Chapter 952: The Battle |
Cheng Shi had no idea what was going through Sun Miao's mind. All he knew was that if her assessment was correct, everything seemed to line up.
Xiao Qi... was very likely the Beast Tamer who'd abducted Xie Yang!
He had Torchbearer blood on his hands.
Noting this silently, Cheng Shi showed no visible reaction.
Seeing Sun Miao still sizing him up, he chuckled lightly and redirected his attention to the trial. He started wondering what had become of Keinlaur, whom she'd been tasked with watching, if she'd really gone chasing after Xiao Qi instead.
He'd been counting on extracting something useful from Keinlaur's mouth.
So on the way back to the Boro Highlands, Cheng Shi raised the question. Sun Miao cast a glance at the hilltop camp, her expression slightly stiff as she typed:
"Compared to your Beast Tamer friend, Keinlaur, who has long commanded the Grand Tribunal, is undoubtedly the harder target.
As you know, the Keinlaur at the left-flank camp is merely one of his slices. And since it's a slice, controlling it loses its meaning, because another Keinlaur can appear at any time, anywhere he needs to be, and accomplish whatever he wants to push forward.
Lies can deceive, but a person's actual actions never lie.
He wants to fulfill the Shared Law Faction's century-old vision, so he will undoubtedly make moves during this battle. All we need to do is watch him closely and find the reasons behind the Grand Tribunal's downfall and [Order]'s decline. And within that authentic past, you, too, can find what you're looking for."
Although Sun Miao's logic was sound, Cheng Shi's expression turned peculiar. He glanced at her and added a pointed remark:
"Vice President Sun, don't tell me you tried trading intelligence with him and got rejected?"
"..."
Seeing Sun Miao silently put away her electronic beeper confirmed it. Cheng Shi's amusement grew: "Did he kill himself? Otherwise, with your methods, even a forced interrogation should have yielded something, shouldn't it?"
"..."
"Heh, interesting." Cheng Shi stopped walking and turned toward the central camp's direction. "No big deal, though. Now that this slice is dead, we just wait for the next one to appear.
But Vice President Sun, I consider you an ally. Don't play games with me. I know the History School's specialty is extracting history from the dead, so what did the deceased Keinlaur tell you?"
"..."
Indeed, the reason Sun Miao had offered so much analysis was to divert Cheng Shi's attention, making him think she'd simply given up control of Keinlaur rather than driven him to suicide.
While Cheng Shi and Chun had gone to deal with Lin Xi, Keinlaur had decisively died in front of Sun Miao. He hadn't wanted to trade intelligence with an outsider, but the Supreme Inquisitor didn't know that his death was itself a kind of exchange, a one-sided one.
Sun Miao used the History School's techniques to invade the corpse's memories, and within its fragmented recollections she found an old conversation between Keinlaur and Lid Yara.
This was shortly after the death of Supreme Inquisitor Lo Yat, and only days after La Quis had been locked away in the Howling Iron Prison. Lid Yara, investigating these events, had sought out Keinlaur, who had rarely returned to Katouting. And what followed was the scene Sun Miao witnessed:
The two sat in a tea room within the Supreme Court, facing each other in silence.
After a long while, Lid Yara broke the quiet, probing: "You seem very busy lately. How are things at the border?"
Keinlaur smiled and shook his head. He didn't sidestep the question, but nor did he directly address the fires burning at the Grand Tribunal's frontier. Instead, he brought up the Tower of Logic.
"The followers of [Truth] seem to have chosen divergent paths, each firmly believing their road leads to the true [Truth]. I find this quite interesting. At least here, within the Grand Tribunal, we've never had such a schism."
Lid Yara frowned: "Don't the different legal factions sharing governance represent our way of handling disagreements?"
"No, it's different. We always worship the same [Order]. But them, each Grand Scholar believes they're seeing a different [Truth]."
Lid Yara thought for a moment and drained her teacup.
"You seem quite knowledgeable about [Truth]?"
Keinlaur gave her a meaningful look. "I have nothing to hide. I know you're investigating His followers, and I know you once looked into Galusha. But my understanding of [Truth] doesn't come from the people around me. It comes from the fires of war at the Tower of Logic.
I'm not interested in [Truth] itself. What interests me is this: if different followers pray to different [Truths], do all of those [Truths] still count as [Truth]?"
It was a terrifying question, one that in that era could easily be considered blasphemy. But the supreme authority sheltered by [Order] seemed unafraid to discuss his neighbor. Lid Yara tapped the table, puzzled.
"What are you trying to say?"
Keinlaur smiled faintly and shook his head. "Nothing. Just idle curiosity."
"The next scheduled audience and report to Him is coming up soon. Are you... going to be traveling again?"
Lid Yara's question all but laid her suspicion on the table, yet Keinlaur didn't deny it. He simply stroked his graying hair and gazed into the distance, his voice tinged with a sigh.
"Yes. The frontier is unsettled. The fighting continues to escalate. Time... is running short."
The memory cut off there. Corpse memories varied in completeness from person to person, but Keinlaur's were especially fragmented, perhaps due to the effects of being a slice.
This fragment was all Sun Miao had managed to extract. Seeing that Cheng Shi had seen through her cover, she had no choice but to share everything, not wanting to lose her most valuable "client." Then she added:
"Keinlaur had harbored treasonous thoughts long ago. He wasn't interested in [Truth] itself. What fascinated him was the fact that [Truth]'s followers each believed in 'a different [Truth].'
That's the logical foundation for his plan to overthrow the old [Order]. It's also why he could claim, with confidence, that he was still devout to [Order]. He truly was creating a new [Order], and he intended to use the method of faith transference to personally forge a new 'Order.'
Unfortunately, the Shared Law Faction's century-long scheme failed. Instead, it ended up handing everything to King Delvo."
"Delvo?" Cheng Shi blinked, unable to find the name anywhere in his memory.
"Yes. You might not know his real name, but you'll certainly recognize his other title:
The War Monarch.
He was the first War Monarch, the man who led the battered War Legion through every obstacle, smashing the Grand Tribunal and the Tower of Logic's will to fight with devastating force. He founded the Kingdom of [War] and planted war's bloody apricot tree in the Volbelli Court.
Right now, he's on the other side of the Boro Highlands, directly facing us."
Sun Miao pointed into the distance, her expression unreadable, typing one-handed:
"Perhaps from this moment on, this era no longer belongs solely to [Order] and [Truth]. It belongs equally to [War], whose creed is: 'How shall we survive? Through blood and fire alone!'"
It was meant as a passing reflection, but fate seemed to play a joke on the two players. The instant Sun Miao's words appeared on screen, against the fading glow of the sinking sun, war horns blared one after another across the entire Grand Tribunal battle line atop the Boro Highlands.
The horns shook the heavens. Battle standards blotted out the sky. The epochal battle had begun, and the Grand Tribunal's fate, like the dusk before them, began its westward descent into an irreversible decline.
Cheng Shi stared in wide-eyed shock at the device in the [Silence] believer's hands, thinking:
'That electronic beeper of yours must be blessed by a god.'
...