Chapter Forty-Three: The Family’s Night Banquet

Blackbeard sat upon the throne, while Lin Qi casually perched himself on the upturned tail of the Black Tiger King's seat. Enzo, resigned to his circumstances, found no assistance from Iron Hammer or Cleaver, both men of crude temperament, nor from Blackbeard, who was hardly a model of decorum—no one thought to bring him a stool, or anything of the sort. Thus, Enzo was left to laboriously drag a heavy oak chair from the dining table up to the platform, and join Lin Qi and his father for an intimate conversation.

Only in moving the chair did Enzo realize its true heft. Carved from solid oak, the chair itself weighed several hundred pounds, but Lin Qi’s ancestors, determined to make it even more durable, had added an inch-thick iron plate beneath it to prevent wear from friction with the floor. The result was a chair tipping the scales at seven or eight hundred pounds; even Enzo, with his considerable strength, struggled mightily to shift it.

Meanwhile, Iron Hammer and Cleaver—both strong enough to move the chair with ease—stood by and howled with malicious laughter. Blackbeard and Lin Qi laughed so hard their eyes squinted into lines. Enzo flushed deep red, feeling utterly foolish for accompanying Lin Qi here. Truly, this family was far from ordinary!

Blackbeard was running for mayor of Dunark, and even aspired to become provincial governor; yet his main concern was the annual administrative budget and tax revenue! A bandit remains a bandit—one could scarcely imagine what havoc Blackbeard might wreak if he ever held such a position in the Empire. Perhaps the servants of the Black Tiger family would be reorganized into official imperial legions? The dragon cavalry and brass-helmeted soldiers who roamed the streets would be replaced by Lin Qi’s fierce, fire-setting heroes, plundering homes in the name of the Imperial Family!

The mere thought of such a scene sent chills down Enzo’s spine. The prospect was thrilling, explosive, and if Blackbeard managed to acquire a noble title and find himself in the imperial court, the consequences would be fascinating indeed. One could hardly imagine what the Empire would become if men like him rose to high office.

Outside, the clatter of pots and pans echoed, and powerful aromas of spice and roasted meat wafted through the air—the family servants were preparing a welcome feast. Lin Qi’s return coincided precisely with the Festival of the Hearth God, a day of worship on the Western Continent, when all members of the household gather to eat and drink together. It marked the beginning of the “Winter Vigil,” when blizzards from Odin’s northern icefields swept across most of the continent, and people rarely ventured outdoors, preferring instead to huddle at home through the long, cold months. For any family with means, the Festival of the Hearth God heralded a series of winter banquets.

After all, how else could one pass a long winter but by feasting indoors? Setting aside the mayoral campaign for now, Blackbeard questioned Lin Qi closely about his activities over the past three years. Though Blackbeard had his own channels—news from the Lame Man’s shop in Dunark arrived from time to time—there were many things even the Lame Man could not discover. So Blackbeard asked Lin Qi for every detail.

Lin Qi deflected his father’s inquiries with vague answers, repeatedly lamenting his poverty, destitution, and lack of funds. Blackbeard’s face darkened to a purplish hue; smoke billowed from his nostrils as if he wished to slap Lin Qi to the floor and kick him soundly.

Amidst their rather pointless exchanges, the banquet was nearly ready. Because Lin Qi, the young master, was returning home for the first time in three years, this year’s Hearth God Festival in the Lin Qi household was especially grand. Not to mention the wine and side dishes—the main course alone featured thirty whole roasted sheep, heads and tails intact, their bodies roasted to a golden hue, fat dripping and infused with abundant spices from the East.

Such roasted sheep would fetch a staggering two hundred gold coins apiece in the finest taverns of Brayley—not for the lamb itself, but for the precious spices sprinkled atop it, brought from the East across tens of thousands of miles of sea; each handful of spice was worth a dozen gold coins.

Besides the roasted sheep, there were generous slabs of tender beefsteak, roasted geese and chickens neatly arranged on massive silver platters; suckling pigs, their plump forms propped up by silver forks and lined up as if marching in ranks.

There were also various rare birds. The nobles of the Empire had a particular fondness for exotic waterfowl—black swans, white swans, mallards, larks, and so forth. At Lin Qi’s banquet, at least forty varieties of waterfowl were served. The aroma was so thick and rich it seemed almost to form visible clouds.

Hundreds of burly, fierce-looking men attended the banquet—these were elders of the Lin Qi family, worthy of a place in the grand hall. Elsewhere, in a dozen smaller banquet rooms, other household members, including servants and maids, indulged in their own festivities. In total, more than three thousand people attended this single feast, a scale rivaling even the imperial banquets at Victory Palace.

And that was not all—while everyone reveled, several hundred robust men stood guard at posts outside the ancestral home. Calling this place a “dragon’s lair or tiger’s den” would not be an exaggeration.

After Blackbeard performed a mock solemn prayer to the Hearth God, he raised a massive golden goblet and declared the feast begun. Hundreds of burly men in the hall raised their cups and cheered, “Long live Old Blackbeard!” and then, “Welcome home, Young Master!” Amidst laughter and shouting, they drained their cups in a single draught.

Among them, several dozen unmistakably pure-blooded beastmen stood out. Elsewhere on the Western Continent, beastmen were relentlessly hunted, but here, in the Lin Qi ancestral home, they drank and feasted with humans, shoulder to shoulder, as if one big family.

Lin Qi and Enzo each carried a barrel of wine, making rounds to toast the elders of the family—uncles, aunts, and cousins, all bearing scars and fierce faces, but each greeting Lin Qi with a kindly smile.

Lin Qi was only required to take a small sip at each toast, but Enzo was not so fortunate—he was made to gulp down a full bowl every time.

Thus, within mere minutes of the banquet’s start, Enzo was flat on his back, utterly incapacitated.

An hour later, Lin Qi himself succumbed, intoxicated and unable to rise.

Blackbeard shook his head, hoisted Lin Qi, and carried him out of the banquet hall.