Chapter 30: Elise Sauron
Lumien didn’t go straight to reunite with his family. Instead, he took a detour to the men’s bathroom.
He knew that if he returned in his current state, it wouldn’t take a genius to figure out something was wrong with him.
His emotions were all over the place, and he was struggling to keep his facial expression from showing how deeply the red-haired woman’s words had affected him.
Even after leaving, her words kept echoing in his mind like an unceasing alarm.
In his two lives, his self-esteem had never taken a blow this severe.
To think she saw me as nothing more than a gigolo; a tool to help her reach her goals before discarding me when I was no longer useful...
Was I really as foolish as she said, viewing virginity as something special?
Lumien let out a heavy sigh and leaned over the sink, splashing his face with cold water.
The icy shock against his skin brought a moment of clarity.
Bloody hell, why do I have to sulk like a little girl?! It’s not like I was the one losing here. If anything, I came out on top. She’s an incredibly stunning woman, and I got to be her first partner.
And let’s be honest: how many men can say their first was with someone as breathtaking as her?
In my past life, I probably wouldn’t have had a chance with a woman even a quarter as beautiful as her. And yet, here I am, with her, a woman who is certainly more beautiful than an actress. Shouldn’t I be happy? Glad that my first time was with someone so extraordinary?
After a while, his gaze shifted to his reflection in the mirror. Slowly, his mouth curved into a smile, but that smile had a hint of bitterness.
...
When Lumien returned to his family, they didn’t seem to notice anything unusual about him and carried on with their departure as planned. Of course, before leaving, they had to bid farewell to the house owner, Duke Sauron.
Somehow, the red-haired woman had returned to the Duke’s side and was now standing beside him. Lumien’s body tensed for a moment, but he quickly forced himself to relax and assume a normal posture.
When it was their family’s turn to greet the Duke, Lumien’s parents didn’t hide their curious glances at the red-haired woman.
However, they quickly averted their gazes out of politeness. After a brief exchange of formalities, the family soon left the mansion.
Until the very end, Duke Sauron never introduced the red-haired woman standing beside him. Lumien’s family, understanding the unspoken etiquette, refrained from inquiring about her identity. If the Duke had wished to reveal her to them, he would have initiated the introduction himself. Since he chose not to, they wisely decided not to press the matter or risk overstepping their bounds.
However, that didn’t stop them from speculating about her identity.
As they walked down the stairs, Eleanor couldn’t hold back her curiosity. "Who do you think the woman beside the Duke is, Leonard?"
Leonard took a moment to consider before answering, "For the Duke to place her at his side so openly, it must mean she holds some importance. Could she be his mistress?"
It was well-known among the nobles, that even before the passing of Duchess Sauron, Duke Sauron had a reputation as a womanizer. He was said to change women as often as he changed clothes, with rumors claiming his mistresses could populate a small village.
"His mistress? But she looks as young as Azalea!" Eleanor nearly exclaimed, only to quickly clamp her mouth shut, remembering they were still within the Duke’s domain.
At that moment, Azalea spoke up thoughtfully. "I don’t think she’s his mistress. She’s more likely a relative. She has red hair, the Sauron family trademark."
"That’s true," Eleanor nodded in agreement. "She must be a close relative for the Duke to place her by his side. But why does she only appear now, not yesterday in parties?"
"Maybe she doesn’t like parties," Azalea said with a shrug.
While Lumien’s family chatted amiably on their way out, the atmosphere inside the mansion shifted drastically once the last of the nobles had departed. When the mansion’s door closed, the refreshing morning air inside seemed to grow heavy, turning suffocating.
The servants, who had been cheerful and polite just moments ago, now seemed like entirely different people. Their smiles disappeared, replaced by blank, emotionless expressions. Their lips pressed into thin, firm lines, and their eyes became cold and indifferent. They moved stiffly, like puppets being controlled by invisible strings.
"Return," a cold, emotionless voice echoed through the hall. At the command, the servants moved in perfect sync, scattering to stations, as if following a pre-planned routine.
In the center of the now-empty hall, Duke Sauron stood, watching the servants disappear into the shadows. A cold, unsettling smile tugged at his lips. He turned to the red-haired woman beside him. Without warning, he roughly grabbed her chin.
The red-haired woman flinched, trying to pull her face away, but her body felt weak, her strength gone. She couldn’t avoid his hand and was forced to let him hold her. She glared at him, her teeth showing up in anger.
