Several weeks had passed since the infamous "public health" incident in the Rust Belt, and a quiet had settled over the grand throne room of Castle Nightfall.

  Michael sat slouched slightly on his throne, the hall entirely empty save for him. He was holding a beautifully crafted pocket watch in his hand, staring at it with the kind of reverence a man usually reserved for newborn children or winning lottery tickets.

  It was made of flawless sterling silver, the cover intricately engraved with the crest of a rearing stag. When he brushed his thumb over the glass face, a magical hum vibrated against his skin.

  It was a Sterling Rank insignia.

  After Michael had accidentally flushed millions of gallons of magically synthesized water through the city's backed-up sewer grid, word of his "miracle" had spread through the local Constabulary and straight up into the bureaucratic echelons of the Royal Society of Hunters. Iron Maiden had ridden Michael’s coattails, earning a promotion from the grimy Coal Rank to the respectable Brass Rank.

  True to Christopher’s boastful prediction however, Michael had been catapulted into the stratosphere.

  The Lodge had skipped him past Coal and Brass entirely. He was now a Sterling Rank Hunter.

  According to the Londinium Gazette, the Sterling Rank was colloquially known as the rank of the "Gentlemen Hunters." These were not the desperate, soot-stained laborers hunting giant rats for coppers in the gutters. Sterling Hunters were the dashing younger sons of wealthy nobles, or highly decorated, retired Naval officers. They were the men who led heavily funded, glamorous expeditions deep into the perilous Grey Moors to map uncharted territories or excavate rare magical artifacts.

  The silver pocket watch was more than a timepiece; it was a status symbol. It inherently glowed in the presence of magical anomalies—a built-in radar for high-society monster hunting.

  His social standing had skyrocketed from "suspicious vagrant" to the Middle-to-Upper echelon of Londinium society. Over the last three weeks, he had received no less than four invitations to high-tea and had been featured in a rather flattering, albeit entirely fabricated, article in the Sunday paper detailing his "heroic, ancestral water-magics."

  But the watch, as beautiful as it was, wasn't his greatest prize.

  Michael reached into the inside breast pocket of his vest and carefully pulled out a folded piece of parchment stamped with a red wax seal.

  His Citizenship Papers.

  He unrolled it and read the legal jargon for what felt like the hundredth time. It was the most beautiful piece of literature he had ever laid eyes on. It was better than any Blue Tier weapon in his inventory. It was a shield forged of bureaucracy.

  As an officially recognized citizen of Londinium, Count Mikhail of House Sabwat now possessed Constitutional Rights.

  First, the legal protection. According to the city's charter, no entity—not the Constabulary, and more importantly, not the fanatical Church of Londinium—could legally scan his magical aura, detain him without cause, or enter his property without a formal warrant signed by a high-ranking Magistrate. If an Inquisitor tried to shake him down on the street, he could literally cite the law and walk away.

  Second, the economic power. As a citizen, he could own "Permanent Deeds." He wasn't just a squatter on the mountain anymore; he could legally own land and open highly secure bank accounts with the Coal & Cog Syndicate's financial branch. He could launder the massive amounts of gold he had sitting in his spatial inventory into the local economy without raising red flags.

  But the third right was the true game-changer: Contracted Retainers.

  A documented noble citizen was legally permitted to register his personal staff and bodyguards as formal residents under his House's umbrella. This meant Michael didn't have to wander the city alone anymore. He could bring his elite, monstrous NPCs with him into the daylight, and the authorities wouldn't bat an eye at a group of pale, terrifyingly powerful strangers lurking behind him. They were just his "staff."

  He was safe. For the first time since getting trapped into this nightmare, Michael felt a genuine, relaxing wave of security wash over his undead body. He was a taxpayer. A gentleman. He had a piece of paper that said the paladins weren't allowed to smite him.

  The sound of someone pounding on the castle’s front doors shattered the silence like a gunshot.

  Michael flinched, nearly dropping his pocket watch. His janitor-paranoia, which had been blissfully dormant for three weeks, instantly violently came back to life.

  Oh god, his mind raced, his heart stuttered. They figured it out. It’s the Church. They brought the silver bullets. The jig is up. They’re here to exorcise me!

  He gripped the armrests of his throne, ready to command the castle's gargoyles to awaken, when his eyes fell back to the parchment in his lap.

  He forced an unnecessary breath into his lungs.

