The Unrestrained Aura was reined in by Mikael in a fraction of a second, so quickly that none of the girls felt anything—except for Lian'er, whose higher cultivation realm allowed her to catch a glimpse of it. "What was that?" she asked, puzzled, her attention momentarily pulled away from the heavy atmosphere.
Mikael didn't answer and continued with his 'story', telling everything honestly—from the fight with the bandits, to touching the Sword Intent door, to hunting and then killing the demonic cultivators, their mysterious backer, the cursed village, and Savagefang City.
And finally, everything he did in the Savagefang Mountain Range, without omitting anything—whether it be his numerous brushes with death, especially when he reached his Partial Enlightenment, or even his meeting and flirting with the duo of sisters that was Bai Yulan and Bai Lifen.
Surprisingly, for once, Kiara didn't react, not even a little bit, to the existence of women near her darling.
Bangs of her mid-length dark blue hair fell before her pretty visage, covering her eyes from him as she looked toward the ground, the aura she released was extremely gloomy.
Mikael inwardly winced upon seeing Kiara's reaction, one that promised to be extremely intense, but he continued nonetheless and told everything that happened, finishing on, "And finally, after all that, I entered the Cultivation Manor and was attracted by Kiara's absolutely amazing and wonderful melody, and the rest you know it…"
For a moment, a heavy silence fell over the room as nobody spoke, until Kiara slowly raised her head. From between her bangs, her dark blue eyes became visible, and within them, a cold, world-destroying fury was burning. She gave Mikael an extremely 'sweet' smile that instinctively gave him a bad feeling.
"Darling~... you were really… adventurous when you were away from home," she murmured, tracing one of her nails across her palm with a distant look. "Knowingly and deliberately putting yourself into dangerous and high-risk situations… it was truly a wonderful idea, don't you think so, girls~?" she asked, turning to look at the others, her unnervingly sweet smile still present.
The other girls, even though they were also angry and worried for Mikael, flinched under Kiara's stare and words, because at this moment, the beauty was releasing a truly dark and intimidating aura, her presence weighing heavily on the room.
The girls didn't answer, intimidated by Kiara's current presence, but the blue-haired yandere didn't seem to care as her gaze returned to Mikael. "So, Darling~~~~ what should I do with you?" she asked, placing one of her dainty fingers on her chin. "Should I keep you home?"
Mikael felt a chill course through him, but the worst was still to come. "Keep you locked up, maybe in my room so you don't put yourself in danger… or maybe… injure you so you can't escape~?"
The instant she finished saying the word 'escape', she suddenly jumped at him, her right hand in a piercing stance, ready to stab him in the chest.
Not being a masochist and consequently not particularly eager to feel pain delivered by his currently crazed yandere lover, he extended his hand, catching hers just before she could pierce him, and with a quick shift in their respective center of gravity, he let himself fall into a sitting position while dropping her squarely into his lap.
"Huh…?" Kiara's confused voice resounded, not understanding what had just happened.
Mikael tightly hugged the beauty's waist, bringing his mouth close to her ear as he softly murmured, "Calm down, I'm not going to disappear or die or anything really, I will always be with you. You don't need to attack me out of fear that I'll vanish or get killed—I'll always come back to you, okay~?"
He finished by placing a gentle kiss on her nape while tightening his embrace, and Kiara seemed to melt into his arms as the warmth of his hold and the reassurance of his words sank in.
"What!?" surprised exclamations from all three girls resounded, their eyes wide with shock—not only at Kiara suddenly attacking Mikael, but even more so at how… smoothly Mikael had handled her.
"Hmm?" an inquisitive hum escaped Mikael's lips as he looked up at the three stunned girls, all while beginning to gently stroke Kiara's head, her previously tense body gradually relaxing as she let herself sink even deeper into her beloved's embrace.
After a moment of stunned silence, Amelia abruptly jumped to her feet, "Crazy bitch!" she cursed—an unusual outburst for someone normally so composed and calm—as she rapidly closed the distance separating her from the now-calmed Kiara, and with a firm grip on the yandere's arm, she tried to pull her away.
"Kiara, what are you thinking!? Mikael said he got injured outside of home, and your idea is to injure him further???" she snapped, her sharp voice laced with cold fury as her emerald eyes burned with outrage—fury that should have caught Kiara's attention but—
At that moment, the blue-haired yandere didn't seem to care about Amelia trying to pull her away in the slightest, a distorted smile blooming on her face as she pressed herself against Mikael's chest and began to sniff him.
"Darling~! Darling~! Darling~! Darling~!" she began to mutter to herself like she was possessed, though Mikael couldn't help but find her oddly adorable in that moment…
Mikael, with a mix of a wry and fond smile, looked up at Amelia, who was coldly glaring at both of them, three parts of her fury directed at him and seven at Kiara. "Kiara Dreyfus!"
Finally, Amelia's loud exclamation and extremely serious tone momentarily brought Kiara back to reality as she looked up at her, an annoyed expression on her visage that seemed to ask why this bitch—sister Amelia—was disturbing her time with her Darling~?
