More like a scholar than a warrior or a king, Duke Skeleton exudes an air like Dean Brehem, so much so that it's easy to overlook its near-legendary power.

"Is it obvious?" Annan asked.

Why does it seem that everyone except Princess Crimson and her subordinates can see that they are not vampires?

"We're undead, and the feeling will be clearer." Duke Skeleton replied, "You don't have that smell of vampires. ”

"A human who is a blood emissary, it seems that you have other tasks to ......"

"No, Lena and I are ...... Friend, I'm willing to help her. ”

"No wonder."

Why not?

Feeling that he would have to return to the warlock if he asked any more, Annan changed direction: "Do you know what's going on outside?" ”

"Persona City's Infestation ......"

"What's wrong with Hearsi?"

After setting off, it seems that a lot of things have to do with Persona.

"It used to be the territory of the princess, but then something happened, and weirdness began to appear in the city."

"What's weird?"

"Something we can't understand."

"What is incomprehensible?"

"We will learn the logic of spellcasting by dismantling spells. We don't know about the weirdness, they're chaotic and chaotic, and if you take them apart, you'll just get a mess. ”

"So I see consciousness because of it?" Annan was thoughtful.

Duke Skeleton raised his head for the second time: "What do you see?" ”

"A girl who is accompanied by a white deer, she says that she is the consciousness of the forest and wants to take one last look at the forest."

The flickering soul fire of the Skeleton Duke revealed a memory: "We have been neighbors for hundreds of years, and even it is going to die......

"Or is it because of Persona?"

"Yes......"

Annan watched as Duke Skeleton finished drawing the magic array and put the rest of the materials aside.

"Aren't you leaving?"

"Wait a little longer, there's one more thing to do...... This can only be done at the edge of Hearsi. ”

The Skeleton Duke continues to use eyeballs, rotten flesh, and ribs to form an evil ritual.

"You made the weirdness in the woods?"

"Did you encounter a weird encounter?"

"One...... A charred girl, she is taking revenge on the nobleman who killed her family. ”

"How did you get there?"

"Dodge? I rescued the nobleman, found him dead and threw him back. ”

"That's a way to do that...... "Duke Skeleton thought." It's not me, they're from Persona. Hearsia is spreading. ”

"Can't you stop Persona?"

The Skeleton Duke lifted its head, its gaze seeming to see through the dirt and the sky.

"Hearing City will not be quiet if the stars do not return......"

"Stars...... Gods? ”

The Skeleton Duke let out a humming sound that seemed to sigh.

As he was about to activate the magic array, Annan asked, "Do I use evasion?" ”

"No, experience is just as important to a warlock."

The Scholar-like Skeleton Duke activated the magic array, and an eerie gray mist began to rise, forming a surging wall of sighs. Gradually, the gray mist rolled up, revealing an unsettling silhouette.

The tall silhouette of the gray robe appeared in the gray mist, and beneath the gray robe were tentacles that supported its body, black mist and blood light surging between its tentacles.

"I'll call it a merchant, and you can trade items with it." Duke Skeleton is happy to share knowledge.

"Are you sure? It looks like an evil infidel. ”

"I've traded many times, and the things they take out don't belong to the Eren world, they should be creatures from other worlds." As he spoke, Duke Skeleton pulled out a list of shopping that Annan couldn't remember.

The gray mist swelled up, spitting out a pile of things that the Skeleton Duke had bought like a living thing.

"Do you want to buy something?" Its soul fire looked at Annan.

"I don't buy anything."

"Buy some." Duke Skeleton encouraged.

"Do you get a commission?"

"Stepping into the unknown is our motivation."

Annan didn't want to touch this kind of existence without beauty, but this sentence is really beautiful.

"For the sake of that...... I want a copy of the leaves of the World Tree. ”

"You buy this with them?" Duke Skeleton wondered.

"Don't blame me if you don't."

As a result, the gray mist brewed for a moment, and it really spat out a falling elm leaf, which was caught by the bones of the skeleton duke's hand.

"This is the leaf of the World Tree?"

Annan felt a sense of relaxation in the jagged edge of the elm leaf.

"Maybe it's the World Tree of their world."

"Do you need it?"

Duke Skeleton shook his head, "It's your thing. ”

"So how do I get paid? Soul? Or is it treasure? ”

"They don't price items the same way we do, and you can take out what you want to exchange and let it pick and choose. But let me pay for you this time. ”

The Duke of Skeleton waved his hand, and the magic ring on its phalanges slanted out a pile of intact bones.

For Annan it was the desecration of the dead, and for the Duke of Skeletons it was human trafficking.

The tentacle merchant who had taken the pile of bones disappeared along with the gray mist, the Skeleton Duke put away the items he had exchanged, and the "Leaf of the World Tree" was borrowed for research.

"Can we go back now?"

"I accepted your assistant's request to get you back, so that it will give priority to working with Princess Crimson."

"Your contract spirit is unlike any other warlock I've ever seen......

"What about the other warlocks?"

Annan had few, or very few, contact with warlocks, only Claudia, a cheap Philosopher's stone producer in Liberty City.

"Just like the rumors."

Annan thought of the rumors about the warlock and fell silent.

"Then, young and brave Keeper of the Faith, I would like to entrust you-"

"I refuse." Annan immediately interrupted.

"Won't you listen to the commission first?"

"That's right...... Say it. ”

Duke Skeleton recounts Hearsi's not-so-distant past:

Heard City was founded in a strange place, and in order to protect the humans and believers here, the king and the gods suppressed it, but with the turbulent years, the gods lost contact, and the unreplenished Persona City resurfaced as the passage passed.

The citizens of the city left, and the princess imprisoned herself in Hearsi, using her bloodline to suppress Hearsa.

After listening to the story, Annan still said: "I refuse. ”

"You're not worried about my rejection of your alliance because of this," Duke Skeleton's soul flickered.

Annan said nonchalantly: "I am just a messenger and have done what I can." ”

Annan is not a blood clan, and he is not profiting from the Free City. It would be enough to make the Skeleton Duke's alliance lean towards the Scarlet Princess in the future.

"Okay......" Duke Skeleton visibly disappointed.

"Anyway, how did the blood clan rescue the princess?" Annan remembered something.

"Rescued? The princess is still in Persona. ”

Annan frowned.

The princess is in Persona...... Who is the princess of Huadu?

(End of chapter)