“You killed both of them?” John Foster asked, his voice full of displeasure.

“Yes.” William Thompson replied, “I killed both of them.”

“Sir, it’s true… this man killed the ones you wanted. We… we saw him do it with our own eyes.” a jailer responded.

John Foster said, “What happened?”

“I killed Brian Carter first.”

It was still William Thompson speaking. At this moment, his face was pale and he looked extremely weak, but his eyes were already very calm.

He walked to the railing, put down the bone knife in his hand, and continued, “This was brought in by Brian Carter. He wanted to kill me, so I killed him.”

John Foster said, “And then? Why is Matthew Cooper dead too? Do you know he was useful to me?”

“It’s exactly because I knew you needed him that I killed him.” William Thompson said, “After I killed Brian Carter, I suddenly heard someone say, ‘It’s the smell of blood.’ I turned my head and saw Matthew Cooper crouched here.

He was crouched here, looking and sniffing toward our cell, the iron chains clanking nonstop. I saw the look in his eyes, as if I saw two words… hunger.

Sure enough, he said to me, ‘Drag the body over, the blood is still warm, I want to drink it.’ So, I dragged Brian Carter’s corpse over to him.”

When John Foster heard this, his face grew even darker.

Perhaps agitated, William Thompson seemed a bit unhinged, even gave a slight smile, and muttered to himself, “Matthew Cooper… he must have been very hungry. With that much muscle, he needs a lot of energy every day, and the coarse grains in prison can’t satisfy him. But I still don’t understand, why does he like to drink human blood?”

Surprisingly, John Foster answered, “Because he was raised by barbarians. Have you heard of ‘eating raw meat and drinking blood’?”

“No wonder, yesterday he said he didn’t want to work for you Song people.”

“Why did you kill him?”

“Yes, I killed him.” William Thompson said, “While he was sucking Brian Carter’s blood, I stabbed him in the chest. I also told these jailers not to touch the scene and to go get you. That way, they could clear themselves of involvement. Otherwise, if the person you needed died, they’d be held responsible. As for why I did this…”

At this point, William Thompson looked up, stared into John Foster’s eyes, and very sincerely said another sentence.

“I’ll be direct—give me a chance to live, and whatever you wanted Matthew Cooper to do, I’ll do it…”

Chapter Three: The Villain

John Foster surveyed the cell for a while, closed his eyes, as if returning to the scene when William Thompson killed…

Through the thick wooden bars, Matthew Cooper was pressed against Brian Carter’s neck, drinking blood. His lips were already cracked, but there was still satisfaction in his eyes, showing he was truly thirsty. After all, he only got one cup of water a day in prison, so he drank with great focus, not minding that Brian Carter’s blood was fishy and gamey.

All four of his limbs were shackled, making movement difficult.

From this, it seemed that William Thompson killing him was very easy.

But that’s not right.

Brian Carter’s corpse blocked most of Matthew Cooper’s body, and there were bars in the way. The angle for the bone knife to stab in was extremely tricky—fast, precise, and ruthless.

There was only one fatal wound; William Thompson stabbed just once.

But Brian Carter had two wounds, meaning William Thompson stabbed him again to make sure.

In other words, when killing Brian Carter, William Thompson was panicked, but when killing Matthew Cooper, he was already confident he could kill with a single blow.

Not stabbing again after killing—that’s a bad habit.

But the satisfaction in Matthew Cooper’s eyes showed he died very quickly, before he could even react.

William Thompson had that kind of skill.

Also, at the time, the jailers had already rushed in and were shouting at William Thompson. For an ordinary youth, not crying under the curses of these fierce jailers would be impressive, but he actually dared to kill someone right in front of them…

After reviewing all the details, John Foster opened his eyes.

“I originally thought you killed Matthew Cooper out of indignation—indignant that he was so evil, yet I was going to let him go.”

William Thompson said, “You weren’t going to let him go, you wanted him to do something. That’s fair. I wasn’t indignant; this is the opportunity I wanted.”

“That’s right. I wanted him to do something very important—more important than the eleven people he ate.”

As John Foster spoke, he looked at Matthew Cooper’s corpse, his expression seeming a bit regretful, and continued, “On my way here, I was thinking, if you killed him for the sake of justice and ruined my plans, I’d have you torn to pieces.”

“You hate procedural justice?” William Thompson said, “Or rather, you hate rigid rules and all that pompous stuff?”

John Foster chewed over the words “procedural justice,” knowing William Thompson was deliberately using sharp terms to show off his abilities.

But after thinking for a moment, John Foster said seriously, “You’re wrong. I hate civil officials. Except for a very few, I hate almost all of them.”

Hearing this, William Thompson actually felt relieved.

Judging by John Foster’s clothes, his rank was clearly not very high, which made one worry whether he really had the power to pardon a condemned prisoner. But now that he could say such things, it showed he had considerable authority.

William Thompson judged that John Foster had powerful backing, and might even be one of those “very few.”

“What do you think I wanted Matthew Cooper to do?” John Foster asked again.