Chapter 98 - Death As Sweet And Toxic

"Raishti? But he's dead!" Leron exclaimed. "You said it yourself... You told me you saw his visage in the flames....."

"Yes, that's what I thought." Yulio propped himself up, and his head almost reach the low-hanging part of the wall. "I thought he was merely a ghost. But you know, ghosts actually are real. I've seen some of those phantoms before...."

He narrowed his eyes. "They don't talk to traitor princes after burning their kingdom though."

Leron blinked. He may have removed a part of his brain, but that doesn't affect his memories much. He may not recall the imagery, or some of it is blurry, but he knows whether it happened or not.

"I didn't talk to Raishti that night...."

SLASH!

Yulio slashed at him but Vladstin immediately pulled him back by the collar and Sangfroid released another arrow that hit the manhound's arm. Yulio ignored it, eyes focused on Leron intensely, like two orbs of lava bubbling in resentment.

Then, after gazing straight at Leron's sky blue ones full of fear and confusion, they cooled down.

"You're not lying. Hmm." Yulio sniffed in the air around them, like a dog trying to gauge if a person can be trusted, his snout twitching. "That doesn't make any sense. I'm sure of what I saw. It was that two-faced prick."

"Why would Raishti speak with Leron after he killed me?" Vladstin raised a brow.

"Don't ask me. I don't know why either, but I can smell his betrayal from a mile away. That smooth-talking piece of filth on the lowest of Earth probably sold his own kingdom to you, blue coat bastards!" Yulio dragged his claws over the walls.

He rambled with his hands in the air. "Ever since he became a diplomat, he had always gone soft. Talked about how leadership should no longer be based on the royal family, but a vote from all the eligible citizens. Said we shouldn't fight with any first-time intruders, and instead explain their violation of the boundary. Said that we should allow inter-kingdom schooling and send out representatives for every kingdom to oversee good relations."

"I thought he didn't know that all these radical ideas would make Crescentia a doormat to step on by the other twelve kingdoms, but perhaps that was his plan all along! He's been colluding with the enemy from the start!"

To the three, those ideas don't really sound like sustainable evidence for treason, but they let the wild manhound burst out his discontent over his former friend.

"I trusted him all my life. Made a pact, cut my palm, and shook it with his own bloody one! And for what? Betrayal!" Yulio punched a bunch of stalactites, causing the cave to rattle.

He gave a bitter chuckle after watching all the stones fall. "And do you know what ticks the cuckoo clock? I learned, that he knows that he was Ilvedian all along. Since we were 15! Yet he didn't say anything!"

The three's eyes' widened all at the same time. like a theater audience being surprised by the sudden twist of events.

Even Sangfroid couldn't feign disinterest. "How did he learn he was Ilvedian? Did his blood relatives claim him?"

"A letter." Yulio said. "From his 'father'. Turns out to be a well-known doctor in your wretched land. Said he gave him away because he was born out of wedlock, and it would cause a scandal as he was to be bethroted to some noble's daughter that time. But now that his wife is dead, he's inviting Raishti to come back to him."

"When did you learn about this?" Leron asked. 

"After the transformation, I went back to our desolated kingdom. I saw it when I went back to our Orphanage, he had a secret compartment hidden in plain sight in our walls. And those walls burn off, but luckily not the letter. Perhaps it was fate for me to bear the aching truth that my soul brother lied to me all along."

He flashed his claws and traced it with his slick, lolling tongue, giving it a deadly shine. "Perhaps it was fate that I turned out like this. To be his reckoning."

Sangfroid connected the whole story to the best of his capability. He knew every survivor of the Ilvedian siege by name, even the immigrants from the ruined Crescentia, but he has not met someone called Raishti. 

The only possibility is that he used a different name...or he perished with the kingdom he sacrificed his former one for.

Since he is not sure, it is better not to say anything, as to avoid aggravating the easily hot-headed Yulio.

Vladstin has no such reservations, and dared to ask without any fear of repercussions. "How did you die? You said you and the soldiers transformed after you died."

Yulio went quiet, a form of gloss over his eyes. But the color of it was indiscernible, whether it was something closer to being forlorn or to being infuriated, because it came in a flash.

"Let me ask you that first." Yulio then gave a grin that was more of a snarl due to his wolfish appearance. "How did you, the long defending champion of the Crescentian wrestling, the undefeatable hero of the masses, manage to get yourself killed by an Ilvedian scum?"

Vladstin seemed to darken from having this question thrown back at him. But it also disappeared quickly and he returned with the most amicable smile.

"Love, I suppose. It's what makes the strongest weak, the weakest strong." He answered plainly. "It blinds you and ties you up until you're rendered immobile, then when you are stabbed in the chest and got your heart shattered to bits, you are still not able to do anything about it. Because it is natural for us to believe that love will never betray us."

Leron looked down on the ground as he said this, thoroughly contrite.

"Love.... you say? Hah, don't give me that." Yulio spat his drool on the ground. "Even when bound with love, you can still fight back. You can still struggle to accept this domination until the very end of your life. But because you are soft, you are still bound by it."

