When you face a beast, your fear is the best reason it has to lunge, tear, and bite.

That was exactly Karon’s situation at this moment. Before this little girl, the moment he showed any weakness, or let any normal human instinct leak through, he would end up like her own brother.

She was a beast, and this damned study was a cage, locking him inside with it.

Karon swore that after this, he would immediately learn the Church of Order’s Arts for Divine Servants. No, since he had been able to awaken corpses before being purified, why could he not attempt higher-level Arts? Divine Seeker, Divine Shepherd, or even an Inquisitor’s.

Even if learning those early carried enormous risks, it would still be better than this.

Truthfully, Karon did not have much right to complain about his delay. He had only completed his purification yesterday, and this little beast had arrived today. The only real negligence was that this morning, he had sat at the desk and calmly eaten a breakfast that had not been very good.

Aside from that, he decided that a secretary’s desk would be added next to his in the study. Even if he was just sitting in the study, idly trimming his nails, Alfred would still have to sit there with him.

Judia walked over to the desk. Before she pressed the bell, she smiled. Then, she turned to look at Karon.

He caught the movement out of the corner of his eye, but continued tugging at his shirt with his fingers.

Ding... Judia rang the bell.

Borg stood outside the door. He was Tier-1 in the family faith system. Karon did not think the young man would be a match for this insane royal.

When Borg saw there was suddenly another person in the study, he visibly froze. He had been standing at the study’s door the entire time, so how could he not have known that someone had entered?

“Fetch me a set of fresh clothes,” Karon said. “Princess Judia drooled all over mine.”

“That’s not true!” she protested. “You just like eating my drool.”

After that coquettish remark, Judia even gave Borg a sweet, innocent smile.

“Young Master,” Borg said. “The master has asked if you plan to attend the cemetery rite later today.”

“I’m not going.”

“Understood. I’ll go get your clothes now, Young Master.”

Not long after, Alfred arrived with the clothes. Before he entered, his expression was heavy, but the moment he stepped inside, a precise, courteous smile returned to his face. “Young Master, the clothes are here.”

“Mmm,” Judia said. “Such a refined male servant.”

She moved to Karon’s side, crouched down, and wrapped her arms around his legs as he sat in the chair. “I’m even starting to wonder if there’s a story between you and your male servant.”

“Put them on the desk and leave,” Karon ordered.

Alfred left clothes on the desk and asked with a smile, “Young Master, do you need me to assist you in changing?”

“No.” Karon shook his head and lightly patted Judia’s small head. “I want to experience what it feels like to have a princess help me change.”

“Understood, Young Master.” Alfred walked out of the study. Passing through the doorway, he stopped, turned, took the handle with both hands, and closed the door.

Click. The instant the door latched, Alfred grabbed Borg by the collar and lifted him off the floor, his feet dangling. “What exactly are you guarding, you useless piece of trash?”

After that soft curse, Alfred flung Borg to the ground. The young man instantly scrambled back up. “I don’t know! I’ve been at the door this whole time. I don’t know how the princess got in. I found it strange, which is why I specifically told you. The Young Master should be fine, right? Sir, didn’t you just go in to check?”

“Fine?” Alfred kicked him.

Borg went down again. The being Pu’er referred to as the “radio demon” only showed deference to great beings. The truth was that he was a demonkin who could stand as an equal to an ordinary Inquisitor of the Church of Order and live freely on its own.

“When I went in, that girl deliberately pressed herself against Young Master,” Alfred said. “She was afraid I would make a move on her, so she used Young Master as a hostage. Do you call that fine?”

Borg clutched his chest and forced himself back upright. “Then tell me what I should do.”

“What you should do?” Alfred backed up and leaned against the wall. “Wait for her to come out on her own.”

“Should I go to the master, tell him, and have him invite Duke York over?”

“Do nothing. Don’t add trouble.” Alfred drew a deep breath. “When you’ve lost control of a situation, doing nothing is what protects the lower limit. A panicked move will usually make it worse.”

He looked at the closed door. “The bell rang earlier, calling you in. That means the situation is still in Young Master’s control. We... trust Young Master.”

“Yes. Thank you for your instruction, Mr. Alfred.”

Alfred glanced at him. “Install a desk in the study. Starting today, I will be at Young Master’s side at all times.”

***

Karon removed his dirty coat and handed it to Judia. She took it and set it on the desk. She then picked up the clean clothes and came back, holding the cuff open. “I’m curious.”

“About what?” Karon slid his arm into the sleeve and put the garment on before turning to face her. He waited.

Judia fastened the buttons. “I’m curious if you were putting on a performance for me just now. If everything before that was all an act.”

