Chapter 27: 27

After Michelle finished speaking, David Elether and Alexander Terce stared at her for a while before glancing at each other. “Do you know how you ended up here?” David finally asked.

Michelle shook her head, closing her eyes lazily. “I just woke up here one day…”

“And you never tried to find out?” David continued asking, Alexander remaining silent in thought.

Hearing that, Michelle opened her eyes and turned her head to look at David. “Without any knowledge of this world, I have no way of finding out why I’m here. So, no, I didn’t! I didn’t know where to start. And… It’s not like I miss that world…” Her eyes cooled down a bit as she said the last sentence.

Seeing how Michelle’s eyes went cold, Alexander raised a brow, but still didn’t say anything. Maybe it was because he was aware that Michelle would only get enraged if he asked her something because of what he did before they parted ways last time. But he didn’t regret kissing her.

Alexander wasn’t the only one who noticed the coldness in Michelle’s eyes. “What was your life like in that world?” David asked, his eyes narrowing.

When the question fell, Michelle closed her eyes lazily. Some memories flashed in her mind as she yawned a bit. “I was an assassin,” she said placidly as she reached into her sleeve, taking out her shifting weapon, at the moment in the shape of a throwing knife. Opening her eyes, her hand flung upwards, and the knife flew out of her hand, getting stabbed into the wall next to her bed.

Both Alexander and David were shocked, as they could barely even see as her hand moved. They could clearly see as the knife flew because of the high levels of their cultivation, but their trained eyes couldn’t catch the movement of Michelle’s hand.

“Are knives the weapons you’re most proficient with?” Alexander finally spoke up, a slight smirk on his lips.

Hearing his voice, Michelle’s eyes flashed with blood-red from anger as she walked towards the knife and smoothly pulled it out of the wall. “No!” she replied lazily. “That would be…” She put the knife back into her sleeve. “A scythe…”

Both David and Alexander noticed the flash of blood-red in Michelle’s eyes caused by her anger, but she was still unaware of it as Mare never had the chance to tell her. Seeing that, David lifted a brow while Alexander’s expression didn’t change. “Why a scythe?” David asked. “A scythe is rarely used as a weapon. And it’s impractical in many aspects.”

Michelle shrugged. “I could just use it naturally without needing to be taught,” she said like it was nothing, but her words caused the two men’s eyes to widen.

“No one ever taught you?” Alexander’s smirk disappeared as he stared at Michelle.

Seeing that annoying smirk gone, Michelle snickered. “Yeah! I was a natural talent with a scythe.” She sat on her bed and stared at the two. Suddenly, a thought struck her. Since the two of them were so strong, and they clearly weren’t stupid or people without thoughts, they could be able to help her cultivate. But even thinking of asking for their help was repulsing her, so she threw the thought away.

The two saw that Michelle had something on their mind, but they didn’t ask as they had already found out what they were curious about. Without even saying anything, they disappeared from outside the window, making Michelle widen her eyes in shock. They came and went like ghosts.

She sighed and once again sat cross-legged on the bed. She very quickly sorted out her thoughts and tried to cultivate without emptying her mind, but the whole night she couldn’t achieve anything. Well… Anything. After she stopped trying in the morning, she realized that her thoughts and strings of thoughts remained sorted out and separated, so she could parallelly think about more things at once.

She could do that before too, but much slower and in lesser quantity, but by giving every thought its own path and space, it was like she untangled a bunch of ropes and straightened them out next to each other. Her mind was much sharper and her thoughts or reflexes could be realized by her mind much faster and more at once, so her reaction speed could increase too.

“It seems the night wasn’t completely wasted…” she mumbled as she got off her bed and went to change into a man’s set of clothes so she could go tutor the Eight Prince once again. For the next three months, she was planning to do nothing but that, as she had already given the archduke the instructions to make it politically impossible for anyone other than the Eight Prince to ascend the throne. Knowing how competent Archduke Grace was, she wasn’t the least bit worried that he would fail, and she knew that she had to prepare the young prince for his first appearance in front of the officials in three months.