"I am not. The moment he aimed his knife at me, I was ready to kill him. I was ready to chop his body into pieces afterward and feed it to the fishes." Yulio was enraptured by the idea, crimson eyes ablaze. "My only fault is that I was not quick to sense his next movement. The next thing I knew, he punched my stomach, and by the doing so made me gape my moth in pain, and he shoved a candy in my mouth."

Sangfroid blinked, unsure if he heard correctly. "A candy?"

"His specialty. He can turn any fruit into those sweet gelatinous confections." Yulio grimaced like he still had it in my mouth. "The fruit he chose for that one was peach. I can still taste it..... along with the arsenic."

The hunter now raised his eyebrow in understanding. So it was poisoned. 

"Do you know what it's like?" Yulio asked, clasping his own throat. "It was so sweet, every tastebud of mine seem to burst from the delectable sugar. A rush came to me that I cannot put into words. Then came so much bitterness, so acrid that it mixes itself with your very own insides, from your mouth to your stomach. I feel like I was burning from the inside, but not because I swallowed fire, but rather, I have become fire itself."

He started to strangle his own self. "Urk.... So much..... pain.... Yet..... so... sweet...."

"He has gone completely psychotic." Vladstin sighed.

The humans just stared at him with a deadpan face.

They then turned back to the situation at hand. Leron thought he could make Yulio snap out of it if he brings another topic. "Who brought you to the King of Faldenhorf? Also, why would you agree to service him when you can transform into manhounds? No matter how much he offers, you can still take all those things you want now that you have power."

"You know nothing of manhounds, do you?" Yulio said. "What do you know of werewolves, smartypants? Let's compare notes."

"Oh.... uh.... well, werewolves transform during the full moon." Leron said. "They can be killed with silver and wolfsbane. And..... that is all I know."

"You know too few, but that beats the average dumb Ilvedian." Yulio mocked. "The difference between manhounds and werewolves doesn't stop at us being the larger and superior creature. We are also the one living with the more risk. You said silver and wolfsbane is a werewolf's weakness? It's the same for us, but...."

"It is also our addiction."

He pulled out a silver coin on the pocket of his ripped shirt. He looked at it with much wonder, like a child that found a new toy. "We are drawn to it like a moth to a flame. Despite knowing how bad it is for us, despite knowing it could kill us, we want to pursue it. To own it, the very thing that we fear and despise the most."

Sangfroid realized that this is like how the Crescentian Palace was to Vladstin. It was his sole weakness to be tied and linked to the place where he was killed, not being able to stray from it for too long and not leaving it even when it is being destroyed. He'd rather be destroyed along with it. 

"Faldenhorf has the biggest supply of silver in the whole Thirteen Kingdoms."The vampire well-versed in world history explained. "And the temperature there is always cool and humid, always raining drizzle yet also letting up some sunshine, perfect for wolfsbane to grow."

"Yes, and with this knowledge, The King could easily hoard as much silver and wolfbane he has into one gigantic palace to lure all the manhounds that exist in the Thirteen Kingdoms." Yulio said spitefully. "The pay is good anyway. It's not like he's enslaving us for these weaknesses, it's more of a.... Uh...."

"What's the word he used again?" He  didn't say this like he really forgot, more like he was being sarcastic. "Oh. Negotiation. "

Leron cannot help but pity this man even if he did attempt to kill him and Vladstin. So they are bound to him because they have no choice, not because they wanted to.

Sangfroid seems to be thinking the same thing. "Have you ever.... thought that you wanted to be free of his hold over you?"

"I did. I wished I'm not attracted to some stupid metal or flower." Yulio clasped the small coin with his big hand tightly. "But that's the way things are now. No use crying over spilled blood, no use mulling over ruined dignity. "

"What if there is another way? For you to be free?" Sangfroid said sincerely. "The Hermit can—"

"I don't believe in silly little Hermits on mountains that performs magic, little Archer." Yulio said. "I traveled everywhere on every woods of every kingdom. I have yet to see one. But even if they are real..."

His eyes narrowed. "Why would I give up this power, this strength to crush the skulls of every blue-eyed bastard that owe me and my family?"

"I'm warning you now. Once Vladstin becomes vulnerable again because of your pooshy-pashy Hermit magic, I WILL come for Leron." Yulio pointed his long index finger to the Ilvedian prince. "For now, I will change targets and look for Raishti. I will scour every nook and cranny for him even to the day the sun sets on the east."

"Now, where is he? If the kingdom of Ilvedia was burned to the ground as Vlad said, where are the survivors?" He leaned to show his frightening dog head to them. 

Vladstin said what Sangfroid most dreaded him to say. "There's no Raishti with the survivors. I should know, I watched every single one of them everyday."

The dog Yulio blinked, looking confused. "What do you mean he's not there!? Where else could he possibly be!"

"This means....." Vladstin said. "That the man you're looking for to reckon with..... May be long dead because of me. Heh.. You're welcome."