Chapter 89 Mermaid on the Shore 11 "Look at me carefully."...

089 Mermaid on the Shore 11

If the entire banquet hall became extremely quiet when Lu Jiu appeared just now, then at this moment, the atmosphere here could be described as dead silent.

Everyone's expression changed.

The one who was originally smiling had his smile frozen at the corner of his lips, and the one who was originally looking at Lu Jiu with a hidden gaze was so scared that he quickly lowered his head.

The two people who caused this change were still talking as if no one was around.

"...Will you die if you don't eat fruit?"

“It will be unhealthy.”

"...I could use some more vegetables."

"Can you?"

“…………”

The mermaid youth glared at the Duke.

Suddenly, another person came in hurriedly from outside, wiping his sweat with a handkerchief. After arriving here, he bowed and nodded to the Duke, and was also very attentive to the mermaid youth with a smile on his face.

"I just stopped the Duke outside to talk for a while. I am sorry for boring you."

This was explained to Lu Jiu.

Everyone in the banquet hall was in a state of confusion again - this was the chief judge of the capital, and he had such an attitude towards the young mermaid? !

This guy is always arrogant to most people here!

Count Beren finally came to his senses.

His smile shifted to another person: "...I didn't expect you to come here, what a pleasant surprise. This way please? We can just talk about the recent case of XX Bank. I've been wanting to hear your opinion for a long time."

He spread out his left hand, turned sideways, and politely gestured to Wei Nanlou to follow him to the left.

It was a gathering place for nobles, and they immediately nodded to Wei Nanlou.

This action clearly distinguished Weinanlou from Lujiu.

In fact, most of the nobles and pets attending the banquet tonight were like this - the nobles talked with the nobles, and the pets stayed with the pets.

It is impossible for owners and pets to integrate into the same social circle.

Suddenly, many people's eyes flickered.

Count Beren is testing the Duke, what will the Duke do?

The next second, Lu Jiu moved first.

Count Beren rolled his eyes and looked at him secretly.

——The young mermaid seemed to have heard nothing of what he said, at least his face did not show any clues.

After handing his removed gloves to the guard and bringing the glass of grape juice, the young man walked towards the table where snacks were placed, glanced around casually, and seemed to be carefully selecting the food he wanted to eat.

That casual posture made the eyes of the people watching him from behind move slightly.

Then, the Duke calmly refused: "Talk about business at the banquet? Let's do it another day. Today I am here to accompany my wife."

After saying this, he passed by Count Beren and walked straight towards the young man.

The nobles were stunned as if they were struck by thunder.

Lu Jiu just stopped in front of a dining table.

He picked up a small, delicate-looking cake, looked at it for a few seconds, took a bite, and chewed it.

His brows knitted together quickly. Wei Nanlou came over and saw it, and laughed, "Not tasty?"

"So sweet." Lu Jiu said with disdain, raised her hand, and handed the remaining half to Wei Nanlou's lips, letting him finish it.

The Duke also frowned immediately.

Lu Jiu glanced over and Wei Nanlou glanced at him, then lowered his head and took the remaining half of the cake into his mouth, tasted it, and gave his evaluation: "Don't eat the cake here anymore."

"Hahaha!" Lu Jiu laughed three times.

…The rest of the people could no longer describe their feelings with the word surprise.

They had not yet recovered from what the Duke had just said, and seeing his appearance, their brains were unable to function.

When they faced the Duke, they were always under pressure and uneasy, but the Duke was so, so kind to this mermaid youth——

Lu Jiu could clearly sense the gazes of these people, but he pretended not to feel them.

He gave up on this dessert area and walked forward, hearing the man next to him ask calmly, "Why do you always leave me behind?"

Twice.

It happened once outside just now: the presiding judge pulled him aside to talk, but Lu Jiu listened for less than five seconds before turning around and walking away.

It happened again just now: Count Beren was still talking to him, and Lu Jiu walked away.

When Lu Jiu heard this question, he smiled and said, "Then why do you always follow me? Look, when you follow me, no one comes to talk to me."

Their conversation was so quiet that only they could hear each other.

"So, this is why you come here?" The man's eyes swept over him calmly.

Lu Jiu said slowly: "So, this is why you obviously don't want me to come, but still want to see what decision I make?"

Wei Nanlou stopped.

"I know more about you than you think, right?" Lu Jiu's tone was light and cunning when he said this.

Wei Nanlou looked at him steadily, then laughed.

They both stopped together.

"So," the man stood behind him, his tall body looming over him, and he lowered his head slightly, his lips right next to his ear, "who are you looking for?"

Lu Jiu leaned back lazily and leaned into the man's arms.

