Starting With an SSS-Rank Goddess Summon!

Chapter 215: Going Home

Lia slammed directly into his torso, wrapping her small arms as tightly as she possibly could around his waist.

She buried her face completely into the thick fabric of his dark shirt, squeezing her eyes shut.

Silas wrapped his arms around her, resting his calloused hand gently on the back of her head, pulling her close.

"I missed you," Lia mumbled into his chest, her voice slightly muffled by the coat.

"I missed you too, Lia..." Silas replied softly, resting his chin on the top of her head.

They stood there for a long moment, completely ignoring the dozens of staring whispering academy students surrounding them.

Then, Lia suddenly pulled her head back. She wrinkled her nose, looking up at him with a deeply offended expression.

"Ugh," Lia complained loudly, taking a half-step back and waving her hand in front of her face. "Big brother, you smell terrible! You smell like burnt rocks and dirty dogs!"

Silas blinked, then let out a highly genuine, barking laugh.

"Yeah, that’s fair," Silas agreed, looking down at his ruined coat. "That would be the scent of dead gods, pulverized sand, and monster guts. It hasn’t been a very glamorous week."

Lia’s eyes darted away from his coat and landed entirely on the massive, completely absurd vehicle idling silently right behind him.

Her jaw dropped.

She slowly walked around Silas, her eyes wide with awe as she took in the sleek, matte-black curves, the wide tires, and the glowing silver runes of the Zenith IVR.

"Silas..." Lia breathed out, reaching out to gently touch the cold mythril plating. "What is this?"

"It’s a car, Lia," Silas replied dryly, leaning casually against the open gull-wing door.

"I know it’s a car!" Lia snapped, looking back at him with wide eyes. "But it looks like a spaceship! You actually bought a car?! That means you must have gotten a whole lot of wealth in the Secret Realm, right?!"

Silas internally winced.

He did not want to explain to his teenage sister that a psychopathic aristocratic Ice Queen had essentially emotionally blackmailed him into accepting a multi-million-credit supercar as a twisted romantic investment.

That was a conversation he was never, ever going to have.

"Yeah," Silas lied smoothly, crossing his arms and nodding his head. "We cleared the Vault and found some decent loot so I sold it to the Association."

Lia’s eyes narrowed slightly. She looked at the incredibly advanced anti-gravity thrusters mounted beneath the chassis.

"How much did this thing cost?" Lia asked suspiciously.

Silas didn’t even hesitate.

He deployed the most basic survival tactic: he lied through his teeth with unblinking confidence.

"Five hundred thousand Spirit Credits," Silas stated firmly. "And I bought it used. The previous owner was a Lord who didn’t like the color."

If Silas himself couldn’t handle the price initially, there was no way Lia would do so.

"Five hundred thousand?!" Lia gasped, completely buying the lie. "That’s still so much money! But it looks brand new!"

"I buffed out the scratches," Silas deadpanned. "Get in the car, Lia."

Lia practically squealed with excitement. She scrambled past him, eagerly sliding into the spacious incredibly luxurious passenger seat of the supercar.

Silas walked around the front of the vehicle, completely ignoring the lingering, awe-struck stares of the academy girls, and slid down into the bolstered driver’s seat.

He tapped a glowing rune on the center console, and both heavy gull-wing doors hissed downward, perfectly sealing the cabin and cutting off the noise of the courtyard.

He grabbed the heavy shifter, putting the massive anti-gravity engine into drive.

With a deep rumble, Silas smoothly pulled the Zenith IVR away from the curb, seamlessly merging into the heavy afternoon traffic of Valoria City.

Inside the cabin, it was a completely different world.

The dampening runes blocked out the sounds of the highway entirely as the climate control was perfectly set to a crisp comfortable temperature.

Lia was actively bouncing in her leather seat, her eyes wide as she pressed her hands against the polarized dragon-glass window, watching the towering skyscrapers and neon billboards of the city blur past.

"This is so cool!" Lia cheered, looking around at the glowing holographic displays.

Silas smirked, keeping one hand casually on the heavy steering wheel while his golden-ringed eyes scanned the traffic ahead.

"Where is Martha?" Lia asked suddenly, turning to look at him. "Usually, she would be the one waiting for me at the gates."

"I called her from the road," Silas explained, shifting lanes effortlessly. "I told her to stay home and prepare the estate so I wanted to be the one to pick you up today."

"Oh," Lia smiled, clearly touched by the gesture.

"So," Silas continued, his tone shifting into that of a protective older brother. "It’s Friday. You officially started classes on Monday. It has been a full week... Tell me everything. How was the academy? Are the instructors treating you well? Did any of the brats try to cause problems for you?"

Lia settled back into her luxurious leather seat, resting her school bag on her lap.

"It was actually pretty good!" Lia reported happily. "The instructors are really strict about mana theory, but I’m keeping up and nobody has bothered me at all! Most of the noble kids just stick to their own cliques. I even made a new friend! Her name is Kaede and she’s from the Eastern Isles."

"The Shogunate territories?" Silas raised an eyebrow. "Those clans are entirely obsessed with honor and swordplay. They produce a lot of high-tier Lords."

"Yeah!" Lia nodded eagerly. "Her big brother is a Level 10 Lord as he picked her up right before you arrived."

Silas listened quietly as he navigated the sprawling elevated highways of the city.

He absorbed every detail she gave him with his brain subconsciously mapping out the social dynamics of her cohort.

"Just remember what I told you," Silas advised her with his voice turning serious. "You can make friends, but keep your guard up. The children of the Valoria elite are raised to be manipulative... If any of those kids try to look down on you because you grew up in Sector 4, you don’t argue with them. You just walk away and let me know. I will personally have an uncomfortable conversation with their parents."

