Chapter 34: Chapter 34: The Poisoned Gifts

Just as Della had predicted, Anom felt someone approaching the house he was staying in. He opened his eyes and stood up from the bed.

He went downstairs, and before the person on the outside could give a knock, he opened the door.

Luna was surprised but she became happy as soon as she saw Anom.

Anom smiled as he stroked her head. "What? You started missing me already?" he asked as he continued to pat her.

Luna wanted to say something but she forgot what it was and lowered her head to enjoy the pats.

Anom had a guess about what she wanted to say but it wasn’t that urgent. He didn’t mind giving her some head pats as he enjoyed that too.

Luna felt so good that she closed hr eyes and kept lowering her head till it was touching Anom's chest.

Seeing her expression, Anom chuckled. "Little maid, you'll become an ostrich if you lower your head any further." He stopped patting her and rubbed her smooth cheek.

Luna broke out of her daze and made a disappointed expression. She jumped abruptly and she really wanted to ask what an ostrich was, but then she remembered what she was there for.

"Ma-Madam Loreana has called for you. Miss Crystal is also with her. They are waiting for you in her room. P-Please come with me." Luna said in one go as she became worried if she would get scolded for taking too much time.

Anom grabbed her hand and said, "Let's go."

They both crossed the garden and arrived in front of the corridor which connected this area to the central area.

Just as he was about to step on the corridor's smooth floor, he paused. He instructed Luna to walk forward while he started following her from the shadows.

Luna was confused at first but understood that he didn’t want anyone else to know about his visit.

She acted normal while walking towards their destination. She never turned to look back, as she didn’t want anyone else to know about Anom's presence. Anom praised the maid for her smartness as he followed her like a shadow.

Now that his control over energy has improved, he can hide his presence even more perfectly than before. Even opponents who were several levels stronger than him would require special detection skills to feel Anom's presence.

One reason for Anom being able to hide his presence so perfectly was his talent at stealth, which he had trained back on earth. His control over his internal energy has only improved his skills.

Another reason was his soul. His strong soul enabled him to delve deeper into the mysteries of energy. But that alone wouldn’t have been sufficient as almost every being will have their soul improve as they increase their level of energy control.

The main difference was that his soul had an intrinsic quality to assimilate with the natural laws. He was still at the initial levels of energy control and couldn’t understand the significance of this yet.

Luna walked through the corridor while Anom followed her stealthily. They soon arrived at the main area of the mansion and were about to reach Crystal's room.

Suddenly, Anom stopped his movements and blended with the darkness.

Luna also had to stop because a person was blocking her path.

It was a middle-aged man wearing a servant's uniform. But his uniform was a little more stylish and looked like it was made from more expensive materials. He had a small moustache on his hatchet-like face while his medium-length oily hair was combed backwards.

His thin frame blocked Luna's path as he asked, "Maid Luna, where are you coming from?" His grating voice sounded as he looked at Luna with a stern expression.

Luna had an expression of fear on her face. But maybe because she was emboldened due to Anom's presence behind her, her fear lessened considerably.

She replied, "Madam ordered me to bring dinner for the new guest. I was returning to report back to Madam."

The man looked at her with suspicion when he saw the usually timid maid speaking with such confidence.

He kept standing in his place and ordered, "You can go."

"Yes, Head Guloi." Luna nodded and resumed walking and moved past the annoying person in front of her.

Anom, who was hidden behind her, saw the man named Guloi looking at Luna's back with a disgusting smile on his face.

"Soon." He muttered as he went on his way.

Anom didn’t wait for the man to leave as his presence was not so easy to detect.

He kept following Luna for a while before she stopped in front of a house with beautiful carvings that were shining in the moonlight and the light provided by the gems embedded in the pathway.

Luna knocked and entered. She then turned to look for Anom.

She felt a hand on her shoulder and saw Anom standing before her.

"Ahh! When did you come in?" The cute maid became astonished.

Anom liked her cute expression and couldn’t help but stroke her head. He thought that he might get addicted to this feeling.

"Hmph!" A displeased snort broke their enjoyable moment. They turned to look and found Crystal looking at them with a displeased expression, while Loreana was sitting on a chair and looking at Anom with a faint smile.

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Anom walked forward and tried to give Crystal a pat but she dodged. "What are you doing?"

"I thought you were jealous of the little maid so I decided to give you a pat too." Anom shrugged.

"Hpmh! Who wants your stinky pats?" Crystal crossed her arms and gave another snort.

"Alright you two, stop messing around. We have more important things to discuss right now." Loreana interrupted their banter and brought their attention to the reason they had gathered here.

