Chapter 552: I am your Guardian

Faced with Harvey's question, Ashe sat in the sunlight just outside the shade of the tree and looked at the necromancer strangely. "You're not the kind of person who talks badly about others behind their backs. If you have a problem with someone, you say it to their face. And if you feel that isn't enough, you'll even bring Alice out to say it with you."

Ashe frowned. "Iger hasn't done anything to offend you lately, has he?"

"I have nothing against Iger," Harvey said. "I'm just curious about what you think."

"Why?"

"Ashe, you're a good person," the necromancer said calmly. "Regardless of whether or not you have truly been an evil cult leader in the past, ever since I met you, I've never considered you a bad person. Varkas, Iger, Lys, Annan. You're not some saint who goes around doing good deeds, but you've never done anything evil either. You're almost unnaturally clean for someone from Blood Moon. I think Iger probably wants to ask you the same question. He just doesn't dare to. What do you really think of us, two death row criminals who have done all sorts of evil?"

Ashe rubbed his temples. "I came up here to get some sunlight. I didn't expect to have to answer such an important question. If I put it the way you did, ever since I met you two—"

Harvey interrupted him. "Back in the Gospel Kingdom, Annan kept us in check, so we had no choice. But after coming to the Myriad Continent... You haven't forgotten why we were driven out of that food factory town, have you? Silver Lamp framing us was only part of the reason. The real reason was that we were simply too reckless there."

"But you still took the consequences into consideration."

"That's why we failed to catch Silver Lamp," Harvey said. "Do you think the fraudster didn't know a gas station could be turned into a devastating weapon? With a Mind Class sorcerer's abilities, why did he lure Silver Lamp toward a sparsely populated area instead of turning the crowd into his weapon?"

"Even if we failed to catch Silver Lamp, we would still find a way to break the Blood Seed curse," Ashe said seriously. "I guarantee it."

Harvey stroked Alice's head. "That's not the point. The point is what we're really like. Do you think I'm satisfied with having only Alice? There's no Annan here to keep me in check anymore. The Myriad Continent doesn't even have a unified government, and I have an endless supply of materials. If I weren't traveling with you, I'd probably join some sect that didn't interfere with my research and become their enforcer, bringing a necromantic calamity to this land just to fund my experiments.

"The fraudster is the same. A world where order and chaos coexist like this is practically heaven to him. He could freely indulge his schemes, cunning, and tricks, playing everyone like puppets in the palm of his hand. If he had come here alone, he'd probably already have become a leader in some branch of the Four Pillars Cult."

Ashe said, "But you didn't do that."

"No. We didn't. Why do you think that is?"

Alice took the cigarette butt from Harvey and swallowed it whole.

Harvey bit into a chocolate bar. "I'm a little different from the fraudster. I'm like a dead leaf that has fallen into a river. I just drift with the current. I don't care whether I end up in the ocean or a muddy ditch. But he's a fish swimming upstream. He might even turn into a bird and take flight one day. He insists on keeping his own fate in his hands. He would never let himself simply drift with the current.

"But there's one thing we have in common. We've never really regarded other people as people. A corpse that can talk, a tool that can be put to use. That's all they are to us. If one day we did something you couldn't accept, how would you deal with us?"

Ashe said, "That's such a pointless hypothetical. It's like when relatives ask a child what they would do if mom and dad didn't want them anymore."

"Did you forget that we're Blood Moon people...?"

"Ah, come on. You know what I mean."

Harvey continued, "Take the food factory town, for example. What would you do if Iger decided to drag the entire town into the battle just to catch Silver Lamp? What if I chose to transform into a plague-spreading Dragon Lich instead of the Wraith Knight to stop her?"

Ashe stared at him calmly without saying a word.

Harvey ate more than half of the chocolate bar before Alice swallowed the remaining piece in one bite. He said, "When you hesitate, you've already made your choice. We're no longer just comrades who escaped prison together. We're not contract-bound slaves anymore, and we're certainly not comrades you can trust unconditionally."

"No, I wasn't hesitating. I was just surprised that the two of you came this close to killing Silver Lamp while holding back this much." Ashe clenched his fist. "Next time we run into Silver Lamp, we're taking her down for sure!"

Harvey blinked. "Hm?"

