The unknown races sealed within the temples, the humans establishing a nation, the God Race secretly plotting to expel the Vampires from Thacker Plain-the situation on the Sitatul Continent seemed to be controlled by the Vampires as usual, but in reality, an undercurrent was already surging. The witches, who were single-mindedly working for the Blood Demon, were completely unaware of this rapidly changing situation.

In a city in Shastaya that had just been occupied by the witches, the humans who had been imprisoned by the Vampires in dungeons were rescued by the witches and then locked up in a castle. For the blood slaves who had always lived under the shadow of death, they now had food to fill their stomachs and no longer had to worry about being tortured to death by Vampires at any moment, but… they had no freedom.

Elder Kana, following the orders of that mysterious ‘God of Darkness,’ directed the witches to rescue humans from various places. But in Betty’s eyes, this wasn’t a rescue at all; it was merely moving the humans from a dungeon to be imprisoned in a castle.

A rescue should be like what the God Race did: give them a sufficiently safe territory, teach them to fight back, teach them to protect themselves, not leave them like lambs to the slaughter.

The cold night enveloped Betty, making her seem to merge with the darkness. She leaned against a tree trunk, her black hood covering half her face, leaving only her slender, small chin exposed. Not far away, torches blazed brightly as witches holding bone staffs escorted teams of humans past her.

“What exactly are you Garcia witches trying to do?” A cold voice, accompanied by footsteps, reached Betty’s ears. Her body stiffened slightly. She turned toward the sound to see Chelsea emerging from the darkness, her eyes as cold as her voice. “Using humans as sacrifices like the Anderson Family-how is that any different from the Vampires?”

Since returning to the Capri Plains, Chelsea had been constantly trying to persuade the clan elders to have Elder Kana hand over the Anderson Family. This was the first time she had come to see Betty. Betty pulled her hood down a little, her hands unconsciously clasped together. She lowered her head and said, “…Elder Kana said that locking the humans in the castle is to protect their safety.”

Chelsea snorted coldly. “And you believe that?” She thought of the stubbornness and indifference Kana had shown while she was trying to persuade her, which made Chelsea’s expression even colder. “Why has Elder Kana become like this?”

Setting aside their friendship with the Anderson Family, the witches of the Garcia clan were inherently kind and gentle. She had never expected them to harm humans.

Previously, Betty had been solely focused on finding Eunice and paid no attention to the outside world. Only after meeting Cynthia did she begin to pull herself together. Her shock at the changes in Elder Kana and her own clan was no less than Chelsea’s.

And all of this had happened after they left the Temple of Darkness. Betty unconsciously gripped her wrist. Her gaze fell upon the Morgan witches not far away, and she paused, asking, “What are you all…”

Chelsea glanced at her and said expressionlessly, “Cynthia wants to seize Thacker Plain from the Vampires to serve as the God Race’s new territory. I’m leading my people to help her.”

“I see…” Betty murmured, her expression looking somewhat sad.

Chelsea was about to turn and leave, but seeing her like this, she felt a pang of pity. She frowned and asked, “Do you want to come with me?”

Betty’s dim eyes brightened a little. She turned her head to look in a certain direction, where the Anderson witches responsible for guarding the humans in the castle were gathered in twos and threes. Camille, however, was sitting alone on the ground, playing with her skeleton rat. Betty stared at Camille for a moment, then bit her lip and said, “I want to bring one more person. Is that okay?”

Chelsea followed her gaze and glanced over, saying with displeasure, “What for? Why bring her?”

“I have something very important to ask her.” Betty took a deep breath, suppressing her emotions, and said in a low voice, “Only Cynthia can tell if she’s lying.”

Chelsea already knew about Eunice’s situation. She was silent for a moment. Seeing Betty’s eyes redden, she raised a hand to place it on her shoulder. Just as she was about to offer some comfort, she saw the previously emotional Betty suddenly become dazed, her eyes vacant. Chelsea was taken aback and asked with concern, “Betty, what’s wrong?”

Betty remained in a daze for a while before slowly coming to her senses. She raised a hand to rub her eyes, not knowing what had just happened to her. “It’s nothing. I probably just haven’t been resting well lately.”

