Chapter 437: I Want the Blood Race Sacred Artifact, and I Won't Let the Blood Race Brides Go

"Run? You think you can get away?" Qi Suian's voice echoed into the castle where the Piercing Demon resided.

This had once been the Villeries family's castle, but it was later seized by the Piercing Demon.

The once-noble manor had been transformed into a den for the Blood Race.

After entering, Qi Suian could see countless Flesh Eggs and all sorts of bizarre things like slime and umbilical cords.

Without a word, the Piercing Demon threw open his tuxedo and stuffed the three Blood Race brides directly into his clothing. He couldn't be bothered with anything else as a pair of bat-like wings emerged from his back.

He smashed through a castle window in low-altitude flight, attempting to escape.

However, just as he burst through the window, Qi Suian grabbed him and dragged him back inside.

"A guest has come to your door, yet you, the host, offer no hospitality. Isn't that a little too rude?" Qi Suian brutally ripped apart the other's tuxedo.

With the space that had contained them now torn, the three Blood Race brides tumbled out from the Piercing Demon's person.

It was almost like he had just dropped loot.

Qi Suian reached out, pinning down all three monstrous Blood Race brides with a single hand. As his other hand went to grab the Piercing Demon, his opponent dissolved into mist and vanished.

Qi Suian's hand closed on empty air. By the time he spotted the Piercing Demon again, he was already five hundred meters away.

Without a moment's pause, he transformed into a swarm of bats and vanished into the sky.

The three Blood Race brides were dumbfounded. They had never imagined that the mighty Piercing Demon would be forced to flee so wretchedly at the hands of some unknown nobody.

"Excuse me," Qi Suian began, not bothering to chase after the Piercing Demon, instead turning his gaze to the three Blood Race brides. "Where might I find the Piercing Demon's Corpse Hand, Demonic Puppet, and Illusion Mirror?"

Honestly, it was impressive that the Piercing Demon could even stomach them.

The Blood Race brides' appearances were beyond ugly; "hideous" was the only word to describe them.

While you could tell they had once been human, that was all that remained of their former selves. There was nothing remarkable about what was left.

Qi Suian had to admire the Piercing Demon's willpower. 'Another man would have trouble lasting a single night, yet he managed to live with them so harmoniously.'

The three Blood Race brides, however, did not speak, remaining silent.

Their sense of self and sanity had long been twisted by the Piercing Demon, making them fanatically loyal to him.

This distortion was a permanent, irreversible change. The only way for Qi Suian to get them to comply was to overwrite it with a distortion of his own.

'But he couldn't be bothered with such a time-consuming and troublesome task.'

He had a much simpler solution.

He took out the Ghost Lamp and the Soul Ring. Two Blood Race Blood Seals manifested on his body, allowing him to control the two Blood Race Sacred Artifacts.

The abilities activated, directly brainwashing and controlling the three Blood Race brides.

Though the Blood Race brides were not members of the Blood Race born from the First Embrace, but were instead artificial creations akin to stitched-together monsters, as long as they were still within the bounds of "human" and "Blood Race," the Blood Race Sacred Artifacts would be effective.

"Where are the three Blood Race Sacred Artifacts?" Qi Suian asked bluntly.

"Lord Dracula has them stored in the treasury," the three Blood Race brides answered in unison.

"Lead the way," Qi Suian said.

For the time being, Qi Suian had no intention of investigating the other strange things in the castle.

The Blood Race Sacred Artifacts were his priority. Everything else could wait.

The three Blood Race brides led the way, and they soon arrived at the Piercing Demon's treasury.

He had infused it with dark power, making it difficult for even a Daywalker to open.

However, the one facing this treasury was Qi Suian. He simply kicked it to smithereens and strolled inside.

The treasury was filled with vast amounts of gold, silver, jewels, antiques, and other treasures. Qi Suian had no interest in any of it and headed straight for the Blood Race Sacred Artifacts.

He quickly found the three Blood Race Sacred Artifacts he was looking for.

He gave the Illusion Mirror a cursory glance before his gaze fell upon the Corpse Hand and the Demonic Puppet.

The Demonic Puppet was a doll, but its eyes glinted with a lifelike spirit, as if it were alive.

"What an interesting human. You actually managed to turn the Piercing Demon's three Blood Race brides." The Demonic Puppet spoke upon seeing Qi Suian. "Let me guess."

"It was the power of the Ghost Lamp and the Soul Ring, wasn't it?"

"Take me with you, and I can help you survive the Piercing Demon's hunt."

"I don't know how you're able to use the power of the Blood Race Sacred Artifacts, but I'm sure you need my help."

The Demonic Puppet's voice was utterly bewitching, laced with an irresistible charm.

Any other man would have likely become her lapdog on the spot.

On Qi Suian, however, it didn't cause the slightest ripple.

He completely ignored the Demonic Puppet's words and turned to the Corpse Hand.

The other twelve Blood Race Sacred Artifacts each had their own corresponding abilities, but the Corpse Hand, in contrast, seemed to have none.

Yet, it was said this hand contained the secrets of the world. The initial suspicion was that it was related to the World Core.

Not because Qi Suian had any specific clues, but because that was the only relevant high-level concept he knew of, so he decided to connect the two for now.

He picked it up and examined it. It really did seem to be just an ordinary piece of a corpse, with no miraculous properties.

If there was one difference, it was that the Corpse Hand was incredibly tough and resilient; even Qi Suian couldn't leave a mark on it.