"You know," Duke Sauron said with a cold smirk, "the look on your face right now reminds me so much of your mother. Ah, I can almost picture her expression... her smile... her screams—"
"Shut up!" she roared, her voice filled with rage, her eyes bloodshot with fury.
Her right hand clenched into a tight fist, and a layer of blazing orange flames engulfed it like a fiery glove. Without hesitation, she moved like lightning, aiming a punch straight at his head.
The Duke’s smile widened. He didn’t flinch or make any move to avoid her attack.
Crack!
A sharp cracking noise echoed loudly. Strangely, the Duke didn’t look like he was hurt, and his cheekbones showed no sign of damage. Instead, it was the red-haired woman who quickly pulled back her fist, wincing. The cracking noise, it had actually come from her own finger bones fractured!
She sucked in a sharp breath, her body trembling as waves of pain shot through her hand. Instinctively, she almost cried out, but the thought of giving the man before her any satisfaction stopped her. She clenched her jaw tightly, swallowing the scream that threatened to escape. Instead, she bit down hard on her lip, forcing herself to endure the pain.
"Tsk, tsk. Of all things, why would you insist on inheriting your mother’s bad traits?"
"Look at this; now your fingers are broken. How do you plan to explain this to your fiancé next week, Elise?"
"Elise?"
Lumien sat dumbfounded on his bed, staring at the translucent display of the system screen hovering before him.
After returning to his family estate, Lumien was in no mood to hang around the estate and promptly headed to his room. With Azalea on the verge of a breakthrough and needing to consolidate her mana, she was too preoccupied to bother him. For once, he was left completely alone.
Once in his room, curiosity got the better of him, and he summoned the system. As much as he detested the red-haired woman, he couldn’t just shake the memory of their passionate moment the previous night easily as he promised to her.
It was precisely because of this lingering thought that he realized he should have earned significant rewards for completing so many quests.
The moment he summoned the system, multiple transparent screens materialized in front of him, rows of glowing text filling the air.
<Daily Quest (Ejaculation) Complete: 1 free Stat Point granted>
<Daily Quest (Blowjob) Complete: 2 free Stat Points granted>
<Daily Quest (Creampie) Complete: 3 free Stat Points granted>
That’s right, after completing his first quest, the system had surprisingly introduced two additional daily quests. At the time, Lumien had lamented the lack of tasks, but when the new ones appeared, he was immediately overwhelmed. Given his timid nature and lack of experience interacting with women, he had dismissed the latter two quests as utterly impossible.
But, who would’ve thought he’d manage to complete all three quests in a single day and that too just two weeks after?
"Six points in total... this feels like a dream," Lumien muttered, staring at the glowing screen. "Damn, not only did I get a blowjob from her, but I also creampied her? Maybe... maybe I really am the one who benefited the most out of all this."
Suddenly, he let out a sigh. "There’s no way I’ll be able to pull this off again anytime soon."
He believed the moment of last night was a rare stroke of luck; a one-time blessing from the heavens. Surely, lightning wouldn’t strike twice, and he wouldn’t hit another jackpot anytime soon.
Of course, this assumption was based on his current unwillingness to change. If he truly wanted to, completing the two quests would be fairly easy. He could simply visit the red-light district and hire a prostitute. Yet, the thought of doing so never appealed to him. No matter how convenient it seemed, the idea lacked any spark of interest or excitement for him.
As this thought crossed his mind, his eyes fell on something he hadn’t noticed before. A faint line of text, barely visible beneath the last two daily quests.
The text read:
*Quest can only be completed with a Harem Member.
"Huh?" Lumien muttered, squinting at the screen. "Damn, this feels like one of those trap ads where they plaster the cheap price in huge, bold letters but hide the terms and conditions in microscopic print."
"Anyway, from the looks of it, these two quests can only be completed with a harem member. But I didn’t have one to begin with, how do I complete it in the first place?"
Suddenly he let out a nervous laugh.
"Haha, there’s no way that red-haired woman became my harem member, right? I mean, I don’t even remember inviting her to join or anything."
His gaze instinctively drifted to the system display of his status. His breath hitched as his eyes landed on a glaring "1" under the section for contracted harem members—a number that had previously been a comforting "0."
"What the...?" he muttered, his heart pounding.
He willed the system to show more details. Almost immediately, the interface shifted, revealing a name that felt both strangely familiar and unfamiliar to him.
"Elise Sauron."
