Chapter 398: The Ancient Vow (1)

Under the streetlamps of Saint Freya Academy’s commercial street, Roel stared at the words written in Teresa’s notebook and fell into a daze.

Scapegoat.

It was that single word that baffled Roel.

The term ‘scapegoat’ should be referring to someone who took the fall for him in dire situations, but the terminology was incredibly vague.

He couldn’t think of a situation at hand that he would require a scapegoat. There was no large-scale pandemonium on the Sia Continent yet, and Roel was the sole child of the Ascart House, which meant that he was in a pretty secure position. The idea that there was a scapegoat specially prepared for him sounded ridiculous to him.

Other than that, Teresa’s mention of ‘your clan’ also caught his attention.

“By clan, you’re referring to…?”

The Ardes. To be more exact, I’m referring to your ancestor, Wendy Arde.

“Wendy Arde?”

Hearing the foreign name that clearly belonged to one of his ancestors brought a grave frown to Roel’s face. However, Teresa suddenly changed the topic at this point and asked a baffling question.

Mister Roel, are you aware of the Tripartite Alliance in the distant past?

“Yes, I’m aware of it. You’re referring to the alliance made out of angels, dragons, and high elves, right? One of my ancestors was protecting their creation. Does this matter have something to do with the Tripartite Alliance?”

That’s right. In the ancient era, the Tripartite Alliance made a prophecy…

Teresa began writing down the unknown history about the three races in the ancient era in her notebook.

Transcendents in the present era were fond of using divination spells to detect calamities in advance so that they could make preparations to avert them. The powerful ancient races happened to share such an inclination too. In fact, it was due to a prophecy that they chose to entrust their bloodlines to the human race.

Those living in the ancient era noticed that the environment on the Sia Continent was slowly changing with time. Slowly but surely, they were becoming incompatible with the world around them. Worried that their people might go extinct at this rate, they sought a way to continue their lineages.

Their search eventually brought their eyes upon the humans, who were prophesied to rise to prominence in the future. That was why there were so many humans who possessed the bloodlines of foreign races.

However, that was not the end of the prophecy.

The Tripartite Alliance was able to prophesy even further ahead, where they found that the awakening of ancient beings in the distant future would unleash a catastrophe upon the humans. Even the successors of their lineages wouldn’t be spared from harm.

This was the apocalyptic prophecy that had been passed down since ancient times. Everything that the Twilight Sages Assembly did back in the Second Epoch was to prevent the realization of this prophecy.

Be it the Mother Goddess or the Savior, both were manifestations of calamities that had laid waste upon the ancient races. Thus, one of the key goals of the Twilight Sages Assembly was to prevent their awakening.

Roel was aware of this, but that was not what he was concerned about.

Nora and Charlotte are the successors of the Angel Bloodline and High Elf Bloodline respectively. If the successors of the ancient races’ lineages wouldn’t be spared from harm, wouldn’t that mean that…

A deep furrow formed on Roel’s forehead. He knew that he had to take this prophecy seriously, or else bad things could happen to his loved ones. But at the same time, he was also confused as this prophecy didn’t seem to involve him in any way.

“Miss Teresa, is our clan related to the prophecy made by the Tripartite Alliance too?”

That’s right. In the final years of the Second Epoch, Wendy Arde affirmed the prophecy. That is the cause of William’s current state.

“Could you tell me more about Wendy Arde?”

She’s one of the remnants of the defeated Twilight Sages Assembly in the final years of the Second Epoch. She was lauded to be a talented astronomer and a high seer. The founders of the Knight Kingdom were her followers whom she had saved along the way. You could even say that the Knight Kingdom is a country established by her knights.

“!”

Roel’s eyes dilated at the revelation. He finally understood why those from the Knight Kingdom treated him so differently.

It was probably safe to say that the Knight Kingdom viewed Wendy Arde to be the founder of their country, perhaps even putting her on a higher pedestal. That would explain why Teresa and the others looked at him through rose-tinted glasses.

It was just that even though Wendy had saved many people through her prophecies in that chaotic era, she wasn’t able to live to see the establishment of the Knight Kingdom.

She had sustained severe injuries while fighting against the disciples of the Savior, and her condition was further exacerbated by the following years of overexertion. She pushed herself to make prophecies and fought hard to protect her comrades. The separation from her family members and the collapse of the human empire also took a toll on her mental state.

In the end, she became far too weak to survive the mass migration.

Despite her hardships and agony, Wendy Arde never cursed the world or humankind. She was still worried about others even to her dying breath. She spent her final moments using her exceptional talent to make one last prophecy for humankind.

She prophesied about the apocalyptic prophecy made by the Tripartite Alliance, as well as the future of the Ardes who sought to fight against it.

She was able to peer through fate in her final moments, but there was a problem with the prophecy she made. It contained glaring contradictions that were incomprehensible even to her.

In her prophecy, she was able to further narrow the time period of the upcoming apocalypse to a thousand years from then. She saw the near extinction of their Ardes’ lineage, as well as the great danger that one of their last descendants would face.

It was just that the details were a mess.

She witnessed a descendant who hadn’t awakened to their bloodline turning into a Fallen under the enticement of an evil cultist, resulting in the complete extinction of their lineage. Yet, at the same time, she saw the very same descendant awakening his bloodline and overcoming all adversities. At the very end, she saw the sight of him dying in the academy.

From that, she derived three prophecies.

First Prophecy: The descendant of the Ardes falls into depravity. He will become a threat and must be avoided at all costs.

Second Prophecy: The descendant of the Ardes doesn’t fall into depravity and successfully awakens his bloodline.

Third Prophecy: The descendant of the Ardes dies in an academy under the witness of the descendants of the Tripartite Alliance.

“This!”

Roel’s golden eyes narrowed upon seeing the three prophecies written in Teresa’s notebook. He was able to comprehend right away what the three prophecies represented.

In Eyes of the Chronicler, the in-game Roel failed to awaken to his bloodline and became an evil cultist. He was eventually cornered by Paul and the four capture targets and died in their hands. The descendants of the Tripartite Alliance here likely referred to Nora, Charlotte, and William.

That was in line with two of the three prophecies.

The remaining one perfectly described his current situation.

He was deeply in awe of his ancestor’s ability to accurately glimpse into the fate of her descendant a thousand years later. It was just that her three prophecies posed a major problem to others due to the incomprehensible contradictions amongst them.

Roel was probably the only person in the world who could make sense of the contradictions.

The contradiction amongst the prophecies could be traced back to the moment Roel recalled the memories of his past life. Those memories changed the trajectory of his life, resulting in the confusion of fate.

Of course, there was no way Wendy could have known about that. She simply attributed it to the uncertain nature of fate and made different arrangements for the first two prophecies.

She told her followers to avoid coming into contact with the descendant of the Ardes until he awakened his bloodline. As long as the descendant remained unawakened, there would be a chance that he was already a Fallen. If so, carelessly approaching him could risk crucial intelligence falling into the hands of the evil cults.

As for the third prophecy, that would depend on which of the first two prophecies was realized. If the descendant of the Ardes had truly become a Fallen, there would be no need to bother with him. All they had to do was to wait for his downfall.

However, if he had awakened to his bloodline, the third prophecy would have to be averted at all costs.