If one were to ask the men of the world: What is the best view to wake up to in the morning?

One would get a variety of answers. Like a bright sunrise with a cup of coffee in their hand. Maybe someone would answer that they wished to wake up surrounded by their beloved family. Or maybe something simple like the ceiling they grew familiar with over the years.

For Reivan? He would certainly welcome the above-mentioned scenery, but right now, he would only have one answer.

'Man, waking up with a busty babe in your bed is the fucking best!'

Reivan carefully pulled his arm from underneath the sleeping Elsamina's head and got up. He spent a moment admiring her angelic beauty and her devilish body.

'Oh, I should cover her up...'

He took out a spare blanket from his Zouros' stomach. Because they jumped right into the action, he and Elsamina hadn't bothered to move to a bedroom. They had rolled around in what appeared to be her office. Reivan briefly recalled how he'd bent her over on every possible surface here and felt touched.

'I've done it. I'm a man now!'

Reivan had killed people, fought monsters, and destroyed organizations, likely ruining the lives of thousands of criminals. But nothing made him feel like a "man" more than what he had just done last night.

'Hehehe... I wanna brag to someone. But I know I shouldn't...'

Instead, he went to the window, opened it up, and breathed in the cool morning air as he looked at the cityscape below.

'Good morning, all the virgins of this world! And a pleasant morning to the virgins of my old world too! I, Reivan Aizenwald, am no longer one of you! I eagerly await you on this side! Get fucking good, you scrubs! Muaaaa ~ ha ha ha!'

Reivan's smile challenged the limits of how wide a human's grin could be. He'd always, always, wondered how it would feel, and now he knew.

'It's the best feeling in the world!'

It was almost addicting, even. And he foresaw how his sexual desires would likely interrupt his duties... and his dreams.

'Oh, shit. That's not good.'

Reivan's mood immediately fell and he calmed down. Sure, sex felt wonderful. But there were more important things than that.

'The heat is gone. Awesome.'

He noted the absence of the annoying urge that had been bothering him and smiled. Now he could get back to work.

"Master? You're awake..."

Reivan glanced behind him and smiled. "Yes. Good morning, Elsa."

"Good morning." She sat up while rubbing her eyes, the blanket that he'd placed over her falling off and revealing... well, everything. "Are you leaving already?"

"Uh... yes. I've stayed for a bit too long."

'Luckily, it shouldn't be time for breakfast yet. So I should still be clear.'

Reivan inwardly wiped off a bead of sweat. Just imagine how his mother or Jiji would react if they barged into his room and didn't find him there. Wouldn't they immediately call the guards and order a search?

'Absolutely not!'

If they did, his little escapade might be revealed to even more people.

With that in mind, Reivan really wanted to hurry on out of this place so the old man could port him back into his room. "I might come back later this afternoon to discuss some matters..."

"Oh?" Elsamina covered her mouth and giggled. "So quickly? Haven't you had enough? You were a beast last night... I'm still sore all over."

"Ahahaha..." Reivan scratched his cheek. "Sorry about that. It must've been tough for you."

"Not at all. Rather, I think I was infected by you... enthusiasm."

'It wasn't really my enthusiasm. I just drugged you.'

Last night, Reivan had continuously utilized [Effect Reproduction] to use the Beast King Ichor's stamina regeneration effect. Of course, he'd also used it on Elsamina by making his saliva into medicine. But he didn't want her sensing anything strange, so he made it so that the medicine didn't last too long.

That's how they were able to do it so much.

'Damn. Now I kinda wanna jump in again...'

Reivan managed to resist the urge with his inhuman willpower though. "Then, I'll be going."

"Yes, do take care. I'll be waiting."

"...right."

With a spring in his step, Reivan snuck out of Elsamina's office, and eventually the Serpent's Haven. Luckily, most, if not all, of the workers were asleep at this time of day. He then ducked into an alley and sent a telepathic message to the Sword Star to portal him as soon as nobody was looking.

Jingle!

The pleasant ring of a bell echoed throughout the alley just as he vanished into thin air.

With the help of his favorite Transcendent, Reivan managed to make it to the breakfast table without seeming suspicious.

Of course, few things in his life ever went the way he planned, so he got found out anyway.

"You little rascal." In an empty room close to the dining hall they used today, Vianna held him up by the scruff of his neck and took a sniff at him. She smirked before putting him down. "You say you're too young and then you go out and do it anyway."

Reivan's knees buckled as he fell to the floor. "How did you even find out...?"

"Your body odor's different. And no, I don't mean someone's smell is on you. I mean that your odor changed. It happens to all warbeasts after they do it at least once."

