Chapter 267: Surging Undercurrents x The Squadron Leader Enters the Trap
"Fire!"
"Is that Lord Edmond's mansion?"
"Quick, go report to Lord Simon!"
The soaring flames seemed determined not to stop until the villa was burned to ashes!
The heatwaves and firelight ignited the entire shantytown, spreading along the walls to Bandle City, separated only by a single wall.
The guards responsible for guarding and alerting saw this and immediately notified the city. The Deputy Commander of the Security Corps, responsible for the overall planning of the entire shantytown, known by the title of "Bandle City's Most Handsome Man"—
Simon Ferrero!
Inside the City Lord's Mansion of Bandle City.
This man, possessing long, ocean-blue hair and a beautiful rapier tied to his waist year-round, looked out through the massive floor-to-ceiling window of his office at the soaring fire growing more and more intense. His handsome face was obscured by an extremely exaggerated captain's hat, his expression gloomy and so sullen it could almost be wrung out like water.
"I know... step down..." The man's cold voice echoed as he waved his hand, signaling the guards to retreat.
As the office door closed heavily with a "bang".
The guard who had just bowed and backed out suddenly heard the sound of things being smashed "crackle and shatter" from inside the door. He shrank his neck and nimbly retreated far away...
"Trash! That damn fat pig Edmond... can't even handle a single thing right. I shouldn't have given him the mission in the first place!"
"Darling, what's wrong~" Next to the shattered vase, the shadows squirmed, and a "snake beauty" drilled out. She wound her way up Simon Ferrero's thigh, continuing all the way up to his shoulder. Flicking her "snake tongue", she gently blew a breath into Simon Ferrero's ear...
[Ren] dissipated. Simon Ferrero, completely naked with his long blue hair draped behind his head, let the woman dress him. Feeling refreshed and invigorated at this moment, no longer gloomy as before, he let out a comfortable sigh and said, "Lilith, poor Andrew Cooper, that idiot is completely a blockhead. After being with you for so many years, he never discovered your identity as a [Succubus], wasting your youth for nothing."
[Succubus]: A humanoid magical beast... Belonging to the [Phantom Beast] family, same as the "Kiriko" family responsible for the Hunter Exam preliminary test. When their aura nodes are closed, they often appear with "pointed ears," "pointed tails," and a "curvaceous" devilish figure... But once they open their aura nodes and officially become a Nen user capable of using Nen abilities, [Succubi] can usually use their will to autonomously retract their non-human features like "pointed ears" and "pointed tails," and transform into humans.
The woman named Lilith wrapped her arms around Simon Ferrero's waist from behind, resting her delicate chin on the man's shoulder. She giggled coquettishly, "If you hadn't been sharp-eyed, Young Master, and helped me open my aura nodes, Lilith probably would have died never knowing she was actually a [Succubus]. Not to mention... Andrew, who was just a ruined commoner at the time..."
"It's a pity he messed up the mission I gave him!" Simon Ferrero snorted coldly and said, "Edmond's mansion was burned down, and the person mysteriously disappeared. Coincidentally, he is also that husband of yours's superior... Lilith,"
Simon Ferrero turned around, hugged the woman, looked down at her, and said, "You don't mind if I call him in for questioning, do you."
"Young Master," The woman stood on her tiptoes, gently kissed the man's lips, and with sultry eyes, let out a soft moan, "You said it yourself, that was the past. I don't know any Andrew. Now... I am your person..."
"Hehehe..." Simon Ferrero, known as "Bandle City's Most Handsome Man," gave a wicked smile. His head instantly transformed into a toad's head. Opening his mouth, he swallowed Lilith's entire head in one gulp: "You're wonderful, Lilith!"
"I truly love you more and more!"
"Young Master, please don't hold back!"
Doing it again... The pink, ambiguous Nen aura reappeared...
In the soaring firelight of the shantytown adjacent to Bandle City...
Simon Ferrero's two toad eyes suddenly looked over, and two cold gleams abruptly flashed in his horizontal pupils!
Tap... tap... The wind blew, the person drifted, and his thoughts rose and fell like billowing clouds, soaring straight into the sky.
After killing Edmond Sander and his squire Dunn West, Roy used [Light Style] to merge into the light, drifting with the sunlight. The scene of Silva reaching out to rescue Edmond Sander continuously reflected in his mind. For the first time in his life, he felt a hazy sense of unfamiliarity towards his father.