Chelsea watched her for a while. Seeing that she was fine, she slowly withdrew her hand, but her brow remained tightly furrowed.

Betty’s strange behavior was not an isolated incident. All the Garcia witches, no matter where they were, stopped what they were doing and stared into the dark night sky, lost in a trance.

A cloud of blood-red mist floated above the Temple of Darkness, slowly coalescing into a human figure. The Blood Demon looked down at the Garcia witches who had been guided to the vicinity of the temple and let out a few low laughs, murmuring to herself in a cheerful mood, “Soon, very soon.”

She scanned the witches below, silently counting them. Her cheerful mood suddenly dissipated by half. “There are still too few witches.”

How long would it take for her to break the seal at this rate? Just as the Blood Demon was staring at the witches, thinking about how to increase their numbers, Wolf Fang suddenly emerged from the temple and said flatly, “Someone’s here.”

“What?” The Blood Demon turned to look at her, but halfway through her turn, she suddenly sensed something. She raised the hand hanging at her side, and a blood-red spear shot out with a whoosh.

The spear pierced through space and collided with a cloud of black mist. Eden appeared disheveled in front of the temple, the bone staff in his hand already shattered to dust by the spear. After steadying himself, he immediately looked up at the temple before him, ignoring the wary witches behind him who were holding their own bone staffs. He spoke very quickly, “I am Eden, Grand Elder of the Sethite clan. I have come at the direction of the Lasombra Vampires to seek an audience with the two Excellencies.”

The Blood Demon recalled her spear, glanced down at Eden, and said thoughtfully, “The Sethite clan…”

Wolf Fang wasn’t particularly interested in witches or Sethite wizards. Seeing that the Blood Demon didn’t intend to kill the man immediately, she turned and went back into the temple.

The Grand Elder couldn’t see the Blood Demon or Wolf Fang. He stared intently at the temple and waited for a while. When no response came, he felt a little anxious, but he maintained a calm expression.

The Grand Elder had learned of the existence of the Blood Demon and Wolf Fang from the Lasombra Vampires, which was why he had so persistently searched for the Temple of Darkness.

He suppressed his excitement and scanned the area in front of the temple, trying to find the hidden Blood Demon and Wolf Fang.

The Blood Demon dismissed the witches, then circled around Eden a few times. Noticing the dense dark aura around him, her interest was piqued. “The Sethite clan… you’re a branch of the Tremere wizards, aren’t you?”

The Sethite wizards disliked it most when people associated them with the Tremere line, but since the one saying it now was the Blood Demon, not only was there no trace of displeasure on the Grand Elder’s face, but he also nodded quickly in acknowledgment. “Yes, like the witches, we are a branch of the Tremere line.” He paused, then asked tentatively, “May I ask which general you are?”

The Blood Demon snorted. “Who I am is none of your business. What is your purpose in coming here?”

“I have come to ask for Your Excellency’s help in clarifying something.” The Grand Elder took out a tattered piece of parchment from his Space Gem. He carefully unrolled it and said in a low voice, “The Sethite clan possesses an ancient text that records the deeds of the gods. After the gods departed for the Divine Realm, only a few pages of the text remain due to disasters and our flight.”

The Grand Elder looked down at the writing on the parchment, his aged face filled with excitement. “This page records a teleportation array-a teleportation array that can cross time. Your Excellency, can you tell me where this teleportation array is located?”

“A teleportation array?” The Blood Demon was stunned for a moment, then something came to mind, and she said with sudden realization, “It seems there was such a teleportation array.”

The Grand Elder was so overcome with emotion that the hand holding the parchment was trembling slightly. Fortunately, he hadn’t lost his senses yet; he knew that the generals of the God of Darkness could not be easily fooled. “This teleportation array is of monumental importance to our clan. As long as Your Excellency tells me its location, the Sethite clan is willing to do anything for you.”

“What do you want the teleportation array for?”

The Grand Elder hesitated and did not answer immediately. Hearing the Blood Demon let out a cold snort, he finally frowned and said, “To retrieve something.”

“Oh?”

