Chapter 25: The War Begins
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
Although it was past curfew, Benjamin successfully returned to the Lithur family with the escort of the knights.
Avoiding the servants on duty, he quietly returned to his bedroom. No one noticed him. He closed the door, laid on the bed, took out the cross, and happily toyed with it.
It was a silver cross that boasts of exquisite workmanship. When Benjamin put it between his eyebrows, he could feel a holy atmosphere emanating from the insides of the cross.
This is the power of the divine arts.
Compared to magic, the general people of the Kingdom of Helius are much more familiar with the divine arts. Every town has a church and a priest, and almost everyone has seen a priest use divine arts.
According to the church, divine arts is the power God gave man to fight against the Devil.
The legends say that a long time ago, demons were rampant in this world. Famine, plague, war and suffering under the Devil’s temptation was a common occurrence. People lived in tumultuous times, and a peaceful existence was seen as a luxurious wish.
But then appeared a pair of brothers, the older brother was called Cain, the younger brother was called Abel. No one knows where they are from, but they were determined to save mankind and end the era dominated by demons. After failing again and again, Cain made sacrifices to the Devil, thus acquiring great power. But at the end, he used this power in turn to drive the demons away, restoring peace and harmony to the world.
However, it did not last long. Under the influence of the Devil’s power, Cain’s temperament became brutal and cunning, just as the demons were. He began to enslave the people, wage wars and kill innocent people, causing the world to once again plunge into chaos.
Abel saw all these changes in his eyes. After one particular war, he stood in one of his brother’s luxurious palaces and began to pray in front of Cain’s face. Cain was furious. He put Abel into prison and had him crucified on a cross. Seven days later, Abel vanished, and when he appeared again in front of Cain, he had the power of the divine.
Nobody knows what Abel went through. The only thing everyone knew was that the newly empowered Abel started a war with Cain.
In the end, Abel defeated Cain.
When he was ready to use the power of the light to purify Cain, Cain suddenly shed tears. He seemed to have changed back to the former Cain, and ran toward Abel in tears, reminiscing the story of their past. Abel was touched, and his back was exposed to Cain. Cain took the opportunity to attack him and the demonic flames burnt Abel to ashes.
While Cain was triumphant, a holy light came from the sky and enveloped Cain. The voice of God came from the sky, and asked Cain of Abel’s whereabouts. Cain denied knowing anything. God knew of Cain’s lies, and brought down punishment. He deprived Cain of his power and gave him a lifelong exile. Cain was furious and did not accept God’s punishment. He used his own blood to curse the world, sealing it up. Since then, no gods or demons have ever appeared here, which became the "God-forsaken place."
Cain died after releasing the curse due to physical weakness. But his blood was diffused across the world, passing down the power of the Devil. The contaminated human world once again fell into war, and those with demonic powers killed one another, while the ordinary people could only live between the cracks.
Until one day, a young man stood in the place where Abel was burned into ashes and put his hands together to pray. A light rose from his palm into the night sky, exploded like fireworks and fell into the eyes of millions of onlookers. Since then, mankind possessed the power of the divine, and the young man who prayed became the Church’s first pope.
He found a sword stuck in the ground at the site of Abel’s death. When his hand first came into contact with the blade, a word in his heart echoed:
"The Holy Light shrouded the world."
The sword became a holy artifact of the Church, and was consecrated to the depths of St. Peter’s Basilica, while that sentence became the first oracle.
The story is what the Church has promoted as the origin of the divine arts and magic.
When the system first repeated this story to Benjamin, Benjamin had to admit that the myth of this world and his original world had a lot of similarities. Like Cain and Abel, these two very similar people were far beyond the "If similar, it is purely coincidence" category.
He could not help but think: What was the relation between the two worlds?
But at the moment he could not think of an answer.
The world was different from his original world. There was magic, there were divine arts, the power of people here had no limits, the so-called God was likely only a powerful human who reached the peak of his power.
Therefore, the myths of this world had a higher probability of being true compared to his world before, although it might not be the Church’s version. Benjamin believed that if he were to let a mage tell the story, it may come up differently.
He suddenly burst out laughing when he thought of this.
If this myth is based on real occurrences, then it could be regarded as the origins of this world. But with his current ability, investigating this might be too early – he has only been in this world for less than seven days. Doing it now would probably send him to heaven.
He might as well go wash up and sleep first.
Benjamin felt sleepy. So he put the cross away safely, hastily washed, put out the flame of the oil lamp and climbed into bed. Not long after that, he fell asleep.
Perhaps because he had not slept well for a long time, this time he slept like a log. When he finally woke up, it was already noon the next day.
He was awakened by a person.
"Benjamin! Wake up now, we have to go!"