"I understand what you mean," Ashe said. "If it were not for your concern for me, you two would be far more ruthless than you are now. I have never doubted the evil in your hearts. People raised in an environment like the Blood Moon could hardly be without some pent-up resentment and hostility toward the world."

The cult leader grinned. "So, I am honored to be the one holding you back. It feels like I have become your guardian. Trust should, of course, be placed in someone worthy of it. Since you have handed me the leash, how could I refuse to become your chain? Even if, as you said, you someday do something I cannot accept..." Ashe's eyes gleamed with confidence. "I can suppress you both immediately. Do not underestimate me, necromancer."

Harvey was taken aback, then could not help laughing. "Then I will look forward to seeing it."

He reached over and rummaged around on Alice. Just as Ashe wondered whether he should turn around, Harvey pulled out a harmonica.

"Where did you get a harmonica?"

"A product from the Transcendent Temple," Harvey said. "Their best-selling products are luxury goods requiring a certain level of craftsmanship. Unfortunately, this is a chromatic harmonica. I used to play a tremolo harmonica."

Ashe frowned. "Oh. Wait, you used to play the harmonica? We've known each other for quite a while now. Don't think I'll flatter you just because you're showing off."

Harvey pressed the key, changing the harmonica's key, and a melodious tune rang out. It sounded vaguely familiar, striking a chord that reminded Ashe of a song once played in the Shattered Lake Prison.

Under the shade of the trees, the dark-skinned, curly-haired young man played his harmonica, while a figure looking remarkably like a beautiful girl leaned against him. Once Ashe remembered this was a necromancer and his corpse, the entire scene somehow became even more ridiculous.

Compared to an ordinary necromancer, a necromancer playing the harmonica was clearly even more terrifying and deranged. But Harvey was surprisingly good at it. Ashe leisurely stretched out on the grass, enjoying this rare moment of peace. After several songs, the music finally stopped. Ashe sat up with a yawn, only to realize a crowd of Transcendent believers had gathered around them.

They looked to be under ten years old. They wore identical blue-and-white uniforms, possessing far fewer external implants, with only their ears and the backs of their necks fitted with them. They stared curiously at Harvey, urging him with their eyes for one more encore.

"Why are there so many children here?" Ashe asked.

"This is the basic education level," Harvey said. "All children under twelve receive education in the classrooms here. This area is basically their playground."

So you came to an elementary school playground to smoke?

"So what now? Another song, then we leave?"

"One more song, then we leave."

When Harvey began playing again, Ashe suddenly recognized the tune. He had heard it before while binge-watching a show with Freya. The rhythm was catchy enough to stick in his memory.

He sat tapping along to the beat. Before long, his tapping turned into a steady rhythm, and the children watching them quickly followed his lead. The playground soon turned into an impromptu music class.

When the song ended, Harvey prepared to get up and leave when a little girl suddenly ran over and gave him a quick kiss.

Alice was already tensed up all over, ready to fight at a moment's notice, but relaxed once realizing there was no danger. Harvey looked at the little girl in confusion. Her face flushed bright red, and after standing dazed for quite a while, she finally stammered out two words. "G-good...!"

Then she hurried back to her group of friends, exchanging meaningful glances with them without a single word spoken. They communicated through the intelligent computational hub, after all. There was no need to resort to such an inefficient means of communication as speech.

She probably froze for so long because even she had not processed what she just did. The intelligent hub might weaken conscious minds, but it also strengthened instinctive responses. Put simply, the bodies of Transcendent believers moved faster than their minds. Before forming a conscious thought, their bodies had already acted on impulses.

As Ashe watched the children scatter in a flurry, he suddenly fell into deep thought.

"Come on. What are you thinking about?" Harvey asked while putting Alice back into her coffin.

"I was just thinking..." Ashe said. "While I pity them because they will gradually lose their sense of self in the future, do you think they pity me because I will never have the chance to evolve into a more intelligent existence?"

Harvey answered with absolute certainty. "They definitely do. Just like I pity you for refusing to learn necromancy and insisting on sticking to garbage."

"Yeah. You have your hobbies, they have their ideals to pursue, and even I have my own light of life." Ashe looked ahead. "Even if reality really is just an illusion... you are still the protagonist of your own story, and you will not let anyone deny that."