Chapter 106
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Chapter 106: Before the Sickbed
The little princess had returned!
Through the ancient streets and alleys of Rose Mountain City, people spread the word. Their faces showed surprise, nostalgia, and joy.
The first heir of the Hamilton family was back!
Within the family, elders, elites, knights, and others wore solemn or grave expressions. The atmosphere felt like dark currents churning in the ocean’s depths.
Yet no matter their thoughts, when that fiery red hair swept down Rose Mountain City’s central avenue toward the castle, all eyes turned. Every heart stirred at her presence.
Fina chose to meet cunning with raw force.
Since hiding her return was impossible, she made sure everyone knew. By drawing all attention to herself, she aimed to stop schemers in the shadows from acting unnoticed.
Now, with the crowd’s fervor, she’d already half-succeeded.
She didn’t linger among the cheering crowds or visit the respected elders. The moment her caravan entered the inner city, Fina stepped out and marched straight to the castle’s deepest chambers—where the Iron-Blood Duke lay.
“Uncle Pipin, it’s been years. Take me to Grandpa,” Fina said bluntly.
Pipin, the old steward, wore a low-profile black suit and a tortoiseshell monocle. Though past sixty, he stood straight. When Midi tried to sense his level, he met only impenetrable shadows.
At Midi’s current strength, even a peak level 50 practitioner couldn’t hide from him.
Yet this old man’s level stayed concealed—proof of one truth:
He’d undergone at least a first awakening.
Midi stifled a bitter smile. The Hamilton family’s hidden power was terrifying.
“Lord Haidrich is secluded, Miss. Follow me to the inner court,” Pipin replied courteously, bowing before gesturing ahead.
Behind him lay the Hamilton family’s most guarded secrets—a realm even elders couldn’t enter. Only the family head and first heir had that privilege.
Midi stopped at once, nodding to Fina.
Though close, their bond was personal, not an alliance between the Hamilton and Asreks families. To the Belmar Duchy’s foremost family, Midi was an outsider—likely a distrusted one.
With reincarnation’s experience, Midi knew noble minds well. He’d avoid missteps here that might shame Fina or threaten her Status as first heir.
But as the pair prepared to part, the old steward squinted at the black-haired boy. “This must be Young Master Midi Asreks?”
“It is,” Midi acknowledged.
“Lord Haidrich left orders: if the Young Miss brought you, both are to see him,” Pipin said, smiling.
The Iron-Blood Duke wanted an outsider?
Midi and Fina exchanged startled glances.
Pipin offered no explanation. Lighting a magic lamp, he walked ahead. Under the elders’ stunned gazes, the two followed.
Through dim corridors laced with restrictions, past instant teleportation arrays, the Hamilton family’s secret realm finally unfolded before Midi.
Pushing open the secret silver door etched with a hexagram magic array revealed an endless lake. Its mirror-smooth surface reflected a twenty-meter crystal dome above—the Lake Light Hall.
Midi blinked, half-convinced it was an illusion.
He’d wondered what lay in this core of Rose Mountain City, reserved solely for the Hamilton family head. A study radiating low-profile luxury, with aged desks and quills? A meditation chamber piled with forbidden tomes? Or an alchemy laboratory lined with crucibles and precise instruments?
However, Midi had never imagined that magic’s creative potential could reach such extremes.
He sensed the powerful pulse of magic veins beneath the earth and felt his spirit merging with the surroundings. Though not Infinite Magic, cultivating here would likely match or even surpass the speed of practicing at Autumn Ancient City villa.
For this place faintly contained all the conditions needed for a practitioner’s "awakening"!
"Young Mistress, Mr. Midi, I shall accompany you no further. The master’s sickbed lies in the lakeside pavilion." The old steward Pipin abandoned his earlier pretense of "closed-door cultivation" and gestured openly toward the water.
After glancing at the crystalline lake surface, Fina stepped forward first. Midi followed closely, with Pipin trailing last. Invisible forces parted the waters beneath their feet while transparent platforms materialized, supporting their weight with crisp footstep echoes.
Water continuously divided before the youth and maiden before reuniting behind them, creating endless ripples across the mirror-like surface – as though unseen sprites danced beneath their soles.
A scene from fairy tales.
Upon reaching the lake’s heart, the surrounding light abruptly distorted. A Baroque oval pavilion materialized with delicately carved contours. At its center lay an enormous bed holding a motionless elderly man with closed eyes.
Haidrich Hamilton, the Iron-Blood Duke.
Their last meeting had occurred before the noble war, yet mere months had carved deep wrinkles across his forehead and eyes. Age spots mottled his sagging skin, his pallid face barely rising with each shallow breath.
Even when Fina grasped his limp hand by the bedside, the duke remained unconscious, occasionally grimacing and muttering incoherent words.
The chaotic magic surrounding him agitated the demon god in Midi’s left arm, making it burn with restless energy.
"So it’s awakening’s aftermath," Midi whispered, clutching his trembling arm. True awakening meant shattering the level 50 ceiling.
Practitioners in Arad had never surpassed level 50 through personal power alone. Like initial transmutation requiring magic array assistance for physical transformation, awakening demanded external Support to contain greater magic and wield mightier skills.
Though similar in nature, transmutation needed minimal magic – achievable through perfect transmutation using massive formations like Nibelungen Array.
Yet according to Midi’s memories from two lifetimes, no awakening sites existed in Arad during Calendar Year 985. Only when Sky Tower emerged at Faero Bay would proper first awakening become possible.
Both Pipin and the Iron-Blood Duke had achieved awakening through artificial means. This Lake Light Hall, which Midi initially recognized as having partial awakening conditions, now clearly served as the Hamilton family’s secret Awakening Ground for their strongest members.
But such makeshift environments couldn’t enable true awakening. Any level breakthrough exacted heavy costs from the Awakened Ones.
"Surprising you know about level-breaking awakenings." Fina’s eyes flickered with astonishment. "This Lake Light Hall is our family’s core secret. Few enter, but successful awakenings create our main pillars of strength."
"Then you must have studied the side effects," Midi frowned. "Why this crisis now?"
The duke’s condition couldn’t be ordinary illness. In Midi’s previous life, the Iron-Blood Duke had commanded battlefields months later during civil war, repelling Sais family forces until Delos Empire’s intervention caused his fall during capital defenses – even then claiming multiple imperial Knights.
Yet now, without war or upheaval, why did the duke collapse?
Butterfly effect from Midi’s return? Had his presence accelerated the awakening’s toll?
As Midi pondered, Pipin’s voice rasped with uncharacteristic anger: "The potions… they became inadequate."