He turned around and handed over the grape juice. Wei Nanlou took a look at it, took it, raised his other arm, and put it around his waist so that he could lean more comfortably.

The intimate gesture invisibly triggered changes in the eyes of countless people.

Lu Jiu said: "One, I'm not sure what his identity is."

He picked up a silver fork on the table, picked up a small piece of steak, and said softly while looking at it: "I can't explain too much. Anyway, I just know that I am looking for such a person, but I have to see him or say a few words to him before I can be sure that he is him. Now that I am here, can you introduce these people to me?"

Wei Nanlou looked down at him for a long while.

Lu Jiu knew that this man must have many questions to ask.

But this guy is not used to forcing him.

A deep voice slowly sounded in my ears.

"There is no need to know most of the people here. Only the following people can be remembered."

"You have already met the Chief Judge outside. He is responsible for coordinating all cases in the capital and has a close relationship with the Minister of Confidential Affairs. He does not raise beastmen, but in order to maintain relationships, he will not miss similar banquets."

"Belen is playful by nature, unable to distinguish between work and entertainment, and his work style is extreme."

Lu Jiu took a bite of the steak and put down his fork.

They turned around and continued walking forward. As Wei Nanlou spoke, Lu Jiu glanced calmly at the crowd.

The Chief Judge and Beren certainly couldn't be the escaped player. Lu Jiu could be sure of it the first time he made eye contact with the two of them.

However, it was quite interesting to hear Wei Nanlou's evaluation of these people.

The man called out names in the crowd.

When Lu Jiu looked over, those people always happened to be looking at him.

Which noble lady, which newspaper president? Lu Jiu carefully looked at the faces of those people and crossed them out from his mind one by one.

After hearing this, he couldn't help but say, "So there really are so many people who keep orcs as pets in private. They are completely hypocritical."

He glanced at Wei Nanlou and said, "Don't they say you are the regent? Are you really that?"

If someone else heard this, they would be scared crazy by his audacity.

Wei Nanlou just smiled lightly.

"Do you think I should care?"

They completed the whole tour.

This banquet room is neither small nor big.

They stopped at one place, and Lu Jiu pointed out directly: "When we were in Mermaid Town, you were in charge."

The situation in the capital city is of course much more complicated than that in Mermaid Town, but Lu Jiu's intuition tells her that if this man really wants to take care of it, he will be able to do so.

Just then, an orc suddenly walked up to them timidly and interrupted their conversation.

They turned to look.

This orc has a pair of erect cat ears and a furry cat tail, and a pair of round emerald eyes, which are very beautiful.

He was wearing a white Greek-style robe with very little fabric, which half-hidden his body and showed off his seductive appearance just right.

A collar around his neck made him look particularly obedient.

He shyly picked up a silver plate with a few bright strawberries on it.

"My master asked me to share this with you, Duke."

In the distance, a handsome young man raised his glass to greet Wei Nanlou.

Lu Jiu heard this and chuckled.

Is the strawberry being “shared”? Are you treating it as air?

He leaned back against the wall, ready to watch the show with interest, but the man's arm was always around his waist, not loosening.

Noticing his retreat, the man hugged him back and looked at him sideways: "Do you want to eat?"

Lu Jiu paused.

The orc was also stunned.

"..." Lu Jiu, "You know I don't like sour things."

The strawberries are still very sour now.

Wei Nanlou raised his lips: "I'm just asking."

Lu Jiu: “…”

The man turned to the orc and said, "No, thank you."

...He completely treated people as servants.

The cat-like orc blushed, nodded awkwardly, glanced at Lu Jiu secretly, pursed his lips and walked away.

“Why should I care?”

Hearing Wei Nanlou's words, Lu Jiu was stunned.

The man said calmly, "No matter how reluctant the orcs appear to be to attend this banquet, they have come here on their own."

…The cat-like beastman who had gone away returned to his “master”.

His master's face was gloomy and he seemed to be apologizing softly. After his master walked away with a cold face, he turned around and stared at Lu Jiu again.

There was a clear hint of anger and jealousy in that look.

Lu Jiu was silent.

"Perhaps you will say that some of them were offered by their tribes and had no right to choose, but the fact is that all the orcs sent to these nobles were obedient. Nobles do not like disobedient pets. I believe this statement has become a consensus among some orc races."

In order not to displease the nobles, the orc tribes often would not send unwilling tribesmen over.

Those who will be selected are all volunteers.

Lu Jiu whispered, "...Some people are just submissive, right? Even if they don't want to or are unhappy, they won't say it out loud, and don't know how to resist. Some people have lived in this environment since childhood, and have been 'voluntarily' unconsciously."

