The Vampire Prince's Toxic Consort (BL)

When Lucius and Julian were very little, they used to be so close. They liked to dress alike, speak in the same manner, fall asleep and wake up in the same room at the same time, and no one would go anywhere without the other one. One of their biggest hobbies was to pretend to be the other and confuse their parents, nanas, and servants.

Lucius still had some of those earlier memories, like watching a movie. Every frame was painted with vivid and fresh colors. He remembered he could feel what Julian felt, think what he thought without any verbal communication. A single glance was all they needed to convey some mischievous idea for a prank or an inside joke.

When did that all stop? Lucius wondered sometimes.

Was it since only Julian heard God’s voice, and not him?

And now, he didn’t even know when his brother was abducted. Julian could have been killed and laying in some random gully, and Lucius wouldn’t have known.

The very thought made Lucius shutter.

Lucius clenched his fist and glowered at Silvan, “You bastard.”

“This is just a little insurance on my part. In case you play some devious tricks on me. “Silvan replied casually, “Give me the blood, and I will release both your brother and his bodyguard.”

Lucius glimpsed at Julian again. Those big hazel eyes were filled with fear and anxiety. And not far behind him, two other neophytes were holding Lewis, also cuffed and gagged, only those gleaming fury eyes denoting his feeling about the situation.

Lucius cursed and handed the blood to Silvan.

Silvan’s eyes fixated on the bottle with such covetousness. He took the bottle instantly. A wide, victorious grin spreaded on his face.Upstodatee from Novel(D)ra/m/a.O(r)g

“Let my brother go!” Lucius urged nervously. But Silvan only waved his hand and commanded, “take him and his slave.”

Lucius widened his eyes, but before he had a chance to resist, a neophyte appeared next to him, grabbed his arms forcefully and twisted them behind his back. Lucius cried out in pain and couldn’t struggle much.

Florian was about to fight back, but seeing the neophyte pressing his sharp claw against Lucius’s fragile neck threateningly, he dropped his sword and surrendered.

Lucius cursed Silvan loudly, but it only made the vampire more complacent. Silvan raised the blood against the lightless sky, and all his soldiers whooped and exclaimed.

A drop of Elder blood. That was the most precious thing for a vampire. With its blessing, Silvan would easily become the new overlord of the whole vampire world, and no one would challenge his authority.

However, that was not what made Silvan so happy.

His true victory was that he had finally beat his arrogant, superior big brother Dorian, who he had always wanted to conquer and...possess... And now, he finally could lock the all-powerful Crown Prince up all to himself, forcing him to watch him take everything from him.

The sickly, secret obsession he had been harboring since many, many years ago could finally be appeased and satiated.

In the ecstasy of a full triumph, Silvan uncorked the bottle and down the whole content into his throat.

In the pandemonium of the soldiers’ hail, Silvan threw the bottle on the ground and gladly waited for the short evolving period to kick in.

Lucius lowered his head, appearing to be accepting his complete defeat. If onlySilvan looked closer, and he would have noticed Lucius was actually...smiling.

Initially, a strange tingling sensation lingered at the back of Silvan’s throat. He didn’t pay much attention to it, thinking it was just a minor part of the symptoms of ingesting Elder Blood. But soon, the tingly gradually intensified, and within seconds it became a fire burning the flesh in his neck. He gagged, realizing something was not right.

“What...“He opened his mouth but couldn’t form a word. Air passed his vocal cord without strumming the strings.

Ere long, that burning sensation began to sink down into his stomach.

Silvan knew that after drinking Elder Blood, he would feel extremely tired and sleepy, his heart would completely stop for a while, and his body would be cold as if he was dead. But he never heard of losing voice or pain in stomach.

A stream of snickering intruded his confused mind. He turned around abruptly and saw Lucius, who was still constrained by Silvan’s soldier, was laughing with such smugness.

“How do you like the ‘Elder Blood,’ Silvan?” Lucius grinned toothily, and Florian was amazed by how those dainty features could convey such dark menace.

Silvan wanted to scream, “What have you given me!” But the pain in his stomach had become too much, and the moment he opened his mouth, instead of words, blood gushed out.