'You shoulda told me that earlier!'

However, in hindsight, knowing that piece of information wouldn't have changed Reivan's decisions. The heat really did get in the way of his duties.

Thankfully, his mother wasn't too hung up about it. "Just introduce her to me one day. And don't forget to meet with the concubine candidates anyway. I don't want a son that leads women on, okay? Those poor young ladies are still hoping for positive answers from you."

Reivan watched her leave and felt grateful that she'd pulled him aside for this embarrassing conversation. He didn't want Roland and Stella teasing him over this... or worse, asking for details.

"Okay." he nodded, a bit troubled. "But there are special circumstances, so she doesn't even know my real identity."

"Oh?" Vianna tilted her head, appearing surprised. She then hummed in thought for a second before asking, "Is she that girl you depend on to run your little business?"

"Yes."

"I see. I did hear that she was very pretty... Well, I can understand if you don't reveal the truth to her for a while. We can't run the risk of secrets leaking to Arkhan, after all."

"Exactly." Reivan nodded. He did trust Elsa, but at the same time, nobody was immune to accidentally letting things slip. The fate of Aizen lay in the balance after all, so he didn't want to gamble.

'I'll tell her one day. For now... we work.'

"Well, I'll be going now, Mother. And don't worry, I won't try to use my qi for a while. Like you told me."

Vianna suddenly grabbed his shoulder. "Ah, no need. Since you went and did that, there's no need to wait. Your qi should have stabilized by now."

"Really? Is that how it works...?"

"Yep. That's how it apparently works for us. I wouldn't know. My first was with your father, and that was when I was in my seventies..."

'Okay. Pause. That's too much information, mom.'

Vianna poked a few points in his chest and left to do whatever it was that she wanted to do.

'This is qi?'

After his mother presumably removed her own qi from his body, Reivan could feel a... strange energy running through every aspect of his body. His bones, muscles, skin, and even his organs. All of it was filled with what he could only assume was his qi.

'This feels... really good.'

He instinctively knew that this changed everything.

'I should call Valter.'

Reivan wasn't supposed to have lessons with Valter until his qi stabilized, so his duties for today were supposed to consist of some brainstorming with Scholars about new ideas for medicine. However, with his mother giving her seal of approval, Reivan intended to push his lessons forward.

"Hm? A message?" he raised a brow as he took out his personal communication crystal. Few people had the right to send direct messages to him, so he rarely got unexpected messages.

'Did something happen?'

Grasping the crystal in his hand, he let the information it received flow into his mind. As he processed the new knowledge, his face blanched.

He hastily called Valter and ordered him to come as fast as possible.

Reivan walked briskly down the halls of the capital's holiest structure — The Sol Sanctum of Sormon. Once he reached the room he was looking for, he nodded briefly to the templars flanking the door and made his way inside.

"Your Highness?" Xander, with a missing left arm, looked surprised as he stared at the visitors from atop his bed. He hastily jumped out of bed and saluted.

"I'm glad you're still alive and kicking." Reivan sighed in relief, noting the lack of stiffness in the knight's movements. "Sit. I didn't come here to bother a patient. Valter has some words for you though."

"Understood." Xander obediently got back to bed and gestured toward his arm. "It's not that serious, Your Highness. I just came to have my arm regrown."

'You say it so casually, but that's a pretty big injury in my eyes.'

Valter entered the room right after Reivan and closed the door. "You must have had a tough fight."

"Yes, Ancestor." Xander smiled, seeming a little proud. "I took out a squad of battlemages on my own."

"Recklessness isn't something to be brag about."

"I was careful. I led them into the sewers where it was dark and ambushed them one-by-one when they split up."

Valter nodded as he listened. "Good. You still lost an arm though."

Xander grimaced and looked down. "There were some minor complications."

"Minor complications that made you use the runestones I gave you?"

"Yes..."

"Goodness." Valter shook his head in apparent exasperation before taking out three dark purple runestones from his ring and tossing them to his descendant. "Here. Use them sparingly. I'm far from the Sword Star's level, so it takes a lot of time and effort to refine one that can teleport you. Be more careful next time."

"Thank you, Ancestor." Xander bowed his head, a smile on his face. "I will be more careful."

Valter seemed satisfied so he nodded to Reivan, signaling that the two were done with family matters.

Reivan took a seat on a nearby chair and faced the mutilated knight. "I roughly got the gist of things, but please give me a rundown of what happened."

"Yes, Your Highness."

