Werewolf Hunting Rules.

Chapter 588 Unable to Speak Out
"That's not fair. How were you able to find out?"

There was a small tree in the Melcher family's front yard, and Charlie was sitting under it when Donna angrily kicked him, but she didn't actually touch him.

Mr. Melcher was watching from the side, making her feel somewhat awkward when she did it.

Alice wanted to come out, but her mother and the older maid pulled her back into the room and wouldn't let her see the Bello family's great achievements.

“You’re smart, but you can fool me in at least ten years.” Charlie was pale, his left hand tightly clutching his right shoulder, his laughter laced with gasps. “Women… are better off staying at home. Dealing with a criminal like me is too dangerous.”

If he had spoken harshly, it would have been one thing, but the way he said it sounded like he was looking out for her, which left Donna unsure of what was going on. She eyed the prisoner suspiciously for a few seconds, then turned to Clayton, trying to gauge the true meaning of his words by observing her uncle's reaction.

The blood at Clayton's mouth had completely disappeared. After bringing Charlie back here, he went to the Melcher family's kitchen and suddenly became quite good-natured.

“Dude,” he addressed Charlie as “dude,” “regardless of whether my child is an ordinary woman or not, do you know that you offended another woman with something similar before? She’s asking me to kill you.”

Charlie's eyes darted around, as if recalling something, before quickly returning to their original position.

"Really? I don't remember. Damn it, so you arrested me for her?!"

"No, it's for Melcher. But I won't give up the bounty either, so you're dead."

Clayton rushed over without even grabbing his weapons for the safety of his new friend's family, taking a real risk. Mrs. Kleber's money was just the right amount to warm his heart.

Melcher stared blankly at Clayton's profile, then looked surprised when he realized his new friend's decision, before turning his face away.

I won't watch Clayton, and I won't watch Charlie.

Clayton noticed his new friend's discomfort, so he patted him on the shoulder and comforted him, saying, "Don't worry, he's going to die eventually. Too many people don't like him. Even if we take him to the police station, the police will execute him."

Charlie chuckled when he saw Melcher avoid his gaze, but the smile faded quickly. He looked thoughtful and then surprisingly apologized to Melcher first.

"Sorry, buddy, I pushed you too far."

Melcher turned his head, looking like he wanted to say something, but was still hesitant.

The werewolf shook his head, interrupting their conversation: "That's enough, Charlie. Now let's talk about something else. Melcher, you can go back to your family. I'll be here in a bit."

After driving Melcher away, Clayton sat cross-legged on the grass, facing Charlie:

"Any last words?"

"Do I still have a chance to live?" Charlie asked, leaning against the tree.

Clayton gave an irrelevant answer.

“My child didn’t give anything away, so I know what level she is at.”

"I disposed of Athena Berlusconi's body."

"She hadn't arrived yet at that time."

“Damn it. Well, it was Joseph who said it.”

"That Joseph with the mask? Hmm."

Donna squatted to the side, listening in a daze, and it took her a while to realize what Clayton meant.

Charlie already knew them, which is why he ran away after seeing him.

"That's cheating!" she said indignantly.

Charlie pursed his lips: "I still don't know what bit my leg, that's cheating too."

Donna's fire was extinguished. The biggest contributor, Clara, was a demon who couldn't appear in public and could only hide back in her saddlebag after the battle. So she couldn't hold Clara up and say to Charlie, "This is the first person to hurt you. Fear her!"

“Alright, since you didn’t kill me right away, tell me, what do you need me to do for you?” Charlie’s gaze returned to Clayton. “But let me guess first—it’s about that book.”

"No, I just rarely get to talk to the people I'm about to kill, so I wanted to chat with you. Besides, I already know that the book is in Kules's hands."

Charlie's expression changed.

"I must say, you're really well-informed, but you don't know enough."

“What else can you tell me?” Clayton asked calmly.

“I’ve done something wonderful, something that could get me to heaven a hundred times over, and maybe it will rouse your pity,” Charlie said, sounding rather proud. “This wonderful thing could only be done by a scoundrel like me. No one else could do it. The smarter, the nobler, the more ambitious, the less likely they are to do it.”

The werewolf laughed: "I didn't know such a thing existed in this world."

Donna didn't believe it either.

"And you're also a noble blue-blooded being, doesn't that conflict with the restrictions you mentioned?"

“Melcher really told you everything.” Charlie sighed deeply, but showed no anger. “It all comes down to that book; its power is beyond your imagination.”

"What's more incredible than turning a commoner into a true nobleman?" Clayton asked.

“Yes, even more incredible.” Charlie didn’t seem to be joking. “I’ve heard people’s speculations about it. Besides saying that it can help people become the lords of the entire city of Sasha, they also say that it recognizes its master and, once its master is killed, will bring disaster to the land like those true nobles. But in the end, that guess was wrong. It’s like a whore who’s always spreading her legs, anyone can have their way with her. You should know how much trouble that will cause, right?”

"What's worse, it also has a distorting ability as a book—to reproduce all the contracts, allowing its holder to sense all the connections made in the past on the land it owns, including those that were abolished in the distant past."

Clayton didn't react, but Donna looked utterly astonished.

"What do you mean?" Clayton asked his niece.

Donna's breathing became erratic: "The first step in influencing is observation. In other words, being able to observe the contract is the initial condition for exerting influence on it."

"The holder of the Book of Earth can steal the sovereignty of the entire Sasha region, but he cannot truly rule over all the nobles of Sasha City, because the essence of this ability is ritual magic. It is impossible for it to generate such powerful energy out of thin air. The actual power is the spirit of the earth. Both it and the 'naming' of the nobles are just drawing power from the earth."

