Chapter 10: Bloodline

Chapter 10: Bloodline

With less than a year remaining of Rain’s trial, their father decided it was about time that he took her to gain some fighting experience. Decidedly, he had taken her to hunt a couple of times, but they were more like picnics than actual training experience.

Ember also had nothing else to do and decided to tag along. Well, it took a lot of whining for his father to agree, but not before setting various rules for him to follow once they were in the woods. Obviously, he was not a fool to wander off into an unknown place on his own. He was merely there to sightsee. For half a decade, he had never been outside of the clan’s territory, save for the couple of times his parents took him around the capital. And they lived in the capital, but the city of Seynhold was so grand and majestic that two trips were hardly enough for it.

The hunting ground should be somewhere far, outside the city walls. Regrettably, it wasn’t far enough that they had to take a warp gate. Ember was dying to experience teleportation in any form they had available. Hell, he’d have been elated if they flew on a ferry.

Unfortunately, his father took them on horses. The stallions were swift as the wind, but he couldn’t say he very much liked the hours-long journey on the back of the saddle, despite having his father’s stalwart figure to lean on. An hour more, and perhaps he might have red patches on his arse.

The place they were travelling to was much more impoverished compared to the city or even the towns around Seynhold.

Ember felt it prickle on his senses. With his mastery of mana sense, it didn’t take much effort to figure out the drastic decrease in the density of ambient mana, and it was still going down as they travelled along the snaking paths and found themselves on the edge of a developing town.

“Finally!” Ember could not help but exclaim.

While he was with his father, Rain rode on her own, a white mare as tall as her, with stocky legs and wiry muscles. With the full body armour, along with the bow and sword she bore, Rain looked far more gallant riding the horse.

“Already tired?” Cliff smiled. “How are you going to hunt down a great demon with this bit of stamina?”

Ember merely snorted as their horse galloped slowly towards the town. Another horse trotted next to them, with a handsome-looking middle-aged woman riding it. Her name was Gemma, a member of House Blackstone, and also one of his father’s most trusted attendants.

“Sir,” she said, “if I am not mistaken, there seems to be a carriage of House Oberon waiting ahead.”

“I have noticed,” Cliff said.

Even Ember had noticed it, though he could not make out any detail until they crossed another couple of hundred metres.

“Oberon?” Rain perked up at the mention.

If they went by conventional titles, then House Oberon would be like a ducal house. Obviously, there were no imperial families or emperors to give such titles, at least not on the continent of the Perennial Verdance. But there was a Saint who presided over the capital of Seynhold, though the Saint didn’t have much political power compared to the named few bloodline houses like Oberon.

Ember didn’t understand the political nitty-gritty of things. He didn’t even want to understand it. The reason it was important right now was that House Blackstone was pledged to House Oberon since its founding. Although Blackstone had grown considerably in the last decade, it still could not compare to the unshakable foundation of House Oberon.

They were the bloodline of the godkiller. Ember didn’t know how much he could trust the story, but apparently, there used to be gods, literal fellows with golden statues and such, and people worshipped them, be it out of fear or necessity. Then one day, a few upstarts came along and felled the deity and its tyrannic forces. The battle had raged on for years over the northern folded plains.

Since there was no good in such a large continent, the few fellows decided to divide the territories among themselves.

Ember was pretty sure that the story had been blown out of proportion. There was no omniscient or omnipotent being. It was probably just some tyrant who had reached such a high realm of strength that people of today began to see him as a god.

His reasoning might be skewed because he was agnostic. But he wasn’t going to change his thinking just because there was an old ruin out there and a group of people with strong bloodlines. Until a literal God with the capital G presented himself to force him to believe otherwise, Ember would remain reasonable.

Well, the System came closest to being omniscient, but its name itself didn’t support it as some godly being.

As the horses galloped down, they finally stopped before the carriage, where a handsome man stood with an easy smile on his face. A young boy stood on his other side, leaning against the carriage next to him, their eyes lighting up upon noticing them.

Father and his guards quickly came down from the horses to kneel on one knee to greet the high nobles. Even Rain dismounted to imitate them.

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Damn noble etiquette! Ember cursed internally before managing the same.

“At ease,” the man said, waving his palm. “You are on no official duty now, so there is no need to kneel.”

Ember barely managed to suppress his snort. The man could have said the same before they had shown the deference. Whatever thoughts his father had, he kept them to himself, barely displaying an impassive expression.

Whereas the boy next to the man regarded Rain, measuring her up and down with an imperturbable look. To her credit, his sister managed to imitate the knight and maintain a more aloof look as well. She might even have a skill for that.

I reckoned the copper evolution of Acting could do that, Ember thought.

“You have brought the children to help them gain experience?” The man didn’t wait for anyone to answer. “Looks like we came for the same reason. How about we join forces? We can make the trip less boring by having the kids compete against one another, no?”

Ember thought he had posed the question towards his father. Then the man knocked on the door of the carriage.

“What do you say, sister?”