The Love that Never Really Dies (Sasha and Sebastian)

“They are the overseas merchants I told you about. There are a dozen of them. If we manage to strike a successful deal with them, people will start buying Elysium's products,” Kurt explained to his father in a rather gentle tone.

In contrast, however, the king appeared to be quite indifferent.

In fact, upon careful observation, Vivian noticed that the king had an impatient look on his face. He even appeared to be slightly averse to the presence of the group of them.

“Ms. Hayes, are these two the leaders of the tribe?”

“Yes, the younger one is the prince of Elysium. He's also the main person in charge of this collaboration,” Vivian quickly explained to the merchant, snapping out of her daze.

The overseas guests had a look of realization on their faces after hearing her words and waited patiently for the instructions for the next steps from their two hosts.

“Lucy, help them settle into their seats and inform the kitchen to serve the dishes. Make sure to take good care of them.”

Kurt's cold voice rang out in the hall. Soon after, a young lady who was dressed in a blue cloth costume and wearing numerous silver accessories appeared.

“Yes, Prince Kurt,” the young lady lowered her head and answered with a respectful bow.

After that, she turned around and left the hall.

The gaze of the overseas merchants lingered on the woman until she disappeared out of sight, her accessories tinkling as she walked past them.

They were unable to take their eyes off those sterling silver accessories that she had on her as they had never seen such jewelry before.

“That was stunning. I'm going to reserve it later.”

“Me too! The design is so unique.”

“Her clothes are pretty as well. Did you guys notice the material of the cloth? I wonder what dye they used that gave it its pure color.”

The merchants started to discuss among themselves.

The king and the various chiefs, who were specially called to the palace that day to help entertain the guests, could feel their anger building when they noticed the behavior of the merchants, thinking that they were interested in Lucy.

“Your Majesty, see that? I was right when I told you that they are not good people. I mean, look at the way they're staring at our women.”

“That's right! Did you see that lecherous expression of his?”

“What are we waiting for? We should chase them out right now!”

Some of them urged the king, exploding in anger.

Noticing that the king was going to be swayed by his subordinates' comments and about to lose his temper, Kurt, who was seated next to him, let out a cold snort with a scornful smile appearing on his face.

“Do you understand what they are talking about? Given how fancy the outside world is, do you really think the merchants would be interested in an attendant? They are just interested in the jewelry and costume Lucy was wearing and was talking about making orders for them,” Kurt commented sharply in a mocking tone.

Upon hearing the young man's words, the chiefs felt as if they had been slapped in the face, and their faces turned bright red with embarrassment instantly.

Even the king had an awkward expression on his face.

Meanwhile, Vivian had been quietly observing the interactions between those men at a distance.

Even though she was not able to figure out what they were talking about, she could tell from their expressions that it wasn't something pleasant. As such, she could not help but worry about the situation. That was, until the young man spoke.

“Our distinguished guests, since you must be tired from traveling, please get some rest after the meal. After that, we will give you a tour of our tribe and introduce the goods we have to you. How does that sound?”

The palace chief and Lucy appeared once again and quickly showed the overseas guests to their seats with Vivian following behind.

However, just when she was about to get seated, Lucy stopped her.

“Ms. Hayes, your seat is over there. As those are foreign merchants, our king would like to interact more with them during the banquet. As such, we have reserved the seats at the front of the hall for them.”

She pointed to the seat right at the end of the hall.

Vivian took a look at her allocated seat. Actually, she was not that particular about where she was seated. Previously, she was worried about the potential difficulty in communication between the Elysians and the overseas merchants due to their language barrier. However, since the palace chief was well-versed in foreign languages, her worries were put to rest.

Without asking any questions, Vivian headed over to her seat. However, what she did not notice was that the expressions of the two men on the throne had darkened the instant she sat down.

The atmosphere was so unsettling that it sent chills down one spine.

Vivian started gobbling down her food, savoring the tribe's specialties, not paying attention at all to the conversations between the overseas merchants, the chiefs, and the king.

Suddenly, slices of bloodied raw meat were served.

“Everyone, this dish consists of raw venison meat from deer around the River of Styx. It's a local delicacy of Elysium. The River of Styx is one of the few remaining rivers with a high salt concentration containing extremely rare metals and minerals that also gave the river its black color. Those deer grew up drinking water from the river. As such, their meat is extremely tasty and nutritious. All of you should give it a try!” the palace chief explained when he saw the signature dish of the tribe being served.

It was indeed a delicacy that even the royals did not get to eat regularly due to the rarity of such deer.

The eyes of the merchants lit up when they heard that and started digging in, completely ignoring the blood on the meat.

“Wow, this is yummy!”

“D*mn right it is! This is definitely one of the nicest food I've ever tasted!”

While everyone was busy enjoying the delicacy, no one noticed that Vivian, who was seated at the back of the hall, had already turned pale. Beads of cold sweat dotted her forehead as she stared at the plate of bloodied raw meat.

She was simply unable to look at it and have the dish in front of her any longer.q