I! Cleaner!-Chapter 1040 - 958: A Bite of Soft Rice

"Ugh..."

As the [Soft Rice Emblem] on the panel emitted a soft cream-colored glow, Leon's consciousness reluctantly detached from his body. It spread rapidly with an invisible wave, difficult yet unstoppable as it extended outward.

Accompanying the unrestricted expansion of his consciousness, the blood near Leon's brain began to accelerate gradually. Under pressure, the tiny blood vessels in his nasal cavity burst one after another, releasing a hot, salty liquid.

When the first drop of nosebleed uncontrollably surged out and dripped slowly along Leon's chin, Leon's eyes "saw" the entire view of Lily City clearly.

A coachman five streets away, using a wide-brimmed hat to cover his face, lay fast asleep in a somewhat shabby carriage. The evening glow spilled in through the glass window, quietly casting its light on his rising and falling beer belly.

In another direction, on a bridge a full twelve kilometers away, fifty-four sets of white-painted cable-stayed wires shivered continuously in the chilly evening wind, producing strainful, piercing wails.

"The suspension bridge southeast of the palace, the fifth pair and seventeenth pair of cables need replacing. Otherwise, they won't last two months before breaking. Remember to have someone fix them later."

Taking a moment to instruct the bewildered Prince Vernon beside him, Leon grabbed a handkerchief to wipe his nosebleed, then wrapped his arm around Princess... Queen Aerial's waist, and closed his eyes to continue his search.

After scattering the ashes of all the ancestors of the Western Carleighwen Kingdom in the Deep Sanctuary earlier, the director grabbed the Serpent Director and hid, clearly not planning to see him.

Given the director's methods and luck, and her understanding of his probing techniques, if she decided to hide, there wasn't much he could do... except for the Soft Rice Emblem.

After roughly limiting the range of his consciousness to the vicinity of Lily City, Leon blinked slightly before beginning to carefully inspect those who did not belong to the "royal property."

According to the description of the Soft Rice Emblem's effect, when he stands behind a queen seeking patronage, he can forcibly mooch off her, mobilizing all things that theoretically should belong to her "property," including even her citizens.

Although the red-haired director is a member of the Western Carleighwen royal family, she's been "expelled" for being too troublesome, so she's not included in this range. The Serpent Director, a member of the Eastern Carleighwen royal family, is the same.

Therefore, to find them, he doesn't need to check every person in Lily City, just focus on those who do not belong to the "royal property."

No matter what methods the director and Serpent Director used to hide themselves, if they're still within the range of Lily City, then they would definitely... be found.

Looking at a building eleven kilometers to the southwest, which seemed completely normal but just couldn't be controlled by the Soft Rice Emblem, Leon couldn't help but raise his brow slightly and immediately concentrated his scattered consciousness towards it.

...

Not good!

Watching Leon, who had been everywhere one second but began "surging" towards her the next, the red-haired director hissed, then stood up and urged loudly:

"Go quickly! Hurry! Leon is coming!"

"?"

He's coming? Are you kidding?

Catching the faceted eye of the Omnia Cicada without thinking, the Serpent Director questioned incredulously:

"You're not trying to trick me again? We're hiding on the twenty-ninth floor of the [February Building], a place usable only one day every four years, temporally misaligned with him. Even if he passes right in front of us, it wouldn't be possible..."

"See for yourself!"

Tossing the Omnia Cicada's faceted eye to the Serpent Director so he could see with his own eyes, the red-haired director immediately took out the [Parasitic Oak] and slipped inside, hiding at lightspeed.

After receiving the Omnia Cicada's faceted eye and observing the surroundings skeptically, the Serpent Director couldn't help but hiss as well. He then leaped up from the ground and rushed towards the door behind him.

But just as he pulled open the door handle of the [February Building] and ran out from a side door of an abandoned building, a middle-aged man holding a white paint bucket on the roadside suddenly stopped and fixed his gaze on him.

"Where's the director?"

Blocking the Serpent Director's path in one step, the middle-aged man with noticeable sunburn squinted his eyes and asked with evident hostility:

"Have her come out and talk to me, you all... Ugh..."

Frowning, the Serpent Director shoved aside the questioning painter and his body seemed to fall into a pond, plunging into the shadow at his feet. When he emerged again, he had moved three streets away.

However, just as the Serpent Director emerged from the shadow of a street lamp and took a breath, an elderly lady with a basket, seemingly about to cross the street, suddenly turned her head and, revealing a mouth missing seven or eight teeth, coldly said:

"What on earth are you trying to do? If you don't..."

"Oh crap!"

Startled by this eerie scene, the Serpent Director's arm trembled, and he hastily retreated into the shadows, teleporting seven or eight times in succession before finally stopping at a small estate eight or nine kilometers away.

And when he climbed out of a slightly musty haystack, confirming there were no more peculiar passersby to encounter, the Serpent Director's expression finally relaxed.

However, at that moment, a pony leisurely chewing on hay near the haystack suddenly spat out the grass, its jet-black eyes fixed on him, and spoke in an oddly stiff voice:

"If you come out, don't blame me for taking action!"

What the hell!

Inhaling sharply in shock, the thoroughly spooked Serpent Director couldn't help but raise his hands towards the talking pony.

Yet before he could dispose of the terrifying creature, the pony neighed loudly before instantly disappearing, replaced by a large cannon with a bore over forty centimeters. An almost person-shattering high-pressure airflow was building up inside, ready to erupt!

What kind of damned ability is this?

Even though he wasn't afraid of the cannon's power, knowing he wouldn't die even if directly hit by a cannon a hundred times stronger, the Serpent Director's scalp still tingled from Leon's bizarre ability, prompting him to retreat a bit.

But as the Serpent Director prepared to escape through the shadows using his usual trick, he suddenly stepped into a void. The previous estate and grassland vanished, replaced by a gorge spanning more than twenty meters horizontally.

And over three hundred identical-caliber cannons were eerily embedded in the cliff walls on both sides of the gorge, their barrels aimed at him as he fell, unleashing an ear-splitting thunderous roar.