Chapter 592: Facing Order |
Back in the room, Chernosly and Moxius's planning finally reached its conclusion.
They set their operation for three days later at midnight—the exact moment when the inner and outer shift-change schedules overlapped at the Supreme Court.
Having committed their entire plan to memory, Li Jingming stopped wasting time and channeled his Memory power to accelerate the dream's flow. The scene leapt forward to the night of Chernosly's operation.
The dreamscape shifted in a haze, and in the blink of an eye the three players materialized near the Supreme Court. Chernosly was already scaling the high walls under Moxius's cover, advancing toward the court's inner sanctum.
Three ghosts trailed silently behind, shadowing his every move.
Chernosly's preparation had been meticulous. He'd timed every gap in the shift changes and slipped through the Knights' blind spots with precision. The sentries guarding the Supreme Court weren't as alert as those at the Howling Iron Prison—in their minds, nobody would dare "walk to their death" in a capital saturated with Order's presence.
Before long, the group reached the High Pavilion where the Iron Law was enshrined. Standing before it, Chernosly's expression became impossibly complex.
His humility hid defiance. His devotion was laced with doubt. His resolve was riddled with anxiety. His fear sparked courage. He gazed upon this holy site—where Order had once watched, descended, and bestowed guidance upon the Grand Tribunal—and felt his heart thunder like a war drum, his mind roar like a chorus of lightning.
He didn't know whether what he was about to do was right. But he knew Order... must withstand questioning!
And so, with this conviction, Chernosly's face grew ever more unyielding, his eyes ever more resolute. He waited for the perimeter to clear, then took his first, near-blasphemous step toward the tower that represented Him.
As for the three non-protagonists behind him—they, too, seemed infected by the suffocating tension. Their faces turned somber one after another.
Of course, what made them tense wasn't Chernosly's performance or the oppressive atmosphere. It was... It. The Iron Law!
A god's gaze recognized no distinction between past and future, reality and dream. The moment they followed this First-Class Inquisitor through that threshold, all three players would—within Chernosly's dream—be standing face-to-face with Order!
The terrifying part was that some of them already suspected something was wrong with Order.
The even more terrifying part was that Cheng Shi already knew the entity in that pavilion was not Order at all.
So, in the name of caution, Cheng Shi shoved the Dragon King ahead of him and pulled Big Cat behind him. Only when he had a meat shield both front and back did his taut nerves relax by exactly 0.001 percent.
Big Cat's expression was equally grave—but within that gravity hid a concealed eagerness.
No one knew what she was thinking. They only heard her ask: "Is this... considered a divine audience?"
Li Jingming walked steadily, disinclined to chat. Cheng Shi hid in the middle and nodded discreetly: "If blaspheming a god to his face counts as a divine audience, then yes—I think we are."
"..."
"..."
That single quip cranked the surrounding tension to its peak. Even Li Jingming stumbled mid-step up ahead, drawing a deep breath before cautiously pressing on.
Chernosly, too, advanced with care. Rather than vault over the outer walls into the High Pavilion, he crept through the night toward the first-floor doors, eased them open, then tiptoed in with almost reverent silence.
And the instant the three trailing "ghosts" slipped through the crack behind him—every one of them froze.
Because the Iron Law—the one that should have been housed on the topmost floor, the embodiment of Order's will and the Grand Tribunal's supreme constitution—was hovering right before their eyes. It radiated infinite holy Order light and faced them, its pages flipping with a rush of whispers.
It had seen them. It had caught these interlopers!
Chernosly's mind went blank. His first instinct was to drop to his knees in devout greeting.
"Civilization's flame ignites, Order endures eternal! Praise the great Benefactor! Praise the God of Order who ensures civilized and orderly progress throughout the world!"
But the moment the reflexive praise left his lips, he remembered: he hadn't come to pay homage to his Benefactor. He'd come to... question him.
And so, under the stunned gazes of Cheng Shi, Hong Lin, and Li Jingming, this "audacious" follower of Order cut straight to the point with absolute bluntness, completely bypassing every planned preamble, and hurled his deepest doubt at the divine artifact before him.
