Chapter 146: A Laughable Person

Chapter 146: A Laughable Person

Bernadette wore a white women’s shirt in the Intis style and sat there quietly. Her chestnut hair fell naturally over her shoulders, and her straight brows spread at exactly the right angle. She even had something of the air of a professional woman from Earth—and the kind who had occupied a high position for a long time.

The Emperor’s taste in raising the Queen of Mysteries certainly left a strong influence. It’s just limited by the surrounding environment, so it can’t be expressed completely… Klein removed his hat, pressed it to his chest, and gave a slight bow. Then he casually pulled out a chair and sat down.

Bernadette’s blue eyes, like a condensed ocean, swept over him. Her voice sounded gentle and calm.

“What is the reason for your urgent contact this time?”

Aren’t you a Prophet? Didn’t you receive even a little revelation? Klein instinctively answered like that inwardly, then immediately felt that he seemed to have grown a little too arrogant.

This should be the aftereffect of spending too long communicating with the Red Angel evil spirit… His status and level are there. He naturally influences the people around Him. If He wished to, that influence could absolutely turn into corruption… Klein swiftly examined himself and formed a certain judgment.

After a brief moment of thought, he did not answer directly, but instead asked, “Have you completed your matters in Backlund?”

Bernadette slowly shook her head.

“No.

“You could even say they have already failed.”

“Mm?” Klein used a single syllable to express his surprise and confusion.

Bernadette looked at him and spoke neither quickly nor slowly. “Sequence 2 of the Mystery Pryer pathway has a strange potion name. It is called Sage. To advance to this level, one must prevent a disaster involving high-level powers.”

Sage… So that is where the sage in Hidden Sage comes from… Klein was suddenly enlightened and was about to ask further when he heard the Queen of Mysteries continue.

“I foresaw such an opportunity appearing in Backlund, so I made arrangements here many years in advance. Recently, I even stayed here for a long time.

“Unfortunately, what I prophesied was for the second half of this year. I was not in Backlund at the end of last year and failed to stop the Great Smog. As for this war, I tried hard to do something and had indeed achieved certain results. Who could have expected Feysac to launch an air raid directly on Backlund? In the end, the disaster still broke out.”

So that is why you said you failed… Klein nodded almost imperceptibly and said with a hidden sigh, “I didn’t expect the war to be initiated by the Feysacians either.”

As he spoke, Klein sighed inwardly. The Queen of Mysteries’s advancement ritual was either very difficult, or not especially difficult at all. It all depended on one’s personal circumstances.

After all, before he had even become a demigod, he had twice stopped the descent of the True Creator and truly saved Tingen and Backlund. That would have more than satisfied the ritual requirements for becoming a Sage. But under normal circumstances, how could there be so many similar disasters? And how could any of them be easy to prevent?

Take this war, for example. Amon’s brother had schemed for one or two thousand years. Even if problems arose on King George III’s side, war would still break out exactly as He predicted, because the knot of the Death pathway’s Uniqueness simply could not be untied.

This made Klein unable to stop himself from suspecting that Mr. Azik’s life on the Northern Continent had always been part of Amon’s brother’s arrangements. Otherwise, after losing the mask that could change his appearance, how had Azik, deprived of his memories, managed to evade the attention of every major Church?

More importantly, in this lifetime, Azik had, for some reason, directly used his true name!

And that likewise had not drawn suspicion or investigation.

Was all this part of your arrangement too, Amon’s brother…? Thinking to this point, Klein again experienced a kind of post-traumatic stress reaction. His body nearly trembled.

He silently inhaled and looked at the Queen of Mysteries, adding, “This war involves the Creator’s son, a King of Angels, and true gods. It simply wasn’t something you could stop.”

With Bernadette’s knowledge, experience, and breadth of vision, even she showed a slight change in expression upon hearing those words. In a low voice, she repeated several key phrases.

“The Creator’s son… King of Angels… true gods…”

She was not overly surprised by this. It seemed she had already foreseen something. But even a Prophet had no way to truly glimpse the “script” written by Amon’s brother.

After repeating those words, Bernadette was silent for two or three seconds. Then she murmured with a faint sigh, “So that’s how it is…”

Klein adjusted his sitting posture. His thoughts shifted, and he said, “Actually, for you, this war is also an opportunity.

“Next, there will be many, many disasters. Among them will be no lack of collisions involving angel-level powers. I imagine you should command at least one Grade 0 sealed artifact, which means you may be able to prevent something at a critical moment. Of course, you must choose the timing and the method carefully.”

Bernadette nodded softly, agreeing with Klein’s statement. In doing so, she also tacitly admitted that she possessed at least one Grade 0 sealed artifact.

Of course, as the daughter of the “protagonist” of the previous era, as Emperor Roselle’s most beloved child, it would be unbelievable if her father had not left her one or two Grade 0 sealed artifacts.

