Elizabeth's entire plan fell apart. She had hoped that she had broken his biggest card, and it turned out the man had a warehouse full of them.
Liping activated the new Wong Chai, and then he brought food. Vegetables and grains that he had grown himself. Elizabeth did not need food. She was the Demon Queen. She was above such trivial things.
But the smell of that food worked on her mind like a magnetic force. She picked up a dumpling. Then another. Then more, her hands moving on their own. The taste was like magic in her mouth, like fireworks bursting.
And then the chili had its effect. The Demon Queen, who ruled the entire world, the most powerful being alive, started sweating from the spice and started making excuses. Her hands started trembling.
Liping nervously started chewing his fingers. He had added the chili to his own taste. He had forgotten that the person in front of him was not an ordinary person. Elizabeth's mind could not cope. One moment she was thinking that this must be poison, some experiment being run on her, and the very next moment she felt like she was flying through the air.
Liping brought soup, into which he had added ingredients that cut the spice. Elizabeth picked up the spoon and drank the soup. And for a few moments she felt a strange sensation, as if some hidden power inside her had woken up.
The Demon Queen was already a world conqueror. But here was a small village man doing this to her with food he had prepared himself. Something no magic in the world could have done. And Liping was just thinking that the path to friendship goes through the stomach.
Then Elizabeth regained her composure and asked him directly what it was that he wanted from her. Liping's answer was extremely simple. He just wanted to know how a Demon Queen and a hero could live together peacefully.
But Elizabeth, obviously, misunderstood again. She thought he was giving her a test. That he wanted to use her as a subject so that he could become stronger himself and then defeat her. She was furious, because dying like a knight would have been acceptable, but to be humiliated, that was beyond tolerance.
Yet somehow she restrained herself, and decided it was not worth the fight.
Meanwhile, Liping was afraid that if he made one mistake she would kill him. But Elizabeth did no such thing. She simply climbed onto the bed and said clearly that she was accepting his terms. Not out of fear, but because she wanted ultimate power. And her deadly aura made one thing crystal clear: whoever tried to bend her, she would erase.
Poor Liping had no option. So he accepted every demand she made. Extra food.
One year passed.
And our hero was cutting wood with the holy sword. Really. The sword the prophecy had been written about, and he was chopping firewood with it. The Demon Queen had broken the village's protective barrier, and now the village was as exposed as a rabbit among wolves. Monsters were starting to appear.
Although they were afraid to come near. Perhaps it was fear of the Demon Queen, or perhaps it was common sense. Who knows. But there was only one thought on Liping's mind: what if Elizabeth ever left here and went away. He was deep in these thoughts when Elizabeth's voice came, calling for lunch, and our hero, who in one year had practically become her servant, ran.
Liping had only one formula for survival. Elizabeth's protection.
And Elizabeth was lying on the couch with a packet of chips, as if she had not one worry in the world. Within a year she had become a part of that couch. Fully in potato mode. And her complaint was that there was nothing to watch on the television.
Nothing new there. Is this the Demon Queen or an aunty from down the road?
Liping called her for lunch, and she did not even walk to the kitchen. She flew there by magic. She herself knew she had become lazy, but she would not admit it. She blamed Liping instead, saying his chips had made her lazy. Liping explained that chips contain calories, and that fat comes with them.
Elizabeth looked down at her stomach. And the next second she had converted that extra fat into magic energy. Liping stared wide-eyed. The Demon Queen literally turns fat into power. And then she started boasting that his plan had failed. Liping had long since given up arguing, so he just kept saying yes. Elizabeth ate as if tomorrow would never come.
Liping promised to make more. He had accepted that this was his life now.
And Elizabeth immediately misunderstood again, deciding that he planned to kill her by making her fat. Liping turned away to fetch dessert. Elizabeth thought, enough is enough, I have to get rid of this man. But as soon as she saw the pudding, all those thoughts vanished. Her mouth watered.
The rebellion would happen tomorrow. First, pudding.
Liping knew its exact formula. Give the Demon Queen some real food and she will become a best friend.
All of this was going on here, and somewhere far away a man and a girl were running to save their lives.
Masked figures were behind them. One of them cast a spell, and both of them were magically locked in a cage. The man held her tightly and told his daughter to run away, to go towards the town. But the daughter flatly refused.
The man had a promise in his heart. What he had done for her mother. Whatever happened, she had to be saved. Those masked figures were not ordinary. He himself was devoid of magic. The man knew he had to finish this quickly.
He swung his sword and knocked one of them down. But where would the rest go? One of them took a shape that had come straight out of a nightmare. The daughter fired arrows. They bounced back as if she had hit a marshmallow. The man kept telling her to run away. They were apostles of the Dark Guild. Fighting them with a toothpick is like taming a tiger.
But the daughter did not move.
Then an apostle punched the man so hard that he probably tasted his own teeth. Even lying on the ground he was still trying to help his daughter escape. That creature threatened to kill both of them. The girl tried to make a deal: if it let her father go, she would go with them.
But the creature did not agree. It rushed forward to attack, and then there was an explosion. The huge thing was crushed.
The dust settled, and there stood a lord mammoth, and above it a shining Toad Immortal. It reported that a danger had been eliminated, and then a little house appeared on top of the toad, and from the house came the voice of Wong Chai.
The voice that ordered that these two humans be taken to the master.
The girl who was named Eve woke up in an unknown room. She was confused and nervous. She remembered that her father had been injured. She opened the door and ran out, and she was not prepared for what she saw.