“It was,” Karon stated bluntly. “It was all an act.”

“Oh? If that was an act, your talent is impressive. You should be the lead at the Royal Grand Theatre in York City.”

“Making a choice and then probing again and again is tedious,” Karon said.

“Mmm. That makes sense.”

Once the front was done, Karon turned around to let her handle the back. With his entire back exposed to her, Karon continued, “Once you’ve chosen, you should keep walking. Most of the time, whether it was right or wrong doesn’t matter in the end. That’s for other people to judge. All you can see is whether you enjoy the scenery along the way.”

“I understand.” Judia released her hands. “That’s done too.”

Karon turned back and adjusted the cuffs himself.

“At first I thought you were cleaning this study, then I realized you weren’t. After that I thought you were just a core member of the Allen family, but now I see that isn’t it either.”

She tilted her head. “You’re the owner of this study. In the Allen household. That’s so strange.”

“Is it?” Karon smiled faintly. “Then your threshold for ‘strange’ is low.”

Judia lifted her skirt and curtsied. “I’m curious. If I walk out of this study alone right now, will you order an attack? Is that possible?”

“It’s just as possible as when you climbed in through the window and decided to eat me.”

“Then how am I supposed to leave?”

“You tell me,” Karon said, finishing with his clothes. “Ask yourself what made you abandon the thought of eating me.”

“I can tell you a secret,” Judia said. “A Gloria royal secret about the Allens.”

“Speak.”

“The Gloria royal family is preparing to move against the Allen family.”

“Then why not now?” Karon asked. “Your brother Henry was a convenient excuse.”

“Because the timing isn’t right. My great-grandmother is getting worse. She’s about to die.”

“She could die any day. She’s old.”

“But she found a way to continue. A way to prolong her life. And if it succeeds, it will elevate the Gloria family a great deal.”

“Be clearer.”

Judia pointed at the portrait of Earl Rekar. “Earl Rekar once gave my Gloria ancestor half of a sea chart as payment for... services.”

“Mhmm.” Karon was not surprised. A pirate story would never miss a sea chart, and that chart could never be complete.

“Over a hundred years ago, the Glorias and the Allens formed an expedition fleet. They combined their two halves of the chart and followed it to unearth a mysterious treasure, but the voyage was a disaster. The fleet suffered enormous losses, and only the Allen flagship returned. The Gloria side was wiped out.”

Karon’s mind shifted. So the finger of the God of Light had been brought back by that expedition.

“But there was actually a Gloria ancestor who did not die on that expedition. He survived, adrift at sea, and eventually washed up on a deserted island.

“Nearly a century passed, and with the expansion of the colonial movement, twenty years ago a survey team from the mining department landed on that island and found his remains in a cave. Beside his remains was a box, and in that box was a black seed.”

“Your story is too long,” Karon said. “Maybe later I can teach you how to tell a story without boring the listener.”

Yet his thoughts were on the joint expedition that had brought the Allens the finger of a god. The seed that the Gloria’s ancestor had guarded to his death was unlikely to be ordinary.

“There are performers at the Grand Theatre who do nothing but tell stories. They perform almost every day. It’s all nonsense, and yet people still buy tickets.”

“Fine. I’ll go listen sometime,” Karon said. “But right now—”

“My great-grandmother plans to visit Allen Manor,” Judia pressed on. “For a vassal, her visits are an honor. Wherever the queen visits, it is a blessing. Even a collective glory for an entire town or an entire city.”

“And then?”

“She will die here in Allen Manor. That seed will sprout inside of her. That night, everyone in Allen Manor will die, and my great-grandmother will be reborn.

“However, she will officially die in Allen Manor. Her body will remain there.” Judia spoke as if reciting an itinerary.

“Outsiders don’t understand this, but the Gloria family only dares to defend itself and will not dare strike outward, because the churches watch the Veyn royal family very closely. The royals can play their games on their own soil, but the moment they reveal any hint of ambition, the church will suppress them.

“With this method, they can conceal what happens from the church’s suspicions. Outsiders won’t believe that the Gloria family destroyed the Allen family.”

“Details.”

“I don’t know them,” Judia said. “My great-grandmother will swallow the seed, not me.”

“Why choose the Allens?”

“That should be the result of the family’s research. The seed is stained with blood; Allen blood, from a century ago.”

“What?”

Judia shrugged. “Is that hard to understand? It’s probably related to that joint expedition and some fight over the spoils. There was a split and blood was shed. Since the Allen flagship came back, the Gloria side lost that fight, so the ancestor who had that seed jumped into the sea, drifted to that island, and died there. He must have been carrying the last hope of every Gloria on that expedition.

