Despite their cellmate collapsing right before their eyes, the other two showed no alarm.
The still-conscious man and woman seed long accustod to this sight. They rely withdrew their gazes in silence and closed their eyes once more.
'Failed to impress...'
'At least nobody noticed.'
Cheng Shi cleared his throat twice, shuffled over to the middle prisoner with practiced nonchalance, and studied the Grand Justice hanging before him—a wrinkled old man with salt-and-pepper hair.
He had once been one of the six supre authorities of the Grand Tribunal. What cri could have landed him in a place reserved solely for the condemned?
In every past encounter, Cheng Shi had approached with subtlety and tact. But today was different. This was a dungeon, with no one around who required discretion—so he cut straight to the point.
"I know you, but you don't know . Grand Justice La Quis—a stranger with no ties to the Grand Tribunal just walked up to your face. Aren't you the least bit curious?"
"..."
The aged La Quis didn't even open his eyes. His lips moved for a ti, but then he seed to give up on speaking entirely and lapsed back into silence.
"Don't you want to know what happened in the Howling Iron Prison today?"
"..."
"Ah, I see now. So you weren't frad at all—you've accepted your guilt. You don't want to leave this place. You're using this imprisonnt to atone before Order. Am I right?"
"..."
La Quis opened his eyes. With great effort he lifted one eyelid, the clouded orb beneath it flicking briefly toward Cheng Shi. Then his gaze drifted downward, and he fell silent again. Every shred of his spirit seed to have been ground away to nothing.
Seeing this, Cheng Shi frowned.
What had he been through? What cri could reduce a Grand Justice at the height of his power to this—a man who'd lost all interest in anything around him, who'd even lost the will to survive?
Cheng Shi couldn't puzzle it out. The only clue he'd gleaned was the man's faint reaction to the word "Order." Perhaps he... was still devout?
'No good. Need a different approach. Normal conversation won't extract anything.'
So Cheng Shi shifted his eyes, raised an eyebrow, and adopted a dismissive, mocking tone:
"It would seem our Grand Justice has abandoned the defense of justice.
How pitiful. Even the follower closest to Order has lost his devotion. It appears that Order...
Has reached the end of its road."
The mont the words left his lips, La Quis slowly raised his head. And at last, a voice answered from within the stone cell.
But it wasn't him. It was the woman dangling to his left—Lid Yara, the forr Grand Investigator. Her voice was frail beyond asure, yet the words she spoke rang with iron resolve.
"There is no more Order in this world."
"?"
Cheng Shi's gaze sharpened as he turned to look at her.
Lid Yara was as gaunt and haggard as La Quis, but she was far younger.
Close-cropped hair. Chiseled features. A jaw clenched tight. No matter how long she'd been imprisoned here, beneath the exhaustion this Grand Investigator still harbored a pair of eyes as sharp as a hawk's.
She stared at Cheng Shi with burning intensity, and in the weakest of voices delivered the most resolute blasphemy: "We... lost the one we followed long ago..."
Hearing this, Cheng Shi's eyes went wide, his pupils contracting sharply.
They knew Order had a problem?!
Had they been thrown in here specifically because they'd discovered sothing was wrong with Order?
Then who had imprisoned them?
Had Iron Law issued a false edict? Or had the Supre Inquisitors passed the sentence?
If the forr, then at least so glimr of Order's light still existed within the Grand Tribunal. But if the latter...
A chill ran through him.
These people in power knew Order had a problem and chose to follow it anyway?
Then what exactly were they following—"order"? Power? Or... desire?
Had Corruption clawed its way up from the Underworld?
Alarm flared inside Cheng Shi, though his face betrayed nothing. He nodded in agreent:
"So my suspicion was right. You do know sothing's wrong with him."
Hearing Cheng Shi's words, the two hanging prisoners stiffened. La Quis finally lifted his head. A flash of despair cut through the murk of his eyes, and his lips trembled:
"Has he... begun openly championing a new will?
Has he... stopped considering the countless followers within the Grand Tribunal?
Why... why has he chosen to walk this path of corruption with no intention of turning back?!
Why would he let this world—already so short on justice—lose justice entirely!
Why! Why! WHY!"
The old man's voice rose higher and higher, the anguished roar tearing at his throat. His eyes were bloodshot, nearly unhinged, and the spittle flying from his mouth pelted Cheng Shi's head and face.
But as every ounce of fury and resentnt was spent, La Quis's vigor collapsed in on itself. By the ti the last three hoarse syllables scraped free, his state resembled the guttering fla of a lamp whose oil had run dry—a final flash of radiance before extinction. The light in both clouded eyes dimd, and the old man slumped unconscious.
Watching the second insider pass out right in front of him, Cheng Shi wordlessly wiped his face with his sleeve.
'That old man better not have anything contagious...'
"..."
That wasn't the point. The point was the utterly critical piece of information he'd extracted from those few frantic words: the Grand Justice apparently didn't know that Order had been replaced by Iron Law. In his understanding, Order itself had fallen.
No wonder!
No wonder this Grand Justice had lost all will to live, all fighting spirit. This devout follower of Order must have been marching along his path when he suddenly looked up and saw—at the end of the road, just short of the destination—that the radiant Divine Throne had crumbled to ruin at so unknowable point!
It was like walking along and suddenly discovering a cliff yawning beneath your feet—a jolting realization that the road of faith had long since ended!
In La Quis's eyes, Order was no longer orderly. And if so, then what did that make him—a follower still walking the path of Order?
This weary old man had never once despaired over the world's lack of justice. But this ti, he'd despaired deeply and completely.
A keen light flashed in Cheng Shi's eyes. He grew intensely curious about what change had revealed Iron Law's flaw—and kept turning over how he could leverage this information gap to extract even more intelligence.
But extracting intelligence required soone conscious to talk.
Only one lucid prisoner remained. Cheng Shi couldn't afford any more accidents, so he quickly turned to Lid Yara, carefully modulating his tone to avoid provoking her while still piquing her interest.
"Grand Investigator Lid Yara—if you still wish to make one final effort for the last ember of Order, then don't pass out like that coward La Quis."
Lid Yara blinked, then slowly shook her head:
"La Quis was never a coward. He was the one who discovered the anomaly—and called it out publicly."
"?"
Hearing that, Cheng Shi was genuinely caught between laughter and exasperation.
'Well, well. So the old man wasn't a coward at all—he was a hothead!'
'A devout hothead!'
'You ended up in here because you were reckless, and frankly, you earned it...'
Reviews
All reviews (0)