It was over!
Staring at the crimson chains wrapped all over his body, Yaxiu sank into dazed bewilderment.
Setting aside how he could possibly break free of them, even if he did, the wind blades whirling overhead were not there to keep people cool.
At the moment, the wind blades were only targeting Valkas because Valkas was the sole mantis trying to stop a carriage. The moment Yaxiu stopped obediently playing the part of a doomed corpse, there was no telling whether the wind blades might turn on him first as the easier target.
Not to mention, Yaxiu had no way of breaking free from the crimson chains in the first place!
It was over. He was a dead man this time. Should he call the Sword Princess? Then again, she couldn't do much besides watch the show...
Just as Yaxiu tried to empty his mind and administer his own end-of-life care, he suddenly felt himself move.
No, he hadn't moved—the ground was moving.
Yaxiu looked down and saw that the surface beneath him had seemingly "come alive," carrying him as it drifted backward. The crimson chains showed no reaction whatsoever. After all, the chains were anchored to the ground; when the ground shifted, the chains naturally shifted with it.
*Could the earth have smartly recognized me as a kindhearted, beautiful environmentalist and decided to spare my miserable dog of a life?*
However, when Yaxiu was ferried to the edge of the platform and saw Harvey summoning sorcery spirits to manipulate the ground, he was instantly moved by this display of genuine prison camaraderie.
"Next time you want to die, could you come find me? My craft is exceptional, and I even offer after-sales service. All you have to do is give me your sorcery spirits as payment before you kick the bucket," Harvey hissed in an undertone. "If an Executioner accidentally kills a non-judgment target, there's a chance it will enter a frenzy and attack indiscriminately. That's happened once or twice before, and nearly every single death row convict was wiped out!"
"...I was almost on the verge of deciding to tolerate your fetish..."
"What?"
"Why do you have an earth-magic sorcery spirit? Aren't you from the necromancy school?"
"Standard burial methods nowadays are earth burials, cremations, and water burials. As a necromancer, mastering earth, fire, and water arts is mandatory. How else could someone be a necromancer?"
Well then. Yaxiu had assumed being a corpse scavenger was merely a necromancer's casual side gig, never imagining that a necromancer's primary career path was employment at a funeral home.
*Clang!*
Valkas suddenly plunged his sword into the ground. A surge of deep yellow sword energy erupted from the earth, enveloping his entire body like a rampart and shielding him from the turbulent gusts of wind blades outside.
"Miracle: Sword Body Barrier," Nagu praised. "A very respectable defensive sword miracle, yet it can only grant Mr. Ur a brief moment of respite. Futile struggles, so agonizing, so humble. But rest assured, everyone—the Titan Executioner will swiftly relieve him of his misery... Oh?"
Facing the Titan Executioner advancing like an avalanche and tsunami, Valkas did not retreat, nor did he flinch. Instead, he assumed an elven sword stance and called forth several sorcery spirits. Radiance swirled across his body, his longsword rang with sharp chimes, and amidst the howling gale, a somber, martial melody suddenly resonated—as though the God of Death had descended!
"If my judgment serves me right, what Mr. Ur is preparing now is precisely the new sword miracle he invented as a research scholar—Ruthless Finale!"
Nagu sounded somewhat thrilled as well. "The last research paper he published was nine years ago. At that time, Ruthless Finale could not enter practical combat testing because the casting sequence was far too cumbersome. But nine years later, Mr. Ur has actually perfected Ruthless Finale, and he even intends to use it to defy judgment!"
An elf dancing with his blade, accompanied by somber music—the inferior defying the superior, a sinner defying judgment!
Looking at that solitary silhouette standing before the Titan Executioner, Yaxiu could not help asking Harvey, "Why him?"
"Hm?"
"Why did he get fifty percent of the votes? Clearly, in terms of crimes and public exposure, I should have been the one to receive the most redemption votes. No matter how you look at it, Valkas shouldn't be the top vote-getter, let alone win an overwhelming majority of fifty percent... Exactly what wrong did he commit to incur such public fury?"
Harvey glanced at Yaxiu. "Isn't it obvious?"
"What's obvious? I read his criminal record. It's totally ordinary—it can't even compare to yours."
