Silent Crown

by Feng Yue

  Few people noticed that there was someone else in the carriage.

  He was no older than the King of Red, but he scarcely breathed. He was simple and slow of speech and gloomy. He always had his eyes lowered, and did not attract attention. When he heard the King of Red’s words, he merely nodded and did not respond.

  The King of Red looked at him. “You don’t seem happy.”

  Abraham was silent for a while, then closed his eyes. “This makes me sad.”

  The carriage continued forward towards the country where God was.

  …

  Three hours later, the carriage entered what had once been the plaza of the imperial palace. The King of Red was welcomed into the conference room under strict guard.

  He carried a heavy box.

  It seemed to be full of treasure.

  Half an hour later, the doors were opened.

  Gaius walked in wearing winter clothes.

  The weather had started to turn warm, but he still wore thick clothes. After taking off his hat, his silky white hair was displayed.

  “Long time no see, Your Majesty.” He stood before the door and stared at the old man who had his back to him with a heavy expression.

  The Pope nodded. “Long time no see, Gaius.”

  Gaius passed him by and strode to the other side of the conference chamber. He pulled out a chair and sat across from him at the long table.

  “After dealing with each other for so many years, we can dispense with the formalities. Let’s be blunt…” Even though he was in his own palace, his own country, it seemed as if he were wearing armor and grasping his sword by the hilt. A trace of coldness flashed in his eyes, and his tone became simple and straightforward. “Why are we here?”

  “To congratulate you, of course.” The King of Red lowered his eyes. It seemed that he did not feel the coldness filling the room. He just slowly pushed the box in front of him towards Gaius.

  “Congratulations. Everything that was once the Sacred City’s is now yours,” he said. “You won, Gaius. From now on I will cooperate with you. Other than the economic accords and financial contracts that the Anglos required, all the archives in the Sacred City, all the files and information, and even government agencies will gradually be handed over to the Caucasians. After that, it’s up to you. Just as you planned. In the future, the Anglo Kingdom will become the hub of the world’s economy, and the Commonwealth will control how the world spins on it…” As if he was admitting defeat, he did not wait for Gaius plans to slowly come to fruition. He simply quickly handed over the true heritage of the Sacred City.

  Gaius still did not show any happiness. “Then who is speaking to me?”

  He stared at the old man in front of him and said indifferently, “The sixth generation King of Red Gregory with the most profound wisdom? The third generation King of Red John with the most devout faith? The ninth generation King of Red Hansel with the most compassion? Or that undead King of Red, the one closest to God…” Gaius paused and read the name. His eyes became hard. “The inhuman Peter.”

  After a brief silence, the King of Red shook his head and laughed self-deprecatingly.

  “Peter died 300 years ago.” He calmly revealed the secret that the Church had been keeping this for hundreds of years. “If I stop myself, I’ll never start again. If you aren’t relieved by this you can go and destroy the last body he has left in this world. I remember that its… uh, it’s under the holy emblem in the Church of the Holy Resurrection. He really chose a good place.”

  “He’s dead?” Gaius was shocked. “Why?”

  “Speaking of why,” the King of Red picked up his cold coffee, sniffed its slightly burnt scent, and then lowered his eyes, “after using theology as a bridge to understand what it truly means to be human, has he thoroughly lost hope in humanity?”

  Gaius said nothing. He had never thought that the one who he had considered his greatest enemy, who he had struggled against all his life, who he had done everything he could against, sacrificing countless things and paying many costs… the monster who he had seen as controlling the world from behind the curtain for centuries was dead.

  Dead?

  Could it be that simple?

  “Don’t worry, I’m not lying. Nibelungen recorded his death in great detail. Its recording method can’t be in error. It should be enough for you to trust,” the King of Red said indifferently. “The third generation King of Red John’s brain stem has long since decayed. After leaving behind a copy of the record, his sense of self dissipated. Gregory, the sixth generation King of Red, has been silent for decades, having not said anything. The ninth generation King of Red was quite mad and was unlinked from Nibelungen 60 years ago. Before dying of exhaustion, he would repent his sins day and night and curse his own soul. He did not ascend to heaven after his death. He had fallen into hell even before he died. This is the original sin of humanity, Gaius.”

  “…”

  After a long silence, Gaius looked at the old man in front of him as if he was going to pierce through his body and see what was hidden under his outer shell.

  “…then who is speaking to me?”

  The King of Red gave a self-deprecating smile.

  “An alternative. Someone who waited for decades and failed to become the King of Red,” he said. “The ‘Last King of Red’.”

  Upon saying this, the old man parted his hair, revealing the slight scar under his hairline. He knocked on his skull, where the brain stem, brains, gray matter, and everything in the brain had been taken out.

  In his empty skull, precise machinery ran silently. A green light that indicated “normal operation” was on his forehead.

  The small scar did not seem to have fully healed, or perhaps it was brand new.

  “About ten days ago, I became the new King of Red, becoming the dominant consciousness of Nibelungen after all this time. Pretty ridiculous, right?” the old man said to himself. “I wanted to be the Sancta Sedes from the first time I opened the cover of the Holy Bible. My whole life I have only had this one goal. I waited so long, and I finally had a chance, so I can’t give it up just because the title is meaningless.”

