Chapter 42: Foolish Hunter.

That fight had taken a toll on his body. His head, shoulder, face, and arm were all damaged in varying degrees and would need a lot of energy to heal.

Tessa didn’t let him sup on Barnabas’s flesh for long, so he finished the fight with less energy than he started with. Even now, his energy levels was draining rapidly, making him hungrier by the moment.

Now that his food was nearby, logic said he should take a few bites here and there to replenish himself. At least, that was the logic the worm was using to try to convince him to pounce.

"Just a bite. It won’t hurt. I promise," the worm said earnestly.

He ignored it and focused on getting to his bed as fast as possible.

The gluttony worm didn’t take his silence treatment well and said, "Is this how you treat someone trying to help you? You’re such an ungrateful person."

"And you’re stupid too. Because what logic is there in fighting but not to kill? What is this nonsense about fighting to vent?"

"And you say that you’re the smart one. Even I know that if you fight, it is to kill the target. I know that it is foolishness to waste energy hunting prey you don’t intend to kill. Like who hunts for fun?"

The worm went on and on complaining about his decision-making and intelligence. For some reason, he didn’t mind it. In fact, they found the droning soothing. It calmed his frayed nerves and made time pass while he listened.

Before he knew it, he had arrived at the main building and was at his door. He didn’t realize he had reached his destination until he had to find the key to open the door.

When he came to, he fumbled through his pockets for the keys. When he found the key, he slotted it into the keyhole. Then he twisted and turned the key.

The door opened with an audible click. He pushed it aside and made his way into the room in large, purposeful strides.

He ignored everything around him and went straight for the bed. The only thing he did between the door and the bed was to remove his clothes. So by the time he reached the bed, he was in his undergarments.

He slumped face first into bed. Then he closed his eyes and tried to sleep.

It was an attempt at sleeping that was doomed to fail because the worm was still talking and disturbing him with hunger. He had to enter his meditative state for any chance of getting sleep.

As he lay in bed, the servants got to work around him. One of them picked up his clothes and took them to wash. The other went around cleaning his apartment. The last one stayed by his bed, waiting for him to wake up.

Jessy was the one who stayed by his side. She had been ordered to follow him everywhere, so when the servants divided their work, she was assigned to stay beside him and wait for any order he might have.

She had not eaten for many days and had barely eaten a few scraps after the test. So she was hungry now. But she didn’t dare to leave his side.

She stood with her back to the wall at the foot of the bed, waiting for the slight chance that he might need her to run errands. Unfortunately, no matter how determined she was to do a good job so that she wouldn’t be sent away, she was just a tiny, weak girl.

In less than ten minutes, she got too tired to stand and sat down to wait. Then, ten minutes later, her head dropped, and she struggled to keep her eyes open.

After another ten minutes, she was fast asleep. Her tiny arms wrapped around her body to keep herself warm.

When she woke up, she found Alexander crouching in front of her. His face was less than ten centimeters from her face. He also seemed to be inhaling her scent.

The first thing she saw after the darkness of sleep was four eyes staring at her and a three-headed tongue nearly within reach of her face.

The sight scarred her, and she rushed away to put some distance between them. Unfortunately, only the wall stood behind her, so she had nowhere to go. Her attempt to escape only made her strike the back of her head against the wall.

The collision caused pain to stab through her, causing tears to well in her eyes. She didn’t cry, though.

She tried to be brave as she said, "Good morning, master. What can I do for you?"

Her voice quivered, and her body shook as she spoke. Alexander noticed all of these signs, and it only seemed to confirm that she was prey that would be easy to take down.

But he didn’t attack her. At least not yet.

Instead, he said, "I am hungry."

With that same quivering voice, she said, "They told me that there is food in the mess hall."

Alexander didn’t respond to that information. Instead, he kept staring at her.

It was as if he was weighing the difficulty of going to the cafeteria for food against eating right here and now. It was either that or he expected another solution from her. Or maybe he expected her to solve his hunger now.

All of these possibilities went through her mind, making her tear up even more. Now she was on the verge of crying.

She still tried to hold back her tears as she straightened her arm and extended it to Alexander as she asked, "Will you eat this?"

Alexander looked at her shaking arm. Then he looked at her trembling body. Finally, he looked at her wet eyes.

All of these were supposed to invoke pity in him. And it did invoke pity. But the pity he felt for her couldn’t compare with the mind-numbing hunger.