“I understand,” Ace nodded, agreeing with Janice. But doubt lingered in his voice as he asked, “But why do you keep asking if I did something wrong? Didn’t Delores tell you about our meeting with your uncle? Then, you should know I am not at fault here. Also, I haven’t spoken to him since our last meeting. You tell me what you felt that I did could have pissed him off.”

Janice’s eyes widened slightly as she put the pieces together. “Wait… Delores was with you when you met my uncle? No wonder you’re still alive after pissing him off.” She shook her head as if suddenly everything made sense before informing him, “Delores doesn’t like talking about my uncle, so I guess she conveniently skipped over it.”

“Yeah, things between Aunt Delores and my father are awkward. The family acts like ignoring it will magically fix everything,” Elinor muttered, irritation creeping into her tone.

They had her complete attention. She was them, but she was also too preoccupied with the crypto-currency wallets on her cursed phone. But with her multiple eyes, multitasking was second nature to her.

Ace let out a humorless chuckle. “Wow, so she threw me under the bus over some old drama with your uncle. Great.” He was beginning to think that if Delores had been upfront with Janice about their meeting with Elinor’s father, maybe Janice could have done something—talked her uncle down, stopped him from rallying the entire curse community into using Ace as bait.

“Oh, before we start pointing fingers, why don’t you tell me exactly what happened?” Janice interjected, cutting Ace off before his frustration made him say something he’d regret. She knew he didn’t really blame Delores—he wasn’t that dumb. He was just frustrated. And rightfully so.

Overnight, his entire country had decided to turn him—and everyone he cared about—into sacrificial pawns in their game.

“I didn’t even talk to him,” Ace clarified, shaking his head. “It was just Delores and him. I just happened to be there. The only thing I said was before we left. It was that I had a share in the Void-tier curseling’s curse core and that I’d be willing to give it up for five Sky-tier innate curse tools.”

He remembered it clearly—Delores had restrained him the entire time, so he barely got a word in with Elinor’s father. This made it more puzzling as to why the latter was hell bent on destroying his peaceful life.

Janice furrowed her brows. “Which Void-tier curseling’s curse core are you talking about?” she asked, clearly confused.

“The one that was infected by Elinor’s curse spell,” Ace revealed, wondering if more void-tier curselings showed up after they left.

Elinor immediately cut in, her expression twisting in disbelief. “Wait, how the hell do you have a share in that? My curse spell incapacitated it, and my father landed the killing blow. I don’t see how you have any claim to its curse core.”

Ace let out a sigh, rubbing his temples. “Okay, genius, how do you think your curse spell managed to infect a Void-tier curseling when you were here, and it was all the way in the city?” He leveled a look at her, watching as suspicion flared in her eyes.

She was glaring at him now, the word liar practically locked and loaded on her tongue.

“Delores said the Void-tier curseling was infected by my curse spell after eating the mutant rust worm curseling that I had cursed,” Elinor argued, her tone sharp. Her tongue rolled, ready to fire the words ‘Shameless Liar’ at any second.

“Damn it, how slow are you?” Ace snapped, exasperated at Elinor for failing to put two and two together despite him hinting and guiding her to it.

So, he laid it out in open, “Did you forget I was carrying that mutant rust worm around in the wicker vase? And did Delores conveniently forget to mention that the Void-tier curseling only ate the cursed mutant rust worm while trying to kill me? If I hadn’t been there, it never would have swallowed the worm, never would’ve been infected by your curse, and your father wouldn’t have been able to land the killing blow.”

Elinor huffed, crossing her arms, she blurted in rage, “Delores said it was just an accident. You were too busy saving yourself and forgot the wicker vase on the terrace, and that’s how the mutant rust worm ended up being swallowed by the Void-tier curseling.”

She revealed that the reason she wasn’t putting his hints together was because she knew everything already and didn’t believe Ace had played a significant part in killing the void-tier curseling to warrant him a claim on its curse core.

Having caught her red-handed, Ace narrowed his eyes and sneered, “Uh-huh. So you and your father just conveniently decided to downplay my part in this and keep the whole curse core for yourselves. My mother was right—girls with innocent faces are the most crafty.”

Elinor scoffed. “Oh, come on, Ace. You’re being shameless. You’re exaggerating your role in all this.” She shot him a challenging look. “Answer me this: If someone accidentally kills a person, should they be punished to the full extent of the law, or should they be given the benefit of the doubt?”

Ace opened his mouth to respond, but Elinor bulldozed ahead before he could argue. Knowing full well that Ace wouldn’t hesitate to argue anything to just get his way. “You give them the benefit of the doubt and punish them with reasonable sentence. It’s the same thing here. You accidentally played a small part in the Void-tier curseling’s infection. What actually happened was just a series of coincidental events that worked in my favor. You trying to claim credit for it is nothing short of shameless.”

“Are you saying a lottery winner doesn’t deserve their winnings? Because that’s exactly what it sounded like to me,” Ace argued, confident that he had Elinor cornered with this argument.

To his surprise, she didn’t even hesitate and shot back, “That’s a flawed argument. A lottery winner bought the ticket and held on to it until the last second. They earned their winnings. But, your situation? It’s like someone finding a lost winning ticket and demanding the prize money. That’s not just greedy—it’s plain stupid.”

“Oof.” Janice let out a low whistle, watching Elinor absolutely wreck Ace. She didn’t actually think Ace was greedy—just opportunistic. But this time? He’d met his match, and history would remember him as both stupid and greedy because Elinor, the winner, said so.

Then, Janice grinned, complimenting her cousin, adding, “I have never been prouder to call you my cousin.”

Janice wasn’t just saying it to be nice. Elinor had always been a bit of a pushover, a side effect of growing up in the shadow of a dominating father. But when did she take a stand? She was stubborn as hell—once her mind was made up, no one could budge her with words or force unless they backed it up with solid logic. Not even her dominating father.

“Don’t be,” Elinor smirked at the compliment before explaining, “I’ve played out multiple scenarios in my head of me trying to get my share of the void-tier curse core from my father, and I lost every single time. The points I just made? They’re only a fraction of what I expect him to throw at me to deny my claim. But this win? It shows I’m making progress.”

Ace felt a little comforted learning that the reason he lost was because he was less prepared than Elinor. He wasn’t outwitted. He was just unfortunate to have caught her at her strongest. Janice grinned, satisfied with Elinor’s performance, ignoring the fact that Elinor was twice Ace’s age.

“I’m rooting for you! You can do it!” she cheered, knowing that in Elinor’s life, her father was the biggest wall she had to overcome—and she had to do it herself. That was the only way she’d ever step out of the massive, overbearing shadow he cast over her.

Ace, feeling completely sidelined, blinked at the chummy cousins before loudly clearing his throat at them to bring their attention to his matters, “Ahem.”

Janice turned back to him, amusement still dancing in her eyes.

“You really messed up big time, Acey,” she said with a dramatic sigh. “Of all the ways you could have pissed off my uncle, you had to go and try to steal credit that rightfully belonged to his beloved daughter? If it were any other situation, maybe he would’ve let it slide—chalked it up to your age and inexperience. But this?” She shook her head. “This was Elinor’s first Void-tier kill. It made her the first curse user in our family’s younger generation to take down a void-tier curseling. Elinor had finally done something he could be proud of, but you? You walked in and demanded a cut?”

Ace winced. “Okay, when you say it like that but that doesn’t justify—”

“No, no, don’t try to downplay it now,” Janice cut in, grinning. “Seriously, what was Delores doing while you were busy shooting yourself in the foot? Did she not try to stop you?”

Ace groaned, realizing he’d absolutely walked into that one.

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep