TBR CH57

Half an hour later, the ornately carved rosewood gates of the Church slowly opened. The young bishop walked out gently and calmly, followed by the Templar Knights who stood guard beside him with a protective posture.

Inside and outside the church seemed like two different worlds. Inside the Light God Church, the vast and ancient buildings stood silently under the sunlight, solemn and sacred. Not even the wind stirred.

This was Edwin’s world.

The man standing on the platform before the gate was momentarily speechless. The fear instilled by the Church’s rule for thousands of years was deeply rooted, and now, the new generation spokesperson of this ancient and decaying machine stood before him, looking at his so-called biological father. He didn’t even look human—his gaze indifferent, mechanical pupils shifting slightly to settle on the man.

Edwin suddenly realized that seeing this man again stirred no waves within him.

The collapse last time had been utterly overwhelming—even the demon who saw him off had shown a glimmer of concern in his bright eyes. Yet it was precisely that concern that, upon reflection, now brought Edwin a faint, inextinguishable joy.

He realized he now had the courage to face it all.

His biological father…

Was nothing more than that.

Edwin had decided not to plead for the so-called unconditional affection that blood ties supposedly brought. He now had something better.

Decades of pain, resentment, and yearning had completely melted away in one sweet embrace that demanded nothing in return. What he had longed for in memory had now been completely replaced by the demon—with his soft hair and even those beautiful eyes.

He needed Tal, wanted Tal, loved Tal.

It was a sudden awakening, a feeling like being reborn into a different world.

And the man in front of him suddenly became truly insignificant—a stranger.

As the bishop stepped out of the church, the guards brought by Prince Anquiro immediately blocked the man, wary he might act out in front of the public.

But such helpless struggle was not Edwin’s style.

The man’s expression could not escape the scrutiny of his deep gray eyes—it held guilt and unease, fear and loathing, and a self-deceiving delusion. Standing on the platform, his mission was to expose everything, creating a sense of self-proclaimed heroism.

“I… I’m sorry…”

He hissed hoarsely, voice nearly gone. “But in order to prevent God’s will from being defiled, I must speak the truth. My child, I cannot watch my sins deepen any further.”

The last time he saw Edwin, the pressure from the High Archbishop had been immense. But afterward, the man recalled that the bishop seemed to carry great psychological pressure as well. When he had spoken certain words, beneath the bishop’s seemingly indifferent eyes, there was something that could have been moved.

And today’s goal was to exploit that fleeting vulnerability.

After all, he was still this man’s father.

But—

The bishop tilted his head slightly, not even looking at him. He gazed instead at the guard beside the man—Prince Angelo’s confidant.

Edwin gave a soft smile. He always smiled like that—compassionate and holy, or so the believers said. But Tal would call it fake.

“Another of His Highness the Prince’s men… Let us hope that when he finally stops, God is still willing to forgive his sins.”

The surrounding crowd began to murmur quietly. Most of these people lived under the Church’s protection and had heard about the recent conflict. Edwin’s conduct had been impeccable in all respects, and people subconsciously sided with him.

The man, untrained in facing public judgment, panicked as he was accused and whispered about by so many.

“No, no, everything I said is true.” He pointed at Edwin. “Bishop Edwin is not an orphan—he’s my child. He carries the blood of a succubus. That much is absolutely true.”

The bishop let out a soft sigh:

“A man who refuses to repent.”

His voice was pure coldness. The man before Edwin instantly seemed as small as an ant.

The gray-eyed man suppressed his urge to retreat and suddenly realized—this bishop seemed different from the last time they met.

Back then, Edwin still had some traces of humanity. Words could leave scars in his gray eyes. But now, under the gaze of the crowd, this bishop no longer looked like someone’s child.

He was the Church’s most esteemed spokesperson, holding power and strength near the peak of humanity.

He no longer changed his emotions because of this man.

And realizing this made the man feel an overwhelming unease.

