74: Let's End This Charade
After having her guards escort the Helis siblings home, Loranhil continued her return journey by carriage.
Hopland at night was even livelier than during the day. After a long day of work, everyone enjoyed going out for a stroll. This world didn’t have a 996 work culture, and without convenient, bright electric lights, people generally finished work and rested after dark.
Street stalls hung lanterns, selling trinkets, snacks, and even music boxes—alchemical devices that could record and play sound. After several improvements, they weren’t too expensive.
The orange light from outside filtered into the dark carriage, creating shifting shadows on the small table as they moved. Listening to the bustling night market, Loranhil was reminded of scenes from her previous life after work.
In the unlit bus, surrounded by tall buildings and neon lights as numerous as stars, the orange-yellow light fell on tired faces. It was very quiet, with only the rumble of the bus and stop announcements. Everyone sat together in silence, their faces occasionally lit by phone screens. Faced with such a quiet compartment, she used to sometimes feel lonely, and other times, she enjoyed it.
The loneliness came from working in a big city, rarely seeing familiar relatives and friends, left to savor life’s experiences alone. The enjoyment came from not being disturbed by others, avoiding uninteresting dinners, family gatherings, or entertaining guests. After work, she could enjoy the freedom and comfort of solitude, doing whatever she wanted, her free spirit running like a wildfire under the starry sky, washing away the day’s dust and worries.
Loranhil leaned on the carriage’s armrest, looking at the twinkling lights outside. She felt a sense of disgust towards assassination plots. Why didn’t people want to achieve things through honest hard work, always looking for shortcuts instead? Once upon a time, diligence was praised, but now it had become unpopular. Countless people spread anxiety through various channels, advertisements telling you that only by doing this or that could you be considered “high-class” or successful. You must make big money, get rich overnight, become an enviable example to others, care more about your future than your parents do, and then sell their courses and products, telling you how to be more successful.
To climb up, to compete, people no longer thought about refining their products. Instead, they focused deeply on advertising, marketing, smearing competitors, and sabotage. The hypocritical faces behind the glamorous exterior became hard to trust.
As the carriage slowly entered the association’s courtyard, Loranhil awoke from her memories. She got out of the carriage and began dinner. The main course was roasted cod, accompanied by vegetable soup and smoked meat bread, ending with coconut pudding.
Watching the maids set the table by candlelight, the girl’s brow furrowed slightly, then smoothed out as if nothing had happened. After dinner, she returned to her bedroom to rest.
In front of the candlelit dressing table, Loranhil looked at herself in the mirror, blinking her transparent blue eyes. Am I so easy to bully, she thought, attempt after attempt on my life, aren’t they afraid of my revenge?
The burning candle emitted a faint fragrance, bringing a subtle feeling of drowsiness, though not very strong and hardly noticeable. She looked at the candle without blowing it out, as she often lit one in her room when reading late into the night.
If she hadn’t known about all this, some of the food at dinner would have reacted strangely with the candle’s scent, causing her to fall into an eternal sleep tonight, never to wake again.
Looking at this long-planned candle, she slowly stood up, wondering what a normal person would do in this situation. Immediately call the courtyard guards, lock down the association headquarters, conduct a large-scale search, then interrogate everyone to find the culprit?
It was like walking through a maze in dense fog, everything full of confusion and incomprehension.
Chelsea’s recent investigation revealed that Ceres actually had connections with the Helis family and knew about Madam Mela’s past, but hadn’t investigated thoroughly. The crossbow carriage and driver from earlier belonged to the Nisos family. Melu’s guard suddenly attacking, did the Helis family truly not know, or was it intentional misdirection to frame others? Was the Tisphone family the mastermind or merely a pawn? And the blue poison on that guard’s sword came from a rare flower cultivated by the Anemis family—how much were they involved?
All these thoughts only made Loranhil feel a deep disgust and anger. Was sowing discord and manipulating people so interesting?
Hiding in the supposed safety of darkness, using various schemes to toy with others, then gloating, as if to show how clever they were, how superior their methods were, thinking they could handle any situation with their plots, as if everyone was just a pawn in their hands. Killing effortlessly and invisibly, then making the victims grateful to the murderer—how absurd.
The girl opened the curtains, gazing at the moonless starry sky, standing silently for a long time.
Then her golden hair gradually faded, taking on a translucent green hue. Her soft hair and dress hem began to float in the evening breeze, her eyes shimmering like jade stars.
“You know nothing of true power.”
With these words, she lightly leaped from the windowsill, her figure rapidly ascending into the night sky like a rising star.
The wind howled in her ears, her hair flying wildly as her speed increased, breaking through layers of air currents. The ground shrank in her vision as the vast sky drew closer.
Hopland at night was a sea of lights, scattered like chess pieces. The lighthouse on the harbor occasionally swept its beam across the scene.
The land was like a huge, dark canvas. The northern forests were pitch black, while the coastal cities embraced the deep blue ocean like crescents, their lights twinkling like earthbound stars. The occasional ship entering the harbor looked as small as an ant.
Turning to survey this land, countless air currents began to flow around Loranhil. Gentle winds started to circle within a radius of tens of kilometers, countless emerald green autonomous magic powers swirling like fireflies in the breeze. The terrifying power of her mythical talent began to manifest, the raging winds becoming incredibly docile and obedient in her hands, as if this was how it should be.
“Let’s end this charade.”
Loranhil’s right hand gently pressed down, and miles of fierce winds carrying gradually transparent autonomous magic slowly descended from the sky.
The wind vanes on the coast suddenly began to spin, street trees swayed in the wind, leaves rustling loudly, the charcoal fires of street-side grills burning brighter. The entire city was slowly filled with night wind, countless scenes, people’s positions, and conversations all feeding back to Loranhil’s mind and consciousness through the night breeze.
In her dreamlike emerald eyes, endless information seemed to flow. The clear wind permeated everything, revealing every detail of the city before her, leaving no secrets hidden.
Faced with the enemy’s scheming chessboard, she simply kicked it over—so simple and crude, yet powerful and efficient.
“So it was you all along.”