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But if judged by the standards of an artist’s temperament, this appearance was just right.

Neither rigid nor soft, neither proper nor effeminate.

At first glance, he might seem rather ordinary, but upon closer inspection, one could see his uniqueness, mainly in those eyes.

The Lord’s eyes had amber irises, with just a hint of crimson, like the most beautiful and bewitching gemstones.

When one saw these eyes, they were enough to make most people overlook the features of his face.

But in fact, the Lord was far from ugly. Although not as stunningly beautiful as Palanno and Murphy, from the aesthetic perspective of any race, he was definitely above average in looks.

Secondly, Lord Payne’s aura was inimitable.

It was a commanding presence developed over 1,100 years of serving as the leader and arbiter since the day vampires appeared on the continent. The legends and even “myths” about him circulating throughout the continent greatly reinforced this aura.

Not to mention those vampires “born” in recent times, even Old Edward, who was of the same generation and similar age to Lord Payne, would restrain his cold and domineering manner as the Wolfsbane Grand Duke when he saw him.

This unique aura, combined with the pressure he exerted when appearing with the sacred spear “Eternal Silence”, was even stronger.

Old Edward’s hand trembled as he held his wine glass.

Not out of fear.

The fact that the Lord came alone instead of bringing the elite of the entire Blood Pact Knights indicated that this matter was still negotiable, but since he had brought out the sacred spear “Eternal Silence”, it probably wouldn’t be easy to resolve this matter lightly.

The cunning Wolfsbane Grand Duke’s first thought was that he was in for a heavy price this time, followed by the thought that if he was fortunate enough to survive, he would probably have to pay dearly.

How painful!

Lord Payne didn’t notice, or perhaps didn’t care about, the changes in Old Edward’s expression. He simply walked into the room with his hands behind his back, unceremoniously sitting down in the chair that should have belonged to Edward in the study.

He waved his hand.

The First Lord and the Third Lord then turned and left the study, closing the door behind them.

The crimson sacred spear “Eternal Silence” was left standing upright in the center of the room, maintaining a 90-degree angle with the floor without anyone holding it. Clearly, this was no ordinary weapon, and the faint light it emitted bathed the entire study in a soft red glow.

Not just for show.

In this light of arbitration, everything that didn’t belong to the material world was exposed.

Fortunately, Old Edward seemed to have kept himself clean so far, without much involvement with dangerous and mysterious otherworldly entities.

“I assure you, I knew nothing about Korando’s affair,” Old Edward spoke first.

He put his wine glass on the table and said softly:

“He has always been an uncontrollable fellow, like an unstable metronome swinging back and forth between madness and savagery. If I hadn’t brought the clan, on the brink of death, to Greenleaf Island in desperate need to preserve our lineage, I wouldn’t have indiscriminately taken in such a person-”

“Spencer, these trivial matters you speak of are not worth my personal visit. I, and all the clan leaders and elders still living, are well aware of how far our brethren can fall under the temptation of darkness.

This has been happening for the past thousand years.

Korando is not the first to betray the interests of our race, nor will he be the last.”

Lord Payne interrupted Old Edward’s explanation with a wave of his hand.

The Lord leaned back in his chair, his gaze sweeping across Old Edward’s study, lingering briefly on a few paintings on the wall, but the artistic merit of these pieces was clearly not enough to warrant further comment from the Lord.

While maintaining his observant posture, he casually said:

“Since you obtained power over the Cato region under the cover of night from King Louis, you should have used it well instead of carelessly tossing it to some dangerous elements you can’t control.

But in the end, this is an internal affair of your Wolfsbane clan.

I have no interest in intervening nor do I intend to comment further. You should know why I came here tonight, and why I made such a grand gesture-”

The Lord changed his sitting position.

He leaned his hands on the desk, interlocking his fingers to cover his mouth and nose. As his smooth hair moved without wind, his amber blood eyes fixed on Old Edward.

He asked, enunciating clearly:

“How much were you involved in the matter of Salrokdar and the subspace rift beneath Transia? Answer carefully! Spencer, I will only ask this once, and you only have this one chance to explain yourself!”

Old Edward’s heart sank.

He knew that Lord Payne wouldn’t have left the defenses of the Dark Mountain range to travel thousands of kilometers to Greenleaf Island just because of a misbehaving faction leader.

He knew that the damned Blood Vulture Grand Duke would continue to cause trouble for him even in death! Damn it, Wolfsbane and Blood Vulture could indeed only coexist with one gone, right?

He also knew that Lord Payne was already scrutinizing his sins.

If there were any lies in his upcoming response, he might be forced into a life-or-death confrontation with his thousand-year-old brother right here.

This confrontation would likely destroy half of Misty City, but he believed Lord Payne wouldn’t show mercy because of that.

