History's trajectory doesn't seem to have shifted much.
After digesting the vast data accumulated by Zhou Shu over the years, Pai Pai had gained a far deeper understanding of his situation. His control over his abilities had also advanced another step.
Not long after the report of the prison break at the Tower, he already understood the entire sequence of events:
Jellal was taken away, Oración Seis set out in search of Nirvana, and the Council began organizing the guilds to strike at the Balam Alliance.
History had not been overturned by the flapping of one great butterfly's wings.
Knock, knock, knock—
"Come in."
The door opened, and Council Chairman Crawford Seam walked in. His round face still carried a sickly pallor.
With the Council headquarters destroyed, all its work had to be reorganized and reestablished, demanding enormous effort. Mobilizing forces against Oración Seis, uprooting their subordinate factions, and summoning guilds into battle also required vast manpower.
Now, with the Tower prison disaster, countless vicious criminals had escaped—each capable of stirring chaos wherever they went. The situation demanded immediate and serious action.
The Council found itself stretched thin, and so, begrudgingly, they had to pinch their noses and ask Pai Pai for help.
"I'll temporarily transfer control of Zhou Shu to you," Pai Pai said. He could already see through their little scheme—they weren't without options, they just didn't want to use them.
There were plenty of ways the Council could deal with the crisis:
Share intelligence with kingdoms and request troops from them.
Arm the legal guilds and coordinate joint operations.
Work with major financial groups, tap into some of their more sensitive research projects, and rapidly build up forces.
Or, failing all else, simply endure the hard times until they recover their strength, then strike back.
Yes, their prestige might suffer. The Council's already fragile reputation might even collapse entirely—but those were all real options.
Compared to that, asking Pai Pai to step in was far more palatable. They'd already lost face once—losing it again didn't matter so long as outsiders never found out. To the public, their dignity would remain intact.
And afterward, they could maneuver to take Zhou Shu's control back into their own hands.
A perfect two-for-one.
Pai Pai didn't care about their little calculations. He had no use for Zhou Shu at the moment anyway. Whether it was sitting idle or loaned out made no difference.
"Uh—thank you for your generosity."
The moment Pai Pai agreed, Crawford was visibly stunned, as if he hadn't expected things to go so smoothly. His gratitude, this time, was sincerely spoken.
"Ha ha ha! Look at you now—weren't you so high and mighty before? And now you can't even speak properly. Pathetic! Truly pathetic!!"
Inside a natural cavern deep in the forest, a shriveled old man in prison garb sat laughing. His skin hung from his bones like tattered cloth, and a strange flush crept across his gaunt face.
The dim cave was illuminated by over a dozen glowing magic circles. At the center of each lay a motionless figure in a guard's uniform.
Their expressions were peaceful, almost as if they were merely asleep.
"Don't worry, you'll wake up again soon. It won't be long. Ha ha ha!!"
His shrill laughter startled flocks of birds from the trees.
"You are a monster. How could something as disgusting as you—and your vile magic—even exist?" Several figures appeared at the cave entrance, blocking out the light. Like him, they all wore prison uniforms. One of them looked at the old man with disgust.
"Heh, people like you could never comprehend its grandeur and beauty." The withered elder sneered coldly.
"How far along is it?" the leader at the entrance asked coolly, casting a glance at the corpses lying in the circles.
"Half an hour more," the old man replied with a delirious smile. His magic was necromancy—he could control beasts' corpses, mages' corpses, anyone.
At his peak, he had commanded a vast undead legion, wielding terrifying political power across nations. Cruel and sadistic, he often lured powerful mages with false missions, killed them, and turned them into his puppets.
When the truth came out, public outrage had surged. The Council hunted him down and threw him into prison.
"You'd better not be lying," the tall leader said flatly, his words heavy with unchallengeable authority.
"My magic will never fail," the necromancer snapped, offended that anyone dared question his art.
The tall figure said nothing further, silently calculating the time remaining.
Most prisoners in the Tower had been powerful and influential figures—political criminals like Jellal, once a member of the Council and one of the Ten Wizard Saints. They fit the Tower's standards perfectly.
And such people—once high and mighty—could never accept living as nothing more than rats in the dark, branded criminals. For them, admitting that identity was worse than death.
So the strongest among them banded together. The necromancer's abilities, beyond controlling corpses, also allowed him to transfer memory and consciousness from one body to another—essentially possession.
They planned to transfer their minds into the corpses of guards, taking on their identities to live again.
To achieve this, they stole guard corpses, killed off certain other prisoners, altered appearances with magic, and made a bloody mess of the scene to confuse investigators.
Revenge and spite were only part of it—the true purpose was to mislead the Council, inflame their fury, and push them into acting quickly. That way, they could "rescue" their supposed comrades before the sadistic necromancer destroyed them.
So far, the plan had gone perfectly. Everything now depended on whether the necromancer's promise was real.
The tall man turned, leaned against the cave wall, and closed his eyes, quietly sensing the world around him. The magic in the cave was cold, like a still lake, yet faint ripples disturbed the surface.
Suddenly—his instincts screamed. His mind went blank for a split second. A flood of immense magical power engulfed his vision in blinding white light.
A sea. A vast, endless sea of magic power, beyond anything they could comprehend. Boundless. Terrifying.
He gasped for breath, exploding with power, and without hesitation, sprinted out of the cave.
The others, realizing danger, also tried to flee. But they were too slow.
A colossal beam of light descended from the sky, piercing the earth. Boulders were hurled skyward, the cave collapsing instantly. At the beam's center, a massive sphere of light expanded outward, swallowing everything—men, beasts, trees, stone.
All was consumed. All was annihilated.
The roar shook the land.
The tall man who had run first was caught by the edge of the blast. He lost an arm and a leg, his stumps seared shut by the extreme heat. He wouldn't bleed out—but other consequences began tearing through his body.
Panting heavily, drenched in cold sweat, agony gnawed at his very soul.
"Council… are you… listening? I surrender. I'll surrender! Treat me… and I'll… I'll tell you… everything you want…"
Face to the sky, each phrase took him long, excruciating seconds. A single sentence dragged on for over a minute.
Inside the Council, staff carefully read his lips, repeating his words aloud. All eyes turned toward Chairman Crawford.
Crawford stroked his chin, clearly tempted.
Meanwhile, the Magic Council's knights had been drawn by Zhou Shu's orbital strike. They soon arrived, spotting the gravely wounded prisoner. He saw them too, and despair flooded his eyes.
"Wait—"
Thwip!
An energy arrow pierced his skull before he could finish.
"Record this. Prisoner No. 52364, after escaping, attempted to stall with words in resistance. Executed on the spot." The Knight Commander spoke coldly, his face expressionless.
"Yes, sir!" the knights answered, full of respect.
"Burn him. Take the ashes back to the prison to honor the dead."
Yes, sir!! Their respect turned into reverence.