The Demon Lord's Bride (BL)-Chapter 681: Behind a man’s success story is a smart, supportive partner

Chapter 681: Behind a man’s success story is a smart, supportive partner

"To be fair," despite his annoyance, Natha gave the Templars a leeway. "It might be hard for them to contact the group, since they are being followed."

True that. Unlike our side, who could turn into a fly, a bird, or a cute pet, the Tenplars were regular humans. Yes, they could sneak as far as the Holy Empire itself, but sending messages was a little tricky.

"Either Midas’s agents or ours should contact them," I stroked my chin.

"You should tell your friend to send her agents inside the Holy Empire, while we stationed ours near the border," Natha said. "We should create a communication line."

I agreed. Communication orb would probably be risky, so I should contact Ignis instead. Gosh--it was fortunate that Ignis was there.

Wait. Would Ignis trigger the anti-human alarm?!

"No, usually not," Natha replied when I asked. "Magical beast’s mana was as close to nature as it gets, so the Salamander would seem like a massive pile of pure fire mana instead."

"Oh, that’s a relief."

Then...what about Jade? Hmm...

I called Ignis then, telling Zarfa about our communication system. Thankfully, they were in an inn already, so it was easier to contact someone without being found out by the church agents. Naturally, they stayed in a place owned by Midas, so the manager was part of the information guild, as always.

Natha also sent one of the shapeshifters to the hotel so we could consolidate the communication method. After brainstorming the whole dinner time, we decided that the hub of the communication would be...well, yours truly.

It was simple; they would have to travel non-stop from then on until they reached the Holy Empire. During this journey, it would be risky for either the templars or Midas’s agents to make contact with the group, and the shapeshifters couldn’t talk in their animal form.

I, on the other hand, had The Great Salamander Ignis as a sentient communication device. Ahem.

So, what we were going to do was send our agents--both the shapeshifters and Midas’s agents--to locate and communicate with the templars. Midas’s agents would go to the Holy Empire, and the shapeshifter would stay in Vulken--the city bordering the Holy Empire.

Midas’s agents would be communicating with Heraz’s subordinate--since they had enough money to operate the communication orb--and the shapeshifters would be communicating with me and Natha. In turn, I would relay the situation to the Hero’s group through Ignis.

Phew. Not very simple, but what could we do?

Meanwhile, Natha was moving his ’troops’ secretly to Vulken. He was piling provisions in several warehouses, as well as building a huge teleportation circle in the middle of those warehouses as our entry point for the war. It was a one-time use only, unlike a portal, but each circle would be enough to carry a whole company.

Not bad. It wasn’t like we were going to occupy the Holy Empire. Just enough to get me the last relic.

It would be perfect if we also found the safehouse connected to the church’s portal, but...well, life couldn’t be that perfect.

The next day, Heraz informed us that the magician group had no choice but to stay another night in the wild. They hadn’t been able to contact anyone or tame the river, and it seemed like they had almost reached a conclusion that they had to use another path. The path in question would send them through the forest and around the mountain, until they reached another bridge.

The church’s agents were fine with it, and would have reached that decision since the night before if it was them. The problem, as you might guess, was the magician. Remember how I said the agents might be tempted to just push him off the bridge?

Yeah. Heraz said they seemed to be so close to doing that from the way they looked at the magician.

Gosh--that would be such a fun time to witness.

Unfortunately, the magician seemed to realize that too, so he relented and agreed to start the journey again through the rough path.

Hmm...too bad, but then again, watching that young master third-rate magician trek through the forest, mountain, and mudfield also seemed interesting.

After Heraz’s report, we received news from Sore, who had arrived at Velkan. He told us that the templars had successfully inserted three people into the auction house of the Holy Empire. They were recruiting people in haste because this Grand Auction came out of nowhere, and the auction house was not fully prepared to receive the influx of participants from the whole realm.

Well, good news for us.

The templars also managed to have their young spies go into the churches as volunteer helpers and prospect acolytes, which was...something, I guess. Perhaps something might come out of that, but as we had discussed before, such a low position could hardly provide access to important stuff.

But again--who knows?

At any rate, we were back to the waiting game, so I finally decided to return to the project I had been neglecting for so long:

Yep, the puzzle box.

After relaying the information to Zarfa through Ignis, I went to the room across the nursery and placed the puzzle box on the table with the tree statuette and the paper where I drew the path. Before starting, however, I turned toward my biggest distractions.

Three of them.

Chii?

Oh, excuse me--four.

