"Casserome." The Bishop glared at him. "What have you done!? Don't you have enough sins in this lifetime!? Why do you keep on turning yourself into a monster—"
"Now, now, Bishop." King Casserome clutched his neck, threatening to crush it if the Bishop kept talking. "I did not come for a sermon, it isn't Sunday yet. I came to retrieve something that is mine. Give it to me."
"The child? That child.... can't be yours...." The Bishop tried to fight him off but the King just easily slammed his frail body on the wall!
"You know what I'm talking about. I don't care about the child since I already fed his two fathers to the hounds. Your little Chapel can have him grow as some common little rat for all I care." King Casserome tightened his grip. "But I want the amulet. You know that its existence is a threat to our peaceful kingdom."
"What.... amulet....."
King Casserome narrowed his eyes. "The child doesn't wear a blue amulet?"
"No. Cough! Cough!" The Bishop wheezed. "The basket only had a child!"
"I don't believe you." King Casserome strangled him more. "It's impossible that Vinsen didn't leave anything else!"
"Just this letter, I swear!" The Bishop could only give up the parchment to stop the king from strangling him. "But the amulet is nowhere to be seen! The father of the child must have had it!"
King Casserome let him go and took the letter, reading it. He sneered. "A mountain child becoming the next heir? How idiotic."
"Even without the Amulet of the Dracon, your command over Ilvedia is strong anyway...." The Bishop clutched his own neck with red marks, catching his breath. "You are not a good man, but you are a good leader. You know that I at least trust you to keep the kingdom safe. If I found the amulet, I would have given it to you."
King Casserome rolled the parchment and nodded. "I see. Yes, after all, you are my first accomplice, hmm? My good friend, the Bishop."
King Casserome patted his head like he would to a puppy, and it irked the Bishop so much that he bit his tongue to keep himself calm.
" Well then, if I learned that you are lying, after all, it's very easy to order my men to blow your Chapel up with my cannons." King Casserome laughed heartily and went to the door. "Have a wonderful night, Bishop!"
The Bishop gritted his teeth and glared at him with red eyes. "Just go away, Casserome."
"That's King Casserome to you." He reminded as he left. "I never came here tonight, you hear?"
"Yes, yes." The Bishop sullenly nodded and slammed the door on the despicable man with a crown.
He took the amulet from his pocket and sighed. "Why haven't I cut off my ties with that demon to this day?"
He walked emotionally fatigued in the empty hallways of the Chapel. He checked on with the nuns, who were putting the child who was now cleaned up in a crib. "We did our best, Father. The wound may not fester, but we don't know how long the child will last after losing that much blood."
"Thank you, sisters. You may now rest in your quarters." He dismissed them, and the two nuns left the Bishop to observe the now sleeping child closely.
He was a beautiful child in the Bishop's eyes, and that beauty was tarnished by evils. He remembered the child's name. Sangfroid. In Old Ilvedian, it meant 'cold-blood', and it reflects his tragic origin quite well. His family got killed in cold blood, putting all their lives on the line for the promise of a better future in him.
He kissed Sangfroid's tiny fingers and placed the blue amulet on him. It suits the child well.
"Your fathers are not the only one placing all their hopes to you, Sangfroid." The Bishop whispered softly. "May you save us from the demon who calls himself the King."
---------------
Even Vladstin had to process everything that happened for a few seconds.
" The bastard father of the snake may have quite a strong hold over the Bishop seeing that he never revealed you the truth and just places such an important amulet as a journal ornament." Vladstin gave him back the shard. "So.... what do you think of all this?"
"I.... I don't know." Sangfroid was very agitated by this revelation yet it never showed on him.
Luckily, Vladstin can sense it. "Well then, I will leave you be for the time being. Let you wrap your head around it. I'll be feeding my pet snake now."
Vladstin picked up the small bag of goods that Sangfroid had prepared for Leron, and went off. "Good night..... Your Majesty."
"Do not call me that." Sangfroid said.
Vladstin grinned. "Why? Anyone who owns the Amulet of the Dracon is rightful to the throne. King Sangfroid has a nice ring to it, don't you think?"
Before he can protest any further, Vladstin again disappeared with the wind.
------------
"Did you see all that?"
