Chapter 69
Chapter 69
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Translator: uly
Chapter: 69
Chapter Title: Back to Godel
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"Lord of Sin, it seems the hunters have been defeated."
In Godel's underground Lord's Tower, built right above Agagthur's lava cave, a cultivator spoke without daring to look at the Lord's face, his skin not only burning but melting from the intense heat.
"I'll send more hunters. Yes."
He wore Godel noble attire to hide his melting skin and bowed deeply, his slender neck rotten from tending seeds. The Lord of Sin didn't even twitch.
"P-Pardon, my Lord, do you have any further orders?"
Trembling in fear, the cultivator asked again with his head bowed, but the Lord of Sin sat motionless in his seat, eyes closed. One arm had already melted away, leaving only bare bone, and his exposed face was charred black, resembling a charred corpse from a mass grave.
"The seeds in the stalactite field continue to grow with the droplets from the stalactites and infiltrate the Empire. The prince may have returned upon hearing that... No, that's my mistake. Forgive me."
But the seeds sprouting on his body had already bloomed into flowers forming a crown of thorns, wearing a crown of red petals, with branches extending everywhere as if bound to his throne.
With each frail breath, he scattered ash-like seed spores.
"Th-Then I'll take my leave, my Lord..."
"That child has returned..."
"Pardon?"
The Lord spoke without moving his lips.
"Call for my beloved."
"I'll summon the Queen."
Trembling in terror, the cultivator left the Lord's chamber. The Lord of Sin arrogantly kept his eyes closed, barely covering his crumbling neck, and began to sleep once more in this deep place.
"I'must hurry. The seeds... ah, my seeds."
Thinking of the seeds scattered by the Lord's kin, the cultivator rushed up the Lord's Tower. Upon reaching the top, he gazed at the endless fields and had the insects scatter corpses across them.
He stared up at Godel's ceiling, praying for blood to drip from the stalactites. Outside, insects kept killing something, drinking its blood; the blood-soaked sand filtered through the stalactites and dripped down. The stalactite droplets irrigated the fields of stalagmites built from barriers above the Lord's Tower and piled corpses, nurturing the seeds.
"Workers, move the seeds for the beastkin to the storage! Hurry!"
The seeds went into the storage in the upper levels of the tower the cultivator had just ascended, then out through the pits on the tower's outskirts connected by bridges, carried by Godel's humans. Below that lay the lower Lord's Tower, where the Lord of Sin resided.
And even further below, beneath the Lord's Tower.
"I need to finish the experiment. Before the King of Lies arrives."
Agagthur's lava cave lay there.
***
"Got it? Godel is a massive, bottomless pit beneath the desert. Think of it as a city the size of Ennaun buried underground. The outskirts near the surface house humans with red hair and black skin, and at the pit's center-above the sealed Agagthur's lava cave-stands a massive tower. Atop that tower, they cultivate seeds from the blood dripping from the ceiling stalactites. It's like a giant embodiment of sin itself. Or you could say it resembles a colossal tree, growing on human blood."
Gaon drew a diagram in the sand to explain Godel's structure. Bison asked back.
"So there's a huge pit under this desert, with a tower at its center? At the tower's peak, they cultivate seeds using blood extracted from the pit ceiling's stalactites. Then those seeds are stored in the tower, transported out to the desert via bridges connected to it by Godel's people. And controlling it all is..."
"Godel's Lord of Sin, Dam Sar. Once, Godel was the land left by descendants who served and guarded Agagthur, but like all royal lines, it fell to ruin. Unlike the previous king, Dam Sar lost his mind to the seeds. Anyway, the key to Agagthur's lava cave has been passed down only to the lords generation after generation, so you can't reach Agagthur without getting past him."
"If we just deal with the Lord..." The insects disappear?"
Gil asked with a heavy heart, and Gaon rose to his feet, holding up three fingers.
"The cultivator, the queen, and the lord. We have to eliminate all three."
"So we each take one? What about the soldiers guarding Godel's tower?"
Bison recalled the Godel hunters he'd seen before and asked. Finally, Gaon began outlining the plan he'd devised.