"If I may ask, great Benefactor—is everything my teacher, Grand Justice La Quis, said... true?"
The sheer abruptness made even Cheng Shi's heart lurch.
'Bro—the plan you and Moxius hashed out was solid. First profess your devotion, then present your experiences, then steer the conversation toward judgment, and finally introduce the doubt. You two spent an entire night rehearsing a complete script—so how come you jumped straight to the last line?'
'Where's the preamble? The emotional appeal? The step-by-step buildup?!'
'All just—gone?'
'How is that question any different from outright blasphemy?'
'That's not even good blasphemy!'
'Who do you think you are—a darling of the Void? That every god is the Fun God?'
'When I question him, he laughs and shades me. When you question Order... guess how he's going to judge you?'
No need to guess—because Order's judgment arrived immediately.
Moments after Chernosly posed his question, the Iron Law hovering in the air began flipping its pages in a frenzy.
The turning grew faster and faster, until it was practically brutalizing its own pages. And as the rustling escalated into a violent racket, the holy Order light emanating from the codex gradually warped into a turbid, gruel-thick yellow glow.
The instant that familiar radiance flared, Cheng Shi's mind detonated.
Chaos!
That murky yellow light was unmistakable. Not long ago, he'd waded through those same churning yellow mists while impersonating the Envoy of Chaos—and conned a Grand Marshal in the process.
The color of that mist was identical to the yellow light now shining down on Chernosly's head.
This wasn't Order's radiance. This was Chaos's muddy glow!
Every muscle in Cheng Shi's body seized. A bolt of cold shot from his tailbone straight to the crown of his skull, and even in his spectral state, he felt goosebumps erupting in waves.
Why was there Chaos?
How could there be Chaos?!
This was Order's divine gift, embodying the supreme constitution! This was Order's avatar, embodying Order's will! This was the Iron Law that had usurped Order's Divine Throne—so why was it radiating the light of Chaos?!
Cheng Shi was staggered. Even the moment Prosperity had destroyed itself, he hadn't been this shaken.
His reaction was swiftly noticed by the Dragon King and Big Cat. Sensing something wrong, both instinctively closed ranks around him.
Big Cat asked with concern: "What's wrong?"
Li Jingming turned his head, expression grave: "So Order really does have a problem. Its radiance has turned murky."
"!!!"
Hearing the Dragon King's observation, Cheng Shi's head snapped up, and he stared at the Iron Law again. A sudden realization struck: the entity hadn't altered Order's aura—only its visual radiance.
In other words, this chaotic, turbid glow—unrecognizable to anyone else—still appeared to be Order in the Dragon King's and Big Cat's eyes. Disordered, problematic Order, but Order nonetheless.
They couldn't distinguish what the light signified. They didn't yet know what was happening.
But Cheng Shi knew far too well. Fear was blooming inside him, because he could already feel a familiar presence beginning to seep from the turbid glow—a presence he'd experienced only once before, while climbing the Chaos Steps.
The unmistakable herald of an indiscriminate storm of Chaos!
His blood ran cold. He grabbed the Dragon King and Big Cat and began retreating at full speed. Both were decisive—the second they'd felt his alarm they'd already prepared to pull back. Seeing his expression contort, they couldn't not know something they hadn't detected was unfolding. Their gazes hardened, and they reversed course, dragging Cheng Shi toward the pavilion's exit.
But they were one beat too slow—because the Iron Law had grown ever more frenzied.
Its pages whipped back and forth like tidal waves. In a flash and without warning, the book violently exploded. Countless pages inscribed with legal scripture peeled away from the codex and drifted down like snow. The holy scripture-light dimmed. Red light pulsed. And across every fluttering page, warped scratches spread like a disease, seemingly desperate to obliterate every shred of Order's civilizational text.
Torrents of unspeakably terrifying Chaos power erupted from page after page in succession, layered like the cresting waves of a tsunami—roaring, surging, and slamming outward in every direction. The man and three "ghosts" who hadn't escaped in time were swept off their feet.