The soldiers were all stunned and frightened, and a bodyguard rushed to Silvan’s side to support his collapsing body. Simon grabbed Lucius’s shirt and pressed his sword forcefully on his neck, “What have you done! ”

“It was indeed blood, but not an Elder’s blood.” Lucius’s cold smile didn’t falter even when Simon’s sword cut into his skin, “people only know that if a vampire consumes the blood from a vampire higher than his class with gain song ‘blessing’, but do you know what would happen if an upper-class vampire, such as your highness, drinks the blood from a lowly ogre?”

Drinking blood from a lower-class vampire had the opposite effect of drinking from a higher-class vampire. Rather than getting a blessing effect, they would have food poison. And an ogre’s blood was poison and acid to an apostle, capable of burning and scarring their throat and wreaking havoc on their body.

Silvan’s eyes widened. Simon also panicked, “but I saw you take the blood from Dorian Ashdown, and he took the blood from Asmodian!”

“Are you really this slow?“Lucius derided, “There was never an Elder blood. The blood that came out of Asmodian’s statue was just illusory magic. We have the ogre blood prepared from the beginning. It was all a show for you, Simon. We knew you were Silvan’s bitch from the beginning, and we were counting on that.”

“’We?’“The implication put terror in everyone’s heart. Simon, in fright, was about to cut Lucius’s throat. But before he could do that, his expression froze on his face, and the next second, his eye bulged out of the sockets, his head exploded into a small blood flower, and his body collapsed to the ground, still twitching as if a headless frog.

Many soldiers gasped and were petrified as they saw the dark figure emerge from the entrance of the Sanctuary. The supposedly stabbed and bleeding-out Dorian stood tall and mighty, with his big, dragon-like black wings spreading behind him. His gaze paused momentarily on Julian. Surprise flashed across his eyes.

Next to him was Serena, head still sitting perfectly on her swan-like neck, glancing at Simon with a smirk.

Meanwhile, more prowling shadows emerged out of the darkness of the labyrinth environing them. Giant beasts with preternatural power and speed, with deadly claws that could easily tear neophytes apart. Werewolves from The Guardians surrounded Silvan’s men like an ironclad wall. Chieftain Volke, the only one who didn’t take his beast form, came forward on a great gray wolf, bared his sharp teeth and said sonorously, “Drop your weapon and surrender, if you don’t want to die.”

The vampire soldiers didn’t hesitate much before they made a unified decision. One by one, they dropped their weapons and raised their hands. The ones who were holding Lucius, Florian, Julian and Lewis all let go flusteredly, fearing retaliation.

Silvan could barely move his head now as the poison of ogre blood had paralyzed him. If not for his bodyguard, he would have crumpled and prostrated on the ground. He stared at Dorian and Lucius with such intense gaze, his lips trembled and moved as if he was trying to say something, but not even a whimper came out. The poison had severely damaged his throat.

Lucius curled his lip corners at him. A devilish smile. As if challenging Silvan, “Now go ahead, tell Dorian about my betrayal.” And that infuriated Silvan to such an extent that the prince’s eyes turned red.

It all went as Lucius planned. The other day, after Dorian promised that he would trust Lucius, Lucius told him that Silvan tried “recruit” him to spy on Dorian. In exchange, he would send Lucius back to Anthor after Dorian fell and Silvan became the new king. And he told Dorian that he feigned agreement, so they could decide what information they wanted to feed Silvan.

He and Dorian had long suspected there were moles among their servants and guards, and Lucius had most of their names from his eyes and ears (the human slaves) all over Vermilion Citadel. He and Dorian selected Simon as their accompanist, showing much trust in him, so Simon could report what he saw and heard to Silvan, and Silvan wouldn’t question the truthfulness of the information.

Most information Lucius gave Silvan was real. Even the photo of the scroll was authentic. Which further muddled the water and made Silvan believe that Lucius had gone too deep into the machination and couldn’t go back on his word anymore.

However, Lucius didn’t tell Silvan that Dorian didn’t really plan to get Asmodian’s blood from this journey. It was a trap to lure Silvan away from his mother and the rest of his family and to gain evidence that he harbored ill intentions toward Dorian.

The Sanctuary had been abandoned by the Aslani family since the last pure-blood Aslani, Queen Mitra, died six years ago because, according to the historical records, Asmodian only answered the prayer from a pure-blood progeny. And since Queen Mitra had fallen and the map had been lost, there was no point in risking all the danger to return to the labyrinth anymore.