“No,” he forced his voice back. Prince Anquiro had ordered him, and he must obey—he could not think of anything else. “I demand… I demand a bloodline magic test to verify this.”

“Very well.”

The bishop agreed simply, as if the matter were of no importance, generously accepting the offense of the man before him.

Edwin turned his head away. For a moment, he hoped to see Tal’s pomegranate-red eyes, but clearly, this was not the occasion to summon a demon.

Tal was a treasure—he must be properly protected.

Standing here, facing this man for the second time, Edwin hadn’t expected himself to be so calm.

Yet now, he was completely detached and terrifyingly composed.

All hopeless desires and unease had long found their answers in the demon. Tal.

The bishop felt a hint of regret that the first time he tried tying the demon’s hair had been interrupted. Tal’s soft black hair looked beautiful when gathered with a ruby hair tie.

Edwin’s fingers twitched restlessly at the thought of his name.

He no longer cared about this so-called biological father—not even the instinctive familial affection—because he had something far better.

He turned and instructed the Templar Knights behind him:

“There is a sample of my blood in the Church’s archive. Please retrieve it now.”

The man seemed to want to say something, but upon meeting Edwin’s gaze, he hesitated and fell silent.

The confidant beside him gave the man a scornful, condemning look and stepped forward:

“Your Grace, I believe the blood samples, after so many years, are somewhat unreliable. If you are truly innocent, why not use your own blood for the test?”

In truth, the sample had been extracted not long ago at the prince’s request and was far from expired. But if Edwin wished, he could indeed tamper with it at any time.

Edwin sighed and once again displayed noble forgiveness.

“Very well. Let’s do as you say.”

To continue wasting time with these people was meaningless.

The bishop took the initiative to cut his finger, and a drop of blood fell—still the crimson red of a human.

The succubus bloodline had indeed taken effect, but Edwin had been learning how to control it under specific conditions. He quickly mastered suppression techniques.

You could say Tal had taught him, and Tal’s disguise also helped. Otherwise, the blood would’ve been slightly darker—but not to the point of being discovered.

This shade of red was beautiful.

Edwin recalled that the Church had recently acquired a new piece of onyx but hadn’t yet processed it. If he were to choose another gift… what should he give the demon?

Angelo obviously hadn’t expected to expose him just by the color of his blood. But the expressions on everyone’s faces were already terribly ugly—anyone could see that Edwin was completely fearless and unafraid.

Of course Edwin had made preparations.

At that time, he had hesitated for a moment, so… he spared the other party’s life. But how could he possibly allow himself to be slaughtered so easily? Over the past few days, he had already played out countless possibilities in his mind. In none of those possibilities did the other party ever appear in the role of a father, nor did he ever show mercy.

He had done everything he could?

Even in the most unbearable moments of collapse, he had never fully revealed his hand.

So, the bishop lowered the mockery in his eyes and looked at the test result revealed under everyone’s gaze:

No blood relation.

Extreme panic and disbelief spread across the man’s face. He stumbled down from the platform, shouting that it was impossible. The guards at his side all stepped back, no longer intending to fulfill their duty to protect him.

He tried to rush to Edwin, but just a few steps away, he was halted by the aura of the Temple Knights and fell heavily to his knees before the bishop, realizing it was hopeless to reverse the situation:

“I was forced.”

The man choked on his words, tears streaming in large drops from his eyes. “The prince took my wife and children hostage, forced me to testify for him. I… I beg you… please help them. Now only you can save me…”

Edwin thought: So it really was like this?

This couldn’t exactly be called the truth, but it still wasn’t unexpected—he found that the man before him had not betrayed him for profit or money. His biological father was a thoroughly weak and ordinary person, loved his wife and children, felt guilty toward him, and that was it.

An ordinary person wouldn’t want to be involved with an Incubus, nor with danger and trouble.

He was kneeling in the dirt in disgrace, while Edwin’s robe was spotless, buttoned neatly to the collar—a powerful figure who could decide his life or death with ease. He bowed his head to the hard stone slab, that emotion at least was sincere:

“Please let my wife and children go. I’m willing to die for them.”