After stowing it away, he snatched up the Demonic Puppet and gave it a shake.

The Demonic Puppet was playing dead.

When its bewitching words had no effect on Qi Suian, the Demonic Puppet realized the man before it was definitely not a normal human.

It wasn't that humans capable of resisting its bewitching words didn't exist, but even they wouldn't have been able to ignore it so nonchalantly.

Even the Piercing Demon, when dealing with it, would cautiously seal its mouth to prevent it from speaking, lest he be influenced himself.

"Tell me, why did the Piercing Demon choose the Villeries family?" Qi Suian asked, staring at the Demonic Puppet.

As a Blood Race Sacred Artifact, and a self-aware one at that, the Demonic Puppet surely knew part of the truth.

When it didn't speak, Qi Suian slowly took out the other ten Blood Race Sacred Artifacts, laying them out in a display. Then, he picked up the Slaughter Knife in his left hand and began gesturing with it over the Demonic Puppet's body.

'His charisma wasn't high enough, so his words lacked persuasive power.'

'Fortunately, he could compensate for a lack of charisma with brute force.'

"The Villeries family is the direct bloodline of the progenitor of humanity, Abel. They..." the Demonic Puppet began.

It got that far before Qi Suian cut it off.

"Hold on. Let's put aside for a moment the utterly ridiculous claim about 'the direct bloodline of the progenitor of humanity.' As I recall, weren't the progenitors of humanity Adam, Eve, and Lilith?"

"How did Abel get promoted to that status?" Qi Suian thought, realizing this Demonic Puppet didn't seem very well-educated.

'If humans were a collateral branch, they wouldn't be pure-blooded humans.'

'As far as he knew, there were only two confirmed collateral branches: the Blood Race and the Daywalkers.'

'And the Blood Race were converts via the First Embrace, which meant they weren't born into it.'

'So theoretically, the only true collateral branch was the single Daywalker.'

"The Piercing Demon wants an heir—one even more robust than the Son of the Dragon. That's why he chose the Villeries family to be the mother for his child."

"Those three Blood Race brides were women from a branch of the Villeries family." The Demonic Puppet didn't answer Qi Suian's question, instead continuing to explain the Piercing Demon's plan.

Qi Suian tentatively accepted the premise that the Villeries were the direct bloodline of Abel. After hearing the Demonic Puppet's explanation, he could only conclude that the Piercing Demon had to be insane.

'The guy actually wanted a pure-blooded member of the Blood Race.'

The concept was truly bizarre—it basically meant an offspring born from two members of the Blood Race.

A human and a member of the Blood Race could, through a union of the living and the dead, give birth to a member of the Thin Blood Clan. But two members of the Blood Race could not.

Because members of the Blood Race are corpses—they are the dead.

The Blood Race World didn't have a "child born of a corpse" setting, so never mind giving birth to a so-called pure-blood; even conceiving was nearly impossible.

Speaking of which, the Piercing Demon got lucky when he met Victor Frankenstein, who was able to artificially create members of the Blood Race.

They were ugly, to be sure, but they could actually get pregnant.

The only problem was that the fetuses were all stillborn. They died in the womb, never mind being brought into the world.

This drove the Piercing Demon to become more and more deranged.

'He's trying to create life,' Qi Suian realized. The Piercing Demon's chances of success were abysmally low.

"Yes. And he has been failing continuously," the Demonic Puppet chimed in.

Even the stitched-together monsters created by Victor Frankenstein weren't truly alive.

In essence, they were a "new life" assembled from corpses and shattered souls—not creation, but assembly, like putting together a puzzle.

And the Blood Race brides were even more straightforward, having been converted directly from living humans.

"Do you know where the Evil Key is?" Qi Suian asked, abruptly changing the subject.

The Demonic Puppet was caught off guard by Qi Suian's leap in logic but replied, "I don't know, but I have some leads."

"The Evil Key is said to be in the hands of the progenitor of humanity, Abel. And since Abel is the direct ancestor of the Villeries family, perhaps one of their clan members would have information."

"This is some information the Piercing Demon once obtained. Perhaps it will be of use to you." The Demonic Puppet sold out the Piercing Demon without a second thought.

'This man has already collected twelve of the Thirteen Sacred Artifacts of the Blood Race,' the puppet mused. 'There's no way he'll give up on the last one.'

'The Demonic Puppet also wanted to witness the sight of all Thirteen Sacred Artifacts gathered in one place.'

'As for the Blood Race? It couldn't wait for every last one of them to die.'

It wasn't born with a self and a mind. Rather, its soul had been extracted after enduring horrific torture by the Blood Race, then sealed into a doll, ultimately becoming the Demonic Puppet, one of the Thirteen Sacred Artifacts.

'It was only due to its very nature that it was unable to defy the commands of the Blood Race.'

'Thus, its hatred for the Blood Race was boundless.'

"Ask someone from the Villeries family, huh? That's a bit troublesome." Qi Suian stroked his chin. 'Coincidentally, I happen to know one.'

'So my 'fated encounter' couldn't be related to the Evil Key, could it? If it is, then that would explain a few things.'

'The problem is, I seem to have offended the last scion of the Villeries family.'

'I can't just resort to torture, can I? That would be hard to explain to the Daywalker afterward.'

His gaze then fell upon the Demonic Puppet. 'This thing's bewitching ability seems pretty good. I can have it help with the questioning.'