Charisma 100: My Academy Life As A Heartbreaking Commoner-Chapter 213: No Need To Rush

{Aegis}

"Make sure they get back to the manor safely, alright?" Aegis asked.

The coachman glanced back to where two throughly-fucked catgirls slept in his wagon. He nodded.

"Of course, Lady Starcaller."

She nodded back. Without much ado, he prompted his horses and the wooden vehicle groaned forward. Aegis stretched, looking up at the night sky briefly.

[Honestly, maybe I was a bit fast to celebrate like this. Sure, I’ve won a few times, but it’s not like I’ve secured Talia’s hand yet. But... Meh, it was a good way to keep morale high at the manor. In that sense it was totally worth it.]

She shrugged and headed back inside.

The bathhouse was quieter now, most of the other patrons having cleared out. Made sense. It was getting late, and Aegis had definitely caused a bit of a scene earlier with the twins. Not that she regretted it. Kai’Lin and Mei’Lin had more than earned a good dicking after all the intel work they’d been doing.

Speaking of which...

[Where’d Scarlett go?]

Last Aegis had seen, Scarlett was sulking in the bath while Rosalie and Evelyn made their exit. Kanna had been there too, doing her usual statue impression. But now? The main bath was empty. No muscular redhead in sight.

[Did she leave already? No, she would’ve said something.]

Aegis wandered deeper into the bathhouse, past the changing rooms, past the steam rooms, until she reached the hallway where the private massage rooms were. A young employee was standing near one of the doors, looking distinctly uncomfortable. Her face was red and she was very pointedly staring at the ceiling.

"Hey," Aegis said. "You seen a tall redhead come through here? Built like a brick wall, probably making bad jokes?"

The employee’s face somehow got even redder.

"I, um." She swallowed. "Lady Starcaller, I—"

She pointed at one of the doors. It was slightly crooked on its hinges, like someone had slammed it a bit too hard.

[Huh.]

Aegis walked over and pushed it open. Quietly. Just a crack, enough to peek inside.

She found Scarlett on all fours.

Kanna was behind her, hands gripping Scarlett’s hips, driving into her with deep, steady thrusts. Scarlett’s face was pressed into the padded table, her ass up in the air, and she was making sounds Aegis had never heard come out of her before. Little gasps and whimpers, punctuated by the slap of Kanna’s hips against her backside.

Aegis’s eyebrows shot up so high they nearly left her forehead.

[Whoa.]

It was a hell of a sight.

Neither of them heard her. Scarlett kept moaning through each thrust. Kanna looked down at Scarlett’s ass like it was gonna leave if she didn’t, regardless of her dick being inside it.

As the impact faded, Aegis smirked.

[Finally. Took you two long enough.]

Not wanting to ruin it for them, she quietly shifted back and mostly closed the door, leaving it like it had been a moment ago.

---

{Darius}

Darius sat with his legs crossed, swirling a glass of whiskey in his hand. 𝙛𝓻𝒆𝓮𝒘𝙚𝙗𝒏𝙤𝙫𝓮𝒍.𝓬𝒐𝙢

Across the drawing room, his parents were having what could generously be called a "discussion." Less generously, it was two nobles yelling at each other while pretending they weren’t yelling.

"The deal was almost done!" His mother’s voice cut through the air like a blade. "We had everything in place. The contracts, the guest list, the venue. And now this— this commoner comes in and—"

"I’m aware, Margot." His father pinched the bridge of his nose. "You don’t need to remind me."

"Someone needs to remind someone, because clearly our son wasn’t paying enough attention to the competition!"

Darius took a long sip of his whiskey.

[Ah, yes. There it is. The blame.]

"The girl came out of nowhere," his father said, waving a hand. "No one could have predicted she’d build a house from scratch in a matter of months. It’s unprecedented."

"Unprecedented doesn’t mean unstoppable. We should have crushed her when she was still small."

Darius thought about his purse.

Specifically, he thought about the fifty thousand gold that had once been in his purse and was now very much not in his purse. Fifty thousand gold he’d given to Aegis Starcaller as a "gift" to stay away from Talia. A bribe, really. A very expensive bribe that was supposed to make her back off and find some other noble to chase.

Instead, she’d probably used it to fund her entire operation.

[I am so fucking stupid.]

He took another sip, resisting the urge to slap himself for that one. Not his best moment, clearly.

"The girl has talent," his mother continued, pacing back and forth. "I’ll give her that much. But talent isn’t enough to challenge a Great House. She must have backers. Someone feeding her information, resources—"

"Lady Vermillion, most likely."

"Then we pressure Vermillion. Remind her where her interests truly lie."

Darius’s father shook his head. "Vermillion won’t budge. She’s invested now. Pulling out would make her look weak."

"Then we find another angle!"

They went back and forth like that for a while. Darius let the whiskey warm his throat and tuned most of it out. His parents were good at scheming, but they were also good at panicking, and right now they were doing a lot more of the latter.

He’d underestimated Aegis. That was the truth of it.

When he’d first met her, he’d written her off as a clever commoner with a pretty face and too much ambition. Annoying, sure. A nuisance, maybe. But not a real threat. Not someone who could actually challenge him for Talia’s hand.

Then, he fought her at the Winter Trials and that showed him he’d been wrong. He should have figured it out then, this girl wasn’t going to back down.

His mother stopped pacing and turned to face him.

"Darius. You’ve been quiet."

"Just thinking."

"Well, stop thinking and start talking. This affects you more than anyone. What do you propose we do about this Starcaller woman?"

His father leaned forward in his chair, waiting.

Darius finished his whiskey and set the glass down on the side table.

"I have a few things in mind. For now, however, we see how she performs with these tests Evangeline has lined up for her. There’s no need to rush anything."