790: Finding the Match

Finding the Match

Damien finally raised his head when he heard the jittering sound in the room just before Ariel appeared.1

"Ariel… Are you alright?" he immediately asked in a worried voice once she appeared right where she was standing a while ago.

Ariel trotted towards the bed while sighing and saying, "Yes, I'm okay. I just went to Wyverndale and left Herbert with Arion."

She sat down beside Zach and then darted her eyes around at everyone in the room. The whole mood had turned gloomy and dull. So, she joined her palms together and apologized to everyone, "I'm extremely sorry for how he behaved. If I knew that he would act like that then I would have left him back at Wyverndale."

"But, should he even be left there in Wyverndale?" Damien asked with concern. "What if he goes around, wreaking havoc in your absence?"

Ariel heaved a sigh again because she herself wasn't sure if leaving Herbert back at her home was a good idea. "I don't really know, Damien. But I trust Arion. At the very least, he will keep Herbert in control until I go back. And I guess… I will have to think about what to do with him when I do get back."

"Yeah, I don't think having that thing by your side will do any good to you," Damien said in a serious tone. He didn't want that stupid brat to cause harm to Ariel in the future, which he was sure he would if he kept on hanging out with Ariel.

Zach wriggled closer to Ariel and then rested on his back so that he could see Ariel's face. Then he asked what everyone was dying to know, "But seriously, Ary, how did you come across that… animal-boy?"

Ariel shrugged and replied, "It's just as how Herbert said it. I saw him in the Heavenly garden. He looked so majestic in his fox form. And I petted him. But I didn't think that he would somehow follow me back to the Earth realm. He said he wanted to be my familiar. He had a fight with my dad. And in the middle of it, he sneakily bit me. And I guess… that's what it takes to enter a contract with a magical beast."

"He was as sly as a fox!" Zach clicked his tongue and exclaimed. "Why would you even accept to keep that rude thing with you instead of scolding it for doing that to you and, I don't know, breaking the contract immediately?"

"I didn't think about that at that moment because he was too cute to handle in his cat form… Ugh…" Ariel felt frustrated and didn't even want to talk about Herbert anymore. So, she decided to change the topic, "Let's not talk about Herbert anymore. I will sort it out later."

She glanced at Joyce and asked, "Why don't you brief us about what we will be doing today?"

"Oh, yes," Joyce immediately cleared her throat and then started to brief today's plan, "We will first obviously have the breakfast with the King. And then we will go sightseeing around the capital. Then we will…"

---

While Ariel and the others were looking forward to the day, Herbert was definitely not looking forward to anything.

He had thought that he would get to have a lovely time with Ariel, maybe try some new cuisine prepared by the Earthlings, and see a lot of places and a lot of new things. However, things didn't go as he had hoped for because his mouth ran faster than his mind.

Right now, Herbert was drooping his shoulder and hanging his head low, and he was thinking of standing like that until Ariel returned. He had no idea that Ariel had planned to stay back in Romania for a few more days.

"What's your name, by the way?" Arion asked the boy after a long awkward silence between them.

Herbert wasn't feeling like talking to anyone now that he got dumped by the very person who he had thought was going to be by his side for eternity.

"Can't you hear me?" Arion asked in a much more authoritative voice than before.

"Her–" the boy cleared his dry throat and answered, "Herbert."

Arion kept on darting his eyes at that boy from top to bottom, trying to figure out how powerful he was.

After another deadly moment of awkward silence, Arion asked again, "How old are you? I don't sense any prominent aura coming off of you."

Herbert instantly got ticked off when Arion indirectly called him weak. So, the calm demeanor that he had maintained for a while now disappeared in an instant, and he spoke in his rude voice, "Hey, don't try to bully me for being young, you old man. I will soon grow stronger than you."

Arion was also not someone who would sit down and take insults to his face. So he wasted no time in putting that rude brat back in his place.

He glowered at the boy and spat the acidic gooey substance from his mouth at the tip of Herbert's boot.

The tip of Herbert's boot instantly melted and a big hole was created. That acidic substance even scraped off the tip of Herbert's toe, startling him greatly. "Aah! What in the holy light?" Herbert exclaimed and jumped a few steps back from Arion.

However, Arion immediately closed that gap between him and the boy and said in a low rumbling voice, "I was not trying to bully you, but if you keep up that tone in your voice, then I will most definitely make the rest of your life miserable."

A chill shiver ran down Herbert's spine when he recalled how Ariel had given that horse permission to do anything to him. And what was worse was that Ariel wasn't by his side to take pity on him and protect him from that horse's attacks.

So, he lowered his head again and answered Arion in a polite manner, "I'm just… I will turn three in a few months."

pqdm.com