Lord of Winter: Beginning with Daily Intelligence

Chapter 811 - 444: The Villains’ Round Table

The council chamber on the top floor of Skull Castle was like a deep well overturned onto the reefs.

The heavy granite walls sealed every side completely, leaving only a narrow air vent in the center of the dome.

Moonlight leaked in through that gap like an elongated silver needle, listlessly stabbing into the floor.

The round table sat in the middle, with three sea‑beast oil lamps burning on it. Their flames did not flicker, but rose straight up, burning with an eerie, ghastly green.

The lamplight was stretched without end, thrown onto the walls, twisting the seated figures into clawing, raving monstrosities.

Rosa sat in one of the seats, her single eye sweeping coldly around the round table.

The first to crash into her line of sight was the bone‑crusher Kane.

The brute had planted both feet—boots studded with spikes—right on the tabletop, one hand clutching a raw lamb shank that was still oozing blood, tearing at it meat and bone together.

Blood trickled through his tangled beard, dripping onto the table with a clear, maddening sound.

Drip, drip.

Rosa sneered inwardly. Brainless idiot. Knows nothing but eating and killing. Once I get the formula for the poison, this kind of beast should be the first to be cleaned up.

Her gaze shifted away. Viper Sanders was hunched into his chair like a sick snake coiling in on itself.

He was wiping that toxin‑soaked dagger over and over with deerskin, his motions meticulous, but his eyes were always wandering, darting back every few seconds to the dark corners of the hall, as if an assassin might spring out at any time.

Rosa snorted. If something really goes wrong, what the hell is that little knife going to stop?

Beside him, the old God‑stick Moro was muttering some kind of prayer that no one could understand.

He rolled a few yellowed divination shells back and forth between his fingers, now and then leaning toward the lamp to study the direction of the patterns on the shells.

Babbling lunatic. Always has been. In Rosa’s eyes he was nothing but trash trading mad talk for a meal.

Rosa’s eye swept rightward over the few empty chairs at the round table. Aside from those already dead, there were still two cowards who hadn’t shown up.

......

Second by second, time crawled past, and that clammy, death‑cold stillness was slowly grinding away her patience.

Rosa suddenly shot to her feet and drew the rapier at her waist, its jeweled guard glinting.

Clang—!

The tip drove hard into the tabletop, wood chips flying. The blade was still buzzing with the impact.

She swept her gaze around, her voice sharp and caustic, bouncing again and again off the enclosing stone walls:

"This place is as cold as a morgue. Is there seriously not even a single serving girl to pour the wine?"

"That old bastard Balk had better haul himself out here fast." Rosa gave a cold laugh, fingers tightening around the hilt. "If I find out he’s playing games with me, or that he doesn’t actually have a poison that can melt an iron ship..."

The words had barely left her mouth.

The old God‑stick Moro, who had been huddled in the last seat, suddenly let out a shrill, inhuman scream.

"Aaah—!!"

It didn’t sound like a cry of surprise, more like a wail being forced out of his chest by something crushing him from the inside.

He flung the divination shells in his hand, scattering them all over the table.

"Wrong... wrong..." His voice shook, as if something cold and wet were strangling his throat. "There’s no money on them... no poison... and no road..."

Moro lurched to his feet, knocking over his chair, his voice suddenly pitching higher, edged with a hysterical shriek:

"It’s all water!! Below is water, above is water too! We’re at the bottom! In a fish’s belly! Run!! This isn’t a banquet... it’s a sacrifice!!"

When his shout died, the council chamber went briefly, utterly still.

Then the jeers began.

Kane split his blood‑smeared mouth in a huge grin and burst out laughing, pointing the lamb shank at Moro. "Old bastard losing it again? Smelled my mutton and started having nightmares?"

Sanders lifted his lids a fraction, his tone cold and impatient. "Put away your scare‑tactics, Moro. If your readings were really that good, you wouldn’t be stuck in the last seat."

A few dry chuckles bounced off the stone walls, forcibly smothering what was left of the eerie mood.

Moro, however, no longer heard anything at all.

All he could feel was the ground under his feet rising and falling slowly, like the belly of some huge creature breathing.

Like a madman he shoved aside the chairs blocking his way and staggered toward the tightly shut oak doors.

Just as his hand was about to close around the handle—

The door slid inward without a sound.

Unable to stop himself, Moro crashed straight into a rigid, icy embrace.

Balk finally made his entrance.

He stood in the doorway, one hand bracing the old God‑stick by the shoulder with steady strength, as if supporting a drunk old friend.

Rosa’s single eye narrowed slightly. The man before her was in a state of health that was downright unsettling.

The old man who’d needed a cane, whose face was blotched with age spots, who looked ready to drop dead any minute—that man was gone.

Now Balk’s back was straight, his figure wrapped in a perfectly tailored blood‑red formal coat.

His hair was thick and black, his hairline implausibly even; his face glowed with color, his skin so taut it didn’t belong to someone his age.

Moro shuddered hard in his arms.

His whole body went rigid in an instant, even his scream clogging in his throat, unable to get out.

Balk was smiling, the corners of his mouth pulled into a slightly too‑wide arc, but in that full minute his eyes did not blink even once.

His other hand was hooked around a woman. She was veiled in layers of heavy black gauze, her steps utterly soundless, her hem gliding along the floor, the tips of her feet nowhere to be seen.

Balk gently pressed Moro back into his chair, his movements excessively tender, yet he left stark purple bruises on the man’s arm.

"What are you running for, Moro? The banquet’s only just begun. My apologies, my friends. To prepare this..."

Balk paused, his smile unchanged. "Feast, I had to spend a little time carefully choosing the ingredients."