Supreme Monarch

—The Sentro Region, Winged City.

Situated on the highest floor of the most luxurious building in the city besides the lord's castle, the Blackwing hotel. In one of the royal suites reserved for only the highest ranking members of the Zorak family.

A male figure lay silently on the large and exquisite canopy bed placed on one end of the luxurious room, half of his body hidden underneath the thick and soft covers of the bed as he rested his back on his pillows that were pressed against the bed's headrest while seated in a semi-upright position.

He had a sheet of coarser grey paper in his hand and wore magical reading glasses. A neat stack of the same paper was placed on the coffee table next to his bed.

As he read through the information recorded in the paper, the lights in the room suddenly became saturated for a moment and in the next instance, a figure that surely wasn't there before appeared in a kneeling posture by the open window.

"You should not be here."

Aur spoke in his usual curt tone without his eyes ever leaving the piece of paper he was reading, his expression as stoic as ever.

"Forgive me Lord Aur, but I have urgent news for you."

"Don't call me Lord. I am no longer the lord of this city and merely a landless noble."

The figure that knelt in the shadows was lithe and slender with black watery hair that reached the lower parts of her back. She wore a skin-tight black rogues outfit. Spotting a similar colored mask that covered the lower parts of her face and dark purple metal greaves that matched the same colored gloves with metal knuckles.

Her purple-colored pupils stared intently at Aur as she opened her mouth to respond to Aur's words.

"Lord Aur is the true leader of the Ghost Legion, and as its commander, I answer only to you. It matters not if you have been unjustly stripped of your title."

A bell-like voice reverberated beautifully across the room with a determination that could not be refuted or challenged.

Aur finally stopped reading the piece of paper before him as he took off the reading glasses and turned his gaze to meet the girl's eyes.

"Never mind that then, why are you here today."

The expression on the girl's face instantly softened at Aur's words. Seemingly relieved that he hadn't chosen to send her away despite her coming here unprompted.

"Right, we've confirmed the location of the VIP merchant you've been looking for."

"I see... And where is he?"

"On his way to the merchant guild. It seems he has just returned to the city. Judging by his wares, he must've taken a trip back to the Far East."

"Hmm... so that was it. It's been almost a month since we sent the guilds to explore the Grade 3 mine in the Farbelt pass. It may already be too late."

"I understand your worries lord Aur but I believe there's still a chance the top Hunters are still alive. Even faced against several superior foes, Hunters of that caliber are well equipped to survive no matter what."

"Hmm... you may be right. It will be impossible for us to mobilize a more capable unit to mine the Gold from that mine without seeking aid from the family or the other cities."

Saying that, Aur's face slightly contorted into something of disgust and anger as the piece of paper in his hand was reduced to dust without even bursting into flames.

He then got off the bed in his natural bathing suit and walked over to the white robes he had left on the sofa next to his bed. He was about to pick it up himself when the lights saturated once more and Aika appeared behind him and took the robes.

Aur stared at her for a brief moment before simply turning his back to her allowing her to dress him.

Although he had lost his city, and even his personal Ghost legion to the third prince of the Zorak family, Nullen Marx Zorak. He had still retained his title as a Viscount. This means he was still someone of relatively high status in comparison to the masses and other nobles.

He still owned several businesses across the city and would be given an estate to manage within the city so he was still entitled to his maids and was not someone that needed to dress himself.

However, Aur hadn't brought any of his personal maids with him and asked that they would be sent over to his new estate whenever it was ready for him. He felt like he needed some time to himself for some self-evaluation and to ponder on how he had failed.

His schemes had been perfect so far and he was on a steady rise to the top of the family food chain even as someone who could not approach the level of a Demon Lord much less a demigod.

However, everything had gone to shits the moment that boy was sent over to him. Aur frowned as he thought about the prodigal son of one of the late family's elders. If only he hadn't presumed he had died after seeing the gaping hole in his chest through the memories of one of his ghosts, Amra.

"Even if I can't regain control over my city again. There's still a chance to continue my rise if I'm able to attain the Runites from the interior cavern inside that mine."

As Aika proceeded to tie his robes around his waist, Aur spoke those words to no one in particular before taking a moment to think, and as soon as Aika was done, he asked.

"What has lord Nullen been up to since he arrived?"

"The prince had immediately relieved me of my duties as the Ghost leader and appointed Cia as the new leader. However, everyone's loyalty still lies with you, Lord Aur."

"I see. And what of his actions to rescue the Hunters and Merchants."

"As per the Grand Elder's decree, lord Nullen has mobilized a small group of mages from the magic institute alongside his person aides for the mission but they had intentionally delayed their advance until the end of the week tomorrow to wait for the VIP merchant Lix, location to be found."

