Chapter 267: Blood and Gods

During the time Luke had been away, he worried that his bond with Allison might have grown cold. They’d barely had a moment to talk since reuniting, on the very night they were thrown into the assault on the second fortress. But seeing her now, hearing her voice, he felt a quiet relief. She was still herself.

Only this time, her expression hardened. What she was about to say touched on wounds from her past and, at the same time, on the powers that ruled the world itself, the World Government.

“We never had the chance to talk after I revealed myself as a Rhiannon,” she said.

“It was during the ant attack in the Safe Zone. That night… too many things happened at once,” Luke recalled.

His mind flashed back to Bartholomew’s appearance at Haven. Maybe the man’s supposed desperation had been nothing but theater, a performance to make them underestimate him. But it was that night Luke also learned the truth: Allison belonged to one of the ruling families of the world, alongside Erza Grimhart.

“Mason comes from a noble family too, but beneath mine in status,” she continued. “He’s half phoenix.”

That made Luke pause. “So everyone in the World Government has a bloodline?”

“Yes and no,” she said carefully. “Some families do, others don’t. But the most powerful ones always have it. And the bloodline isn’t some gift dropped into our laps. It’s hereditary.”

He turned sharply toward her. “Wait, you said your power came from a dragon. So you were born with it?”

“I was born half dragon. I didn’t become another race the way you did. But I also inherited my mentor’s bloodline,” she explained.

Luke’s mind began connecting all the fragments of knowledge he’d gathered, what Allison had admitted before, what Angelica told him about Erza Grimhart, and what Samael had revealed to him about gods and divine orders.

“Born half dragon… your whole family? How is that even possible?”

He had become half demon through Azazel’s blood, but what she was describing was different. She and her kin were never fully human to begin with.

“How do you think a god ensures the absolute loyalty of a ruling family?” she asked. “There are rules. Why do you think the gods empower chosen families instead of just sending their armies to overrun our universe, or stepping in themselves? The rules forbid it. Otherwise our world would’ve been stripped bare by stronger universes ages ago.”

She stared down at her own hands. “They need champions. Someone from within the target universe to rise, to push beyond limits, to claim everything. That’s how conquest works. Not by invasion, but by making one of us powerful enough to conquer in their name.”

“I see…” Luke muttered under his breath.

“But it isn’t all blood and war. There’s faith, religion, orders, worship,” she went on. “Not every god rules through fear. Most prefer devotion. They want to be adored. Gods are vain. Still, some families are chosen above all others. And how do you strengthen those families?”

“By giving them a bloodline?” he guessed.

“Yes. But not every being grows strong enough to pass down their power. Which is why there’s a second method, one the divine orders favor most.”

Luke leaned forward. “What is it?”

“Marriage,” she said simply.

He frowned, taken off guard by the weight of that single word.

“A powerful god has millions of worshippers across the multiverse. So, in the past, those World Government families… you know the old stories about offering a virgin as sacrifice in divine rituals? Well, there’s a grain of truth in them. The god doesn’t simply demand blood. He arranges a marriage.”

The explanation kept flowing, steady and deliberate. “Back in the first generation of the system on Earth, gods offered members of their own orders to marry chosen humans. The children of those unions became the first noble families. That’s how the families that rule today were formed.”

She leaned in, lowering her voice slightly. “None of them are entirely human. Part of their blood comes from another universe. Including mine. I’m half human, but one of my ancestors married a dragon.”

A sharp piece slid into place in Luke’s mind. It even explained why Samael once told him he couldn’t just get anyone pregnant at random.

“So, wait… your ancestor way back when actually had to… you know, with a dragon?”

Her cheeks turned red. “No, idiot. A dragon that strong can take a humanoid form.”

“Oh. Right. Makes more sense.” He scratched the back of his neck. “So that means your entire line is naturally half dragon.”

“We’re born with that race influence in the system. But some noble families have their own bloodline skills passed down like a legacy, unique only to them. And then there’s the other kind, the ones tied to a Unique Skill, like yours. From what I understand, your case is different. You weren’t born into it. You were adopted into a demon family.”

Adopted? It had been obvious all along, but he’d never stopped to frame it that way. I was adopted by Azazel.

His eyes drifted up toward the ceiling as the thought sank in. Somewhere out there, does that mean I have a demon father?

What that implied for his future, he didn’t know. But he was certain of one thing: somewhere in the endless multiverse, that Darkness was waiting for him.

“So in the end, Mason, Erza, and I… none of us are completely human,” Allison said, pulling him back into the moment.

Through marriage, a god could bind a family. Control their descendants.