His ancient and powerful brother could be as merciful as the saints in elf legends when he chose to be, but once he turned cold-blooded, nothing on this continent could stop him from achieving his goal.

As an elder, Old Edward had witnessed similar events with his own eyes, and more than once.

The Wolfsbane Grand Duke let out a long sigh, stepped back a few paces to pull out a chair, and sat down directly in front of the desk, right in front of the suspended sacred spear.

This unique composition made the scene look like an interrogation.

And he, the esteemed Wolfsbane Grand Duke Edward Spencer Gongreau, now sat in the “confession chair.”

He raised his head, looking into those amber eyes before him, as if facing the ancient rules of judgment of the blood clan’s thousand-year tradition, and said in a deep voice:

“I did not participate in the action to tempt Salrokdar!

What I mean is, I knew about his strange changes in recent decades, I also knew he had been secretly associating with some odd characters, I even knew that he had been using the alias ‘Count Fox’ to seek out evil objects related to subspace while tasting fine cuisine across the continent.

But I had no intention of using this to deal with him!

Although the hatred between Wolfsbane and Blood Vulture is deep, I know where the bottom line you set for us is, especially after our poor little brother Charlemagne was executed by you, our ‘big brother,’ 200 years ago. I know even more clearly that some things are untouchable.

However, the situation changed quickly.

Specifically, two years ago, when the Ten-Year War was in full swing, just after that dwarf general’s pioneer army had taken West Seicob City, most of the high-ranking officials of the entire Portia Federation were captured in one fell swoop, and the Wolfsbane clan also became involved as part of the war.

That was just my way of expressing loyalty to King Louis, I didn’t expect to use human wars to strike at Blood Vulture.

But one of my descendants brought back a person for me.

A woman!

A woman called Cecilia.

She was already on the brink of death, as if drained of life by some evil entity, like a candle in the wind, but this woman’s identity was not simple.

She had been Salrokdar’s human mistress, and she said she had ‘given birth’ to a child for Salrokdar, she also said Salrokdar had taken that child away from her.

She was raving mad, making me think for a while that this woman might be delusional.

But I finally decided to take the risk.

I turned her into my descendant, and then I saw some terrifying things from her memories, and it was those memories that gave me a complete plan-”

Old Edward glanced at Lord Payne.

The latter’s face was extraordinarily calm, showing no signs of rage despite his candor. That calm expression meant a terrifying fact.

Everything he was saying now, Lord Payne might have already known!

Even the plan he had been secretly plotting to destroy Blood Vulture had never escaped the eyes of this ancient brother.

“You’re being honest, at least up to now you’re being honest. Continue,” Lord Payne said.

“Tell me the most important part of your plan.”

“Dusk!”

Old Edward uttered this word, saying:

“A person or organization calling themselves ‘Dusk’ was lurking around Salrokdar, they helped him modify that bold plan for a ‘perfect blood clan’ originally devised by the ‘Crimson Witch’ Tris for Salrokdar.

They expanded it in an unimaginably mad way into areas related to ‘gods and subspace.’

Perhaps the Crimson Witch also intended to use this plan to explore the mysteries of the gods, but the Dusk crowd was clearly crazier. They bewitched Salrokdar into wanting to directly create a ‘god.’

A midnight god belonging to all vampires.

I don’t know why the once cunning and intelligent Salrokdar would believe such nonsense, but the fact is, he actually did it!

From Cecilia’s memories, I saw that this plan had been in preparation since the birth of that little girl called Femis.

Salrokdar intended to sacrifice his clan to complete this mad enterprise.

I took advantage of this plan.

My method was to ensure he could smoothly advance his crazy ideas. For this, I used my connections in the Goldflower Kingdom political arena to force the pioneer army to stop in East Prussia after destroying West Seicob City.

I knew that Salrokdar would eventually destroy himself.

But I didn’t expect this matter to end in such a way. In my original thoughts, it should have been you personally stepping in to end this subspace-related affair.

Just as you annihilated the Blood Dread clan 200 years ago, I admit, I had intended to use you-”

“Lies!”

Lord Payne rebuked.

He stood up abruptly, his long hair flying, and said:

“You know why Salrokdar did this! You clearly know why our ancient brother was bewitched! You clearly know we all suffer from the same dark temptation!

In every midnight, in every dream, in every time we approach the crimson holy land. Spencer, you know why Salrokdar did this, don’t you?”

The Lord’s rebuke turned gentle in the last sentence, even somewhat neurotically sentimental.

Faced with his question, Old Edward finally broke down completely.

A twisted expression appeared on his gloomy face, as if he had fallen into some painful ancient memories, pinching his brow.

