In Backlund, inside the luxurious villa of Earl Hall.
After a sumptuous dinner, Earl Hall regained the calmness and composure he had always carried. He set down his cutlery and gently dabbed the corner of his mouth before asking about the situation in the Southern Continent.
Hearing the question, Edward looked toward Audrey in surprise. Audrey, in turn, lowered her head at once like a child who had done something wrong, a faint hint of embarrassment on her face.
Their reactions gave Earl Hall a clear idea of what was going on. Under normal circumstances, no matter how much he doted on his daughter, he would have felt angry at Audrey's "ruin-the-family-for-charity" decisions. But after meeting that living legendary emperor—Roselle—Earl Hall's state of mind had undergone a profound shift. He no longer cared about such things the way he used to.
He merely shot his daughter a glare and huffed, "I thought at least a few of the things you told me were true. But now it seems that perhaps not a single word was credible."
Audrey protested softly, "That's not fair…Didn't Alfred tell you the other day? A certain faction drove off the colonial soldiers and even confronted the Loen army. The territory they occupy keeps growing, and their population is increasing too! They aren't funded by Edward and me, but they are indeed…our friends' doing."
"Who?"
"Mr. Moon—Emlyn."
"Oh~" Edward suddenly understood. He glanced at Lilith, who was quietly drinking fruit juice with her head lowered, and asked, "Is Emlyn backed by you?"
Lilith blinked innocently. "Miss Lilith doesn't understand what you're talking about~"
Edward reached out and gently rubbed her head, then said to Earl Hall, "Don't worry, my lord. I promise, your 'investment' in Audrey will never result in a loss."
"No. That's not why I brought this up." Earl Hall's expression grew serious. "Now that the king has been assassinated and Intis has suddenly declared war on Loen, regardless of the eventual outcome, the entire kingdom will soon suffer greater repercussions. The prices of food and other essentials will inevitably surge wildly. When faced with increasing numbers of starving civilians and the destitute, I fear Audrey may, out of compassion, make some irrational decisions…"
He paused, then added quietly, "For example, opening up the Hall family granaries and letting them take the grain."
One had to admit, Earl Hall understood his daughter remarkably well. In the original timeline, Audrey had indeed made such a decision.
"I don't care much about these material things anymore," Earl Hall continued, "but Audrey tends to oversimplify matters. The Hall granaries alone cannot solve the root issue, yet such an act could unleash the beast hidden inside starving people's hearts. Once they learn that noble households possess large reserves of grain, they may become impulsive…dangerously so."
He sighed. "It could lead to a tragedy. I don't want Audrey's kindness to result in such an outcome."
Audrey froze for a moment at his words, then said resolutely, "But isn't it true that hoarding grain while letting others starve to death is something the nobles did wrong in the first place?"
"Right and wrong aren't that simple, Audrey."
"But…"
Edward took her hand. "Alright, alright. From what I know, the Church foresaw the coming war long ago. They've been secretly buying up grain. So if the situation truly reaches an uncontrollable point, they should release those reserves."
He was referring to the enormous stockpile he had helped the Evernight Goddess acquire the last time he returned to the Harry Potter world.
Audrey pursed her lips. "But even so, that can only solve the crisis in Backlund at best. What about the rest of Loen?"
"Do your best, and leave the rest to fate."
The "fate" he spoke of naturally referred to the gods high above.
The Northern Continent's war involved George III's conspiracy, Adam's shadow, and—more importantly—the clash between the Evernight Goddess and the God of Combat. A conflict involving deities was almost impossible for mortals to resolve.
———
Half an hour later—
The three of them, along with one dog, returned to the small villa in the Empress Borough.
As soon as Susie entered, she began circling excitedly around the living room and even invited Lilith to play with her.
Audrey fixed her gaze on Lilith. "Lilith, you didn't really start the Southern Continent war, did you?! How could you—"
This time, Lilith did not pretend to be clueless or use her usual cutesy tricks. Instead, she answered calmly, "That's right. Miss Lilith was the one who triggered the Southern Continent war."
"But privately, I did it to stir up a war and complete my advancement ritual. Only then could I obtain power strong enough to better protect Edward…and you all in the days to come. Publicly, I was helping the oppressed, impoverished people of the Southern Continent overthrow the classes that exploited and abused them, so that they could rebuild a fair and just order. Did you forget the books I gave you?"
Audrey was momentarily stunned.
"Of course," Lilith continued, "Miss Lilith must admit that pushing the war forward was mostly driven by my own selfish desire to complete the ritual. But if the final outcome turns out to be good, I don't see anything wrong with that~"
"And besides," she added lightly, "I didn't intentionally orchestrate the Southern Continent's uprising. I merely told those who could no longer survive that the reason their countless rebellions in the past had all failed was because ordinary people were simply too fragile before high-sequence Beyonders."
"But now, with me taking care of the Beyonders, all they needed to do was what they had always done—resist injustice and exploitation, overthrow the tyrannical and corrupt noble rulers!"
Audrey pressed her lips together. "But all those systems described in those books…it's built on a certain level of productive capacity. Is the Southern Continent truly capable of that right now?"
"If they overthrow the current system yet fail to build a better one, won't it just plunge everything into chaos?"
As Susie turned her head back and forth between the two, Lilith said, "You have to take things one step at a time. You can't simply give up because the ideal outcome can't be achieved immediately."
