Chapter 117 "Are you implying that I should pursue you...?"
I turned my head shakily and looked at the disfigured criminal again. "Is he... the one we saw at the island slave auction?"
At the slave auction, one male slave stood out from the crowd; his physique, appearance, and the gift of a man in his lower abdomen, bestowed by heaven, were all exceptional.
He is truly a man among men, the best of the best.
“Yes,” the Elf King replied, “I used to hate it when you stared at him there.”
"Could there be a misunderstanding? How could a man like that be..."
“He is the lover of the leader of the slave revolt,” the Elf King interrupted me. “You can interrogate him severely.”
A quarter of an hour later, I ordered my men to bring the male slave to the interrogation room. The Elf King had already left.
The interrogation room also served as a torture chamber, with various instruments of torture hanging on the walls, gleaming menacingly in the firelight.
A basin of ice water was poured to wake the unconscious male slave. An armored guard held a red-hot branding iron, waiting for my order to scald his body.
His limbs were chained to the wall, and there was a large fire burning beneath him.
For some reason, I suddenly remembered Bernard, who was imprisoned in Castle Black—the Bernard I first saw in horror comics, was imprisoned in the same way.
I told myself not to pity him, otherwise I wouldn't achieve my goal, but I still couldn't help looking at him with sympathetic eyes.
"Put him down," I said.
“I’m sorry, madam,” the armored guard saluted me, “the king said that he must not be put down.”
“Then go to the side.” I walked to the brazier and tried to reason with the male slave who had just woken up and whose hair was disheveled. “If you are willing to tell me who the leader of the riot is, you can suffer less physical pain.”
With a "pfft," he actually spat a mouthful of bloody saliva in my face. I covered my face and backed away in terror.
The armored guard viciously branded his chest with a hot iron, and he let out a miserable howl.
Half an hour later, I left the interrogation room in frustration.
His body was made of flesh and blood, but his mouth was as hard as steel. No matter how I tried to persuade him with gentle persuasion, or how the armored guards tried to pry his mouth open with torture, all attempts failed.
Fifteen minutes later, the Elf King received a report: "She went to the library?"
“Yes, Your Majesty, Lady Lanna went to the library without even having dinner, and at the same time asked me to request your permission to visit her in prison,” a guard replied politely.
"Visiting in prison?"
"She said she wanted to see her comrades who had been imprisoned."
The Elf King pondered for a few minutes, then said, "Yes."
"Yes." The guard acknowledged the order and left.
The dark, damp dungeon was much better than the "eighteen levels of hell" we'd just been in. I spoke to Deira through the bars. Beatrice huddled in a corner, secretly watching us. Hya and Dailin were imprisoned in another dungeon.
Both Deira and Atresia looked haggard with messy hair, but they were in good spirits.
"How can we get a prisoner to talk?" I told Di Yaruo about my troubles.
“Oh, that’s not your forte,” Di Yaruo laughed. “Why don’t you make good use of your strengths?”
“I don’t have any strengths,” I said.
"You've got several of the most powerful men on this continent completely captivated by you; that's your forte."
"They only care about my superpowers."
“I don’t know whether I should refute that,” Di Yaruo thought for a moment before saying, “Maybe it’s because of your rarity, since you come from another place. If I were you, I would have followed King Sarga. If other men still have feelings for me, I would have stirred up their conflicts and profited from them.”
I laughed out loud. "Do you think all men are lovestruck fools? Their love is only effective when it doesn't affect their own interests."
Di Yaruo suddenly stopped talking and stared at me quietly. I waved my hand in front of her eyes a few times. "Not going to talk anymore?"
“If I had thought like you ten years ago,” Di Yaruo slowly began, “I might not have been locked up.”
I'm curious, she doesn't seem like the type to be love-struck, how could she suffer such a loss?
“To answer your initial question,” she said, “I usually get prisoners to talk using only punishment, painful physical torture, which will make them eager to speak.”
Stepping out of the dungeon, I felt I had gained nothing.
"May I ask who Diya Ruo is?" In the midnight room, the Elf King had once again resumed his habit of sleeping naked on my sofa. I, wearing a bathrobe, sat on the bed and asked him.
"Do you know that the Western Regions were once fragmented?" the Elf King answered me. "Diyaro's father was the lord of one of the large territories, second only in size to the current King of the Western Regions."
The Elf King suddenly stopped talking, and I got anxious. "And then?"
"I'll tell you if you come to me." He actually cunningly started negotiating with me.
I had no choice but to come to his side and sit on the other side of the sofa. Only then did he lazily continue, "When Di Yaruo was still a princess, she had a great fondness for handsome men and slept with every handsome man around her, not even sparing the hearts of her sisters. In the end, she even slept with her stepmother's secret lover. Her stepmother was furious and secretly sowed discord between Di Yaruo and her father, even encouraging her father to marry Di Yaruo off to a lord in a desolate land. Di Yaruo was extremely angry and planned an incident to stage the rape and murder of her stepmother, but it failed, and her stepmother turned the tables on her, exposing all of Di Yaruo's schemes..."
