Silas and Bernadette spent a long time studying the box Roselle had left behind, and in the end confirmed that it could only be opened once Silas reached Sequence 3.
So the problem, after all its twists and turns, came back to the same starting point: advancement.
In this battle, Silas had succeeded in drawing the Sequence 3 figure known as the Death Announcer into his own shadow.
Thanks to this, a large portion of the Black Knight's potion had been digested, and he could now begin trying to reach for a higher level.
Queen Mystic didn't have the Sequence 3 potion formula for the Secrets Suppliant pathway.
The Hermit had said earlier that she might be able to try, but it would cost a drop of blood from a mythical creature as payment.
Thinking of this, Silas glanced at Antia outside the room.
He wasn't sure whether she could bleed. If not, the Councilor from the Life School of Thought could probably supply blood as well. In any case, the new week's Tarot Club gathering would be starting soon.
He would ask the Hermit then, and if she succeeded, there would be plenty of time to consider things further.
If the formula couldn't be found through the Tarot Club, Silas might genuinely have to turn to the Aurora Order.
After this, the two of them discussed matters, and Bernadette took away all of Roselle's belongings from the captain's quarters, leaving only the Twilight Giant card and the black box for Silas.
The Card of Blasphemy had been the agreed payment, and as for the black box, since the Queen had no way to open it, it would stay on the ship for now, to be dealt with later.
The two of them walked down from the Black King.
Black Lake Island had already become a ruin.
The other pirates who had attended the gathering had long since left. The only ones still lingering here were Silas's fleet and Queen Mystic's ship, the Dawn.
As for the rest of the crew and ships that had been separated from Anderson's fleet, they too had been reunited through Queen Mystic's fairy-tale magic.
Upon learning that Silas had become the recognized new king, they had grown quite excited and insisted on throwing a celebratory feast.
At this moment, the Doe was full of noise and clamor, all of it the sound of their revelry.
"Thank you." Just then, Bernadette suddenly said to Silas, "Not only for finding the Black King, but also for driving off the Divine Abomination, Suah, and helping me avert a disaster."
"Your Majesty, you went to Backlund before for the same purpose." Silas recalled what had happened back then.
"Mm. Actually that was the ritual I needed for advancing to Sequence 2, the Sage: Prevent a disaster that involves a higher level of power."
Bernadette glanced at him and explained plainly, "My potion ingredients are all ready, all I lack is the ritual itself. But that sort of opportunity isn't something one comes across easily."
Behind Backlund's Great Smog had lain an evil god and the royal family; at the pirate gathering there had been the Divine Abomination and the Mother Tree of Desire.
Both incidents involved high-level disasters. And Bernadette had taken an active part in this battle, genuinely helping Silas hold Suah back and greatly reducing the death toll.
"Congratulations, Your Majesty," Silas said. "It seems you can try to become an Angel."
Bernadette's eyes flickered for a moment. "I don't plan to advance for now," she said softly. "My knot hasn't been undone yet. Forcing myself to drink the potion would only lead to losing control."
The sea wind stirred her long chestnut hair as she gazed absently at the black three-masted ship.
A knot in her heart...
"Something to do with Emperor Roselle?" Silas asked, guessing at it.
For the first half of his life, Roselle had been Intis's guiding figure, leading the world's reforms, yet in his later years his temperament had changed drastically, and he had declared himself emperor and turned to autocracy.
For Queen Mystic, this was probably no small blow. The father she had always admired as a hero had become a cold-blooded dictator, suppressing dissent at home and expanding through colonization abroad...
"That's right." A sigh crept into Bernadette's voice. "He grew cold and unreasonable back then, so out of spite, I refused to speak with him. By the time he was assassinated, it was already too late for anything."
So that's why you keep chasing after Roselle's legacy, investigating endlessly, wanting to know the truth of your father's final years, Silas thought to himself.
More than a hundred years had passed, yet Queen Mystic still couldn't let go of these matters, to the point that it was even affecting her advancement.
"Sometimes I even feel that he's still alive, only hidden away somewhere, slowly recovering his strength..." Bernadette's voice trailed off, faint and distant, as though hinting at something more.
As Silas listened, he suddenly understood what she meant: Queen Mystic suspected Mr. Fool's true identity, suspected that he might be a resurrected Roselle!
A hiss of breath escaped him. Once he understood the Queen's reasoning, he couldn't help but suck in a cold breath.
Could such a guess really be possible?
Could it be that Mr. Fool understood Chinese, and had gathered everyone to collect Roselle's diaries because he had only just awakened, not yet strong enough, and was collecting the diaries to recover his past memories?
No, that wasn't right!
Although Bernadette's guess held a certain plausibility, Silas hesitated only a moment before firmly ruling it out.
Judging from his own sense of things, the Fool's temperament and way of doing things were entirely different from Roselle's.
Even if the latter had truly come back to life, he wouldn't have changed so drastically.
No wonder Queen Mystic cared so much about the Fool. Still, there was nothing he was going to tell her.
"Then I hope your knot unravels soon," Silas said. "It's about time for me to go meet up with my crew. Your Majesty, was there anything else?"
The celebration feast on the Doe was already being prepared, and as captain, if he didn't show up, the feast couldn't begin.
Bernadette glanced at him. "There's one thing I'd like to ask of you," she said. "If Cattelya ever runs into trouble, I hope you'll help her, at the very least spare her life."
With a splash, her figure and the Dawn together dissolved into brilliant sea foam, vanishing over the ocean just like that, leaving Silas looking on in confusion.
Cattelya... the Admiral of Stars?
She had, it seemed, once belonged to the Queen, but later left her to join the Moses Ascetic Order.
Why would Bernadette ask him to help her? Was she afraid that if he ran into her at sea he might kill her? Or was there some other reason behind it?
Silas drew his gaze back and let out a small breath.
He tucked the Twilight Giant's Card of Blasphemy into his coat and turned to ask Antia beside him, "Can you leave this ship? If you can, would you like to come to the feast with me? I could introduce you to my crew."
"I have no interest in boarding another ship." Antia stood at the rail with her arms crossed, saying coldly, "Especially not your former flagship. You'd best hurry and send your crew off, then come back."
Ah, right, she didn't like being left alone...
Faced with an Angel's glare like that, Silas gave a silent, wry smile, and rode the wind over to the other ship, intending to show his face at the feast before coming straight back.
A night passed.
The next day, Silas woke up in his room aboard the Black King.
On the ship across the way, the portly Apothecary Darkwill was going around dosing the hungover crew one by one, while the sailors with nothing pressing to do were carrying out their daily tasks: scrubbing the deck, coiling ropes, and so on.
Silas watched them, and began turning over in his mind what to do next.
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