Dragon Raja 5; Chapter 33: Old Friend (2)

Dragon Raja 5

Pompey played with the rose and sat down on the chair in front of the old people. It was the only empty chair in the hall and had been prepared for him.

“It’s not easy to find you, Pompey.” The old man in the lead said slowly.

“Why did the ancestors summon me?” Pompey crossed his legs, still looking nonchalant. “I was about to go to Tibet to continue my Tantric practice.”

“Practicing with some lady you met at the Stockholm airport?”

“You understand my situation very clearly. Love is also a spiritual practice. I am willing to die on this path of practice.”

“A king’s emotions are like a lion’s prayers while he eats.”

“Can you please stop spouting this kind of uncultured, meaningless talk? You’re speaking like a vampire dug out of a medieval tomb,” Pompey paused. “And you look like one, too. Come on, what do you want from me?”

“As for Chen Motong, the bride of the Gattuso family will not be forgiven for doing something like that.”

“Are you talking about her fleeing with Lu Mingfei?” Pompey shrugged. “It’s certainly unethical, but in the eyes of your ancestors, is there really such a thing as a woman’s virtue? When you were still able to move happily, you all loved women, right? Your love history is recorded in the family archives. Every time I read it, I get as excited as if I were reading a pornographic novel!”

It was clearly a teasing tone, but Pompey rubbed his hands while he said it, with a lewd look on his face, as if he was really a little excited.

The old people’s expressions were between embarrassment and anger, but they still restrained themselves. After dealing with Pompey for so many years, they learned to tolerate this guy.

“What we care about is whether she is contaminated. A contaminated woman is not qualified to be the bride of the Gattuso family. You know the family’s bottom line very well.” said the old man.

“I understand! What you care about is whether our bride has slept with Lu Mingfei!” Pompey nodded. “I’m not so sure about that. If I were Lu Mingfei, she’d be three or four months pregnant by now. If the elders are so concerned about this, what should I do? Capture Chen Motong and send her to the gynecologist for a checkup?”

“Don’t use that foolish tone! This is a serious matter!” The old man emphasized, “We can tolerate other things, but reproduction is the family’s top priority and the responsibility of the family heir. Our bride must not be contaminated! She must be fresh, pure, and loyal!”

“If it was my son instead of me sitting here, he would have spit in the faces of all our ancestors.” Pompey scratched his head in embarrassment. “Instead of trying to persuade him to change his fiancée, you might as well persuade him to sever the father-son relationship with me.” The man in front of him suddenly disappeared.

“We won’t tell Caesar that. Caesar doesn’t need to know anything. As long as Chen Motong disappears from this world, he will naturally and slowly end his obsession with her. Time can heal everything. It will take some time to prepare a new fiancée for Caesar, but it is better than taking the risk of letting a polluted woman become his bride.”

“What the elders mean is…” Pompey’s expression slowly faded.

“She brings shame to the family, she’s obsessed with our chosen heir, and her body may be contaminated. That’s reason enough for us to replace her. Once she’s replaced, her continued existence will be unnecessary.”

“Killing my son’s fiancée without telling him?” Pompey mused. “I have to warn you all, if word gets out, he’ll rush in here and shoot everyone in the head.”

“He won’t know, just like he won’t know how his mother died,” the old man said softly. “This is the decision we reached after our discussion. Beta, Gamma, Delta, Upsilon… each of us agrees that Caesar can no longer act so willfully.”

The names of these old people were just simple Roman letters: Alpha; Beta; Gamma; Delta; Epsilon…

These are more like codes or serial numbers than names. These old people seem to not care about their own existence in this world at all.

The old men nodded silently. Sometimes they were more like computers that could be connected through neural networks. Twelve elders, with the same clothes, the same haggard faces, the same eyes, all had the same opinions. As long as Alpha, the leader, spoke, he would represent all of them.

“So, Alpha, you didn’t call me here to discuss this, but to carry it out?” Pompey stared into Alpha’s eyes. “A father-in-law chasing his daughter-in-law around the world is such a melodramatic drama that it doesn’t suit my status as a superior.”

“You are not required to carry out the execution. I am just notifying you to avoid any trouble.”

“Am I the kind of person who likes to cause trouble? You always look at me with tinted glasses. I just dote on my son a little, even though he doesn’t love me that much.”

“We love Caesar too, provided he does what’s good for the family. We live for the family and we die for the family. Every Gattuso should have this awareness.”

Alpha said slowly: “He is the heir of the family. It is his responsibility to produce pure offspring for the family.”     

“It’s like an ant colony. Every ant exists for the colony. The soldier ants’ job is to die in battle, the worker ants’ life is to gather, the male ants’ job is to mate, and the queen’s job is to lay eggs.” Pompey looked up at Alpha. “Caesar and I are the male ants, right? That sounds good. We just need to pass on our genes. I like passing on our genes, but I’m different from you. I only like the process, not the result.”