Chapter: Chapter 2: New Century (Epilogue)
Chapter 2: New Century (Epilogue)
“What should I do, Master? Will Miss Gabriel kill me… I guess a succubus bloodline is hard for others to accept…” Sakura, not even eating, lowered her head in shame.
“Ahem, it’s nothing like that.” Xi Wei was truly at his wit’s end. He had finally helped Sakura regain her confidence, and now it seemed they were back to square one.
“I’ll take you to see Clemon later. Gabriel just hasn’t met you before, so she mistook you for an ordinary succubus. She’s very sensitive to demonic auras…” Xi Wei said, carefully selecting other dishes from his bowl and giving them to Sakura, mostly vegetables. With the large roasted suckling pig Gabriel had given him, he couldn’t eat anything else.
Sakura looked at the extra vegetables in her bowl, and a warm current flowed through her heart. The blow she had received from Gabriel vanished. She held her spoon, her eyes filled with tenderness and gratitude.
“Thank you, Master. No one has ever picked out food for me before. You’re so kind to me!” Saying this, a blush crept up her pretty face. She dared not look at Xi Wei’s face and just buried her head in her rice.
Xi Wei: “???” Is someone like Sakura so naive that she’d help count money even if someone sold her off?
After finishing the meal, Xi Wei took Sakura to observe Sark. The two arrived at the castle’s fountain area and saw a rockery, adorned with various flowers, placed in the now expanded fountain.
“When was this rockery placed here?” Xi Wei was a bit confused. He hadn’t been here in a while and didn’t know what had happened.
“Yo! Good afternoon, Lord!” Half of a pretty face peeked out from behind the rockery. It was Xing Hai. In her left hand, she held a flower, complete with roots, and she waved to Xi Wei and Sakura with her right hand, her face beaming with a bright smile.
“Xing Hai, you’ve finally recognized my identity, though not completely…” Xi Wei was very pleased and waved back at Xing Hai.
As he walked closer, he realized the rockery was actually Sark. However, it was now covered in flowers and even moss. He almost didn’t recognize it at first glance.
“Sark, it seems you’ve been living quite well recently. Are you cultivating your sentiments?” Green hellfire burned in the stone man’s hollow eye sockets. He exhaled two puffs of gray smoke from his nostrils and said in a deep voice, “Roar, great Insect Emperor, curse it, please manage this fish! If I don’t let her put flowers on me, she cries! Every day she promises me she’ll only put one flower on me, but the next day she tells me she forgot and uses the excuse that I already have many flowers to put on even more!”
While he was speaking, Xing Hai, as if no one was around, inserted another flower into the joint of Sark’s left leg. She then carefully covered the roots with moist soil. After finishing, she took a watering can made of a conch shell and seashells and watered the newly planted flower. Mud slid down Sark’s leg. This mud contained seeds of ferns. This was the source of the abundant moss on Sark’s body, which looked verdant and fluffy and quite cute.
“I don’t think growing flowers on your body is necessarily a bad thing. Look, birds are willing to nest on your head.” Xi Wei couldn’t help but chuckle as he pointed to Sark’s head, where a lotus bloomed vigorously. Its large leaves looked like Sark was wearing a hat, and beneath the hat, a group of young mountain finches stretched their necks, chirping.
“No! Your Majesty! This is really noisy!” Sark lamented, covering his ears.
“Sark needs quiet!” But he forgot that he had flowers on his hands. This movement caused many of the flowers Xing Hai had planted to fall onto the base of the statue. Sark whispered, “Oh no.” He saw Xing Hai’s eyes redden visibly, and her lips pouted as if she were about to cry.
“Roar! Fine! Curse it! I was wrong!” The poor stone man roared. He bent down to pick up the fallen flowers. Unfortunately, his palms were too large, and after much effort, he couldn’t pick up the flowers.
“Your Majesty, could you please help?” Xi Wei wouldn’t refuse such a simple request. However, he didn’t plant the flowers in Sark’s joints, although they wouldn’t fall off easily there. He rolled the roots and soil into a ball and placed them on the metal edges of Sark’s shoulders and back.
“Xing Hai, Sark also needs to move around occasionally. If the flowers are planted in the joints, he’ll easily knock them off when he moves.” Xi Wei patted Xing Hai’s little head. The merfolk lady’s expression changed as quickly as flipping a book. A moment ago, she was on the verge of tears, and now she was beaming, looking approvingly at the Hellfire Lord covered in flowers.
“Lord, you’re right.” Xing Hai frowned, her fair fingers tapping her lips. “Then how can I make him covered in flowers without affecting his movement? I want everyone to like him, not just the people of Winter Fort, but also people from outside, and the surrounding animals~” Her previous plan to make Sark grow shells had failed. Shells didn’t have the same adhesion as soil and always fell off. However, the plan for potted Sark was now showing promise.
“It’s simple. Tomorrow, I’ll summon an earth mage to the palace. Whenever you want to plant flowers, just tell him, and he can use earth magic to make these flowers grow as sturdily as possible on Sark.” Xi Wei strategized like a loyal advisor, completely ignoring Sark’s crestfallen face.
“Really? Thank you so much!” The merfolk lady’s eyes lit up. She turned and looked at Sark again, saying with a smile, “Big rock, you’ll soon be loved by all and admired by all! Now, only a family of mountain finches lives on you, but don’t be discouraged. In the future, there will be moles, squirrels, bees…” She spread her arms and spun happily in the fountain, her eyes sparkling like fallen stars.
“Are you not going to consider a demon’s opinion?” Sark asked helplessly.
Xing Hai/Xi Wei: “We’re not considering it!!” Sark turned his back and picked up a branch, drawing circles on the ground. Xi Wei then turned to discuss business with Xing Hai. He took out the Sea God’s Tear. The moment it was exposed, the divinity within the Sea God’s Tear immediately reacted with Xing Hai. Her eyes glowed with a sea-like blue light, and under the guidance of an unseen force, the water in the fountain boiled violently, forming a waterspout that lifted Xing Hai up!