The man’s regret and shame were so painfully obvious that even the bystanders who had just been pointing fingers at his chest were beginning to soften. Though they didn’t know exactly what had happened, they had already concluded that this whole affair was a failed scam. The gray-eyed man was just a pawn of the powerful, and even he couldn’t seem to understand the crime he had committed.

A person who couldn’t control their own fate—if they made mistakes, perhaps they could still be forgiven.

But Edwin smiled gently and took a step back:

No, perhaps this too was a form of his arrogance.

He would not forgive.

And clearly, things weren’t over yet. This attack from Prince Angelo wasn’t particularly vicious—probably because he’d already realized that Edwin had visited his biological father in advance, so he didn’t place too much hope in the outcome. If it could hurt Edwin, then of course that would be ideal; if not, he couldn’t afford to ruin his own reputation. So…

The man seemed to catch something in the corner of his eye, and in that moment he froze like a statue—not sure if it was ecstasy or terror.

It was an ornate carriage that had suddenly appeared in view.

And stepping down from the carriage—was Prince Angelo himself, along with the man’s wife and two children. They all looked pale, as if they had never stood in front of someone so powerful in their lives, even the smiles on their faces were strained and weak.

But they were whole and safe.

That was enough, the man thought—until he suddenly saw the expression on his wife’s face. That look instantly chilled him to the bone.

Only then did the prince seem to notice the stalemate in the scene. His face showed an unsettling smile, his eyes a pure blue that felt out of place in the setting. But he smiled pleasantly:

“Ah, Your Grace, I do apologize,”

Angelo tried to walk toward Edwin, but the bishop merely shifted his gaze slightly, and the Temple Knights beside him blocked the way. The prince spread his arms in mock helplessness and smiled:

“I, too, am a victim in this matter, dear bishop. It was my mistake to let your reputation suffer. But why not listen to this lowly wife and children’s side of the story? Perhaps it will give us a fuller picture of the deception.”

Hurry up. Edwin thought, already tired of this kind of petty game.

Had Tal messed up his hair? Demons might not be used to tying their hair up—after all, he always wore it down—but he still looked good that way. When he was alone in the room, Tal would read books. Though Edwin could never understand the demon’s taste in literature, he did regret not returning to the library before he left to swap out the collection.

Lately, Tal liked to lean on his bed while reading. A bit lazy, but definitely not the demon’s fault.

When he snapped out of it, the man’s wife had already stepped forward and, with a somber and solemn expression, told the other version of the story.

In this version, the man was a greedy scoundrel, who had hidden his youthful fling with a succubus from her, and then forced his wife and children to go along with him, trying to use the lie to gain the prince’s trust and money. Now he was even pretending to be good and trying to fool the bystanders. Thankfully, His Highness the Prince was kind and merciful, and treated them all very well.

And that child of succubus blood he mentioned—of course, His Highness had already investigated everything. That child had died in the monastery over ten years ago.

“So? What do you think?”

As the smile on Angelo’s face grew increasingly blinding, the man’s expression grew darker and darker. But he gritted his teeth and didn’t refute a single word. His wife was doing it for the lives of their children—this he understood well. And the past… he really had wronged her. But even so…

The feeling of being abandoned was far too despairing.

I did it all for them. That thought scraped dully and painfully at the man’s heart.

The woman’s words were so sincere, and the two children clinging tightly to her added significant credibility to her testimony. By contrast, the man’s current powerlessness was as good as admitting everything.

When the situation couldn’t end in blood, the confrontation between powerful figures remained superficial. Excessively pressing the issue served no purpose. Edwin smiled faintly, did not respond to the prince’s enthusiasm, and merely said lightly:

“If Your Highness puts it that way, then yes, he is guilty. However, being easily deceived is also a grave sin before God. I believe you ought to be more cautious.”

“…Ah, of course, of course.”

