Chapter 217: Talking Past Each Other

Asteria Valoran!

Tracey’s roar slammed into the silent reading room like a hammer blow.

“What are you doing to my student?!”

An iron-blooded murderous intent instantly flooded the entire space, and the dust on the bookshelves seemed to tremble under that pressure.

Wendy’s blood nearly froze in that instant.

It’s over.

The innocent scholar persona he’d painstakingly crafted, the future military titan image he’d meticulously forged, was about to be permanently nailed to the academy’s Pillar of Shame—along with this book, The Duchess’s Seven Male Servants.

But Asteria, still pressed against him, didn’t even twitch an eyebrow.

She let out a lazy yawn before slowly sitting up from atop Wendy.

She casually closed the forbidden book, tucking it under her arm.

Her Highness the princess leisurely smoothed her slightly disheveled clothes, then looked up and flashed a playful smile at the red-haired female instructor who was practically about to explode at the doorway.

“Instructor Tracey, with a voice that loud, you’ll scare the little ones.”

Her tone was light and carefree, as if the person standing before her wasn’t the academy’s most fearsome elite instructor, but a primary school teacher here to collect homework.

That attitude—utterly dismissive of her—finally ignited Tracey’s fury.

“You!”

Tracey stepped forward, her military boots thudding heavily against the floor.

Her sharp eyes locked onto Asteria, and then onto the pale-faced, evasive-looking Wendy behind her.

“As Valoran’s princess and the kingdom’s future heir! Is this how you choose to debase yourself—using filthy, depraved things like this to corrupt a promising future general star?!”

She jabbed a trembling finger at the book tucked under Asteria’s arm.

The cover was gaudy, and the title was outright rebellious—The Duchess’s Seven Male Servants.

Just those words alone would give any rigorous instructor an aneurysm on the spot.

But Asteria wasn’t the least bit flustered at being caught.

In fact, she found it amusing.

She casually picked up the forbidden book, waving it in front of Tracey, her smile growing even brighter.

“Instructor, you don’t understand.”

“Wendy is in the middle of crafting a groundbreaking masterpiece, right?”

The prince frantically signaled Asteria with his eyes, begging her not to pour more fuel on the fire.

But Valoran’s princess completely ignored his SOS.

“Creation requires inspiration,” Asteria explained with a straight face.

“Prolonged high-intensity mental labor easily drains the mind. At times like this, some special external stimulation is needed to reactivate that precious brain of his.”

“I’m just helping him with some ‘inspiration stimulation training’.”

“In-sper-a-tion stim-u-la-tion train-ing?”

Tracey repeated the phrase word by word, her blood pressure skyrocketing.

She could feel the veins on her temple throbbing wildly.

She looked at Asteria’s righteous, unyielding face, then at the drained-looking Wendy beside her—who wanted to die but didn’t dare—and a nameless fury exploded straight to her head.

“Nonsense!”

“Asteria, I don’t care what kind of princess you are. In here—I am the instructor!”

“Wendy Black is a talent I’ve chosen! A future valuable asset I’ve personally invested in!”

“What you’re doing is serious overdrafting! It will massively depreciate his value—do you understand?!”

Tracey said this with righteous indignation, looking like someone whose retirement fund had been gambled away.

Wendy, caught in the middle, listened to this absurd conversation and felt dizzy.

‘So in your eyes, I’m just a goose that lays golden eggs.’

“Asset?”

Asteria’s smile vanished instantly upon hearing that word.

Her emerald star-eyes narrowed slightly, and a sense of pressure slowly leaked out.

“Your asset?”

She repeated the word, her tone turning playful and dangerous.

“Instructor Tracey, are you mistaken about something?”

“Wendy Black is an important official of the Kingdom of Valoran.”

“He… is my man. It’s not your place to dictate terms.”

The words were light, but the air in the reading room froze solid.

Tracey’s pupils contracted sharply.

She could hear an unmistakable possessiveness in Asteria’s words.

One saw Wendy as an academic asset.

One saw Wendy as a personal object.

Two powerful women, facing off at their sharpest over a shared “target.”

Wendy felt like his scalp was about to explode.

He desperately wanted to shout, “Let me explain!” but he knew that anything he said now would be wrong.

Taking Tracey’s side would offend Asteria—and he’d seen the consequences this morning.

Taking Asteria’s side would completely shatter his “scholar” persona, and he’d never have a peaceful day again.

At that critical moment, his prince’s brain—specialized for survival—finally ignited its last spark of wisdom.

He clutched his chest, stumbled to his feet from the sofa, and forced a weak smile that looked more like a grimace.

“Asteria… Instructor Tracey… please don’t fight.”

“She’s right. This… is indeed a form of cultivation.”

At those words, both Tracey and Asteria turned to look at him.

Wendy met their two completely different but equally sharp gazes, and struggled to continue fabricating his story.

“The duchess in the book is like a brilliant commander. Those seven male servants are like seven warlords, each with their own army and hidden agendas.”

“Without using a single soldier, relying only on… skill at manipulating people’s hearts, she made them check and balance each other, wear each other out, and eventually… all of them knelt at her feet.”

“Doesn’t that… isn’t that… the highest state of strategy?”

“Subdue the enemy without fighting.”

With every word, Wendy’s face grew paler, and his body swayed more, as if this “earth-shattering” insight had drained all his vitality.

Tracey was completely stunned.

‘You… you can explain it that way?’

‘It… it actually sounds… kind of logical!’

Asteria, on the other hand, looked at Wendy with great interest.

She hadn’t expected this little guy to pull such quick thinking out of desperation and spin her nonsense into something so flawless.

‘Truly the man I set my sights on.’

Just as the atmosphere in the reading room fell into an eerie calm thanks to Wendy’s masterstroke—

“BAM!”

The already shaky oak door was kicked open from the outside!

Wood chips flew everywhere as a figure rushed in, wrapped in a storm of fury and thunder.

The newcomer had dazzling golden hair, slightly disheveled from running, and her usually haughty, tsundere face was now full of shame and anger.

It was Laxana, who had charged all the way from Magic Theory class!

“Asteria! You—”

Laxana’s furious shout cut off abruptly as she took in the scene.

The image she had expected was Asteria and Wendy entangled shamelessly.

But what she saw was a hundred times more complicated than she’d imagined.

Wendy sat in the middle of the sofa, disheveled like a startled daughter-in-law.

Asteria stood to the side, a mischievous smile on her face, watching the show.

And on the other side stood Instructor Tracey—her body wreathed in red magical energy, clearly ready to fight!

‘There are three of them?!’

Laxana’s brain short-circuited instantly.

She looked at Asteria, then at Tracey, and finally, her gaze landed on the man who was the root cause.

An unprecedented wave of humiliation and rage surged to the top of her head.

‘Not only did Asteria steal a bite first… but even this female instructor, who seemed so prim and proper before, who kept men at arm’s length…’

‘No wonder! No wonder Asteria was so arrogant in the Empathic Link just now!’

‘She’d already found an ally!’

Miss Klein’s eyes instantly turned red.

With a look of utter despair, like the whole world had betrayed her, she stared at Wendy, her voice trembling.

“Wendy… I really… misjudged you!”