Chapter 148: I Will Not Allow Such Thing to Happen
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
The following day, as promised by Undine, she showed up at the mansion in the same knight attire that she wore the first time Baiyi met her. However, compared to the pink and lively aura that she gave off last time, she looked wan and sallow with her face thinner. Looked like she must have been very busy with her family matters.
Instead of rushing into the topic of the glider, the first thing that she did was to push her Soul Armature uncle who was sitting in a wheelchair to Baiyi. No longer the once almighty black gold armored fighter, he had changed into an ordinary knight armor. Due to the fact that his limbs were severed for far too long from his body, the remnant of his soul left in the armor had already dissipated and he could no longer move normally as he used to.
Still, the Dole family did not plan to give up on him. Although he had completely lost his combat ability, and it could even be said he was a burden to Undine, she still refused to abandon her family and decided to come look for Baiyi for his help.
Be that as it may, his condition was already at a critical point. No matter how mighty the Voidwalkers were, they still could not create a soul out of nothing. Still, it was not that difficult to enable him to move again as Baiyi could make some soul prosthetics for him. Although he would never be as agile as he was before, it was still much better than being chair bound for the rest of his life.
The process was not at all cumbersome, but it would take some time before Baiyi could finish the whole operation. He needed to disassemble Leo's new body into small parts and draw prosthetic formation on every joint. Undine who was watching from the side was entertaining Mia and Tisdale with some small talks and Baiyi could see that she looked very tired with her bloodshot eyes as she nodded off while she was sitting on the chair.
"Let Undine have a quiet moment, okay?" Baiyi told Mia and Tisdale, "Or, bring her up to the room and let her get some rest. Didn't Attie clean up a few rooms lately? My work here will take quite a while and I'll inform you once I'm done."
Immediately, Undine looked at Baiyi gratefully. Without any hesitation, she followed Tisdale upstairs to have a nap after apologizing to Mia and Tisdale sincerely. Because of their visit to the Dole family yesterday, her work was held up while she entertained them and because of that, she did not sleep all night to make up for the time that she lost chatting with them.
"Sister Undine, take Sharkie with you," Mia handed the hammerhead shark that still warm with her body heat over to Undine, "You will be able to sleep soundly hugging him!"
"Thank you, Mia," Undine smiled softly as she accepted Mia's kindness and hugged the hammerhead shark plushie close to that deep cleavage of hers. Like what Mia always do, she rubbed her face against the plushie and exclaimed, "Ah, it smells so good! Next time I must hug Mia-chan to sleep when I have the opportunity," Having said that, she shut her eyes, her long brush-like lashes slowly lowered down as she entered a sweet dreamland.
Baiyi was sitting with Leo alone in the living room drawing the prosthetic formation and all of a sudden, Leo who had been quiet all along suddenly broke the silence, "I envy you!"
Baiyi was stunned. After a while, he turned his head and threw a glance at him.
"It's not about your strength or knowledge," Leo continued in a casual tone--- with no honorifics like how he used to use when he talked to Baiyi last time, "I envy your peaceful and quiet life, and the fact that you have so many beautiful girls around you."
Just as he was speaking, Attie entered the living room while rubbing her eyes to clear away the teacups that she served Undine with earlier. She appeared to be gliding when she walked and her eyelids were drooping. It looked like she did not sleep well, too.
"Of course, except for her," Leo added snappily when he saw her, "I did not expect you to keep her as a servant you know."
"This is for the sake of your family," Baiyi casually replied before looking up at Attie, "Why don't you take a nap as well?"
Attie shook her head and did not reply. Promptly, she left the room muttering something under her breath. Baiyi guessed it was probably the notes written on the booklet. The girl was so afraid that she would lose the valuable handbook that represented power to her so she chose to memorize everything that was written on it.
After Attie was gone, Leo's tone turned nasty as he smirked, "You know, I know of a way for us Soul Armature to play with women. Should I teach you as a reward? Although this woman is kinda irksome, but look at that body of hers! She's quite a beauty! Don't you wanna have a taste of that?"
Right now, he was completely treating Baiyi as a friend--- even friendlier than how he usually talked to Undine.
I'd rather have a go at your Undine and not this girl, okay? Can't you see that she's still a young little girl? Baiyi lamented in his heart. In a disinterested manner, he scoffed, "You think I don't know any of those?"
"Urghh... Sorry. I seem to have underestimated you..." Leo replied awkwardly.
Casually, they continued their nonchalant chitchat and it was mostly men's locker talks that eventually touched on the air commercial route. When noon was approaching, Baiyi finally finished his drawing of all the prosthetic formation and all that was left was just reassembling every part together.
