Chapter 491
Charlotte first picked up the noble roster.
The roster was recorded in red ink, neatly and elegantly, even though Charlotte’s handwriting was dreadful, she could tell that the person who recorded the roster had written it very well, perhaps even better than Sebastian.
Curiously, she opened it and roughly browsed through it, discovering that it was a list of nobles who had dealings with the Blood Demon Church.
Or, more accurately, it was a list of nobles recruited by the Blood Demon Church.
There were not a few names, a thick stack of them, from court nobles walking in the Royal Palace to noble officers in charge of patrolling the city defenses, from direct members of Great Noble families to impoverished nobles, indistinguishable from paupers… all statuses, all classes were included.
Charlotte even saw several well-known noble family heads, also prestigious noble lords within the Kingdom, who were likewise on the list.
Mostly, they were nobles who supported the Third Prince of the Kingdom, but besides that, there were also some from the Neutral Party and some Royal Party nobles.
What was more outrageous was that Charlotte saw some Church Priest names, which even included the former Great Priest of the Holy Royal Court, Linus.
Of course, Linus’s name was already struck out.
Moreover, after his name, it recorded the date and cause of his death with another slightly inferior handwriting, stating, “September 4, 1444, burned at the stake, died at the Holy Royal Court Lutecia’s Judgment Court,” and such.
Seeing this list made Charlotte quite understand why the Holy Royal Court had always been exterminating the Blood Demon Church but had never been able to completely annihilate it.
Just looking at this list, the nobles of the New Moon were almost infiltrated like a sieve.
Although not all the nobles on the list had joined the Blood Demon Church, being on the list alone at least meant that they were willing to do business with the Blood Demon Church, even offer them asylum.
With nobles holding them back and the corrupted priests within the Holy Royal Court colluding with the Blood Demon Church, it would be no wonder the Church couldn’t completely eradicate the Blood Demon Church.
That Charlotte could publicly suppress the Blood Demon Church was a miracle.
After browsing through the noble roster, Charlotte gently closed it.
The roster was of significant importance—if handed over to the Church, it was sure to deal a heavy blow to the Blood Demon Church.
Frankly, Charlotte was somewhat tempted.
Although the core members of the Blood Demon Church were also from the Bloodline, she had no good feelings toward these individuals, who could be described as “terrorists.”
These guys had already targeted her, and since they could report her to the Church, she could do the same to them, leveraging the Church to strike harshly at the Blood Demon Church.
However, what made Charlotte somewhat puzzled was that, from what she recalled, Bertrand had only joined the Blood Demon Church three years ago.
In just three years, could Bertrand actually have access to this kind of roster that likely only the high-rank members of the Blood Demon Church could possess?
Of course, Charlotte’s confusion only lasted a moment.
She quickly figured it out on her own.
While it was true Bertrand had joined the Blood Demon Church only for three years, he was, however, the Taboo Blood Servant of the Dark Apostle Albrecht.
His power within the Blood Demon Church was an extension of the Dark Apostle’s power, probably why he had rapidly become the Blood Count.
In this way, although he had only been in the Blood Demon Church for three years, because of his connection with the Dark Apostle, he was already a high-ranking member of the sect.
Having understood the reason, Charlotte put down the noble roster and looked towards another notebook.
She opened the cover page and discovered that it was actually Bertrand’s diary.
The handwriting in the diary was different from the first neat and elegant handwriting on the roster.
However, it was exactly the same as the second kind of corrected handwriting on the roster.
It was clear that someone else had written the noble roster, it had been handed to Bertrand, and Bertrand had made additional entries.
The diary was somewhat old, the earliest entries being about Bertrand’s early experiences, which Charlotte skipped over, turning to the recent years.
The records in the diary were similar to the memories she had seen.
In the recent years, the aging Bertrand increasingly felt the terror of passing time, with his body weakening and power waning, making him more anxious. As the head of the Chevalier family, his death would greatly weaken his family, forcing him to seek various ways to extend his lifespan.
In this process, he met the Blood Demon Church.
The Blood Demon Church offered to help him solve his lifespan issue in exchange for joining the organization, and the diary also recorded the internal struggle Bertrand experienced during that period.
However… he ultimately could not face the fear of death and accepted the deal from the Blood Demon Church.
After that, he conducted the First Embrace ceremony with the Dark Apostle, becoming a Taboo Blood Servant.
Afterwards, the Dark Apostle handed over the noble and Holy Priest contact roster of the Blood Demon Church to him, appointed him as the Chief Priest of the Blood Demon Church in Lutecia, instructed him to secretly recruit more nobles, and preside over the sacrifice rituals in the Royal Capital Lutecia.
As for the specific details of the sacrifice rituals, the diary did not write them.
Not that Bertrand didn’t want to write them, but some of the passages related to the sacrifice rituals clearly intended to set out the details of the rituals, yet whenever that happened, the handwriting became suddenly sloppy, as if the writer was trembling.