Crow disguised himself as Harold. After absorbing enough of his memories, Crow almost felt the urge to kill the fat kid again. This pig was something else, always lusting after shit beyond his means. It’d be one thing if they were willing to sell themselves to him, but none of these women wanted what they got. Even if they did, Crow seriously doubted they knew how depraved Harold was.

After returning ‘home,’ Crow did things as Harold normally would. Minus the rape, mutilation, and other unconscionable things this fat bastard did. Instead of doing all that, he went into their family’s vault and cleaned up the place.

*Are you seriously robbing another vault?* Zoe asked with a laugh.

*You do not know what these sick fucks have done. Some of it makes Unhulde look tame. I want to castrate them, burn their dicks to ash and then turn it into tea for them to choke on.*

*That’s… hey, I want that black sand in the bowl to the left.*

*Why? I mean, I don’t care. Most of it is going inside my treasure cave which you can access.*

*It’s called the Sands of Calamity, so don’t let it touch your skin.*

*Hah! Those fools had this shit down here exposed. No wonder they are about to be wiped out.*

Sands of Calamity were rare but not unattainable. Crow’s father destroyed many Blood Ember sect branches, so there was probably a lot of this sand floating around. It could be found in small doses where a major disaster happened. Still, it took some time for the resentment to consolidate.

Witches could use this for their rituals, but the result depended on the witch. Zoe and her coven could use it to detect and avoid calamity, while the Hex Witches would use it for curses. It was also an ingredient used by most Scholarly Talents, such as weapon forging—assuming the forger had a method to draw the ‘calamity’ out of the sands.

The vault wasn’t as good as Unhulde, but there were a lot of alchemy ingredients and Mana Crystals. He took it all as compensation to his captured wives. After robbing the place blind, he left, but not before disrupting the formations on the door. Unless they had a formation master living on site, it’d take a few days to open that vault. By then, it would be too late.

At dinner, he met Harold’s dad, who talked about the wedding tomorrow. Pretending to be the kiss-ass fatty that Harold was, I felt disgusted with myself. That self-loathing probably sold my performance more than the ass-kissing.

“Harold, you cannot maim or kill these girls, you understand? I absolutely forbid it. They are both important to my plans. I don’t care how much you play with them, but do not let your depravity cross the line.”

“Like you’re any better,” Crow muttered under his breath, and he was sure Hank heard him. Hank just gave his ‘son’ a wintry smile as if to dare him to say it a little louder. “I understand, father. I will just fuck them stupid.”

“If anything happens to them, you’ll be forced to take this,” Hank said, putting a pill bottle on the table between them. “It’s not a pill but an insect that nestles in your brain, killing all your sexual urges. Your dick will remain limp until such a time I will give you the method to remove the bug.”

Crow gulped, and he didn’t need to act this time. Hank really gave him a fright this time, and he shrank away from that pill bottle. Who the fuck would design an evil thing like that?

They finished the rest of dinner in silence.

Crow tried to figure out who Harold’s mother was but couldn’t find any memories of her. It was the only loose end, but there was nothing he could work with. Harold never even asked about her. Hank probably killed her, but that was speculation on Crow’s part. It was easy to tell the man had some wild ambitions toward alchemy. Enough that he’d do anything to gain more knowledge, which explains his greed toward Song Lin.

Exploring the rest of the house, Crow retired to his room. He killed all the lights and silently waited. A slight shift in the air was his only warning before a knife was pressed against his throat.

“Little bird?”

“Did you miss me?” Crow asked before shifting back into his original self.

Song Xue’s body shivered, and he felt her head against his back, nodding up and down. The knife disappeared, and he turned around and hugged his Faelan. She jumped on Crow and wrapped her legs around his waist while his hands roamed down to her butt and squeezed tightly, pushing their body’s close together. Her moans were soft and drove him wild.

Crow was ready to dominate his woman, but she reacted first. Her lips pressed against his and her tongue darted into his mouth. No matter how he tried to take control, her body contorted and locked down his arms and legs. It turned him on so much that she’d need to be paralyzed not to feel the monster rubbing against her damp vagina.

Her small hand reached down and ripped apart his pants before grabbing his rock-hard cock. Stroking it a few times, she chuckled at his anxiousness. It wasn’t only him that was being teased at this point. Even she could no longer resist and lifted her toned ass up before expertly positioning her sacred place above the tip of his cock and pushed down on it.

It’d been so long since she slept with her man that she almost forgot how pleasurable it was. Her sounds weren’t light, and their reunion lasted almost until dawn. In that long session, Song Xue felt all the stress of the last few years melting away.

“I’m sorry it took me so long to get back,” Crow mumbled into her ear as she rested her head on his chest.

“I’m sorry I couldn’t protect them. I don’t think I—”

“Stop. You aren’t solely responsible for our people, and neither am I. We work because we trust one another—because we’re family. There is no blame. At this point, I believe all of us know each other’s strengths and weaknesses. You aren’t the commander in the light but the guardian in the dark. Maybe it was unfair of me to make you my first wife, but in my heart, you are always the first. You are the little girl in the plaza, the beautiful woman at the Flower Festival—the first woman I fell madly in love with. That will never change. Mara leads in the light and complements you perfectly. We both know she relies heavily on you to make informed decisions. Both of you are indispensable and necessary to the protection of this family. Our people are alive, and the bruises and hard knocks are to let us know that we still have more to learn.”

“You’ve changed.”

“Some. I see more today than I did yesterday. But I continue to grow to keep all of you safe. Once this wedding fiasco ends, I have a lot to tell all of you.”

“More wives?” Song Xue snorted.

“Yes,” Lily said after appearing next to Song Xue. “This horny bastard became the husband of a coven.”

“Lily!” Crow called out in mock shock. “You wound me.”

“Oh, please. With skin as thick as yours, I doubt anything can hurt you.”

“Is that true?” Song Xue asked, her head lifting and staring into Crow’s eyes. He gave her a pained smile and nodded. “Interesting.”

“Th-that’s all you are going to say?” Lily asked.

“A Witch’s Coven is a powerful thing. My sister said that a coven with a powerful husband can create a phenomenon that even the Heavens can’t prevent.”

“That’s thirteen wives! Fourteen if you count Hooligan.”

“Whose that?”

“A woman I met in the trial. She is from another tower,” Crow told her. He also handed her a wooden ring, a token taken from the trial. “Once a year, that will open and allow entry into that realm. Time flows differently there—to you, I’ve only been gone a few years. For me? It’s been nearly ten years. Ten years…” The last part came out hoarsely. Saying it aloud, Crow felt the pain of being separated all this time.

“It’s been hard on you,” Song Xue giggled, reminding him of the four-year-old girl that befriended him. Her pure-hearted nature hidden under that cold exterior was the true gem. “I need to go. I’m staging a rescue to slay the evil groom. You better be ready to fight tomorrow. While you wear that guise, you are my enemy.”

“Hehe, my little Faelan is always so fierce. Don’t worry, hehe, I won’t disappoint you. Don’t tell the others. I want to surprise them.”

“Fine, but if you get hurt, you only have your foolish self to blame,” Song Xue laughed as she disappeared into the shadows.