As if Edwin weren’t the one who spread the lies. He was clearly the one who had deceived God the most and stolen all the fame and fortune. But there was no longer any strength in mocking him for that now.

This had all become a complete farce.

In the end, only the man stood there blankly, as everyone else walked around him. The older ones looked at him with contempt for having been involved with a succubus, and expressed deep sympathy toward his wife.

Before leaving, Archbishop Edwin said a few words to him that no one else heard:

“Angelo lied to you, but didn’t you truly realize it?”

He said, “The silence curse hasn’t been lifted—it was only temporarily suppressed. In fact, you already made your choice before any of this began.”

Climbing the White Tower, the knights beside Edwin all bowed and departed, leaving the space to the bishop alone. Without realizing it, Edwin had already curled the corners of his lips slightly, anticipating a meeting with someone—an emotion he had never felt before—and in this moment, it blazed through his gray eyes like fire in the fog.

Until he stood before the door, and for the first time, an unspeakable fear gripped Edwin’s throat so tightly that he felt an overwhelming, unfamiliar anxiety—that he might lose something.

—The magic array had been broken.

While he was lured away and forced to deal with matters outside, someone had come to his room’s door and taken measures to try and break in. Edwin had set two magic arrays on the door, and now, the outer array was completely depleted, leaving only remnants behind—a sign of a fierce struggle.

This should not have been possible. Edwin was very certain that currently, within the Church, there were only people belonging to the Church. Any spies Prince Angelo had planted should have been completely eliminated.

Edwin felt his hand go stiff and cold. He struggled to maintain his composure, but the intense anxiety and dread inside him were a hundred times greater than when he was being slandered earlier. When he placed his hand on the door handle, he could not bring himself to turn it.

Click.

The lock made a light sound and then silently slid open.

The bishop’s first glance caught the still-running half of the inner array—it was more intricate and delicate. Whoever tried to break in had gone all out, as the edge of the array was covered in scorched black marks. Fortunately, the array had been updated by Edwin himself, and he had invested much effort into it. So the intruder hadn’t succeeded.

But even the slightest chance—Edwin could not bear it.

He didn’t even quite dare to lift his eyes to look for the demon inside the room. It was the bishop who first heard Tal’s voice—not the demon speaking, just the faint sounds of movement; and then the scent of roses, seeping into him little by little, until his heart—suspended on a thread—finally settled in place.

But he still pressed his lips together and stood at the door like a child who had done something wrong.

The presence that had attempted to sabotage the warding array in his room—though far from matching Edwin in strength—already posed a considerable risk when it came to dealing with a low-level demon.

He had placed too much trust in his own talent, too arrogant and full of himself, like a fool convinced he had prepared for everything, when in truth he was blindly walking along the edge of a cliff.

He didn’t even dare imagine—

“Edwin?”

He had been frozen for too long, and the demon was a little confused by his behavior. Tal jumped lightly and quickly down from the bed and walked to the bishop’s side, brushing against his hand—only to realize with a start how icy Edwin’s hand was.

Edwin, at the moment of being touched, seemed to take it as permission. Only then did he finally raise his eyes again, greedily looking at the demon who belonged to him.

His hair was still tied with a ribbon, and with the demon’s movements, the rose-shaped onyx gem at the nape of his neck swayed, bright beyond belief. Tal leaned closer and gently asked by his ear:

“Do you need me to hold you? Because you look like…”

Before he could finish the sentence, the bishop had already lost control and embraced him tightly, burying his head against Tal’s neck. The demon thought he felt cold—just like that time he had nearly broken apart. Without asking any questions, the demon chose to embrace him gently in return, because Edwin was trembling, and he himself was warm.

Was it because he had seen that man again?

In the god’s deep crimson pupils, hidden outside Edwin’s line of sight, a glimmer of thought passed—but in truth, he had witnessed the whole thing today. After all, he wasn’t some little demon that could truly be locked away by the bishop.

Humans never disappointed his expectations.