"What happened? Did you find something?" Anom asked.

"…We did. Two things actually," Loreana answered. Her tone indicated that she was not happy with this development. Not because she lost her bet with Anom, but because it meant that her family was having internal problems at a time when they should be united against the outside enemy.

Seeing Anom focusing on her, she continued, "Crystal received a lot of gifts from almost all of the family members. But as we had discussed before, I didn’t allow her to use any of the items and tested all of them after the guests had left." She sighed. "I found poison in five of them and they were all herbs which could be consumed without any processing. Two of them were in the form of fruits. If I had not warned her beforehand, this silly girl might have stomached them long ago."

"But they were my favourite fruits and I have only eaten them a couple of times." Crystal pouted as she was angrier at the fact that they had ruined her favourite fruits.

"What else?" Anom asked Loreana.

"…One of those two fruits was brought by a servant sent by the Third Brother-in-law." Loreana still didn’t believe that the boorish and straight-forward fellow could do something like that.

Anom lowered his head and thought for a bit. But he didn’t give any opinion of his own, and asked, "You said you found two suspicious points. What's the second?"

Loreana explained, "The second point is actually quite puzzling. And if not for the fact that you had shown me something similar before, I wouldn’t even have suspected it… It was like how you had made me drink that water. A servant named Biona had brought a medicinal soup prepared from multiple expensive herbs for Crystal. But when Crystal refused, that maid insisted while saying that the herbs would lose their beneficial properties if not eaten quickly. But the thing was, she hadn’t dared to do anything like forcing members of the family she served before this. What made her even more suspicious was, she even went on to explain the hardships her master had to go through while collecting all these herbs. It was like she was trying to make Crystal drink the soup by making her feel guilty." Loreana paused as she then spoke about what puzzled her. "But I checked the soup just like the other herbs but it didn’t show any signs of containing any poison… That's what made me puzzled. While the other poisoned herbs were special in the way that Crystal might consume them directly, they were still delivered normally. But the suspicious soup was actually not poisoned." Loreana shook her head as she couldn’t think of any reason to explain the situation.

"Maybe we should just focus on the poisoned herbs for now." Loreana spoke as she was out of options.

"What is the relationship between that maid and the head of servants, Guloi?" Anom asked suddenly.

Loreana was surprised at his question but she still answered, "They are husband and wife. Why? And how do you know him?" Suddenly she looked at Luna and thought that maybe the little maid had told him about it.

"Oh! Interesting." Anom chuckled as he explained about how they, or more accurately, Luna was obstructed by Guloi on their way here.

Loreana frowned, "Don’t tell me…"

"Yep. He was keeping an eye on Crystal, and maybe also on you." Anom spoke clearly about what she suspected.

"But …why?" Loreana didn’t understand.

Anom sighed. These women really get muddle-headed when it comes to their family. "Who sent that soup?" he asked.

"…Her second Uncle." Loreana answered as she rubbed her forehead. She was getting a headache with the situation in her family being so confusing.

She then looked at Anom. She had seen his expertise with these 'evil' ideas before.

"Hey! Why do I feel that you consider me as some kind of evil person who resorts to any kind of method to achieve his goals?" Anom frowned.

"You don’t?" Lorena asked with a sarcastic smile. Looks like she was angry about how Anom had fooled her before.

"I do." Anom answered honestly as he thought about how petty women can be.

"See! You're accepting it yourself!" Loreana clapped as she thought she made Anom agree to him being evil.

"I meant that I might resort to some means which might not be considered honourable by some saints, but I do all those things as an honourable thief." Anom explained without even a hint of shame.

Loreana was exasperated as she shouted, "Like that’s even a thing!" While Crystal nodded, indicating that she had also said the same thing to him before.

"What? So now you both want to team up against me? I haven’t even taught you both a lesson for scaring little Luna before." Anom spoke fiercely.

"Hmm?" They made a confused sound as Luna took the initiative to explain how she had misunderstood Anom.

Loreana giggled after listening to Luna and Crystal laughed while holding her belly. But she soon gnashed her teeth when she saw Anom stroking Lena's head again.

"Alright, stop… Now tell me what you think about this situation? How should we proceed from here?" Loreana asked with a serious expression.

Crystal also became solemn as she looked at Anom.

But Anom just shook his head, "I don’t know your family well enough to give an opinion of my own. So there's only one way left."

"What way?" The mother and daughter asked together. Even Luna looked at Anom curiously.

Anom smiled.

"Spying!"

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