Chapter 15: Who is this Lioness?
They arrived in their room and Lia prepared another bath for Rio with the medicinal herbs. He showed little resistance this time for the Bathing session and it went smoothly.
They ate their dinner and decided to head to sleep.
Sun rose in the eastern sky and welcomed a new day as it glistened on top of empress villa.
Rio slowly opened his eyes. He yawned lazily and stretched his body.
'She didn't wake me up in a rough way.'
He looked around him to find her.
Lia was near the dressing table. She was wearing a white dress that bloomed her beauty.
'Last night I told her I liked white dress. Is she wearing this for me?'
Lia saw his movement in the mirror and turned around.
"You woke up. Father told me to send you to meet him for training. He said you have reached the yellow stage and you should get some combat training." Lia spoke while combing her beautiful white hair.
"How did he find out?" Rio scrunched his eyebrows as it was only a few hours ago he reached the yellow stage.
"There are Royal guards guarding the castle. You can even see them on the high walls, they may have probably seen you when you were enveloped in yellow light and informed Father." Lia said with a stiff voice and put the comb down.
"I have one more question I wanted to ask you. Why did I have to go through white stage to reach the yellow stage? Didn't the emperor say that it started from the yellow rank cores that humans absorb?" Rio asked with a puzzled face.
Lia turned around to look at him and explained, "Unlike humans, who are dependent on the core to raise their roots, beasts and asuras cultivate for years to raise their core. We asuras start from white stage and you also formed a core using ancient devlin technique so you started from White stage same as an asura."
"Doesn't that mean humans can also have white stats points if they find a white stage wild beast's core?" He asked with a curious smile as if he solved a big problem the world was facing.
She shook her head gracefully and said, "It doesn't work like that. Wild beasts inherit the same rank of core as their parents when they are still a fetus unlike us asura or humans who have to start from zero. As the river of time flowed there weren't any white stage beasts left as many reproduced when they reached the yellow stage."
"Won't the same happen to yellow ranked beasts as more time passes and become as rare as unicorns and Phoenix feather?" He asked as his eyes were filled with questions.
"It's easy to evolve your core to yellow stage from the white but the journey up ahead is difficult. So many beasts remain in the yellow stage for life. And one more thing, Phoenix and unicorn aren't rare in this world." Lia said the last part with a hint of pleasure as if to give him shock.
"What…" he looked dazed but then he calmed down a few seconds later as this wasn't earth and he should be ready for unexpected outcomes.
He said after standing up, "Okay, I'll go meet him but I am not familiar with the castle and where to find him."
"I have already told Yami. She will bring you to father." Lia said as a mysterious glint flickered in her eyes.
"Okay, I'll go then." He felt awkward as if Lia wasn't talking to him normally. This was the first time she was sending him with someone else.
'I'm probably overthinking.'
He walked out of the room and went downstairs.
"I would have come with you for combat training but Father restricted me to come as I wouldn't be able to see you suffer in pain." Lia sighed inwardly like a doting mother whose child was going on a war for the country.
***
He asked Yami and she brought him to the room where he got his first training class with the emperor.
After he reached the room, Yami asked for permission from the Emperor and they entered the room.
There was one more person standing in the room while the emperor was sitting on his seat.
That person turned around to look at Rio, Her red eyes gazed at him as if she was longing for something or someone that she lost but when she saw his sea-green eyes, she stared at him with a murderous intent.
She gave an aura of a terrifying wild beast but her figure told differently. She had blonde colored hair that came to her shoulder.
She was 174 centimeters tall which made her taller than Lia who was around 168 centimeters. She looked the same age as Lia as she also appeared around eighteen years old.
Her seductive figure was covered in different armors. She wore a blue dress on top that was white at her perfect sized bossom.
A metallic gorget was covered by a blue shawl that was wrapped around her neck and its end was kissing her black greave above her black pants that hid her slender legs. Her hands were covered in black gauntlet and one of her shoulders had a black pauldron.
A black scabbard was hanging on her waist that was hiding her weapon.
"Helia, don't scare him. He is the one you need to train." The Emperor said to her.
She took back her killing intent from him but she was still looking at him as if he was her prey.
'Finally, there is someone who will teach this Shameless idiot a lesson.'
Yami bowed to the emperor and left the room while gloating inwardly.
"She is prettier than Yami and many girls I met but she still pales in comparison to Lia. But, she is looking at me as if I killed her parents." Rio thought and gulped nervously as a chill ran down his spine.
"Who is this lioness that's looking at me as if she would chew me alive." Rio asked the emperor bluntly.