day, how can the subordinates even focus on their own work!

“Elena, it seems like you’re not that great at communicating?”

“Didn’t you already know that…”

“No, I thought you were purposely acting cold and hiding your expression to protect yourself. But now I realize that you don’t understand anything.”

“Hah?” Elena thought he was purposely angering her, but when she saw his serious expression, she curiously asked, “… W-what do you mean? Explain it!”

“Let me ask you, why did you refuse ShenDai Ying earlier?” Lin Xiao suddenly asked an unrelated question.

“Of course because I hate her,” Elean responded without any thought.

“That doesn’t seem right… if it was because you hated her, then you would have said so earlier and personally refused her, but you didn’t. Instead, you lowered your voice and told me then got me to refuse her, so you were clearly concerned about her feelings.”

“That’s…”

Perhaps Lin Xiao understood her better than she did. According to her personality, if she did hate someone, she would personally reject them, why would she care about their feelings?

So, the real reason she did that was because…

“I-I just thought she would get in the way, so I didn’t want to bring her.”

“Hehe, you’re still not being honest, why can’t you just say it?” Lin Xiao shook his head and tore through her pretense, “You were worried about her safety, right?”

“…”

Even she herself didn’t realize it, the reason she refused her wasn’t that she hated ShenDai Ying, or because she was afraid of her secret being leaked, but it was because she was worried about her safety.

Although ShenDai Ying’s sword skills were demonic and she was extremely fast, but she was still a delicate girl. Dealing with one or two demonic beasts would be fine, but if she was surrounded any mistake would lead to a disastrous result.

In Lin Xiao’s words, she would be ….

“If we brought her along, then you would be responsible for her and can’t let her get hurt… but that’s too annoying, the demon king doesn’t need anyone to drag them down, that’s why you refused her, right?”

“Tsk… how conceited, why do I have to worry about you lover?”

“Hehe, I take back what I said earlier, the demon king isn’t violent at all, she’s super cute and is a kind girl!”

“Kind? Hehe, I guarantee that you’ll change your opinion very soon.”

“How is that possible? My eyes are never wrong!”

“Oh, is that so, then let’s bet on it.”

Elena didn’t respond and instead gave him another kick.

“We’re already here, where are you going?”

“Uh… I was too focused on the conversation, and not on the road.”

As they entered the canyon, because of how difficult the terrain was to navigate, the two had to go by foot to do a night raid on the demon nest!

Of course, their so-called ‘night raid’ was just Elena disciplining some disobedient kids…