Chapter 222: 222: My Gift To You.

"It's a shame we had to let that seal go..." Victor spoke in a slightly sad voice, as he looked like a child who had lost a favorite toy.

Ruby looked at Victor with narrowed eyes, "... What were you thinking? They're an endangered species, we must not mistreat them!"

"... What are you talking about?"

"Huh?" Ruby didn't understand.

"I mean, aren't you trying to treat the seal like a dog?" Ruby spoke while she thought of Victor holding the seal, making her dance and everything to make her laugh...

"Of course not, I was thinking of building a house around it, and leaving them there, so when I want to visit them, I'll go there."

"... Do not do that." Ruby's voice came out colder than usual.

"WHY?"

"Which part about them being an endangered species don't you understand!?" She was strict.

"...But it's not like I'm going to treat them badly..." Victor pouted.

"No, it's not right!"

"Tsk, petty."

A vein popped in Ruby's head.

But before she could say anything, Victor spoke up:

"Oh, in that case, we should just fend off all the humans who are here to hunt the seals, and we can take care of them!"

"..." She was speechless. Why was he so obsessed with the seal? Just leave the poor thing alone!

Little did she know that Victor wasn't particularly interested in the seal, he was interested in Ruby's reactions to that seal.

After all, it was very rare to see Ruby laughing like a teenager.

"Just forget about the seal." She sighed.

"Fine..." Victor sighed too, and he looked to the side:

"Hmm?" He seemed to have found something, his vision widened as if it were the zoom function of a camera, and soon he saw something:

"A polar bear!" He jumped excitedly.

"What?" Ruby looked where Victor was looking and saw a large polar bear.

When Victor was about to start running towards the polar bear, Ruby suddenly grabbed him by the collar of his shirt.

"Wait!!"

"...?" Victor looked at Ruby with a confused look.

"What do you intend to do?"

"I will ride it! Like the Russians!"

"..." Ruby was speechless. She never thought her husband was so childish...

Somehow, that put a smile on her face, but she couldn't help but comment:

"Russians don't ride polar bears!"

"What? Were those google images of Russians riding a polar bear while drinking vodka a lie!?" Victor felt that his worldview was shattered.

"...Just what have you been googling...?" She really wanted to know this.

Victor looked a little shaken and said, "...Don't worry, I browse incognito."

"You know incognito doesn't really work, right?" She flashed a small smile.

"W-What..." Victor opened his mouth wide.

"..." Seeing Victor's reaction, Ruby became more curious about what her husband was researching...

'Maybe I should look later?' This was an easy task for Ruby, but she didn't want to invade her husband's privacy.

She understood that everyone in this world desired their privacy, and they would feel offended, oftentimes becoming defensive, feeling exposed when that privacy was invaded, and the same applied to her husband.

Putting that thought aside, she said, "Anyway, no bears!" She pulled Victor somewhere else.

"..." Victor got carried away by Ruby as he thought he should delete his google account and make another one.

'Trails must be erased...'

...

Somewhere in the middle of the North Pole, Ruby and Victor were standing there as they looked out over a plain of ice and icy winds.

If they were normal humans, they'd have already frozen to death from hypothermia, but as vampires and especially vampires of Clan Scarlett, that temperature was nothing to them.

"... I think it should be enough around here, we're quite far from civilization."

"...?" Ruby looked at Victor, who had his hand on his chin, while he seemed to be thinking about something deeply.

She was curious about what he was thinking of doing. She hadn't complained about anything so far because, surprisingly, she was enjoying this trip to the North Pole, even though she was embarrassed about some things...

'...I never thought I'd laugh at something ridiculous like a seal that says 'EGG'.' She thought with a little shame.

She did her best not to laugh and ruin her appearance, but she just couldn't take it. It was something very stupid and very childish...

But she liked it and so, because of that, she didn't complain anymore and let Victor guide her.

"Hmm, I'll do the outside structure first, and then I'll do the inside, and then, I'll do some caves, then I'll kidnap some bears and seals... Maybe some penguins..."

"..." What is this kidnapping story?

"Stop, do not-." Ruby was going to stop Victor from committing an environmental crime, but she was surprised when all the air around Victor started to change.

Victor lowered his center of gravity a little and spread his arms as the magic symbols on his glove began to glow like crazy:

Victor flashed a small smile, "Let's make something Big, Robust, and Durable."

"..." Ruby's face turned a little red when she heard what Victor said, her thoughts immediately drifting towards something not safe for work.

She shook her head several times to get those thoughts out of her head.

Suddenly, Ruby felt cold air leave Victor's body.

FUSHHHHHHHHHH!

"...?" She woke from her stupor and looked at Victor curiously.

"Basics first..." Victor whispered in a low voice, then he gestured with his hand.

Quake, Quake, Quake!

The earth around them began to shake violently, and soon several pillars of ice began to rise from the ground and rise to the heavens.

"D-Darling? What are you trying to do!?" Ruby asked as she looked at the pillars that were ridiculously tall.

"Shhh, don't distract me." Victor spoke.

"..." Ruby was silent and just watched Victor.

Victor looked at the pillars and imagined what he wanted to do, and then as if by magic, which in this case was exactly that, immense walls of ice began to be created. These walls, as if they had taken on a life of their own, began to connect between the pillars of ice, and a structure began to form.

"...Holy-..." Ruby was speechless, as she had never seen anyone use ice power like that, and not even her mother used her power for something like that.

Yes, she saw her mother create little things like an ice throne, or a statue, etc. But she'd never seen her mother do something of this magnitude.

