Chapter 440: The Fourth Seat Awakens (2)
"When I tried to kill those worthless servants, he appeared before me, stopping me in my tracks.
There’s no doubt it was him.
That level of wave manipulation is something only someone of his caliber could perform."
Beatrice still remembered every moment of that encounter, when she had nearly killed Gavid Lindman and Mergo.
Just as she was about to strike,
time froze around her, reality flipped upside down, and a tremendous force pressed down on her, rendering her unable to move.
Hearing this, Draxler nodded.
"Hellmond is in complete chaos right now.
The Great King, Agaroth, and the First Seat, the Red Moon Crimson, have been dormant for a long time, and have stepped away from the battlefield."
"As for the Second Seat, Agares,
he vanished after his defeat against one of the Seven Supreme Powers.
Which leaves Shadow King Vayne as the strongest active demon among the upper seats."
Draxler paused for a moment, gathering his thoughts before continuing.
"Vayne has always been a strange and reclusive demon who follows only her whims.
She has no interest in leadership whatsoever, which left the Fourth Seat, Wesker, and the Fifth Seat, Marvas, to lead the upper demons."
Since the top three had withdrawn from leadership for various reasons,
the upper demons had split into two factions:
One led by the Fourth Seat, Wesker ..the Black Faction, which included demons like Beatrice and Astaroth.
The other followed the Fifth Seat, Marvas—the Red Faction.
Although they were part of the same hierarchy, the two forces were constantly at odds, their relationship tangled and strained.
Wesker was cunning and calculating,
often scheming from behind the scenes.
Marvas, on the other hand, was the oldest among the 72 upper demons, a seasoned war general with vast experience.
The struggle between these two forces had raged for years, especially after the higher ranks ignored them completely,
leaving them free to wage their own wars.
The power struggle was evenly matched,
until the Red Faction recently gained the upper hand after the sudden disappearance of the Black Faction’s leader—Wesker.
This disappearance led Wesker’s followers to search for him, their journey eventually leading them to Earth ..
the last place Wesker was seen.
Realizing this, Draxler stared at Beatrice’s back, unable to believe what they were about to face.
"Is Lord Wesker really in this place?"
Draxler asked, but before he could say another word, his mouth vanished without warning.
Beatrice turned toward him,
holding her magic staff in hand.
"You talk too much, Draxler.
You’d better control yourself before my hand slips further."
With that threatening tone,
Draxler realized his missing mouth was Beatrice’s doing.
He had no choice but to submit,
understanding that he had crossed the line.
Beatrice, however, was entirely certain of her actions.
She had spent a long time planning the Witch’s Game, all for one higher purpose:
To draw Wesker’s attention.
His disappearance wasn’t random ...
Beatrice knew him well.
This wasn’t the first time he had done something like this.
The King’s Eye never moved without meaning.
Every step he took was calculated,
and his sudden vanishing could mean only one thing:
He was preparing for something enormous.
Beatrice had always been fascinated by the intricate schemes Wesker wove from the shadows.
The Witch’s Game was nothing but a cheap imitation of her supreme master’s grand designs.
That’s why she wanted a front-row seat to the show the Fourth Seat was about to put on.
She was certain it would be spectacular.
As for Marvas and the Red Faction?
She wasn’t concerned about them in the slightest.
Once it was over,
Wesker would deal with them easily.
She was certain of it.
At that moment,
Beatrice cared about only one thing ..
meeting him.
And that was why she had come here.
"He led me here himself."
It happened during the final battle against the Elite Class students.
Back then, Beatrice had felt a subtle current guiding her toward somewhere far away.
That was why she never activated her final magical trap, the one that would have annihilated Frey and his companions.
A witch like her had already accounted for the possibility that Frey might break through her defenses, so she had prepared an automatic trap that would trigger even without her casting it.
Meaning Frey’s anti-magic would have been useless.
"I was guaranteed victory.
The Witch’s Game was designed that way from the start."
Frey and his companions had zero chance of winning ..
unless some outside force intervened.
Who could have predicted that Wesker himself would intervene on their behalf?
In such a case, Beatrice had no choice but to yield.
And at that moment...
She realized they had ventured too deep into the cave, the darkness around them growing heavier and heavier.
A darkness far from ordinary.
It was said that those who reached the higher realms of the SSS rank
possessed such overwhelming power
that those below SS+ couldn’t even sense it...
And so, Beatrice and Draxler stood frozen, unsettled beneath the crushing weight of the vast darkness that crept over their skin.
Slowly, the shadows gathered and converged, taking the form of a colossal silhouette stretching across the cavern wall.
It was a demonic shadow, its single crimson eye snapping open without warning ...
gazing straight into their very souls.
That eye did not merely see their bodies.
