_*]:min-w-0 !gap-3.5" style="border:0px solid">With characteristic patience, Lucius orchestrated Lord Constantine's downfall through a series of precisely calibrated political maneuvers. Evidence of corruption gradually emerged through seemingly unreted channels, each revetion appearing coincidental rather than coordinated. When Constantine was finally stripped of his nobility and sent to Valerian's territory as a blood resource, not even the most astute political observers connected these developments to Lucius's subtle influence.

  The vacant territory presented a strategic opportunity that Lucius seized immediately. Rather than appointing a traditional noble, he granted the domain to Viscount Gabriel, a former priest whose progressive leanings made him an unusual but defensible choice.

  "Gabriel's theological background provides valuable perspective on resource management," Lucius expined to questioning council members, his reasoning seemingly focused on immediate governance rather than long-term strategy.

  This territorial restructuring created a continuous corridor of progressive influence connecting several previously isoted domains. But Lucius didn't stop there. In a follow-up directive that initially appeared to be minor administrative housekeeping, he granted permanent traveling rights to all his wereanimal "pets" housed on Cassian's nds, allowing them free movement to and from Gabriel's newly acquired territory.

  This seemingly routine permission had profound consequences as some wereanimal packs, drawn to Gabriel's more accommodating governance style, chose to relocate entirely. Wolf packs, feline groups, and other wereanimals established new communities within Gabriel's territory, creating unprecedented concentrations of different species in proximity to human poputions.

  The territorial adjustments served multiple interconnected purposes in Lucius's broader design—creating safe havens for vulnerable poputions, increasing beneficial interspecies contact, and establishing conditions for developments that existed only in his prophetic visions. Yet to outside observers, these changes appeared merely as routine governance decisions by an Archduke known for efficient territorial management.

  Even the nobles most suspicious of Lucius's motivations could identify nothing objectionable in these arrangements. Granting territory to a respected vampire with religious credentials seemed reasonable, while allowing movement of his own property between territories under his influence was entirely within his rights as an Archduke.

  What none could perceive was how these seemingly disconnected administrative decisions were carefully positioned steps in a strategy whose true purpose remained entirely invisible to vampire society.

  Lucius hopes that Nova would be born there.