Chapter 327: Project Crimson Crucible.

"I can’t."

Lucian said no and for a moment, Aurelia paused, her mind simply couldn’t comprehend what had just happened.

One needed to understand, Aurelia was without a doubt one of the most beautiful women in the world. Not only that, along with irresistible beauty, she was unbelievably strong and had a strong political say in the Vampire World and the Supernatural World in general.

She did not go around offering herself to any being who gave her blood, she did not need to. She was a Veyr, her House gathered blood for her. And if, in any case, she did offer herself like she did to Lucian, she would have had lines of Alpha Wolves ready to offer their blood to her.

She could practically have an endless supply of blood if she wanted to.

She just did not because she found those beings... repulsive.

Lucian, however, was different.

He was... interesting.

She actually wanted to get close to him, that was the only reason she offered what she offered in the first place.

So for a few good seconds, she did not understand how she was supposed to react when she was rejected, then suddenly—

"My blood isn’t enough."

Lucian spoke up.

"Hmm?"

"The Blood I have inside me is the Blood of a High Incubus, even if you take all my blood, it wouldn’t be able to satiate you."

Aurelia obviously knew that.

For her to feel full, she needed blood that was at least on the level of an Alpha’s blood. She would need to drink Lucian’s blood ten to fifteen times to feel completely full, that simply wasn’t possible.

"I can get more blood on my own."

Aurelia tried to explain but—

"You don’t understand."

Lucian shook his head.

"I am not normal, Aurelia."

He spoke, looking at her with a strong glow in his eyes.

"I am unhealthily possessive. If I give you my blood and take you, I will make sure mine is the only blood you ever drink from this point on, even if you have to bleed me dry, then let me recover and bleed me dry again, tens of times."

"That is... not healthy."

Aurelia muttered with a strange look on her face.

"I know."

Lucian nodded with a light laugh.

"Why else do you think I am backing down?"

"I did not think you would back down."

Aurelia actually smiled.

Maybe because she was rejected or maybe it was some other reason she did not know, Lucian now became even more interesting in her mind.

Now, she wanted him even more.

"Trust me, my heart is bleeding."

Lucian sighed dramatically.

Aurelia chuckled at that, then, she placed her hands back on Lucian’s shoulders and pushed herself away from him.

"Well, if that is indeed your decision, I will respect it."

Lucian practically cried at that sight.

His heart truly was bleeding.

Seeing his expression, Aurelia laughed out loud.

"You still have your two favours, save them."

"I will."

Lucian nodded.

"And stay put, don’t make any unnecessary moves."

"I’ll live the next few days in depression, don’t worry."

Aurelia chuckled and shook her head. Then, she walked away. Before leaving the suite, however, she did stop for a moment and turned.

"I’ll tell you if I do find something interesting."

That made Lucian smile.

"I’ll wait for you to call me."

...

"You found it all... in a day?"

The very next day, Lucian stared at Aurelia in absolute disbelief.

"Yes."

Aurelia shrugged as if searching through centuries of hidden history and investigating it in less than a day was the most natural thing in the world.

Lucian kept staring at her.

"...I am starting to understand why you wouldn’t let me come."

"That is good."

Aurelia chuckled.

"No, it isn’t. It hurts my pride, you know?"

"You’ll survive."

Lucian sighed.

The two were inside Aurelia’s suite, only this time, the environment was different. There were several files spread across the table, old documents, copied records, handwritten pages, digital files displayed through a small artifact.

Lucian stared at the giant mess in front of him, then he turned back to Aurelia.

"So, what did you find?"

He asked.

And Aurelia—

"You were right. Varek was an experiment."

Lucian’s eyes changed at those words.

"And he wasn’t the first. There were six hundred and five confirmed subjects before him."

"...six hundred?"

Lucian blinked at that number.

"This is the number we’ve managed to confirm, there are more but the information about them isn’t clear."

Lucian exhaled deeply.

"And Varek was the first successful one?"

He asked.

"According to the documents, yes."

Aurelia nodded.

Lucian looked down at the files.

"What was the experiment about?"

He asked. Aurelia picked up one of the older documents and—

"Project Crimson Crucible."

She said the name.

Lucian raised an eyebrow at that.

"That sounds cheerful."

"It wasn’t."

Aurelia placed the document in front of him with a serious look on her face.

"The project began centuries ago."

"How many centuries ago?"

"The oldest record I found dates back seven hundred and forty-one years."

"That’s long after Neroth’s death."

"It is possible I wasn’t able to find older records."

Lucian nodded, that was a possibility as well. Aurelia then shrugged, that did not matter for now, what mattered was the project itself.

"The theory behind it was surprisingly simple, Vampires evolve through blood, every Crimson Ascension improves that blood."

"Yes."

Lucian nodded, he was following till now.

"And Demons... possess some of the most powerful supernatural blood in existence."

Aurelia spoke.

Lucian nodded again.

Blood from a Demon’s True Body was truly powerful, this was also one of the reasons Aurelia approached him yesterday.

"So House Arcelis asked a question."

Aurelia continued as she tapped on the document.

"What would happen if Vampiric blood was repeatedly exposed to Demonic blood of extraordinarily high quality?"

Lucian stared at her.

"Are you saying..."

"They attempted to force Vampiric blood to adapt, to evolve beyond what its natural bloodline would normally allow and they used Neroth’s blood to test their theory and experiment."