  Gaius was silent.

  “The Sacred City no longer has a purpose. From the start, the Church’s reason for being was to allow humanity to have a better existence. Since humanity chose to let the Church withdraw from the stage, we will do so. Before I came, I had the last surgical cabin that had the means to extract the brain destroyed.”

  The last King of Red looked at him as he spoke, and he sincerely congratulated him, “Congratulations, you have accomplished the great cause that has never been accomplished before. The inheritance of the King of Red ends with me. From now on, it will be up to you to decide the world’s course and the future of humanity.”

  Gaius said nothing.

  The old man who was as hard as iron lowered his eyes and clenched his fists. There seemed to be anger in his eyes, yet they also seemed to be empty.

  It was difficult to hide his sense of loss and exhaustion.

  Gaius closed his eyes.

  In the silence, there was only the sound of the King of Red opening the box and pulling the things inside out one by one.

  “This is my last act as the King of Red. In any case, why don’t you take a look, Gaius?” he said as he pulled the things out. “The original Book of the Ultimate, the Church’s secret technology, and even secrets that the College of Cardinals cannot touch are all in here.”

  Finally, he pulled out the thing that was at the bottom of the box.

  He put the thin six pages of paper in front of Gaius.

  “And this. Probably the most important thing to you.”

  “What is it?”

  “History.” The King of Red looked at him. “After I became the King of Red, Nibelungen prepared a history of the Church. If there are history books in the world to come, these six pages are the part that the Kings of Red can occupy.”

  Six thin pages, from the start
of the Age of Dark till now.

  Nothing was written about the nations or about wars, and it did not even list the major initiatives of the Church. Its content revolved around a central point: the changes that each King of Red brought to the Church.

  From the beginning, Peter the Inhuman, William the Cruel, John the Devout, William II the Incompetent, Paomen the Persevering, Gregory the Wise, all the way up to Ian the Ruthless, Ludovic the Cunning, and the final nameless king.

  500 years of history in six short pages.

  The great first king created the Church, causing the evil consequences that had manifested in the present. The cruel second king had expanded the Church and turned it into a monster. John the Devout had brought faith, but did not notice the internal corruption. William the Incompetent had tried to clean up the Church, with the result that he had been opposed by all. Paomen the Persevering put all his effort into the fraternities to restore the Church to its original goal, but disaster returned it to its former state. Gregory the Wise created a new balance of power, but the Church became nothing more than an authoritarian organization and began to engage in taboo research…

  Under the efforts of the inhumans, and 120 years of hard work, it was still difficult for the Church to maintain its original purity and integrity. It was constantly remedied and renovated, but this only made the monster more bloated and huge.

  Indulgences, loans, finances, conferring titles…

  From being founded for the purpose of saving mankind to the point where cardinals were drinking fine wines with their sympathizers and saying “one heaven is not even to repay us for the great work we’ve done,” there were only 100 years.

  Up until then, the Church still maintained a glimpse of its original purpose—trying to correct a word that had gone out of control. The historical popes had sacrificed themselves, relying on the eternal Nibelungen.

  “What are you looking at? This is the beginning and the end of the Church.” The King of Red looked down at Gaius and whispered, “No matter what the original intention was, after a hundred years it all became ugly desires. The world is the same. People cannot change, no matter the institutions or the government, people will become crazier and more greedy as time goes on. They went from safeguarding love the abnormal greed for material possessions. When compared to the length of history, it happened in but a moment. You threw off the Church’s shackles, rooted out the cancer and did what the Kings of Red could never do: planted the seed of a new beginning. Now it’s your turn to experience the curse that had entangled us.”

  “This was your plan?” Gaius dropped the manuscript indifferently. “Use something like this to make me compromise with you?”

  “No, these are just the loser’s last words, but the difficulty that the winner will have to face.” The Kind of Red smiled mockingly. “You’ve gotten the new world that you wanted. I hope that in ten years you can still stick to your original purpose, and the world is still the way you want it to be.”

  “Don’t worry,” Gaius’s face was cold, “I will.”

  “Mmm, I never doubted it.” The King of Red looked at his white hair and said softly, “Unfortunately you are already old, Gaius. After you die who will support this new world?”

  Gaius was silent.

  The King of Red knocked on the table producing an empty sound like the dull echo of a coffin.

  “Who? Your godson, Hein? Your deputy, Frank? Or your student, Brightman?” With each name that he listed, the King of Red’s expression grew more condescending. “Gaius, they’re all dead. You have no one to succeed you. Think about it. Wolf Flute won’t be able to control a nation, Paganini is just a pure musician, or perhaps you still have high hopes for the Son of God?”

  Gaius said nothing.

  “Ah, a living god. An eternal emperor for the world of humanity.” The King of Red seemed to have seen into his mind. “If this is the case, you will certainly be much stronger than we were. With miracles on your side, eternal peace is not a vain hope. But all of this has a prerequisite…”

  He did not finish the sentence, for Gaius was glaring at him murderously.

  If he had said one more word, Gaius would have destroyed him right there.

