To stop his thoughts from spiralling further into territory that genuinely frightened him, Klein reined them in and asked: "Besides all that, did the Lord of Chaos say anything else?"
"He also said..."
Audrey scrunched her face in concentration. "After I described the recent reforms in Loen, He suddenly said the king harbours considerable ambitions. But when I asked why, He said I was too curious for my own good."
Klein was speechless inwardly. Too curious for your own good? You're not just curious, you're actively courting death. The moment you're face to face with what appears to be a deity of unknown nature and power, you start asking questions without the faintest idea what you're dealing with. As Mr. Fool, I salute your sheer nerve.
Though — if a deity can describe the king's ambitions as "considerable," whatever that king is doing must be something truly staggering. The question is how the Lord of Chaos knows — what is it about the new policies that suggests ambitions of that scale?
Could He mean... someone trying to emulate Roselle, to become a 'Great Emperor' whose legacy endures for eternity?
Though actually, none of this seemed to directly concern him.
Klein set aside his curiosity and asked: "What changes did the Broker ability bring you?"
"I can more keenly sense certain needs in others — especially needs that fall into grey areas — and I can identify the right parties to fulfil those needs, then facilitate the transactions through language and relationship."
"That's all?"
"That's all."
So it's a pathway practically made for being a middleman. Which makes sense — 'Broker' is just another word for one.
"Describe the process of receiving the Broker ability in detail."
"Of course, Mr. Fool."
As Audrey spoke with Mr. Fool, Vincent noticed that a grey crystal had appeared in the left pan of the scale in the Nation of Disorder — the return on Xio's "facilitation" of the connection between Audrey and himself.
The scale shifted another step toward equilibrium. By his estimate, if he could distribute the remaining two Broker slots and one Shadow Merchant slot, the balance should be achievable.
Back in reality, Bernadette asked immediately: "Was it the other one?"
"No." Vincent shook his head. "It was Audrey."
"Oh?" Bernadette sounded genuinely surprised. "How did she get hold of your three-part honorific name?"
"It was Xio who passed it to her. Since it counts as Xio facilitating a 'cooperation,' I went ahead and established a connection with Audrey and bestowed the Broker ability on her."
"Did you get a grey crystal?"
"Yes. At this rate, if I can distribute the remaining three slots the same way, we should have enough for the Sequence 6 potion."
Bernadette was quiet for a moment. "Audrey is a member of the Tarot Club. She has the Fool's backing. Doesn't it concern you that connecting with her might irritate Mr. Fool? Your Lord of Chaos is a fake, after all."
Isn't everyone?
Honestly... I genuinely never considered this.
And on top of that, I've been quietly planning to rope Mr. Fool himself in as one of my 'subordinates' at some point.
That was probably better left unsaid to Bernadette, so he laughed instead. "I don't think Mr. Fool is the petty type. Audrey was the one who voluntarily read my honorific name first, and I gave her a benefit in return — by any measure, I'm the one extending goodwill."
Bernadette knew his reasoning was sound, but with a deity involved, who could ever be certain?
In any case, what was done was done — dwelling on it served no purpose. She set it aside and said: "While you were in the Nation of Disorder, I've been thinking about the human trafficking and MI9 — or more precisely, the Loen royal family."
Vincent felt a quiet flicker of attention: Has Bernadette worked something out?
"What have you been thinking?"
"I refuse to believe the royal family's involvement in human trafficking is purely about money — or about supplying slaves for the palace. They must have a specific purpose."
"Fair point, though I can't imagine what that purpose might be."
"I couldn't either, at first — until I recalled..."
Bernadette's voice became thoughtful. "In Father's later years, something similar happened in Intis. Not human trafficking, but a number of people Father trusted deeply were secretly assigned tasks and vanished quietly from Trier one by one."
"At the time I had no idea what it meant. It was only when Bonnivale told me the truth that I learned those people had been sent off to build a mausoleum."
Vincent feigned surprise. "You're saying the royal family's involvement in human trafficking is for something like that? That's..."
"At first it seemed like an overreach on my part. But then I remembered — you told me you had an encounter with the Loen king at some point. You said the way the Nation of Disorder responded to him suggested he was likely an Arbiter or a Lawyer at a higher sequence than me."
"That's right."
"So when you combine these two pieces — a certain possibility becomes increasingly plausible."
In that moment, Vincent genuinely wanted to applaud her. Remarkable. She pieced together the truth from a handful of disconnected fragments, and she got there entirely on her own.
"Though I want to be clear: all of this is my own unilateral speculation, and I find the conclusion itself difficult to credit. Because I cannot understand how the Seven Gods would permit the Loen king to pursue something like this right under their noses."
Vincent picked up where she left off: "But if this possibility is real, we have to prepare ourselves mentally in advance. After all, Father — your father — is most likely waiting in that mausoleum on the primitive island for his resurrection. If the Loen king truly is working toward ascending to the Black Emperor, then the day of his success becomes the day of the Emperor's permanent death."
Bernadette was silent for a long while. "You're right."
"But the Loen Kingdom is nothing like the old Intis Empire. It has been standing for over a thousand years since its founding, and the royal family's reserves of power are extraordinary. Opposing George III is tantamount to making enemies of the entire royal house."
Her tone at this point was very calm. "Counting George III himself, there are at least two Angels at Sequence 1 — and possibly two more at Sequence 2, with the number of Sequence 3 and 4 demigods unknown."
"Acting alone at Sequence 3, I would simply be throwing myself against a wall."
Setting aside those, there was also Hermes at Sequence 2 and Zaratul at Sequence 1.
Vincent thought back to the original story — George III's downfall had actually had very little to do with Klein or Bernadette's direct efforts. The largest factor had been George III himself: his method of seizing an advancement opportunity was so clumsy that he simply did not possess the qualifications to become the Black Emperor. He'd crumbled the moment pressure was applied.
Of course, Adam's last-moment betrayal had also been decisive — publicly destroying George III's false identity, severing his name from his title as king in an instant, stripping away all his anchors at once. The final nail in the coffin of a drowning man.
But the original story was already bending under the weight of all the changes Vincent's presence had brought about. Those changes would only compound as time went on. Would things still unfold the same way when the moment came?
He honestly had no idea.
Which meant that stopping the Loen king, for now, could only be considered in terms of what he and Bernadette could actually bring to bear.
If the Tingen crisis could really be used to complete Bernadette's Sequence 2 advancement ritual, she'd be an Angel. At the absolute optimistic extreme, if he himself also managed to cheat his way up to Sequence 2 by then, they'd be two Sequence 2 Angels — which might just about equal one Sequence 1 Archangel.
And then what?
The only other ally Vincent could think of was the True Creator, exiled far away in the Forsaken Land of the Gods.
To be continued…
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