He felt as if he didn't know Silva anymore.
It was as if he wasn't the unsmiling, stern, and strict father from the original story, whose face always hung with the words "strangers keep away," pushing people thousands of miles away.
Instead, he was a "butcher" who aided the tyrant and killed by nature, making one's heart turn cold.
"Assassins do not distinguish between good and evil; they only care about killing for money and completing missions." Silva's teachings from the past surfaced in his mind. Roy remained silent, flying, passing over the shantytown, passing over the plantation fields, passing over the plains, and re-entering the Uzuki Forest. At a certain moment, he abruptly stopped.
Accompanied by the sunlight, he slowly descended deep into the forest.
With a wave of his hand, he deployed the [Sumeru Mustard Seed], gently placing Ribéry Garcia, along with the young boys and girls confined by Edmond as "playthings," onto a lawn in the woods.
Ribéry Garcia, draped in the exaggerated playing card trench coat, with his hook-shaped mustache curled up, didn't wait for Roy to react. He directly crawled at his feet and called out: "Great existence above, Ribéry Garcia pays his respects to Your Holiness. I am willing to piously listen to your teachings!"
[Prompt: Detected one "Potential Believer"]
[Name: Ribéry Garcia]
[A man who, influenced by fortune-telling, obeys destiny. Having glimpsed the future and witnessed your demeanor, he piously converts and eagerly awaits official acceptance]
Roy pulled himself out of his thoughts at the right time, swept a faint glance at Ribéry Garcia, and said: "You used to hate [Gods] the most. Now... what are you doing?"
A blasphemer "turning over a new leaf"? Rebellious in youth, stubborn in adulthood, and by middle age, one's worldview is set, and nature is hard to change. Roy didn't believe... that just by shaking his imposing figure, he could casually make a guy who is well-versed in the "ways of the world" and has survived being hunted by the church for over twenty years, submit... Even with the panel guaranteeing it.
Ribéry Garcia, lying prostrate on the ground, raised his head to meet Roy's gaze head-on. Neither dodging nor avoiding, he instead looked at him with burning eyes and asked: "Will you become a [God]?"
Roy was stunned, stumped by the question.
He gently touched the back of his left hand, feeling his life ticking away second by second with time, slowly but firmly shook his head: "Rather than being a [God], I hope more to be a guide who never forgets his original intention."
Receiving... plundering... making rules... shaping privileges... deliberately solidifying classes, disregarding the life and death of the lower class... This trip, just a simple walk through the [Shantytown], was enough to extinguish Roy's idea of becoming a [God]. He said to Ribéry Garcia with absolute frankness: "I will not abandon power. In the future, I might lean towards the [Divine Path], nor can I guarantee to those who believe in me, respect me, and love me that I will never change, but there is only one thing,"
The boy deactivated [Deception], shedding Andrew Cooper's exterior and returning to his original appearance... Subsequently,
A head of beautiful silver hair swaying in the wind entered Ribéry Garcia's sight, stunning him. He continued to hear Roy say faintly: "I will always remember who I am... and where I came from..."
Whoosh~ A gust of wind blew, making the leaves rustle...
The sunlight spilled down from the canopy, casting specks of light through the shade, weaving a sun-halo cloak for the boy. Reflected in Ribéry Garcia's pupils, in a trance, it seemed to pull him back to the moment of fortune-telling again. He was dumbfounded, clicking his tongue, dizzy and fascinated by the man sitting on the Sun Chariot, high in the sky...
"Precisely because of this," Ribéry Garcia recovered his senses again, and said to Roy with deep seriousness: "That's why destiny guided me to meet you." As the man finished speaking, he thumped his chest, aggravating his injury. Coughing up a mouthful of blood, he pledged solemnly: "Ribéry Garcia, piously listens to Your Holiness's teachings, unchanging until death."
Thump~ Bowing, kowtowing.
The tip of his nose touching the ground,
Splashing a bit of dust...
The panel prompted... [Prompt... Detected "Potential Believer" Ribéry Garcia has [Absolute Loyalty], can be trusted...]
