Embarrassment

'How did we end up in this situation again?'

Alastor found himself wondering as he tried to console the crying young woman in his arms. She was now even sobbing and demanding his attention. 

In fact, he had done nothing wrong actually. Vian started to cry hard after telling him about her special trait. He had never heard about something like that. 

However, Vian assumed that his arched eyebrow and tilted smile meant he was mocking her. Now, he not only had to release her and give up on asking more, he was now forced, by none other than himself, to calm down this young woman. 

"Vian, I think you need to calm down. Why are you crying?"

'Because this whole thing is too embarrassing!'

Vian was screaming internally. Her connection with the phoenix Alexander made her able to smell people's power. Alastor's scent was too delicious and addictive to be left alone. 

She had been sneaking to his room daily, but could only find his faint scent and not his presence. Vial always felt sad over that, but at the same time, she felt content to spend her time sniffing his scent. 

'I know that's a perverted behavior, but…'

It was not her fault. For her, trying to quit this was like asking an addict to suddenly quit their drug. 

Impossible to do! 

The night was almost ending when she finally gave up on crying and decided to listen to what Alastor was asking from her. 

"So, Vian. Please do not cry."

'I think my ears would bleed if I heard another one.'

Seeing her not crying, Alastor felt blessed. His smile turned a bit genuine as he asked, "And now, why did you sneak into my room? I do understand what you mean about my scent, but what makes it too unique and irresistible for you?"

Eyebrows knitting together upon that question, Vian answered from her subconscious, the only answer she actually had. 

"It was spicy."

"Huh?"

"Your scent, it was spicy. Like telling me to go away, the danger was approaching– If you get what I mean?"

She struggled to find the suitable words, she had just realized she was still sitting on his lap. As much as Vian liked it, Alastor felt reliable and warm to lean on, she was still embarrassed by how she barged into his room and sniffed him so… 

"That sounds lewd."

Her face turned even redder with that, she thought she spoke her thoughts out loud or something but then realized it was Alastor who said that so casually. 

Something inside her twisted– but in a pleasant way. She, however, decided to leave the room as fast as possible to avoid any more awkward moments between the two of them. 

This time, Alastor did not stop her from running away. He just laughed helplessly before locking the door again. Vian had not explained a single thing to him, yet she escaped without a care. 

"Oh well, saying 'without a care' is harsh there."

The young woman probably was drowning in guilt, embarrassment, and other emotions when he carelessly commented about her actions being lewd. 

For some reason, he enjoyed the current situation more than he should. 

Three pawns were resting in his palms without him even trying hard enough. Evan, Arisa, and Vian. The previous Alastor was amazing at gathering the most important pawns for him. 

If they met one day, Alastor would surely treat the other to a feast. 

Alastor pushed all of these useless thoughts for the next day, he closed his eyes and slowly drifted to sleep. Thankfully, no one interrupted him this time. 

The next morning, Alastor woke up with a massive headache.

He found a red card that was thrown from beneath the door inside the room. Just looking at it made him know that something interesting would happen. 

Nonetheless, that did not lessen his headache or brighten his day at all. He was pissed off since morning, yet he would never show. 

Simply, it did not settle well with Alastor to give an excessive amount of emotions into each reaction. At certain points, he would even feel that they were stupid and unwilling to do anything. 

Brushing his lack of emotional reaction aside, he picked the card up and started reading. 

{I heard you were there when Vian Mckvey showed off her talent. Due to how many people were charmed by her appearance and aura, I'm giving you friendly advice to stay away from that pervert.}

"Oh."

Why did he assume this card was from Vian? He never thought Arisa would send something like that, maybe due to how arrogant she looked during their interactions. 

Meanwhile, this card had a small bag of chocolate attached to it. It was apparently recently made– a considerate, lovely gesture so he assumed it would be the flustered girl instead of the serious one. 

Oh if only Alastor knew how truly serious Arisa was. 

While Alastor was slowly doing his morning routine, a simple exercising season after brushing his teeth and taking a shower. 

As Alastor was chewing on the chocolate that was attached to the card, Evan arrived and greeted cheerfully, "Yo!"

"Morning, Evan."

The two left the dorms and headed again toward the Training Hall, this time, they were not going to just back away due to some big shots taking over it. 

"What do you plan to do today, though?"

"Throwing a shitshow."

"?????"

Despite Evan's face being filled with question marks all over it, Alastor did not explain. He dragged Evan with him and this time, he felt relieved that no one was going to ruin the day's plan. 

"Students, line up and be ready. A friendly match between you is going to be held after you choose your opponents."

The Instructor informed them before taking a step back and activating a spell, the mana around them shook before creating an invisible barrier that separated the students from the people who were there to watch. 

Alastor nodded with satisfaction at that. 29 days were left, he needed to work harder and faster. This was an amazing opportunity to finally establish his power.