Academic gathering with a lich-Chapter 535 - 489 The Great Deception

Silvette stared at her hands, the firefly-like dots disappearing upon touching her skin.

Perplexed and blank, her purple eyes were filled with confusion.

"Ralph, do you intend to transfer this power to me?"

"It’s not ’transfer,’ it’s ’returning’ it to you."

"I don’t understand." Silvette clutched her head, pain converging in the girl’s mind, torment tearing at her consciousness, just as Loshutar was falling apart.

"I never expected to awaken you easily," Ralph sighed with a feeling that was close to an ’I knew you wouldn’t get it,’ patting Silvette’s elm-wood head.

Ralph spat out a series of questions.

"Would the Loshutar Family allow their bloodline to choose their own way of living? To live among the lowly as a human, sharing their life with said rabble?"

"Would they ignore you, let your hatred for vampires grow unchecked, making you the key to cursing the Loshutar lineage?"

"Why would the monsters of Degonris coexist peacefully with you, a mere human?"

"Why, in Blood Angel Gallaron’s plans, is your sacrifice necessary?"

"What exactly is the power beneath Degonris?"

Silvette raised her hand.

"I may not understand the rest, but about the buried power, Ralph, haven’t you said it? It’s prison rules, a set of familiar and intact bureaucratic regulations. You unveiled it yourself, and the fact you found a way out so quickly left a deep impression on me."

Ralph tilted his head, speaking indifferently.

"Oh, the prison rules, that was a lie to deceive all of you."

"???"

"Everything that happened in Degonris, from the moment Verlet and I arrived until just now, was a trap I set."

"I deceived the enemy, you, Verlet, and even myself."

Silvette was stunned by Ralph’s words.

"But... but... what did you deceive us about?"

Ralph crouched down and took out that sandalwood box, the box containing Sage’s Stone bullets.

He withdrew an ordinary Alchemical Silver Bullet. "A silver bullet soaked in garlic oil, capable of dealing massive damage to vampires." Ralph inserted the bullet into the mud of Degonris, the black muck clinging to the bullet.

"What do you see?"

"...A bullet dirtied by black mud?"

"Wrong, look more closely."

Silvette narrowed her eyes, closely observing the bullet in Ralph’s hand; the black mud slipped off due to gravity, creating a writhing sensation, evoking a familiar feeling in the girl’s memory with a certain substance.

"Is it... a Sage’s Stone bullet?!"

"Exactly."

Ralph turned the box upside down, the "Sage’s Stone bullets" falling onto the filthy ground, the wolf demon paying no mind to these terminative rounds.

"Just like I’ve said, I’ve got plenty of those, Degonris has all the raw materials. I can mold Sage’s Stone bullets out of rubble and black mud."

Ralph’s Sage’s Stone bullets were just ordinary bullets he’d picked up with some muck on them.

"But... but these bullets indeed ended the lives of those creatures. If they were just mud-covered bullets, why did they possess the power of Sage’s Stone bullets?"

Ralf stared with those dead fish eyes, directly at Silvette.

"Because I told you they were Sage’s Stone, and you believed they were Sage’s Stone."

"I believed?"

"You believed they were Sage’s Stone, so the bullets ended the monsters. You believed I could kill the monsters, so I killed the monsters. You believed I could execute the angel, so I executed the angel. All of this, it’s because you believed."

"The power that enshrouds this land is not some prison rule, but your belief. In your domain, Silvette, what you believe becomes reality."

"This is why I went to great lengths to tell you the story of Barkin and Sage’s Stone, I needed a plausible reason for possessing the Sage’s Stone. Barkin made the Sage’s Stone and gave it to me."

"Sage’s Stone was my first attempt at a con, it was my first guess at the nature of this power."

"That’s also why I kept repeating to you in the cemetery that I had dug up Barkin’s grave, not to correct your naive ideas. What do I care about your naivety? Even if you set Degonris on fire, it wouldn’t matter to me. I had to plant the suggestion in your mind that I truly obtained the Sage’s Stone, to deepen the concept in your heart that Ralph possessed it." 𝓯𝙧𝓮𝓮𝒘𝓮𝙗𝙣𝒐𝒗𝒆𝓵.𝓬𝓸𝒎

"The first attempt, I was quite nervous inside. But I succeeded, I confirmed my guess, so afterwards, I acted without restraint."

Ralph covered his face, slowly shaking his head, "Roaring like a beast, charging like a warrior, rebellious and overpowering, that’s not my style."

"But I played it well, I made you believe I was a fiend capable of contending with angels."

"As for the later fabrications, the prison rules. I was speaking to you, using your power to confront the angel Gallaron head-on."

"This was a con aimed at you, Silvette. You were too easy to deceive, you believed every word I said, I think, those vampires must have deceived you long ago in the same way."

"Making you believe you were of Loshutar blood, making you believe you were human."

"This also explains why the rules sealed your power. You were confined within the world view they had instilled in you, in the eyes of an ordinary young lady associated with vampires, this world only consisted of humans and vampires. Thus, you denied all other powers."

"The Blood Angel coveted your power, Silvette, but he could not harm you himself, the only way he could obtain your power, was for you, to willingly sacrifice."

"You’ve been thoroughly tricked, you foolish girl."

Silvette’s face shifted between light and shadow, her head bowed, and through the gaps in her hair, that deep purple glow could be seen.

"When did you begin to notice this rule?"

Ralph took the fire gun that Verlet handed to him.

"When I first arrived, I introduced myself, saying we were ’Demon Hunters,’ which was a casual remark, meant to help us blend into this city better."

"For some reason, I’m very sensitive to my own body."

"Right after my cover identity slipped out, my body became agile, and my arm muscles swelled a bit. I’m not good at frontal combat, so I know my capabilities very well."

"It was then that I realized, the power buried beneath the land wasn’t our enemy, it, could be used by me."

"Word becomes law, then such rules must have a pair of listening ears, turning the true and false information I convey into reality."

"That’s you, Silvette."