Roy looked down at him with a complex expression, silent for a long while. Reaching out, he materialized the [Solar Eclipse] and lightly tapped Ribéry Garcia's left and right shoulders respectively: "You rebelled because you couldn't tolerate the filth of the church and the absurdity of the nobles. This shows your conscience is not dead, and you have never forgotten the basic qualities you should possess as a [Human]."
"Ribéry Garcia,"
"Your Holiness, I am here."
Roy raised his volume at the right time, and finally tapped his forehead lightly: "Praise the Sun... May you never forget your original intention and always remember this point."
"Praise the Sun!" Ribéry Garcia piously put his palms together. Then... as Roy took away the lightsaber from his forehead, a stream of information wrapped in Nen aura turned into a puddle of stream water, gently flowing into his mind through the center of his brows...
[Bestowal]... [Deception]...
Note: A practical technique for "Nen Shape Transformation". By pre-visualizing the object to be transformed into in the mind, one can use Nen aura to "disguise" and "transform". Combining "reality" and "deception", it achieves the purpose of blinding the human eye's investigation. (Those with a profound understanding of Nen can even deceive the perception of [En], enough to pass off the fake as genuine.)
The information stream dissolved... Ribéry Garcia felt as if he had grasped something in a haze. His spirit jolted, and he trembled in his heart: "Is this... a [Blessing]?!"
He then looked carefully at Roy, seeing the boy put his hands behind his back. Looking at the dozens of young boys and girls still in deep sleep nearby, he said calmly: "The Lord Knights of Bandle City don't treat people as people. I also think... in my future actions, I have no reason to treat them as people either."
"Ribéry Garcia, I need intelligence, and even more, I need an intelligence officer,"
Roy turned his head to look at the man again: "Can you do it?"
"Praise the Sun, my Lord. Ribéry Garcia is willing to follow your teachings!" Suppressing his inner excitement, Ribéry Garcia straightened up again and said in a deep voice: "As soon as I can control the side effects brought by the [Blessing], I will immediately set off for Bandle City to scout for my Lord."
Side effects?
He should be talking about the [Nature's] backlash brought by acquiring [Faith]... Roy gave Ribéry Garcia an inconspicuous look, suddenly remembering the absurd, crazy, and unsightly scenes he saw in his heart and in Edmond Sander's villa. They were all a group of people lost because of "power".
He said faintly: "My [Blessing] has no side effects."
"Furthermore, a true [Blessing] should be the [First Embrace] that can elevate a person's talent ceiling, just like myself to Gotoh, or Muzan to the Demon Moons in the past. It belongs to a higher level of deep binding." As his words fell, Roy added another sentence in his heart.
Immediately following, he felt the surroundings seem to quiet down in an instant... leaving only Ribéry Garcia looking shocked to the point of aphasia. The man stared blankly for a long while, then glared at Roy with inexplicable astonishment, blurting out: "Why?"
"Because, nothing can stop the sun from rising as usual, regardless of whether it shines on the dark and foul, or the bright and mighty," Roy reached out to pinch a ray of sunlight, playing with it in his palm, and said slowly: "This is the reason."
Ribéry Garcia: "..."
Suddenly shivering,
Thinking of the Sun Chariot, thinking of the gilded giant bird, thinking of the Sun Wheel carried behind Roy on the chariot...
He lowered his head and said piously: "Praise the Sun, I was narrow-minded."
Ribéry Garcia looked up again, solemnly guaranteeing: "Following Your Holiness's orders, I will set off for Bandle City immediately."
"No rush,"
"Wait until you heal your injuries first." Roy stealthily swept another glance at Ribéry Garcia. A charlatan is indeed a charlatan, his life is truly tough... His soul had flown out earlier, almost dying. Now, in just half a day, he was able to hold on and recover his consciousness.
A red light surged in the depths of Roy's eyes. He silently deployed the [True Eye] to see through reality and falsehood, secretly noting the other party's attributes.
[Ribéry Garcia]
[Physique: 1354]
[Manifested Aura Volume: C+ (52,000 / 100,000)]
[Potential Aura Volume: B- (410,000 / 1,000,000)]
[Evaluation: C+]
[Note: Chimera Ant Elite Squadron Leader level, reference Scorpion Ant Zazan who invaded Meteor City]
Not inferior to Feitan and Uvogin in their prime.
He was at a disadvantage for not being in a combat category, such as "Enhancement" or "Transmutation", otherwise, he could potentially be even stronger...
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