Goodbye [3]

In life, it has become somewhat normal for people to shower the dead with nice words. At every funeral, people always send the departed off with flowery phrases.

Some say that doing so will pave a nice road for the departed soul. Most people do this only to ensure that good things are said about them at their own funerals, letting their evil deeds remain in the shadows.

Encender, on the other hand, was very honest when it came to the dead; she believed that lying would only make the departed experience a cruel afterlife.

When Meron was slaughtered before her, she didn't say a thing, as she knew so little about her and only shed a few tears to send her off in grace.

It felt as if the edge of her heart was cut off, but she didn't have time to waste on sobbing, as Meron's sacrifice would go to waste. Whether she liked it or not, she was in a position where she had to swallow her pain and move on.

Then Star took the blade for her a few minutes later. She was already feeling vigilant, and this death was just as painful as those of all the prison guards she had ended that night.

She didn't even have a second to shed tears for a guy like Star Kazuma.

She didn't like him at all.

To her, he was better off dead than alive.

Seeing the face that had remained indifferent to Star's noble sacrifice, Raiden felt a sting in his heart. Star wasn't supposed to be here, and his last words kept ringing in his mind.

"Your reign is over, motherfucker... And be wary of... Tito."

He knew that with the current incident, he would be stripped of his title as the Warden, leaving the next generation to oversee the Galactic Prison.

When it came to the man from the planet Earth, Tito Roux Z, all Raiden could say was that the man was a good actor. In all his life, he had never seen a person who could lie to himself just to make his acting seem like the real deal.

Did he really have a sister? Did he really have a wife?

Only Tito knew the truth, and this scared the hell out of Raiden. Tito was someone who couldn't be judged merely by living with him. The real him was known only to himself; what people saw as the real him might turn out to be one big lie.

"Damn it!" Raiden cursed as he recalled the cold eyes that seemed to glare at him when the original body was killed. "What does he intend to do in this world? I'm really going to die if it becomes known that he was once an inmate here, when he becomes the most wanted person in the future."

Raiden could see countless Nobles surrounding him as they placed his head on a block, ready to slaughter him. Encender wasn't the fated devil of Ablauf...

It was Tito!

There are many crystal bugs that roamed the universe, especially on the planet Ablauf. Despite that, some rare and powerful ones existed.

In the tenth position is the hueless cicada, which belongs to the group of Zodiac crystal bugs.

It allows a person to experience a simulation of the next hundred years. It is similar to the power of regression, yet different in that even if the user dies in this simulation, they will be able to continue seeing the future until the hundred years are up.

The reason it is ranked tenth, despite its incredible ability, is that the user dies three days after the simulation ends.

The last known person to be bitten by the hueless cicada died twenty-one years ago. She was a military air-force captain with extraordinary talent who would have been a Deputy General if not for the General.

Her last words were, "A devil shall rise from the depths of the Galactic Prison with immanence strength like no other. Golden eyes will stare upon Ablauf like an ant hill, and his sword will bring chaos and suffering to our planet. Please, you must stop the devil before he enters the outside world; that is the only chance we have."

This is why Raiden's clone wanted to take care of Encender. She had immanent strength, and unlocking sensory Opia was already proof of that. The word "sword" just made him assume the person would be a swordsman.

Now he understood how foolish he had been. The word "immanence" means the state of dwelling within and not extending beyond a given domain; it does not mean super.

Tito is indeed physically strong in some aspects, but his true strength lies within himself.

The word "sword" simply translated to something Tito would gain and use to destroy Ablauf in the future—his mind, perhaps. After all, it is also a tool to him.

Turning his head to look at the inmates swarming towards the X-Block like flies, Raiden felt hopeless to the point that his red skin turned dull.

He was sure this was all Tito's doing, and he didn't need to guess a second time that Tito had killed Hyde.

Losing one of the seven systems in Ablauf was already bad enough for him to receive a death sentence from the World Government, and worse, he had let the fated devil escape.

Thud–!

He fell to his knees on the now-dirty floor with his hands raised in the air, admitting defeat. He knew it was pointless to try to delay his death. Tito was already out of the prison, so his end was inevitable.

He looked at the three inmates from the F-Block with a face drawn in defeat, his eyes resembling a small pond of water. "You have bested me in everything. I can't keep wasting your time, delaying your freedom. Can one of you please return this kindness by ending my life?"

His voice was emotionless and low-pitched. No lies could be detected from it. The man had already let go of the rope of life and was ready to die, yet Rajah and Encender felt hesitant to end the killer of their friend. There is no such thing as a tomato volunteering to be chopped.

On the other hand, Layla was already furious with this man; she didn't waste a second as she dashed toward the man of thunder with her twin daggers glinting gold.

Thack–!

Raiden felt a stab on his neck, blood splashing onto Layla's silver-pink hair, and he knew this was the end. Compared to how he had lived, this was not painful at all.

"Be wary of Tito... He is like his hair; one can't define whether it is black or white."

Plop–!