Chapter 581: Act 328 – The Battle of Saintly White XII
“Everything Returns Society?” Romaine heard this answer and raised her chin to think for a moment, “I seem to recall Brendel mentioning it before; it’s a cult organization, right?”
White Mist stared expressionlessly at Viscount Begning on the ground, “The nihilists believe that everything is meaningless, and there exists a serpent called ‘Ouroboros’ in the world; the world is a cycle, a brief order followed by a long chaos. They have existed since before the War of the Saints…”
Viscount Begning was stunned by this statement. Under the suppression of the four great temples, mortals believe that the Everything Returns Society is synonymous with cultists, and few understand their history and doctrines.
He couldn’t help but widen his eyes and stare at White Mist, shouting, “Since you know the truth about the world so well, why don’t you join us? You know… our goal is noble!”
But Miss White Mist pinned him to the ground with a single sentence: “All things are one, everything returns to the cycle; complex things must inevitably return to nothingness. I never expected that there are still people who believe in such nonsense today.”
“No, this is not nonsense!” Viscount Begning roared.
“Romaine, give him a hammer.” After a millennium of experience, White Mist had no interest in reasoning with mortals, especially since the other party had no relation to her; power was the best truth.
“Okay!”
“Don’t, ah—!” Viscount Begning let out a horrified scream, tears and snot streaming down his face, as he nervously stared at the two female demons, momentarily unsure of who the real cultist was.
“Continue with the next question.”
The Business Lady waved her hammer and asked leisurely, “So you are the third-party force in this game? Yet you are also manipulating the direction of the situation; human hearts are shallow, and everything is driven by desires, much like merchants acting for profit. What is the purpose of your actions?”
“……” Viscount Begning was silent for a moment, his gaze landing on the glittering hammer, and he couldn’t help but tremble slightly, “Of course, it is to overthrow Erluin.”
Romaine turned her head, and Miss White Mist yawned, “Half truth, half lie. Mortals often say that the most truthful lies are seven parts true and three parts false, yet they do not realize that lies serve only to conceal the truth, and lies are inherently opposed to the truth.”
“So the three parts of falsehood are merely to mislead. Conversely, consider this: beneath the goal of overthrowing Erluin, the actions of the Everything Returns Society must have their core interests, right?” The Business Lady nodded in agreement.
Viscount Begning stared at Romaine as if he had seen a ghost: “…Are you playing dumb?”
Before he could finish his sentence, he was struck again. Amidst the Viscount’s cries, Romaine corrected him seriously: “Romaine is destined to become the greatest merchant in this world; this is called great wisdom appearing foolish, you fool.”
White Mist looked at the poor creature with dead fish eyes and shook her head, thinking that this time he was right; this guy was indeed a fool, but he had eyes that could see the essence of the human heart.
Witches exist to manipulate hearts. As she had said before, no one can resist their own desires.
Romaine clapped her hands and looked at Viscount Begning, asking, “What do you want to do? Just say it.”
Viscount Begning’s face revealed a look of sorrow and anger; he struggled to control his mouth but could not escape his true feelings. In his difficult struggle, he slowly opened his mouth—
“Jotungrund.”
……
Saneer brought Antinna down from the ship before nightfall, joining the princess’s army. However, the arrival of the staff lady brought a headache-inducing piece of news for Brendel—Young Romaine had gone missing again!
Brendel’s head immediately throbbed.
Recently, the Business Lady had been performing well; even he thought she had ‘turned over a new leaf’ and put away her headache-inducing whimsical ideas. But unexpectedly, in the blink of an eye, our Business Lady had reverted to her old ways!
If Brendel had any thoughts at this moment, it would definitely be to grab that little one who wandered around and give her a good spanking. Unfortunately, this was merely wishful thinking. Besides, Antinna had brought back another piece of information: Romaine’s last words before she left.
Brendel knew well that although Romaine’s ideas were often outlandish, her instincts were always accurate. Whether in Buche or Eternalwood Forest, not to mention in previous adventures, the Business Lady had demonstrated astonishing insight.
Not to mention she now had another identity: the successor of the Witch King.
In fact, that night at Dierphir’s estate, after Romaine had used witchcraft, Brendel had indirectly reached a conclusion. The older sister she mentioned was likely the legendary Witch King’s ice princess; at least from that underground time frame, one could discern clues. Moreover, the Business Lady could hide no secrets from him.
Brendel quickly calmed down. He did not know whether Romaine was still in Ampere Seale, but he could only hope that the Witch King would protect her heir well. Furthermore, according to Antinna’s description, Romaine was expected to have a contract spirit with her.
In “Amber Sword,” contract spirits are somewhat similar to witches’ familiars but are far superior. A contract spirit is an entity existing between nature spirits and lower-level deities, most having existed in this world for thousands of years, possessing extensive knowledge and experience. The contract spirits left by the Witch King would have been even more outstanding.
Although the Business Lady usually seemed somewhat air-headed, Brendel knew she was actually very shrewd; no one with a dull mind could make a name in the merchant profession. With her in addition to a contract spirit, she should be equipped to handle most emergencies. Brendel could only self-comfort.
A moment of silent silence fell between the two.
“Lord, I’m sorry, I…” Antinna couldn’t help but bite her lip. She saw the worried look on Brendel’s face and thought it was impossible to feel even a shred of jealousy. However, aside from Freya, probably no one understood better than her the place Romaine held in Brendel’s heart.
