Chapter 417 The Minister’s Unwilling Generosity (Part 1)
While Aisha and the others went into the bathroom to dress and prepare to leave, Daimon went ahead and left to the dining room, where the queen and the others were already waiting for them.
While Annete was calm as usual, Mellie looked a bit depressed, which was understandable, she was too little when her mother died to the point that she has very vague memories of her, so deep in her heart she wanted to think she just faked her death and escaped after she was poisoned.
But now that Carlos has spilled the beans, and the place where she was buried was revealed then that small possibility disappeared.
On one hand she was happy that she will be able to pay her respects to her mother who gave birth to her, even with the complications that the first poison brought her, and also bring her back to the Clear Water kingdom, the two sisters had even decided a place where they will build a small garden just for their mother to rest in peace.
On the other hand, she couldn't help but feel a bit sad in general, and also angry towards the White ancestor who orchestrated her mother's death, her pretty face was filled with a troubled expression.
"Good morning", he said, getting a positive response from everyone but Mellie who was lost in her thoughts, until her sister slightly nudged her below the table.
"Ah… sorry, good morning", mumbled Mellie giving Daimon an apologetic gaze.
Daimon inwardly bitterly smiled and then took his seat; the queen took the chance to change the subject to something else to try and distract Mellie from the subject of their mother.
"I sent a message to the Minister, he is obligated to personally welcome the champion after all~", said Annete with her playful voice.
Maybe because she had accepted her mother's death a long time ago, she was in a good mood, knowing that the ones who caused it will be getting what they deserve, starting with Carlos who is being put through some fun games and activities right now, especially because she asked Daimon to lend her Horals for the rest of the time they had before departing.
Annete will be staying behind Along with Vincent to guard the fort here in the Mermen Sea, though Mellie will be accompanying Daimon as a representative of the queen, similar to how Daphne will be going as the representative of the Valas family while her mother stays behind.
Out of the adults in the alliance, only Thea, Aurora and Cassy's father in other words Patriarch Underwood, will be going with Daimon to the Elemental Sea, so he can receive his reward from Aurora officially.
Daimon nodded, and then seeing that the others were entering the dining room to join them, the head maid Martha and the security head Mina brought the food.
The atmosphere changed to a more relaxed one with all the girls here chatting and eating, even Mellie cheered up a bit thanks to Daphne and Jasmine, those three got closer to each other since the incident where the pirates and Skelefiends wanted to capture them, not to mention their positions were pretty similar, so it was easy for them to get along.
Once everyone had their fill, Aurora and Thea went to do the last preparations they needed for the travel, the queen and Vincent took Daimon and the others to the mansion of the Minister.
With a wave of his hand Vincent created a portal, even the old man seemed to be having a good day since he will get to see more of Raymond's defeated expression like yesterday.
A couple of minutes later a portal opened in the outer area of Arc city from which the queen's carriage came out.
The visitors from all the territories of the kingdom had most likely left at this point, in part because the outcome of the events of this year wasn't what the vast majority wanted, unlike the Risha sisters and Aisha who added some Mermen characteristics to their disguises, Daimon didn't bother to do so since he is using the mask of the hollow suit anyway.
So, for them, an outsider won the most important events that took place in the Clear Water kingdom, they were defeated as the locals, which made them look bad, especially because the defeats were crushing.
The crowned prince that everyone admired was crushed in front of their eyes, the only relief was that even if he lost, Lance still managed to block the attack of his opponent head on, in fact the popularity of the neo nobles went through the roof, while the popularity of the royal family hit rock bottom.
Luckily for Triten, the most important event of the year, in other words the royal ball has yet to take place, and that was his opportunity to regain the prestige of his royal family, that's why he wasn't bothering with anything else right now.
A large aquamarine carriage soon arrived at the entrance of the mansion of the Minister, standing at the gate of his mansion, was Raymond with a stiff expression on his face, even if he was feeling depressed, politics are politics and he had to oblige and present the champion with his reward.
The door of the carriage opened and a large group led by a silver haired masked youth came out of it, the Minister frowned as he glared at the queen, there was no need for anyone but Daimon to come, so in his mind she just brought more people to witness his humiliation, especially because Vincent who clearly was laughing at him also came.
With his right eyebrow trembling due to anger, the Minister put on a fake smiling expression as he greeted the group.
"Welcome to my mansion, please follow me so that the honored champion can receive his reward from my Arcarius family".
Vincent was barely containing the urge to laugh, while Daimon and the others simply followed the Minister inside of the mansion, since they were in the same group with the queen thus related to Vincent, Raymond didn't invite them to his mansion before.
So, this was the first time they had entered, with the exception of the Duchess and Daphne who had come a couple of times for business reasons.
Once inside Daimon noticed there weren't servants or other people here, he still noticed a couple of presences here and there but all were too strong to be butlers or maids, meaning they were family members of the Arcarius, the Minister probably didn't want his servants to see this disgraceful experience of his.
With Raymond's guide they soon reached the depths of the mansion, more accurately the vault room in which the treasury of the Arcarius was located.
