Fang Zhen looked at Tos as well.
He wanted to hear why Tos had betrayed the Whig Society.
Tos's expression remained unchanged, betraying no emotion or thought. He was even sowhat placid.
"Hardworking and uncomplaining? Perhaps." Tos lifted his head slightly to look at Gwendolyn. "Gwendolyn, I'm not like you."
"I've heard your story many tis. When you were young, your best friend was killed by soone from the Eternal Night Council. Filled with a deep resentnt for them, you traveled far and wide just to join the Whig Society. You dedicated yourself to fighting alongside us to defeat the Eternal Night Council and overthrow their rule."
"I'm different."
Tos exhaled softly. "I was an orphan from a young age. I was found by a high-ranking mber of the Whig Society and raised within its ranks. I was educated by the Society from childhood, so I never had the ti to develop my own preferences, my own judgnt, or my own thoughts."
"Everything I know, from my earliest mories, was instilled in
by those around ."
"What you saw as being hardworking and uncomplaining was, in truth, simply
not knowing what other choice I had but to fall in line with the Whig Society."
At this, Tos glanced at Gwendolyn.
"Sotis, I envy you, Master... and you too, Fang Zhen," Tos said. "You knew what you wanted to do with your lives from a very young age."
"But everything ca later for . Before I turned forty, my diligence and tireless work were rely a habit. After forty, it beca confusion."
"In fact, until recently, I was still lost, not knowing what to pursue, or even what constituted my 'self'."
"What are you talking about? You betrayed the Whig Society because of *this*? Are you a lobster? Is your brain full of shit?" Karen, reeling from the unexpected betrayal, shouted emotionally.
Tos ignored her and continued, "At forty, I realized my life seed to have been designed for . The Whig Society has a group of orphans like , specially grood to be people who would supposedly never betray them."
"But I've been lost ever since that mont."
"You know, when a person feels lost, their thoughts run wild. The more I toed the line in my actions, the more my mind would stray, especially when there were things I couldn't comprehend."
"Within the Whig Society, my duties included assassination, disarming traps, and delivering ssages for important figures. I've traveled to many parts of the Kingdom, and what I observed was that even with the Whig Society's existence, no fewer people died. On the contrary, because of our conflict, even more people died. Yet the Kingdom remained the Kingdom, and the Eternal Night Council remained the Eternal Night Council. Nothing changed."
"I couldn't help but wonder, if nothing ever changes, what is the point of the Whig Society's existence?"
'Perhaps it's just... redundant?'
"So many ideas clashed inside my head. I looked calm on the outside, but I was on the verge of madness."
"Then one day, when I was near my breaking point, I was in a village and saw a butcher slaughtering a sheep. The instant he brought the knife down, the look in his eyes was exactly like the look I'd seen when mbers of the Eternal Night Council killed humans."
"In that mont, I had an epiphany."
A strange light glinted in Tos's eyes, and his tone grew fanatical. "I suddenly understood."
"A butcher kills a sheep for its at, and the Eternal Night Council kills humans for food. What's the difference?"
"There is no fundantal difference."
"The crux of the matter isn't the justice, the good versus evil, that the Whig Society drilled into . The fundantal difference is power, status, the hierarchy of life forms."
"There is no sin in a man eating a sheep, so why is it a sin when an aberration eats a man? Isn't it the sa thing?"
"As long as a life form is sufficiently advanced, what's wrong with letting lesser creatures provide a bit of sustenance? Isn't that what humans do?"
"Therefore, the issue isn't about justice at all. It's about the strength of one's power and the level of one's life form. Higher life forms naturally possess the right to treat lower life forms as sacrifices and offerings."
"And in this entire Kingdom, the aberrations—or more precisely, the Eternal Night Council—are the highest life form, possessing the greatest power."
"Once I understood this, all the chaotic noise that had filled my head for years vanished completely."
"And for the first ti in my life, I had a desire of my own."
"Since the Eternal Night Council is the highest form of life I know, then what I must pursue is to beco an aberration, to enter the Eternal Night Council, to beco a higher being."
As he said this, an abnormal, fanatical light shone in Tos's eyes.
"I don't want to be human anymore."
"I'm very grateful to the butcher who helped
realize the truth." For the first ti, a smile that could be described as genuine appeared on Tos's placid, almost numb face. "So, I thanked him. And then I killed him. His wife, his five children... I killed his entire family."
"In that mont, I truly felt it—the thrill of being a higher life form, crushing those lesser beings."
Fang Zhen listened to Tos, his expression remaining impassive.
Tos's words, however, left the mbers of the Whig Society utterly stunned and horrified.
Gwendolyn and the others stared as if they didn't recognize him—or rather, as if they were seeing the 'real' Tos for the very first ti. Their faces were etched with astonishnt, even a sense of profound shock.
Having said his piece, Tos's face broke into a strange smile.
It was the sa kind of smile as Ellick's—deeply unsettling, filled with aristocratic condescension and a contempt for humanity hidden in the depths of his eyes.
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