Chapter 248: 248. Buried past

“Arghh!!!! My lord, forgive me!!” A piercing shrill cry escaped the mouth of the old butler inside William’s moving ship.

Blue Raven, aka William, sat at the corner of the chamber with mana clouded around his ears. He looked at the mess happening in the center of the huge chamber.

Several hounds pinned the old butler to the floor while Number 1 brutally interrogated the poor old hag; he looked at the sliced fingers and poked out eyeballs on the floor.

And the irony is that the old hag hadn’t even confessed to any collusion with the demon cults; he had just agreed to be on the side of Daniel and betray Aurelius in his political missions and leak private decisions and policies to his brother.

William wondered whether the wailing and broken old butler even knew he was helping a traitor of the kingdom. The reason he had given right now was just his belief that Daniel was the rightful owner of the throne as the elder sibling.

William just wondered at this point why the old emperor never crowned Daniel even after declaring him the crown prince. No one knew the reason, and this lack of reason and abrupt change of decision was what made the choice of Aurelius as the emperor questionable in front of the world.

In the novel there was a certain excerpt where people in Riverdale talk about how the emperor’s mother used some forbidden demonic spell to control the old emperor.

Although the claim itself had no solid weight to it, William still wondered what had happened. The novel never explored the past history and politics of the continent and just remained stuck to the story forward with Ethan killing enemies, rising in ranks, and a classic hero journey.

Now that William looked at the characters in real life, this unexplained decision that he had never cared about before was just making him realize how it had left so many cracks behind.

The previous emperor left Daniel with an unfulfilled promise by making him crown prince but not the emperor, while he left Aurelius with an empire that was broken by the former decision.

Everything had done a 360-degree turn and come back to bite Aurelius in the back in the form of betrayal from his own butler and unrest among the public who doubted his leadership at every step of the story.

Finally, the cries of that man stopped; he lost his life under constant torture for the past half an hour.

William turned to look at Aurelius’s figure, who looked out of the window of the spacecraft silently; his figure did not even move an inch from the time he had been standing there, even after the butler died while apologizing to Aurelius in his last moments.

William guessed his thoughts; usually people become oddly silent when they are having flashbacks of past trauma or painful memories. There was clearly something that the novel didn’t mention, something that made these characters real.

With another second of waiting, he turned to look at the two ladies who were having a silent conversation using voice transmission; their silent looks at each other were proof that William’s assumption was not wrong.

The grim expressions on their faces made him feel that their conversation revolved around Aurelius and the imperial family’s past.

William felt the need to unearth the whole picture; it was just his curiosity fueled by the reason that he was now a part of this world now, so he needed a better idea about its history and politics for a better future.

“My lord, are you there?” Suddenly Grimlock’s voice sounded in Williams’s mind, diverting his attention.

“Yes, did something happen?” William asked, confused by Grimlock’s voice.

Grimlock then proceeded to explain the whole situation about Astra Ashfall’s arrival, his status, and his thirst for revenge.

William’s brows furrowed; the guy sounded like trouble right now.

Someone who was able to have multiple rebirths was actually trouble in the true sense because even if William managed to catch him and restrain him in some way, then he would just commit suicide and be reborn with the help of a divine rebirth embryo.

The exploitable factor thaat was ’fear of death’ became meaningless in case of high born pheonixes who had the privellage to use divine rebirth embryo.

William couldn’t deny it, the imperial family’s memebers of Ashfall empire really had a cheat code on them; 9 rebirths almost made them unkillable most of the time in battles.

Killing Astra was out of the question anyway, so William just gave Grimlock the usual orders for now.

“Turn into Mika and feed him some chocolates, and try to dismiss him in an hour; otherwise, I will just have to count him as collateral damage,” William said.

“Don’t deviate from the plan; in fact, now Amorphus has a fair reason to present to all elders and hold them under one roof.

We will deal with that phoenix the same way we deal with other elders; if he tries to escape, we just let him,” he spoke in a clear tone without any speck of doubt.

He was sure that even if Astra Ashfall escapes, his connection to that Spy Celera, could be exploited, or the fact that he was thirsting for revenge against Damian Cross could also be utilised according to how Will found suitable.

For how he would do so was a question he left unasnwered for now, since he had to focus on other important things.

“System, will the blood of mine that Astra would ingest through chochlates? Will it carry forward after rebirth??”

[No, unless you place a binder; that’s not possible.]

The system replied.

“Thought so,” William spoke. At last he had to leave a few loose ends for the future unless an idea popped up in his mind in the next hour.

With a sigh he shifted his thoughts to the upcoming completion of the unknown’s mission. He wondered what the next subquest be after the current one is completed.

———⁜⁜⁜——————⁜⁜⁜———

[# Unknown’s Chain Quest]

[Sub-quest 1: Where is the veil??]

[Description: The Clayman cult’s leader knows the location of the veil.]

[Task: Enslave the cult leader and find the veil]

[Rewards: Sun-based God Spell]

———⁜⁜⁜——————⁜⁜⁜———

“Definitely excited for the new spell though,” William said with a smile. He looked forward to it, although the effect of his new talent, Oracle of Pandemonium, still showed effects; the unrestful feeling and palpitations in his heart didn’t stop, meaning the impending crisis was still overhead.

“When will they stop??” William asked finally as he couldn’t control himself under the repeated beating.

[When you face the crisis, your heartbeats will turn normal, and you will feel utter silence.]

“Is this a crisis, an entity, or a phenomenon of some kind??”

[anything that will test you and change you]

hearing system’s cryptic words William chuckled. “Change me?? What’s left to be changed in me?? I’ve had worse experiences, and I don’t think I have anything left in me to change anymore other than becoming more and more unsure of my ability to fullfill my revenge properly.”

The system remained silent, choosing not to reply, while William brushed it off and left his seat only to enter the control chamber of the ship and lock it before disappearing into the infinite domain; he had a new assignment for Maris.

——————————————————

[A/N – A few things to make clear]

– I never have or will nerf my protagonists.

– Yes, Will is still in a phase to grow and find more about himself, but trust me, everything will pertain to his goal of revenge and make him more focused towards it.

– I know the blood-boiling (or some might say ’edgy’) personality you read about in the start is slowly dissolving, that’s just what I wanted to do from the start. I want to make him focused practical, and selectively cold. Though that doesn’t mean he will stop kicking ass.

– I know that the William from the starting Chapters who didn’t care much about the massacre of Opera Town has changed a lot in some right ways, he has surely given up the idea of sticking to the script.

Although I would still like to know how you guys are feeling about MC’s personality in the comments.

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep