Weakest Beast Tamer Gets All SSS Dragons novel Chapter 984

Chapter 984: Chapter 984 - Taming the Ceremony - 12

"My marital status will be a personal decision that does not fall within the scope of this session," Luna said. 𝚏𝗿𝗲𝐞𝚠𝕖𝐛𝗻𝗼𝐯𝕖𝚕.𝚌𝗼𝗺

"In the context of family leadership and diplomatic alliances, the marital status of the heir is relevant to the stability of the faction my lady," the representative insisted.

"The stability of a faction is built on verifiable results and real political alliances," Luna replied. "Not on the personal life of its leaders being treated as a negotiable resource."

Orion intervened directly on this point.

"Miss Starweaver is of course free to make her own decisions." He said it with the dissimulated calm of someone conceding something that cost him nothing to concede. "Though there are decisions that generate consequences which affect the faction as a whole. The ’associations’ an heir chooses affect the perception of the family."

A pause during which his gaze moved to Ren, standing in the back section of the podium with his rewards rolled in a scroll in his hands. "Particularly when those associations, the kind a ’capricious adolescent’ might pursue, involve figures whose nature is currently under discussion before this chamber."

It was the same mechanism they had used with Ren. The same angle of entry for injecting doubt, for manufacturing enough uncertainty to demand concessions in the votes that followed. The name didn’t need to be said directly. The reference landed without it.

Even if only a little for now, it worked.

The hall understood who he meant without Orion having to say it.

Luna felt something in her chest that wasn’t her wolf’s mana but something more ’intense’ and her own.

’No.’

’Not here. Not now. You won’t give him anything to use against you!’

Three seconds, four... Five.

The time needed for the internal temperature to drop far enough that her face stayed the face it needed to be before speaking.

"My personal associations do not affect my abilities and do not require the approval of this chamber," said Luna, and her voice came out exactly as it needed to come out: flat, without fractures, without the heat Orion was looking for. "What this chamber can evaluate are my verifiable merits and my capacity to represent the interests of the Day faction. Both are in the record, unlike your baseless assumptions."

Seiya went unmentioned by her... Even with support from the Night side, the proposal had neither Luna’s engagement nor the social pressure momentum Orion had needed to make the marriage a proposal with real weight rather than an insinuation.

Since what Orion wanted, beyond the territories and the titles, was to leave Luna with as little economic and social power as possible while surrounding her with obligations, hundreds of problems to manage, disputes to maintain, things demanding her attention every hour so that controlling her became a matter of simple pressure. The marriage proposal served that goal too, layering personal obligation onto political pressure. But stripped of momentum, stripped of Luna’s reaction, stripped of the social discomfort that was supposed to make it hard to refuse...

It died without anyone having to formally kill it.

Arturo and Liora released the air they had been holding, very slowly.

The most resistant argument was the association with Ren. That one, Orion wasn’t ready to let go of yet.

"Miss Starweaver has collaborated closely with tamer Patinder during the academic period and during the recent crisis," said the Night representative. "Given that this tamer’s nature is currently under scrutiny by this chamber, we maintain that the proximity of that association is relevant to evaluating Miss Starweaver’s judgment."

It was the weakest argument in technical terms but the hardest to answer without the answer appearing defensive. The kind of argument that didn’t need to win, it only needed to make the response look like it was trying to hide something.

’Good...’

’It’s done.’

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