Lixia was truly furious, far more so than Eivass or Sherlock. This human Extraordinary, merely a hundred years old, had already witnessed all sorts of bizarre and suffering in the world. Her personality had already fused halfway with the Path of Authority.
Even when she had just seen Rock Cell City petrified not long ago, Lixia had only furrowed her brow slightly. This was because Lixia – who was also Meg in the past – had long understood the truth that “the essence of an Extraordinary is the embodiment of violence.”
All things change because of the existence of an Extraordinary. Nations without High-Tier Extraordinaries would submit to those with them; the righteous and weak would submit to the erroneous and powerful. Even if human nations adhered to the fighting standards set by the elves, it was fundamentally because people feared the elves’ even greater power.
Whether it was Star Antinomy or Iris Flower, or even Avalon – if they suddenly obtained supreme power that could completely ignore the Church, they would eventually destroy rules, rule the world, and become world overlords. The outcome would be the same even if other nations or races reached this level of power.
A nation is an entity. But it has neither personality nor morality; only “strength and weakness” is the all-encompassing law that determines everything. Whatever a powerful nation says and does is right, while no one cares about the words of the weak, no one listens to their laments, and no one upholds their justice.
—This is the truth of the Path of Authority. Its essence lies in revealing the truth that “violence changes everything.” Its substance remains the “king of the strong, the winner is king” of the Path of Power. Therefore, for Lixia, she could actually accept the idea of “powerful Extraordinaries doing whatever they please” better than others.
But she absolutely could not accept their foolish fanaticism. To her, the word “Savior” carried special weight. Who else could be more deserving of the title “Savior” than Eivass, who could reverse life and death, reverse desperate situations, and reverse fate?
She personally witnessed and experienced Eivass’s step-by-step act of salvation—reversing fate, overcoming the “impossible.” He brought the dead back to life, made the old young again, allowed those on the brink of despair and destruction to laugh in the sunlight, gave the stagnant and decaying Avalon new “possibilities,” and reversed all the dark futures she had vaguely glimpsed during the Ascension Ritual… That was a true Savior!
Not to mention, that Lord even dared to use the lie of “saving the world” to deceive these Desert People, making them sacrifice their lives for his selfish desires! The “unconditional loyalty” advocated by the Path of Authority actually had a sole prerequisite—that the superior be legitimate and wise, worthy of the absolute loyalty that the inferiors would pay with their lives.
And to provide them with a lie as a reason and excuse for their subordinates’ sacrifice, to have these Troll shamans carry out fatal missions unknowingly through deception, and to make those who were more loyal to him and believed in his lies become executioners overseeing their colleagues’ deaths—intentionally sending subordinates to their deaths, and using lies to make subordinates kill each other—this was a taboo of the Path of Authority.
Even after being transformed into demons and having their thoughts and perceptions altered, those two succubi still had absolute faith in Adler’s nonsensical talk—
“Adler gave us flowers and water, honey and olive oil. He gave us sweet and salty, gave us color, gave us food.”
The slightly larger succubus vibrated the air and said devoutly, “He bestowed upon us grace—allowing us to live in Heaven City, happier than anyone else.”
The smaller succubus, with a missionary-like attitude, passionately spoke to the enemies they were about to kill, amidst the agonizing repetitions of the Troll shamans, about Adler’s greatness: Heaven City was unlike other Lord’s cities. Here, water resources were not monopolized by the Lord and then sold to the masses, but were freely available to all Free People.
It wasn’t just water; even food was free. Every day, bronze plates filled with fresh food-roast naan, stewed chickpeas, stewed lamb, as well as honey, olive oil, and salt-were placed in the squares and along the streets. People could take what they needed at any time, and the food was replenished constantly. They had new clothes every year, fruits to eat every month, and a bottle of pomegranate juice distributed to each person every three days—all of this was still free.
People didn’t need to labor or fight. They only needed to devoutly recite “Adler is the Savior” a hundred times a day, kneel and sing “Praise the generous Adler, praise the benevolent Adler” nine times before the Sacred Statues visible throughout the city at all times, and they could remain in Heaven City for a long time, each served by three slaves.
There was no concept of money or wealth in the city; since there was nothing to buy, everything was free. “Money” was considered impure and unclean to the residents of Heaven City. It was precisely because people in other places craved these things so much that disputes and conflicts arose.
—Of course, the free benefits mentioned above were only enjoyed by the Free People.
As the succubus vividly described the graces of Heaven City with a vibrating hum of air, the solidified sand of Rock Cell City shimmered under the twilight sun. Those petrified slaves maintained their final postures: some reached out futilely towards the water source, some kissed the sand with cracked lips. More curled up in a fetal position. Compared to Heaven City, this place was simply hell.
“—In the desert, a city where everything is infinite and free?” Eivass murmured quietly, his expression becoming a little more serious. “That can indeed be called ‘heaven.'”
This sounds, surprisingly, has a bit of a watered-down Church vibe. Regardless of his motives, he had indeed created a rare pure land in the desert. Sherlock nodded slightly in agreement, but then mockingly added, “Although the residents in the city have no money, he himself is selling ‘things’ to make money.” Speaking thus, he glanced at the Troll shamans whose minds had been stolen. Their “signature product” used to support their own citizens was undoubtedly these augmented live ritual bombs.
Judging from the extremely skilled supervision and cooperation of these three Ritualists, he must have developed quite a few such unethical products. He definitely didn’t establish Heaven City after stealing Amber’s power, meaning he had similar inventions and products before.
Lixia, after hearing the succubus’s narration, also calmed down somewhat, no longer as angry and irritable. Because this was an answer she could accept. Treating outsiders—such as Troll shamans—as food and consumables in exchange for benefits for her own subjects. Although the Path of Authority had not formed Heavenly Envoys representing “deviations of the Path,” the concepts and schools of thought that expounded upon the Path of Authority had already existed. This kind of “cruel benevolent governance,” was one of the mainstream factions of the Path of Authority. Fierce racism, or the practice of leeching off foreign races or nations to support one’s own citizens, both belonged to the ideology of the Path of Authority.
Lixia frowned and keenly asked a question that bothered her, “You said… food cannot be eaten by slaves, and the Free People have no money to buy food for the slaves, and there is no market in the city at all, so what do the slaves eat?”
“Slaves have their own place for food,” the succubus replied.
“Heh heh…” At this moment, the Night Demon Viness suddenly let out a mocking chuckle.
Little Crow shook its bird head, “You truly don’t understand Anxi… you’re not asking the right question.” The pitch-black crow gazed at the succubus with its scarlet pupils and asked sternly, “How many Free People are there in the city?”
“Three hundred and twenty, my lord,” the succubus replied respectfully and sincerely. This number was less than half of Rock Cell City!
“And how many slaves?”
“Oh, quite a lot. Probably eighty to ninety thousand, maybe even more… I’m not sure of the exact number.”
“…What?” Sherlock was stunned.
