Ch.75The Butterfly Effect of Chaos (1)

Something was strange.

Haltos, the leader of Arguirion, frowned. Blasphemia’s pursuit was much faster than expected. The chaos caused by the Silver Gift hosts should not have been contained so quickly.

Sometimes, Blasphemia would ambush Arguirion’s agents even before they could disperse the Silver Gift.

If Haltos hadn’t sensed the discomfort in these clear anomalies, he wouldn’t have been selected as an agent for the Golden Desert operation.

“Nastion.”

The shadow beneath Haltos’s feet rippled. The elongated shadow slowly rose and stood on two feet. A figure of darkness, completely black without facial features, taking the shape of a person.

“Is there a traitor among us?”

The mouthless shadow spoke. Strangely, its voice seemed to resonate evenly from all directions.

“Our comrades stand proud even in the shadows, they are more than adequate in upholding our cause.”

If that was the case, the current situation made even less sense. If it wasn’t the work of a spy planted by Blasphemia, how on earth was information leaking out?

Haltos carefully reviewed the methods of acquiring information from his time at Blasphemia. However, there was no means to obtain information so thoroughly without leaving evidence.

“…No. There was one.”

Future prediction calculations using the Ten Commandments was an advanced method only available at the Ten Towers. Even if Blasphemia, merely a puppet organization of the Ten Towers, applied for its use, it would be difficult to get permission for future prediction.

The Ten Commandments were so powerful that they acted as variables in future prediction themselves; to properly predict the future, more than half of the Ten Commandments had to be used simultaneously. It was a limited privilege used only in secret meetings of the Ten Towers’ elders or after intricate negotiations.

However, Blasphemia had a means to glimpse the future even without the Ten Commandments.

“The Prophet of the Basement…”

Blasphemia knew the dangers of superstition followers and sought to eliminate them. Yet at the same time, they didn’t deny their usefulness.

Particularly useful were prophets, including the priests of Phoibos.

The fate of prophets who made deals with Blasphemia to save their loved ones or to escape pursuit.

The ‘Prophet of the Basement,’ created by parallel-connecting the brains of prophets, was one of the mysterious tools created by Blasphemia.

“…Wasn’t the Prophet of the Basement deactivated after the birth of the White Light Monster?”

Nastion questioned. The White Light Monster, the bastard child of the Ten Commandments. Like the Ten Commandments, it was a massive variable that disrupted future predictions.

Originally, prophets’ prophecies were closer to ‘foresight’ than ‘prediction.’ They glimpsed a moment in the future without any logic or causality.

However, the ‘Prophet of the Basement,’ a crude imitation made from prophets’ corpses, was closer to prediction. By excluding the Ten Commandments, which were the branching points of countless futures, from the prediction from the start, they could make it work at the cost of accuracy…

The White Light Monster dealt a fatal blow to the Prophet of the Basement. It was a variable that exceeded the computational limits.

No matter how many times they reactivated it and interpreted the output prophecies, only blue light would shine.

“Just as the Prophet of the Basement initially excluded the Ten Commandments from prediction targets, perhaps they’ve created a new Prophet of the Basement that excludes the White Light Monster?”

“The number of superstition followers has decreased due to continuous hunting. In a situation where there are limits to material supply even for maintaining the Prophet of the Basement, I believe it would be difficult to create a new prophet.”

“Our former superiors might have compromised with reality and decided to use the relics of superstition followers. What’s important is that they’ve started tracking us using such non-magical means.”

Nastion couldn’t deny this. If there was no traitor, the only explanation for how Arguirion’s every move was being read was the intervention of means other than magic.

“What should we do?”

“There was always a limit to how much we could blind the Ten Towers with Silver Gift terrorism. It’s unfortunate that we couldn’t even reach three months of the six months we aimed to buy time for, but…”

Haltos’s calculations became more complex. First and foremost was to disrupt the prophecies. Second was to destroy the ‘Prophet of the Basement’ that Blasphemia had reforged.

