Chapter 47
Chapter 47
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 47
Chapter Title: First Principle: Trust No One (2)
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1.
Blood-scented alley.
My savior, Ceres, whom I encountered at the moment of death.
“Why did you make off with the True Ancestor?”
Her words made my heart turn ice-cold.
“Or should I say the fake True Ancestor here?”
There’s no way Ceres would know that.
I hadn’t reported the counterfeit to anyone.
“How did you know that, Lady Ceres…?”
Where did this connect from?
I pulled away from Ceres’s embrace.
She didn’t stop me.
Her black dress was blotched with bloodstains.
Ceres took out a cigarette and lit it.
“Sedric, I’m grateful to you. You freed me from those suffocating precepts. My fondness for you is no lie.”
Confusion, chaos, doubt.
I couldn’t make sense of anything. My head was a jumble.
“So I overlooked the parts that didn’t add up.”
Ceres closed her eyes wearily.
Her eyelids twitched like they were spasming.
“Knowing precepts I hadn’t told anyone about and approaching me, recognizing the classified Project Z and trying to stop it, even grasping that I was using Project Z as bait to lure in Eiming and Gisella. All of it. I let it slide because I found you endearing. But now a fake True Ancestor too?”
“It’s not like that….”
Her words suddenly made it click.
It was easy to misunderstand.
I had regressed.
All that information came from trial and error, staking my life alongside the Joker.
But how would it look to Ceres?
A freak who somehow got his hands on key intel and executed everything flawlessly.
“Who are you? What’s your goal in approaching me?”
It was no wonder she’d say that.
“Fuu….”
When she exhaled a long plume of smoke and opened her eyes again.
The warmth was gone from those black pupils.
“Tell me. I’ll give you a chance.”
“I’m Lady Ceres’s loyal dog. The counterfeit was just… something I picked up.”
“That’s impossible. It was an item managed by the Golden Carp Clan. They put up a perception interference barrier, so the ‘it was just there’ excuse won’t fly.”
“A perception interference barrier? I just looked and it was….”
Wait a minute.
No way.
✧ [Fateful Encounter]: Probability of encountering key figures in the scenario ▲drastically increased▲!
No way, this?
Fuck, that explains it.
Even for a counterfeit, it felt too blatant, like a ‘please pick up this stray cat’ box.
So it was the status window buff.
But Ceres?
How does Ceres know that much?
“Tell me honestly now. Then….”
Ceres’s words trailed off.
“…I’ll pretend it never happened.”
I realized this was Ceres’s final warning and a major concession.
The same Ceres who gouged out eyes on first meeting.
She was that suspicious, cautious, and meticulous.
Yet for someone as shady as me, she was offering forgiveness if I came clean.
Could I trust her words?
Could I confess my goals and everything, earn her trust, and get her help?
After long deliberation, I opened my mouth.
“The fake True Ancestor itself was something I coincidentally recovered based on info Eiming passed me.”
“Eiming ordered it?”
“Yes. But Eiming didn’t seem to know the item he ordered recovered was the fake True Ancestor. I didn’t tell him either. The fake True Ancestor ran away. I really don’t know where it went.”
Barely noticeable, but Ceres’s expression softened ever so slightly.
“Why hide it without reporting even to me?”
“That I’m truly sorry for. But I needed the fake True Ancestor’s power to save my sister.”
“You have a sister?”
“Yes, my sister who’s on the verge of death.”
Ceres crossed her arms, looking displeased.
“Why not just ask me? Don’t go causing trouble alone.”
That was unavoidable.
In the first run, I saw how much Ceres liked Arbel’s corpse.
From my perspective, I had to be wary.
Plus, saving Arbel wasn’t that simple a quest.
The end of this Premium Route required killing Arbel.
My goal was to bypass that by turning her into a familiar with the fake True Ancestor and clear it.
How would that look to Ceres?
She’d see me as a vampire fanatic throwing a tantrum, insisting on turning Arbel—who could be healed with one Universal Currency—into a bloodsucker.
There was only one way to clear up all these misunderstandings.
Reveal my regression and the status window, explain everything.
That would address everything from what made her suspicious to why I needed the counterfeit.
I could even prove it by showing the Joker’s effects.
“…….”
Was it really okay to do this…?
“You’re already in too deep.”
Ceres added, chiding my hesitation.
“Don’t lie to me. If you do, I won’t be able to protect you anymore.”
“…I’ll tell you everything.”
Ceres’s downturned eyes lifted slightly.
Her tight lips softened a bit.
I could even sense faint relief, like she’d been waiting for that answer.
Great!
Sedric’s secret secret, about to be unveiled right now!
“The truth is….”
What cut off my resolve.
-ding
A clear notification sound.
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::: Warning :::
- Disclosing information about the Death Game will incur a penalty.
- Mind your words and actions.
======
Fuck!!!!!!!!!!!!
Something like this existed?
It’s genre convention that regressors get screwed if they reveal regression….
But this is too much!!!
Without mentioning regression, I can’t properly explain the situation to Ceres.
