The Innkeeper

Despite trying to keep their polite expressions, the unexpected comment caused all the brothers, save William himself, to erupt uproariously into laughter! The one known as Batu, the founder of the Togoldor family, actually fell from his chair and started rolling over.

William himself slightly blushed and pretended to cough to clear his throat while he subtly kicked Batu off to the side.

"Innkeeper, I assure you, while I might have had a few… unexpected girlfriends in my youth, any rumors you might have heard are greatly exaggerated."

"A few… a few… \'unexpected\' he says," Henry said while wheezing with laughter, only to also receive a kick from William. Lex noticed that, although Williams\' kicks were not hard, whoever received them became completely incapacitated from it.

Lex only gave a half smirk, as if he understood what William was implying. In truth, he had no intention of embarrassing the man, but passing such a comment would automatically explain why he, as the Innkeeper, might have given William more attention than his brothers, thus once again lowering his guard.

"Such is the nature of youth," the 24 year old shamelessly said to the man older than 400,000 years.

"Oh man, I completely forgot about that," said Jotun, effortlessly dodging one of Williams\' kicks. "Innkeeper you have truly brought up some fond memories."

"People love to gossip with some of the Inn\'s workers, and I occasionally end up hearing a few things. Of course, gossip is just gossip. No one takes it too seriously."

"Oh you should…" began Nisar, but William directly kicked him in the face to shut him up.

"It is not even gossip, but a rather unfortunate fairy tale one of my brothers spread when I was young, and it has followed me since. I suspect from time to time someone revives the rumors, but I\'ve yet to find proof."

"If you of all people cannot find proof, brother, then it surely doesn\'t exist," said Jotun, keeping a suspiciously straight face while effortlessly dodging all attacks.

The meeting Lex was supposed to have with the emperor had turned strangely comical, and not at all what Lex had been originally expecting, but that could work in his favor. The longer they conversed about unimportant topics, the more time Lex would have to dig up details about William. If they got directly to the heart of the matter, it would seem improper if Lex diverted the flow of conversation towards anything else.

"At the Inn we have a Guild room where you can leave tasks for those qualified to fulfill. Perhaps you could hire a detective," said Lex, in an attempt to keep the conversation flowing.

"It\'s not a matter a detective can resolve, Innkeeper," Jotun explained, as he wiped a single tear from his eye. "There are few, human or otherwise, who can compete with good old William. If there was a clue to detect, a mystery to unravel, a lead to follow, anything at all really, he would have already picked up on it. Since he hasn\'t, then that means there\'s nothing."

"Or the perpetrator knows exactly how to avoid my detection," William said blandly, looking directly at Jotun. It need not be explained who he suspected as the culprit.

"Innkeeper, I saw you have a news agency where you sell sensitive information," said Henry, the founder of the Knight family, who was head of the royal family\'s intelligence department.

"Perhaps you can have them look into the matter. It would not do if one of the pillars of our empire was maligned like this so publicly."

He spoke with a straight face and genuine concern, but Lex suspected he was still teasing William.

"I will have them look into the matter, though the Midnight News is run by one of my workers. I don\'t know if she will be able to investigate such a matter, she is still young."

Lex paused for a moment before he continued.

"All my workers here at the Inn are very young, and have just begun to spread their wings. I treat them like family, but I am busy so often that I worry their familiar bonds will grow weak. It is good to see that you brothers have maintained such a strong bond, even after so much time."

Lex\'s statement was, of course, a probing one. Although he had his suspicions, it wasn\'t like he could ask them personal questions directly. Besides, of them all, William was the only one who supposedly hadn\'t sired a prominent family. Lex was probably just a victim of over imagination. There was no way he was related to this man who looked completely identical to him and had Lex\'s last name as his first name.

"Family… family is complicated, for everyone," said Nisar with a sigh, his previous jovial mood dissipating. "Though as brothers we\'ve remained close, Jotun is the only one of us who really even meets his descendants anymore - and even that is often because of work. And poor William, his family is too embarrassed to meet him even if he were willing."

"Oh? Do you mind me asking why?" asked Lex, making sure to display only the appropriate amount of curiosity.

"I don\'t blame them, but… they\'re just too unlucky. Not a single one of them has ever been able to fully unlock the bloodline William passed onto them, causing them to develop very poorly. It\'s so much so that they don\'t even dare publicize that they are related to one of the emperors \'advisors\'."

So that means William does have a family… though they are apparently weak. And what does it even mean that they couldn\'t unlock the bloodline he passed to them? Since they were all brothers, shouldn\'t they all pass the same bloodline down to their descendants?