"You are insane."
Samuel clicked his tongue as he walked away, stomping up the stairs with a foul face. The other younger members also had the same expression.
One looked reluctant, one looked ashen in fear.
Jessie slowly walked away from the table and ran upstairs, following after Samuel. Only 6 of us were left here, and to my surprise, Eliot – whom I thought would follow after them – stayed inside the basement.
"Are you not going to follow them?"
I glanced at him as I crossed my arms. I thought being a textbook person that he was, his morals would definitely conflict with my ways of doing things, but here he was, proving me wrong.
"No, I trust your decision."
He clasped his hand on the table and observed my face as he answered.
Seeing the dark gaze in his eyes, I knew something had broken inside his mind. I was sure now his morals didn't align with 'good' but was slowly twisting into tolerancing and embracing the 'bad'.
He's slowly turning into one of us – a person with the mindset of a criminal.
I shifted my gaze to my other members. Cassius' unflinching face was a given, but Azazel, Ornil and Baretta seemed more tolerant of it than I thought.
But one shouldn't be too cautious in steering the masses' opinion. Who knows what they were thinking behind that silence of theirs?
"I'll give you guys half a day. Think it through and settle with your ideology before sunrise. I expect you guys to be ready by tomorrow."
I stood up as I walked away from the table. The stairs creaked as I stepped on it, echoing quietly inside the room.
Now I just needed to wait.
Whether they could or couldn't pass this first lesson of war, entirely depended on them.
Trust was such a fragile emotion after all.
.
.
Ornil observed the other members' reaction as he quietly rubbed his chin.
Yolan had said what he needed to say, all that's left was for them to decide whether they would follow his plan willingly or kiss their freedom goodbye and be forced to do his plan by the power of his authority.
Personally, Ornil had already anticipated this kind of brutality from the research he had done in the past, but for Yolan – who was younger than him – to have this kind of mindset was unsettling even for him.
'Just what happened to him that he could easily put weight on other human's lives?'
"I'll be honest, as the Queen of this faction, I'm willing to support any decision Yolan makes. But, because of that same reason, I'm the bridge that will connect you guys to Yolan as our leader. That is the role given to the Queen by the Gods."
Cassius' words made his focus shifted. Just like that psycho of a King, his Queen had that same psychotic glint on his eyes – like everyone on his sight was just a bug to crush.
With those words said, Cassius rose from his seat and went upstairs. Though he still put on a blank face as he strode up the stairs, a flash of joy flickered in his eyes.
Ornil scoffed when he saw that expression, he could see to whom that joy was directed.
'I'm truly stuck with psychopaths.'
"What do you guys think about moral ambiguity?"
Ornil asked as he swiped his hair.
In this country where good and bad was clearly highlighted, the concept of moral ambiguity always rose conflicts in the world.
There were times in history when human rights were questioned. But those who brought that topic to life would be branded heretics and would go missing soon after.
As time went on, the questions of 'right' or 'should' were never brought up again. So once a child was born, everything their parents taught them was the rules of 'good', not teaching them to question what was 'right'.
That's why Yolan, who embraced both the rules of the 'good' and the 'bad', raised the question of moral ambiguity among his members.
'I personally think he leaned more to the good side.'
The last look Yolan gave wasn't the look of someone calculating the loss he would suffer, it was a look of someone ridden in guilt.
That was definitely a shred of humanity Yolan had kept together in front of the atrocious things he would do from now on. And even though he tried so hard to act cold, he let that weakness slip – revealing his true colors.
"I personally don't mind what our King said."
Baretta was the first to answer. She lazily popped her chin with her hand on the table and continued.
"If you truly trust what he said and if we still want to keep our heads, we must throw away the foundation of 'good' that had been taught to us since we were little. After all, the key to stay alive is to 'kill your opponent', which is a stranger we never know."
A smirk formed on her beautiful face, "But even then, it still aligns with Uola's teachings. 'As long as you had enough reason to kill someone, you could do it.' Maybe that verse in the bible is intended for this exact moment and we humans are the ones who misinterpret it."