As he spoke, he moved closer and closer to me. I tried to back away, but he still managed to corner me against the sofa.
“From then on, Di Ya Ruo was imprisoned by her father,” he suddenly hugged me tightly, his strength so great that I couldn’t break free, “and he was imprisoned for two years. During this time, Di Ya Ruo’s father also fell out with his stepmother because he discovered that his stepmother had a lover. Seeing that they were growing increasingly estranged, his stepmother decided to strike first, joining forces with her lover and making contact with another great lord in the West, who was also the great-grandfather of the current King of the West, to conspire to overthrow Di Ya Ruo’s father’s rule.”
He was talking while tossing my hair. I was getting impatient and wanted to run away, but there was nowhere to escape.
He continued with a smile, "The plan succeeded, but the only real beneficiary was the great-grandfather of the current Western King. He colluded with Di Ya Ruo's stepmother and her lover to poison Di Ya Ruo's father at the banquet. According to the original plan, Di Ya Ruo's stepmother and her lover would control the entire capital city, and the Western King's great-grandfather would lead the army to conquer the other subordinate capital cities. However, unexpectedly, this great-grandfather secretly conspired with his stepmother's lover, using his stepmother as a weapon to kill the main nobles of the capital city and directly attack the capital city."
I was stunned, forgetting that he was kissing my hair. "So this territory has now fallen into the hands of the great-grandfather of the Western King?"
“They only captured the largest royal city and two smaller ones under its jurisdiction.” He stroked my hair and kissed the back of my neck. “Because Diya’s uncle received a secret message and rushed back with 50,000 troops—his private army, which he had secretly gathered and trained while in exile. This uncle, along with other surviving nobles, did their utmost to defend about half of the other territories, preserving the royal cities within that half. Afterward, the uncle lied and claimed he was going to hold a wedding for Diya and his son, but the groom turned out to be himself. To rightfully ascend the throne, the uncle insisted on marrying the former king, the only daughter of his half-brother.”
I've heard this story before; Di Yaruo once told it to me.
A cool night breeze brushed against my skin, a stark contrast to the fiery kiss on the back of my neck.
I suddenly snapped out of it and pushed him away forcefully, but he took the opportunity to kiss my neck and then my chin. I quickly used my hands to stop him, but he kissed my lips. Just as I was about to stop him again, he moved faster and grabbed both of my hands with one hand.
His lips intertwined with mine, sucking and licking. I tried to escape several times, but I couldn't.
His kiss was forceful and wild, like a cheetah, unrestrained and wild, pressing me tightly.
His breath was hot and intense, carrying an intoxicating aroma.
His body temperature was rising, and my breathing was becoming increasingly erratic. "If I were you," he said, biting my lip, his voice low, magnetic, and slightly husky, "I would take Di Yaruo's advice, follow me first, and then stir up conflict among the other men to profit from it."
"No..." I gasped for breath.
"Why?"
"I...I don't want to."
Another gust of night wind drifted in through the French windows that weren't fully closed, and it brushed against our faces. He suddenly let go of me. "What a spoilsport."
He strode out of the room, his tall, muscular body bare.
I slept alone on the sofa that night.
As dawn broke and the first rays of morning sunlight touched my face, I woke up. Barefoot on the carpet, I drew back all the curtains that were half-open.
My head is spinning, and I'm still a bit dazed.
The door opened, and I turned around to see the Elf King, clad in a magnificent snow robe, standing in the doorway. Sunlight shone on his golden eyes, making them sparkle.
He strode towards me and suddenly pulled me into his arms. "I'm sorry, I was too rough with you last night."
He held me tightly again, and that suffocating feeling of being squeezed came over me once more.
"Alright, I forgive you, let me go." I quickly pushed him away forcefully.
He looked at me with a wronged expression and innocent eyes, "I just wanted to hug you."
“I know, but you’re using too much force,” I tried to explain tactfully, “It’s making it hard for me to breathe.”
Are you implying that I pursued you too aggressively?
I stared at him in surprise. "I don't know."
"I'll try to relax a bit more in the future. Will that make things easier for you?"
"I have no idea."
He looked at me intently, the light in his golden eyes dazzling and mesmerizing.
"I will never be your ordinary friend, nor will I ever be your subordinate, and it is impossible for us to have a pure friendship, never." He said bluntly.
Suddenly, without any restraint, he kissed my lips again, fiercely, forcefully, and wildly. I was kissed until I finally collapsed into his arms, my heart in turmoil, my mind intoxicated, and I was swept up in his arms and carried to the soft bed with its light blue curtains fluttering...
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Author's Note: Please also support my novels "Cinderella Wants a Thrilling Novel Script," "A Love of Ice and Fire," and "All the World's Male Gods Are in Love with Me"!
Bring on the nutrient solution, comments, and landmines! Hehe~~
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