Atlanna froze, then sprang from the bed as if electrocuted. Her pale amber eyes widened, and she burst out cursing:
"You... did that to Arthur's sweetheart right in front of him?"
"You're the Demon Satan himself!"
Yongye shook his head vigorously and lied with a straight face.
"Wrong. Demon Satan is someone else. I was helping your son."
"His sweetheart is Mera, Princess of the Kingdom of Xebel and his younger brother Orm's fiancée."
"Mera tried to ambush me, so I taught her a lesson. Arthur wanted to stand up for her, so I pinned him down in the sand and made him listen to the whole thing."
"But don't worry, I didn't kill them. After all, one is your son, and the other is technically your daughter-in-law."
Atlanna had ten thousand things she wanted to say, but she had no idea where to begin!
She closed her eyes, drew a sharp breath, then slowly exhaled. Her fingers clenched the edge of the blanket until her knuckles stood out. It took a long while before she let go.
"Mera is Orm's fiancée?"
"Yes."
"Arthur has feelings for her?"
"Yes. Arthur fell for her at first sight. She's got him completely bewitched."
"If I hadn't stepped in, those two would have ended up fighting each other over Mera... brother against brother!"
Atlanna closed her eyes again and forced a muffled curse through her teeth. "...Shameless little vixen! And to think I was so good to her when she was young!"
Meanwhile, thousands of meters above them in the Indian Ocean, a burly figure and Kurenai sped along a route marked on an ancient map toward the Mariana Trench.
Arthur and Mera.
Mera suddenly sneezed.
To break the monotony of the journey, she joked, "I wonder who's talking about me. My