  Wait, Michael told himself, his pragmatic instincts wrestling his panic into submission. I pay taxes now. I have rights. Even if it is the Church, they need a warrant. They can't just kick the door down.

  He stood up, smoothing the wrinkles from his vest and decided to answer the door himself. If he sent Dralis or Lavius, there was a ninety-nine percent chance their primal, human-hating instincts would override their restraint, and they would immediately decapitate whoever was standing on the porch. That would definitely violate his citizenship terms.

  Michael strode purposefully through the grand halls of the fortress, his boots echoing sharply against the marble. When he reached the front doors, he grasped the handle, pulled it open with a fraction of his strength, and looked down.

  Standing on the steps was not a squad of silver-coated Inquisitors.

  It was Greta.

  The young human maid—the one Michael had accidentally crushed with a mountain and subsequently resurrected—was standing there, clutching a wax-sealed envelope to her chest. She was trembling violently. Her wide eyes darted around Castle Nightfall, looking overwhelmed by the sheer magnitude of the fortress.

  When she saw Michael tower over her in his dark silk, she let out a tiny squeak of pure terror and awe, immediately dropping into a deep, clumsy curtsy.

  "M-My Lord Count!" Greta stammered, her voice shaking. "A thousand apologies for disturbing the sanctuary of the angels!"

  "Greta," Michael said, fighting to keep his voice in its deep, commanding register while internally sighing with massive relief. "Rise. You have nothing to fear here."

  She stood up, her hands trembling so badly the parchment she held rattled audibly and practically shoved the letter toward him.

  "From... from my Master, My Lord!" she squeaked out. "He requested I deliver it to the peak with utmost haste! I... I must return to the kitchens! Blessings upon your House!"

  Before Michael could even offer her a gold coin for her troubles, Greta spun around and sprinted back down the winding mountain path, her apron strings fluttering wildly in the wind.

  Michael watched her go, bewildered, before looking down at the cream-colored envelope in his hand. It was sealed with blue wax, stamped with the crest of a roaring lion.

  He closed the doors and retreated immediately to the guild's war room.

  Ten minutes later, the high command of House Sabwat was assembled around the table in the center of the war room.

  Michael sat at the head, the open letter resting in front of him.

  To his right sat Morpheus, fingers resting beneath his chin, his eyes analyzing the parchment with intensity. Next to him stood Drummond, the werewolf. The man was pacing like a caged predator, his eyes burning with restless energy, his arms crossed tightly over his chest.

  To Michael’s left sat Lavius, her chin resting lazily in the palm of her hand, a sadistic little smirk playing on her lips. Behind her stood Dralis, his posture so rigidly straight he looked as though he had swallowed an rod.

  "It is an invitation," Michael announced to the room, breaking the silence. "A grand dinner party, to be held at the end of the week. Hosted by a man named Charles of House Darlington. The letter states it was dispatched to all high-ranking nobles and esteemed citizens of Londinium."

  Stolen content warning: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

  Michael tapped his finger against the table. "Because I am now in the citizen registry, the system identified us as foreign nobility. We are on the board."

  Drummond stopped pacing and slammed a fist onto the table. "Let us go, My Lord! Allow me to accompany you. I will rip the throats from any mortal who dares look at you with disrespect. I am ready to prove the power you have gifted me!"

  Dralis sneered, looking at Drummond like he was a stain on the carpet. "Silence, you overeager lupine. We are not a pack of rabid dogs begging for scraps at a human table. My Lord," Dralis turned his gaze to Michael, bowing slightly. "It is a farce. To sit and watch mortal insects consume dead animals is beneath the majesty of the Progenitor. We should decline and let them wallow in their ignorance."

  "Oh, I disagree, Dralis," Lavius purred, her eyes gleaming with dark delight. Her tail, hidden beneath her gown, twitched visibly against the fabric. "Think of the claustrophobic panic of a crowded dining hall. I could slip a necrosis toxin into the wine decanters. We could watch their veins turn black before the dessert course. Or better yet... I could simply flay the host alive in his own drawing-room. Can we go, Master? Please?"

  Michael stared at his Spymaster. Why are you like this? he thought miserably.

  "Nobody is flaying anyone," Michael said firmly. He looked at Morpheus. "Strategist. Your assessment."

  Morpheus unsteepled his fingers and leaned forward. "As always, Father, your maneuvering has forced the enemy to invite us through their front door. This is the natural progression of our infiltration."