“But the seed was stained with Allen blood. It might have happened during the killing, or it might have been done deliberately, to claim it early. Regardless, the Gloria family spent nearly twenty years studying that seed, and their conclusion is that when the seed sprouts, what it will need as nourishment is the Allen family.”

In fact, the research had been concluded nearly a decade ago. Even back then, the method to use the seed and the forbidden aspects had already been made clear.

“So why wait until now?”

“Because my great-grandmother is afraid of death,” Judia said. “As the highest among them, she’s used every method possible to delay and obstruct the plan, but now she believes that she is really about to die, so she has committed her hope to rebirth through that seed.

“She is the Glorias’ matriarch, as well as the sovereign of Veyn and its attached kingdoms and colonies. If she doesn’t want to die, no one can push her.

“Not only that, in recent years, the Raphael family’s encroachment on the Allens has grown more severe. To prevent the Allens from falling too far, the Glorias even helped to suppress the Raphaels.

“That’s because Allen Manor is the place my great-grandmother chose long ago as her awakening ground.”

The girl patted her stomach. “Concerning more recent things, my brother’s body won’t be found. But the funeral will be held at Allen Manor, as is tradition. When that happens, my great-grandmother, as queen, will likely come in person to mourn her great-grandson. If she chooses to stay the night at Allen Manor, it will mean that she’s completed all of her preparations, mostly mental ones.”

She smiled. “That’s because while the outcome of swallowing that seed has been calculated and analyzed by elders for years, there is only one seed. They can’t actually test anything.”

“If the seed needs to be nourished by Allen blood, then the Gloria family also has...” Karon looked at Judia.

She pointed at Earl Rekar’s portrait. “Honestly, my direct line isn’t Queen Gloria the Third. She never bore any children for Earl Rekar. In fact, when she was with Rekar, she had already lost the ability to have children. Historically, she gave birth to several after that, but all of those were other family members’ children who were placed under her name.”

“Then you...”

“However, Gloria the Third’s daughter, Princess Lucen, did bear a child for Earl Rekar.”

A mother, as Rekar’s lover, could not have children, but her daughter could.

In that era, a pirate who had done whatever he pleased had no regard for conventional ethics. Perhaps his attachment to his family was all that had been preserved. For most of his life Rekar had been filth, and had done what filth does.

“That line wasn’t able to produce much,” Judia continued. “Only produced two Tier-1s. But you know how the Glorias are. They mingle. They mix. A little here, a little there, especially among royal family. People often aren’t even sure their parents are their parents.”

She giggled. “Like me. Duke York is my grandfather, but he’s also my father. Hehe.”

Karon swallowed. That kind of mixing would either produce stupidity or madness. Judia clearly belonged to the latter.

Fortunately, because of his previous life, he had experience dealing with such people.

“I must have a little of Rekar’s blood,” Judia concluded. “And by coincidence, I actually awakened successfully.”

She laughed softly. “Do you know what tier I am in the Allen family faith system now?”

“Two?” Karon guessed.

“No. Three.”

Karon suddenly felt Anderson should take his three sons and jump off a building. The main line had barely managed to claw their way to Tier-3 at best, while this bastard child had reached Tier-3 at such a young age.

“Now that I’ve told you all this, if I walk out of this study, will you order an attack?” Judia asked. “Your male servant is very strong. I might not be able to beat him.”

Karon shook his head. Compared to all of Allen Manor being used as a sacrifice, this little girl was no longer the most urgent threat.

More importantly, Karon had already sensed something off from Judia’s story. When speaking of the Allens and the Glorias, she had not taken the Glorias’ side at all.

Judia spun in place a few times, her skirt fluttering. At that moment, she really did look like a girl her age. Her face lit up with an unrestrained smile. When she finished spinning, she pulled a letter from her bodice and handed it to Karon.

He took it.

“What’s written in that is what I just told you.”

Karon stared. “So you climbed into this study just to leave a warning letter for the Allen patriarch?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“Why?” Judia asked with a smile. “What level are you in the family faith system?”

Karon shook his head, noticing something else; Could Judia not tell that he was a Divine Servant? Perhaps his unusual purification had given him a natural way to conceal the aura of a Divine Servant.

As for fact that Pu’er, Alfred, and Master Anderson had not noticed any sort of concealment, it might simply be due to the fact that they all knew that Karon had undergone purification and they had simply overlooked it.

“So you don’t understand,” Judia said. “When you awaken the ancestor’s bloodline, when your family faith system keeps rising, you develop a natural affinity for the ancestor and for your own blood.”

She pointed to Allen above the desk. “I can feel him clearly. He is my starting point.”

Then she turned to Earl Rekar’s portrait. “The Gloria family isn’t my home. Duke York has no bond with me. In my perception, my father is him.”