"The soldiers aren't the issue. The queen who cast spells on them is. The queen... she's a monster uglier than any insect we've seen. Big enough to coil around the tower."
In other words, she had long ago abandoned being human.
"Not everyone has to infiltrate Godel. The revolution will be all of ours together. But leave the queen to me. While I deal with her, the hunters will come, and it'll cause a huge commotion, so beastkin knight-you lead Godel's citizens out of the pit then. Save as many as you can. And you, senior knight-you alone infiltrate the tower."
While Gaon handled the queen and her spellbound hunters on the tower's exterior, Bison would evacuate Godel's remaining humans, and only Gil would enter the tower interior-a diversionary tactic.
"Go burn all the seeds. I'll handle the cultivator."
Only then did Gil realize why Gaon, despite his immense strength, had sought helpers. This wasn't something one person could do alone.
Distracted by the queen, the cultivator would use humans to transport more seeds, making evacuation impossible. Even if they caught the queen and lord, the seeds-and Sin's kin-would sprout anew somewhere.
Therefore.
"Once we take the queen and burn the cultivation grounds, we head straight to the tower's base and drag the lord from his throne. That's a dynastic revolution."
"Dynastic revolution?"
"It's a Godel term. Unlike the Empire's phonetic language, Godel words are logographic, each carrying meaning. Of course, knowing such things is forbidden in the Empire, so it's natural you wouldn't know."
Gil recalled how Riu, the 1st Knight Order Captain and his combat instructor before becoming a senior knight, sometimes uttered incomprehensible words. So those were Godel words.
"Wait, if one of the three Godel knights was Captain Riu, what was your relationship with her? And how did those three kids escape Godel and cross Tohou?"
"You said you'd believe me."
"Just curiosity, wandering knight."
Gaon eyed Gil's expression, sighed, and continued.
"As children, the three of us were locked in that tower. Kids are valuable test subjects for the cultivator. Of course, we escaped before seeds could be planted thanks to the previous king's help, his maid who followed him, and the one called Agagthur's proxy. But all three died. You know there are those chosen by Mirr, right? Having seen the Hero. Agagthur chooses a proxy too. He died in Tohou after getting us out, so there won't be a new proxy after the experiments."
"I see. That's regrettable."
Gil offered words of comfort upon seeing Gaon's first bitter expression. Gaon shrugged it off as no big deal, resuming his roguish demeanor, and pointed west.
"See that? That's near Godel's entrance... What the hell is that?"
Looking where he pointed, they saw beastkin loading something onto wagons.
"Over here for a sec."
Gil quietly ducked behind a sand dune and slowly approached the beastkin at Godel's entrance, who were loading something. He observed them.
With snake-like scales, they seemed to be desert snake beastkin. In this barren Tohou without cities, cooperating with Godel was inevitable.
Which meant.
"They're transporting seeds too."
"I'll go check. The entrance hunters will think I'm with them. Anyway, more info is always better."
Gaon shrugged at Bison's words, and Gil nodded, playfully slapping Bison's shoulder-hard enough to make him wince, but Bison headed toward the snake beastkin group, staying out of the hunters' sight and blending naturally.
"What are you carrying? I'm a beastkin too. Is there a village nearby?"
Bison smiled slightly and asked one with black scales and a flat nose. He flicked his long tongue, unable to hide his surprise, and glanced around in panic.
"No need to panic. I'mean no harm."
Bison approached slowly, but the snake beastkin froze in place.
Like someone caught in a crime, he said nothing and avoided looking toward the hunters. Suspicious, Bison examined their cargo.
And he, too, had to stop.
"What's going on?"
Gil didn't know what Bison saw, but Gaon turned away as if he could guess. Bison glanced at the cloud-covered sky, pressed his trembling hands to his eyes, then opened them again to face the horror.
There lay dismembered corpses of young beastkin and children.
Dead with what looked like black vines-perhaps from the seeds-bursting from every orifice in their bodies.
"Calm down first. The experiments in Godel are for us beastkin."
One snake beastkin cautiously approached Bison and spoke.
"Shut up."
Bison gripped his sword behind his back and swung, toppling the wagon. Corpses spilled out, and Gil, Gaon, and the hunters guarding Godel's entrance came rushing.