Chapter 21

Chapter 21

* * *

“Lady Roxana, will you be going to the toy room now?”

“No, I wish to stop by the incubation chamber first.”

Three days had passed since I first helped disinfect Cassis’ wounds. Each day was pretty much like every other. I would personally deliver each of his three meals, as I believed my visits also served to help him keep better track of the time. Since I couldn’t tend to all of his medical needs, I had a doctor visit him regularly. Besides, I had other matters which required my attention.

One of which was to visit the incubation chamber, a space that’s primary feature was its warmth and humidity. The muggy air hovered heavily over the enclosure. Originally a greenhouse for Lante’s toxic plants, it had been converted into an incubation chamber for the poison butterflies. Of course, the place was still teeming with plants that were spewing poisonous fumes. If I had to guess, I’d say a normal person would probably last about 10 seconds before keeling over, but the pungent toxicity of its atmosphere hardly bothered me.

I winded my way through the deadly and overgrowing greenery until I came to a thorn bush with a black egg nestled inside of it. The egg had grown to about the size of my two fists held together. I grazed the dagger I had brought with me over my forearm without hesitating for even a moment. The sharp edge sliced cleanly through my skin, leaving only a slight sting and a string of red beads in its wake.

Drip, drip.

As the crimson droplets fell onto the black egg, the shell turned dark maroon as it absorbed the blood I was feeding it.

“Bon appetite. And if possible, please hurry up and grow.”

In the beginning, I had three poison butterfly eggs, but at that point, I only had a single unhatched one left. The chance of successfully breeding them was roughly 30 percent, so I suppose it wasn’t that much of a surprise. They were basically demons, which meant that locating their eggs already wasn’t a picnic, so breeding them for the purpose of controlling them was an even greater risk.

In order to etch loyalty into the butterflies’ minds, they needed to feed on their master’s blood regularly. And as their name indicated, the other nutrient they required to hatch successfully came from the poison in the air surrounding them. The old greenhouse for toxic plants thus served as the perfect incubation chamber for my precious butterflies. Of course, my blood, which had been infused with poison for years, also helped the little beasts’ growth. Not to mention, I had been ingesting even more poison than usual lately specifically to hurry them along.

In the novel, the person who originally found the poison butterfly eggs was a protagonist known as the White Demon Tamer. As a character with the ability to tame monsters and demons, he discovered the poison butterflies’ lair and eventually succeeded in hatching the eggs. Since I remembered the location of the lair from the book, I sent Emily to find the eggs for me. Breeding and taming magical beasts and demons takes a special kind of skill, which I had never learned. But I figured that if I could instill in the eggs that I was their master during the embryonic stage, there was a chance my plan to have multiple methods of protection would be possible. Even if my efforts failed it would be no huge loss, so I had Emily bring the eggs home, then fed them my blood.

Having absorbed a good amount of my blood, this particular egg was already covered in a red sheen. After quickly stanching the cut, I carefully caressed the egg’s shell. As soon as I did, I felt a warmth transfer to my hand as if from a living creature. The egg could hatch at any moment.

* * *

From the incubation chamber, I went straight to Cassis’ room.

“Lunchtime!” I called out.

The menu that day was chicken stew, multigrain bread, and fruit. Since any food that require a fork or knife was prohibited, what I could give him was limited.

“I don’t know why you bother bringing the food yourself every time.”

He spoke somewhat icily, but there was no real sharpness to his tone. Most of the time he was calm and cooperative.

As Cassis was sitting on his bed, I brought the food over to him. Just as I had set the tray down and was about to back away, I felt a sudden need to vomit. A dry heave escaped from my mouth, and then...

Drip, drip.

I immediately covered my mouth with my hand, but dark blood was already dripping from between my fingers and onto the floor. I supposed the stomach pains I had experienced the previous day after taking the poison Emily brought me were acting up again. I accepted that explanation as I casually wiped my mouth with my sleeve.

Clink.

I looked up to see Cassis staring at me. His face was rigid from shock. Judging from his wide-eyed stare, it was clearly an unexpected sight for him. The clink of the tray dropping back onto his bed was evidence enough of that.

“You...”

He began to speak as if he had something urgent to say, but then seemed to sputter as if he was at a loss for words.

“W-W... Was that... b-blood?”

“Oh... Sorry.”

Seeing him like that, I couldn’t help but apologize. That small spectacle must have been quite upsetting for him.

“Hope I didn’t ruin your appetite.”

I’d be uncomfortable too if someone suddenly spewed blood in front of me just as I was about to eat. Perhaps I had thoroughly disgusted him. My lack of concern only seemed to further unsettle Cassis for his voice was filled with confusion as he continued to speak.

“It’s not that. Did you just... spew blood?”

“Yes, but... it’s nothing to worry about. Really.”

I raised my sleeve to my mouth in an attempt to hide the sight of my blood from him. As there was no mirror in the room, I couldn’t be sure if I had wiped away all traces of it. One thing was for certain though—my sleeve was soaked. Cassis’ eyes remained fixed on the bloodstain.

“You call coughing up blood nothing to worry about?”

He sounded incredulous, but then his face became even more somber.

“Mhm. This sort of thing...”

I stalled for a moment as I considered what to say.

“This sort of thing happens all the time.”

I didn’t feel much need to go into specifics about what I meant though. I actually worried that if I explained to him that all Agreces consumed poison from childhood it might actually be counterproductive. What if he once again began to consider me as no different from the rest of my evil clan for being able to drink poison like water? Still, perhaps I shouldn’t have been so blasé about it. It may have served me better had I acted shocked or even swooned at the sight of all that blood. Oh, well... No use crying over spilled milk. Seeing another cough up blood was so commonplace at the Agrece household that I hadn’t given a second thought to how it might appear to Cassis.

“This happens all the time?”

At this point Cassis was noticeably frowning.

“As I recall, last time you also...”

Huh? What “last time”?

Had I coughed up blood in front of him before? I couldn’t recall any such thing. On top of that, Cassis had stopped mid-sentence, which left me hanging on edge. Still, the most important takeaway from this entire exchange was...

“Are you worried about me?”

I asked while gazing at him. He seemed stunned for a moment but managed to recover.

“Worried? Why should I be?”

His face was already returning to its standard stony appearance.

“Anyone would be startled at the sight of someone suddenly coughing up blood,” he added icily. If looks could freeze, I might have become an ice sculpture at that very moment.

He was basically in total denial that I had worried him, but I instinctively felt that the timing couldn’t have been more perfect to engage him.

“Ah, I see... It’s just that with this sort of thing not being all that uncommon to me, I thought it might be shocking to someone else.”

Cassis seemed to be the type who was considerate of the weak and not at all afraid of the powerful. If that was the case, then a damsel-in-distress approach would be necessary with him.

“I thought you hated me, but I see now that you even care for your enemy, so thank you for,” I punctuated the last part with a wan smile tinged with bittersweet regret, “being so kind.”

That left him looking truly stumped for words. I did have my doubts about whether the damsel-in-distress thing would work considering I had punched him out cold repeatedly not that long ago.

Sigh... Still, there was a chance he might have forgotten all about that, so I decided to journey on. Besides, he had been nearly blind at the time.

“Well, I should be running along now.”

I had figured a wistful exit would seal the deal. I also felt my leaving would allow Cassis to have his meal without any further disturbance.

“I’m sorry to have shocked you.”

I said it quickly, then turned to go. He’d been watching me rather stiffly the entire time—his face looking almost grim—but for some reason that rigid gaze of his is what lingered with me long afterward.