Chapter 166: Lance Will Do Anything As Long As Its Not Illegal

Chapter 166: Lance Will Do Anything As Long As It's Not Illegal

On the third floor of Lichten's Castle, the trio walked along the carpeted corridor alongside the vampire. Lance was escorting Viscount Augustine to what he termed the newly established "Art Paradise." Both parties were in high spirits, and the atmosphere was cordial. They traversed the chilly hallway, where the flickering lamplight cast shadows that stretched and shrank rhythmically.

At the far end of the darkness stood the black oak door of the castle's master bedroom. It was imposing and solemn, bearing the unique marks left by the passage of time.

As they approached the entrance, Augustine's eyes burned with sudden intensity in the gloom. Although he wished to maintain decorum before the count, he could barely contain his eagerness to feast upon the three humans waiting inside.

He murmured to himself, "I have been waiting for this moment with bated breath."

Clearly, Count Palokas had already taken control of the castle and was awaiting his arrival.

"May your joys be imminent." Lance offered his well-wishes as well.

Augustine smiled and raised his hand, gently pushing open the heavy doors. As the wood groaned with a low creak, a palpable, oppressive weight surged out from within. A strange, stale scent of medicinal potions rushed to meet them.

The dim, flickering light from oil lamps mounted on the stone walls played across an array of blades and test tubes. Strange green alchemical fluids shimmered faintly within various flasks and jars, imbuing the entire bedroom with an eerie atmosphere.

In the center of the room, three masked clergy members stood clustered around an indescribable humanoid figure lying on the bed. They had already coated Palokas in resin and bound him tightly in layer upon layer of linen strips.

The count had been thoroughly transformed into a living mummy. His deathly pale face, visible beneath the wrappings, was devoid of vitality, save for a pair of hollow, lifeless eye sockets. Despite all that, his hand continued to rise and tremble, as if to prove that a spark of life still lingered within.

When the three clergy noticed the approaching Augustine, their gazes locked onto him instantly as if they had discovered fresh prey.

The viscount felt a sudden, bone-chilling cold run down his spine. His eyes flashed with a mixture of disbelief and wariness.

The count was nowhere to be found, and this was certainly not the master's bedchamber. No, it was a horrific laboratory.

Although Augustine didn’t know the identity of the wretched creature strapped to the experimental table, he was certain it was a fellow member of his kind, though a weak one. Only the vampires possessed such endless vitality.

Augustine's reaction was lightning-fast. The instinct for survival caused his gaze to snap toward the rear in an instant. Yet, at that very moment, his field of vision was flooded with a pure, flawless white radiance!

It was the world bathed in sunlight, blazing like an endless inferno. The heat was so intense it felt as though it would melt his very eyes.

"Impossible—!!!"

As Augustine let out a shrill, harrowing scream, Frey, who had been standing just behind him, stepped forward, seized the viscount's wrist, pinned his shoulder, and slammed him heavily against the floor with a crash that sounded like his very bones were shattering.

The viscount was a Rank 6 vampire and was already in a state of extreme hunger after his seal was lifted. Now, exposed to the scorching sun, he was as vulnerable as a cockroach stripped of its shell.

"Behave yourself."

Frey kept the viscount's head pinned firmly down with one hand while taking the Blood Pressure Emergency Device that Lance handed him with a smile. Without a shred of mercy, he drove the large needle into the viscount's back and began extracting his blood.

The blood rose slowly within the chamber, acting like a crimson indicator that foretold Augustine's fate.

The Poet of Boundless Love had just been summoned next to Lance. She casually took Lance's sunglasses and put them on her own face. After observing the state of both Palokas and Augustine, she couldn't help but sing a song for them.

"Full of sorrow yet unable to shed tears, utterly exhausted yet unable to sleep, only able to endure day and night, and then day and night again, endless days and nights, forever trapped in the mortal realm!"

Because his sunglasses had been snatched away, Lance could only close his eyes. The Poet always liked to steal his spotlight, leaving him somewhat embarrassed. He couldn't understand why his own summon was so eccentric.

"...Could it be that their inability to shed tears and sleep isn't due to their own issues?" Hyperion said while putting her own sunglasses on Lance beside her.

She felt that seeing less of the farce unfolding before her would help her accrue more merit.

"Thank you, Hyperion." Lance then looked at the three clergy. "Here comes another delivery for you."

"Who... who are you people?!" Augustine's cry was filled with fear and rage.

However, the humans ignored him.

One asked, "What should we do with this new one?"

The other shook his head. "No need to do it like that. Of course, if he doesn't cooperate, you can do whatever you want."

A third opined, "Let's remove all his organs first."

The first nodded vigorously. "I agree with that idea."

Seeing Palokas lying on the bed, yet still so full of life, Lance was certain that not having organs didn't affect the normal lives of vampires. In fact, they could always grow them back.

Augustine's voice trembled with rage as he asked, "Do you Honing humans know what you're doing?! In the Blood Moon Era, you will face endless hunts and retaliation from the vampires!"

Even though he didn't quite understand the slang the humans were using, he roughly knew that they were planning something extremely heinous.

"Viscount Augustine, I recently heard from a vampire that in the Honing Empire, vampires are the law itself. Basically, to you all, human laws are merely rules of the game that worms must follow. So it's quite normal that you vampires aren't very familiar with the current laws." Lance, acting like a seasoned lawyer, explained the latest version of the Honning Empire's criminal law to Augustine.

"Although the laws of the Honing Empire forbid humans from trafficking other humans, there is no clause prohibiting the trafficking of vampires. Therefore, what we are doing is a perfectly legitimate business."

After arriving in the Shadow Realm dungeon, Lance had read through the Honing Empire's statutes out of curiosity. Indeed, the laws, having been revised by the vampires themselves, contained no such provision.

Augustine was rendered speechless for a long moment. That went without saying, didn't it?! What sane living being in this world would dare to traffic vampires? Why would vampires ever demean themselves by explicitly adding a law stating, "Vampires must not be trafficked"?

Augustine roared, struggling with all his might against Frey. "I am not some frail vampire like the one wrapped in linens. I am a viscount! Do you know the fate that befell that witch who sealed me? She died at my hands. For fleeting, short-lived beings like you, even staking your lives to seal away a vampire is utterly meaningless!"

These humans had clearly failed to grasp the gravity of the situation regarding a vampire viscount like himself!