In light of Arkhan's recent crackdowns on criminal activity within the capital, Xander naturally worked to evacuate and transport as many of Ouroboros' assets. Even the land and buildings they owned within the capital were mostly sold off, with only the legal businesses remaining.

Unfortunately, since some of the assets were rare plants, exotic animals, and slaves, they couldn't just be stuffed into spatial storage artifacts. And in any case, the amount of spatial storage artifacts Ouroboros had access to has been artificially restricted, since having too many would be very suspicious. It would likely be connected to Aizen, where spatial rings were relatively accessible to people — as long as they had enough lumens, of course.

As the final shipment was about to leave the capital, Xander received a tip-off that battlemages were spotted in their area. Since they were the only criminal organizations there, it was obvious who the sorcerers were gunning for.

Which is why he cut down their numbers when opportunities arose and eventually fought the remaining ones.

He hadn't come out unscathed and had to consecutively use three of Valter's runestones to make it back to Aizen, where he then took one of the military portals to the capital.

"You were a bit too reckless, Sir Xander." Reivan shook his head, disapproval in his face. "It would have been a much more tremendous loss if you died. Much less, revealed our actions to the Arkhanians. I like money just as anyone does but I would've just burned everything and be done with it. Instead of tempting fate like that."

"My apologies, Your Highness. I simply felt as if I knew my limits. But perhaps I underestimated the battlemages." Xander dipped his head in apology, but then took out a box and presented it to Reivan. "I have acquired some very valuable things, Your Highness. Kindly check them for yourself."

'You're bribing me? This better be good...'

Reivan opened the box and examined its contents. "Wands?"

Valter peeked in from behind him and remarked. "Their Class-A wands, Your Highness. Higher quality than most sorcerers have access to. They're primarily granted to battlemages and even the great families can't easily procure them. Eleven would fetch quite a price on the black market."

"Hoh" Reivan was already very satisfied with the knight's loot. "I'll give them to Father to do as he wishes. I'll keep one though."

"A good choice." his guardian knight nodded with a smile.

The scarcity of wands was the main reason why Aizen couldn't train their own force of sorcerers. That didn't stop his father from having a few secretly trained, however. These wands would be a great boon to the puny sorcerer squads.

Xander cleared his throat and somewhat enthusiastically chimed in. "There is more at the bottom, Your Highness."

"Hm?" Reivan looked down at the box in confusion and finally noticed the worn leather book at the bottom. The book had nestled into the box so perfectly, its color matching the container's, that he'd briefly thought it was the bottom of the box. Carefully, he took it out, studying its plain cover, which had no title or text. "Valter, you said you knew a bit about sorcery?"

"I've dabbled. I've lived a little too long, after all."

"Good enough. Kindly inspect this and estimate its worth."

"I will do my utmost." Valter respectfully took the offered book and flipped through its pages. It only took him ten seconds to reach a quarter of the book. "I believe the knowledge in this grimoire can be considered as advanced sorcery. It's far too complex for me to fully understand with my limited expertise. In conclusion, it is highly valuable, but useless on its own without the required foundational knowledge."

"Oh?" Reivan raised a brow and then nodded in satisfaction. "That's great."

Knowledge pertaining to sorcery was even rarer than wands. And from what he knew, Aizen only had entry-level to apprentice-level stuff.

He turned to Valter and asked. "So what is that book about?"

"Souls, Your Highness. Particularly, the diseased."

'What!?'

"Gimme that!" Reivan snatched it out of the shocked Valter's hands and began to furiously slip through the pages, his eyes scanning every letter. He eventually closed it shut with a resigned look on his face. "I can't understand any of this."

"Yes. As I've said, it requires quite a lot of foundational knowledge."

'Fuck. What luck... Wait, no. I actually have good luck here, don't I? While I was out having sex, someone got me a clue to reviving Kyouka and Hanzo!'

Perhaps the spells in the grimoire would ultimately lead him to a dead-end, making him despair at the impossibility of his desires. But a clue was a clue. He was very thankful.

"You've done really well, Sir Xander!" Reivan got up and repeatedly patted the injured knight's shoulder. "You stay here and rest up, alright? Prepare for a fat reward when you do!"

"Hm? Ah, yes, Your Highness. You are most welcome. I was just doing my job..."

Reivan couldn't help but laugh out loud and pat the shoulder again before turning around and handing the book over to his guardian knight. "Valter, kindly have this book duplicated and archived. Then give me a copy."

"Understood."

'I guess I have to pay even closer attention to Arkhan, huh?'

With the discovery of the mysterious grimoire, there was even more reason for him to take an interest in the Spirit Tower.