The World Dragon's Heir

Chapter 798: Katerina The Hero

Just as Dominic was about to ask if his daughter smelled the berries anywhere else, the server broke free from the Guards.

"The Resistance Lives!" He shouted, drawing a glass dagger from under his clothes.

With a flick of his finger, Dominic sent an [Arcane Blast] into both of the man’s legs at once, severing them and sending him tumbling to the ground.

"Dad. Mom specifically said no attacking people at the party."

"No, she specifically said that you were not allowed to attack people at the party. There are different rules for me because it’s part of my job."

Katerina frowned. "So, your job does have fun parts?"

The King’s Advisors, and the visiting Royals, laughed at the little dragonkin girl’s innocent question. Apparently, her view of her father was that of a boring bureaucrat, and she either didn’t know, or didn’t have any reference for his actual reputation.

In reality, Katerina just didn’t see the problem here.

She got her snacks, and her dad got to beat up the guy who misbehaved. They could just put his legs back on as soon as someone brought a Larry over here, it wasn’t a big deal.

He wasn’t even bleeding that much.

The guards grabbed the severed legs and dragged the man away, presumably to heal him before he got his actual punishment for misbehaving at the party. That meant that the interesting part was over, and Katerina stealthily grabbed the whole plate of snacks for herself.

"You have to share, even if nobody around you wants any, you don’t take the whole serving tray. I know your mom told you that at least three times."

"But they’re my favourite."

"They’re also not supposed to be served here. Remember what I taught you about Dragonberries?"

"Oh, right. He’s in the big trouble now."

The Nobles laughed quietly as the father and daughter bickered, both stealing forbidden snacks from the plate.

"You know, you need to leave some of them for the investigation, right? There might be more than Dragonberries in there."

Dominic gave the King a nod. "Of course, Your Majesty. I checked them first, in case someone had poisoned my daughter. The berries are the only toxin in them."

He hadn’t, but now that it was mentioned, he used [Quality Kibble] on one, and found that he was right, there were no toxins in it for him to cleanse. At least, not ones that would harm him or Katerina.

Alexis rushed over and picked up Katerina, who immediately stuffed two last snacks in her mouth before they could be stolen from her.

"We need to talk about risk management, little one."

"What’s that?"

The laughter of the Royals, including her father, made Alexis sigh.

"Your Majesty, apparently there are a few lessons that we forgot to have with our daughter.

It appears that she has missed out on a few little things, like the fact that sampling snacks that are clearly toxic to everyone else is probably not safe."

Katerina frowned. She hadn’t thought about it that way. That meant that the waiter who ignored her request for snacks really was a bad man. She had vastly underestimated the powers of her own judgment.

The whispers changed as they spread through the crowd, and the reality of the situation was quickly lost.

What was left to spread to the Nobles who couldn’t actually see what happened were whispers that the Duke of Wistover and his five-year-old daughter had just saved the King from an assassination attempt after heroically confronting the assassin who had brought poisoned food.

The rumour was that their keen dragonkin senses had picked up on the toxin from a distance, and the Duke had brought his daughter to show her how he took care of traitors.

Terrifying levels of blood thirst and loyalty at the same time.

The other kids rushed over to make sure that Katerina was alright, not fully understanding that there was no danger to her from the sweets.

"You’re not feeling sleepy, are you? Even with healing magic, Dragonberries can put you out for days at a time. My mom said that they’re really dangerous to kids," one of the boys asked in a worried tone.

Katerina shook her head. "No, I’ve got enough dragon blood that it’s not a problem. My dad is the same way, they don’t bother him either."

"That’s super cool. You’re like nearly immortal or something," the boy gasped.

One of the older boys laughed. "What are you talking about? She’s a dragonkin. They’re resistant to poisons."

The girl in red smiled. "But I heard that they live a long time too, so he’s not really wrong. Like, she will likely live to be older than Advisor Morgana."

The kids laughed at the thought. Advisor Morgana scared most of them, she was too old and knew too many things. Plus, she was a Techno Witch, as a little crazy. The thought of relating any of them to her was just crazy talk.

But Katerina really might live that long. Would she be the same sort of scary old lady when she was that age?

It was too weird.

The new level of notoriety brought all sorts of new friends to Katerina, kids who had heard something about her protecting the King from poisoning, or whose parents had heard the rumour, and wanted them to get to know the young girl who would surely have the King’s favour for some time after this incident.

Though, most were planning to send their children to see her anyhow.

She was the child of a Duke and one of the Paladin Princesses, making her a prime marriage alliance partner for the other Nobles. Especially ones whose businesses had been struggling lately, or who were living entirely off the revenues from their estates.

Having a title was great, but marrying into vast generational wealth was even better.

To Katerina, the motivations didn’t matter.

What mattered was that these people were her own age, and they were interesting. She didn’t get a chance to meet new kids often, just the same ones from the Baronies who were going to the Academy.

And most of them weren’t in her class, they were taking the general education classes.