"I see... how unfortunate. Is Lord Nullen aware of this Lix of a fellow's arrival?" 𝒇𝗿𝙚ℯ𝑤ℯ𝑏𝒏𝑜ѵe𝙡.c𝐨ｍ

"Not yet. I intentionally delayed the report and immediately came here."

"That's good."

Aur nodded his head in approval as he contemplated his next move. He hadn't yet reported the existence of the Runite found in the Gold mine to the family even though he had written about the possibility of a double mine in his report.

Even though he had been questioned thoroughly in his last summon to Blackwing City, he hadn't revealed any details about the rare metal found in the second cavern.

Lucky for him, the mere mention of the possible appearance of a Devil had garnered their attention and redirected their line of questioning to the point that he didn't even have to lie.

"Alright then. Aika, I need you to do me a favor."

"There is no need to ask so politely my Lord. I am still your servant and your wish is my command."

Aur turns to stare at Aika's lowered head for a while before nodding his head once more in approval.

"Excellent. Secretly make contact with the VIP merchant, Lix, and make him an offer to work with me. I'm sure someone like him wouldn't take kindly to working for someone they haven't met so try and be persuasive. You should keep my identity a secret for now. Report his response back to me before informing Lord Nullen of his arrival."

"Understood, I'll get on that immediately."

"Make haste, I do not believe lord Nullen came here with his private legion but I may be wrong. It's best you do not give him any cause for concern over his control of the Ghost Legion."

"I'll keep that in mind."

As those words left Aika's mouth, the lights in the room saturated once more and her last words echoed ethereally in the room as her figure was nowhere to be seen.

Anyone with extraordinary perception skills would notice that not only had her physical body disappeared, but every single trace of her existence had completely vanished as well.

Such a phenomenon was simply impossible to accomplish even with the highest level of spatial teleportation as everyone leaves a faint trace of their existence wherever they went.

Such minute traces cannot be erased or hidden completely even by the most skilled rogue-type mage in the known universe. Even gods and celestial were not exempt from this rule as this was the foundation of divination itself.

Without such traces that were invisible to almost all living beings, the concept of divination itself would not work as there would be no information left in the world to trace. Unless one was equipped with a Ring of Nullity, a God Class artifact that was forged from the embodiment of Nothingness itself.

The conceptual entity is known only as the lord of nullity, the god of the infinite void, Novak.

Legends are, the only one being had been capable of attaining a bit of the essence necessary to forge such an item and live to actually create it was the original Demon king of Destruction himself.

Being the only being crazy enough to travel through dimensions to find the lord of nullity and steal a piece of his essence within being reduced to nothingness.

In the presence of Novak, even absolute destruction would be reduced to nothing as everything in this world and beyond was born from nothing and everything must return to nothing.

Although it was still unknown how the demon king had been able to survive an encounter with Novak. It was safe to assume he hadn't come face to face with the Lord of Nullity and had merely stolen a piece of his essence from a distance. However, this did not take anything away from the ridiculousness of this feat.

In all of creation, no one else had been crazy enough to attempt such a suicidal task as even gods would not challenge the lord of nothingness. Therefore, there was only one such artifact in existence.

Aur silently shook such an outrageous thought off his mind as he turned back around and headed straight for his indoor bathroom.

He knew Aika, while highly skilled beyond her level— was incapable of attaining such an overpowered item, and even mimicking a tenth of its powers was undoable.

However, what she had just done was an Advance Tier skill that combined light illusions and stealth with spatial movements to hide both the tear in space and any traces of her existence temporarily.

This was why the area saturates whenever the skill was used. Its effects were ridiculously effective for such a low-ranked skill and made them appear like ghosts to their opponents.

Hence why they were known as the Ghost Legion and their capabilities and effectiveness surpassed their tiers. Otherwise, there would be no reason why the family would even bother about the Legion under a low-ranked noble such as a common viscount as even the weakest legion under a prince like prince Nullen, would completely outclass the Ghost legion in every other category.

Yet the family had seen the great potential of the Ghost Legion's unique abilities and their application in espionage. It was obvious they believe the Ghost Legion he developed from the ground up was being wasted on a low-ranked and low-tiered noble like him.

However, as they were his personal Legion not supported by the family, they were unable to take them away from him until now. If he was unalienable to redeem himself with the family, he was as sure the third price would soon send the Ghost Legion back to the capital to teach the families experts their unique skills before tossing them aside for their low magic potentials.

This was the reason the Legion was still loyal to Aur despite them already being assigned to the third Prince by the Grand Elder.