Knowing that the Blood Demon would not tell him unless he explained clearly, the Grand Elder fell silent for a moment before saying in a low voice, “It is rumored that after Prince Bernard was transformed into a vampire, he was not welcomed by the other clans and was jointly slain. His blood nearly dyed the rivers of Setelna red. I want to go back and obtain some of Prince Bernard’s blood.”

“Prince Bernard…” The Blood Demon searched her memory, her eyes narrowing slightly. “Are you talking about the clan leader of the Tremere family who insisted on being transformed into a vampire?”

The Grand Elder nodded. “That’s him.”

The Blood Demon looked the Grand Elder up and down, her tone strange. “You also want to transform into vampires like the Tremere?”

The simplest way to become a vampire is to receive the Embrace from another vampire, but the vampire hierarchy is strict. Accepting the Embrace means accepting a fate of being controlled. The clan leader of the Tremere family at the time was unwilling to be subjugated by other vampires and stubbornly found another way to transform. In the end, he succeeded, but he also failed. The laws of the Vampires are not to be challenged so easily.

“Only by becoming a vampire can one achieve eternal life.” The Grand Elder looked down at the loose skin on the back of his hand, his eyes deep. “For the sake of eternal life, I must try, no matter how difficult it is.”

“It makes no difference to me if I tell you. What does one more or one less vampire clan have to do with me?” The Blood Demon floated from the Grand Elder’s left side to his right, chuckling lowly. “But what can you do for me?”

“Anything.” Since the Grand Elder couldn’t see the Blood Demon, he simply stared straight ahead, his voice low and deep. “The entire Sethite clan is at Your Excellency’s command.”

After returning from the Mentos Desert, Cynthia immediately summoned Darcy, Doris, and some of the older God Race members to begin discussing the attack on Thacker Plain. Although she and Olivia had failed to kill Talia in the Mentos Desert, they had managed to severely injure her.

With the leader of the Lasombra clan injured, this was the perfect opportunity for them to drive the Vampires out of Thacker Plain.

Moreover, judging from Avira’s departure and their anxious behavior at the Earth Mother’s temple, the Vampires must be facing some kind of crisis right now. Cynthia felt it would be a shame not to strike at them at a time like this.

After deciding to advance the timeline for the attack, Cynthia took over from Darcy to personally oversee all pre-war matters. Susan also halted her plans for further territorial expansion and specially prepared an elite squad of knights to contribute to the attack on Thacker Plain.

While Cynthia was busy, Olivia returned to the Elf Territory. Since the last attack by the Vampires, the elf warriors had also suffered considerable casualties. Not many elf warriors would be able to join the battle this time, but they were still an elite force.

“Your Majesty the Queen, the snow eagle with the message for Clan Leader Helen has been sent out, and all elf warriors who were abroad have been recalled.” Polly looked at Olivia, who had her back to her as she trimmed the branches of the Tree of Life, and asked, “Shouldn’t we move the little elves to a safe place first?”

The little elves were the future of the Elf Race. If they were going to attack Thacker Plain, they couldn’t leave the young ones behind in the territory by themselves.

“There’s no rush.” Olivia put the shears aside, then touched the leaves of the Tree of Life. She bent down and dipped her hand into the clear stream, her slender, fair fingers hooking a branch and lifting it out.

Polly looked at the branch in Olivia’s hand, her face full of confusion, not understanding why she would take out the branch of the Goddess of the Forest.

“Go and prepare for the Guardian Ceremony.” Olivia lowered her gaze, her eyes tracing every inch of the branch. Her light green eyes softened slightly as she spoke softly, “We’ll send the little elves away after the ceremony is over.”

With the little elves present, the ceremony would be a bit more lively. A tiny smile touched Olivia’s red lips, but it vanished just as quickly.

Polly was stunned, surprised. “The Guardian Ceremony? With Excellency Cynthia?”

Olivia glanced at her and frowned. “Who else?”

Polly shrank her neck and gave a dry laugh, feeling that she had asked a foolish question. “Does Excellency Cynthia know? Should I take some people to invite the God Race to attend as well?”

Olivia’s hand, which was holding the branch, paused. She nodded slightly. “Wait until Clan Leader Helen arrives before you go invite them.” The God Race was very busy right now. As for Cynthia’s side… she should probably go herself.