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"Terrok deals in the slave trade, right? Do you think cutting off all imports and exports to them while aiding the oppressed races to rebel would destabilize them for a while?"

"It would do more than \'just destabilize\' them. More than 40% of Terrok\'s imports and exports come from our empire, cutting that off suddenly would be disastrous, for both sides.

Though the damage to them would be a lot worse.

Let\'s not even talk about the implications that the \'rebellion\' fails, that\'s a different case altogether."

"True, it\'s not worth it if our people suffer even a little bit just to make Terrok miserable."

Laurene affirmed Arnold\'s reply as she placed her elbow on her desk and propped her chin up with her hand. She rhythmically tapped her fingers on the desk, with each tap releasing a pulse of magic power that slowly repaired the desk.

Seeing that she was relatively calmer compared to before, Arnold posed a question to her.

"Mind if I know what made you even think about doing that kind of thing?"

"They\'re looking down on us, that\'s what. The damn bastards seem to think that they\'re on top of the continent.

When there\'s us and the Great Eastern Empire, not to talk of the Beast Kingdom and Tarse.

I really don\'t know where they got the gall to demand we release classified information that could affect the whole world for free, saying that we are obligated to do so.

Explaining it with words is hard. You\'d understand why I am pissed off if you read the letter but I can\'t show you that since it\'s confidential. Royal family members only.

Or maybe I can? It\'s not like there\'s anyone here to see."

"I\'d rather not see It, Princess Laurene."

Upon hearing Arnold\'s words, Laurene dropped the papers on her desk and turned her gaze to him before asking.

"Didn\'t I give your permission to NOT call me with my title?"

"The only time I would stop calling you by your title is when you stop possessing it which is never."

His reply was just as she had expected, making the young girl heave a sigh in response

"You know, sometimes you can be harder to deal with than Evan is."

The moment the name \'Evan\' came out of her mouth, Arnold\'s previously neutral expression changed into a light frown, one that was impossible for Laurene to miss given she was staring right at him.

"Hmm? What\'s wrong?"

"It\'s Nothing."

Arnold quickly adjusted his expression and replied perfunctorily but unfortunately for him, that was kind of pointless in front of Laurene.

"Oy, Arnold. Did you forget who I am?

If you did, then let me give you a short reminder."

Laurene placed her hands down on the desk and leaned forward as she continued.

"I am Laurene Val Hayes, arguably the only person in the entire Great Western Empire who possesses a skill that lets them tell lies from truth.

And you, just lied to me.

Well, that much was obvious without the skill but you get my point."

Her words made Arnold chuckle slightly as he replied to her.

"Princess, you really should not use your unique skill\'s ability for such trivialities."

"Yeah, yeah. I kno-! Wait up!"

Laurene suddenly paused mid-speech and rose from her seat. She abruptly jumped over the table, walked towards Arnold and placed her hands on the two arms of the chair he was seated on, effectively trapping him in his seat.

"Repeat exactly what you just said."

Although Arnold was stunned due to her sudden actions, he regained his calm relatively quickly and repeated his earlier words after a moment of silence.

"...I said you really should not use your unique skill\'s ability for such trivialities."

After he spoke, Laurene silently stared at him with a slightly cold expression on her face. A conflicted look appeared in her eyes for a moment, but it disappeared so quickly that Arnold almost thought it was an illusion.

The Princess heaved a sigh of exasperation before turning around and walking back to her seat. Multiple thoughts went through her head in the few seconds It took her to do that.

\'Should I call him out on it?

But even if I did, it\'s not like I can force him to talk, at least for now.

But it\'s so annoying to not do anything, just when he finally slipped up.

Should I probe him for a bit? No, that\'d make him warier. He might realise where he messed up and that\'d be bad.

He already knows that I\'m onto him, I can\'t make him raise his guard any more than he already has.\'

As she sat down, she stared at Arnold in silence, causing the teenager to have a questioning look on his face.

\'The general knowledge of my \'Lie Detection\' is that it \'IS\' my unique skill. That\'s what everyone thinks, even my family. However, Arnold just said that it\'s an \'ABILITY OF\' my unique skill.

There\'s only one person in the country who is supposed to know that \'Lie Detection\' is NOT my unique skill, but an ability that resulted from my actual unique skill.

No one is supposed to know that besides Evan, and Evan can\'t tell him about it even if he wanted to. So why does Arnold know this?\'

Arnold would have never expected that the fact that he knew of Laurene\'s mystic eye skills would be exposed just because of the way he phrased the words he had just spoken.

While he knew that Laurene was suspicious of him, he did not expect that she would catch on to such a minor detail that could have been easily ignored.

\'Judging from the expression on his face, he still hasn\'t realised. That\'s good.

I have already thrown in a few words casually over the past few months and I\'ve discovered that the restrictions that prevent me from speaking about the demons and my mystic eye skill, don\'t apply to Arnold...and my brother.

This means that they are already somewhat aware of the two subjects.

I could understand Richard as he is dad\'s successor so it\'s understandable that he is aware of the dimensional rifts, as all the royalties and heads of state of all the countries on the continent are aware, however, it makes no sense for him to be aware of the demons when Dad isn\'t.