Arc 2 - Chapter 29: Ahead of the Storm (2/2)

"Let's talk about the Mora..." Yu cleared his throat and opened a new topic. "Mora was a theocratic state, ruled by the Andromeda Church. Under the Church were the cathedrals and they were the leaders of the sects. In this country the king was just a representative and his powers were limited. Then the king said he didn't recognize religion and civil war broke out. Is that the case?"

"Yes," Yurine nodded in agreement.

"Tell me about the King, I wonder what he's like."

The King had the same name as Yu. He would have liked it to be special to him, but if someone else had it, at least it had to be someone cool.

"As you say, the king is the representative of the country and is elected from the Long Clan."

"How are kings elected?"

"With the seal." Yurine showed her own wrist to Yu. "Long Kings have a dragon seal on their wrist. This seal only appears on one male in the entire Long Clan, and when that person dies, it is passed on to someone else. This is how the new king is chosen."

"Hmm... It's actually a good method, so that kings can easily claim that they get their power from God, but they don't have the authority."

In some ways it was similar to the kut system. If kings were the sole rulers of the country, their claim to the throne would be too strong for ordinary people to resist.

"The next king to appear with the Dragon Seal was from the Zao branch of the Long Clan. His duties were the same as those of the kings who came before him; he would occasionally mingle with the people, pretend to listen to their problems, talk about how pious he was, and sometimes help them with supplies."

"Maybe one day I'll be king, it would suit me... If I had a crown on my head, a cape on my back, and then I could sit on the throne with my ass on my back... It would be great, I swear. And if I had a harem, oh, ahem, whatever."

"All he had to do, you see, was to fulfill the simple duties assigned by the church and, like the kings before him, to sit on his ass and enjoy himself."

"Of course, comfort makes some people uncomfortable, that asshole must have been looking for action."

Yu Zao Long, King of the Kingdom of Mora. If Yu were in his place, his life would be worthy to calling "life." Even though he was only nominally king, he had almost nothing to do. He would just relax all day, not stress himself out, and the biggest action in his life would be to sleep with several members of his harem at the same time.

"I want to do a 'six one nine' attack to the justice of this world like Rey Mysterio. Why I can't have a life like this?"

Yu envied a man he had never seen.

"The new king opposed this order. He said that under Zodia's rule the people had become poorer and religion richer, that the people needed money, not God. The king wanted a country ruled by him, not by the church."

"Does he really want this for his people or is he using this as an excuse for his lust for power?"

In Yu's eyes, no political figure worked for the people. Yu believed that the desire for fulfillment was at the root of everything, and that politicians were not working for the people, but were trying to gain power to fulfill themselves.

Yu Zao could also be acting for his own self-gratification, using the manipulative rule of religion as an excuse. If that is the case, the only thing that would have changed if he had won would have been who exploited the country.

"He believes it is fate," Yurine said.

"Fate? If he's convinced himself of that, he might have problems, people like that are unbearable."

Faith was such a powerful construct that armies would be powerless to destroy it. Yu was a man who wanted to know rather than believe, and whenever he argued with a person who believed rather than knew, he would get angry at the other person's ignorance and end the argument. Eventually, he realized that he couldn't get through to these people and stopped arguing.

"The rumor on the religious side is that there was a witch who was with the king and he was brainwashed by this witch. The witch made him believe that he was the human form of the Great Dragon."

"The human form of the Great Dragon... Sounds cool, no wonder he wants to believe in such a thing."

Yu wanted to believe that he was a special person, that he had a mission. Every human being does.

"Since Rie was a cardinal, Yu Zao is your enemy too."

"Yes, but my mother said he had a point. She too believed that religion was badly run and that they were working to line their own pockets."

"But wasn't your mother one of Zodia's cardinals? Did she become part of it to reform the religion?"

Rie didn't strike him as a religious woman. Had she really died in pursuit of some absurd ideal of reforming religion? Yu wouldn't want to die for such a cause.

"It was for her own good, she said, that she joined the Zodian religion and rebuilt the Virgo Cathedral."

"That's a more acceptable reason."

Yu believed that civilization could only advance if people pursued their self-interest. Of course, to do that, they had to be educated and able to understand what was best for them.

"For what purpose did Rie join the religion?"

"I don't know."

"What do you mean you don't know?"

"I don't know, she didn't tell me."

Yu remembered again. He was closer to Yurine as he didn't have many people to be friends with and they talked a lot about their missions and their daily lives.

But Rie saw her as just a child and didn't tell her things that a child doesn't need to know. So Yurine was not aware of some of the information they needed to know to help Rie.

"But I know there was something she wanted to kill."

"Kill," he repeated. The word made him uncomfortable. He would never get along with the word.

"You say it's a thing, not a person?"

"I don't know."

"A system, an order, a wheel, a belief, a kingdom or an entity... The word thing can mean many things."

Could there be a connection between what Rie wanted to kill and the murder? Or was the murder independent of that thing?

"It should come as no surprise that the thing she wants to kill wants to kill her."

Earlier, Yurine had said that Rie thought the king was right. Perhaps Rie's opinion did not sit well with the other members of the religion and they decided to have her killed to keep order among them.

Or it could have been the king who was behind her death. If Yu Zao wanted to destroy all religion, he could start with the weakest of all cathedrals, the Virgo Cathedral.

Another possible motive could have been related to what Rie wanted to kill. If it was a matter of revenge, it would not be easy to resolve the issue without the death of one of the two parties.

"Maybe there's a completely different reason than the ideas I've come up with. We're trying so hard, I'd be really pissed off if the murder was done for a fuckosonic reason."

If it turned out to be a crime of passion, Yu would think that everything that had happened to him was all bullshit and he wouldn't be able to let off steam without hurting someone.

"So what if there's a logical reason behind it?"

Would it be possible to turn back time? Was Yurine really right? And what if it wasn't possible? Yurine expected him to avenge her mother.

"Who do I take revenge on? Who will we take it from? From how many people? Do I have to kill myself in the end to punish all the guilty parties in this case?"

His name was on the list of those to be avenged.

"Even if we want to take revenge on someone else... What have I gotten myself into, my God..."

This was not the parallel world adventure he had imagined. Yu sank deeper and deeper, the webs wrapped around his body in ways he could not untangle.

"It's not just the fighting power, it's the people we want to take revenge on that we can't easily mess with. Let's say it was the king or the religion that killed Rie, how do we get revenge on them? They're not even easy to get close to, and if the murder was planned by the very thing Rie intended to kill, how do we find it? Even those closest to her don't know anything. Off... Off..."

So many events, each of which could be connected to another, a blind knot, and Yu, who had not yet touched that knot. He wondered what to do, what would happen in the future.

If he saw a single particle of light, maybe everything would be different.

"What do you plan to do when we find the people who killed Rie?"

"Of course we will kill them! What else do you think will happen, didn't I tell you before? We will avenge my mother!"

"We will..."

Why, he wondered, was the future getting darker every day?