Leron shakily nodded as Vladstin came back to the Palace. He had been told before Vladstin left to watch the Looking Glass this entire time. "Sangfroid is the heir of my uncle, the true king. My father... I've always known he was a bastard but I didn't expect he would cause a major impact on Sangfroid's life. He's the reason why Sangfroid had to grow without his real family feeling so alone and helpless. He didn't wasn't even willing to spare the child until the Bishop intervened."
"Makes you feel even more guilty to be the spawn of such a monster, doesn't it?" Vladstin grinned. "Oh wait, you can't really feel guilty because of the mind-altering ritual. You're just like me. A low immoral creature who has no soul."
Vladstin laid out the dinner Sangfroid made for him. "Why are you even bothering to pretend to be so worked up for Sangfroid? You can't change his past, and you don't really care about it. You just know that you have to care as a human being, but you don't really have empathy, just emulating it."
"I know but...." Leron sat down at the table. "Actually, I think... I think I'm recovering the part of my mind that I lost. My soul."
Vladstin narrowed his eyes. "Uh-huh. And what makes you think that?"
"I can feel that whenever I see our memories together....." Leron took a bite of the roasted hare. "I can feel them again, in my heart, even vicariously. And I want to..... love you the way I did before. As a friend and a person that I have valued over the years."
"Maybe it's just your instinct to 'seduce me and then kill me'. " Vladstin denied it. "From what I can tell from the memory about Xiani's lecture, the 'mind', 'soul', 'heart', 'instinct' and 'sense' is all part of this 'brain' in our heads, right?"
Vladstin took out the blood he had saved up and drank only a few drops. "Your 'mind' is making you feel sorry or admire me, to make you feel like the 'heart' facet is working. But it may just be its cunning way to make you gain my trust only for your 'heart' to be turned off again, and for 'sense' and 'instinct' to take over and do what you have been commanded since your rebirth as a 'soulless' person. "
Leron shook his head. "No, I don't think that's it. I would never try to kill you again, Vladstin. Believe me—"
"I would only trust you once you're dead and a puppet I can control." Vladstin said. "Don't ponder about useless things like that anymore, focus on your own survival instincts. That's what I should have been doing all this time instead of trying to gain 'emotions' through a similarly empty shell like you.
Vladstin continued: "If there's one thing I've learned about Xiani's lectures, it's that the people whose part of themselves are gone and now broken only live miserably because they hold on to their past selves. You have to accept what your present nature is now. You're reborn as a killer, and so am I. So be what you are meant to be and don't pretend that the 'you' before is still alive."
"Wait, what are you saying, Vladstin?" Leron's eyes widened.
"The little rats are going to attack here soon because of an incident I indirectly caused." Vladstin said. "Once they do, I'll fulfill my purpose and slay all of them, then you, then that bastard father of yours. I'm a vampire lord after all, my only goal is to be a vengeful menace and nothing else. And that wouldn't change."
"But you can still change! And so can I!" Leron protested. "Sangfroid knows what the Hermit looks like. You must believe him. If you can't put your trust in me, at least put your trust in him."
"But that's not what I want Sangfroid to do. I do trust in him, but to serve a different purpose."
Vladstin looked at his reflection on the half-empty wineglass. "Being able to kill everyone is boring. So he will serve to be the alternative ending to this whole affair. Once the Ilvedians made their counterattack against me, and they already know what my weakness is....."
"Then their greatest hope is to have Sangfroid deliver that shot to the both of us, rebuild a new Ilvedia, and become their king." Vladstin smiled. "And if I'll be honest, that is one glorious ending indeed that I wouldn't mind dying for. It would be a legend that will be passed on to generations, something my former self would truly enjoy."
Vladstin left Leron to eat alone after declaring that, and it made Leron's modified brain go wild from thoughts.
Vladstin doesn't want to gain emotions anymore, but he did not realize that by desiring to perish in the hands of Sangfroid to fulfill that 'legendary ending' is also an emotion. A proof that though he has still not fully recovered the kindness and morality of his past self, because he still holds on to the thought that he is a monster and a killer, he subconsciously was rooting for Ilvedia to recover. The kingdom that caused his kingdom to suffer.... He may not think he is capable of forgiveness, but he is giving them a chance.
If that is not a slight sliver of humanity in him, Leron doesn't know if he can ever be right on reading people anymore.
"Vladstin can't die, and he can't kill the people too. There should be a way to compromise." Leron thought as he lie in his bed to sleep. "But..... What is this weakness that the Huntsmen had found? If I could find what it is.... I can find a way to stop all of this."
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