SSS-Rank Harem Sword: My Lustful Life With Legendary Maidens
Chapter 197: To the Kingbane Family
It was the fated day. Adonis finally decided to get his answers from Kingsbane family.
The front gates did not open. They simply dissolved into fine black powder as the carriage of the Emperor materialized within the courtyard, forged from the very shadows of the valley.
Adonis stepped out first, his movements fluid and entirely devoid of haste. Behind him emerged Adelaide,She wore the modest robes of a high priestess, her face pale but beautiful, her eyes fixed on the towering stone doors of the home where she had once been systematically killed.
Mariana followed close behind Adonis.
The heavy oak doors of the manor house were unlocked.
When Adonis pushed them open, the echo ran through the empty corridors like a death knell.
There were no knights to greet them. There were no high-ranking lords waiting to negotiate.
A single elderly figure stepped out from the darkness of the grand foyer. It was the old butler, Oscar Rodriguez. His hands were shaking so violently that the silver tray he held clattered against his livery buttons.
Thud!
He fell to his knees instantly, his forehead pressing hard against the polished hardwood floor.
"Welcome home, Young Master," Oscar choked out, "Forgive the lack of a proper reception. There is... there is no one left to form a line."
Adonis looked down at the old man, "Where is Clementine, Oscar?"
"She fled, Your Imperial Majesty," Oscar answered, not daring to lift his head. "The moment the dispatch arrived regarding the exile of King Magnus and Queen Eleanor, the Duchess lost her mind. She gathered the treasury seals, took three of her personal guards, and used a forbidden warp scroll before the vanguard could lock down the sector. She abandoned everything. She abandoned the Duke."
Adonis smirked, a cold, empty expression.
"A cockroach always knows when the kitchen is about to be burned. And the rest of the family?"
"The younger young masters and the cousins fled to the eastern mountains on foot. They did not even pack food. They simply ran until their legs gave out."
Adelaide stepped forward, "And Leonel? Where is my husband, Oscar?"
The old butler finally looked up, his eyes filling with tears as he recognized the face of the woman who was supposed to be dead.
"Lady Adelaide? By the gods, it really is you. The rumors from the capital were true. The Duke... the Duke is in the solar, my Lady. But he is not... he is not the man you remember."
Adonis did not wait for further explanations.
He walked up the grand staircase, his black robes trailing behind him like a physical manifestation of night.
Adelaide and Mariana walked beside him, while Oscar scrambled to his feet to follow, his old bones groaning with the effort.
The door to the Duke’s personal solar was wide open.
Inside, sitting in a high-backed leather chair by a cold fireplace, was Duke Leonel Kingsbane.
The man who had once been known as the Lion of the West looked like a hollowed-out tree trunk. His hair was completely white, his skin translucent and hanging loosely from his cheekbones. His eyes were wide, staring blankly into the empty grate, his jaw slightly slack.
A thin line of drool pooled at the corner of his mouth, completely unheeded.
Adelaide gasped, her hand flying to her mouth. "Husband!"
She rushed to his side, falling to her knees and grasping his hand. The hand was cold, stiff, and did not respond to her touch. The Duke’s eyes did not even blink. He did not look at her. He continued to stare into the dead ashes of the hearth.
"He can not see you, my Lady," a voice said from the corner of the room.
Commander Silva stepped out from the shadows of the bookshelves. He was no longer wearing his polished armor. His breastplate was dented, his cape torn, and his face covered in a thick layer of stubble.
He looked exhausted, but when his eyes met Adonis’s violet gaze, he immediately dropped to one knee and placed his fist over his heart.
"Emperor Adonis, I stayed behind to ensure the estate did not completely collapse before your arrival. I knew you would come for him."
"Uncle Silva, You look like a man who has run out of Chapters to read."
"Haha, I am a man who has learned the truth too late," Silva replied, looking up at the hollow shell of the Duke. "For years, I thought Duke Leonel was a cruel, detached father who chose to ignore your existence out of pure malice. I thought he allowed Duchess Clementine to abuse you and torture your mother because he was complicit. But I was wrong."
Adonis leaned against the grand desk, crossing his arms. "Explain."