He had already realized how foolish familial affection was, so today he showed no emotional fluctuations. The human favored by the gods did not allow irrelevant people to sway his thoughts, which pleased the god. But now, Edwin’s condition was very poor—and it was not an act.

Or perhaps it was due to the warding array at the door having been tampered with When the god returned, this was already the state he found things in. Tarscius didn’t think it posed any real threat. Clearly, this was another attempt from the Holy Son, and the power within the church wasn’t enough to shake Edwin’s defenses.

Before the demon had come here, the bishop’s room had practically been an assassin’s base. If Edwin was worried about this, it was perhaps a bit too sensitive.

Thinking about this only took Tal a few seconds.

Because very quickly, he realized it might be better to focus on the bishop in front of him now.

“Very quickly” meaning: right as the other kissed his neck and reached out to pull open the buttons of his shirt.

Tal had far fewer buttons than Edwin.

The bishop acted as though he were desperately begging for something. His current state felt off, Tal thought—touching him and kissing him as though longing to be stopped. The gray eyes were misty, like fog condensed into droplets. Until the demon pressed down on his waist, pinned him to the wall, and grabbed his collar to stop him from going any further.

“Wait,” he said helplessly, “Edwin, you have to explain this to me first.”

“I’m sorry.”

The bishop spoke before he could even finish, “I’m sorry, I… I didn’t expect this. It won’t happen again. Absolutely not. Tal, I’ll set up three light-attribute arrays at the door with curses and steel seals. No one will be able to come in and hurt you.”

“For this…?”

Tal looked at him in some disbelief. Did the demon’s garnet-red eyes deepen a little? Edwin wasn’t sure. But he stopped all movement. Tal had made a contract with him for the sake of protection—this was something he ought to do. Now he had failed in that duty.

All imperfect things must be punished.

And he was willing to be held accountable—as long as it wasn’t too much. At the thought of leaving the demon alone in the room and him possibly being harmed, the bishop felt an unbearable panic. Unbearable—thinking of that word, he gave a short, self-mocking laugh.

He had always had nothing, and now, suddenly, he had begun to fear loss.

“And then,” Tal asked, a little reproachfully, “this is your way of apologizing?”

As he spoke, he raised a hand to touch Edwin’s forehead—surprised to find he didn’t have a fever. From a god’s perspective, the human’s words clearly sounded a bit unhinged. If the other were sick, this would be easier to understand.

Edwin clearly hadn’t expected that question either. For a moment, he couldn’t control himself—he only wanted to touch the demon as much and as tangibly as possible. But he was right. No matter what, this didn’t feel like an apology—it felt more like a reward.

“If there’s anything you want…”

The bishop felt even these words were weak, but he stood in front of Tal like someone awaiting judgment after a mistake. Or rather, the other was still pressing against him, using his knee so he couldn’t move, and his head was forced to lift under Tal’s touch—his fragile neck bending into a soft curve.

Then, the demon leaned in and kissed him.

The kiss came suddenly, but it was a formal kiss. At the end, Tal licked Edwin’s lips. The bishop often said he carried the scent of roses, but Edwin didn’t realize—mature demons also had their own scent. Tal had tasted it on the night of his transformation. And now, only when lips and teeth blended closely could one catch a trace of that fragrance.

Tal couldn’t quite name the scent—but for some reason, he liked it.

“I still think it wasn’t necessary.”

That was his final judgment, looking at Edwin’s dazed eyes from the kiss.

“You see, in the end, your array did block the intruder, didn’t it? You can protect me. There’s no need to apologize for this.”

Are there really mistakes that can be forgiven without a price?

Edwin felt like everything had become light and weightless. But Tal just had that kind of goodness. The demon hadn’t realized his actions had finally messed up the hair he’d kept tidy all night—and the bishop reached out to touch that soft, satin-like long hair.

He still felt uneasy, but mixed with honey.

Sweetness that made him forget fear.

Sweetness that came from a demon he truly had—and one who truly needed protection.