  Morpheus tapped the blue wax seal on the letter. "A gathering of this magnitude will attract the highest echelons of Londinium. Nobles affiliated with the Syndicate, decorated Admirals of the Navy, and inevitably... the high-ranking zealots of the Church. This is a goldmine. We stand to gather intelligence not just on the city’s immediate vulnerabilities, but on the geopolitical shape of this entire world."

  "Precisely," Michael nodded, silently thanking the system for coding Morpheus with actual common sense. "We will attend."

  "Who shall act as your vanguard, My Lord?" Dralis asked.

  "Dralis, Drummond," Michael commanded. "You two shall remain here. You are tasked with guarding the keep. Do not let anyone breach the castle doors."

  Drummond looked visibly disappointed, his shoulders slumping slightly, but he immediately bowed his head. "Your will, Progenitor." Dralis simply nodded, looking rather relieved he wouldn't have to watch humans chew their food.

  "Morpheus. Lavius," Michael turned to his left. "You two shall accompany me. Lavius, you will continue your role as my Countess. Morpheus, you will act as my heir."

  Lavius clapped her hands together in twisted glee. "Oh, delightful! I shall pick out my most intimidating gown!"

  "Before you do," Michael said. "This is not a battlefield, Lavius. This is a social war. If you draw blood, if you expose your aura, we lose the board entirely."

  He looked back at the Dhampir. "Morpheus. I am giving you a vital assignment. You have one week. You are to train Lavius in the etiquette of human nobility. She must learn how to navigate a ballroom without resorting to homicide."

  Morpheus’s stoic expression cracked just a fraction, a brief flash of weariness crossing his eyes at the monumental task he had just been handed. He looked at the sadistic Succubus, who was currently giggling to herself about slipping arsenic into the soup.

  "I shall... refine her, Father," Morpheus said carefully. "She will be a paragon of high society."

  A week later, the night of the dinner party arrived.

  The air outside the carriage was cool but inside the luxurious, horse-drawn cabin, the tension was suffocating.

  Michael sat stiffly on the cushions, his cane resting between his knees. Across from him, Lavius looked as though she was being actively tortured.

  Morpheus had done a spectacular job outfitting her. She wore a stunning, high-collared gown of crimson and black lace, her hair pinned up into an intricate style. But she looked deeply uncomfortable. The corset was clearly restricting her innate, demonic need to move fluidly, and her face was locked into a painfully tight, forced smile.

  "Breathe, Lavius," Morpheus instructed calmly from the seat beside her. He looked perfectly at ease in a bespoke, razor-sharp black tuxedo and a white silk cravat. "Remember the posture. Shoulders back. Chin parallel to the floor. When someone speaks to you, you offer a pleasantry, not a death threat."

  "I am pleasant," Lavius hissed through her teeth, her eyes twitching. "If a mortal bores me, I will be pleasantly tearing his jaw off."

  "No jaw tearing," Michael ordered automatically, staring out the carriage window.

  As the carriage rumbled over the cobblestones, the distraction of Lavius’s etiquette training faded, and a horrifying realization began to dawn on Michael.

  He stared blankly at the passing gas lamps.

  Wait a minute, his internal monologue stalled. Greta delivered the letter. Greta is Charles Darlington’s maid. Greta was in the summer villas when I accidentally crushed them with my mountain...

  Michael’s heart felt like it had been dunked in ice water.

  Charles Darlington owns the land beneath my castle.

  His anxiety violently spiked. He wasn't just going to a dinner party. He was walking directly into the den of the man whose multi-million-gold-piece country estates he had literally pulverized. Did Charles know? How could he not know? There was a mega fortress sitting exactly above where his summer homes are! Was this an ambush? A trap to publicly humiliate Count Mikhail, or worse, arrest him for zoning violations?

  "Father?" Morpheus asked, noticing Michael’s sudden, rigid posture. "Is something amiss?"

  "Maintain absolute vigilance tonight, Morpheus," Michael said, his voice tight with genuine dread. "The host... we may have a prior conflict of interest regarding his country estate."

  Morpheus’s eyes narrowed in understanding. "A territorial dispute. Understood. I shall map all exits the moment we cross the threshold."

  The carriage rumbled past the Downtown district, leaving the bustling avenues of the Royal Hunter Society behind, and began its ascent into the exclusive, heavily guarded "West End."

  The wealth here was staggering. The streets were paved with white stone, and the gas lamps burned with a clean, smokeless pink flame.

  As they rounded a wide avenue, Michael looked out the window and felt the breath catch in his throat.