She then looked toward Edward. "Isn't that right, Edward?"
"Well…"
Edward, who had barely participated in keyboard politics even in his previous life, really couldn't give any profound insight into such matters. After a moment of thought, he said, "I've never been to the Southern Continent, so I'm not sure. But the natives of the Rorsted Archipelago have indeed never stopped resisting. It's only because of the military and the Church's high-sequence powerhouses that they were suppressed time and again."
At that moment, Edward's thoughts drifted involuntarily to the storm-wracked era of his previous life—an age when entire nations seemed to teeter on the brink and the old order collapsed in fire and confusion. In those desperate years, countless ordinary people had risen with nothing but faith and stubborn resolve, pushing forward even as the world around them fell apart.
No one could ever know how many lives were lost in that long struggle. Most of them had never expected to see its end.
But they refused to shrink back into quiet submission. They refused to endure indignity in exchange for a few more days of breath. For people who possessed no wealth, no power, and no protection, that defiance was the greatest strength they had—the final means by which they tried to wrench their destiny onto a different path.
And they embraced sacrifice without fear, asking only that if they were to fall, it would be on a road leading toward the faint promise of a brighter future, rather than in silent despair beneath the weight of oppression.
"With my limited understanding of politics," Edward said finally, "Lilith's reasoning does make a certain amount of sense. So…whether the Southern Continent must experience war should be decided by the people at the bottom who live there."
After a moment of silence, he reached out and gently tapped his fingers on Lilith's head. "But don't even think about switching to another pathway again!"
Lilith puffed out her cheeks in dissatisfaction. "Oh."
She said it, but in her heart she had already made her decision—this Red Priest pathway? Miss Lilith was absolutely switching to it!
Not even God could stop her—she said so herself!
Edward then turned to Audrey and said softly, "Audrey, don't overthink it or pressure yourself too much. Once we return to Hogwarts…there might be a turning point."
"When are we going back?" Audrey asked.
"Tomorrow—or the day after."
"You still have something to take care of?"
Edward smiled and nodded. "Mm."
Just then, a palm-sized black shadow suddenly tore through the air and shot out. It circled Edward and Lilith dozens of times, shouting excitedly, "Finally found you!! Edward, Lilith!"
It was none other than the messenger Phoenix.
Fluttering its wings, it landed on the back of a chair and tilted its head, staring at Edward with beady black eyes. "Where did you two go? I couldn't find you anywhere."
A strange sense of disorientation washed over Edward. The last time he had seen this creature felt like ages ago. His final news of Phoenix had been that it was killed by the divine abomination Suah to help Lilith.
"Thank goodness…I'm glad you're alright."
"Azik saved me," Phoenix said proudly. "Otherwise, I would've died while helping you save your daughter!"
After speaking, it stared fixedly at Edward, saying nothing, though its eyes were loudly speaking for it.
"…Fine." Edward understood perfectly. He took out the Resurrection Stone and shook it. "Give me a few more days. Once I confirm this thing is useless to me, I'll hand it over immediately."
Phoenix's eyes locked onto the Resurrection Stone, unblinking. "I'm not in a hurry. Not~~ in the least."
———
The next morning, just before 9 a.m., a series of knocks broke the quiet of the house.
Immediately afterwards—bang!—the door was kicked open. Roselle swaggered inside with exaggerated arrogance, shouting, "Edward! Get up! Time to do real work!"
Moments later, Lilith emerged from her room in loose pyjamas, hugging a soft pillow. Half-asleep, she rubbed her eyes with a thoroughly disgruntled expression. "Roselle, you're so annoying…"
Roselle flopped dramatically onto the sofa and snorted. "You two are angel-level Beyonders. Do you still need to sleep like ordinary humans? Didn't Edward just take a hundred-year-long nap?"
"At your age, how can you still sleep soundly?"
Edward strolled out at an unhurried pace. "Maintaining normal human habits helps preserve one's humanity. You know that. Not everyone is like you—able to preserve yours by having your daughter read your diary."
Roselle's eye twitched. "Ah, so that's why Bernie keeps muttering about my diary. You were the one who put that idea in her head, weren't you?"
"Tell me it didn't work."
Roselle grumbled but then suddenly stretched his neck to peer into the bedroom Edward had just walked out of. A mischievous grin spread across his face. "Where's your little girlfriend? Didn't sleep together last night? After being apart for over a century, shouldn't you two have had a passionate century-long reunion?"
"…," Edward's expression didn't change. "And you must have had a wonderful night with Matilda then, hm?"
Roselle instantly snapped, "Don't change the subject. Don't tell me you still haven't done anything with your little girlfriend? Wow—didn't expect you to be this pure! Tsk tsk! Don't tell me you're still a—"
Edward replied expressionlessly, "Oh? And you—now a Sequence 0 god—still retain mortal desires? Matilda's current body is alchemical. Does it even have those functions? During all those years in the mausoleum, when you got urges, were you handling it…yourself?"
"…"
Lilith covered her ears. "Hey! Can you two at least pretend to care that a child is in the room?"
Roselle sneered internally: Child? Of the three of us, you're the one who's lived the longest!
"Alright, enough nonsense. Let's go."
Roselle rubbed his hands together, his face full of anticipation. "I've been waiting for this day for a very, very long time."
Edward's lips curved upward. "To be honest, so have I."
"Let's go—time to open the box named Klein!"
———
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