Chapter 791: Fool Me Once

Julius stared skeptically at the white-haired man. He didn’t know what was going on, but he knew from experience that when someone offered him a choice, there was clearly a “correct” choice.

“The choice is simple. You can take this fruit,” the man said and pointed at the Kinetic Starfruit in question. “It is of similar quality to what you would find on the fifth floor, and it will have a decent chance at raising your affinity to perfect. And then I will teleport you back to the first floor, where you can then exit without fearing the rift trying to interfere with you again.”

Julius held back the many questions he had and instead asked, “What about the other choice?”

“You can ignore what I have to say and continue your way through the rift, where you will probably be attacked by the rift the second you leave this building. As you can see, it has already made some preparations,” the man said while pointing out the tiny window of the shack. Julius looked at the window and saw what his spatial senses had already indicated.

Row after row of white robes surrounded the courtyard where the shack stood. There had to be hundreds. For some reason, though, they weren’t attacking; they were just standing there. Even more worrisome was the massive array surrounding the courtyard. It was far stronger than anything he had seen from them, and he was a bit anxious about whether he could escape it.

His void techniques were powerful, but the sheer number of Authorities might be enough to disrupt them. Look at this shack; it was already capable of obstructing his teleportation.

Julius turned back and stared at the young man's white-and-black eyes. “This doesn’t seem like much of a hard choice to make.”

“No, it is not,” the man said with an acknowledging nod.

“So what is the catch?”

The man didn’t respond, but Julius knew when a deal was too good to be true.

“What is the catch of the first option? I don’t think you are going to give me such a valuable fruit and then go out of your way to teleport me to safety without a reason.”

The mysterious man nodded. “You are correct; there is a small favor I wish to ask you if you choose the first option.”

Julius used the man’s own tactic against him and stared silently.

“I ask that you search around the world for a proper place to plant this,” the man finally said, and a small seed appeared right next to the glowing fruit. A soft white light illuminated its surface; it didn’t seem like much, but Julius’s life senses detected something.

“What is this?” he asked, but made no motion to pick it up, much like the fruit.

“It’s a seed to a Kinetic Starfruit Tree.”

“And you want me to plant it?” Julius asked with a frown.

The man smirked a little bit. “It’s not as easy as it sounds. The conditions to plant it are pretty extreme. The hardest part is finding a place with a natural source of kinetic energy. It also needs a strong and stable source of life mana, one that can feed its growth through its developmental periods. Finding a place that meets both conditions will not be easy.”

“And what do you get out of this?” Julius asked curiously.

The man caressed the seed with a longing look. “Rebirth.”

Julius pressed his lips tightly together. “Rebirth?”

“Indeed. If you haven’t already guessed, I am a spiritual creature. One born from the accumulated energy gathered in a Kinetic Starfruit Tree over the course of many centuries.”

“And you want to escape this rift?”

“Yes,” the man’s voice deepened with desire as his eyes pulsed with light.

Julius nodded with understanding and stood up, looking out the window again. The organized army of Tier 4s was getting even larger as time went on.

He then checked his mana and other resources. When he felt the last trickle of mana fill up his pool, he turned back to the man.

“I think I’ll go with the second option,” he said with a smirk.

For the first time, the man’s face twisted up in confusion, then anger, and then back to calm.

“What?” he asked calmly.

Julius leaned against the wall with the same smirk. “You know, I had a similar situation with a particular smelly dwarf. He lured me in with honeyed words and treasures,” he said, and his smirk slowly faded into one of anger. It gradually flowed over into his mana and his skills.

“He used my greediness as a weapon and took advantage of me. I spent a very long time trapped inside that stupid rift. I wasted years, and you think I’m going to fall for the same trap again?” he exclaimed with a scoff.

This text was copied from the author's publishing page without approval, while the chapter at its source supports their work.

“I don’t know what you are talking about. I’m not trying to trap you inside here,” the man said exasperatedly, as if Julius was being unreasonable.

“Oh? Perhaps not, but you want to know something? I had my friend help me with some mind techniques, and she helped create a few mental constructs for me. She is quite a brilliant mind mage and told me that these constructs would alert me when someone tried to influence my mind; it doesn't matter if they were Tier 5 or 6. It wouldn’t stop it, but it would tell me when an attempt was made,” Julius explained with a feral grin.

The calm look on the man’s face slipped ever so slightly.

“However, even if you hadn’t tried to mess with my mind, I would have seen through this farce. You tried so hard, but did you really think you could hide it from me?”

“Hide what?” the man asked, still trying to keep up the facade.