Luke turned the thought over, comparing it to the concept of investment he’d learned. It was the perfect long term strategy. Choose a representative within a world, grant them professions and classes to climb the system, help them rise, and then tie them to your order through marriage. The next generation wouldn’t be entirely of Earth. They’d be loyal to a foreign bloodline, and by extension, to the divine order behind it.

“Seems like all of this is a lot bigger than I ever imagined,” he admitted quietly.

“I don’t know how you got your bloodline, and it’s probably better if I never find out. But now you at least understand how things work. You can see why my situation is complicated. Mason might belong to a lesser house than mine, but he’ll always have deeper training and strategy drilled into him. He was raised for it from the start.”

Luke understood. If she had been raised properly as a noble, she would have mastered the system. But being cut off from her family explained much of what he’d always wondered about her. Still, one question lingered, sharper than before: why would her own blood reject her? Why would parents scorn their own child?

That puzzle called Allison had gained more pieces, but the gaps had only widened.

“I think… it’s better if we change the subject,” she said after a pause, her tone soft but final.

“Better,” Luke agreed.

He’d already gathered more than enough information, but what struck him wasn’t the content of her words, it was the fact that she had chosen to open up at all. She hadn’t been prompted, hadn’t been pushed. She’d simply let it spill, the same way he had with Evangeline not long ago. And that realization hit him harder than expected. He never liked talking about himself, never liked peeling back the layers. But homesickness, the weight of this cursed place, and the pressure of everything riding on them made him realize just how much it mattered to have someone to confide in.

Allison’s gaze drifted to the stone walls around them. “In the past, you and I stumbled across this fortress in the middle of chaos. Do you remember? We were running from the orcs.”

“Oh, I remember,” Luke said with a dry chuckle. “We had to cut our way through a whole swarm of them… and I was missing an arm at the time.”

They lingered on that memory, on the bloody clash with the Orc General, and how they had thrown themselves into the river while the horde glared down at them from the bank.

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“And then you killed the Orc Lord,” he said, a small grin tugging at the corner of his mouth. “I wish I’d been there to see that.”

“You’re the one who killed the general,” she reminded him. “That gave us the chance to explore the forest, to settle, to build bases. Without that, we’d never have held the ground.”

Heavy footsteps echoed in the corridor, cutting their memories short. Both of them turned toward the door as it creaked open.

Evangeline stepped inside, her expression sharp. “I have news,” she announced. “Jerry just returned. He brought word from Bastion.”

***

There were other ways to keep an eye on Bastion besides Haven’s spies, and the most reliable one was Jerry. Evangeline’s familiar, a black crow with uncanny intelligence, was perfect for the job. He could slip past notice, deliver updates quickly, and even travel at night without fear of being hunted down by the Midnight Wardens. Flying predators still posed a threat, but according to Evangeline, Jerry had a few tricks that kept him alive.

“Jerry!” the bird croaked from her shoulder.

The group had gathered again in the war room.

“Jerry! Jerry!” the crow kept repeating, his voice harsh but oddly fitting in the tense silence.

Most of his report confirmed what they already suspected: Bastion had made no move. That all but guaranteed Bartholomew hadn’t been alerted. But there was something else.

“Your friend was released from prison yesterday,” Evangeline said, scratching the crow’s neck as she spoke. “Jerry kept an eye on him to make sure he wasn’t being followed. Seems he’s free, back to working as a lumberjack.”

“Friend?” Allison asked, arching a brow.

“Wait. You mean Jack?” Luke’s voice carried a spark of recognition.

“That’s him,” Evangeline confirmed.

Every eye in the room turned toward Luke.

“You know Jack Bean?” Mason asked. “One of Bastion’s healers?”

“Ex-healer,” Luke corrected. “And yes, he’s with us. Believe me.”

He looked straight at Allison. “Bringing Thiara here might raise suspicion. What if we recruit Jack instead? He’s a healer.”

“And risk dragging in someone who could rat us out?” Dustin snapped. “Are you stupid?”

Luke leaned forward, his tone sharp. “I’ve been in this longer than you. How long have you even known about this fortress? A few days? I was here when orcs patrolled these walls, when stepping outside meant a death sentence. After that, I had to cross into another zone of the tutorial and nearly died a dozen times. If I were as stupid as you think, I’d be long dead.”

The room fell quiet.

“Can he be trusted?” Allison asked at last.

“As much as anyone else in this room,” Luke replied. “As much as the soldiers standing outside. What matters is he wants out of this nightmare. He wants to go back to Earth. That’s enough reason for him to help.”