Beast Gacha System: All Mine-Chapter 113: Pretense

"What’s wrong with you, East? Why do you look even worse than before...?" Harriet’s concern and observation made the lion turn as she watched her son trudge across the sun-baked stones of the desert palace courtyard.

The shadows under his eyes were like bruises. They were hollow, as if he’d been fighting sleepless battles in another dimension.

Eastiel shook his head wearily. "I’m fine, Mother. Just... losing some sleep. The northern winds don’t agree with a lion’s rhythm, you know?"

Elias, his younger brother, chose that moment to stride past them on his way to the armory. He didn’t slow, didn’t turn his head, but his voice, dry and perfectly aimed, sailed back on the hot air.

"He’s losing sleep because his wife isn’t here."

The voice shifted frequency as he walked past.

Harriet immediately pressed her lips together, but the corners twitched upward. She had to try her best to suppress her smile. "Is that true?"

Narrowing his golden eyes, Eastiel wished he could just say yes. That the absence of Cecilia was the sole cause. It would be easier. Cleaner. In a way, it was. But not for the same reason as she thought.

That oLD DRAGON WAS FUCKING HER EVERY NIGHT!

And he felt ev—ERY. SINGLE. STROKE.

Why did the ancient fossil get to have two? Why did he seem to favor filling both of her passages simultaneously, almost every dAMNED TIME?

He could sever the Sense Sharing connection, but it wAS UNFAIR TO TURN IT OFF!

So he endured. It was already maddening enough that his climaxes triggered his own, leaving him gasping and furious in his empty bed. But the sensation... Gods. How could he almost feel the stretch and the filling pressure, deep in his own guts? HOW BIG WAS (were) THE MAN?

He had seen it, but feeling it inside—fair, he had felt it before but goddamn, feeling it without seeing it was different!

He could swear that the dragon was doing something more. He shaped them. He deliberately made them expand the deeper the sex. He’d expand it when he withdrew just to make her clench around harder. She was already tight! That was her pussy’s magic! She didn’t need draconic dick-sorcery to enhance it!

Fuck.

Fuck, don’t wake up, junior... you’ve been on duty all night...

The only good thing in this entire ordeal was the imagined parallel suffering of the black wolf up north. Surely Arkai was being similarly tormented.

...No. On second thought, knowing how perverted both his ’elder brothers’ were, they were probably enjoying it.

...

...

...

Well... he’d enjoyed parts of it, too. A little.

...bUT THAT WASN’T THE POINT!

"Mother," he said, pulling himself back to the present, to her concerned face. "I’ll go catch some sleep. Thank you for helping me in court today."

Harriet smiled, helplessly fond. She reached up to stroke his shoulder. "Your mother and your brother can manage the court, my son. If it would make you happy, you could even let Elias take over completely. I’ve always known you never truly wanted the throne’s every burden."

Eastiel shook his head, a smile touching his lips. "You’re right, Mother," he admitted. "But it’s unfair to dump the entire crown on Elias just because I’m... not happy."

Harriet huffed, swatting his arm lightly. "See? You admit it! You’re not happy!"

"Ahahahahah—" A laugh burst from him. The sound felt good. "I’m kidding, I’m kidding. How could I not be happy?" He looked toward the horizon, his gaze growing distant and warm. "I’m the happiest man alive."

Harriet’s smile softened. This was her son. Her bright, laughing son returned from the shell of grief he’d been trapped in. All thanks to her. To the Saintess.

"Please," she said softly, "tell her to visit more often. I know she’s busy with... whatever world-saving she does..."

Eastiel nodded. "Okay. I’ll tell he—"

"My lord!"

The urgent shout sliced through the moment. A lion-kin aide in his half-beast form came skidding to a stop before them, his chest heaving, his eyes wide.

"The Temple’s Acolytes had arrived. With Arzhen Vasiliev," the aide said.

"They’re asking about... the ’Former Saintess’."

***

Arzhen had spent days now.

First, he went to the Empire’s authorities. Not the highest echelons, of course. Those were watching his father’s sudden ’retirement’ with too much interest. But the mid-level bureaucrats who handled missing persons and domestic disputes.

He established his alibi. He crafted his excuses. He laid down a logical, grieving trail of breadcrumbs. The strained marriage, the mutual decision to part ways using the legendary Meleth Flower, his own focus on his ailing father and the clan’s stability... and then, her sudden, worrying disappearance.

"I thought she simply chose not to attend the true Saintess’s coronation out of respect, or perhaps was assigned some remote penance by the Temple," he explained in regret and mild confusion. "We’d gone our separate ways amicably, or so I believed. I never imagined she would simply... vanish."

He sighed, the burdened noble son, grappling with a private worry amidst public crisis.

The authorities offered their ’utmost’ help. Of course, Arzhen could see the calculation behind their sympathetic nods.

They knew this was a play, a son trying to clean up a loose end to appease his suddenly fragile father and secure his inheritance. But that was fine. He knew they were the same.

They played along because, even though the fate of a disgraced, ’fake’ saintess ranked somewhere below the seasonal grain tariffs, they still needed to make themselves seem care.

Why would they care? She was a political inconvenience who had quietly removed herself. Perfect.

So, they made the appropriate noises, filed the reports, and kicked the entire matter to the Temple.

"A spiritual matter," they declared. "Best handled by her former associates." They did promise to ’spread their own investigative resources’. But it was just a phrase he knew meant assigning a single, hungover clerk to forget about it by lunch.

Privately, Arzhen had already scoured the woods. He’d retraced his own steps. He hadn’t been stupid, he’d chosen a place off the main trails. No one should have found her. Not unless they were looking very specifically.

Which led to the next link in the chain of suspicion.

Eastiel.

"The morning of the coronation," Arzhen recounted to the two weary Temple acolytes assigned to this farcical errand, "the Golden Lion King himself confronted me. He was... agitated. Demanded to know where Cecilia was. When I told him I didn’t know, he seemed... unconvinced. Enraged, even."

He spread his hands helplessly. "I truly don’t know if he’s involved, but he was the last person asking about her. Should we not, at least, inquire if he’s heard anything?"

The Temple acolytes, one older and one younger, exchanged a glance. They, too, would prefer the ’rebellious’ Saintess forgotten. Her predictions of disaster had been a public relations nightmare, scaring off the lavish donations from nobles who preferred their faith to be comforting and prosperous.

But now, with the Vasiliev heir publicly raising the issue, their hands were tied. Ignoring the formal inquiry of a major clan’s son would be a slight.

So, they would go through the motions. They would follow the only ’lead’, a lead that conveniently pointed toward another powerful, volatile royal house, potentially creating a useful distraction or conflict.

Thus, they set out.

To the Golden Lion King’s Desert Palace.

Only to find him standing with a tired frame and hollow eyes.

Ah.

This man...

Did he love her that much...?