  Dominating the West End skyline was the Church of Londinium.

  It was a colossal masterpiece of gothic architecture. Towering spires of white marble stabbed into the night sky, and massive stained-glass windows depicted scenes of angels smiting supernatural beasts. But it wasn't the architecture that made Michael’s skin crawl; it was the aura.

  Hanging in the highest belfry was a giant, intricately carved silver bell. Even from inside the carriage, a quarter-mile away, Michael could feel it. The bell radiated holy magic. It felt like standing too close to a roaring furnace. To a Vampire Lord, it was a sun.

  "Disgusting," Lavius whispered, genuinely recoiling away from the window, her hand coming up to shield her face.

  "A formidable construct of Holy magic," Morpheus observed coldly, though he too leaned away from the glass.

  Michael forced himself to look down at the street level, and his dread deepened.

  Standing in pairs outside the gates of the cathedral were the men Lavius had warned him about. The Inquisitors. They wore white and silver trench coats that fell to their ankles. They weren't armed with standard swords; long, curved blessed sabers hung at their hips, and heavy, silver-plated revolvers rested in shoulder holsters.

  They stood with absolute stillness and their eyes constantly scanned the passing carriages, looking for the slightest hint of a hidden aura, the faintest whiff of demonic energy. They were fanatical predators.

  As Michael’s carriage rolled past the cathedral gates, one of the Inquisitors—a tall man with a scarred cheek and grey eyes—suddenly turned his head to the side.

  His gaze cut through the darkness and locked directly onto Michael’s carriage window.

  A spike of pure terror hit Michael. For a split second, he swore the man was looking right past his human disguise, right through his Aura Suppression, and staring directly into his undead soul.

  Acting entirely on instinct, Michael ducked, throwing himself sideways onto the bench, his heart hammering a phantom beat against his ribs.

  "Master!" Lavius gasped, startled by his sudden movement.

  "Did he see?" Michael hissed, pressing his back against the carriage wall, out of sight of the window. "Did the silver-coat see us?!"

  Morpheus leaned forward, carefully peering out of the corner of the window and watched the Inquisitor for a long, tense moment.

  "Negative, Father," Morpheus reported quietly, though his own jaw was clenched tight. "His gaze moved on. Your suppressive magics hold firm. We are merely another carriage of passing nobles to them."

  Michael let out a shaky exhale, slowly pulling himself back up onto the seat. He adjusted his cravat with trembling fingers.

  I can't do this, his janitor brain said. I'm out of my depth. I should have stayed on the mountain. I should have just been a hermit!

  But he couldn't turn back now.

  Ten minutes later, the carriage pulled away from the shadow of the Church and entered a crescent of grand townhouses.

  Michael realized instantly that the "summer villas" he had crushed on day one had essentially been garden sheds compared to these estates. These were fortresses of generational wealth. Massive stone facades, towering pillars, and manicured gardens hidden behind fences.

  The carriage slowed to a halt in front of the largest estate on the block.

  The Darlington Townhouse.

  Every window in the massive, four-story mansion was ablaze with warm light from crystal chandeliers. The faint, elegant strains of a string quartet drifted out into the cool night air. Above the doors, carved into the pristine white stone, was the crest of a roaring Blue Lion.

  "We have arrived," Morpheus stated, adjusting his cuffs.

  A smartly dressed servant in a blue livery stepped up to the carriage and pulled the door open, offering a white gloved hand.

  Morpheus stepped out first and moved with such dignified grace that the servant actually blinked in surprise. The Dhampir turned and offered his own hand back into the carriage.

  Lavius took a deep breath, visibly suppressing her overwhelming urge to maim, and stepped out into the gaslight. She looked breathtakingly regal, though Michael could see the faint twitch of a sneer fighting to break through her forced smile.

  Finally, Michael stepped out.

  He leaned heavily on his cane, stepping onto the cobblestones. He adjusted the lapels of his coat, making sure the silver chain of his Sterling pocket watch caught the light of the gas lamps. He stood tall, towering over the servant, projecting the unshakable authority of Count Mikhail.

  Internally, he was reciting a mantra on loop.

  Act normal. Act normal. Act normal.

  "Count Mikhail, of House Sabwat," Morpheus announced to the servant at the door. "And his family."

  The servant bowed deeply. "Welcome to Darlington House, My Lord. The host awaits you in the grand hall."

  Michael gripped his cane, offered a nod, and led his monsters up the marble steps, straight into the lion's den.