"It isn't a fault recorded in his criminal record."
"Then what fault is it?"
"The fault of his appearance, the fault of his bloodline, the fault of his birth."
Yaxiu blinked.
"He is an elf—that is his greatest fault," Harvey said. "Appearance, martial prowess, intellect, lifespan—elves hold an overwhelming advantage over every other race in every single aspect. Moreover, their population is small. To protect their collective interests, their scarce numbers make them far more inclined to band together. Brilliant elves will never hesitate to spare effort in helping their kin.
"Elves are almost always taken in by the best rearing institutes and regarded as the 'stewards of society,' extensively occupying managerial posts. A long-lived race's lifespan, coupled with striking looks and preeminent knowledge, makes it virtually impossible for other races to compete with elves for managerial positions. Though people say managers and employees are equal in status, everyone knows that's just lip service.
"Anyone who has ever worked a job—who hasn't seen the brutishness of an ogre coworker, the laziness of a goblin coworker, the sloppiness of an orc coworker, and the harsh strictness of an elven boss?
"In the history of the Blood Moon Trials in Kaimeng City, there has never been a single elven convict. Aside from the fact that elves belong almost entirely to the middle and upper classes and have no need for crime, it's even more because elves shelter one another, standing united by bonds of blood. That is something no other race can achieve.
"Goblins are shortsighted, orcs are ignorant, ogres are cunning, and humans are selfish... Before an elf, all we can ever feel is... an inferiority complex.
"Even I cast a vote for Valkas just now," Harvey said softly. "For most people, this is perhaps the only chance they will ever have to trample an elf underfoot."
Yaxiu looked toward the Titan Executioner once more. But this time, what he saw was not a grotesque monster, but a turbid rage—a colossal, hysterical pressure condensed from countless ordinary people.
Although Yaxiu had never met any ordinary people besides the Sword Princess—the prison held only prison guards and death row inmates—he could understand what the everyday folk outside were thinking.
It was a despair born under an orderly society, a fury sparked in the face of an unbridgeable chasm.
In the Blood Moon Country, with its system of socialized child-rearing, most people were sorted into tiers starting from infancy. Those with high potential went to good rearing institutes; those with low potential were sent to poor ones. Stratification began at the starting line, and their circumstances upon growing up differed like heaven and earth.
Those of superior birth, like elves, held respectable professions, and becoming a sorcerer was nothing extraordinary for them. Those of inferior birth, as Yaxiu had seen from the criminal records of goblins, orcs, and ogres, were either consigned to manual labor or ended up as street thugs, their entire lives mapped out to the bitter end.
And those at the bottom didn't even have the right to complain.
Because the person ranked above you genuinely was more capable than you. Everyone started from a rearing institute, possessing no capital other than sheer ability.
It was simply that his talent was better than yours, so he was admitted to a better rearing institute, and so he could snowball his assets step by step until he was stepping on your head.
A society stratified purely by capability left almost no one with the courage to transcend their class.
Yaxiu finally understood the purpose of the Blood Moon Trial.
Under such suffocating class barriers, everyone's desire for a better life was thoroughly suppressed, and twisted desires could only breed venom and resentment.
When the system decreed that one would never have a day in the sun, breaking those shackles was only a matter of time. What was more, in a Blood Moon Country where the concept of family had vanished entirely, every person was an isolated island; whatever they did, they had no loved ones to worry about leaving behind.
Therefore, three things had to be driven into the public mind: first, breaking the law meant dying a horrific death; second, even those of high status would die horrific deaths; third, you who are content with the status quo are the happiest of all.
Yaxiu was a sacrifice, Harvey was a sacrifice, all the death row convicts were sacrifices—and Valkas was the most satisfying sacrifice of them all.
Just as the Titan Executioner gathered its momentum at this critical juncture, Valkas suddenly turned his head and shot a glance at Yaxiu.
Yaxiu froze.
*What are you looking at me for?*
Yet in the very next second, the death row convicts around Yaxiu scrambled and crawled away from him, and Harvey even manipulated the earth to flee into the distance. Yaxiu understood instantly.
*Damn it, don't tell me Valkas wants to use me as a meat shield to cushion his fall?!*
Chapter 59