Hydra and the demons, on the other hand, were two surprises to Dorian and Lucius. They thought the labyrinth only had some benign ghosts.

Inside the Sanctuary were all a performance and a lot of illusions. Including Dorian being stabbed and Serena being decapitated. And just as Lucius hoped, Silvan was so heady about his grant and final victory against his brother that he didn’t question what was given to him and consumed the blood immediately.

Lucius was the one who suggested ogre blood. He found the consequences of drinking blood from a vampire lower than one’s class when researching the effect of drinking Elder blood, and the losing voice part caught his attention. He could not allow Silvan a chance to tell Dorian about the Durchville Witch blood.

Throughout the whole scheme, Julian was probably the only part that was out of Lucius’s calculation. But it didn’t matter because he had to focus on shutting Silvan up forever first.

Lucius stood next to Dorian and said calmly and cooly, “Now it’s your chance to avenge your mother, Dorian. Take away the most precious thing, her most precious son, from Devina.”

Dorian’s eyes flashed a smoldering wroth as he approached Silvan. The bodyguard was also shaking before the Crown Prince’s rage, but his loyalty forbade him to abandon his master.

Silvan returned his brother’s gaze. They both hated each other so much, yet also obsessed with each other for so long that...it became complicated.

Silvan bared his teeth and mouthed a silent “Do it.”

However, to Lucius’s dismay, Dorian shook his head after a prolonged moment, “no, I won’t kill you yet, because death is easy. You will face your judgment in court, for your crime of treason, attempted murder, and fratricide.”

Lucius frowned. He quickly approached Dorian and whispered, “You should not let him leave here alive. You know how wily he is. He will twist the truth in front of your father.”

Dorian glanced at him with a little surprise in his eyes. He didn’t expect Lucius would encourage him to kill his brother without much hesitation. He said quietly, “We don’t have time now. The Hydra is still here. We should leave first.”

Some of the werewolves transformed back into human shapes. They quickly put vampire cuffs on Silvan’s soldiers and took away their weapons. Dorian had a few quick exchanges with Volk, and they agreed they should leave here before settling anything else.

However, strange things happened just as they were about to march toward the exit. Only one way led to the Sanctuary, but now it was gone. A tall stone wall stood there as if it had always been like that.

Did the walls move? When did it happen?

Volk ordered his men to find another exit, but there was none. They were like a nest of ants surrounded by tall walls. Several werewolves tried to climb over the wall that sealed the exit, but as they were about to reach the top, suddenly, they were at the bottom of the wall again. It was like they were trapped in looped footage.

Lucius’s heart sank. He turned to Julian and Lewis and said urgently, “Lewis, no matter what happens, don’t let my brother leave your sight.”

Lewis nodded. Julian asked anxiously, “What’s happening?”

“I don’t know...”

Dorian opened his wings and shot into the sky, trying to take a look from a high point. But he only managed to rise for about 20 feet, and all of a sudden, he felt an enormous, insurmountable force drop on him like a giant, invisible hand crushing down at a bee. He fell to the ground and almost broke the bone on his wings.

“Dorian!” “Don!”

Lucius and Julian both exclaimed. Lucius rushed to Dorian’s side pell-mell and was only relieved a little when Dorian propped himself up. But as he helped Dorian to his feet, he noticed everyone was staring at something in the sky, mouth open, eyes gaping with horror.

Lucius and Dorian looked up to see what was happening, and they, too, were petrified by what they saw.

The starless black sky was changing. A giant slit lacerated the empyrean, and it opened slowly. Behind it was an immense nightmare of thousands of swirling, obscene colors, all squirming and moving toward a black hole in the middle as if they were something gigantic and oily worms. It was bizarre but strangely captivating. The moment people saw it, they couldn’t look away anymore.

The mesmerizing maelstrom of indescribable colors covered the whole sky. And only after some minutes, Lucius realized it was a colossal iris.

And that’s when a rumbling, thunderous voice echoed in everyone’s ears and minds. It was a voice composed of a thousand different voices. The sound of the eternal flame and suffering.

“Do you think my temple is somewhere you can come and go as you like?”