Chapter 134
His surprise lasted only a moment.
After reaching the top floor of the main castle, where the marital room was located, Kuinan stood at the end of the corridor and observed the two women before him with a blank expression.
Then he calmly examined the four men surrounding them.
The corridor was wide enough that the six figures could crowd together comfortably as they faced him. Thinking back to how eerily silent the lower floors had been, Kuinan quickly reached a conclusion.
‘They’ve either put them all to sleep… or killed them.’
How those bulky men had been smuggled into the castle could be deduced later. If Rossa had insisted they were personally vouched for by her, the head butler would have had little choice. Getting them inside under some pretext wouldn’t have been difficult, Rossa had never caused an incident like this before.
‘I thought she was troublesome, sure but not troublesome enough to kill…’
Truthfully, he’d been too lazy to bother killing her. He’d assumed that sparing her life would cause fewer headaches than cleaning up after her death.
Now, however, looking at the scene before him, he realized killing her outright the day they met might have been the wiser choice.
‘Why did I only warn her? She’s clearly capable of this.’
He’d shown unnecessary mercy. Even if she was insane, she didn’t seem immune to violence or threats. He’d thought fear alone would keep her from something as reckless as taking Sylvia hostage.
He had only just endured hearing from his own kind that they might kidnap his mate. Naturally, this smaller-scale disturbance grated on his nerves even more.
“Son. Don’t move another step.”
Kuinan didn’t respond immediately.
Instead, he listened, not to her voice, but to the castle itself.
He strained his hearing to detect whether anyone else on this floor besides the seven of them was conscious. He picked up several irregular breathing patterns, but none sounded awake. He dismissed the thought.
Then he answered the woman before him.
“What is it you want?”
If she wanted her perfectly intact son returned, that was one thing he could never grant. The moment she voiced such a wish, he fully intended to answer honestly that he had killed her precious son.
Like mother, like son… though in this case, the mother was far more pathetic.
At least Lancart had faced death calmly. He hadn’t tried to use others as shields or sacrifice someone else to save himself. Kuinan had seen it with his own eyes in battle.
He had fought fairly. Lost fairly. And when death approached, he had quietly closed his eyes and accepted it. Granted, he had wished for Sylvia’s death, but compared to this woman, he was infinitely more respectable.
The blade pressing against Sylvia’s throat dug in slightly deeper. A thin line of blood trickled down.
Rossa bit her lower lip until it nearly split and shrieked,
“What do I want? I want you to come to your senses and listen to your mother!”
Her voice rang out, desperate and sharp enough to shred her own throat.
Kuinan felt exhausted.
He sighed, glancing between Rossa, the men, and Sylvia—until his eyes caught the bead of blood sliding down Sylvia’s neck.
In an instant, his expression changed.
The urge to kill flooded his body. Even if he hadn’t been a monster, he would have wanted to kill her in this situation.
If he had been an ordinary human man, he doubted he could have stood by calmly while a blade scored his woman’s skin and blood welled forth.
And he was not human.
One of the four men, who had remained silent until now, must have sensed the murderous aura emanating from him. He flinched and hurriedly raised his arm to shield Rossa and Sylvia.
Rossa had brought four strong men because she believed Sylvia to be some kind of demon.
In truth, she wasn’t entirely wrong.
Sylvia was already halfway transformed into something monstrous.
In Rossa’s mind, monsters and demons were one and the same. Therefore, she didn’t consider herself to be committing any wrongdoing.
In the hand of another man was a small vial.
“Drink it, Grand Duke.”
They knew this was the Grand Duke’s castle. They knew he was its master. And yet for a handful of coins, they’d chosen to become Rossa’s dogs.
The one offering the vial even grinned, unaware of what fate awaited him. He looked incredibly foolish.
“……”
The moment he uncorked the bottle, Lancart—no, Kuinan—recognized it.
These days, everyone seemed to carry monster poison.
Even before he inhaled it, his body recoiled violently in instinctive rejection. He knew immediately what it was.
At the same time, he spat out a curse and looked at Rossa with a murderous glare.
Discussion
0 CommentsNo comments yet.