"Yo, isn't this Edmond, Executive Secretary of the Tax Bureau? I told you so—sooner or later, you'd come in here to keep me company."
"Brothers, I've got a score to settle with this guy. Nobody steal him from me! I'll let you have the last five death matches, but the first five—no problem letting me have my fun with him, right?"
"Tsk, tsk, tsk, one big shot after another. Does that mean Andere's Wine of Immortality Club was wiped out entirely? The mayor really went ruthless—didn't spare a single one."
"Kaimeng City is Financier's kingdom now."
In the Central Hall, death row inmates crowded together, welcoming the arrival of their new cellmates with laughter and jeers. Compared to their gloating seniors, the newcomers were far calmer. One after another, following the prison guards' instructions, they pressed their fingerprints onto a bronze roster.
"Strange. When I was thrown in here, I didn't get such a grand welcoming ceremony," Yaxiu remarked, watching from the side.
"That's because you're special."
Yaxiu turned his head to find Harvey, the necromancer. As chatty as ever, the man picked up the conversation naturally, as if they were old pals. "The Four Pillar Gods have too fierce a reputation, and you're the first Four Pillar Gods cult leader in a century. Before completely modifying your permissions, the prison wouldn't dare let you anywhere near the other inmates."
"Modifying permissions?"
"Do you see that Sinner Directory?" Harvey pointed toward the bronze roster. "When we enter prison, we all have to press our fingerprints onto it. Once we do, the prison takes over our permissions, giving them total control over all our authorizations—like attack permissions and sorcery power output permissions."
"Huh?" Yaxiu looked surprised. "Weren't those permissions already restricted when we were arrested?"
"Yes, but previously our administrative permissions belonged to the Sin Hunting Hall. Once we enter prison, they have to be transferred to the prison."
"Why go through so much trouble?"
"It's necessary. First of all, if our permissions were still with the Sin Hunting Hall, the Sin Hunting Hall could remotely lift our restrictions. If we caused trouble here, wouldn't the prison take the fall? And wouldn't the Sin Hunting Hall get blamed? That's why both the Sin Hunting Hall and the prison insist on transferring jurisdiction.
"Second, the Sin Hunting Hall's processor is too far from the prison. Over time, the restrictions could wear down."
Yaxiu froze. "Restrictions can wear down?"
"All shackles must eventually rust away." Having said that, Harvey suddenly stepped out of the crowd and grabbed a serpent-lizardman by the collar. "Habolen, where is Na'erbeier?"
When the serpent-lizardman saw Harvey, the scales across his body faded in color. "Archibald, you... how do you remember me? You shouldn't remember me!"
Yaxiu's mind worked for a moment before he recalled that Harvey's full name was Archibald Harvey. The name was just so long that he had only remembered the surname.
But what did the serpent-lizard mean by 'shouldn't remember'?
"I'm a necromancer. Adding a backdoor to a soul isn't impossible for me... As for memories, one might fail to recall them, but they are never completely forgotten." Harvey glared at the serpent-lizardman. "Where is Na'erbeier?! Why didn't she come in with you?!"
For a moment, Yaxiu thought Harvey had a grudge against this Na'erbeier—this was a death row prison, after all. A normal person would only wish for their enemies to end up here, wouldn't they?
Yet the serpent-lizardman's answer gave Yaxiu the scent of a melodramatic soap opera. "Why did you have to remember her...? Aren't you just asking for heartache?"
"Did she betray you? Did she run away? Or did she—"
"She's dead. When Andere fell, the hunters caught up with us as we fled. Her head was pierced clean through; there was no saving her."
Harvey's mouth twitched. "...You promised me. The boss promised me too. You..."
"The boss is dead too. I was the weakest, so I was caught first," the serpent-lizardman said. "The Sin Hunting Hall sent an entire Law Enforcement Brigade... Financier and his faction deliberately leaked word to let us flee; they came to pull us up by the roots. We were just ants they crushed along the way."
"To hell with all that! To hell with... all that!" Harvey's face was flushed with fury, his teeth clenched tight, yet his legs gave out beneath him. He sank to his knees, his eyes brimming red. "Impossible... That was Na'erbeier. How could she just... like that..."
No one pulled them apart, and not even the prison guards bothered to intervene. Restricted by their chips, the most aggressive action they could take was grabbing each other's collars; a real fight was impossible.
The farce was soon forgotten, not even amounting to gossip. Though Yaxiu was curious about Harvey's melodramatic past, going over to ask right now would clearly only earn him an invitation to a death match. Seeing that it was about time, he headed to the dining hall for lunch.
In the dining hall, a group of crewmen and Bloodmad Hunters was already eating. They all sat on one side of the hall, while the inmates conscientiously sat on the other. Not to mention that there were no troublemakers left in Shattered Lake Prison, even if there were, they couldn't stir up trouble, nor could they hurl insults. Would they walk over just to say hello to the hunters?
Today's recommended menu was red bean paste Lalafell, orc cheese lettuce, and nata de coco egg tarts. Not long after Yaxiu sat down, a refined-looking young man took a seat opposite him.
Yaxiu felt as though he had just seen this person registering on the roster. "A newcomer?"
"Yes. Hello, my name is Baraka," the young man replied shyly.
