Chapter 582: The Heretic

"Roarke... the Heretic..."

Cecilia’s eyes faltered.

She immediately glanced back at Roarke, who looked as shocked as herself. His usually calm, unflappable expression had shifted into something resembling genuine bewilderment.

Roarke was called many things. The best assassin was one of them. Arkai Dawnoro’s Strongest Beta, too, was one of his most cherished titles. He had been called the generous patron to the orphans all over the world, and he had even recently added ’Father Rohan the Temple’s Contract Healer’ to the list.

’Roarke the Heretic’... was absolutely not one of them.

Heretic. The word carried weight in this world. It got people burned at stakes, excommunicated from temples, and hunted down by zealous inquisitors. It was a label that marked someone as an enemy of the gods themselves.

Cecilia herself, the Fake Saintess, had almost earned that title. If not because she had saved countless people in the course of her service, she absolutely would have.

And Ruby had just applied it to Roarke as if it were a well-known fact.

Could it be... it was a title Roarke gained in that future before her regression?

Cecilia suddenly felt the squeeze of Arkai’s arm on her shoulder. When she glanced, she realized his jaw was tightened, eyes cold. His muscles were coiled beneath his sleeve, the kind of tension that preceded violence.

Perhaps in this room, the one most confused and hurt from the whispered exclamation of the Saintess was this very man.

She dared to call his brother the name ’Heretic’?

The insult was not just to Roarke. It was to Arkai, to their family, and to everything they had tried to rebuild together. It was a stain on a name that had already suffered more than its fair share of defamation.

But before Cecilia’s brain could parse through the implication, if there was any she could deduce from just that, Ruby had asked the next question.

"What is the connection between you and the assassin?" Ruby looked at her suspiciously. Her eyes narrowed, the gears of her mind visibly turning behind that pretty, guileless mask. "Are you the one who is going to prove it?"

Ruby was trying to know why a woman of Lady Sees’s status was involving herself in imperial affairs.

Ha.

Cecilia knew she would gain something from her conversation with Ruby today, but never did she imagine that this—

"No," Cecilia said. "Why would I need to prove something His Majesty and the Princess are able to prove themselves regardless of your prophecy or not?"

Ruby was a bit flustered now. Her mouth opened and closed like a fish gasping for air. "T-then... why did you stop me from speaking at the funeral?" 𝒻𝑟ℯℯ

Cecilia tilted her head. Ruby was ready to accuse the Emperor of patricide in front of the entire court, but Cecilia had stopped her, and Ruby had never quite forgiven her for it.

"My reason never changes," Cecilia answered. "I thought I had implied my reasoning at the time?"

Her answer made Ruby even more flustered. She was saying it was simply because she wanted her to be more careful about what she prophesied?

Was she truly trying to protect Ruby from her own recklessness?

Ruby glanced at Arkai, who was now surprisingly looking at her coldly.

Of course. She prophesied his death.

"I came here because that same assassin was the very one my husband was trying to find before the tragedy at Mount Saede," Cecilia answered. "He was the one who assassinated some Southern Lords, drawing him there to investigate."

Cecilia wasn’t lying. In fact, it was good to mix some truth to the lies. Everything they were saying was still meticulously designed to make Ruby reveal more of that past life for Cecilia to understand.

The Southern Lords had been assassinated. Arkai had investigated. Roarke had been involved. All of it was true, carefully selected and arranged to build a narrative that served Cecilia’s purposes.

"Because of your prophecy, Saintess, Iondora and Dawnoro had decided to join hands," Cecilia smiled, her red lips curved beautifully. "After all, now, we must announce that this Roarke was someone who killed the Emperor. We are provoking a dangerous assassin."

Ruby froze. This... the union of Iondora and Dawnoro? This was such bad news!

The two most powerful families in the continent, united against a common enemy? The political landscape had shifted in ways she couldn’t have predicted, ways that made her own position more precarious than ever.

If Iondora and Dawnoro were working together, who else would they turn their attention to? Who else would they decide was a threat?

It could either be Delanivis—or Vasiliev!

Again, her prophecy had changed the fate of the wo—

"No," Cecilia shook her head. "Your prophecy had provoked him. That’s why we have no choice but to join hands to have a chance to capture him."

This—

Angela and Damon were silently amazed. They never knew that once Cecilia decided to torture someone, it would be this thorough.

She was framing everything so precisely it was terrifying. Even they, the Imperial Siblings, wouldn’t be able to do things this meticulously.

They had always seen Cecilia as a benevolent seer who saw through evil and disasters, preventing them from saving as many people as she could grasp.

She told them privately what exactly killed their mother, and that was also how they came to be best friends. Yet at the same time, she was also the one who prevented them from destroying their stepmother, Lady Vera, completely.

She was the reason Reginald, Gertrude, and Jove, their step-siblings, still had a mother until today, and in turn, also saved these three siblings from falling to corruption.

She was that righteous. That kind-hearted.

That was why this created a chill down the Imperial Siblings’ spines. This was their first glimpse of Cecilia’s malice.

The first time they saw hatred in the body of Cecilia Araceli, the Saintess.

The way she framed Ruby, first as someone who had caused the alliance... and then that Ruby had merely revealed the necessity of it. The way she framed how Ruby was a catalyst for chaos.

Damon and Angela realized at that moment... that it was their fortune that they didn’t stand on the opposite side of Cecilia Araceli’s coin.

Before this, Cecilia only intended on tying loose ends. She wanted Ruby to no longer try to attack Damon’s rule, and at the same time, get as much information as she could from Ruby’s reactions and acts.

But now, she had to take it one step further.

"The Heretic," she said, and Ruby flinched. Cecilia decided she had to know what that title meant. And to get that information, she’d do anything.

Including threat.

"Saintess, thanks to your prophecy, you will be the main subject of his interest," Cecilia seriously began to scare her. Her voice was low now. "Before he comes to get you, it’s best you prophesy everything about him and tell us what we need to know to stop him."

Cecilia initially never wanted to use this direct approach. "Tell us a prophecy!"

It risked Ruby’s distrust and desire to twist the truth.

But by telling Ruby that she had painted a target on her own back, and the only way to survive was to cooperate, she wanted to test if Ruby was vulnerable enough to fall for it.

If she wanted protection, if she wanted to live, she would have to give them everything she knew.

Thankfully, Ruby seemed to actually fall for it. The fear in her eyes, the absolute belief that it was the natural conclusion of everything that had been revealed, was enough for her to believe whatever Cecilia was saying.

"Y-you will not believe what I’m going to tell you..." Ruby said timidly. Her voice quivered like a leaf in a storm, and her hands, clasped in her lap, were white-knuckled. But this time, it wasn’t a performance. She was genuinely afraid.

This just made Cecilia’s bad feelings intensify.

But nothing could prepare her for what Ruby said next.

"Six years from now... that man will desecrate the remains of the Dragon Lord... a-and... and forge it into a weapon."