Holding the ball, Zenith stepped forward and handed it directly to Lucian.

"Listen, I know you can get the deal done properly..." Just saying that much, she forced an awkward smile and turned her back to him.

What does she mean by a ’deal’? Lucian thought.

Lucian glanced over toward Viktor and Adrian, but both of them completely avoided eye contact with him.

Moving her hair away from the back of her neck, Zenith revealed what was hidden beneath...

"Eww..." Sera immediately flinched in utter disgust.

However, Elira stepped closer to examine it, looking like some kind of nerdy scientist.

"Ohh... how fascinating..."

It was a mouth... consisting only of lips, which were tightly closed together.

Narrowing his gaze, Lucian also leaned in to take a closer look...

"You mean... I have to make a deal with this?" Lucian asked, gesturing toward her neck.

Zenith nodded silently. Her face was flushed bright red. Obviously, she was embarrassed—how could she not be? A literal living mouth had just suddenly manifested on the back of her neck. Up close, the fleshy lips looked unsettlingly alive.

Then, without warning, the lips parted, stretching over a row of razor-sharp, needle-like teeth.

"What are you insects gawking at? Never seen a superior being forced into a meat sack before?" 𝑓𝑟𝑒𝘦𝓌𝑒𝑏𝑛𝑜𝘷𝑒𝘭.𝒸𝘰𝑚

Sera immediately flinched back a step, her hand flying to her chest. "Gross! It talks?!"

"I’m starving," the mouth snapped, its tongue darting out to wet its lips. "Chop-chop. Feed me."

"You’re awfully loud for a parasite living rent-free on someone else’s spine," Lucian muttered under his breath, completely unfazed.

"Watch your tongue, mortal!" the voice hissed, the skin around Zenith’s neck tightening in irritation. "You are in the presence of Curse Lord Meldora. Now state whatever pathetic reason you summoned me for! But before that... feed me."

Elira, completely fascinated, actually extended her finger to poke it. Lucian calmly grabbed her by the wrist and pulled her back, continuing in a deadpan voice.

"Yes, yes, I can feed you. What would you like to eat?"

"Your flesh..." Meldora rasped, a low, wet chuckle echoing from the back of Zenith’s neck.

"What? My flesh?" Lucian raised an eyebrow.

"Yes. I prefer strong flesh..."

"Oh, how observant of you," Lucian replied dryly.

"Now feed me!"

Lucian remained silent for a few seconds, staring intently at the sharp edges of those needle-like teeth, calculating exactly how he was going to turn this bizarre situation to his advantage...

"How about instead of my flesh, I give you this girl’s flesh? She is way stronger than me..." Lucian said smoothly.

Before she could react, he grabbed Sera by the waist and hauled her right to the front lines like a human shield.

Sera’s head shook so fast it was a blur.

"Hey! Why me?! Me?! Give him her! She was the one pointing her finger at it literally just a second ago!" Sera shrieked, pointing frantically at Elira.

The demon let out a raspy, booming laugh.

"Hahaha! Do you think so lowly of me? Why would I reject dark flesh just to feed on a puny little girl like her?"

"Hey! Who are you calling puny?! I’ll show you—" Sera started to yell, but Elira instantly clamped her hand over Sera’s mouth, stopping the outburst before she could trigger the entity.

Everyone standing nearby went dead silent. The demon’s demand was insanely high—it wanted flesh, and specifically, it wanted Lucian’s.

"So... you really like dark mana, huh?" Lucian noted, his voice dropping into a dangerously calm tone.

Meldora licked his lips, a thick drop of drool dripping from his fleshy edge.

"Haha! Exactly, brat... Now feed me both of your hands, torn straight from the shoulders, and then I will surely think about fulfilling your little wish..."

...

A few more seconds ticked by in tense silence. Then, Lucian casually held the ball out forward.

"How about this... instead of my hands, I completely fill this sphere with dark mana and give it to you?"

A brief silence hung in the air. For a moment, Lucian actually thought he had cleanly locked down the deal, but then—

"Haha... sure, sure! If a mere mortal like you can ever even hope to fill that entire sphere..."

"It’s a deal then," Lucian replied, a sharp smile spreading across his face.

A few minutes later, Lucian took the sphere and disappeared through a portal, simply leaving them with a brief parting note that he knew exactly how to fulfill the vessel’s massive capacity.

It took almost three to four hours before he finally returned, completely drenched in sweat and visually exhausted.

The three girls immediately stared at him. They could clearly tell that Lucian had somehow forced his way through his own limits to completely fill the sphere by himself. But before anyone could voice a single question, Lucian immediately stepped forward and handed the ball over to Zenith.

The crystal ball’s color had completely transformed—changing from its original clear, translucent white into a dense, swirling dark blackish-purple.

However, just as Zenith was about to blindly bring the mana-filled sphere toward her neck to feed Meldora, Elira suddenly reached out and clamped a firm grip around her wrist.

"Wait..."

"Huh...?" Zenith blinked.

"Do you seriously think a demon is just going to keep its word if you feed it beforehand?"

It took Zenith a few agonizing seconds of staring dumbly at the dark ball before the realization finally clicked in her head. Then, instantly snapping her expression back into a dead-serious face as if absolutely nothing awkward had just happened, she cleared her throat.

"Yup. You are right. Let’s force him to remove the curse first."

Yup... she is a total, empty-headed bimbo, Lucian and Sera simultaneously thought to themselves, mentally facepalming.

A short while later, after wrapping things up at the quarters, the group headed back, carrying the dark, pulsing sphere straight to the cove where Aria was resting.

Seeing Lucian arrive so quickly, Aria felt a pang in her heart.

Lyria was sitting right beside her, while Zeri — who was not sleeping for once — was causing havoc on the broken deck, which Kaelen was trying his best to control.