Chapter 65: Happiness So Great She Fainted

“Grandpa Fran.”

In the dim dungeon, Eli watched the old man who had raised him since childhood tightly gripping his throat, his eyes filled with fear and confusion.

“Gah!” His eyes bulged instantly from lack of air, shock and agony twisting across his face.

He simply could not understand why his own grandfather would kill him with his own hands.

He had never done anything wrong—just opened a few brothels and formed a gang, and he’d paid his taxes properly!

“Why…” His voice trembled as he tried to ask for an explanation, his hands grasping uselessly at Fran’s arms, the touch like gripping a rotting oak log.

His feet kicked wildly, trying to break free from the deadly grip, but all effort seemed futile.

The air grew thinner, his vision blurred, and Eli’s consciousness began to unravel.

Memories from his past flashed like a spinning lantern.

Before age six, he lived a luxurious life in the castle, envied by countless others, with a clear future ahead as the lord.

Until his father was caught in an affair with his aunt and hacked to death by his uncle, and he himself was thrown out of the castle like trash.

Fortunately, Grandpa Fran took him in; back then, he had once dreamed of revenge, spending every day swinging his sword without rest.

Until one day he saw a maid’s naked body.

Sword practice, women, sword practice, women, women, women.

Without realizing it, he had become addicted to lust, utterly drained of all energy, even forgetting his father’s murder.

“Perhaps this is punishment for my laziness.”

Eli Hughes stopped struggling; soon his consciousness fully dissolved in the agony of suffocation.

“Ah…” Fran stared for a long time at the youth he had strangled to death, then let out a long sigh.

He pushed open the dungeon door and walked before Kallen and Danielle.

“Uncle, shall I help you?”

Danielle’s slender fingers traced lightly in the air, and a ball of searing fire coalesced before her.

The Marsha family had, since ancient times, been masters of fire, even taming the Flame Fox, a fire-controlling beast.

“Never mind, don’t want you two arguing later.”

Fran stretched his limbs.

“Under the second cabinet in the last room on the third floor of my house, you’ll find all my coins and a Strength-Enhancing Potion—for Hayden to use when he grows up,” Fran said calmly.

“Kallen, the honor of the Hughes family rests on your shoulders—make sure Hughes is raised to the rank of Count!”

“I’ll be watching you from the nether realms!”

He roared these words, then slammed his head hard into the stone wall beside him.

Thud. Thud. Thud!

After several heavy impacts, the stone wall dented, and the old man finally collapsed, bleeding from his head, his breath gone moments later.

Even Kallen, a hardened man, couldn’t hold back his tears at this bloody scene.

“Uncle!” Danielle had already collapsed onto Fran’s corpse, weeping uncontrollably.

For the sake of that Strength-Enhancing Potion, she decided to cry with at least a little sincerity.

Black Wolf Castle.

It was deep night, yet the great chandelier’s candles in the main hall still burned fiercely.

Xia Mingyu sat on the main seat, while Kallen and Danielle stood respectfully on either side.

Two young maids stood below the main seat, each holding a wooden box.

“Your Highness, these are the masterminds behind the brothels and gangs in the territory—Eli Hughes and Fran Hughes.”

Danielle spoke, then raised her hand in a gesture to open.

The maids opened the wooden boxes, and a heavy stench of blood filled the air.

Inside were two severed heads—one an old man, one a young man—one with peaceful closed eyes, the other with eyes wide open in death.

“Close them,” Xia Mingyu said, suppressing his nausea.

The maids quickly shut the boxes; if they opened them again, even they would vomit from the stench.

“Hughes… are they also from the Hughes family?” Xia Mingyu asked involuntarily.

“Yes, Your Highness. They are a branch line of the Hughes family—Fran is Kallen’s uncle, and Eli is his nephew.”

“Please, don’t blame the Hughes family for their crimes,” Danielle whispered, her lovely face filled with apology.

Uncle. Nephew.

That’s patricide.

Hearing this, Xia Mingyu stared at Kallen in shock, and though the smile Kallen offered was forced, he still held it under Xia Mingyu’s gaze.

Xia Mingyu: “...”

He realized he had underestimated the allure of a kingdom with 1.4 billion subjects offering its heir as a godfather.

To achieve this, they would unhesitatingly slaughter even blood relatives.

But at least the outcome served justice.

“Your Highness, here is all the information on the criminals in the dungeon and their crimes.”

Kallen handed Xia Mingyu a thick stack of papers.

“Your Highness, to confirm the criminals’ guilt, I employed interrogation and citizen testimony, personally overseeing to ensure not a single innocent was wrongly accused,” Danielle added.

She had spent these days locked in the interrogation rooms and dungeon, even personally torturing some—she’d nearly stunk to death!

“As for judging truth from lies, I’m fairly confident. Please trust me, Your Highness,” Danielle smiled.

Since childhood, she had learned to lie; the criminals’ desperate, convoluted lies to escape punishment were transparent to her—she didn’t even need to hear them, just look at their faces to see through them.

Xia Mingyu flipped through a few pages; the dense list of crimes made him frown.

“Excellent. You’ve truly been righteous!” Xia Mingyu sincerely exclaimed.

If all nobles across the land were like Kallen and Danielle, this continent, soaked in crime and tears, would be transformed overnight.

But such a thing was impossible to replicate—he alone could not become godfather to every noble on the continent.

“Your Highness, the judgment of these criminals is entirely in your hands.”

“As for little Hayden…” Danielle leaned forward, asking cautiously.

Her beautiful violet eyes fixed anxiously on the black-haired youth on the throne, her lovely face tense with dread.

Her shoulders were taut, her heart pounded as if about to burst from her chest, her breaths short and shallow.

With Hayden’s entire future at stake, even her usual calm had shattered—she felt as if her heart were being crushed in a fist.

Until

“Next month, for Hayden’s infant honor ceremony, I will keep my promise and serve as his godfather,” Xia Mingyu said calmly.

She had heard it with her own ears—the Prince’s vow.

Ah!

What bliss! What honor! What beauty!

The thought that her newborn child would become the godson of the future ruler of the entire Eastern Continent flooded her soul with an unprecedented wave of happiness.

Thud.

Overwhelmed by happiness, Danielle fainted onto the floor.

(End of Chapter)