More importantly, Bernadette was already preparing the ritual for advancing to Sage. This meant she certainly had the corresponding Sequence 2 Beyonder characteristic in her possession, and to some extent, that was equivalent to a Grade 0 sealed artifact.

After this tacit admission, the voice of the Queen of Mysteries Bernadette—gentle yet devoid of emotion—underwent a subtle change.

“Even so, I still dislike war, although it may bring me an opportunity.

“I once hated him, could not understand him, and for many years refused to call him Father. That was because, in his later years, in order to advance to Black Emperor, he did too many things that went against the tide of the times and harmed innocent people. I could not accept the father who was like a hero in my heart turning into a mad tyrant…

“But now, after the answer from the one behind you, and after my own investigation, I have begun to understand his situation. I understand that he bore despair, pain, and loneliness. I understand that he was like a drowning man, instinctively and desperately struggling.”

…Klein felt a wave of sorrow and complicated emotion as he listened.

The two people sitting here might well be the only ones in this world who understood Huang Tao—Roselle Gustav—the most.

Of course, this sentiment did not stop him from noticing that Bernadette’s state was somewhat different today. During their previous meetings, this princess had never spoken so much, never so directly opened her heart. At most, she had blown a musical piece and expressed a little sorrow in an implicit and restrained way.

After thinking for a moment, Klein pretended not to notice and instead asked, “When did He begin to change? Do you believe there were any signs before that, or anything worth paying attention to?”

The deep blue eyes of the Queen of Mysteries moved slightly, as though she had fallen into a long memory.

Only after quite some time did she slowly speak.

“Not long before that, he said something to me with a little pride: Haven’t you always wanted to know what lies on the moon and the other planets around us? In the future, perhaps our journey will be to the stars and the sea.”

The stars and the sea… What lies on the moon and other planets… As Klein pondered the Queen of Mysteries’s words, he suddenly recalled a key phrase and an incident.

The key phrase was:

“The starry sky!”

The incident was:

Mr. Door had once told Emperor Roselle that when he had the ability and the chance, he could go look at the moon. It would answer many of his doubts.

Did the Emperor ultimately go? Was that hysterical diary written after that exploration? Did his personality unknowingly change after that, becoming extreme and radical? Klein recalled the relevant content and, under Bernadette’s gaze, considered his words before saying, “At your level, you should more or less know that there is corruption from the starry sky.”

Bernadette nodded and did not ask further. It seemed she knew that Gehrman Sparrow, seated opposite her, did not know either. She also knew that only demigods at the level of angels could perceive and resist that kind of corruption.

Klein and she looked at one another in silence for more than ten seconds. Then he guided the topic toward his purpose.

“One of the causes of this war is that Loen’s King George III discovered the nine secret mausoleums left behind by the Blood Emperor Tudor and conceived the idea of switching to the Black Emperor pathway to become Sequence 0. For this, he repealed the Grain Act…”

Klein did not care whether the Queen of Mysteries already understood these matters. Following his own rhythm, he gave a rough account without omitting the key points. At the end, he said, “The Black Emperor indeed has the ability to resurrect. But once a new Black Emperor appears, the original one will fall completely.”

The “original one” referred to Emperor Roselle, who might have already succeeded but “died by assassination.”

Sometimes, Klein even suspected that Roselle had deliberately given others an opportunity and fallen on the spot. That way, when he resurrected from the astral world, retook the Uniqueness, and drew back the three Sequence 1 characteristics, he would no longer take back the characteristics of other pathways such as Knowledge Emperor and Arcane Scholar. He could then make himself pure again and rid himself of madness.

It was a method of seeking life in death. But the premise was that Roselle’s ritual had succeeded back then—that he had died during or after the ritual, not before it.

The Queen of Mysteries Bernadette listened quietly, then slowly said, “You wish to stop George III?”

“Yes.” Klein nodded calmly.

“Why?” Bernadette asked in a tone that did not change.

The corners of Klein’s lips lifted. He smiled and said, “For some laughable reasons not worth mentioning.”

Bernadette’s gaze rested on his face for a while.

“That is enough. I too am working for things that are faint, distant, and may very well never happen.

“In stopping George III, we can cooperate.”

We are all “laughable” people… Klein sighed inwardly and said, “I’ll give you the method to summon my messenger.”

“Very well.” Bernadette reached out with her right hand and gently tapped the tabletop.

The fountain pen originally placed beside her suddenly sprang up, as though held by an invisible spirit, and began writing freely and smoothly across the paper.

“This is the method to summon my messenger,” Bernadette said calmly.

Translator’s Note:
The diary entry referenced here appears in Volume 3, Chapter 233, “Madness in His Later Years.”