Oscar, the butler, stepped into the room, wiping his eyes with a handkerchief.
"If I may speak, Your Majesty. The Duchess... she did not just use mundane poison on Duke. She was a practitioner of the Dark Spider arts. Over twenty years ago, she began feeding the Duke small amounts of Mind-Rot marrow, a rare substance imported from the northern black markets."
"Mind-Rot?" Mariana murmured, "That is a restricted tier curse. It slowly replaces the victim’s mind with false memories and sensory paralysis."
"Yes, Your Highness," Oscar nodded eagerly. "Every time the Duke tried to protect Young Master Adonis, every time he questioned the treatment of Lady Adelaide, the Duchess would trigger the curse. She made him believe that Lady Adelaide had betrayed him. She made him see false visions of monsters whenever he looked at his own son. By the time Lady Adelaide passed, the Duke’s true consciousness was already locked inside a cage of his own mind, forced to watch his body move like a puppet controlled by Clementine’s words."
Silva nodded,
"It is the truth, Adonis. I managed to find the secret laboratory beneath the Duchess’s private chambers yesterday. The journals detail everything. Duke Leonel is completely innocent of the malice. He was a prisoner in his own skin for two decades. The man you hated was a phantom manufactured by Clementine."
Adelaide wept openly now, pressing her forehead against Leonel’s limp knee.
"Adonis... my son... please. Look at him. He didn’t hate us. He was being tortured every single day. Look at what she did to him."
Adonis did not move. He looked at the Duke’s stat block, which was currently flickering with red error messages:
[Name: Leonel Kingsbane]
[Status: Mental Paralysis / Logic Loop Lock (Severe)]
[HP: 12% / 100%]
[Condition: Brain Death Imminent in 48 Hours]
"Adonis, please," Adelaide begged, looking up at her son with pleading eyes. "You have the power of the system now. You cured me. You can save him. Do not let him die like this, a slave to that woman’s curse."
Adonis remained silent for a long moment. His face was an unreadable mask. The system was humming in his ears, presenting options, but his emotional baseline remained completely flat.
"He is irrelevant to me, Mother," Adonis said, his tone as cold as the marble outside.
"Whether he was a puppet or a tyrant, the result was the same. He was a bad character in the early Chapters. Why should I waste resources on a broken asset?"
"Because he loved you before the darkness took him! When you were a baby, Adonis... before Clementine ever entered this house... he would hold you by the window and tell you that you would build a world better than this one. He didn’t want this for you. Please, for my sake, if you have any love left for me, heal him."
Mariana stepped closer to Adonis, her silver eyes looking at him softly. She did not speak, but her hand gently found his, her fingers twisting into his palm. She was ready to obey whatever command he gave, but she knew the sadness of a mother’s tears.
Adonis let out a slow, heavy breath. "Vexa, what is the cost?"
Vexa replied,
"A standard Divine Cleansing via the Harem medium will suffice, Master. It requires a catalyst of high-purity ether and maxed affection. Lady Mariana can act as the conduit. The cost is negligible: approximately 5,000 Harem Force."
Adonis looked at Mariana. "Do it Maria."
Mariana nodded quickly. She stepped toward the leather chair, her silver and violet gown rustling against the carpet. She placed her soft hands on either side of Duke Leonel’s pale temples.
Her eyes closed, and her celestial tiara began to glow with a brilliant, blinding white light that carried the warmth of the unified continents.
"By the authority of the Overlord," Mariana whispered, "Purge the foreign directory. Reset the baseline."
Soon, a visible wave of golden and violet particles erupted from her palms, sinking into the Duke’s skull. The black veins that had been subtly pulsing beneath his transparent skin began to hiss, turning into grey mist that evaporated into the air.
The Duke’s body convulsed violently. His back arched, his fingers clawing at the armrests of the chair as a loud, guttural gasp tore from his throat. The blank, wide stare vanished, replaced by a sudden, intense focus as his pupils dilated.
The error messages on the system screen began to clear one by one.
[Logic Loop Cleared.]
[Dark Spider Curse: Removed.]
[Sanity Restored: 100%]