It pierced far deeper, laying bare their past, present, and future, holding their fate in its grasp.
"The King’s Eye,"
Beatrice whispered, awe-struck.
Draxler dropped to his knees without hesitation, pressing his forehead to the ground.
Beatrice followed, bowing deeply,
her lips curling into an exhilarated smile despite herself.
They sought to greet him, to honor him,
yet his mere presence robbed them of their voices.
They couldn’t sense his power ..
but the pressure he radiated left no room for doubt.
Then came that voice.
sweet, seductive, the very whisper that had lured countless beings into ruin.
The Fourth Seat spoke.
"Beatrice, one day your curiosity will be the death of you."
Summoning all her strength, Beatrice managed to reply to her master.
"If death is the price to witness the masterpiece you’ve painted here...
then so be it. Let death come !!"
"Ever the sweet talker."
The crimson eye continued to fixate on them, as Wesker spoke from beyond the veil of shadow.
"Your little game was amusing to my eyes.
So go ahead, say what’s on your mind.
I’ll allow it."
Those final words ignited a spark in Beatrice’s eyes. Without thinking, she stepped forward, unable to contain her excitement.
"Your words are more than I deserve!"
But the shadow on the wall remained silent.
And in that silence, she realized her flattery was meaningless here.
So she cast aside her empty words and asked the question that had haunted her for so long:
"Forgive my boldness, My Lord
but why go to such lengths to toy with a worthless species like humans?"
A fair question.
In the distant past, there had been a mighty civilization ..
highly organized, fiercely strong ..
warriors so powerful that even the demons could not breach their defenses.
With a population of two billion, they were all hardened fighters, a race whose might forced the demons to tread carefully.
But in that age, Wesker vanished,
only to reappear hidden within their ranks.
From the shadows,
he plotted and schemed, turning them against one another within mere years.
They split into two warring factions,
blinded by petty disputes, unable to see the truth before them.
Thus began a catastrophic war.
Blood flowed without end.
That once-unbreakable civilization
crumbled overnight, reduced to a sea of corpses.
With only a few well-placed whispers
and a handful of masterful conspiracies,
Wesker destroyed everything.
One billion lives were lost in that war.
And then, at the moment of one side’s triumph .. at the peak of their joy ..
Wesker appeared before them,
snatching away their victory and replacing it with utter despair.
He was a sadist who delighted in breaking souls.
Just as they thought they had won,
as their joy reached its peak,he descended upon them ...
slaughtering the remaining billion himself in a massacre that scarred the world’s darkest history.
Wesker’s dreadful reputation was born of acts like these.
But humans were not like that civilization.
They were far weaker.
Unlike that ancient race, who could repel the elite demons, Wesker alone could erase all of humanity from the face of the Earth in less than a day.
And yet, he hadn’t.
So Beatrice could not help but ask herself:
Why?
Why would the Fourth Seat,
one of the mightiest beings in existence,
bother hiding and manipulating such fragile creatures from behind the curtain?
That was the answer she sought.
"You’re clever, Beatrice...
but your vision is far too narrow."
Between Beatrice’s violet demonic gaze and Wesker’s crimson King’s Eye,
the gap was vast.
She had only glimpsed the surface ..
ignorant of the deeper currents beneath.
"There is far more beyond what your eyes can see.
In the end, you are nothing but a pawn on this board .. just like every human soul standing on this chessboard called Earth."
The game had been in play for far longer than she realized.
And whoever revealed their hand first would lose.
Whether it was the one with the King’s Eye,
or the one with the piercing blue eyes playing the opposite side ..
Or perhaps...
A third player ..
an uninvited guest in the game?
"Many eyes are watching this place.
Even the King himself has shown interest."
"!!!"
Beatrice could not hide her shock.
And how could she not?
When she heard that the Demon King, Agaroth .. in all his unimaginable might ..
was watching them.
Here on Earth, in this insignificant corner of the vast cosmos.
"You’ve always been a fine piece, Beatrice.
So continue to play your part...
but do not try to break out of your shell."
After all ..
What good is a pawn ..
if it tries to leave the board and confront the player himself?
"The end draws near.
The schemes will be revealed, the plans exposed, the secrets laid bare...
and this world will finally learn the true meaning of horror."
With those final words, the shadow slowly faded away, leaving Beatrice in stunned silence.
"Not much time remains."
Planet Earth stood on the verge of a decisive turning point in its long and tangled history.
A turning point that could mark the end ..
of a story woven from countless threads of fate, now wrapping tightly around the necks of its inhabitants.
And among them all...
Frey Starlight stood at the center of those tangled threads, gazing up at the sky,
weary and worn by the storm of events surrounding him.
Time remaining until the end of the final mission: 1 day.
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