The Fake Bride Offered to the Snake God - Chapter 11

Chapter 11

On the seventh day, the Temple sent a second group.

This time, they weren’t knights.

They had sent a High Priest.

The High Priest was named Adelan. He was very old, and he leaned on a staff carved all over with Silver Bells.

He stood outside the Serpent Lair and did not enter.

“Semyre.”

The mountain wind carried his voice into the cave.

“Malo was useless. He failed to bring back the Vessel.”

“Then we’ll use another method.”

He struck the Silver Bell Staff against the ground.

Down the mountain, a scattering of delicate bell chimes suddenly rang out.

“If you don’t hand over Ailia, everyone in Yuehuai Village who has been branded with the Bell Curse will pay the price for you.”

I stood at the cave entrance, my palms slick with sweat.

The villagers were awful. That was true.

But there were children among them too.

Norn nervously clutched my sleeve.

Behind me, Semyre looked terrible.

After burning away the Black Lotus, he had recovered a portion of his power, but he had also suffered heavy damage.

Adelan knew that very well. That was why he dared to come.

He had the villagers dragged to the foot of the mountain.

I saw the bearers who had carried me into the Serpent Lair back then.

I also saw the apothecary who had sold Norn those inferior medicines.

Beneath each of their collarbones was a tiny Silver Bell Mark.

Some of the marks were very old, as if they had been there since birth.

They knelt on the ground, sobbing and begging the Snake God to save them.

Something lodged heavily in my chest.

Semyre asked me, “Do you want to save them?”

I didn’t answer right away.

In the past, I would have said yes.

Because that would have made me seem like I was still a decent person.

But now I had realized that before being a good person, you had to ask yourself whether it hurt.

I looked at the people down the mountain.

“I want to save the children,” I said.

“I don’t want to save everyone.”

Semyre lowered his head and looked at me.

“That is allowed too.”

I froze for a moment.

He placed a Black Scale in my palm.

“Whoever you decide to save, I will save.”

Those words weighed more than any declaration of love.

What made them heavy wasn’t killing intent.

It was that he had finally placed the choice back in my hands.

I clenched the Black Scale and walked out of the Serpent Lair.

When Adelan saw me, a trace of greed flashed through his eyes.

“Livia’s bloodline.”

“My name is Ailia,” I said.

“Names are unimportant.”

“Unimportant to you.”

I looked at him.

“They are very important to me.”

Adelan smiled.

He raised the Silver Bell Staff.

“Child, the Temple can grant you a more dignified fate.”

“Such as?”

“Becoming a Holy Maiden.”

“And then being cut open by you so you can plant a Divine Bone inside me?”

His smile faded.

The villagers down the mountain fell silent too.

I lifted the Black Scale.

“Let every child in Yuehuai Village under the age of twelve go.”

Adelan narrowed his eyes.

“You have no right to negotiate.”

I used the Black Scale to cut open my palm.

Blood dripped onto the ground.

Inside the Serpent Lair, every remaining root of the Black Lotus lit up at once.

Semyre had said that Livia and I shared the same blood.

Since the Temple could use this blood to screen for Vessels, then I could use it as a key.

A rumble came from beneath the earth.

Countless serpentine shadows burrowed out of the mountain stone and coiled around the knights holding the children.

The children cried as they ran away.

At last, Adelan’s expression changed.

“You dare use your own blood to summon him?”

My hand shook from the pain.

“Is that not allowed?”

He sneered.

“Of course it is.”

“It’s just that he will be hungry.”

“What the Blood Key opens is the Divine Bone contract, not a door.”

“When you awaken him, you will also awaken the hungriest part of his body.”

As soon as the words fell, Semyre gave a muffled groan from inside the Serpent Lair.

I looked back.

He was bracing himself against the stone wall, his eyes turned completely gold.

That was not the gaze of someone conscious.

Adelan began to laugh.

“When a god is awakened, he always has to eat something.”

“Ailia, who do you think he will bite first?”