Benjamin opened his sleepy eyes, he was still in a confused state.
"Get up, don’t sleep anymore, we’re going to be late!" The noisy voice still echoed in his ear, but the word "late" made him think of his life before he teleported, so he woke up.
Late? What am I late for?
Darn, I thought I was late for morning classes.
Benjamin rubbed his eyes and looked around. He saw a young man of similar age and looks standing next to the bed, forcefully shaking his shoulder.
It was his brother - Grant Lithur.
"What......What are you doing?"
Benjamin was confused.
According to the System, Grant had a good relationship with him. Grant did not look down on him just because he was a loser. But because Benjamin had not communicated with Grant before, the situation now was completely out of his expectations.
In addition to what he was clamoring about being "late", what did the "leaving"...mean?
"Have you forgotten? We’re going to war with them today, please don’t delay anymore, we’re going to be late!" Grant continued urging without hesitation.
Going, going to war?
Benjamin’s eyes flew wide open while he stared blankly at Grant. But Grant’s face looked serious and solemn. He even looked slightly fanatic. It did not look like he was joking around.
"...."
Benjamin felt sluggish, so he fell back asleep.
I must be dreaming.
Dream, do not interrupt my beauty sleep, this bed is very expensive.
"Hey! Don’t go back to sleep, hurry up!" Grant did not disappear like a dream would, but he shook the shoulders of Benjamin even harder, to the point Benjamin almost puked out his stomach acid.
Benjamin sat up again from the bed and opened his eyes.
"I’m not dreaming?" he asked.
"No." Grant replied.
"..."
Benjamin did not know what to say, he was not feeling very well.
He felt like after he came to this world, the situation to which he has woken up to has not been proper. It was first a kidnapping by a witch, followed by the encounter with a somnambulist in the middle of the night. It was even worse this time – he has to go war after waking up. How long has he been asleep?
Was he really going to war?
"Don’t dawdle anymore, hurry and get up! Get up get up get up ... ..."
"I’m up! Don’t shake me anymore, I’m about to puke!"
Under Grant’s crazy urging, Benjamin did not know what was happening, but he still got out of bed and was rushed like a duck to wash and put on his clothes. His head was still dizzy but before he had time to even say a word, he was dragged by Grant out of the door.
On the way out, he saw that the servants they passed by did not seem surprised at all, and they were all wearing a blank expression.
Benjamin felt helpless as he gradually recovered from his condition. The only thing he could do was to ask the system: "What exactly is it all about?"
The system slowly emerged and answered: "No big deal, it’s just a small activity by the aristocratic children."
Obviously, Benjamin was not satisfied with this answer.
He asked: "Can you explain, what is the "activity of the aristocratic children?" Also, what is this war thing, are we to fight with other aristocratic children?"
"Well ..." The system seemed to be think for a moment, "You can see it as this way."
"Might as well not explain." Benjamin’s dissatisfaction continue to escalate.
"Don’t think too much of it, it’s not a big deal, believe me," the System said wisely. "What are you being impatient for? To explain it would be a very troublesome process. Anyway, once you reach the place, you’ll naturally understand the situation. "
Was the System really to be trusted?
Benjamin could not help but feel revolted.
The System was already unreliable, but now it had another problem: Laziness.
He did not have to think of getting anything out of the system anymore. He looked at the Grant, who was sprinting away and obviously not in a state to communicate. So Benjamin had no choice but to obey and see where Grant was bringing him to.
On the streets of Havenwright, two young men hurriedly ran past, with faces as if there was no one left to love alive.
The place they had to go was not far away, and it was not long before they stopped.
They were still in the city, but the place was relatively remote, there were no people passing through. It was in front of an abandoned castle that looked a bit old. Although it was not big, Benjamin was still in awe of the castle located in the city.
He saw that at entrance of the castle stood about a dozen people. With a closer look, he saw that most of them were teenagers dressed like aristocrats – this confirms the System’s explanation that they were "aristocratic children."
But Benjamin was still puzzled and clueless about the situation.
"What were you guys doing, why are you guys so slow?" A person out of the group walked forward and said after seeing the two of them.
"We’re not even late, what are you concerned about?" Grant immediately retorted.
The man did not care. He turned around and said: "OK, then let’s start, follow the old rules, we will disperse first, then we can start moving about after ten minutes." With his words, a row of people began heading inside the castle.
Start moving? What were they intending to do......
Although he was still confused, Benjamin noticed that Dick Fulner happened to be among these people.
Just when he saw Dick, Dick also turned his head and stared back at him. When their eyes met, Dick gave Benjamin a fierce glare and made a threatening gesture, warning Benjamin that he will lose.
Benjamin was speechless.
Why was it him again?