"...This is going to take longer than I expected..." To be honest, Victor thought it would be easy to do what he was planning, but he never imagined that making a more elaborate structure was more difficult and tiring than just making ice spikes.

"Well, we have a week, I'll finish this in a day." Victor wanted to see Ruby's reaction, and he didn't mind getting tired because of it. In fact, internally, he wanted to see if he could get tired from doing these things.

A challenge was in front of him! And that's something he loved!

A big smile couldn't help but appear on his face.

FUSHHHHHH

A cold blue aura began to leave his body.

His hair looked like it was defying gravity, and soon he said, "Let's go with all our might!"

BOOOOOOOOOOOM!

A pillar of blue power began to emerge from his body.

"!!!" Ruby jumped back a little when she saw Victor's burst of power, and the pressure coming out of his body was insane:

"...Just how much power does he have?" She was speechless again since she thought she had already seen Victor's limit... But what is this?

She looked at Victor's gloves that were glowing red and thought:

'If he uses his powers without his gloves... What would happen?' She was quite curious about it.

Victor floated a little in the air, and as if he were an experienced architect, he began to use his hands to do what he was planning to do.

"..." Ruby just watched on at the sight of Victor creating walls of ice out of thin air with a stunned look, many thoughts were running through her head, but the main thing was.

'My husband is amazing!'

...

48 hours passed.

'That took longer than expected...' Victor thought as he looked around. To be honest, he expected to finish this in 24 hours, but as he was new to this, he made a lot of mistakes and had to redo whole sections of structure again.

But he managed to finish...

Victor floated towards the ground and said, "Done." The moment he hit the ground, an ice throne was created, and he sat on the throne.

His face was paler than usual, and his breathing was a little labored, but despite being that way, the small smile on his face never faded.

And he controlled his expression not to show weakness in front of Ruby. It was only if the woman watched closely that she'd notice how tired he actually was, which was something she wouldn't do right now.

He looked around and looked at Ruby, who had a shocked look on her face:

"What did you think...?" He asked.

Ruby, who was looking at the ice structure... Wrong, the ideal would be to say an ice castle, a gigantic ice structure created in the middle of the north pole.

A stunning ice castle that was made with Ruby in mind.

"DD-Darling...this is amazing..." Ruby couldn't help but think while she watched the entire process, and even then, she couldn't believe what she was seeing. This was so much more than creating a simple ball of ice or spikes of ice.

He basically created an entire structure with the ice power of Clan Scarlett.

"Right?" Victor flashed a gentle smile.

"And this is yours."

"...Huh?"

"It's my gift to you... I did all this thinking about you. Walk around, you'll understand what I'm talking about."

"Okay..." Ruby's eyes were bright with curiosity, and she didn't think twice about exploring the place.

'A gift from Darling!' She was very excited.

With quick steps and a small smile on her face, she left the place and went to explore the castle that Victor had made for her.

"..." Seeing Ruby's expression, Victor felt that all his effort was worth it.

'But seriously... I didn't expect that I would get so tired...' Victor leaned back against the ice throne and looked at the ceiling, and slowly he closed his eyes.

In the back of his consciousness, he thought he could use this method to train his ice... But that wasn't something he wanted to think about right now.

...

Nightingale.

BAAAAM!

Someone suddenly pushed open the door angrily and entered the room.

"Father!"

"Hmm?" Sasha, Violet, Scathach, Natashia, Lacus, Pepper, Siena, Luna, and Natalia looked at the girl who entered.

Bruna, Eve, Roberta, Kaguya, and Maria weren't in Nightingale since they stayed behind waiting for Victor. After all, they were his maids.

Maria was technically a maid too, but Kaguya forbade the woman to leave the house until she understood the powers she was given. After all, she was no longer a Ghoul, and the same applied to Bruna and Eve...

Roberta stayed at home because no one wanted to keep an eye on her...

"O-Ophis, why do you always do that!" Elizabeth appeared behind Ophis in a tired voice.

The little girl ignored the women's stares and entered the room. As she looked around and didn't find Victor, she sniffed the air and looked in Violet's direction.

"Father..." Victor's scent was much stronger on Violet, and because of that, Ophis looked at her.

"You again, little girl..." Violet couldn't help but comment.

"I'm sorry-..." Elizabeth was going to apologize for Ophis' attitude, but she was speechless when she entered the room:

"The number has increased..." She was talking about the women who were there.

"Hmm, the king's daughters?" Natashia looked curiously at the women.

"Why are they here?" Natashia looked at Scathach, who was sitting on an ice throne.

"It's a long story." Scathach was clearly too lazy to explain.

"Can someone summarize in 10 words what is happening?" Natashia asked around.

"Victor found princess, princess found Victor, and Voila!" Natalia spoke while making exaggerated gestures.

"..." This is not an explanation! The women thought at the same time.

"I see..." Natashia lit up a little as she looked at Ophis.

"..." She understood!? The women were speechless.

"Little girl, do you like Victor?"

"Of course! Father is not evil! Unlike Father number 1!"

"O-Ophis!" Elizabeth held the girl's mouth when she became so chatty!?

"HmmmHmmm" Ophis seemed to be saying something, but no one could understand.

"Pfft..." Natashia inadvertently almost laughed when she heard 'Father number 1', as she understood clearly that the little girl was talking about Vlad.

"... Sister, you found Ophis..." Suddenly a woman's voice was heard in the room as the girls looked to the side and saw a woman with long hair that was as black as night that reached the floor. She had violet eyes and a sinful body that looked like it was made by a Succubus.

She was accompanied by several royal guards.

"Oya?" She flashed a gentle smile when she saw the group of women looking at her.

'another one...' All the women in the room thought.

.....