In the chapel on the ground floor of Lichtenstein Castle, Lanqi delivered a vivid arts-and-crafts lesson titled *A Mummification Guide Even a Three-Year-Old Can Understand*.
After having the Priest cleanly seal away the extracted blood of the Count, Lanqi proceeded to direct everyone's assignments.
First, the trio from the merchant guild was responsible for crafting the coffin to hold the mummy, which could be done right in the castle's fourth-floor smithy.
The clergymen were tasked with the Count's "optimization."
Lanqi and the others would prepare and organize tomorrow's activities and dining arrangements.
Everyone would still have to stay up late tonight to put in some overtime, but once the work was done, they could all happily enjoy this wonderful holiday together.
Although everyone felt a little tired after such an exceptionally full day, the thought of four whole days of carefree fun ahead filled them with renewed energy.
"Blood... Give me back my blood..."
Count Palocas's voice was hoarse and faint, like a skin-and-bones addict suffering from withdrawal.
"You see? Staying up late is truly terrible for you—it has caused him such agony. Count Palocas is so fond of staying up late, and to correct his bad habit, we must stay up a bit with him tonight. Truly, he harms not only himself, but others as well."
Looking at the trembling, mummified Count Palocas on the floor, Lanqi couldn't help sighing in sympathy.
Hyperion opened her mouth, then held her tongue.
She couldn't shake the feeling that Count Palocas's agony wasn't entirely caused by staying up late.
"Mr. Lanqi, since the Blood Clan possesses immortality, staying up indefinitely won't kill them. If we encounter vampires who refuse to adjust their sleep schedules in the future, could we make them stay awake for ten days or half a month without sleep, thereby helping them realize on their own the importance of a healthy routine?"
The merchant guild's young master was quick to apply the lesson, asking Lanqi from the side.
"Quite right."
Lanqi nodded in gratification.
As the saying goes, "Virtue has no fixed master; take the good as your guide." The young master had evidently grasped the true essence of winning people over through virtue.
"..."
Hyperion watched the two of them—one bold enough to teach, the other bold enough to learn.
She felt as though the world had just lost yet another sane person.
All afternoon, the merchant guild's young master had been slacking off and hardly speaking a word, leading Hyperion to assume he was the least influenced by Lanqi. Little did she expect that the moment he opened his mouth, he was already severely infected.
...
The world outside the window remained plunged in deep darkness. The castle courtyard and the distant mountain forests were swallowed by the night, their silhouettes faintly outlined by the moonlight.
On the second floor of Lichtenstein Castle, in Bedroom 202 where the Resurrection Church cultist was imprisoned, it was exceptionally quiet.
The air was thick with the heavy stench of rust and blood. Splatters of blood stained the opulent decor, the floor, and the walls—red, brown, and black, each shade chronicling agony from a different point in time.
In the center of the room, a petite young woman sat unconscious on a chair, iron locks, chains, and shackles binding her tightly so that escape was impossible.
Her garments looked as if torn by wild beasts, the shoulders shredded to tatters. What had once been a white priest's robe was now dyed almost entirely in overlapping patches of deep crimson.
The source of that blood was none other than the countless scars and wounds covering her body. Every cut ran deep into her flesh, etching unforgettable memories. Her skin was deathly pale, as though weathered by biting winter storms, and the festering, unhealed gash across her thigh resembled a sickly red line that threatened to weep blood at any moment.
In the dead of night, a bank of dark clouds drifted across the sky, allowing a shaft of faint moonlight to spill into the bedroom and illuminate the girl's face.
The captured priestess of the Resurrection Church kept her eyes tightly shut, as though enduring indescribable torment and agony even within her dreams.
Suddenly, a faint disturbance came from downstairs: the soft clinking of chains, the creak of wooden staircase banisters, and the murmur of indistinct voices.
These subtle sounds acted like a key, slowly turning the lock on her consciousness.
"..."
Her eyelids began to flutter gently, peeling back the fog of unconsciousness. Her awareness surfaced slowly through the dark, sharpening into focus.
She remembered that she had entered a Shadow World called the [Banquet of Sanctuary Villains]. She was a Blood Clan dependent tasked with betraying and slaughtering the challengers, meant to inflict the most brutal psychological and spiritual torment upon them...
And then...
And after that...
She did not want to think about it anymore.
As if jolting awake from a nightmare, she snapped her heavy eyelids open. Even the dim moonlight seeping into her pupils felt blindingly harsh.
"..."
When full awareness returned, every detail in the room became agonizingly clear. She could feel the icy chains binding her body, her stolen freedom, the faint whisper of wind in her ears, and the bone-chilling pain racking her flesh.
Those once-bright blue eyes were now lifeless and dull, filled only with profound exhaustion.
Those bastards from Ikerite Academy were truly unimaginable beasts; there was nothing they wouldn't stoop to.
The priestess tried to make a sound, but her lungs felt as if slashed open by a sharp blade. Her ragged, halting breaths sounded like wind scraping over gravel, hissing softly. The lingering traces of her agony drifted outward from her body, melting into the scent of blood that hung in the air.
"Damn... you... beasts..."
Though the muffled words from her gagged mouth were faint and slurred, they brimmed with bottomless malice, permeating the dim room.
Under the dreary moonlight, the girl's face resembled a stone carving—rigid and lifeless.
Suddenly, approaching footsteps outside the door shattered the room's silence, growing clearer like the distant tolling of wind chimes.
They were the unhurried strides of a victor, utterly poised, like a predator savoring the approach to its final prey.
Without a doubt, the Blood Clan Count had finally arrived.
Listening to the sounds beyond the door, the priestess's lips actually curved upward. She threw her head back and began to laugh—laughing like a blooming flower of madness, the sound shrill and hollow.
She knew her hour had come, but all this agony and humiliation would at last be brought to an end.
Even though she still harbored immense terror toward those three clergymen, she knew that the monsters who had tormented her for so long were now dead.
Including the most damnable of all, Lanqi Wilfort.
She felt only pure exhilaration!
She slowly raised her drooping head, fixing her gaze upon that door—the door through which the Blood Clan Count was about to enter.
For some reason, she no longer found the Blood Clan Count frightening in the least.
*Click.*
In that final instant as the lock gave a metallic twist, she felt no fear—only a profound sense of release. Amid her laughter, tears welled at the corners of her eyes, bitter yet cathartic.
Yet in the very next second,
the door swung open to reveal Lanqi holding an interrogation log, looking at her with a puzzled expression.
"Young lady, is there something cheerful you'd like to share with me?"
Chapter 156