Earl Gustav
Looking at the guards who were being held down on the ground and still struggling desperately, Harvey, Leon, and Karin all felt that the guards of the Earl's Mansion were behaving somewhat abnormally.
You see, the Knight Academy and the Night Watcher Watch had already presented irrefutable evidence and stormed into the inner courtyard. Even the most loyal guards of a normal nobleman would have dropped their weapons and surrendered at the sight of such a force. Yet these people dared to fight back recklessly. There must be something seriously wrong with the Earl's Mansion. This act of blocking the way and fighting to the death is no different from admitting that they have something to hide.
However, what Lu Yuan saw was a completely different scene. Above the heads of the Earl's Mansion's guards who had been pinned down on the ground, without exception, were lines of glaring Gray-White Text.
The words "[Believer Transcendent]" and "[Deep Pathway Contamination]" are clearly marked on it, indicating that these people are not loyal to the Earl at all, but have long been thoroughly corrupted by Heretic Contamination agents.
Lu Yuan glanced at the rows of identical gray-white entries on both sides of the corridor, and a sense of helplessness rose in his heart. How could a dignified hereditary Earl's Mansion's mansion have been completely Contamination by Heretics, inside and out?
Could such an absurd situation really happen in Watch City? For a moment, he didn't know whether the old the Earl living there was too stupid, or his guards were too stupid.
As they looked ahead, at the end of the stone archway, lay the tightly closed iron gate of the Herb Repository. From behind the gate came the faint, hurried sound of moving footsteps. Lu Yuan's eyes narrowed slightly, and he turned to Blanca, Harvey, and the others beside him, whispering a reminder:
"Be careful, their guards aren't alert; they've probably all been Contamination by the Pathway."
Upon hearing this, Leon's face darkened immediately. He gripped his shield tightly, spat it on the ground, and muttered, "Damn it, I knew these guys were like mad dogs, risking their lives!"
Karin, who was at the front of the group, didn't waste any words. She gripped the Wide-Bladed Greatsword on her back tightly with both hands, stomped her boots heavily on the bluestone slabs, and strode straight toward the Herb Repository door at the end of the stone archway in the backyard.
Karin, having reached the end of the porch, used the momentum of her charge to leap into the air and kick the tightly closed iron-clad wooden door of the Herb Repository with a powerful slam, carrying the robust energy of Third Order knight. With a deafening roar, the thick wooden bolt on the door snapped instantly, and the two heavy doors, carrying splinters of wood, crashed open. Lu Yuan and the others followed closely behind and rushed inside.
A murky air, a mixture of bitter herbs and damp, cold air, rushed towards me.
Inside the spacious yet dimly lit hall on the first floor of the Herb Repository, rows of tall wooden shelves were brightly lit. A Heretics, dressed in ordinary gray and black robes, were sweating profusely and frantically carrying sealed wooden crates, preparing to escape through the back door. On the dark floor near the corner on the left side of the hall, the two Knight Academy workshop medicine dispensers, who had been knocked unconscious and bound hand and foot, lay scattered haphazardly.
Beside the main shelf on the right side of the hall, a white-haired old man with a burly build like a brown bear stood there with a dark face. He was wearing a dark green velvet count's casual the Earl, and was none other than the Earl Gustav Sterling, the hereditary lord of Watch City.
Beside him, always close by, was a gaunt old butler, also Contamination, and several Heretics and servants with sinister eyes.
The Heretic leader, who was standing beside the pile of wooden crates and supervising the process, was startled by the loud crash of the door breaking open. Turning around, he saw Karin, Lu Yuan, and the others, all fully armed, burst in. His expression changed drastically, and he immediately pointed to the door and shouted sternly:
"How did the Knight Academy people manage to break in so quickly? Stop them!"
The moment the words fell, the gray-robed Heretics carrying boxes instinctively reached for their weapons, but the old the Earl standing by the shelf on the right did not move an inch.
His previously somewhat cloudy and dull old eyes instantly transformed, all dullness vanishing in an instant, replaced by a chilling, bone-chilling aura. He smiled and narrowed his eyes, slowly turning his head to look at the Heretic leader.
The leader of the black-robed heretics caught a glimpse of the old the Earl Heretic motionless out of the corner of his eye. Meeting the Earl's ambiguous, chilling gaze, his heart skipped a beat. His voice suddenly rose several octaves, and he called out the Earl's name loudly:
"Gustav, didn't you hear me? I told you to stop them!"
The old the Earl completely ignored his roar, not even glancing at him again. Instead, he slowly shook his thick neck and turned his head back to face Lu Yuan, Lin En, and the Night Watcher behind them at the door, and then opened his booming voice to hurl a string of curses:
"You damned Night Watcher and the city guards, why are you so slow?! Damn it, if I had more men at my disposal, I would have had you Heretic arrested! How long have I been jumping around here? How many clues have I left behind? If you had come any later, I would have blown them all up!"
The loud, forceful cursing echoed through the empty Herb Repository hall. Upon hearing this, the leading black- Heretic's face darkened instantly, almost dripping with malice. His gaze fixed on the old the Earl's broad back, his palm subtly gripping a dark red bone fragment. He uttered the old the Earl's full name, his voice chilling and threatening:
"What do you mean, Count Gustav Sterling The Earl? Do you have a death wish?"
Leon, Harvey, Karin, and the others, who had already taken their stances ready to fight, were all stunned by what they saw. Leon's hand, holding his shield, froze in mid-air. He blinked in astonishment, then turned and blurted out:
"Huh? Why are they insulting us now?"
Standing in the middle of the group, Lu Yuan finally understood what was going on. It seemed that the Earl Gustav had known all along that the people in the manor had been Contamination and infiltrated by Heretics. The reason he intercepted the Academy's medicinal herbs tonight and deliberately caused such a commotion outside the manor was probably to leave clues to lure the Knight Academy and the Night Watcher over.
However, Lu Yuan wasn't quite sure why this old the Earl, who was also surrounded by Heretics, seemed to have some kind of confidence that wasn't afraid of these Heretics. In Lu Yuan's vision, two lines of Gray-White Text were slowly emerging from the top of the old the Earl's burly head.
[Target detected: Gustav Sterling (The Earl of Watch City) (Alienated Transcendent) (Deeply Contamination Pathway)]
[A human being bound by a form of Contamination capable of scorching the soul—perhaps calling him an empty shell is more accurate.]
Lu Yuan stared at the line of comments that popped up in his field of vision, his brows furrowing slightly. For a moment, he didn't quite understand where the old the Earl's fearless confidence came from, nor did he understand what the Gray-White Text comments meant by "contracted with some kind of Contamination that can burn the soul" and "it's more accurate to call him an empty shell."
The gaunt old the Earl, though his body had also been Contamination by the drug, was also Pathway.