Throughout the whole process, Leo did not mention a word about rewards or gratitude or so on. Instead, he kept saying stupid things like, "Actually there are many practitioners who eventually fell in love with their Soul Armature and in the end, they got married to each other," Having said that, he asked another question that almost elicit an eye-roll from Baiyi, "What if the little girl that you're raising now wants to get married to you when she gets older?"
Miffed, Baiyi knocked on his helmet with a hammer, "I will NEVER let that happen! I'll correct her view of love and help her choose a qualified partner!"
Those words immediately caused a clamour in the Void.
"Are you going to choose a female partner for Mia? I don't think men is possible you know! Just look at how you're treating the men around her! It's already good enough that you didn't kill all those guys that came close to her!"
"HAHAHAHA! Our Fifth Walker finally knows how to crack a joke!"
"Sir Hope, who are you trying to deceive with these words? Have you forgotten the two young boys who stared at Mia when you brought her out on the street? You were so furious that I thought you'd unleash the Black Flames and burn them into ashes you know!"
Once again, those few people commented anonymously and slthough Baiyi flew into a rage with shame, he could not pinpoint who exactly who made those comments. With no other choice, he focused all of his fury on the Paladin.
"W-What are you trying to do? You dictator!" The Paladin asked, "I'm not a person who would hide behind a screen, okay? I'm always righteous and noble even when it comes to professing my love towards bishoujo you know!"
Baiyi pondered for a little while and decided to let the matter go for the moment. De novo, he focused his attention back to reality and rapidly assembled Leo's body. After a short while of hammering, he finally activated all of those formations.
"Done! Give it a try," Baiyi announced.
Hastily, Leo jumped up from the wheelchair and moved his body about. Oh, I can really move now? In short order, he paced back and forth in the living room.Although his movement was stiff and awkward as a fat fish on land, he was overjoyed with such an improvement. Excitedly, he exclaimed, "Master Hope! You really can create miracles!"
"But you certainly cannot fight with this body anymore," Baiyi explained and pointed to the few formations on his major joints, "I've embedded some magical crystals in these formations to supply continuous energy to you but you have to remember to change them regularly."
"Sure, sure, I'll remember," Leo answered repeatedly, he did not give a damn about the fact that he could not fight anymore. Quickly, he added, "It's good that I won't be able to fight anymore you know. Our family doesn't intend to let Undine continue to be that Butterfly Saint something anymore. They just want her to take good care of our family's status quo and nobody would complain even if there was no improvement to our current situations. They even objected to the air commercial route that you proposed earlier as everyone is afraid of losing her again."
"Let me guess, she still insists on continuing, right?" Baiyi asked.
"Yes, she's stubborn, as she always is. Sigh.. . This girl values the family too much. If it was up to me, I actually prefer that she lead a normal peaceful girl's life..." Leo confided in a serious manner. Suddenly, without warning, he smacked a hand on his own forehead and exclaimed loudly, "How about we just let Undine marry you?"
"Are you crazy?" Baiyi chuckled as he looked down at the hammer in his hand. I didn't break his mind when I hit him just now, right?
"Of course not! I'm exceptionally serious and sincere in discussing this issue with you!" Leo sat down on the sofa and crossed his leg, "Undine is not beautiful enough for you? Is she not good enough for your standard?"
Well, she's certainly very beautiful! Yes, she is an outstanding beauty but you can't expect me to say that out loud, can you? Still, not wanting to offend him, Baiyi nodded his head reluctantly.
"If that's the case, that's settled then! She's at the peak age for a woman and she really should not waste her time anymore!" Patting his own thigh lightly, Leo added, "I think that you are powerful, very powerful! You're kind and trustworthy, I'm sure you'd be able to take good care of Undine and look after our Dole family. What a perfect pair you guys would be! Except for the fact that you will not be able to produce any kids but still, this is not important. I really think that this would be a good marriage! Don't worry! I'm gonna speak to the current Dole family head when I get back!"
"The point is, if Undine don't give her hand to you, she would most likely be married off to some rich aristocrat for the sake of the family's benefits and are you sure you want to see a good girl like her being forced to climb into the bed of a disgusting perverted man? I'm sure you wouldn't, right?" Leo continued to pursue the matter.
"What does it have to do with me? Why wouldn't I want that?" Baiyi shook his head helplessly, "Give up on that unrealistic dream of yours, will you? Who says that I must be attracted to her just because she's beautiful? I hope you'd respect her own choice!"
"Respect her choice?" Leo shook his head hard, "No, no, no, impossible! Ever since she came back from the Wasteland, I'm not sure if she hit her head or something, but she suddenly had a huge interest in black clothing, and every so often, she'd keep mumbling about some stinky bastard under her breath..."
Baiyi's heart suddenly turned cold at his words. Why does this woman keep thinking about my old armor? Don't tell me she had fallen for me?