Chapter 31 - Mutation.

Facing Satoshi who suddenly appeared at her door, Rei is slightly annoyed but tried her best not to show her annoyance since he might be on some official matters.

Just as Rei wondered about the reason for Satoshi's arrival, he suddenly handed Rei a bag of things and left without saying a single word. A bit confused by Satoshi's behaviour, Rei looked into the paper bag and is surprised to find out that it's a bagful of bite-size puff pastry that are lightly coated with icing sugar, and it smells really nice.

Despite having problems understanding what intention Satoshi has, that bag of puff pastry smells so nice that Rei can't resist and pop one into her mouth, and yes, it's delicious.

"What is it, My Lady? Is Mr Satoshi having some official matters with you again?" An Er asked as she just came back from getting daily supplies with Xi Er.

"Ah... My Lady, what is inside that paper bag? It smells so good! Is it some 'one-bite-puff'?" Xi Er asked as she sniffed the nice smell of the puff pastries.

"One-bite-puff? That's quite nostalgic, Lord Shao used to buy for us quite often and our Lady loves it very much," said An Er, low-keyly mentioned Rei's fiance.

"Well, Xi Er, too bad it's not the one-bite-puff you are familiar with, but it's quite similar and equally delicious," said Rei as she stuffed a puff pastry into Xi Er's mouth...

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With that first language lesson from the King as a starting point, Rei had started her everyday routine of language lessons with the King as well as helping him to tidy up his working desk as an appreciation for his language lesson. Through the daily interaction with King, Rei slowly found out that the King's health condition was indeed not quite well. Aside from the shaky left hand and occasionally having difficulty in breathing, he seems to be coughing quite often as well, Rei can't help but wonder if he might be having some lung problems. However, she does not have the courage to inquire too much about it, moreover, his condition was actually quite light, and the only thing she could do is to get him a warm drink and some massage to ease his discomfort.

But aside from that, everything is very peaceful with her daily routine, until one day...

That day was like every normal day, after Rei had her breakfast, she went to the King's reading room. The King is as charming as always, and his teaching is as interesting as always...

"So, just like the Qin's language, we have a set of several different ways to express the thing in different situations, for example... Hmm? Rei, did you hear that?"

As the King was teaching Rei her language lesson, he heard a weird noise from outside the door that sounds like a whole group of people collapsed onto the ground at almost the same time.

Rei nodded as she heard the weird noise as well. Alerted by the sound, the King slowly stood up from his seat and carefully walked towards the door, followed by Rei.

As the King cautiously looked out from the door, he was astonished by the sight, all of the palace guards that were guarding outside his reading room are now lying unconsciously on the ground, some of them seem to be undergoing some unexplainable mutation with their hands turning into some sort of long deformed claws.

"What the hell is going on right now..." The King murmured as he briefly saw through all the unconscious palace guards with a thoughtful look.

Then, due to her natural kindness, Rei decided to give a helping hand to the unconscious palace guards. However, before she even reached her hand to one of the palace guards, the King noticed some weird movement from that palace guard's limbs.

"Watch out!" The King exclaimed as he pulled Rei away from that palace guard who suddenly jumped up and was about to reach his deformed claws to Rei.

As the King pulled Rei away with his right hand, he blocked the assault from that palace guard with his slightly shaky left hand.

"Get into the building! There is a secret path under my working desk!" The King shouted as he was blocking the palace guard's attacks single-handedly.

Despite being a bit hesitant and unwilling to leave the King alone in this dire situation, Rei was forcibly pushed into the building by the King before he closed and blocked the door from outside.

After he got Rei back into the building safely, the King swiftly observed his surroundings while blocking the attacks from the palace guards, he was terrified to find out that it was not just his palace guards that got affected by this weird phenomenon, but more than half of the servants in the castle seems to be affected as well, he even witnessed one of the palace maids brutally bite off her colleague's face at the corridor of the building at the opposite side.

Furthermore, through the close interaction with the assaulting palace guard, the King can somehow feel the palace guard's steady pulse and slow breathing, indicating that he was still in an unconscious state, which means that the palace guard did not move at his own will but got controlled by some unseen force. With that piece of information, the King realised that a normal attack would not be able to stop that palace guard since he was already in an unconscious state, the only way to stop him is to totally kill him off and destroy his body. However, the King doesn't have the heart to do that to someone who had been working for him for quite some period.

The King has no choice but to continuously dodge and block the aggressive assaults from the palace guards while trying to brainstorm a way to stop him without killing him, and his time is almost running out as the other unconscious palace guards seem to be starting to rise as well.

After a short thought, the King took out a dagger from his pocket, then, he swiftly and precisely cut through the limb's muscle connective tissues of the palace guard and successfully immobilised him.

Then, the King quickly opened the door, entered the building and locked the door just before the other palace guards raised from the ground...