"Regarding your first point, Jiujiu, you may not understand enough about how the orcs sent here are selected. As long as they are major races with 'formal procedures', they will not send orcs who are even slightly unwilling."

Wei Nanlou's voice was so calm that it was almost inhumane.

“Perhaps you can see hardship on their faces now, but these hardships have nothing to do with the choices they made in the first place, but are due to the gap between ideals and reality.”

Wei Nanlou's meaning was very straightforward to some extent... Lu Jiu understood it.

"As for your second point, the overall environment has only changed over the past two or three years, so it's far from being 'influenced since childhood'."

Lu Jiu was stunned.

Only two or three years, is it really that short? He didn't pay much attention to this aspect and thought it had been a long time.

But why? What caused this change?

However, Wei Nanlou did not further answer this question.

The man only said, "The law has always prohibited the enslavement of orcs, but no matter what the law stipulates, it cannot stop people's selfishness. Jiujiu, the orcs here are different from the orcs in Mermaid Town. You will understand it later."

Let's stop here for this topic.

According to Lu Jiu's original request, Wei Nanlou introduced him to the last two people who needed attention.

These two characters are also the most special in some ways.

One was the young man with golden eyes who was sitting in the corner diagonally opposite them and had been secretly observing them.

When Wei Nanlou directed Lu Jiu to look over there, the young man's eyes lit up, he straightened his back, and nodded at them like a gentleman.

Wei Nanlou said that this was the illegitimate son of the previous emperor and an orc maid, a half-orc named Xu Yin - yes, the imperial lineage had the surname Xu.

This half-orc was given this surname, but was not openly recognized by the royal family, which put him in a very awkward position.

In terms of status, he is more noble than any of the nobles present today, but no one is willing to pay attention to him, and no one looks down on him.

Only Wei Nanlou, his nominal uncle, was relatively familiar to him.

Lu Jiu was a little surprised and couldn't help but look at Xu Yin twice.

The boy looked at him with starry eyes and smiled sweetly at him.

Because he was too sincere, Lu Jiu also nodded for the first time since he stepped into this place.

"Don't be fooled by his naivety," Wei Nanlou poured a bucket of cold water on him the next second, "His belly is full of his own thoughts."

Lu Jiu: “…………”

"There is another person," Wei Nanlou's eyes swept to the right side of a group of orcs gathered together, "He is the orc who was offered to Xu Ning by the bird tribe. His name is Ran Ye."

Xuning, is this the name of the little emperor now?

Lu Jiu followed Wei Nanlou's gaze and immediately caught sight of the young man who stood out from the crowd.

The other party was very tall, with a pair of white wings that were very conspicuous.

He had his back to Lu Jiu, but perhaps because he felt Lu Jiu's gaze, he turned his face slightly.

The next second after meeting Lu Jiu's eyes, he turned his head away fiercely.

The deliberate avoidance made Lu Jiu suspicious.

…

That’s the general introduction.

Perhaps because they were free, someone finally came over to talk to them.

It's a human male and an orc female.

The man put his arm around the woman's waist. Apart from Wei Nanlou, he was one of the few human nobles in this situation who openly showed consideration for his orc partner.

After he came over, he extended his hand to Wei Nanlou respectfully: "Duke, long time no see."

Wei Nanlou stretched out his hand and shook hands with him.

The two men started chatting - obviously, Wei Nanlou was not incapable of discussing serious matters in such an occasion.

"Hello, my name is Bai Yue, you can call me A Yue," A Yue spoke to Lu Jiu in a gentle voice, "Can I call you Jiu Jiu?"

"sure."

"Jiujiu, why are you here with the Duke?" A Yue asked in a low voice, "With the Duke's support, you don't have to come, right?"

"What about you guys?" Lu Jiu couldn't help but ask, "If you don't want to come, can't you just not come?"

A Yue shook her head regretfully: "We can't afford to offend Count Beren. We won't come every time, but it's not good to refuse all the time."

Lu Jiu understood.

He chatted with A Yue for a while and asked casually, "Do you know that Ran Ye?"

"Are you talking about His Majesty's friend?" Ah Yue looked at the young bird man. "I can only say that I know him, but I haven't spoken to him much."

"He is His Majesty's man. Does he have to come to such an occasion?"

"I don't know either. Theoretically, he doesn't have to come, but he always shows up," A Yue paused and said tactfully, "...not every orc is unwilling to come here."

This sentence seemed to confirm what Wei Nanlou had just said.

Lu Jiu was silent again.

After a while, applause sounded, and Count Beren walked to the middle of the banquet room. As the organizer of the banquet, he loudly announced the start of the routine entertainment activity - a fighting match.

Suddenly, the nobles became excited, but the orcs reacted differently.

