Chapter 629: Vamp And Shadow

The silence was loud enough to rupture Sunny’s eardrums. Something he wasn’t quite sure was possible.

Of course, he was being completely hyperbolic. Literal words weren’t enough to illustrate the feeling of absurd awkwardness that he was forced to endure. Sunny was still bent forward, unable to muster the courage it would take for him to look Seishan in the eye after not only failing to greet royalty with the respect they didn’t really deserve, but also looking like an idiot while doing so.

Normally, the latter was a plus, but not when put together with the former. Especially when he was trying to make a good first impression.

Sunny could already see the thoughts going through her head...

"This peasant is as stupid as he looks."

"This peasant has no respect for his betters."

"Peasant, peasant, peasant, peasant, peasant, peasant—"

"Sunless?"

The bubble that represented Sunny’s thoughts popped away into nothingness, and a moment later, he was standing at attention. His facial expression conveyed no nervousness, and his body language was absent of doubt. He created the convincing image of a man who always had a plan and never deviated from them.

It was as if his mistakes were intentional.

Of course, in reality, Sunny was panicking on the inside. Was he eligible for execution? Did they even do that in the Great Clans? Suddenly, he felt like he should have invested more time researching the overlords of society — second only to the IPC, of course.

With a look that carried the pinnacle of what could be considered polite, Sunny smiled in a way very much unlike him.

"Apologies, Lady Seishan. My mind was deeply embroiled with thoughts on the current state of degradation—"

Sunny quickly adjusted himself before things got too kinky.

"I mean to say, the degrading state of society. Why, just recently, there was a man who could only think of the various ways a princess may call him a peasant. In the end, he settled on only one. Degenerate, is it not?"

Things got kinky anyways.

’Fuck.’

Well, at least it wasn’t obvious that he was talking about himself. Maybe she’d just brush him off as a weirdo rather than a pervert.

He dared allow his shadow to glance up at Seishan. She kind of just stared at him.

Like, really stared at him.

Then, she squinted her hazel eyes and parted her soft lips, looking at him with something that could only be described as utter bewilderment.

"...I see? Yes, sure. Mhm."

...That response didn’t fill Sunny with much confidence. At the very least, he knew that he wasn’t completely alone in his awkward state of being, but that thought didn’t exactly inspire any amount of joy in him.

Seishan shut her eyes for a few moments, then opened them with an odd look.

"Nevermind, I don’t get it. More importantly..."

She looked him up and down.

"What are you doing? You look ridiculous."

Sunny’s body suddenly lost all dimensions, perfectly converted into a poorly drawn paper cutout that vaguely resembled himself.

He had been holding on to that last sliver of hope. The tiny possibility that Seishan wasn’t as intelligent as her upbringing would suggest. But... but it just wasn’t meant to be.

Seishan... has proven that she was at least as intelligent as the average human being.

And that proof brought with it the Destruction of any possible positive relations with Song. They might just kill him, actually.

"So, it was the Astral Express, then?"

She seem displeased, throwing him an expectant look. In Sunny’s mind, a war was being waged; one argued that he, Lost From Light, should not be afraid of a mere Legacy. He has achieved far more than she could even dream of, after all. That, and in a world governed by strength, he was far above her on an individual level.

The other side told him to finish what he started, to carry that sophisticated persona for the entire week.

Downsides and upsides, pros and cons...

Eventually, burdened with his Flaw, Sunny just decided to answer her questions in a way that made him seem less rude but more idiotic. The two scales had to be balanced in such a way that she’d underestimate him, but wouldn’t be offended.

"Apol— Sorry, I was trying to be respectful and professional to seem impressive..."

’Yep, look at me go. Humble and honest, but stupid to a fault. Now for the payload...’

"And — sorry if this sounds dumb — but what does the Express have to do with anything?"

He was genuinely confused about that question, but it certainly helped to play into this persona.

Normally, pretending to be multiple different characters while being scrutinized by the same audience was an extremely dangerous move, one that wouldn’t work normally. Fortunately, he already made a fool of himself while playing his bootlicker character, so switching to a bigger fool wasn’t particularly difficult.

Especially when he already felt like one.

Seishan blinked a few times.

"Impress... who? Me?"

Sunny dumbly nodded as his insides recoiled in humiliation. He felt like a rimbo...

A soft, melodious sound resounded in his ear, Seishan holding a hand up to her mouth as her shoulders shook.

Well, looks like he was being laughed at. Somehow, Sunny wasn’t particularly surprised—

A hand gently patted his head. Once, twice. Seishan snorted as she stepped forward, walking around him as she head towards the docking bay.

"That’s just adorable, Dear. But please, I’d rather not."

She turned her head with a glare.

"And don’t pretend that you don’t know what I’m mad about, you fool. I never thought that there would be a day when someone would choose a space train over the attention of my family..."

Seishan sighed in disappointment, looking through the glass into space. A dot was slowly enlarging, filling the void with its volume.

"We can continue this conversation later. It looks like our clients are here."

Sunny didn’t hear a thing. He didn’t see a thing.

The only thing he was sure about was that he was a thing.

A thing who just received a head pat.

’What.’

As always, nothing was as it seemed.