The Elf Journey In The Western Fantasy World-Chapter 28: Hidden Ties and Ancestral Secrets

Bearnard chuckled in exasperation. "Anyway, that’s the gist of it. The funny thing is, you’ve actually met that brain-dead guy before. He’s the one who was spouting nonsense in front of you. But his family does have some connections—otherwise, there’s no way he could have smuggled a dark elf into the auction without anyone noticing."

Illiya found it hard to believe.

He turned to look at a certain dark elf, who had remained silent, trying to see if he could find any answers from his expression.

Drow didn’t argue—because he had no grounds to.

The whole situation had played out exactly as the City Lord of Haneulseong City described.

Did the dark elf do anything wrong? No! He just wanted to prepare a decent greeting gift when he meet his soul-bonded partner later.

The dark elf was aggrieved, but the dark elf said nothing.

But being stared at with such a doting expression by a light elf made him extremely embarrassed.

The tips of his ears started turning pink again.

Before long, he repeated the same action as before—vanishing into thin air and hiding away.

To Illiya, this reaction was equivalent to admitting that the city lord’s words were true.

Regardless of how it started, selling an intelligent race was an undeniable crime.

And the two people responsible had to face the consequences, no matter how deep their connections ran.

Illiya didn’t bother beating around the bush and directly asked the city lord about the two men’s backgrounds.

"Lord Bearnard, do you know their identities? That way, I can plan accordingly."

There was no attempt to conceal the killing intent in his voice.

Bearnard wasn’t intimidated by the elf’s murderous aura.

Instead, he let out a hearty laugh and readily shared the information. "The one who picked up the dark elf is just an illegitimate son of his family. I can take care of him for you—his family’s head would probably be more than happy to do me this favor. The other one is a bit trickier. From what he said, he has ties to the royal family. Apparently, his sister is a favored lover of a certain someone... and it seems like she’s about to be officially recognized."

The last part was phrased more vaguely, mainly to avoid triggering someone in the room.

Sure enough, as soon as Darius heard that, he immediately blew up. "His Majesty would never do such a thing!"

Realizing his reaction was too emotional, he quickly adjusted himself and calmed down.

"No, I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with His Majesty taking lovers and legitimizing them. That does seem like something he would do," Darius continued, completely unaware that he had just dropped a bombshell of a statement. "I just don’t believe His Majesty would ever favor someone as brain-dead as that guy."

That part, at least, sounded reasonable.

Bearnard wholeheartedly agreed. "That’s why I can’t shake the feeling that something is wrong up there. Otherwise, why would my repeated requests to switch from kerosene lamps to magical crystal lighting keep getting rejected?"

"It just doesn’t make sense!"

Bearnard was still brooding over the rejection, to the point that he was practically committing treason by suspecting something was off with the royal family.

Illiya was also puzzled.

Humans really were strange creatures.

Before deciding on their next move, they figured it was best to have a chat with that so-called brain-dead guy first.

If they could squeeze more intel out of him, even better.

After all, there was no such thing as too much "knowledge"—in fact, they wouldn’t mind getting a little more.

Stealthily, Illiya and his group snuck out of the city, only to sneak right back in again—climbing over the walls of Haneulseong City and returning to the city lord’s mansion.

Finally seated in the guest hall once more, the group felt an overwhelming sense of relief, as if they had narrowly escaped death.

This was especially true for a certain young master of the Taeharin family—his body hit the chair, and he collapsed onto it like a boneless creature.

As he passed by, the city lord gave him a disdainful kick. "Where are your manners? Don’t just sprawl out here. By the way, have you found a solution for your condition yet? If you have, go deal with it. Stop lazing around in my house."

A string of reprimands rained down on Eoryun’s head, making his already-dizzy brain feel even heavier. He weakly protested, "Alright, alright, stop nagging. The ruins’ owner told me to check my family tree... and called me a bastard. So, does my family have some other bloodline or what? According to the ruins’ owner, I just reverted to an ancestral trait."

Hearing this, the city lord raised an eyebrow, recalled seriously for a moment, and then admitted straightforwardly, "How would I know? When I was your age, I wasn’t good at studying and didn’t like it either. If my family hadn’t been a noble household, I wouldn’t have even been able to enter the royal knight order."

"You sound way too happy about that, you bastard uncle!" Eoryun groaned at the thought of the mountain of knowledge he had to learn. "I just want to be a salted fish that eats, drinks, and plays all day. Why do I have to suffer like this?"

The city lord scoffed at his words, too lazy to argue.

In the end, how one lived their life was up to them.

"Kid, don’t let your other elders hear that. Those old fossils would lose it. As a hedonist myself, I don’t have much right to criticize you. But as for any strange bloodline in the family, I wouldn’t know. I’m not exactly the type to remember that kind of stuff."

Eoryun lazily hummed in response.

Illiya who is standing to the side, was amazed.

Among the elves, no elder would ever force their children to study.

Aside from teaching them basic knowledge, everything else was left to the little elves’ personal interests.