“If the two ideas you fear turn out to be true… you’ll have no choice but to swallow your pride and live with them.”
“Mr.Fury…”
This matters. On the day you become empress, I’ll have no right to interfere with your decisions, but…
“ Some one had told me long time ago.”
Three things can not hide for long: the Moon, the Sun and the Truth. You will never defeat the truth. No one can. Not even me.
“When I understood that… it’s why I am the way I am, every single day. I’ll do whatever it takes to keep myself on the same side as the truth.”
And you should, too.
“When you put it that way… it’s…”
Nora’s eyes dropped to the book in Dan’s bag. She took it out… Darwin’s book.
There’s no harm in Nora trying to argue that what this book says is wrong; but if she can’t… then the scripture is wrong. And if truth = scripture… why did Luminus suppress it for over a hundred years?
Because they were afraid.
Afraid it might be ‘the truth.’
A spark lit inside Nora.
When Nora pulled out another book from Dan’s bag, its author was…Johannes K.
An astronomer who died twenty years ago.
Both Darwin C. and Johannes K. had already passed away.
Yet their work only grew more powerful with time… and now that it had fallen into Prince Fury’s hands—
“Mr.Fury.”
“?”
“I’d like to know… for my question-right today.”
“Go ahead.”
“What made you think this way?”
Because this wasn’t the kind of crystallization that comes from war alone.
Many Snowhaven generals had seen war, and yet Nora hardly knew anyone who thought the way Mr.Fury did.
So there had to be something else—something Nora needed to pry at properly and ask in the right place.
Dan fell silent for a moment, then stopped writing, lifted his face to the sky, and said,
“A human once taught me.”
“A human?”
Nora had to repeat it, unable to believe her ears.
“A human taught you?”
“Yes.”
“Who could teach you, Mr.Fury?”
“He was a man in Zentinel,” Dan said.
“Ten years ago—you would have been eight, right?”
“Yes, Mr.Fury.”
“Back then, my father ordered me to hunt down a shadow general who’d fled across the border into the Zentinel forests… It wasn’t my first mission off the battlefield, but it was a rather special one.”
“How was it special?”
“It wasn’t difficult, but the Zentinel forests are complexly layered, so it took a week to complete. One day, I led my twenty men across a swift river to the far bank… and I met a monk.”
“A monk?”
“He wore rough brown cloth—like rags… completely different from the monks I’d seen in Zentinel. If you’d seen him yourself, you’d probably have thought he was a beggar rather than a monk.”
“And what made you think he wasn’t a beggar?”
“I don’t know… but I could sense it. There was something inexplicably different about the air around him… I wouldn’t know how to explain it unless you met him yourself.”
Dan looked down.
“We came ashore and found him alone. Strangely, he showed not the slightest fear of us… To this day I still remember him.
He was the most extraordinary human I’ve ever known.
The most special human Prince Fury had ever met?
“I asked to camp near where he was and to leave at dawn… He didn’t object or show any displeasure. I didn’t tell him who I was or what I was doing there, but he seemed to know, deep down…”
And after that… I had the chance to speak with him.
“We talked about many things. It began with the journey… the fatigue… and before I knew it, I was the one venting everything bottled up inside me. I spoke with him about life… about beliefs... about God… 'til morning.”
The boy shook his head.
“I was confused then, unsure what I should believe—until I spoke with him, he taught me about things I'd never thought before … That’s why he was special. I feel like He was the only person in this world who likely had the answer I was seeking.”
“Did he answer you?”
“He said that he only pointed the way, it was me to strive… He told me I was a lotus about to break the surface. I don’t know what that meant, guess I had to find the answer myself…”
Dan gently tapped the book.
“ Do not believe in anything simply because you have heard it. Do not believe in anything simply because it is spoken and rumored. Do not believe in anything because it is written in your religious books. Do not believe in anything merely on the authority of your teachers. Do not believe in traditions because they have been handed down. But after observation and analysis, when you find that anything agrees with reason and is conducive to the good and benefit of one and all, then accept it and live up to it..”
“ The monk taught you that?”
“ Yes. I can still remember that exact speak.”
“Did you ask who he was?”
“Regrettably, I didn’t.”
Dan sighed.
“ I heard he died of food poisoning years later… It saddened me a little, knowing I’d never have the chance to speak with him again… If he were still alive, Artheris wouldn't be the first place I set foot upon.”
“Did he seem like a cult leader?”
Nora wondered.
“In Zentinel, those crop up often. You must be careful, Mr.Fury.”
“I asked him that myself. I asked which god’s avatar he was.”
But what he answered was…
He was just an ordinary human.
A ‘teacher,’ not any kind of incarnate deity.
From his tone…
Nora could tell Fury liked him very much—and in his eyes there was a shade of sorrow that the man had gone before Fury was free.
“I sent Livramento to look for leads on him… I just want to know where the people around him are now—what they’re doing.”
“You sent Livramen to Zentinel?”
“He's the one I trust when it comes to something personal”
Dan turned to meet Nora’s gaze with a gentle smile.
“Quite a few people followed that man… If I’m lucky enough, I’d like to meet someone close to him. Just one would be fine.”
“And what will you… do next?”
“…Good question.”
The prince looked up at the stars.
“Perhaps tell them I’ve found some answers to that man’s question.”
Artheris Academy fence.
Rafinya Saint Pauli walked out holding a check. What mattered wasn’t the check; it was…
The name on it: Goodison Holding Inc.
“A sponsor, is it? What is this about?”
Rafinya had uncovered something even more complicated.
Casca had nothing to do with Goodison Holding Inc., a registered company in Zentinel—not in the slightest…
“To found a company requires a great deal of money… or else…”
Dan might not be a commoner?
Rafinya’s sense screamed at her. Even if Thomasin said he was merely a representative of the sponsor, knowing how Dan hides things, Rafinya did not believe he was just a ‘middleman’ as claimed.
She headed back toward her own dorm… but before crossing the gate, she looked out toward the far Anfield woods.
Red-velvet eyes glowed against the darkness and the star-scattered sky.
“You really are a complicated one.”
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