"I know, Big Brother," Lia smiled, rolling her eyes playfully. "You don’t need to threaten to decapitate a CEO just because someone looked at me funny."

"I willthough," Silas corrected her deadpan.

Silas tapped the glowing holographic GPS display projected onto the windshield, adjusting their route.

"I need to make a quick detour before we head back to the Silverleaf estate," Silas announced, glancing at the navigation lines. "I need to stop by one of the central Lord Association Buildings."

Lia tilted her head, looking at him in confusion. "Why?"

"I need to hit the Marketplace," Silas explained, his jaw tightening slightly as he mentally prepared himself for the impending financial damage. "I need to purchase a massive stack of Tier 1 elemental spell scrolls since I’m expanding my magical affinities this weekend."

Lia stared at him for a solid five seconds.

Her expression was completely blank.

"Silas," Lia said slowly, as if she were speaking to an elderly man who didn’t understand how a television remote worked. "Why in the world would you physically drive all the way to a brick-and-mortar LA Building just to buy basic spell scrolls?"

Silas frowned, his hands gripping the steering wheel. "Because I need to browse the inventory?"

Lia let out a loud groan, slapping her palm against her forehead.

"You absolute boomer!" Lia groaned, shaking her head in sheer disbelief. "You literally have a Lord Association account! You don’t need to walk into a building and carry physical paper scrolls out in a shopping cart! You can just order them online! That’s what Kaede’s brother does!"

Silas blinked.

He actually stuttered.

"I... I can order magic spells on the internet?"

Actually he could... that was the plan initially before he met Lia in his house that day.

"Yes!" Lia yelled, throwing her hands up in the air. "There is an entire digital marketplace on the LA portal! You literally just click ’Add to Cart’, pay the premium delivery fee, and they instantly deliver the scrolls directly to you! It takes five seconds!"

Silas sat in the driver’s seat in stunned silence.

His brain completely short-circuited.

"I..." Silas muttered with his cheeks flushing a faint shade of pink from sheer embarrassment. "I completely forgot about the internet."

Lia burst into hysterical laughter, kicking her feet against the floorboards.

Silas grumbled, aggressively tapping the holographic GPS to cancel the detour.

He merged the supercar into the express lane, significantly increasing their speed as they headed straight toward the wealthy district of Silverleaf.

Twenty minutes later, the massive, matte-black Zenith IVR smoothly pulled up to the towering wrought-iron gates of the place where they lived.

The automated security scanners mounted on the stone pillars instantly recognized the vehicle’s unique mana signature.

The massive iron gates silently glided open, allowing Silas to drive up the long paved tree-lined driveway.

’I did pay for new gates to be done... I’m glad that they’re working.’

Standing dead center in the middle of the circular driveway, wearing her immaculate black-and-white maid uniform, was Martha.

The middle-aged woman was aggressively waving her hands in the air with her face completely lit up in joy as she saw the strange new vehicle pull up.

Silas smoothly engaged the parking brake with the heavy anti-gravity engine humming to a complete silent halt.

He pushed the driver’s side gull-wing door open and stepped out onto the pristine cobblestone driveway.

The microsecond his heavy combat boots touched the ground, Martha completely lost her mind.

"MASTER!" Martha shrieked at the top of her lungs.

She didn’t just run over to greet him. The maid literally threw herself forward, completely abandoning her dignity.

THUD!

Martha violently fell directly to her knees on the hard cobblestone.

She aggressively threw her arms completely around Silas’s muscular calves, hugging his legs with a death grip as she burst into loud unprofessional tears.

"Master Silas!" Martha sobbed loudly, burying her face directly into the dirty fabric of his trousers. "You came back! You didn’t die in the dirt! I was so terrified that the estate was going to be liquidated!"

Silas stood there in the driveway frozen, he was completely unprepared for a crying middle-aged woman attached to his legs.

He let out a long, deeply exhausted sigh, looking down at the top of her head.

"Martha," Silas said firmly, trying to gently pry her arms off his calves. "Get up. You are ruining your uniform on the cobblestones. I’m fine."

But Martha refused to let go. In fact, her devotion escalated to terrifying heights.

She actively leaned forward and began rapidly, desperately kissing the scuffed leather of his heavy combat boots.

"Thank the heavens!" Martha praised through her tears, kissing the dirt off his boots. "I am so incredibly glad you returned safely! I didn’t want to lose my Master so suddenly! The pay here is too good, and you actually let me eat real food! Please, never leave us for a Secret Realm again!"

Silas’s face flushed red with awkwardness.

"Martha, seriously, stop kissing my boots!" Silas demanded, forcefully but gently pulling his legs free from her grip and taking a large step backward. "I am not going to leave so just stand up."

Lia hopped out of the passenger side of the supercar, slinging her school bag over her shoulder.

She walked over, looking down at the crying maid with an amused teasing smile.

"It’s okay, Martha," Lia comforted the maid, reaching down to pat her shoulder. "You don’t have to pretend... I know you were just crying all week because you missed cooking his favorite meals."

Martha sniffled, wiping her nose with the sleeve of her immaculate uniform as she finally pulled herself up off the cobblestones.

"I was very worried, Miss Lia," Martha admitted, bowing her head respectfully. "The news broadcasts regarding expeditions like that are completely terrifying."

’Tell me about it...’ Lia thought.

"Well, we’re all home now," Silas declared, turning toward the massive oak doors of the place. "Let’s go inside."