The unusual and imposing guest, amid the profound surprise and tense silence of everyone present in the hall, took a calm step forward.
Completely ignoring the number of powerful entities around her, she raised both hands with flawless grace and adjusted a beautiful hairclip in her black and white hair.
Then she adjusted another one. Both hairclips were placed on the left side of her head and had the delicate shape of silver wings.
"What exactly is the meaning of this, Ivis? Your mission was supposed to be finishing off that lizard, not taking her out for a stroll to the castle," Helen said from her defensive posture, tightening her grip on her sword.
"Lizard... my, what deplorable manners humans have these days," the white-winged dragoness murmured, rolling her heterochromatic eyes with evident annoyance.
Without making the slightest effort, she completely dispelled her partial transformation. The majestic white wings on her back faded into particles of light, leaving her in a beautiful and delicate human form that emitted no murderous intent whatsoever.
The girls in Ryan’s group looked at each other, completely confused by the bizarre situation, and then turned their faces toward Ophelia, who remained with her arms crossed and an expression of total calm.
’That over there is Rigal’s famous wind elemental dragon. Did Ivis lose the fight?’ Ryan thought, analyzing the scene with his cold green eyes.
’I mean, clearly both of their clothes look very worn and dirty from combat. Well, if those scant rags barely covering their bodies could even be called clothes. I do not see any intention of fighting us in her, but for what purpose did Ivis bring her all the way here?’
If this exact same situation had occurred a week ago in the villa, Helen would probably have charged headlong at the wind dragon with pure murderous intent, and only then asked questions.
But now the atmosphere was very different. Helen maintained complete and absolute calm, keeping her weapon low. Perhaps she trusted far too much in her new and overwhelming SS-rank strength.
But Ryan knew it was much more than simple arrogance or confidence. Helen possessed an immensely high and polished instinct. If she was so calm in front of a mythical beast, it was purely and exclusively because she truly did not detect a single intention to fight or any hostile behavior in that two-toned hair dragoness.
The other girls in the squad were also quite calm. They were probably thinking and feeling the exact same thing as Helen right now.
Ophelia, who was still standing next to Ryan near the destroyed window, let out a light sigh.
"There is a very good reason for all of this." The demon queen broke the hall’s tense silence, drawing the attention of everyone present.
"I asked Ivis to convince that dragoness to serve solely and exclusively you, Ryan, instead of killing her," Ophelia declared with a satisfied smile.
"I think her power will be a very useful tool for you. After all, now that you killed Rigal, you are the legitimate new demon king of these lands."
"What?!" High-pitched whispers and exclamations of surprise erupted all over the hall around them.
"The original plan was for Ivis to dominate her completely. But it seems Lise became much stronger than we had calculated."
Upon hearing the demon queen’s words, Lise, the wind elemental dragon, nodded with immense pride puffing out her chest and showed a faint smile of superiority.
"That is right... this little dragoness gave me far more trouble than I initially thought," Ivis admitted, scratching the back of her neck with an annoyed expression. "Never in my life did I imagine she would have managed to awaken a second element in the middle of this war. Or perhaps, she kept it hidden all this time."
"What do you mean she awakened another magical element?" Irina, the elven princess, asked as she approached. A large portion of her elegant attire was in very poor condition from her own battle outside the towers.
"It is quite annoying, but now this girl is also a rare ice dragon," Ivis explained, pointing at her guest.
"Wind and ice? Now that is a very interesting combination," Ryan commented, taking a firm step forward to close the distance.
He directed his cold, heavy gaze straight into Lise’s peculiar eyes, evaluating her mettle.
"And if you are standing here before me without resisting, does that mean you plan to follow Ophelia’s whimsical plan and surrender?" Ryan asked in an authoritative voice.
"Hold on, wait... isn’t a dragon supposed to only be able to serve and make a contract with a demon king due to their dense manifestation of darkness?" one of the Infernal-rank twins asked, raising his hand in clear confusion.
"Yes, that is exactly right," Ivis commented, crossing her arms. "That is the only primordial element through which our race can make loyalty contracts with demons."
’So the rules of the dragon world work like that?’ Ryan thought, processing the new information.
"Hold on a second." Karol took a step forward, resting her magical staff on the floor.
"If what you say is entirely true, then how on earth do you plan for Ryan to make a contract with her? Ryan does not possess a single drop of that elemental manifestation. All of you know perfectly well that he is not a demon," the blue-haired mage stated with total certainty.
Then, Karol brought a hand to her chin, adopting a strange look of doubt as she looked her leader up and down.
"I think..." Karol added in a whisper.
’What do you mean you think?! I am a completely human man, you know that perfectly well!’ Ryan thought, frowning at his own companion’s ridiculous lack of faith.
Before the discussion could spiral out of control, Alicia took a step forward, twitching her wolf ears.
"Is what you plan to do with this dragoness perhaps because of the power Miss Beatrice just awakened?" the young beastwoman asked with great curiosity, looking at the demon queen.
"What exactly do you mean by that?" Ophelia asked, tilting her head without understanding the young assistant’s mention.
"Well... I thought that you, as high-ranking demons, already knew that Miss Beatrice awakened the demon king factor and her darkness manifestation after killing the earth dragon," Alicia explained with complete innocence.
"What are you saying?! Is that really true? Beatrice?!" Ophelia asked, widening her red eyes and turning sharply toward the quiet black-haired assassin.
"Yes... it is true," Beatrice replied, slightly raising her hand, which was still emitting a faint, disturbing trace of black smoke.
"But honestly, I still do not fully know how this power works."
"My, it seems your little harem really evolved to monstrous levels in a single battle. That is amazing, Ryan," Ophelia said, looking at the human with renewed respect and a bit of caution.
"What do you mean harem?!" the girls in Ryan’s group grumbled in unison.
"You can say that again," Ryan commented immediately, keeping his face completely stoic and expressionless, as if he were already perfectly aware of that whole matter and it were part of his master plan.
’Now I understand a bit more about dragon politics, but Beatrice’s darkness matter really took me by surprise,’ Ryan thought, maintaining his omniscient leader facade in front of Ophelia. ’What is this demon king factor...? Later, I will have a talk with her about this.’
"Honestly, I do not know what the hell that Infernal girl standing over there has to do with this matter," Lise said suddenly, raising her hands to chest height with a clear gesture of annoyance and arrogance.
The ice and wind dragoness looked Beatrice up and down with disdain.
"Let me make it very clear, I do not intend to make a servitude contract with her or any other woman," Lise declared. "I do not have tastes as strange and questionable as Janina’s, or that crazy Irnina’s."
"Could you do me the immense favor of not talking bad about my sister right in front of me?" a chilling female voice whispered.
A dark silhouette took shape out of nowhere, emerging directly from the shadows cast on the floor, right behind Lise’s back.
And at the exact instant the surprised Lise turned to face the threat, the figure disappeared again from the view of everyone present, moving at a speed that defied light.
The mysterious silhouette took physical, solid shape right in front of Ophelia.
It was Janina, the darkness dragoness, wearing a lazy, sadistic smile on her beautiful face.
And in her right hand, she firmly held a captive person by the collar of her outfit. The prisoner’s sharp whimpers echoed throughout the silent throne room, and her massive breasts bounced violently from Janina’s frantic, swift movement.