A vein popped on the usually calm beauty's visage as she saw Kiara's expression, "Ahhhhh." Amelia took a deep breath before continuing, her expression now 'calm', "Kiara, why did you attack Mikael? Don't you think that talking about it would have been better than suddenly attacking him? What would you have done if he was seriously injured by you right now?"
"Tsk, it's in the past, it doesn't matter anymore," she declared before continuing to snuggle against Mikael, a distorted smile still on her face.
"It doesn't matter!?" Amelia's disbelieving voice resounded.
"Let it go, it's… Kiara being a yandere…" murmured Mikael as he gently stroked her blue hair while giving Amelia a wry smile.
Thwack.
Amelia's arms dropped along her sides as she let out a resigned sigh, "Fine, I give up on this point, but…" her gaze, full of cold fury, locked onto Mikael who was currently stroking the yandere,
"Don't think I've forgotten how you deliberately put yourself in danger, how reckless and life-threatening it was—and while it may have been admirable, brave, and even… attractive…"
Cough.
"I mean, it was extremely dangerous and stupid, you shouldn't have done that!" she declared fiercely, but her true thoughts had already been exposed earlier, dulling the impact of her 'menacing' tone.
"T-true."
"It's true, Junior Brother, you really experienced a lot of danger outside of the Sect!"
Lyra and Hua Lianyu's affirmations rang out as both looked at Mikael with a frown on their beautiful visages.
'Kiara is now calm, now I need to do the same for both Amelia, Lyra, and my Senior Sister,' Mikael thought to himself, his mind extremely active in a 'battle state' as he rapidly made plans on how to successfully solve this crisis.
He lifted his free hand in a soothing gesture, "I know that with the way I talked about my expedition outside of the Sect, it made it sound like it was extremely dangerous and that I was always in danger, and in a way that was somewhat the case…"
He saw the girls' expressions rapidly darken—even Kiara in his arms stopped snuggling and sniffing him—but he continued, "…but while it was dangerous, I would also say that it wasn't nearly as bad as it could look at first glance. I had my non-cultivator powers as a safety net in case something went wrong."
"So in the majority of the cases where I looked to be in extreme danger, I wasn't actually, as by using my non-cultivator powers I could escape from the danger in case something truly had gone wrong."
"And even then I had a second safety net in the existence of the talismans that Master gave me, so I was never too much in danger…" he finished while looking at them with a gentle and calming expression.
All the girls' frowns eased, even Amelia, who was currently the most angered—Kiara having been masterfully calmed down—but then she remembered something, and her frown came back with a vengeance, "And what of the demonic beast tide!"
"As you said earlier, when you were battling your way through the demonic beast tide your mind grew foggy, to the point you were too confused and couldn't even think of activating the talismans or your non-cultivator powers. Do you dare say you weren't in danger at that moment?" she asked, her tone sharp, but the worry in it—and in her gorgeous eyes—was unmistakable.
!!!!
The girls who had nearly been 'fooled' suddenly looked at Mikael, their gazes sharp and attentive as they waited for his explanation.
Mikael gently shook his head. "It's true that my mind was foggy, I even said it earlier, but the danger wasn't as high as you might think. The talismans, even if not activated by me, would have automatically triggered just before my death, so the worst that could've happened was me missing the Partial Enlightenment and maybe…"
He paused for a moment, raising one of his hands to his back, toward Sangrelia's cracked form. "...that Sangrelia would've been further damaged, maybe, maybe even beyond repair…" he murmured in a low melancholic voice.
"Ahhhh"
Amelia let out a long sigh before her gaze on Mikael softened. "J-just be more careful when you're out… I—and I would even say we worry about you, okay?" she said in a low, worried voice.
Mikael took a moment to absorb their concern before giving her and the other girls a firm, serious nod. "I'll do my best."
Seeing how noncommittal his answer was, Amelia was about to retort—wanting to extract a more serious promise out of him, but as she caught his somewhat melancholic tone and remembered Sangrelia's current state, she held her tongue.
After that, Mikael and the girls continued to talk for hours. For a while, they stayed on the same subject, though nothing new was truly raised, and it eventually ended with Mikael calming them down, reassuring them, and promising once more that he would be extra careful outside the Sect.
Still, while he promised to be extra careful, he also honestly informed them that he would still do his best to grow stronger and consequently would need to take potentially dangerous opportunities…
This promise wasn't exactly to the girls' liking, but it was the best they could obtain from him, and it also somewhat relieved them as they knew that Mikael would hold his promise and be more careful in the future—after all, he may be a villain, but he was their villain and he wouldn't lie to them.
Afterwards, time began to quickly flow like an unstoppable river.
Author Note:
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This was a pretty tense chapter, especially considering that neither of the girls were happy with him having been in danger numerous times especially Kiara who had a yandereness outburst and attacked Mikael!
Fortunately he managed her wonderfully and successfully calmed her down by using her greatest weakness was used against her, so in the end, all's well that ends well, right?
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