  After suddenly gaining everything and fulfilling his life’s goal, Gaius finally understood how the former King of Red felt.

  It was a pain like he had been cursed.

  Illusory laughter sounded, echoing through the deserted corners of the palace like ghosts coming and going.

  It was the former king of the Commonwealth of Caucasian. He had died, but his corpse was buried underground. He had awaited this day with laughter as he watched the human world with his cold eyes.

  It was just like he had said, the one who released the monster would one day feel the pain of being swallowed by it.

  Gaius closed his eyes to calm the dizziness inside his head. His doctor had told him to take medicine whenever his symptoms flared up, but he did not want to show weakness in front of his enemy. He could only let the dizziness and vertigo spread to his brain. It was like countless people were whispering in his ear, one after another.

  Those who had followed him and died for it were all there, interrogating him in a whisper, “Gaius, you’ve created God, but will God really be willing to obey you?”

  Gaius said nothing else.

  “In any case, I leave both the problem and the means of solving it up to you.” The King of Red took his coat off the coat rack and put it on. He nodded at the king of the new world. “So, let us say farewell, Gaius. I hope that, in a hundred years, you will not have become a sinner in this world.”

  He looked away and opened the door, leaving only a final whisper, “I also hope that… humanity will destroy itself with its own hands.”

  He closed the door behind him.

  In the silence, the last nameless king passed through the slightly deteriorated palace and once again boarded his carriage to leave.

  Abraham was smoking a cigarette on the steps to the gate.

  From start to finish, he said not a word.

  781 Why Bother?

  It was a distant dream.

  Bai Xi dreamed that she was singing.

  In the dilapidated palace, under the setting sun, she saw a dim, yellowish light shining on the roof ridge, causing the broken shingles on the ridge to reflect the iron gleam.

  Withered vines fell from the roof ridge, following the sun, dropping into the empty hall from the cracks.

  The slender weeds were entangled with the white bones, and flowers bloomed from the hollow eye sockets of skulls.

  The ministers in court dress had turned into skeletons, but even their skeletons were still kneeling on the ground, on both sides of the hall, worshiping the lofty throne.

  They prostrated themselves in front of the supreme Empress.

  The skeleton rang the bells, and the solemn and forbidding music seemed to be coming from the underworld, celebrating the arrival of the new ruler.

  “Rise, my ministers.” Bai Xi stepped barefoot on the broken steps, looking down, but no one responded. The skeletons knelt on the ground, continue showing reverence to their ruler even in death.

  In the silence, only the Empress sang softly, roaming around in the palace, dancing in the dim, yellowish sunlight. As she danced gently and charmingly, her sleeves fluttered in the wind, dancing along with the dust. Everything around her, all dilapidated and in decline, prostrated themselves below her toes.

  Bai Xi looked around.

  Everything was still and beautiful.

  It all seemed very well.

  It was just that she felt some insignificant… loneliness.

  …

  Bai Xi opened her eyes, woke up on her bed, and saw the light from the setting sun outside the window. It was not glaring.

  The soft light shone on her wrist. After a long nap, the laziness she felt seemed bone-deep, making her unable to muster up enough enthusiasm to do anything.

  “You’re awake?” The
Empress sat in the chair, looking at the pile of packed luggage beside. “It seems like you are already done with packing. You are so eager to leave, it really breaks my heart.”

  “What are you even saying?” Bai Xi turned over and gazed at the Empress, still lying in bed, her smile seemingly cheerful. “Since I returned to the East, Your Majesty has treated me as if I am one of your own. Now, although the palace is chilly and fairly deserted, it still feels somewhat homely to me. When I think about leaving this place, I naturally feel reluctant about it.”

  The Empress lowered her head, sipping tea, and simply raised her eyebrows slightly. “Do you really mean it?”

  “Of course I mean it,” Bai XI replied.

  “At least your words sound pleasant to the ears.” The Empress put down the teacup and lifted her phoenix eyes to look at Bai Xi, full of pity. “All the while, even though your adoptive father is Bai Heng, I have never been wary of you, nor have I taken precautions against you. Instead, I passed on all my music theory and experience to you, giving you glory and power far surpassing hundreds of thousands of people.

  “But now you are willing to give up everything I have given you and obediently go back to being a caged bird?”

  “Such is ‘love’.” Bai Xi shook her head and sighed, a trace of mockery in her tone. “An old woman like Your Majesty will not be able to understand, I assume.”

  “I am the ruler of my kingdom, of course I have my reasons for not paying attention to insignificant things like romantic feelings. But what about you, Bai Xi?” The Empress asked calmly, “When you hold the so-called ‘love’ in your hands, which hand could you use to hold the ‘power’ and ‘strength’ you want?

  “And where will the things you obtain by relying on a man’s love go after you lose his love? You need to know, charming someone with beauty will not last long. “

  “Your Majesty has really lived up to your name, even the words you persuade someone to stay with are so unique.” Bai Xi giggled, propping herself up slightly, and leaned forward to look at the Empress’s indifferent expression, and said seriously. “Since Your Majesty is so reluctant to part with me, why not let me dine with you but stay with him?