Vile Evil Hides Under The Veil

"I want to see how Lensa reacts when she feels your presence."

Dan narrowed his eyes on Ken after he said that.

He hadn't released his high ranking aura. Neither his words contained any threat. But Ken could feel that this was the most life-threatening situation he had found himself in.

But then again, the white knight didn't have much wiggle room either. So he stopped thinking and nodded to Dan before proceeding to act on the latter's instructions:

'Erni, I don't think Ken will succeed in waking Lensa up.'

Reen spoke as Ken started walking back to the block of ice again. Eren controlled the sheer surprise of his demon beast defying his orders for the first time and spoke back to her in his mind:

'I think I had told you to stay silent, little lass. I'm sure there's a good reason for you to risk defying my order like this.'

Eren raised his eyebrows after he said that. One could believe that he had done that in anticipation of events unfolding in front of him. But he was put on edge because of a different matter altogether.

'There is, Erni. Don't you want Lensa and Ken's engagement to take place in the future? This idiot needs to successfully wake her up first with his presence for that to happen.

But he won't be able to wake her up. And because of that, he'll be hated by the entire Carren clan. How will he get engaged to their girl even after she wakes up by other means after that?'

Reen said this before sounding a 'hmph' in Eren's head. The butcher was looking at Dan to gauge his reactions after he talked to Reen. He only continued speaking to his demon beast after ensuring the high ranking entity's lack of reaction:

'You mean this guy isn't what Lensa is looking for? And how do you know this in the first place?'

Eren again had black lines on his forehead after he heard Reen talk. He had seen a chance to finally start getting back at Sienna with his seemingly botched-up operation. But even that possibility was turning out to be dim if Reen's observations were on point.

'Her subconsciousness that is seeped into her mana sense is constantly looking for a particular mana signature. It is like screaming one's name out loud when you can't find them in a crowd.

That mana signature is your Erni. I know this because I can sense these things of course.'

Eren heard another 'hmph' going off in his mind. But he was too lost in his current predicament to care about any of that.

'So you mean she is looking for me? Or my presence? But how could that be? Doesn't my mana signature get colluded when I shapeshift? You had certainly told me so.'

Eren wasn't a fool who'd halfheartedly start making a mess everywhere just because he had gained the unique ability of shapeshifting. He knew that there were spells and methods of several kinds that could help someone establish the identities from real to fake.

But Eren had been assured by Reen that his mana sense gets colluded when he shapeshifts. It somewhat became the fusion of his signature and the signature of the person he had shapeshifted into.

That's why Eren had dared to shapeshift into Ken in the first place. He had weighed the risks and made sure that he didn't leave a clue behind his misadventure. And yet, the protagonist's luck had managed to retaliate against him.

'I'm not sure about that either. Maybe she asked the higher consciousness to clarify the colluded mana signature. And it rectified the collusion and let her know about the real thing? As I said, I'm not sure.

Anyway! The girl is looking for you and she won't wake up by herself until she senses your presence. I'll follow my master's orders now and won't say another word. Hmph!'

'Why are you throwing tantrums now? Anyway, thanks. And yeah, keep silent. We shouldn't be pushing our luck here.'

Eren now had to figure out a way to wake Lensa up while making sure that it was Ken who did it. All this conversation only took a few moments in reality as it was rapid transferring of thoughts. So Ken had just touched the block of ice while imbuing his hand in unelementalized mana.

And as Reen said, no visible change took place.

"Can I tell something to my friend here that could help him wake Lensa?"

Eren suddenly spoke up after seeing that things would start deteriorating if he let them be as they were. He didn't leave his place while doing that. Neither did he raise his head, lest the old monster finds some vague reasoning to hurt him because he didn't follow his orders.

"Oh? And what that might be?"

Dan asked while looking at the new participant in their conversation.

"Well, the things that might have happened between Ken and Lensa are personal. So I want to talk to Ken privately regarding a few things. It might help him wake our young miss."

Dan thought for a while and retracted his mana sense from the block of ice. Others did the same. It was a silent agreement to let Eren have a word in private with Ken.

Eren walked up to where Ken was standing. The latter was looking at him with questions written all over his face. He still had his mana-imbued palm placed over the block of ice.

Eren came close to Ken's ears and talked random bullshit about women's hearts and their feelings. Then he patted the palm that was over the block of ice in a gesture to encourage him.

Eren told his "friend" to release his mana sense while thinking about all the feelings of a maiden's heart. It seemed that Ken did his best in following his teammate's orders.

And the butcher barely grazed the block of ice "accidentally" just when Eren was about to remove his hand from the back of Ken's palm. He also sent a tiny burst of his mana sense at the time of that touch.

So tiny in fact that one would mistake it to be an involuntary action by a low ranker. The butcher had excellent control over his mana sense deployment for his rank and age to pull this off.

And that finally did the trick. The block of ice glowed brightly before melting at a rapid pace. And the shining water was just evaporating into thin air instead of making a large pool around.

Lensa, the sleeping beauty was finally out of her self-confinement.