After several seconds, he said hoarsely:

“Yes, I know, those memories about the mist before the era, those memories we’ve forever forgotten, about our origins, about the original sin of the blood clan!

Even today, I can occasionally see some fragmented, incoherent scenes, in which I can see you, can see Salrokdar, can see Oxana and Charlemagne.

I can even see myself.

But I completely cannot understand what we’re doing in those scenes!

I can’t even pursue whether those memories truly exist in our cursed, eternal life that has no beginning or end, no origin or destination!

It’s very likely just some illusions, strange phantasms formed from the golden life’s keen perception of subspace.

But I can confirm!

It’s no coincidence that Charlemagne and Salrokdar ultimately died from subspace disasters. That dangerous power, those dangerous shadows have always been calling and tempting us.

You and I…

We’ve resisted that call.

But Salrokdar finally couldn’t hold on.

He responded!

So he went mad, so he destroyed his own clan with his own hands, so he created a terrifying godly abomination with his own hands.

I’m even guessing, is the so-called ‘Dusk’ an organization imagined by Salrokdar? Perhaps it’s a lie produced from the cruel torment of his mind by subspace?”

“No, they really exist,”

Lord Payne waved his hand with a certain fatigue.

He had asked all the questions he needed to ask, and Old Edward had passed this interrogation. It was time to say goodbye.

He said:

“‘Dusk’ is an organization active in the shadows. For the past hundred years, they’ve had a hand, more or less, in all subspace-related hidden dangers and calamities across the entire continent.

I’ve already locked onto several of their members, I will handle the following matters.

You!

Don’t pursue anything related to them.

Salrokdar is a very painful example, but Spencer, the fact that you stood by and watched your brother fall into the quagmire of subspace without lending a helping hand troubles me greatly. 1,100 years ago, on the day when we, the original blood clan, supported each other as we walked out of the Dark Mountain range, we made a vow-”

“Huh? Did we?”

Old Edward looked bewildered.

He raised his head, looking at Lord Payne in surprise, and said:

“My earliest memory before the era is of you awakening me in the night at the foot of the desolate mountain, telling me you had forgotten the past and so had I.

We… did we really make some strange vow?”

“We did,”

Lord Payne looked into Edward’s eyes and said:

“You, me, Charlemagne, Oxana, Salrokdar, and Constance, the six of us made a vow to lead the blood clan to multiply and continue civilization on this strange continent, but only Constance and I could remember all of this. After Constance mysteriously disappeared, I became the sole keeper of that initial vow.

Now only you and I remain of the original elders, Edward. If one day you suddenly remember those memories from before the era, be sure to tell me.

Be sure to stay away from subspace!

Nothing good will come from there.”

With that, Lord Payne retrieved the sacred spear and walked towards the study door. Before leaving, he turned back to Old Edward, who was sitting motionless in his chair, holding his head in deep thought, and said:

“I think you should thank the Blood Vulture Clan for helping you solve that little trouble. A proper gift of gratitude is in line with tradition, don’t you think? Also, the adverse consequences caused by the internal strife of the Wolfsbane clan make me very unhappy. I don’t want to see it happen a second time. That woman called Cecilia…

Keep an eye on her!

If she has any contact with Dusk again, report to me.

Of course, all of this is just a suggestion.”

“Of course, I understand your meaning. I will personally take charge of the defense of the Cato region afterwards. I promise you will see your trustworthy old brother on the battlefield against the Black Disaster,”

The Wolfsbane Grand Duke stood up and bowed to Lord Payne in farewell.

He stood by the window of the study, watching Lord Payne and the two knight lords disappear from his territory. Only at this moment did Old Edward relax.

He walked back to the desk and reached for the wine glass at the edge.

He looked at the amber liquid inside.

His thoughts seemed to suddenly return to the past, to the era before the epoch, in those strange buildings where he and his brothers and sisters were busy with work he could no longer understand.

He didn’t know where that was, he didn’t know what they were doing.

But he knew that it was the work of that day that burdened the vampire race with eternal “original sin.”

The Wolfsbane Grand Duke drained the wine in one gulp.

Using this to scatter those memories he shouldn’t recall again, then let out a long sigh, raised the empty wine glass high, facing the night, and said:

“‘Chief Navigator’ Salrokdar Collins, may your soul return to Eden.”

A dozen minutes later, a disgruntled Old Edward put on his tanner’s gloves again and returned to his leather workshop, his face full of the dissatisfaction of a working man forced to work overtime.

But what else could he do?

Lord Payne had said to send a gift as a gesture of sincerity for a “temporary truce,” so as the continent’s finest tanner, he could only personally craft a set of fine protective gear for those who had eliminated Korando, to “thank” them for removing one of his descendant.

Sigh, he still ended up losing money after all.

How annoying!

Ah, why are things in Transia always so troublesome?!