"It's very simple. When people have a common enemy to hate, they will rise up to save themselves. But this force is too powerful, leaving them no hope of shattering it. So they despair and can only numbly choose to endure.
If your strength were even greater, enough to break all of this, then you could turn the tables and become the rule-maker.
When you are so strong that no voice can oppose you, forcing everyone to numbly choose endurance, then you can advocate for the world of mutual understanding you desire, even if that mutual understanding is enforced."
Spartacus gritted his teeth with difficulty. "Wouldn't that make you no different from the nobles who oppress slaves?"
"Indeed, it would—"
"But you are willing to oppress those who are innately evil for the sake of the innocent, so that they may live in happiness.
Or, knowing the method yet clinging to naive ideals, do you choose to turn a blind eye?
With power in your hands yet refusing to act, watching innocents who could have found happiness under a new order reduced to walking corpses deprived of freedom, life, and dreams, would you not then be an accomplice to those evildoers?"
This was sophistry,
Night knew full well.
But forgive him for using such soul-tormenting words to help Spartacus face reality.
If one only saved without changing anything, in the end nothing would truly change.
The ones who alter the world are always the strong.
When the weak band together yet approach the strong with the mindset of the weak, one day they will either become stronger themselves, or be swallowed and drowned by the desires of the strong.
There is no salvation you seek there—!
Spartacus trembled, his eyes widened as he stared blankly at Night...
Possessing power yet refusing to use it, was that being an accomplice to evil?!
For evildoers, such words would only provoke gales of laughter and disdain, followed by something like,
"What does that have to do with me? Did your mother give birth to this mess and then come looking for me to acknowledge kinship?"
If inaction could be called evil, then those who actively committed evil would be the saviors of all evildoers, drowning in boundless sin.
But for Spartacus, it was just like that saying laced with Western heroic individualism: with great power comes great responsibility.
His entire life had been one of fighting to liberate slave gladiators, and eventually all the slaves of Rome!
That burning heart of his was not mere simple kindness.
It required an extremely strong sense of responsibility, the courage to redeem others, and many other complex factors combined.
For someone like him who always wanted to save others, he truly would believe this: having the ability to save yet choosing not to, that was evil...
He could not face his own conscience, his true heart.
Spartacus's voice trembled.
He could not utter a single word of rebuttal.
At this moment, his soul had suffered a tremendous impact, far greater even than the pain in his arm.
"...I—"
Looking at the man, Night spoke.
"If you long to liberate the slaves so that people will no longer suffer oppression and can show happy smiles.
In essence, it is to let everyone find happiness, to let them reveal smiles that come from the depths of their hearts, right, Spartacus?
If oppression itself no longer caused suffering, or rather, no longer caused suffering to the kind and innocent, but instead caused suffering to the wicked, allowing far more people to reveal smiles from the depths of their hearts?"
In that case, in that case...!
A flame seemed to burn in Spartacus's mind.
He finally thought of a word so sacred it was almost divine.
What word could describe such a thing?
"Is it... judgment?"
Judgment!!
Judgment upon the wicked!
If gods truly existed in this world, without doubt the gods would be the greatest rulers and oppressors of the world, and the king of gods the ultimate dictator.
But if they could properly punish the wicked and uphold justice, then what meaning would there be in the resistance of someone like him?
'Let everyone reveal smiles from the depths of their hearts...—'
Spartacus's heart was deeply moved by these words.
Night released his hand and finally left alone.
Spartacus's mood was somewhat heavy.
Although in the end he had not agreed to pledge loyalty to Night, at this moment an entirely new thought had inevitably taken root in Spartacus's mind...
To check oppressors, one must become an even greater oppressor.
To free the entire world from oppression, one must mercilessly oppress everyone to achieve a stable, balanced mutual understanding.
To ensure that even if the wicked harbored intentions, they would be constrained by rules and laws, unable to act or impose them.
What an inconceivable man... and ideas even more inconceivable than himself.
Would that strongest oppressor he spoke of be himself?
In this clash of strength and words, Spartacus had inevitably glimpsed a trace of Night's ambition.
In the past, he would not have believed a single word of such talk from the ruling class.
But if that man truly reached the highest position, would the world he described descend?
Spartacus did not know.
He hesitated time and again, but in the end decided to proceed with his original plan for now.
If he could not understand something, he would stop thinking about it and first do what he could do right now.
For example, save his compatriots.
Yet not long after Night left, Crassus arrived, expressing his intent to transfer Spartacus away.
This quickly made the latter feel the cruel whims of fate.
Even though he expressed that he did not want to leave this place, Crassus's attitude was extremely firm, allowing no refusal.
When you place yourself in the position of the weak, you can only be manipulated by others, forced to proceed according to their plans, having your own original plans completely disrupted.
This once again compelled Spartacus to hasten his own actions.
.
.
.
Meanwhile, on the other side..
Night knew that recruiting someone like Spartacus required patience, after all, that man's inner will was extremely firm and he held his own profound views of the world, so, he was not so easily swayed.
But even if he could not recruit him, after today's meeting, he believed his words would plant a seed in Spartacus's heart.
That was enough.
In the future, when fully consolidating voices within Roman territory, Spartacus would be an excellent asset.
Sometimes, personally suppressing every voice of resistance was a very foolish approach.
That would only push oneself into opposition against everyone.
Even with unmatched power in the world, one would be nothing more than a lofty tyrant.
Such a person could be a general, but was unfit to be a king.
Just like the Impaler of Wallachia, who used his strength to defend his land, only to be betrayed in the end by the very citizens his power had protected.
The people feared the brutality of his strength, viewing the forest of impaled bodies as a symbol of demonic power.
Yet they ignored that it was precisely that brutal strength which had safeguarded their homeland.
.
.
.