"Stop!"
The whole street froze.
Amidst Theo's half-deployed glyph, the guards' unleashed weapons and the world's mana brimming under the pressure of everyone's spiritual energy, the girl's voice stood out as the only element completely and utterly deprived of any sort of inner energy in it.
All that this shout had was pure desperation.
And somehow, it worked.
"Sheathe your steel." Seeing how her shout somehow worked, the girl quickly spoke again, exploiting the window of opportunity she created.
"But my lady…"
The man who was the first to bring his weapon out was also the first one to complain.
"Sheathe your steel!" the girl repeated again, throwing her men a furious stare. She then patted down her robe and moved up to Theo…
Before bending her back and giving him a deep bow.
"I apologize for the disturbance. It was never my intention to startle you, good sir, nor for my guards to…" she twisted her head to the side, throwing her bodyguards a fiery stare, "to overreact."
Theo stared at the top of the girl's head for a moment before sighing out and letting go of his glyphs, allowing them to dissolve into the air without fully forming.
'Why do I feel like I've seen her before?' he thought, squinting his eyes a little.
Yet, even with his glyphs dissolved and the situation now turning towards a peaceful solution, he didn't allow himself to relax.
'Given the hurry with which they attacked, who knows what will happen if this girl… or if any of her guards suddenly changes her mind.'
"Once again, I apologize, good sir," the girl repeated herself while pushing her upper body even lower than earlier, before raising up and taking a first, proper look at Theo's face.
Then, she froze, her face twisting into one of surprise and confusion. Her eyes twitched and before she could think about what she was about to say, "Wait, aren't you the…"
Tap.
Theo's hand shot up as he stepped forth with his right foot, closing the already short distance in a single motion before covering the girl's mouth with the palm of his hand.
This kind of rapid motion was enough to alert the guards again, almost sending them into a frenzy…
But this time, Theo was ready. And before any of the guards could move, he already deployed a simple glyph, one that did nothing but drain all the mana from the air around before shooting it up into the air.
This kind of glyph would paralyze a modern mage's ability to construct their own glyph… just like it removed Theo's ability to set any further glyphs on his own. It would do nothing to stop or even slow down the reaction of the old-type mage… while merely slowing down cultivators by depriving them of their ability to replenish the spiritual energy they actively burned merely by existing.
In this situation, though, just slowing down the response of the girl's guards was enough, stopping them from counterattacking for long enough to make them realize Theo merely shut their ward's mouth rather than actively seeking to harm her.
"Sometimes, to speak less means to say more, Lady Serene."
It only took a quick sweep through his new memories for Theo to finally recognize where he knew this girl from. The fact that pretty much all of her men wore the distinct coat of arms of her house only made this task easier, allowing Theo to confirm his guess before he spoke out.
The girl before him wasn't just a random young lady rich enough to have an extremely proactive and capable escort.
She turned out to be Tia Serene, the daughter and prime heir to the Grand Duke Serene, whose power easily rivaled that of Theo's own royal house!
The mention of the household name was enough to make the guards stiffen up, even when they saw Theo slowly pull his hand away from her face and then take a step back.
"And seeing how you are here, I'm not going to impose on you any further. You wouldn't want to insult the local lord by being late with paying him his due respects, would you, young lady?"
The tension shot through the roof, albeit for an entirely different reason than it did before.
The fierce looks of the girl's guards now turned awkward and outright anxious as they all glanced towards the town's fortress, looming over the entire settlement from the hill upon which it stood.
"Ah."
The girl herself appeared to take the hint, taking a step back as her face twisted into an expression of open displeasure.
"I…" she hesitated for a bit, her eyes darting over to her guards, "I was just about to have my guards go on their way to the fortress to act as my proxy and pay my due respects to the local lord," she quickly countered before putting on a smug, yet slightly uneasy smile. "Until then, would it be too much for me to ask you," Tia took a step forward while closing her hands behind her back, only to then lean in over Theo's chest, "my prince," she whispered, only to then lean back and straighten her spine, "to escort me through the town until their return?"
A whisper like that would only stop a random passerby from hearing what she said.
Her guards, however? With their impressive cultivation?
For them, it made no difference whether she whispered or screamed from the bottom of her lungs.
And that gave Theo's face all the reasons to darken.
'I've worked so damn hard to save myself the bother of following through the protocol of an official, royal visitation,' he thought, squinting his eyes as he stared right back into Tia's huge, blue eyes, 'and now you are going to try to threaten me with it?'
Theo closed his eyes and breathed out a short sigh, fighting an inner battle much worse than what could've happened on this street if not for Tia's hurried intervention. And as he opened up his eyes, he could see the girl's guards stepping to the back, their faces all sorts of gray.
It seemed that they were now finally realizing the full degree of shit they would be in if Theo decided to hold their brutal response against them to the full extent of his position!
But doing so would require for him to announce his standing out loud, making him take a piss at all his efforts to avoid the hassle that came with it!
And so, having little to no other choice, Theo reached out and offered the young woman his arm.
"It would be my pleasure, young lady. Albeit I have to hope you have your lodging secured, for my humble quarters quite surely do not fit your noble standing."