But the status window is stricter than the Supreme Court justices lurking in YouTube comments.
Ignoring the penalty isn’t an option.
Fuck.
Checkmate, Sedric.
“…….”
I squeezed my eyes shut.
Ceres’s lips twisted again.
“So you won’t talk.”
“…There are circumstances preventing me from telling you everything.”
“That’s all you have to say?”
“…I truly never meant to cause you harm, Lady Ceres. Please believe that much.”
Long silence.
Ceres’s cigarette burned out completely with her slow breaths.
She flicked the butt to the ground.
“Sedric….”
There was weakness in Ceres’s voice.
At least not the cold tone vowing a purge.
“How can I trust you.”
Disappointment. Betrayal. Pity. Melancholy.
A distraught voice laced with all of it.
She bowed her head deeply, hugging her own elbows.
“You’ve done well so far. If it’s your sister, don’t worry. I’ll take care of her.”
Ha, so this run ends like this too.
Frustrating, infuriating, I feel like dying.
I closed my eyes.
How to handle the next run….
I shut my eyes.
Just get it over with quick since it’s a one-shot anyway.
“…….”
But time passed.
“……?”
Ceres didn’t kill me.
She simply vanished as if she’d never been there.
Instead, moments later, like passing the baton.
Voices came from the other end of the alley.
“We gotta clean up this piece of shit ourselves?”
“Orders from above, so we do it. Don’t get cocky. They say he handles Death Verdict.”
“Fine, let’s finish clean and grab drinks.”
“What a joke. Ceres Kasian isn’t the type to cover for anyone, and here she is.”
“Keek, must be his concubine or something.”
Two men and one woman sauntering in casually.
Flashy carp embroidery over black attire.
No ID badges, but affiliation and rank were obvious.
Golden Carp Clan, hitmen.
Their flashy outfits, their auras.
Nothing like the mid-tier fixers I’d dealt with.
The situation wasn’t hard to guess.
As expected, the counterfeit was tied to the Golden Carp Clan.
And somehow, Ceres was involved too.
Word got out that I’d swiped the counterfeit.
Why now, after staying quiet?
Probably that sticky-rice-cake-toting escapee Sion got caught.
Judging from ‘If you do, I won’t be able to protect you’….
At the point where facts weren’t clear, I’d lost Ceres’s trust.
Her protection ended.
My execution was set.
So what now.
Chased and killed by fixers, or by elite assassins—difference of degree.
“Hello, big bro, big sis!”
I rubbed my hands politely first.
Gonna die anyway, might as well squeeze out max info.
“I just can’t wrap my head around the situation. Even if I die, can I at least go knowing the reason~ clearly?”
“Uhahaha! This kid’s hilarious.”
The guy in front with the glaive laughed loudly.
“Uhahaha! I get that a lot.”
You can’t spit on a smiling face, so I laughed along.
“Punk, you thought you could steal Golden Carp Clan secrets and live?”
“That’s true, but… I’m Eiming’s right-hand man. This could get awkward for everyone….”
“Kuhahaha! This fucker! Eiming’s right-hand!”
“Uhahaha!”
Laughter cut off.
“Know your place, punk. You’re just disposable toilet paper. You think Eiming’s crazy enough to go against the Golden Carp Clan to save trash like you?”
“Let’s wrap this up. How long you gonna humor him?”
“Yeah.”
Fuck off.
Cheap-ass in front of a dead man.
“Stay still, and I’ll make it quick.”
My mana was nearly depleted, but I still had fight left.
What’s the point of lingering thin and long? For a man, girth matters.
Unfair to die without a peep.
Take at least one with me via death’s echo.
“Charge!!!”
-thunk!
As I gathered mana, the three leaped at me in sync.
Right before my eyes as I formed seals to fire Death Verdict.
A pale blade flashed.
No, fuck, already…?
The man was upon me in an instant.
Swinging his sword right in my face.
Speed defying comprehension, like film frames deleted.
On another level from foes so far.
This is Golden Carp Clan hitman?
Casually outputting speed beyond full-power Sunming.
Even if I reacted and dodged, no escape.
The other two had predicted my retreat and marked the spots.
Worlds apart from ragtag fixers.
Pros of this trade, masters of killing.
Whoa, fuck. These guys are no joke.
The sharp blade about to cleave my skull horizontally.
-kwaaaaang!!!!
Air before me erupted in blinding white.
Deafening boom. Bone-rattling shock.
The glaive-wielder’s upper body folded at the waist, rocketing like a shell into the adjacent building.
-krumble!
Building crumbling as he crashed.
The two following in formation tumbled away in panic.
What?
What the hell?
Blown back by the blast, I sat dazed with mouth agape.
No way?
“You fucking bastards….”
Heat haze-like dust cloud rising from blast center.
Gaudy red lights flashing, a mountainous back looming overwhelmingly.
“Dare touch my little brother without fear?”
Unbridled rage in the giant man’s low growl.
“No injuries, Rowen?”
“Eiming bro!!!!”
He came to save me!
I didn’t believe it!!!