Some looked eager to try, while others looked resistant and afraid.

Lu Jiu observed everyone calmly, especially Ran Ye.

Ran Ye's performance was quite calm, but some orcs around him were scared to the point of crying.

Ran Ye spoke to them with a frown, looking like a leader. After hearing his words, the orcs' faces turned paler.

Finally, Ran Ye pushed two of the orcs out.

The conversation that just took place between them was as follows:

"Ran Ye, we don't want to go up, can we not go up?"

"Hold back your fear! Only by winning the favor of these nobles can we make them relax their vigilance and act accordingly," Ran Ye lowered his voice, "Believe me, these human nobles who are laughing at us now will surely suffer a miserable fall in the future!"

*

People gradually moved to the corridor behind the banquet hall. Outside the corridor was a courtyard where the fighting competition was held.

Lu Jiu always stayed where he was.

Looking across the crowd, he almost frowned as he watched the game.

The two orcs who were pushed out faced each other tremblingly, and punched and kicked each other at the instigation and orders of the nobles.

At the beginning, they held back on their strength, fearing to hurt each other. However, with shouts of "We can only stop when one of us dies" and "Use harder, haven't you eaten?", they became more and more ferocious and hysterical.

Gradually, they seemed to really regard each other as enemies that must be defeated, and every attack they launched was fierce.

The group of orcs led by Ran Ye all huddled behind him.

Ran Ye stood at the front with his arms folded across his chest, watching seriously.

Some of the orcs behind him closed their eyes, some lowered their heads, all showing expressions of pity.

At some point, Wei Nanlou and A Yue's partner stopped talking and the air became very quiet.

Lu Jiu turned his head.

Wei Nanlou looked at him calmly.

After a moment, Lu Jiu pursed her lips and turned back.

...At the end of the first fight, the defeated orc was bruised and fell into a coma.

Two servants carried him away as if he were a large object.

The winner seemed to come to his senses only at this moment, realized what he had done, and left in a hurry.

…

It doesn't end with just one game.

But one after another.

The nobles drank more and more excitedly, and they forced the orcs to go forward. The violence and blood seemed to be a more powerful intoxicant than alcohol, making them forget everything else.

They even forgot that the Duke was present at the banquet tonight.

The few nobles who remained in the banquet hall occasionally glanced outside, and occasionally glanced at the man in the distance whose emotions could not be determined. Finally, they looked at each other, shook their heads, and decided not to join in the fun outside tonight.

…

Cheers rang out, and another orc fell.

The winner was particularly brave this time. He shouted, "I can play again. I want to choose my opponent!"

One noble asked with a smile: "Who do you want to challenge?"

"I want to challenge the Duke's lover!"

As soon as these words were spoken, all the laughter was cut off in an instant.

Everyone was stunned and stared at him, thinking they had heard it wrong.

The orc repeated, "I want to challenge the Duke's lover, Lu Jiu."

This is a very strong orc, perhaps from the bear or tiger tribe. In any case, there is no racial feature to be found from his appearance. Only his muscular body reveals his strength.

He looked through the gap in the crowd and cast his gaze at Lu Jiu with a provocative tone.

"I don't know, do you dare to come?"

…

In the corridor, Ran Ye did not look back, but he exchanged a quick glance with the orc.

And at the back of the crowd, in the banquet hall which seemed rather empty at the moment, the air seemed to be sucked out in an instant.

“…”A Yue and her partner came back to their senses.

They both gasped and turned their heads to look - to look at Lu Jiu and Wei Nanlou.

There was no trace of emotion on the expressions of these two people.

It's just that the Duke's calmness at this moment seems a little different from Lu Jiu's calmness.

No one knew where the orc got the courage from, but everyone could already feel that the Duke's presence at the banquet tonight was purely to make an exception for Lu Jiu, and when he spoke again, this stupid and provocative orc would be thrown out of this place directly...

But Lu Jiu put down his arms.

He put down the glass of grape juice that had returned to his hand earlier and was almost empty.

The empty wine glass hit the table with a click.

When Wei Nanlou heard the voice, his eyes turned, he looked at his movements, raised his eyes and looked directly at him: "You are pregnant."

At such a close distance, A Yue and her partner were further stunned when they heard these four calm and clear words.

Lu Jiu smiled and said, "Don't worry."

He twisted his wrist and said, "Wei Nanlou, you haven't had those dreams yet, right?"

Wei Nanlou narrowed his eyes.

Lu Jiu knew.

In fact, as early as when they first met, he realized that something was wrong with this world.

This man hadn't had those dreams about their past.

"It's okay," Lu Jiu said softly, "It's time for you to remember."

He took a step forward towards the courtyard.

"Look at me carefully."