Replacement Bride for the Alpha of the North - Chapter 226

Chapter 226: THE CRITICAL SITUATION (18)
“So, will you tell us what is the deal with this golden mask?” Lucia asked Zander for explanation. She looked at the king with her sharp eyes, Rye was sitting beside her, while she was standing.

She crossed her arms in front of her chest and waited impatiently. She didn’t even have any scrupulous to demand the answer, even though the man before her was the king.

She needed to know after all the horrendous thing that she had to go through. She still remembered all the name of the children that had met their demise on the slab when they sacrificed them and she couldn’t do anything about it.

Lucia knew it was not nice to bring this up, but she was more than willing to stoop that low to remind Zander about that. She looked at the king in the eyes and then reiterated all the name of the children.

“… Rose, Dean. There are around thirty children in total, but obviously there are more children that I didn’t know of, since I am not always in the ritual.” Lucia walked toward Zander and stood in front of him. “If you don’t think you owed me an explanation, you are sorely mistaken.”

Zander looked at Rye, who didn’t seem wanting to say anything. He only shrugged his shoulders. “She insisted to remember those children’s name.” Rye then changed his tone. “Whether you think you owed us or not, you need to know that we are willing to help only if you allowed us to do so.”

Zander creased his brows. He took off his golden mask and stared at it for a while.

“Nadia…” Zander said. This must be the first time he said that name after a decade. “She is a spy, but she is also a magic user.”

Nadia was his destined mate. She died ten years ago, where all of this started, where he started to wear this golden mask.

“What the thing with the golden mask?”

“She came from a tribe in Andelus continent,” Zander started.

All of them knew about this, ever since decades ago, this continent gave them nothing, but a headache, yet somehow they seemed to tangle together in the matter of business and whatnot related to magic stone.

“She put curse on me before she died.”

“What curse?” Lucia narrowed her eyes.

“I don’t know how to explain this, but ever since her death, I saw so many people in golden mask and while they don’t bother all the other people… they would always notice me. As if I am part of them.”

These people in the golden mask were akin to a ghost, where only Zander could see them. The reason why Zander would use the golden mask very often was because they would come to approach him and take over his body.

All this time, Zander was wearing the golden mask because he pretended that he was one of them. He had been ‘hiding’ from them behind his golden mask.

“What happened if you took off your golden mask?” Rye asked. This was weird, this was the first time for Rye to hear something like this. He didn’t even know there was this kind of curse. The black magic world was indeed vast and confusing. He was sure even the magic user didn’t even know the depth of their own history.

“They will take over my body. I realized this on the first week of the death of Nadia.”

Zander didn’t talk to anyone about the golden mask people that he saw the moment he realized that he was the only one that could see them. This might be ridiculous, but he was afraid that people would call him crazy.

People already looked down on him because he lost his destined mate and branded him as an incapable king. He didn’t want to add more label on his head.

Therefore, when he found a way to keep these ‘masked people’ from him by wearing a golden mask that was the same like them, he didn’t see the point of talking about it and now, after a decade, he used to it.

“You are crazy, Zan,” Lucia said, she clicked her tongue. “Don’t you think if you could see those masked people just like the children that had been marked as the sacrificed, it meant, you have been marked too?”

Zander tilted his head. “I know.” A self deprecating smile grazed his lips. “Why do you think I lost my beast? My dear mate took pity on me, so instead of outright killing me, she put the mark on my wolf spirit and killed my wolf spirit instead, which caused me unable to shift. How sweet she was…”

The sarcasm was very thick in the way Zander was speaking, he gave a chuckle to make the situation less tensed, but it was clear to see that it still hurt him deeply. People thought he must have forgotten about it, but as it turned out, Zander still remembered every detail of what happened and he was holding onto that memory. He only put it on the back of his mind and pulled it out whenever he was alone.

“Zan…” Lucia was speechless she didn’t know what to say anymore.

“Did Zen know about this?” Rye chimed in, he stood up and then approached Zander.

“No. I told you that I have never talked about this. So, no one knew about it.”

“Who do you think ‘those people’ behind the golden mask?”

“The people that had been killed for the sacrifice.” Zander put on his golden mask again, but this time, Lucia shuddered and looked over her shoulder, as if someone could jump from behind her and this subtle movement made Zander chuckled. “Don’t worry, they will not be able to bother you. They only like to bother me though.”

“How do you know that? Can you communicate with them?”

“No. They didn’t really talk.”

When they were in the middle of discussion, Yara barged into the room.