Chapter 221: Promise of Liberation

After all, if only one prince remained, the very prince who had conspired with them, they could eventually find some way to kill him.

He would be just one man.

But Asterion shook his head.

"They failed because of the Emperor."

"Huh?"

"After the Execution of the Princes, we discovered an important rule governing the Blood Curse. The princes possess equal authority, but the Emperor is different. His authority is superior, and his commands are absolute, overriding every command they issue."

"That’s not all. The Emperor can also strip his children of their authority whenever he wishes! And that’s exactly what he did to the prince who had conspired with our clan!"

"Do you understand now why the position of Emperor is so important, and why the princes fight such bloody battles to claim it?"

The revelation stunned Ethan, forcing him to reevaluate everything from the beginning.

It turned out that the Emperor possessed far greater authority than he’d ever imagined.

"Attempts to overthrow the Arden family became much less frequent after that incident. Instead, we focused primarily on gathering information."

"However, the incident also inspired numerous internal wars among the princes in the years that followed, as they tried to repeat the massacre for their own benefit."

"After all those experiences, we summarized everything we knew about the Blood Curse as follows."

Asterion proceeded to explain everything he knew.

Some of the information was already familiar, but other details were incredibly valuable.

The most important revelation was that contradictory commands granted a member of the Heart Clan the freedom to choose between them.

The Emperor’s authority surpassed that of the princes, and he could strip them of their authority whenever he wished.

Members of the royal family could kill members of the Heart Clan regardless of distance. However, their authority over long distances was limited to simple commands, such as Die, Stop, or Come.

More complex commands required the Heart Clan member to be physically present before the royal issuing them.

Commands also faded with time.

It was impossible to issue a single command that would remain effective for an entire lifetime.

For that reason, members of the royal family couldn’t simply rely on an order like Don’t try to kill me.

The command would work when issued, but its influence would gradually disappear, making it necessary to issue new orders.

Asterion also pointed out another extremely important detail.

The curse couldn’t influence emotions or convictions.

The royal family couldn’t make the clan love them simply by issuing a command such as Love me.

The hatred would remain.

A prince could force a member of the Heart Clan to murder their dearest friend, but he couldn’t force them to hate that friend.

The victim would remain fully conscious of what they were doing and remember everything once the command wore off.

Another crucial detail was that ordinary commands only worked when the royal issuing them knew the victim’s name and appearance.

Even the Emperor couldn’t kill someone from a distance without possessing at least a minimum amount of information about them.

That was why the clan’s bloodlines were so strictly monitored.

A magical identifier, linked to the blood of every newborn child, was used to ensure that each individual remained registered for as long as they lived.

Finally, Asterion revealed one last, particularly important detail.

"There are recorded cases of certain members of our clan managing to resist a royal command for a short time."

"They couldn’t nullify it, but they managed to delay its execution slightly. However, they suffered unimaginable agony while resisting..."

That final revelation surprised Ethan more than anything else.

"I didn’t think resisting the curse was even possible..."

"Neither did I, but it happened."

Asterion spoke as everyone’s attention turned toward him.

Even the others had been unaware of this particular detail.

"Is strength a requirement for resisting it?"

Moon raised an important question.

Asterion shook his head.

"No. Some of those who resisted the commands were weaker than you. Perhaps it has something to do with willpower, or perhaps something else entirely... We simply don’t know."

"But that resistance is ultimately pointless. All it does is delay the inevitable while subjecting the person resisting to horrific suffering."

With that, Asterion finished his explanation.

He leaned back against the wall and closed his eyes once more.

"In the end... No matter how hard we searched, we never found a way to free ourselves from the curse. There are loopholes we can exploit here and there, but the outcome remains the same."

Opening his eyes slightly, the Uncrowned Emperor turned his gaze toward Ethan.

"So? What do you think of everything you’ve heard, kid?"

There was a good reason Asterion had asked that question.

It was the expression on Ethan’s face.

The young man looked almost possessed, completely absorbed in thought, one hand resting beneath his chin while his eyes were wide open.

"What do I think? This information is incredibly useful, old man!"

Most of these details weren’t common knowledge.

Ethan would never have learned them anywhere else.

The fact that his companions had been unaware of much of what Asterion had explained was proof enough.

But the Uncrowned Emperor was an exception.

He was a veteran hunter who stood at the very top of the clan’s leadership structure, possessing information unavailable to almost anyone else.

Ethan owed him a great deal for sharing all of this.

And he had a feeling the old man had deliberately made sure he heard these details.

Ethan wasn’t some superhuman capable of coming up with endless solutions.

Even after hearing everything, he still couldn’t figure out how to break the curse.

But he now possessed the means to make many things that had previously seemed impossible achievable.

For example...

That mission to assassinate one of the princes.

"I don’t know how our clan can free itself from the curse, but there’s one thing I know for certain."

"Nothing in this world is perfect."

Ethan spoke with absolute conviction.

And he possessed genuine evidence to support his words, even if he couldn’t share it with the others.

’In the game Ordeal, the clan has already been destroyed by the time the player reaches it. But the same is true of the Arden family.’

’In fact, the Arden family is completely wiped out, leaving no trace behind... Unlike the Heart Clan, which still has quite a few survivors.’

Ethan looked toward the people gathered around him.

Several of those survivors were sitting in this very room.

Moon, the bearer of the Phoenix Blessing...

Chai, Alicia, Raiden...

He had seen every one of them alive in the game after the Arden family had disappeared.

In other words...

There was a way.

He simply hadn’t discovered it yet.

"Let’s hope you’re right, kid. Perhaps one day, our clan will no longer have to live as slaves..."

To Asterion, it was a distant, almost unattainable dream.

A dream he had no idea might be much closer to becoming reality than he could ever imagine...