Translator: AnubisTL
In Mentor Clark's laboratory, Jieming was buried in processing a complex set of energy flow data.
From the corner of his eye, he saw Viola beside him sighing in frustration over a pile of rune structure diagrams. Her beautiful face, usually tinged with a hint of playfulness or languor, was now scrunched up like a bitter melon.
"Senior Sister, what's wrong now? Isn't the war over?" Jieming couldn't help but stop his work and ask curiously.
Viola snapped her head up and glared at him fiercely, as if she had found an outlet for her emotions. "Over? Yeah, it's over! But what did I get out of this trip?! Absolutely nothing!"
She grew angrier as she spoke, stabbing her finger at the data on the virtual light screen as if it were her mortal enemy. "Besides wasting several years in that godforsaken place, living in fear, I was forced into a mandatory rest period! And to shorten that damn rest period, I even had to cough up a bunch of high-tier military merit! And for what? Resources? Knowledge? The little bit of stuff I brought back isn't even enough to fill a gap in my teeth! The most infuriating part is, I was already drowning in debt before this! Now, it's just adding insult to injury—I'm completely bankrupt!"
She grew more agitated as she spoke, her voice rising to a near-roar, her usual elegant and composed demeanor completely gone.
Beside her, Mentor Clark was carefully adding a stardust-like powder into a miniature reaction core. Without looking up, he remarked coolly, "Your foundation is unstable, and you're too eager for quick success. I told you to accumulate more knowledge before taking action. If you had prepared enough, you wouldn't be in this mess."
His words were like a needle, precisely deflating Viola's fury.
Her momentum stalled, and she mumbled a weak defense, "But... but even a bunch of seventh-tier wizards fell this time... How can you blame me for being unprepared...?"
Mentor Clark finally paused his delicate work and slowly turned his head, his eyes as still as a deep well, fixing Viola with a calm gaze.
Though he said nothing and released no aura, Viola froze instantly, like a cat caught by the scruff of its neck. She fell silent, a smile more awkward than a sob twisting her face, and quickly changed the subject, turning to Jieming:
"Oh, right! Jieming! You punk! The rewards from the expeditionary force should have been issued by now, right? You're the one who got the credit! Hurry up and check—let me see, so I can soothe my wounded soul!"
Jieming blinked, stunned.
He had been so busy these past few days, running himself ragged helping his mentor clear the backlog of experimental projects, that he had completely forgotten about the rewards.
Under Viola's repeated urges and curious gaze, Jieming opened his magic net terminal, logged into his personal account, and found the after-action report and merit reward notification for the "Justice" plane incident, issued directly by the Expeditionary Force High Command.
The first thing that caught his eye was his own reward, listed separately and marked as "Primary Intelligence Contribution and Key to Breaking the Deadlock":
High-tier Military Merit: 1,000,000 units
"One million?! High-tier military merit?!" Beside him, Viola's eyes instantly widened, her voice leaping an entire octave.
She stared at the string of numbers in disbelief, then at Jieming, before suddenly collapsing as if all the strength had been drained from her body, yet all her grievances had been ignited.
With a dull thud, she slumped ungracefully to the floor, even beginning to drum her heels against the polished tiles, wailing with a choked-up sob:
"Aaaah—this is so unfair! Why?! I worked my ass off, nearly died, and came back with absolutely nothing! And you? You just strolled in there, died once, came back, and got a million high-tier military merit points?! A million!! And high-tier at that!! I'm done with life—!"
Jieming watched Viola throw a childish tantrum on the floor, rubbing his temples in frustration. "Senior, calm down. The Substitute Death Puppet I used is worth way more than that. This reward doesn't even cover a fraction of the cost. I'm the one who's truly lost everything, okay?"
He ignored Viola, who continued her fake crying, and turned his attention back to the after-action report.
The intelligence analysis at the beginning was mostly what he expected, but his gaze snagged on the "Personnel Loss and Return Statistics" section.
"Personnel Return Rate for This Fall: Approximately 87%"
"Only eighty-seven percent returned?" Jieming looked confusedly at Viola, who had finally been forced to scramble up from the floor by a single glare from Mentor Clark. "That percentage... were the casualties that high? I thought there were no battles. Why didn't everyone come back?"
Viola brushed off nonexistent dust from her clothes and leaned in to glance at the light screen. A cold smile, a mixture of mockery and knowing, touched her lips. "Casualties? Only three unlucky bastards were confirmed dead this time. The rest... hmph, they chose not to come back."
"Voluntarily stayed behind?" Jieming was taken aback. "Does the Star Ring Federation... allow that?"
"Why wouldn't they?" Viola retorted, her tone carrying the detached indifference of someone who had seen it all. "The Star Ring Federation—or rather, the upper echelons of the wizard civilization—has never cared about the specific choices of individual wizards."
"All the hardships and adventures we've endured are essentially brutal screenings, designed to temper the true elites who can carry the future of our civilization. Those who cannot withstand the pressure and risks of the wizard's path, and would rather immerse themselves in a false but 'happy' life, have simply reached the limit of their resolve."
She paused, her lips curling into a frigid arc. "What's wrong with letting them stay there? Beings with excellent wizard aptitude, acting as 'high-quality stud' to sire countless offspring in that modified plane, will increase the probability of future wizard apprentices being born there. For the civilization as a whole, that's not necessarily a bad thing. It's called putting waste to good use."
Jieming fell silent for a moment, digesting this cold logic.
He continued flipping through the summary report, suddenly spotting a brief entry in the "Background Information Supplement" appendix:
[ Regarding the civilization that created 'Justice': The 'Enlightenment Era' civilization was confirmed to have completely perished 730,000 standard years ago due to unknown reasons. No direct successors have been found. ]
Seeing this information, Jieming's heart stirred. He looked up at Viola.
"What about that Sage? The Ninth-tier Sage who created 'Justice'... is there any news of his whereabouts?"
Hearing this, the mocking expression on Viola's face vanished.
She fell silent for a moment before speaking in a slightly complex tone, "Before I came back, I heard some unconfirmed rumors circulating from the command center... They say that Sage has already died of old age."
"Died of old age?" Jieming asked, stunned.
For a Ninth-tier creature, such a death was too ordinary, even absurd.
Even Mentor Clark, who had been focused on his own experiment, paused slightly. Clearly, this news had also captured his attention.
Viola nodded in confirmation. "Yes, he died of old age. I heard that he remained steadfast in his convictions until the very end. In the world 'Justice' created—a place that suppressed all transcendent power—he never unleashed his own. He lived and died like the most ordinary of mortals, eventually... passing away peacefully at the end of his life."
A brief silence fell over the laboratory.
Jieming opened his mouth to speak, but his throat felt dry, and he found himself at a loss for words.
The Sage, who had harbored a utopian ideal and spared no effort—even harnessing the entire power of a civilization—to create "Justice" and establish a world of absolute fairness, had ultimately met such an... ordinary end within the very "ideal state" he had built.
This conclusion was steeped in an indescribable irony and sorrow, yet it also seemed to possess a strange, unwavering harmony.
Beside them, Mentor Clark slowly shook his head, as if trying to deny it. But then, he gently nodded.
In the end, he offered no comment. He simply lowered his head again, refocusing his entire attention on the faintly glowing reaction core in his hands, and continued his unfinished alchemical experiment.
(End of the Chapter)
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