1263 A Love Letter

[Host, you have a lot of patience for all the impulsive decisions you took not too long ago. You endured all those beatings. You matured. You aren't even that petty anymore.]

"Aren't you being too harsh? I was just a teenager, only 18 back then. After everything, I matured." Varian replied as he looked at his reflection in the lake.

It had been two days since the incident. The envoys didn't bother contacting him. They stayed around the place and were carrying out more studies to figure out the space portal and space cracks.

As for the census? They carelessly stamped down on a few documents and were done with it.

Looking at the official page of the Alliance, Varian exhaled a long breath. Whatever the situation, humanity had stepped onto the grand stage.

He held no delusions about making humanity a kingdom in a few years. It's not that Varian couldn't fathom the ridiculous power Hortus granted him.

The moment he could wage a war against the strongest of rank 9s, he could kill them all and build up a kingdom's army from scratch.

The problem, however, was that these artifical powerhouses couldn't exert most of their strength.

It's somewhat fine in the lower ranks, but when talking about creating a rank 6 or rank 8, these synthetic powerhouses would be no match for someone a rank lower than them, much less their peers.

Unless he found a solution to that problem, the only way to solve it was giving them sufficiently long training and letting them realize their powers.

It wasn't enough to give someone the power of Assimilator, they'd need to understand the intent, underlying principles, and aspirations of that divine path.

"Those bastards won't disturb me. And the princes will come here in a week or two. Now all I have to do is wait for the Zions."

Varian rested on the lake, his body touching the cold water but not getting wet. The fragrances of the flowers caused him to relax and the warm sunlight of the morning created a perfect nap spot.

'Hey, Logos?'

[Yes, Host?]

'Is there Heaven?'

[…This System doesn't know. The slivers aren't omnipotent.] Pausing for a moment, it asked in a confused tone. [But why are you asking this?]

Varian's lips curled into a cold smile. "I'm going to kill those three dogs. I hope there isn't a Heaven so that they won't even get there by chance."

[This System takes back its words.]

— — — — —

Zion Duchy was in chaos.

The death of the most important prince—the son of the Holy Matriarch herself—was a blow unlike any other.

If the lady under the seventh prince held any grudge, then the imaginary riches of Zions would bite dust and they'd soon lose most of their allies.

No duchy would've welcomed a newcomer who rose only up only because of pimping if not for the banner of the 7th prince they proudly carried.

But it was all in jeopardy now.

The economy was crashing, the wealthy business magnates were fleeing, and the foreign warriors had already left while the native warriors were screening to join other duchies as sneakily as possible.

The common people had it the worst.

After saving up all their money to buy a house, the prices of the houses plummeted. Fortunes evaporated overnight. Conglomerates went bankrupt.

The wealthy Zion duchy, which originally had the capital to forcibly control the situation, spent all that money and more on propping Fairies against Abyssals.

As a result, they were defenseless against the crisis.

Varian pushed only a small card. But it sent ripples, no, a freaking tsunami throughout the duchy.

What made it worse was that Zion Emperor, who was supposed to reign in the chaos and control the panic wasn't even seen in public since the event.

Heck, he didn't even turn up for the funeral of the prince!

Forget being an emperor, what kind of father would skip the funeral of his own son?

His actions or the lack of them, made everything so much worse.

People would've never imagined that the Emperor was going through the most challenging point of his life.

In a secret chamber, a few figures sat across a table, with the Emperor taking the central seat.

Floating on the table was a letter left behind by the killer that day. It was written by a familiar enemy.

Haedon, Abyss Emperor.

A letter of vengeance and madness.

[Jataur, you drove my people to death over your petty insecurities. Did you really think we, the abyssals, a declining duchy that had fallen so low that we don't even have a handful of celestials could threaten you, a duchy on the verge of thresholds?]

Jataur, the Zion Emperor, glanced at the section of the letter with an impassive gaze.

The few members in the room, however, clenched their jaws or balled their fists. Even though none of them voiced it out aloud, all of them agreed with Haedon.

[We were enemies, are enemies, but we didn't have to go so far.]

Jataur scoffed.

[You must be laughing. What can these weaklings even do, right? Well, those eight abysses that disappeared many years ago were sent to Centaurus for a very particular mission.]

The letter blurred a little here as if someone had changed its writings a bit, but the aura coming from it remained familiar.

So, Jataur and other zions only assumed it was rewritten by Haedon—instead of thinking someone else could've changed those words. Varian's peculiar powers that enabled him to manipulate aura provided him immunity from these speculations.

[Those abysses struggled. But through a stroke of luck, we saved someone related to an important person and that person granted us two wishes.

I didn't want to waste those wishes on you. But you forced me. At the time of my death, I have used those wishes and sent them the request.]

There was a symbol right below.

A black rose.

A beautiful, scary black rose.

Under it were two names.

1. Jataur, Zion Duke.

2. Crown Prince, Son of Jataur and Matriarch.

Zion Emperor's breathing grew heavy and his face started to grow pale. His teeth chattered and he shivered like he was thrown naked into ice water.

"…Black Rose."

An ominous silence filled the hall. Everyone looked at each other with vigilance. They didn't have such worry earlier but now, they had to wonder if the person sitting next to them was the one they knew or the assassin in disguise.

Black Rose—the infamous assassin organization—killing members of both the Alliance and the Jai Empire.

It wouldn't take tasks of people with direct connection to divine rankers. But everyone else was a fair game.

Dukes? Princes? Commanders? Kings?

"N-No wonder…if it was them, it makes sense…it all makes sense," Jataur muttered.

Killing the prince openly was Black Rose's intention and challenge to Jataur. They were telling him that they killed the number two on their list. And they were coming for him.

"H-How da…" Jataur couldn't even manage to complete that sentence. Because he knew they dared.

Black Rose dared to kill. And they dared to tell him he was their next target.

'But even if it's Black Rose, I won't give up my life. I will never give up my life. Never!' Jataur eventually regained his calm and looked at his most loyal subordinates.

"You said you detected a secret space portal, right?"

"Indeed, Your Majesty. It leads to a remote place in the Pala Kingdom, very close to Centaurus. It's likely that it's where those eight abysses went."

The traces were left behind by Varian, with this very intention.

"If they think I'm going to sit and wait for death, they're wrong," Jataur's voice had never been so determined.

A man like him feared death the most. So, when pushed against the wall, he'd fight back more than any other.

"Send the scouts. I'll kill them before they can even try making a move on me." Jataur instructed and tapped his armrest. "Assemble the Strike Team in two days. The war is on."

Two hours later, a team composed of ten rank 6s highly specialized in stealth reconnaissance gathered in front of a space crack in the Zion Duchy.

It was slowly closing up. They used precious treasures and restored the space channel which was already created. And then, the scouts jumped in.

Along with them was a fairy named Hazel—sentenced to death by service in the military.