There were two ways to disrupt prophecies: either engage in a battle of wits using prophets to read the future, just as Arguirion did, or make the future itself more complex to read.

“What about the magic towers we deal with?”

“After the annihilation of the Torres School, they’ve all become cautious. Some are slowly trying to cut ties or showing signs of legal transactions.”

“We’ll have to use them.”

Haltos looked out the window.

A massive magic circle being drawn using mana accumulated through the Silver Gift. A passage to another dimension.

It would take much more time for the gateway to be completed.

“For the cause and the truth.”

***

Blasphemia and the Divine Order formed a united front against Arguirion, using me as a bridgehead.

In fact, they both thought I was a spy working for their side, so “united front” wasn’t quite fitting.

“Director Noir, please head to the ruins of Elimon, and Director Divius, to the ruins of Piraios.”

Meanwhile, Director Hydra was accelerating the divine investigation while the two forces were busy dealing with Arguirion.

Most investigation sites had no notable sacred objects remaining. There was a reason Blasphemia had abandoned them. But if we scraped the entire temple to find artifact fragments, or if all else failed, took the altar itself, Kaicle could extract divine power.

The artificial Ten Commandments was slowly but surely accumulating divine power.

“Please contact me if you find anything unusual. I will be making contact with nearby Blasphemia agents.”

After giving each director their assignments for the divine investigation, I began to act alone. Niobe’s previous message to me had requested a meeting.

I had declined contact several times, using the excuse that I was busy tracking Arguirion. At the same time, I passed on information provided by the Divine Order to Niobe for her to use freely. This was to induce a clash between Blasphemia and Arguirion.

Niobe seemed to have made good use of the information I provided. Her emails continuously reported news of Arguirion members being captured or killed. The operation was successful.

Since tracking Arguirion was Blasphemia’s biggest current goal, Niobe, who always brought in exclusive information, must have received considerable promotions.

If she had reported the information I gave her as her own achievement, she would likely have become an elite agent with independent operation authority by now.

This Niobe had requested a meeting, saying “we really must meet at least once now.” The contact location was a Blasphemia safe house near the predicted Arguirion appearance area I had sent.

I was reluctant to take the risk of meeting, but continuously refusing would also raise suspicions. I prepared thoroughly and headed to the designated location.

***

Agent L13 had been the biggest topic within Blasphemia for some time.

The first incident where traces of Arguirion were discovered: the betrayal of Charlotte branch director Nardanit.

The Elysion terror attack where Arguirion officially revealed its name.

Even on Crete Island, where the Torres Magic Tower had defected, the name L13 had surfaced.

This was thanks to Ortes’s instruction to the Torres Tower’s prisoners and fixers before disappearing from the scene: “If asked for my name during Ten Towers’ interrogation, answer L13.”

Blasphemia was thrown into confusion while reviewing the testimonies. How could an agent whose communications had been cut off long ago be operating so smoothly?

Was it a fictional identity created by Arguirion to spread misinformation?

Such doubts were dispelled by Audit Director Salmosia.

Niobe faithfully followed Ortes’s instruction to “not trust the existing reporting system and report truly important matters to the Audit Director or L13 himself.”

She decided to report all Arguirion appearance information received from L13 to the Audit Director, rather than disguising it as her own evidence-gathering ability or deduction.

Therefore, Salmosia, filled with great trust in Agent L13, dismissed the internal questions within Blasphemia.

From this atmosphere, Blasphemia roughly guessed L13’s identity. If he was an unknown agent belonging to the Audit Department, he could only be a secret inspector.

Although there were still questions about how L13 tracked Arguirion, everyone knew well that prying into the “secrets” of a secret inspector wasn’t wise.

Niobe was elevated by Salmosia to a position similar to L13’s dedicated operator. And Salmosia wanted to meet his most capable agent who was loyal to him in person.

And so.

“I’ve heard the reports you sent through Niobe. I understand your caution about apocalyptists within the Ten Towers who communicate with Arguirion, but don’t you need to return home occasionally?”

“It’s an honor to meet you again, Audit Director.”

Ortes was face to face with Salmosia.