"Hello, I'm Yaxiu."
Having stayed here for so long, Yaxiu had developed a healthy vigilance. As the saying went, the pinker the surface, the blacker the heart; this bashful young man was probably some hardened desperado with a mile-long record. "How come you're here to eat?"
"Because... it's noon?"
"Shouldn't you be confined to your dorm on your first day, waiting for meal delivery?"
"No. After they showed us our dorms, we were allowed free movement right away. No restrictions."
Yaxiu understood. So being kept in solitary confinement on day one had been an exclusive privilege reserved for cult leaders.
"Did you get thrown in here over political struggles too? Becoming a political prisoner at such a young age—you're quite the accomplished young talent!"
"No, no, no, I'm actually... a writer."
Speaking of his profession, Baraka became even more embarrassed.
"...Is it really that strict out there? Writing a book can get you sentenced to death? Political? Pornographic?"
"Actually, I haven't written it yet."
"Huh?"
"A few months after finishing my last book, I came up with a brilliant idea. So I discussed it with my editor. The editor told me, 'If you insist on writing this, I'll have no choice but to report you to the Sin Hunting Hall. Go write it in prison; don't drag our publishing house down with you.'"
Yaxiu blinked. "And then you got sent here?"
Baraka nodded. "After hearing the subject matter from me, the Sin Hunting Hall sent a memory master to examine my memories. Following the Tribunal's ruling, I was ultimately sentenced to the punishment of redemption for the 'crime of endangering public safety,' to purify my thoughts in the Blood Moon Trial."
"Couldn't you just... not write it?"
"After examining my memories, the memory master found that I showed no repentance whatsoever; my mind was packed with detailed material for the new book. They concluded that as long as I lived, I would find a way to write it. And that is indeed the truth. I am not a creator; I am merely a narrator. I cannot allow such a magnificent story to rot away in my mind."
Yaxiu gave him a thumbs-up. "Hang in there, you have my full support! By the way, does it have erotic content?"
"No."
"Then I support you in spirit. To be honest, I don't really care much for books."
While chatting, Yaxiu finally spotted Igola walking through the doorway. He quickly returned his tray, dumping the leftovers into the slop bucket, and jogged over to throw an arm around Igola's shoulders. "Have you eaten? Those hunters are almost done eating. The signal to act will appear soon. Why haven't Langna and Ronald shown up—"
"They're not coming."
"Hm?"
"I told them the plan is canceled."
Yaxiu didn't show shock or hysteria, nor was there confusion in his eyes. He merely watched Igola calmly, without uttering a word.
"Yaxiu, you know the effect of the Contract. Unless absolutely forced by circumstances, I cannot defy your wishes," Igola said. "Besides, deep down, I never truly resisted it—if I did, I wouldn't have brought forward a plan I've spent years conceiving.
"To me, this plan is also the stage I have long awaited. You were the one who supplied the missing piece. Truth be told, even if you hadn't made this wish to me, I might not have been able to resist cooperating with you to orchestrate this operation.
"Believe me, just like you, I want nothing more than to leave this shithole where even the air is suffocating."
Igola pressed a hand against Yaxiu's shoulder. "But today really won't work. The plan must be canceled."
"Why?"
"Because every single crucial link in the plan has become impossible to carry out. Too many unforeseen events happened this week, and I didn't factor their fallout into the plan, leaving reality far too distant from what I had imagined."
A commotion suddenly arose by the entrance. The first batch of hunters who had finished dining began filtering out, while the second batch began entering the dining hall.
Yaxiu glanced at them and sighed. "The signal to act is here."
Igola shook his head slightly. "That is a danger signal... You're about to see the first unstable factor that derailed the plan."
Suddenly, all the Bloodmad Hunters stood up and bowed toward the newcomer at the entrance in unison. "Good day, Captain!"
"Good afternoon, everyone."
The white-haired hunter clad in a pitch-black half-sleeve glanced at the death row inmates, chuckling, "Good afternoon, scumbags."
One death row inmate raised his head in displeasure. "I'll file a complaint against you with the Sin Hunting Hall—"
"It's rare that I get to curse out so many pieces of trash in one go. I'm more than happy to take the punishment. What's one month's salary deducted for an insult? Hmm, I've said it twice now, so that's two months gone."
The white-haired hunter snapped his fingers, wearing a disdainful grin. "Still, I rather like the number three, so let's add one more—Scumbags, how does it feel to be cursed out by me while unable to talk back? Infuriating, isn't it? Hahaha! I just love seeing that aggrieved look on trash when you're furious but can't do a damn thing about it!"
Another death row inmate with a sullen face growled, "I'll remember you. You'd better—"
"You certainly should remember me, because many of you were caught and hauled in by my own hands!"
A bloody light gleamed in his eyes as he swept his gaze across the condemned inmates in the dining hall. His stare was like a sharp sword, sending chills down everyone's spine under his gaze. Yaxiu, even more so, recalled their last encounter—
The terror of having his chest run through by a sword spread throughout his body once again.
"I am Bloodmad Hunter Gerard Westminster of the Sin Hunting Hall, Hunter ID 307791." Gerard grinned playfully. "When you meet the Blood Moon Sovereign, don't forget to pass along my regards."
Chapter 93