“I have never seen the Book of Earth, but I understand ritual magic and can deduce how it works. It pastes a piece of paper filled with fabricated content onto the pages of the Book of Earth, covering most or even all of the content on that page, and can peel it off at any time and paste it onto another page. Just looking at this covered page, it is easy to be deceived by the fabricated content, but by connecting it to the context, you will find that its theme is not coherent, and you can easily pick out the fabricated content. The page being read cannot be covered by the fabricated content of the Book of Earth.”

"Therefore, true nobles are not afraid of the influence of the Book of the Land. They are the genuine articles, and the authority stolen by the Book of the Land will be taken back when they oppose them."

"But if the Book of Lands can also reproduce all land contracts from ancient times to the present, then it will have the ability to replace all the pages, even modify the table of contents. At that point…" Donna didn't finish her sentence, and Charlie completed the conclusion for her:

"Then he could arbitrarily bestow titles and strip away the lordships of the Sasha nobles, becoming a true uncrowned king."

If the Book of Earth truly possesses such immense power, and killing its master would not bring calamity to this land, then the bloodshed it would unleash is unimaginable.

In this regard, one can refer to the perilous political environment of Mensis, where a county changed hands six times in a single month, resulting in the annihilation of nineteen families.

If King Heron IV had not sent people to forcibly nationalize the Book of the Land, Sasha City would have been in a much worse situation.

Clayton slowly spoke: "Since you put it that way, then I think what fell into Kules' hands was not something so dangerous."

Pain and blood loss couldn't stop Charlie's smug smile:
“Indeed not. I broke it apart. The Book of the Earth in Kules’s hands is only half.”

The nobles of Sasha City are mostly northerners who were left behind when the kingdom expanded southward. Their inherited secret training methods are also northern in style. They are not complicated and varied, nor do they mix in other types of secret techniques. Instead, they extract the characteristics of the blade technique itself and then refine and specialize it.

The same applies to Charlie's Romitz family.

The path he chose was not that of a warrior, but that of a craftsman.

"What? Who else but me could bring themselves to do such destruction? I have completely ended this dangerous future, and even blade masters like Jonard and Kentauer could not have restored it. Now tell me, am I worthy of your leniency?"

Donna suddenly became alert, her brows furrowing slightly: "Something's not right. To disassemble the multiple abilities of a wondrous object requires extremely profound blade-based secret techniques. You haven't even obtained the qualification for [Summoning] yet, how could you possibly do that?"

Charlie replied dismissively, "You know quite a lot, little girl, but that's not an inviolable rule. I almost reached the threshold of [Summoning], but as long as you don't care about damaging the power of this artifact, even an ordinary person can tear it in half. After all, it's just a paper book."

"So, not only does the Book of Earth in Kules's possession only have one ability left, but even that last ability has been weakened?" Clayton asked.

“Yes, the other half of the Book of Earth is the same, but even weakened, its power is still considerable,” Charlie replied. “If you promise to let me go, I will tell you the whereabouts of the other half of the Book of Earth.”

Clayton Bellow nodded knowingly, then drew the captured silver-plated dagger and swung it horizontally, and Charlie's head rolled off.

The tomb raider's blood gushed upwards from the severed neck, soaking the March grass, where it lingered like dewdrops on the tips of the blades.

Donna, standing nearby, gaped in astonishment, then abruptly stood up. She couldn't believe it.

"We're still talking!"

“I’ve finished speaking.” Clayton stood up, flicked the blood off his short sword, sheathed it, then bent down and gently placed the sword into the corpse’s arms. He then picked up the head, whose face still held an expectant expression.

“Actually, I don’t think his request was excessive. The Book of Earth is also useful to us.” Donna looked at Charlie’s body and felt a pang of sadness.

"Silly girl, don't take his words seriously. It could very well be a trap. Even if it isn't, his presence is still harmful."

“But he seems like a sensible person, and I don’t think he’ll want to come back for revenge after he’s free.”

“I think so too, but just because he won’t retaliate against us doesn’t mean he’s harmless.”

Clayton whistled, and his mount swayed and came closer. He hung the severed head on the saddle like an ancient knight displaying his trophy.

He turned around and saw that Donna was still looking conflicted, so he had to explain further.

“I don’t believe his conclusion that ‘the change of ownership of the Book of Stud has no consequences’ because he is my enemy and I have never seen the Book of Stud. So I still need Sir Jonard to help me take the part of the Book of Stud that Curles has before the end of the horse race, so that I can fight Curles without any worries.”

“Joanrad will help me with this, provided that I hand over Charlie to him, or the location of the Book of Styx.”

“I know the location of the Book of the Earth, but words alone are not enough. Charlie’s head is good proof.”

"You might ask, why can't I bring Charlie alive to Sir Johnrad? Even if he's honest, it doesn't mean he won't make mistakes. For example, Dess Johnrad claims he can't repair the Book of Stud, but what if he's wrong? Once Charlie is with Sir Johnrad, he won't be able to hide anything. If Johnrad finds out the whereabouts of the two parts of the Book of Stud and repairs it, won't the terrible future Charlie speaks of come true again?"

“Finally,” Clayton said, “I know nothing about contract magic. Of all the people I trust, only you and Julius might be able to use the other half of the Book of Styx. But you’ll only stay in Sasha for two years at most before moving to another city to get married, and Julius is easily influenced by his druid mother. I don’t want this thing to cause any major political repercussions; it’s not worth the risk. From that perspective, my reasons for killing Charlie are the same as his reasons for splitting the Book of Styx.”

“Okay,” Donna said listlessly, “but if you didn’t trust him in the first place, why did you talk to him for so long?”

"I said that from the beginning."

Clayton replied, "I just want to talk to a dying person, that's all."