So, for the upcoming three months, Michelle went to tutor the Eight Prince every day, staying with him from morning till evening, making sure he was well taken care of, and that he was improving. Within the three months, the young prince no longer looked so sickly and malnourished. The boy was smart, so what Michelle was planning to teach him in the three months, he mastered within two months, and she could teach him more, which highly satisfied her.

During the three months, Michelle didn’t live in the Archduchy but in the Cold Palace of the Imperial Palce, and some nights, she would sneak out to go give instructions to David, Archduke Grace and Ivona Beltrez.

One night, the four people all met together and Michelle was surprised when she realized that David Elether clearly knew the Archduke, but she didn’t ask anything. She just noted it in her mind to remember, and realized that the Archduke might be able to instruct her how to cultivate. She didn’t know his cultivation level, and it was definitely below David and Alexander, but he probably wasn’t far from them. Which made her think about the Archduke’s real identity. Was he really just an Archduke of a small low-ranked Empire?

After the three months passed, Michelle sneaked into the Emperor’s chambers at night and checked his condition. The poison had already seeped into his bones and lungs, and was about to reach his heart, which would mean death. The Emepror was clearly in a bad condition of no salvaging, groaning in pain even in his sleep.

Seeing him like that, Michelle’s eyes didn’t show any pity or sympathy, just a cold smirk. “See… Michelle…” she spoke, as if to herself, but in reality, it was to the original Michelle. “…I didn’t even do anything to him, and he’s dying in agony… The man who killed you is dead… and even his father won’t have a peaceful death…”

Then, she walked over the bedside table and stabbed a knife into it. The knife’s whole blade sunk into the wood like it was butter, and only the hilt remained poking out. The next day was the day that she was going to make the Emepror crown the Eight Prince the new Emperor, and the knife in the bedside table was a warning for him to do as she wanted. She took out another knife and carved two letters, M and G, into the wood, next to the knife stabbed in the table. Then, she used Shadow Spirit Steps to disappear from the chambers and went back to the Archduchy, for the first time in three months, to prepare the last things for the Eight Prince’s crowning.

The next day in the morning, still dressed as a man, she woke up the young prince and told him to change into clothes she prepared for him. After he had changed, she explained to him what was about to happen, and when he understood, she led him to the Imperial Palace’s main hall where the Emperor usually met his officials for meetings once a week. But the last three weeks, he called off all the meetings, trying to find a cure to his poison.

All the officials were curious as to why the Emperor suddenly called for a meeting, but their guess was that he found a way to cure the poison, but he was lacking something. But they realized that their guess couldn’t be more wrong once they saw Michelle Grace, oh… Michael Grayson lead the Eight Prince into the meeting hall and take him to the Crow Prince’s seat. And to everyone’s surprise, none of his siblings dared to complain, even though they were all already seated in their seats. But as Michelle expected, their expressions were sour. They hated having to give up the ruling position to their youngest and most neglected sibling.

When the Emperor entered the meeting hall, his face was visibly pale, not only from the poison, but also because he found the knife and letters M and G in his bedside table. None of the servants knew how it got there, which meant that someone was able to come and go in his chambers and was able to kill him at will.

Michelle watched the Emperor as he got to his seat while all the Royal Children and officials bowed down in front of him. Not wanting to cause turmoil just yet, Michelle bowed down too. “Rise!” the Emperor’s voice was weak as he spoke, making Michelle suppress a smirk.

The Emperor looked around the hall and his eyes fell on “Michael” standing behind the Eight Prince who was sitting on the seat of a Crown Prince. That made it clear that his children finished fighting for power and the next heir was decided. Without needing his intervention. That made him grit his teeth, but he suppressed his anger and looked over “Michael”. It was clear that “he” was the one who made it possible for the Eight Prince to surpass his siblings in mere three months without the Emperor knowing.

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep