A light shone in the sky, blinding everything for a moment. Then, the princess' silhouette was not seen in the highest flying pavilion where the Prince Samael and Victor were seated.
The light glowed in the top floor of the large tower they were in.
"Yes!"
This was something he only planned a whim and had a large chance of not happening.
It's one of the many possibilities Varian played out in his hand and kept it as a tactic to use if some very specific set of conditions were satisfied.
Without any hesitation, Varian headed to Adsher, grabbed the most precious set of artifacts.
Then, he walked into a private room, created a clone and sent it up the tower. Simultaneously, he hid himself with utmost focus.
If things really went wrong, then his clone would just die. And he'd be treated as an arrogant employee who deserved to die.
From then, he'd just have to wait for an opportune moment during the duels to quietly kill someone and change his identity.
'But honestly, I hope it goes as planned.'
There were no private guards stopping the clone. After all, no one had the guts to cause any ruckus in the presence of the princes.
Every professional here did their best not to offend anyone to keep their life intact and acted very cautiously.
So, no one ended up stopping him from reaching the highest floor.
Because of the sheer presence of the princess, the floor was glittering in green.
"Excuse me, Princess." Varian knocked on the large door in a polite manner.
"…Do you want to die?" A very harsh voice replied.
Considering she's challenged and about to get killed, this was already impressive.
But it might've also got to do with the fact that he's carrying so many 'tokens' of the princes and princesses who were impressed with his performance.
They said he could use a token for a reasonable request.
A bunch of these tokens also had the aura of Princess Eshala's underlings.
'Prince Victor is not a stupid brute with no smartness, but compared with Princess Eshala, he might as well be one.'
Under this weird situation where an appraiser had so many tokens of her followers and even dared to knock on her door, the wise Eshala decided to give him a chance, as expected.
"Princess, I have a proposal to speak of." Varian's clone spoke with a bright smile. "Huh?" A killing intent locked onto the clone, causing it to instantly kneel.
Eshala now decided to kill him and was giving him one last chance to see if he could give a proper justification to spare him.
"Clause 35C, a factional leader may only be challenged by ranked princes.
43D, only the winner of the ranking duel who is not already a faction leader has the right to request a duel with the leader.
51F, consecutive holdings of challenges should be seperated by atleast five centuries."
Varian's clone spoke eloquently, spitting facts that shouldn't make any difference to him.
The killing intent on him intensified and the clone's skull began to crack.
"What do you intend to say?"
"I…I can fight out the strongest ranked prince, use my racial talent to inflict a serious injury and render them unable to challenge you. The match will hence be cancelled for half a millennia."
"Why would I need your puny help?"
The clone's legs burst into blood and bones, causing it to collapse. Then its arms turned into fine red dust. Yet, it kept speaking with a determined expression.
"If you didn't, this competition would have never begun in the first place."
"…" The dissolving torso froze for a moment before Varian's arms and legs came together with the reversal of time.
Clutching his arms and legs, he stood up with a tense face.
The door opened with a creak, revealing a dangerous woman in a starry black dress.
Before he knew it, he was pulled inside. Eshala took a deep look at him and Varian held his breath, hoping for everything to go fine.
His disguise was not perfect but with the additional help of four slivers, he should be able to pull this off.
Of course, his avatar couldn't exert his true strength and that might cause problems if Eshala wanted to check his strength here.
Then his plan would still fail and he'd have to keep hiding.
Thankfully, she didn't do that.
"Your stealth truly is impressive. If I didn't look carefully, I would've never imaged you to be a divine ranker."
"The princess has a sharp eyesight."
It was a flaw he deliberately revealed but he had to pretend to be caught. Others might've felt embarassed to act that out but Varian felt absolutely not hesitation.
None at all!
"Still, unless you're a strong peak rank 1, you're going to die. What a waste." Eshala clicked her tongue.
Varian was very tense facing her but even in that moment of tension, he felt that something was off.
'Why…why is she so nonchalant about this? Shouldn't she be more worried?'
He swallowed his saliva, hoping it wasn't something that would flip his plan entirely.
"Like I said earlier, even if I can't win, I can use my racial talent to inflict a lasting injury. Since it's directly tied to soul, no one here can heal it without a few decades of work."
"Hmm~" Eshala leaned back in her chair, glancing at him from head to toe.
Varian shivered instinctively, his body screaming at him to run away. But he stood in place stubbornly.
With a snap of her fingers, a barrier was set up around the room. With another snap, a huge pressure pressed down on Varian.
"Kuk!"
With a groan, the divine power in his body exploded, resisting the pressure that would've instantly crushed him to death.
Unlike the calculated moves outside the door, this one was a real killer move. Eshala wanted him to fight back with all his power and she got what she wanted.