Valerian Cross 37    

Darkness pressed heavily upon the Blood Mansion, thick with tension and unrest. The battle had been brief, but its consequences rippled through the halls like a relentless tide.

Lucien Blood lay motionless on a grand bed draped in crimson silks, his once-imposing presence reduced to a fragile shadow of itself. His pale skin had lost its luster, his body covered in faint traces of wounds that should have long since healed. Yet, despite the gallons of virgin blood he had consumed, despite the relentless care from his most loyal followers, something within him remained broken.

For a month, he did not stir.

The mansion had grown eerily silent, as if holding its breath, waiting for its master to return to the world of the living.