297 Searching The Blood Mountain

Once the Queen's sharp gaze landed on the group of Valaran Kingdom officials, the group of officials all had their heart thumped like the gallop of a thousand hooves. 

The group of officials all stepped forward and offered their salutations with utmost respect and dread. 

"Your Majesty." 

"Where is the king?" Elizabeth asked after giving the group of officials a comprehensive look. The king of Valaran did not seem to be among them. After a short pause, she added, "Or rather, is there anyone left from the Valaran royal family?"

When the officials heard these questions, their eyes grew red and became stricken with grief as they dropped to their knees. 

"There is no one left… the Valaran royal bloodline ended when his Majesty took his own life." One of the officials spoke.

Elizabeth furrowed her brows at their emotional state. 

The Bloodfiend Sect had terrorized and ruled over the Valaran Kingdom for years. If the Valaran royal family died out a while back, Elizabeth found it strange for these officials to be so overwhelmed with grief.

After all, time heals everything, even if scars remain behind.

It was not like these officials were the king's lovers or something. There was no need for them to still be so emotional, not unless the Valaran king took his life very recently instead.

"When did this happen? And why did your king take his own life?"

"Yesterday, Your Majesty… The king took his own life just yesterday. The king's family had been held captive by those bloodsucking fiends many years ago. When the Burning Heaven Sect arrived to help, we led our forces up the Blood Mountain and slaughtered the rest of those monsters."

"However, when the battle was over, and we went to look for the king's family..." At this point, the official tightened his fist and gnashed his teeth. "Those people were not humans. They never intended to keep their promises. The king's family had long departed the world. Their heads were hung in front like trophies."

"Don't be too hard on yourself. If I had not insistently persuaded his Majesty to lead our forces up the Blood Mountain with the Burning Heaven Sect, his Majesty would not have stumbled upon such a scene and taken his own life on the spot. I am to blame for this."

"Don't be stupid. I was the closest to his Majesty. I should be the one to blame for his Majesty's death. If I had just been a little faster, I would have stopped his Majesty from taking his own life."

"You? Don't be ridiculous. His Majesty's cultivation was one step away from Transcendence. None of us could have stopped his Majesty when he is vehement on dying."

The officials blamed and consoled each other.

The officials glanced at each other with a tacit understanding before lowering their heads to the Queen submissively. They simultaneously spoke, "We were hoping you would take over and lead us, Your Majesty." 

"Oh? Don't tell me that no one among you is interested in stepping up to take the throne for yourselves?" Elizabeth raised an eyebrow, despite expecting this answer. She did not believe that they did not have this ambition.

The officials all had wry, bitter smiles when they heard this.

"Please do not tease us, Your Majesty. Even if one among us has the ambition of a king, if we do not possess the ability of one, we will be leading a path of self-destruction of not only oneself but the kingdom."

Elizabeth nodded with a pleased look. 

"Being self-aware of one's abilities is a good thing. Good that you all know that. Very well, the Valaran Kingdom will become part of the Crawford Kingdom. Henceforth, there will no longer be a Valaran Kingdom, and you will all be subjects of the Crawford Kingdom."

After saying this, Elizabeth swept everyone a look. "Does anyone have a problem with what I said?"

"None, Your Majesty."

The officials all lowered heads even more submissively. 

To them, the Valaran Kingdom was a thing of the past and had only existed in name ever since the Bloodfiend Sect took over the kingdom. Under their tyrannical control, there was no Valaran Kingdom and only a Bloodfiend Sect.

The Queen was simply making this official with her statement. They were more accepting of this change. Compared to the inhuman Bloodfiend Sect, being under the Crawford Kingdom's ruling was a better choice.

"We pledge our loyalty to the Crawford Kingdom and the Crawford royal family to who we serve."

"Very good!" 

Elizabeth clapped her hands together and gave them another look before asking, "Who among you had the highest official rank in the kingdom?"

There were shuffling movements among the group of officials as they separated, and glanced at a single person among them. The person subjected to their stares was the person who blamed himself for persuading the late king to lead the forces up the Blood Mountain, the royal advisor.

"Ahem." The royal advisor coughed. "That would be me, Your Majesty. I was the royal advisor for the late Valaran King."

"I see. You shall be in charge while I am away. The army will be left here for you to command." 

"Yes, Your Majesty." The royal advisor bowed.

Elizabeth turned to the rest of the officials and said, "The rest of you will work with him to return stability to the kingdom and record every problem you encounter. I want to see a complete report the next time I return. Is that understood?"

"Yes, Your Majesty."

"Good." 

Elizabeth prepared to take only a handful of troops from the army and head up the Blood Mountain with Aria and Lynne. 

"Hold on, Your Majesty." The royal advisor said after a slight hesitation.

"What is it?"

"Are you returning to Capital? Will you not stay for a bit longer? What should we do about the Durham Kingdom?"

"Leave them be for now. You have the army to help you stabilize the kingdom and guard the Valaran-Durham borders. Deal with things accordingly in my absence, understood? I need to return for some urgent matters, so no, I will not be staying." Elizabeth said decisively.

"Yes, Your Majesty." The royal advisor complied with a slight bitter look. After the Queen left with her small group, the royal advisor glanced at the group of idle officials. "Well, you all heard the words of her Majesty. Time to get to work."

"Yes, sir."

Everyone scurried back to the palace and became busy at once as they begin looking into matters that needed attention. 

After Elizabeth left with her company, she headed straight to the Bloodfiend Sect headquarters on top of Blood Mountain. 

There were no corpses on their path, and only dried bloodstains left behind amidst the peach blossom. Everyone wore heavy looks as they passed numerous stake-impaled skulls along the way. 

They quickly found them were to the main square where a large pile of scriptures and scrolls laid among other items used by the Bloodfiend Sect.

After a quick skim through one of the scrolls, Elizabeth tossed it back into the pile and ordered the troops to burn everything. 

Perhaps there might have been something useful amidst the pile, but Elizabeth did not entertain any thoughts of taking any of these filthy techniques and treasures back. She did not want to see another Bloodfiend Sect.

"Search the area and see if there's anything left hidden. Report back to me if you find anything. Go, be quick!" Elizabeth gave out the orders to the 500 soldiers that followed her.

Noticing the impatient tone in Leon's mother, Aria asks, "Is there something troubling you, mother?"

Elizabeth gave her a slight warm smile before she nodded with a solemn look. "En, the Sect Master of the Bloodfiend Sect is still alive and missing. I have this nagging feeling that something bad will happen back at home. We have to hurry back after we are done here."

"What are we looking for here?" Lynne asked, thinking they would have already left if they were not searching for something in this place.

"I'm not exactly sure myself. I have this feeling that there may be some deep secrets contained within this place. The technique practiced by the Bloodfiend Sect is very diabolical and harmful to human life. Considering the current situation of the Human Domain, who would create such a technique? This is something worth looking into."

"Come, we will head to the library to look. We might be able to discover something there." Elizabeth said to Aria and Lynne.