She spoke as if stating a fact.

“Do you know why I ate Henry?” Judia asked. “Henry was useless. He didn’t know the family secrets, but I’m different. I get treated like a genius by the Gloria family. I know far more than Henry ever did.

“I’ve seen Eunice several times. She used to accompany her mother, Ms. Jenny, to the palace to drink afternoon tea with my great-grandmother. I liked watching her, staying close to her. She gives me the feeling of family.

“This fallen Allen family has never tested her bloodline because they want to marry her off for a good price, but I’m certain. For her to give me that feeling, she must be like me. Her bloodline is strong.”

She drew a breath and smiled. “She is my sister. My beautiful sister, gentle and moving, and Henry dreamed of marrying her, staining my sister.”

Judia’s smile sharpened. “He was only fit to eat shit!

“And I realized something,” she continued. “Because of me, the family may have wanted to arrange their marriage. By having Eunice marry in, carrying out this great plan, and preserving one more thread of the Allen bloodline for the Gloria family.

“So I found a chance. I killed my stupid brother who wanted to eat swan meat. And while I was at it, I stuffed horse dung into his mouth and told him what he truly deserved to eat.”

She laughed. “But what you said was even better! My great-grandmother’s underwear? Hahaha! That would have been a real classic!”

“So you killed Henry because he wanted to marry Eunice,” Karon said.

“Yes.” Judia nodded. “Even if I’ve only exchanged a few simple greetings with my sister, who would dare stain my beautiful, holy sister? What filthy man dares to marry her? I’ll kill him.”

Karon said nothing.

“Alright. That’s everything,” Judia said. “The dirty, stupid Glorias want to use us Allens as a sacrifice. How could I sit and watch that? Of course I had to come warn you. This is Allen Manor. It’s my manor. My home, even if I’ve never lived here for a single day.

“Now I’m leaving this study and returning to Duke York, who is both my grandfather and my father.”

As Judia walked toward the study door, Karon called out, “But...”

Judia stopped and turned. “But what?”

“But I’m certain that you genuinely wanted to eat me just now. I have the Allen surname, and I’m sitting in this study. If you see this place as home...”

“Those who don’t awakened the ancestor’s bloodline are outsiders to me,” Judia stated. “Everyone else, even if they bear the Allen name, is a stranger. Sometimes, it even disgusts me, seeing them carry the same name.”

“Alright,” Karon said. “I understand.”

“No,” Judia smiled. “You don’t.”

She tapped her forehead with a finger. “I’m even starting to suspect you might be a Beguiler. I can’t sense any demonkin aura from you, but you made me lose myself.

“You’re interesting,” she said softly. “No, you’re very interesting.”

“Is that so...?”

“Even now, I still haven’t escaped your beguilement,” Judia said. “Because I’ve started to anticipate it, anticipate that one day you really will take me to meet my father. Then, I can tell him my loneliness and my grievances. I want to be like a normal little girl. I want to act cute with my father.

“You were right. Whether the end of the road is right or wrong doesn’t matter anymore. Even if everything you told me is a lie, my heart is full of longing now.”

She stared at him. “Tell me. Will I really have that day?”

“You will.”

“Then I’ll wait for it.”

“But you still haven’t told me why you wanted to eat me,” Karon said. “You can’t want to eat every ordinary person with the Allen name.”

“Because you are too handsome,” Judia said simply. “In the palace there are many handsome men, and many handsome not-men, yet I’ve never seen anyone more handsome than you.”

Karon said nothing.

“I believe many women like you just because of your looks.”

“Actually, they don’t.”

“I do,” Judia said. “I like you. I like your face. There are many ways to like someone. For me, liking someone means wanting to eat them, that way you can be with me forever.”

“That’s not a good habit,” Karon said.

“It’s the simplest habit,” Judia replied. “And it leaves no emotional trouble afterward. Those plays about love and longing that are performed in the grand theatres, I got sick of them long ago.”

“Alright.”

“I still have one regret,” Judia said.

“Whether I ate you or not doesn’t affect leaving that letter on the desk. I could even twist your head off, clamp the envelope between your teeth, and place you on the desk. That would make the family head take this even more seriously, wouldn’t it?”

“Life is beautiful because of regrets,” Karon said.

Judia nodded. “Then can I go?”

“You can, and thank you for the warning.”

“I’m only handling my own family business,” Judia said. “I don’t need thanks from an outsider.”

She opened the study door and met Alfred’s gaze. She then smiled and left. Alfred did not stop her, but immediately entered the study.

He saw his Young Master standing before Earl Rekar’s painting, holding up a middle finger to it. “You... animal.”