"Now, I need to concentrate," I stared at the biggest distraction first. "So, you play with your daddy for now, okay?"

"Aaah!"

Whatever. I shifted my gaze to Natha. "You take care of him, okay?"

"Do I get a reward for it?" Natha tilted his head.

"Well, of course," I curled my eyes. "You get a jolly time with your sons!"

"That’s not the kind of reward I’m thinking about..." Natha pursed his lips, but I ignored his disappointment and turned to Jade.

"You help Natha, okay? Play with Shwa in my place, yes?"

Jade was the most enthusiastic, even replaying with a salute. "Yes, Papa!"

"You too, Shiny."

Chii! Chii!

Hmm...perhaps I should make a contract with this mole soon. But Shiny still preferred roaming the cave and the underground, so until Ignis came back to give permission, we had no idea where this mole would live in the future.

Who knows if Shiny would choose to go with Stan instead?

Anyway, it wasn’t the time for that. After sending my distractions to the corner, I took the puzzle box I hadn’t touched for a while and stared at the path I had drawn on the paper. With the paper visible in front of me, I took a deep breath and pushed my mana through the tip of the middle finger I placed over the tiny entrance.

And so, my return to puzzle solving started in full swing!

Or so I thought, but a minute later, I met a dead end.

"Wait, what?"

My eyes squinting at the path I had drawn, and then at the puzzle box. Why couldn’t I get through? Was this path I had drawn the wrong one? I tried three more times but I still got stuck.

No--more than that...it seemed like I got stuck earlier than before. Instead of making progress, I was regressing. This...didn’t make sense.

"What happened?!"

I almost threw the box away in frustration after two more useless tries. Ugh...had I been acting cocky all this time? Perhaps this tree was just a decoration and nothing else.

Or perhaps--wait, perhaps the path kept changing like some of those ruins?

"No--no! Please, no!" I groaned in frustration, almost felt like crying.

"Papa?" Jade grabbed my arm and looked at me anxiously. "

"Oh--I’m sorry, Jade..." I took a deep breath and exhaled heavily. "I’m fine, just feeling a bit frustrated."

Jade stared at me for a few seconds before taking a candy from his pocket. "Papa, eat this! Lesta say sugar good for brain!"

Oh, my sweet child. I laughed and received the candy in my mouth. It was followed by Natha’s soft stroke on my hair. "What’s wrong, sweetheart? Is it difficult?"

"Mmh..." I whined a little. "I kept hitting a dead end. I don’t understand--I thought this path was the right one! I couldn’t even go as far as my previous attempt before I followed this guide."

"Hmm..." Natha narrowed his eyes while swaying the confused Shwa in his arms. "Had you been following this path exactly?"

"Yeah..."

"In one to one scale?"

I tilted my head. "What do you mean?"

He pointed at the guide and the tree statuette with his chin. "This tree statuette is not the same size as the base of the puzzle box--a little bit bigger, maybe around thirty percent? If you follow this path in exact measurement, of course you won’t get through the path."

"...huh?"

"See here--there are two parallel turns; if you went past this turn and entered the next turn, the path wouldn’t be the same anymore, so you’d hit a dead end, and--"

I shot up and grasped Natha’s face to kiss him hard. You genius! You handsome and smart demon!

With a big grin, I started again--this time by carefully calculating the difference in scale. I was more focused than ever, using my brain after a long time. It did take me a few tries--four, to be exact--to get through my past record. At that point, however, I already got used to the scale, and the path forward became smoother.

In fact, except for the blunder at the top of the ’tree’--which got me to start again--I no longer met any difficulties. As expected, the tree was truly a guide, and after drowning myself in concentration, I managed to reach the goal.

My mana struck something different, and for a few seconds, nothing happened. I could not breathe, and I realized my palms were sweaty. When I almost felt suffocated, a welcomed, soft clicking sound could be heard, and I exhaled harshly.

"Haa...haa--oh, Mother!"

I took a sharp breath and leaned back, closing my eyes in relief. When I opened them, four pairs of eyes were looking at me, waiting.

"Papa!"

Chii?!

"Waaah!"

"You did it?" Natha asked with a smile.

My lips stretched into a grin, and I looked at the puzzle box again. A soft green glow came from the thin line following the small crack from the unlocked base.

"Alright, let’s see what’s inside."

Carefully, I flipped the box and opened it from the base. As the cover lifted, the green glow became brighter, shrouding the single item quietly lying inside.

And I gasped.