Right, that's precisely it.
Ornil also had the same thoughts as Baretta when Yolan first explained the rules.
'If that's the case, then is killing another person justified in this war? Especially since the act of death itself is considered graceful.'
'…'
'But wouldn't it contradict the 'good' that had been ingrained in our brain?'
Ornil once believed Uola but now with these contradictions showing up here and there, the flaw of the world's system relying solely on a God's teaching became even more apparent.
That's why Yolan, who seemed to know more about this War of Throne warned them from the start.
'Uola isn't to be trusted.'
Ornil almost laughed out loud when he reached this conclusion. That omega was smarter than he thought.
'Maybe I could trust him.'
He once again glanced at Baretta, she seemed to have reached a conclusion similar to him. As for Azazel and Eliot, they seemed to have reached their conclusion way before this meeting started, so conflicting ideologies wouldn't be a problem for the people gathered here.
A seed of trust had somehow been planted inside his heart.
.
.
Samuel was a child growing up in a religious family. Everything the bible deemed 'good' became the foundation of his and his family's lives.
And killing innocent people was certainly not on the list.
"He's a murderer! What in the hell is he thinking?!"
Samuel rubbed his temple in frustration as he sprinted outside the building. He had decided to trust Yolan's words about the whole crest thing, but he was still skeptical about the 'death and survival' thing in this supposedly 'war' he talked about.
His last words about bombing a building were the last nail in the coffin. A little bit of trust he had in Yolan was turned into repugnance.
"He wants me to sit still and become a murderer too? There's no way my conscience allows it."
He gritted his teeth as anger clouded his mind, all he could think about was leave this accursed place and erased every memory about ever meeting those people.
The piled-up cold white snow on the street didn't hinder Samuel's steps. But a shout of his name made him slow down.
"Samuel!"
He turned around and saw a girl with violet hair chasing after him.
"Jessie."
Jessie stopped in front of Samuel as she gasped for breath. Locking her gaze to him, she slowly spoke, "Do you also can't accept the bombing plan?"
Samuel nodded, Jessie seemed to also oppose the idea.
"What do you think we should do?"
Jessie rubbed her neck as she asked – hesitation was clear in her tone.
Samuel's mind calmed down upon seeing her expression. Logically, he knew there was no way for him to actually escape from Yolan because of that weird power he used to teleport people.
It was never a choice, it was an obligation.
They were truly slaves to their King.
And that power came from the same God he worshipped.
An incredulous laugh slipped from his mouth.
Raising his head to Jessie, he said, "There's nothing we can do, is there? As long as we're still breathing, we have to do everything he said."
"So does that mean we are going to become murderers?"
Yes, murderer.
The title was what made him feel repulsed by this plan. It went against everything he had lived for in his life.
"There's no way I can do it…"
His whisper wasn't answered by the person in front of him. She just silently gazed at the snow-covered road as tears slowly streamed down her cheeks.
"What- What do we do? I want to go home… I want to meet my parents and friends… I don't want to be here anymore…"
The painful sobs and gasps as she wiped her face stung Samuel's heart. Grabbing her hand, he said, "Let's go back home, we can still do it."
"R-Really?"
He nodded and pulled her hand.
Although Samuel knew this was just a useless attempt to run from his fate, he still did it. At least until Yolan summoned them back, they could have their own illusion of freedom.
That's why they didn't realize the eyes observing them from a distance.
Hiding behind the cover of a dark alley, a man with platinum blonde hair flicked the ashes from his cigarette as his blue eyes observed the two youngsters running on the street.
A small soft laugh echoed in the alley, then came a sigh.
"They're truly still kids."
"Is it alright not to chase them?" the man beside him chimed in.
"The best teacher you could have is experience. They need to suffer some hardship to finally realize the cruelty of this world. Let them be, at least I've put some precaution on them."
Giving the pair of youngsters one last glance, they stepped out from the shadow and left.