That Business Lady possessed a certain nonchalance that seemed transcendent, as if she shouldn’t belong to this world at all. And Brendel was the only link that connected her to this world. She liked Brendel; anyone could see that, but only Antinna understood that this affection was unbound by any constraints.
Though the Business Lady had never said so, Antinna had seen this simple fact in those gray eyes more than once: because, for her, Brendel mattered more.
Even more than all the justice and kindness, ethics and morals, because she knew Romaine had never valued those ‘external things.’
Antinna lowered her gaze. She had asked herself this question more than once. Perhaps she could abandon her life for Brendel, but some deeply rooted things cannot be changed. If one day Brendel chose to become an enemy of the world, could she stand up and kill everyone who opposed him?
If he became a tyrant, turning his back on today’s vow, could she still unhesitatingly follow him?
Though this was merely a hypothesis, Antinna understood she couldn’t do it. She might choose to walk toward the end of life in pain, but she had a premonition.
Romaine could.
Because there are two people in this world who are so similar, Antinna looked at her lord. She saw Brendel eventually shake his head, reassuring her, “It’s okay; it’s good for her to suffer a bit.”
This sentence pulled Antinna back from her reverie; she exhaled heavily and quickly reverted to the demeanor of Brendel’s chief aide: “But what about what Miss Romaine said?”
“Traps?” Brendel laughed softly, “I’ve already faced one; the Temple set us up for a big trap, but in the end, it all came to nothing.”
Antinna breathed a sigh of relief. She was still wearing the long dress she had put on when boarding the ship. Now, having crossed the sea without having had a chance to tidy herself up, she found herself directly before her lord, feeling a bit awkward as she was all wet. Although the heavy dress was safe from revealing, for a moment, it was indeed somewhat embarrassing.
Brendel glanced at her; damp strands of hair were sticking to the noble girl’s forehead. For such a beautiful girl, it was quite uncomfortable, and Antinna was of noble descent. He felt somewhat moved and couldn’t help but ask, “Do you want to go change your clothes first?”
Antinna’s face flushed slightly, and shaking her head, she responded in a suitable manner for an aide, “Lord, you urgently called for me, so there must be something important. I’m fine; let’s listen to everything before discussing.”
That was indeed the case.
Brendel nodded, glancing in the direction of the forest. The sky had completely darkened by now, and below the hills behind him, the garrison city Bunoan was ablaze—according to the officer’s inference, it was likely that the Black Blade Legion had just passed that area.
However, they did not have much time left.
He gestured, and several young men immediately carried over a dark object. The object was clearly a part of a much larger metal apparatus. Upon seeing it, Antinna couldn’t help but furrow her brow; evidently, this item had not been treated with the respect it deserved when disassembled. She was almost certain that these young men had simply smashed it down.
It was part of a magical furnace.
To be precise, it was the core part, the core magic conduction device of the furnace. This was Antinna’s area of expertise; she recognized at first glance that this piece was quite old, likely one of the first models from half a century ago, though she would need to examine it more closely to distinguish which model it was.
In Antinna’s memory, these models of magical furnaces should have been introduced by Erluin from the Cruz Empire, and many places had such outdated colossal devices. Local lords typically used them to smelt steel; the core components of these magical furnaces were worth quite a lot decades ago, but now they should barely fetch anything.
Of course, they were still far better than Duke Toniger’s old furnace.
She couldn’t help but curiously look up at Brendel, not understanding why her lord wanted to show her something like this. The aide suddenly recalled that Charles had mentioned before that her lord had lived in poverty in his early years and seemed to have a habit of stealing and robbing from the rich to help the poor. The famous painting of the Dark Princess sold at the Ampere Seale auction was one of his early notable ‘thief’ creations.
Antinna hadn’t believed it before, but now she somewhat did. Only the method of dismantling these things was wrong, and almost all of them were broken. She couldn’t help but shake her head and sigh, wishing she had arrived earlier.
“My lord, these things will be hard to repair. Even if they are repaired, the cost will far exceed purchasing a new one,” she observed Brendel’s expression and replied cautiously, word by word.
“Ah?”
To her surprise, Brendel was taken aback, taking a long time to respond. “No, no, you misunderstood. Antinna, I’m not asking you to repair them; that would be troublesome. It took me quite a long time to figure out how to take them apart.”
“Ah?” Antinna was also stunned, staring at Brendel in shock, “My lord, were you the one who smashed… dismantled this?”
“Indeed, not only that, but I also need you to further dissemble them.”
“Why?”
“As you can see, because they are too heavy; there are dozens of them here—those nobles are indeed wealthy—but we can’t carry so many big fellows on our journey.” Brendel answered matter-of-factly.
“Ah…” The noble lady suddenly realized: “My lord, you are going to…”
“Exactly,” Brendel nodded, “There are quite a few core waste materials from the magic conduction devices here. Alright, I admit I turned them into ‘waste,’ but in any case, how many depletion crystals can you produce?”
He replied while looking up at his aide. And this was the real reason why he insisted on attacking the Bunoan area.
Antinna looked at her lord with a strange expression; it felt somewhat out of the realm of practical concerns to her.
……
(PS: I woke up late, so this chapter is slightly delayed. Additionally, the promised end-of-month explosion concludes yesterday. My body is a bit worn out, and moving forward, I will work to stabilize updates more. My condition isn’t great; I rewrote this chapter a bit.) (To be continued. If you enjoy this work, please visit Qidian (qidian.com) to vote for recommendations and monthly tickets. Your support is my greatest motivation.)