“Death mana stinks. Perhaps that is just because of my life mana, but I learned that I am very sensitive to it,” Julius chuckled. “Did you really think I am going to consume something that has clearly been corrupted with death mana?” he asked, looking at the so-called Kinetic Starfruit with a disgusted scowl.

Julius might be a little stupid, but he liked to think he learned from his lessons. Especially when a sketchy person came along and offered him something too good to be true.

Honestly, it wasn’t as easy to see through the deception as he tried to make it out to be. The mental invasion was extremely insidious. Even the constructs Lily helped him create could barely detect the slight manipulation.

But once he detected that, he finally took note of the other things. For one, the fruit he had barely looked at was bursting with kinetic energy. It took much longer than he was proud to admit to see what lay beneath the loud layer of kinetic energy. A well-concealed core of something else lay buried deep inside. Only thanks to Drasil and the little spirit’s immediate revulsion did Julius finally figure out what was inside the fruit.

As for why he bragged to the mysteriously powerful person or creature who had essentially trapped him inside this shack. Well, the answer was simple. He was a petty little shit who hated when someone tried to control him.

Julius stared at the man with the same smug smirk and couldn’t say he was surprised when he vanished from sight.

He tried to jump back, but within the small confines of the shack, he couldn’t back up all the way.

However, a burst of golden chains suddenly appeared inside the room, erupting from the ground. It tore apart the shack like it was confetti and wrapped around the man who currently had his hand jammed inside Julius’s chest, gripping his heart.

Julius didn’t even flinch. He stared at the man with a victorious grin and pulled away, letting the man keep the heart in his hands. Julius felt the blood pool onto the ground as his chest was already regenerating. He then reached out with some ruinous flames and burned away his still-beating heart while it was in the man’s hands.

As for the man who tried to kill him, he was on his knees and completely restricted by the golden chains. They weren’t budging an inch either. They had him completely immobilized.

Julius knew he was playing a dangerous game, but he had a good feeling about what would happen based on the man’s actions and what he had been saying to Julius. The man had given Julius a choice for a reason, not just to force the fruit down his throat.

It was clear that the fruit had to be consumed willingly.

Julius cleaned himself of the blood and walked over to his teapot, which had been sent flying in the chaos. Surprisingly, it was undamaged; not a single scratch marred its surface. A small part of him wondered if the teapot was more special than he'd thought.

He picked it up with his teacup and shoved them back into his void space. He spotted a stray cookie on the ground and quickly snatched it up, cramming it into his mouth.

The five-second rule was absolute.

He brushed the dust from his pants and turned to the chained man. Though he didn’t know if "man" was the right word, especially now.

The once handsome young man now resembled more of a wild beast. His hair was still white, but his eyes were what changed. The black stars had expanded and taken over the white halo until the eyes looked more like a pool of pitch-black oil. The feeling of death and decay coming from the man was even more pronounced.

He desperately tried to break free of the chains and attack Julius again.

Julius knelt down and, with a curious tilt of his head, he asked, “So what was the point of this?”

“I’m going to kill you,” the man snarled, and Julius watched as the chains wrapped around the man's mouth, muffling him.

“Okay, that’s fine. But what’s up with all of the games? What would have happened if I ate the fruit?”

The imprisoned man didn’t answer, mostly because of the gag, but that didn’t mean Julius wasn’t curious. He looked over at the fruit with an intrigued expression. What would happen if he just took a small bite?

As if the chains could hear his thoughts, they suddenly leaped out and tried to block him from touching it.

He backed up a step in surprise, wondering what in the nine hells that was about. Thankfully, it seemed that at least not all of his questions were going to be unanswered. That said, he was taken aback by who was doing the answering.

Notice: If you were to consume the fruit you would have been possessed by him and your soul slowly consumed as he took over your body.

He froze where he was standing, the feral man no longer a concern.

What was this? Was this the Words of the World speaking to him? Or was it something else entirely?

I am technically what you would classify as a rift entity. But if it makes it easier for you to understand, you can address me as the rift administrator.

You can read my thoughts?

Not precisely. I am monitoring your aura and other physiological biosignals to interpret what you are thinking. However, if you desire to, you can communicate with me telepathically now that you have opened up a channel.

Julius hadn’t even known this was possible. He didn’t know whether it was a good thing. The last time he got a personalized message like this was when he got kidnapped by that rift challenge.

Communication is only possible due to the unusual circumstances. The system is allowing me to utilize its communication network to relay information to you in return for your inconvenience.

So you can answer some questions for me?

If it is not strictly forbidden, then yes.

Julius nodded, feeling like this was actually a great opportunity. He could get answers to some pretty pertinent questions he had.