"Please show me the proof of the champion of the three-art tournament", said the Minister.
Daimon took out the token Raymond gave him yesterday, the Minister took it and broke it on the spot, he then mumbled a couple of words and took out a key from his storage ring, which he used to open the metal door of the vault, but that wasn't all, behind that metal door, there was an ice door.
This time the Minister cut his hand and placed it on the door, once the blood was absorbed an array lit up on the door and the ice melted away, to reveal the entrance to a large store-like place with tons of shelves and racks, treasures displayed on the walls, coffers full of sea crystals and, books and other types of valuables accommodated in a perfect way.
"You have thirty minutes, you can choose only one thing, don't try to play any tricks, spatial treasures don't work inside the treasury and there are surveillance arrays all over the place", coldly said the Minister.
Daimon didn't care about the Minister's attitude; he instead approached him before saying.
"I wonder if the Minister is interested in making a deal with me, I have way more three-colored water than what I need, so I was thinking of using some to get the chance to choose a second thing from the Arcarius treasury, how about one liter of it for a second reward".
The Minister gritted his teeth at the words "I have way more three-colored water than what I need", but his eyes suddenly glowed and then he nodded.
"Let's make it more interesting, give me one tub of three colored water and I'll let you chose four things".
Daimon knew this old fox had something in mind, but he didn't care, he wasn't going to play nice too anyway, so everything reduced to who had the best trump card.
"Deal, old Vincent and miss Annete please be the witnesses", said Daimon as he took out one of the tubs with three-colored water and gave it to Raymond who was all smiles right now.
Now that the transaction was finished, Daimon smirked and then entered the treasury, the gate closed behind of him, since no one else was allowed to enter besides him.
Naturally the Minister made things hard for Daimon by setting a limit of thirty minutes, even a day will be too short to inspect the whole place, the coffers of the Arcarius family were larger than Vincent's apparently.
Which made sense, Vincent represents basically himself, he isn't lacking resources at all, but he is sole person, since the Malleus family is being led by Tideus, also Vincent has most of his riches in sea crystals.
Unfortunately for the Minister, Daimon didn't need to go through all the shelves and racks individually like probably all the members of the young generation in Neptune will have to, those exceptions who have the weak mana sense akin to natives of this place included.
Daimon's eyes glowed behind his mask and the world's perspective he has, changed, he could now see the mana flow of the things, similar to Yvonne's ability.
With a quick scan, Daimon could notice that the Minister was playing some tricks, he couldn't find anything on the Stellar rank, even the treasures on the walls which looked so glorious and dignified, were just Half Stellar ranked magic equipment.
Which normally wouldn't be that bad, but the problem is that all of them just had a good outer appearance, but were low quality things, in other words it was a trap to force him get some worthless crap.
'Those things can't even compare with the equipment Liz made for me', thought Daimon.
While Liz is still an Arch ranked, her abilities who used to be at the peak of the Arch rank, progressed thanks her Crown Fire, after eight years she could create Half Emperor grade treasures of the best quality.
Naturally she couldn't just produce a lot of stuff out of nowhere, unlike Neptune at the four galaxies Half Stellar rank materials were incredibly rare, but even her effortless creations which were peak Arch rank equipment, were better than most of the Half Stellar treasures Aster has seen in Neptune so far.
With a few exceptions like Mellie's fiddle, Lance's spear, the sword used by the crowned prince as well as Walford's sword, and the gloves that were gifted to him by Thea.
Besides that, only Stellar ranked treasures could interest him, like the spear he got for Horals the other day, Aisha and the others didn't need him to get them Half Stellar treasures, since the queen has promised to order a weapon for the Risha sisters and Aisha too, as part of her payment to Daimon for protecting Mellie, since she had some ties with the other Stellar ranked rune master of Neptune, besides Blackbeard.
As for the materials needed for the weapons, the Duchess will provide them for free as a thanks for saving Daphne, as for the elaboration fee, the bill was thrown at Vincent who could only sigh and pay, the order was already in process right now.
Originally Daimon wanted to order weapons for Aura, Erin, Liz and Elaine, but not only the materials will take months to be gathered, the creation will take also too much time, so instead of that he had to find them weapons that were already created.
Erin was already solved since Aurora mentioned that they had some Stellar ranked darkness oriented magic weapons in their treasury, from which Daimon could choose, but he needed to find a nice souvenir for Aura, Liz and Elaine.
And the Arcarius with their ice affinity was probably the best place to find one for Elaine, and he could take other three to use for trade in case he didn't find something that fitted Aura and Liz.
Outside of the treasure room, the Minister suddenly felt a shiver running down his spine, but after a second thought, he inwardly shook his head.
'What am I worried about, I personally hid the nice things in there, so even a week isn't enough to find a single Stellar ranked treasure, I have to thank that brat for being so "generous" as to give me a whole tub of three-colored water in exchange of four pieces of trash hahaha!'.
Aisha saw the sufficiency expression on the face of the Minister and she softly snorted.
'I wonder what your expression will be when my darling leaves your family un bankrupt', she thought.